STEEL

HC Deb 20 February 1973 vol 851 cc243-372

4.3 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry (Mr. Peter Walker)

I beg to move, That this House approves the White Paper, British Steel Corporation: Ten Year Development Strategy (Command Paper No. 5226).

Mr. Speaker

I should inform the House that I have selected the amendment standing in the name of the Leader of the Opposition and his right hon. and hon. Friends, to leave out from 'House' and add instead thereof: Whilst welcoming the Government's conversion to the commitment of an expanded steel industry, regrets that the White Paper, Command Paper No. 5226, contains quite insufficient information about the Government's general strategy and responsibility for the industry; calls upon the Government to provide much fuller information, including publication of reports of the Task Forces; and strongly condemns the failure of the Government to take account at all in the White Paper of the individual representations of the steel communities threatened with closures.

Mr. Walker

We are concerned here with a major White Paper which outlines the biggest modernisation programme to take place in the history of the steel industry. First, I should like to say a few words about the background to the preparation of the strategy, because remarks were made in the earlier debate on the topic and have been made since which give a false impression as to how the strategy was developed. The strategy put forward in the White Paper is that put to me by the British Steel Corporation and which has the entire agreement of every member of the Corporation's board. There have been implications that the strategy was modified under Government pressure. But the Corporation, and certainly the chairman of the Corporation and his colleagues have stated publicly and know that this is not the basis of the strategy.

Mr. Arthur Bottomley (Middlesbrough, East)

Is the Secretary of State saying that there has been no pressure at all or that there has been none in recent times? My impression was that there was great pressure upon the Corporation earlier.

Mr. Walker

There has been no pressure on the British Steel Corporation. The plan that it is putting forward is the one which it believes is realistic and sensible and which I certainly discussed with it at great length after seeing delegations, including one of which the right hon. Gentleman was a member. I had discussions with the Corporation at which I put various points that had been put to me and my colleagues from delegations about the future of British steel.

I cross-examined the Corporation on a number of its assumptions and to the best of my ability, with my colleagues, I have examined the strategy it put to my Department. The Government have accepted the strategy in its entirety because from that cross-examination we believe that the arguments it put forward were the correct ones. First, therefore, I wish to make plain the basic fact that this is not a plan put forward by the British Steel Corporation under pressure from the Government. It is a plan which the board of the British Steel Corporation full-heartedly supports and considers to be correct.

Secondly, I should like to say a word about the amendment put down by the Opposition. I regret it because it somewhat detracts from the importance of the modernisation programme vis-à-vis the world at large, and it has all the disadvantages that the hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside (Mr. Eddie Griffiths) pointed out in his speech on the previous debate. I hope he will forgive me for quoting him. He said: I have great sympathy with the redundant steelworkers, but it comes ill from those politicians who say, because their constituencies are affected, If the huge investment proposed under this great plan, with all the coastal sites, does not happen to come to my midden, I condemn the whole scheme as shocking and I shall not play ball'. I wonder what the whole exercise is about. That is what steel debates in the House are deteriorating into. They are becoming debates not on a broad, logical policy for the industry which will safeguard it for the future, but on parish pump steelmaking. He went on to say Many of us on this side of the House have never realised that when we modernise and put in competitive steel plants there is a price to pay. What we have seen in the last few months—indeed, the last couple of years—is that we jib at the price we have to pay. I do not mean the price in terms of human suffering, which I shall come to later, but the price of closing obsolete plants, plants located in wrong places, plants based on wrong technology and so forth."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 25th January 1973; Vol 849, c. 757–8.] The hon. Member, who probably knows more about the practical problems of the steel industry than most hon. Members, was on to an important and very understandable point.

The other point about the Opposition amendment is that they at least deserve a certain admiration for their basic audacity. It is interesting to hear the hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Varley) going up and down the country talking about a 43 million tonnes output and the need for a much bigger programme. The potential job losses in that policy will be dealt with later in my speech, but it is interesting to see the new mood of the Labour Party about how vital it is to expand steel even more ambitiously than is proposed in the White Paper in view of what the Labour Government did. In the four years before they came into office investment in the steel industry amounted to £1,116 million. In the six years they were in office—a 50 per cent. longer period—they spent £747 million in investment in the steel industry. They spent 50 per cent. less in six years than had been spent in the previous four years.

As to steel production—and we hear all these lovely figures of £43 million by 1980 tripping off the lips of the hon. Member for Chesterfield—here was a Government that in 1965 said the steel industry should increase its production from 23,180,000 tons to 27,250,000 tons by 1970. In reality by 1970 they had increased steel production from 23,180,000 tons to 23,980,000 tons. In six years of Labour Government there was an increase in steel production of 800,000 tons. That is the party which now condemns us for suggesting that we shall increase steel production by only 11 million tonnes in 10 years, the party that failed to increase it by even one million tonnes in six years.

Mr. Gerald Kaufman (Manchester, Ardwick)

Is the Secretary of State telling us categorically that production of 38 million tonnes will be reached by 1980?

Mr. Walker

if the hon. Member reads the White Paper he will see that what I am saying is that the strategy we are agreeing will ensure that provided demand is appropriate production will rise to 38 million tonnes by 1980, with a minimum of 35 million tonnes.

Mr. John Morris (Aberavon)

Will the Secretary of State agree that we inherited a large number of companies with a low financial status, low technology and low productivity. Private industry had failed miserably in the years before in the sense that the state had to finance and carry the burden of major investment both at Llanwern and of £50 million which went into the begging bowl of Colville's at Ravenscraig.

Mr. Walker

I wish the right hon. Gentleman had listened. Had he done so he would have heard me say that over the four years prior to the last Government coming into office investment in the steel industry was running at £1,116 million, a very high rate of investment in that particular period, and it was stopped purely because the Labour Party decided that nationalisation was more important than modernisation. But the other remarkable thing about a party that is now the arch expansionists of the steel industry is that this was no part of its programme at the last General Election. One can search the election manifesto of the Labour Party at the last election, for example, and one will not find a paragraph or even a mention of the steel industry as a whole. No plans of any description were made public by the Labour Government before they went out of office for the modernisation of the steel industry.

I want, therefore, to bring to the attention of the House the importance of having, at long last, a very substantial and very important modernisation programme. This is a modernisation programme that would ensure that by the year 1980 we can have production of between 33 million and 35 million tonnes. [HON. MEMBERS: "But not 38 million."] No, but increasing by 11 million tonnes in eight years—to the 35 million tonnes, so that when we reach 38 million tonnes that will be an increase of 14 million tonnes on what we inherited when we took office from the Labour Government. This strategy embarks upon a programme which will go for 33 million to 35 million tonnes by 1980 and can be extended to between 36 million and 38 million tonnes by the early 1980s. Hon. Gentlemen opposite in the last debate which took place suggested that this was for 1990. In fact, the provision for going to 38 million tonnes is one that can be reached in the first half of the 1980s. With the private sector, which is likely to produce upwards of 4 million tonnes at that stage, it represents a total capacity of the industry of 42 million tonnes by the early 1980s, certainly one of the biggest expansion programmes we have ever undertaken, one calling for massive resources, and one which I believe is very much needed if we are to continue a major presence in the steel industry.

France has embarked on an important modernisation programme. So has Italy, and, as we know, so has Japan. All these countries, in embarking on these major expansion programmes, have sensibly and wisely used the most up-to-date technologies and up-to-date methods to be competitive. If we are to secure the jobs of the great majority of the people employed in the steel industry it will only be by having the most up-to-date methods and technologies and using the best steelmaking methods that are available to us. It is vital to recognise that this gives a unique opportunity to the steel industry.

In fairness to the Labour Party, its amendment starts by welcoming the fact that modernisation will take place. But I wish to make another point perfectly clear to the House. There is quite a temptation on the part of the Labour Party to suggest that if a higher figure is used all the old plants, however old and wherever they are located, can continue in existence. It will be very interesting to hear this afternoon any reference by the Labour Party to plants which in their view ought to go out of operation. I wait to hear which plants are so badly out of date or so badly located that they are considered to have no future.

I wish to make it perfectly clear that if one decides to go more speedily to a higher figure and one's assessment of world demand and domestic demand proves to be wrong, the result will be that a number of plants now destined to be closed at the end of this decade will have to be closed far sooner and far more rapidly, because the only way substantially to extend still further this programme is to have some major new sites available—for example, competitive coastal sites at various places, which could be made available, with enormous investment, where it would be vital to use this capacity. If one did so and the higher production failed to occur, of which there is great danger, we should be putting a substantial number of jobs in jeopardy sooner, quicker and in a more devastating way than under the provision made in this strategy.

I believe that both sides of the House are very concerned about the social consequences of any modernisation programme. From the best judgment that the Government and the British Steel Corporation can make, if we are concerned about the security of the jobs and the time to take action we should not go for a far speedier programme of expansion than that which is outlined in this White Paper.

I should like to say a word on the size of the problem in respect of job losses. This is set out very clearly in the White Paper in which we deal with it region by region, indicating the number of jobs affected. There was a suggestion in the last debate—I agree that it was before the White Paper was published—that in my original statement I had left out a number of unemployment potentials. The White Paper shows clearly that this was not so. Indeed, the estimate we have made of the drop in the number of jobs available in the steel industry—50,000—is, if anything, an outside estimate and not one which has been modestly based.

In estimating potential losses of jobs it is important to put a realistic figure, and if necessary an outside figure, and not to underestimate the position. For example, it was suggested last time that the potential closure of Brymbo and East Moors had not been included in my original figures. The White Paper made it clear that these were included. As far as East Moors is concerned, it is expected that there will be a mill which will provide probably 500 jobs in the private sector. As far as Brymbo is concerned, negotiations are going on with Guest, Keen Nettlefolds at the present time and if these are successful that mill, with some 2,000 jobs, will continue in being. This will accordingly reduce the net figures for unemployment in Wales arising from steel closures. Therefore, the figures have been estimated as objectively as possible and we have taken the outside figures that may occur during the period of the strategy, rather than modest figures.

I wish to put these in the context of what has previously happened in providing new jobs and in terms of past redundancies. The total figure for the steel industry of 50,000 in 10 years, for example, compares with redundancies in the nationalised industries of 404,000 in the six years of the Labour Government. In that period 232,000 redundancies were made in coal, 134,000 on the railways and 20,000 in steel. That was in six years of a Labour Government. If in 1964 a Conservative Government had come to the House with a White Paper outlining 232,000 redundancies in coal I wonder what would have been the reaction of the Labour Party and how impossible they would have said it was to meet that problem.

Mr. Ted Leadbitter (The Hartlepools)

Would the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind that it is not quite sufficient to give the House figures over an extended period about redundancies in the whole of the nationalised industries, when we are talking in terms of the figures of the steel industry by itself, without quoting them. I do so now. The figures of the redundancies of all the nationalised industries in the country since June 1972, in the northern region in particular, have consistently been at the rate of 2,000 a month.

Mr. Walker

The White Paper clearly shows that substantial steel redundancies occurred in the North East in that period. On the railways, redundancies have occurred much more slowly than previously. As a result of the measures I announced in the Coal Industry Bill, redundancies will be much slower in the coal industry than they were during the six years of Labour Government.

During the six years of Labour Government there were substantial redundancies due to changes caused by pits not being economic and various other matters, and in the nationalised industries there were 404,000 redundancies. I give that figure to get into context the present 50,000 redundancies in 10 years. Also important in getting the 50,000 redundancies in the right context are the number of jobs provided and the number of jobs that have come into the regions during the same period.

The White Paper envisages a total net loss of jobs in Scotland of 6,500 over the period of the strategy. Yet between 1960 and 1969, 184,000 new jobs were provided in Scotland. We are talking about tackling a problem—I agree an additional problem—of 6,500 jobs in steel over the next decade.

In the northern area we are talking about 6,000 additional jobs lost in steel. Between 1960 and 1969, 167,000 new jobs were provided. Unemployment in the North-East has dropped during the last four months by 6,000. In the North East, more advance factories were taken up last year than were taken up during the whole of 1969 and 1970 together. Expansion is taking place in those areas.

Likewise, in Wales, which is by far the worst hit of the regions—

Mr. John Robertson (Paisley)

Will the Secretary of State tell us, along with the jobs that were brought to Scotland, how many jobs were lost in the same period? What is the comparison between the number of male jobs in June 1970 and the number today?

Mr. Walker

Certainly during the six years of Labour Government a large number of jobs were lost in the nationalised industries in Scotland. I am saying that a large number of new jobs came in during that period. I am not arguing that jobs were not lost. I am trying to put the 50,000 jobs lost over a decade in the context of the 404,000 lost jobs in the nationalised industries in the six years of Labour Government. Members of the Labour Party would be much more impressive if they had made as much noise about the 404,000 redundancies as they are now making over the 50,000 redundancies.

Wales is the worst hit area, primarily because that is where the largest number of steelworks are operating. In Wales, the White Paper estimates a total reduction in the number of jobs of 17,500. On the basis of a new mill at East Moors and the continuation of Brymbo, that figure will be somewhat lower. Between 1960 and 1969, 120,000 new jobs came into Wales. That shows that there is an ability to meet this problem.

I want to say a few words about Ebbw Vale, partly because the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) is to wind up the debate and in our last steel debate he mentioned some of the problems there. First, I wish to make it clear that the future of steelmaking in Ebbw Vale was raised before the last General Election, and the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale knows that to be so. So that there is no doubt about this, I will quote from the British Steel Corporation Press handout of 24th March 1970, which said: There will be no long-term future for iron and steelmaking in its present form at Ebbw Vale, the coastal works being in a much better position to produce large tonnages of steel at economical costs. That statement was made in Ebbw Vale in March 1970.

Mr. Michael Foot (Ebbw Vale)

I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will not again perpetrate the mistake that he and other Ministers have made on other occasions of reading out just that sentence. I hope he will go on to read out the further sentence, which must have the same standing as the reference to reductions, and which is to the effect that 8,000 jobs would be provided and retained at Ebbw Vale and that money would be spent on the hot mill which was to be retained. Those are the items which gave us the readiness to support the general proposal.

Mr. Walker

As the hon. Gentleman knows, I have been down to his constituency and discussed this matter with the people concerned, and I have no intention of misleading either the House or the people of Ebbw Vale—[HoN. MEMBERS: "Read on."] Certainly I will read on. I wish to make it clear that at that time it was stated that steelmaking would cease at Ebbw Vale. That was before the General Election. It was said that £45 million was to be invested in the additional mill. That was the main theme of the hon. Gentleman's election address which was entitled, "How to keep that £45 million feeling". Surprisingly, that address did not deal with the sentence I have just read. It dealt with the future and the new investment of £45 million which, as the hon. Gentleman himself said, would substantially reduce the number of jobs at Ebbw Vale but would still leave 8,000.

Since that time the BSC has decided to close the mill and has given five years' notice of that decision. One new factor is another major investment in tin plate of £50 million which the BSC has decided to make in Ebbw Vale. The closures that were spoken of in 1970—before the General Election, before the strategy was thought of—BSC now intends to fulfil five years later, in 1975. BSC has given notice that the closure of the hot mill is expected to be just over five years after notice has been served.

The hon. Member for Ebbw Vale has made a significant statement of policy on behalf of the Labour Party on this topic. He has said that closures of nationalised plants should be a matter for the Government and not for the nationalised industry. That is a significant change of policy. I hope that the speeches made in this debate will make perfectly clear how the Labour Party intends in future to operate closures in nationalised industries.

The hon. Member for Ebbw Vale in a speech made locally in the West Country and reported in the Western Mail—I agree not nationally, but presumably the Western Mail was accurate on this—said: The Labour Party last night pledged to take immediate action to withdraw the dates for the proposed steel closures in Wales if they are returned to power. He went on to say: I…make this statement officially on behalf of the Labour Party after consultation with its leader, Mr. Harold Wilson, following publication of the Government's White Paper on steel.…The next Labour Government would make a fresh examination of the position of the steel industry, and of what alternative employment had been provided for the threatened areas. I ask the House to realise the significance of this commitment by the Labour Party. The Government obviously cannot say to the steel industry, if it has a plant which is to be closed in Ebbw Vale, that they will fix the date of that closure. The Government cannot say to the colliery industry, if a colliery is closing, that they will fix the date of the closure. I presume that in coal as well as in steel the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale has committed the Labour Party to saying that in future, instead of the nationalised industries deciding the timing of closures it will be done by Ministers and Government Departments.

Mr. Kaufman

Surely the right hon. Gentleman is aware that in the autumn of 1967 the then Prime Minister was playing an active part with other Cabinet Ministers, with the chairman of the NCB and with the NUM, and that the Labour Government intervened and for social reasons prevented many coal mines being closed down?

Mr. Walker

One may organise the application of a general policy, as I did in my Coal Bill more than anyone else had done in this context. That is very different from saying that in future Governments will make decisions on the time of closures. I ask hon. Members from the North-East to realise the implications of that sort of decision for Teesside. One cannot have a decision taken by Ministers against the strategy of the British Steel Corporation to close a works in Ebbw Vale and to keep a plant on Teesside working. That would put in jeopardy the whole potentiality of the new plants because one by one Ministers would say to management of nationalised industries that any decision on timing of closures would no longer be taken on the basis of what management considered best for an industry but on the basis of what the Minister concerned considered best.

Mr. Foot

I confirm that the quotation made by the right hon. Gentleman from the Western Mail was absolutely accurate. We fully stand by that statement. What we are saying is that proposed dates for closures will be suspended, first so that the position of the industry can be surveyed afresh, because we are not satisfied with this Government's survey and, secondly, in the light of what alternative employment is actually available in the area. Unless the Government take steps to suspend the closure dates to ensure that that happens, all their pledges about alternative employment may prove to be hot air.

Mr. Walker

The hon. Member said much more than that in the statement he made. He was not saying that he would review the position because he considers the Government's assessment is wrong, but that the British Steel Corporation and the Government in their assessment are wrong. He is saying that a Labour Government will know, in terms of the date on which to close particular mills and plants, better than the people managing the industry. That is some- thing which for six years the previous Government avoided doing. They were pressed time after time by their hon. Friends to do that, but for very valid reasons of enormous financial consequences, and the consequences in respect of trying to attract good management to nationalised industries, they did not do so. How can a Government attract good management to the nationalised industries on the basis that the decision should be made by a Minister with relative lack of knowledge? If that commitment continues and goes forward by a Labour Government it will be very bad for the future of the country.

Mr. Foot

We shall have further time to debate this and it will be fully debated in the steel areas. What we are debating today is the White Paper presented by the Government. We are dissatisfied with the Government's survey of the industry, which does not cover these matters satisfactorily. Why does the right hon. Gentleman not try to defend his Government's record rather than shelter behind the British Steel Corporation?

Mr. Walker

It so happens that my Government's view is completely identical with the view of the British Steel Corporation. It is a corporation of which the chairman was appointed by the previous Government. The hon. Member is saying of this strategy, prepared by the British Steel Corporation and recommended by the Government, that he does not agree with it and that future Labour Governments will operate the power to decide dates of plant closures. This is a very important and significant change. If future Labour Governments tried to operate that policy they would regret it because never again would they attract managerial ability to operate such a process.

Mr. John Mendelson (Penistone)

Why is the right hon. Gentleman trying to isolate my hon. Friend the Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) and to fasten this attitude on him? It is a waste of time to do so. Why does the Minister not quote the decision of the steelworkers' union—a very important decision—that because of the difficult employment situation in many steel areas the union will oppose any closure of a steelworks before new jobs have been assured for the steelworkers in the area? This is not an individual point of view of my hon. Friend.

Mr. Walker rose—

Mr. Mendelson

Will the right hon. Gentleman allow me to finish while I am still on my feet? He has no right, having given way, to rise while I am speaking. He has to wait while an hon. Member completes his intervention. Why does he not admit that the policy originally accepted by people in the steel industry had two prongs—modernisation and therefore a certain reduction in the number of jobs, and creation of new jobs in steel and other industries before closures take place? That is the policy of the Labour Party today.

Mr. Walker

I repeat that in the six years when the Labour Party was in power there were 404,000 redundancies in the nationalised industries. That took place without ministerial interference and without providing new jobs for many of those concerned. That was their record.

The British Steel Corporation has informed me that today it is sending a memorandum to the works committee of Ebbw Vale giving the factual background for the basis of its decision concerning both financial strategy generally and Ebbw Vale in particular. That will be in the hands of the works committee tomorrow. The Corporation has stated that it is its intention to discuss with works committees the financial implications on which it takes such decisions.

Very seldom do hon. Members opposite mention the very considerable extra job opportunities which this strategy pursues. This is totally ignored by the Labour Party. They had incredibly low investment in steel, indeed a reduction in investment, and doubtless many jobs were lost in the industries involved in creating new plants. The White Paper states that 75,000 jobs will be supported during the work of modernisation. No fewer than 13,000 jobs will be sustained in civil engineering, 12,000 in structural engineering, 6,000 in general fabrication, 24,000 in the provision of mechanical equipment, 15,000 in the provision of electrical equipment and 5,000 in engineering services. That is a total of 75,000 jobs sustained throughout this strategy and a great number of those jobs will be in the development areas.

Mr. Eric G. Varley (Chesterfield)

The right hon. Gentleman will remember that in his statement on 21st December he not only said that 75,000 jobs would be sustained but actually said that they would be created. When he was questioned by me he was even firmer and Perhaps it was a slip of the tongue. Can he break down these totals further and say how many new jobs will be involved?

Mr. Walker

It is impossible to do that. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] I would be deceiving the House if I tried to do so. I can say that this is increasing investment by 50 per cent. and will create many more jobs than reducing investment by 50 per cent., which is what the last Labour Government did. There will certainly be new jobs. During the six years of Labour Government, with a considerable reduction in the programme, many jobs were lost. There are the additional potentialities of considerable export orders due to the high level of domestic demand. We have had talks with the steel manufacturers of this country to see whether we can conduct a worldwide market survey of the potentialities for building steel plants abroad so that a firmly based domestic industry can take full advantage of international potentialities.

Also in relation to job opportunities, we have announced the creation of task forces in five areas, potentially the worst affected. We have asked for an interim report from the task forces within a period of two months.

Added to this, I very much welcome the initiative taken by the General Secretary of the TUC, Mr. Feather, when he approached the Government and suggested that a consultative committee or group should be set up consisting of Mr. Feather, the Minister for Industry, and the Chairman of the BSC. This is a suggestion which we discussed with the corporation and it was gladly accepted. The consultative group will come into operation to consider arrangements for meeting the problems caused by steel redundancies.

Mr. Roy Hughes (Newport)

The right hon. Gentleman has now been speaking for three-quarters of an hour and he will be aware that the White Paper envisages of expenditure of £3,000 million in the next decade, of which £900 million is to be allocated to Wales. Will he give an assurance before he concludes that he will illustrate at what plants the £900 million is to be spent and on what projects.

Mr. Walker

No, I will not. If the hon. Gentleman is saying that I should go around the country analysing investment at each plant, it is an absurd suggestion and is not worthy of him. I am sorry the hon. Gentleman took so little interest in this initiative of the TUC on this topic. The first meeting of the group will take place next week and thereafter the group will meet regularly to see that progress is made. The combination of the Industry Act, the advance factory programme and retraining facilities will help the corporation and it is willing to give substantial economic growth and will do a great deal to assist in meeting the problems in these areas.

Mr. A. E. P. Duffy (Sheffield, Attercliffe) rose—

Mr. Walker

I am sorry, I have given way many times, and I have already been told by the hon. Member for Newport (Mr. Roy Hughes) that I have been speaking for 45 minutes.

I should like to put the whole programme in the context of broad industrial strategy. We have for a long period, partly due to the effects of at one time seeking to nationalise and then to denationalise the industry, had a steel industry that has fallen behind the rest of the world. The corporation, with the ability at its command, has made its best estimate of what can now be done to catch up with the other countries and to provide the industry wtih a strong, successful and secure future. This is only part of the broad economic strategy. At the moment economic growth is taking place at a fast rate. It is interesting to note that the figures published only this week show that the consumption of British steel in the United Kingdom is up by nearly 14 per cent., compared with a year ago.

The exciting thing that is happening is that in a number of our major and basic industries real progress is being made. Orders for commercial vehicles at home, in the last quarter for which figures are available, are the best in our history. The last quarter's figures for the machine tool industry were the best in our history. Over the last two months the shipbuilding industry has obtained massive and substantial orders. Indeed, in the last quarter of last year the shipbuilding industry obtained more orders than in the previous nine months. Today, the orders in our shipyards are virtually at an all-time record high in the history of shipbuilding. The construction industry in its use of steel also has had a period of expansion of considerable importance to the steel industry.

If we can modernise the steel industry, if we can use this opportunity of large orders to modernise the shipyards, if we can lay down considerable expansion programmes in terms of motor vehicles, the basic industries will at last expand and have an increasing share of world markets, instead of the declining share which they have suffered for so long. That is why I ask the House fully to support the policy laid down in the White Paper.

4.45 p.m.

Mr. Eric G. Varley (Chesterfield)

I beg to move to leave out from "House" to the end of the Question and to add instead thereof: 'whilst welcoming the Government's conversion to the commitments of an expanded steel industry, regrets that the White Paper, Command Paper No. 5226, contains quite insufficient information about the Government's general strategy and responsibility for the industry; calls upon the Government to provide much fuller information, including publication of reports of the Task Forces; and strongly condemns the failure of the Government to take account at all in the White Paper of the individual representations of the steel communities threatened with closures.' If I congratulate the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry on nothing else, I must congratulate him on his sheer effrontery. In his statement last December, on television three weeks ago, in his Press conference two weeks ago and again this afternoon, his performance deserves a medal for salesmanship of a kind which would be envied by any foot-in-the-door salesman trying to hawk encyclopaedias.

The right hon. Gentleman said that the 43 million tonnes for 1980 tripped off my tongue. It also tripped off the tongue of the right hon. Gentleman's predecessor. He said it on 18th March 1971 and presumably he got it from Lord Melchett. Therefore, it is not my figure. It is Lord Melchett's figure. When we look at the original plan put forward by the British Steel Corporation, we see that it was a programme for steel. When we compare it with the White Paper, we see that the White Paper chops off 10 million tonnes something like £1,000 million and 20,000 jobs from that original strategy. It is proclaimed by the right hon. Gentleman in bold and exciting terms.

If the Secretary of State had held his present position in ancient Egypt, no doubt he would have advertised the 10 plagues as a tourist attraction. Certainly with his long-standing enthusiasm for the Common Market he would no doubt have incorporated this text in a "Fanfare for Pharoah". At any rate, he would have been able to give the Israelis one or two tips on how to make bricks without straw. That is what he does in this pathetic and flimsy White Paper—a White Paper boosted so heavily in advance and found to be so utterly inadequate when published.

It is instructive to compare the first flush of the Secretary of State's statement two months ago with the sober, second thoughts of the White Paper. The right hon. Gentleman said flatly on 21st December that the steel strategy "will require"—I emphasise that he said "will"— a programme of investment of £3,000 million….".—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 21st December 1973; Vol. 848, c. 1576.] But the White Paper is a great deal more cautious. In paragraph 16 it tells us: Over the next 10 years, BSC investment is expected"— not "will" this time— to average £300 million a year". And the White Paper is even less definite than that, because paragraph 12 cautiously and hesitatingly states …there is bound to be uncertainty about prospects so far ahead and they will be reassessed each year, and the timing of developments reviewed, when the corporate plan is rolled forward and discussed with the Government. This is not a confident strategy looking 10 years ahead. It is a tentative blueprint whose validity will be reviewed annually.

On one page the impression is given that expenditure will be guaranteed for at any rate four years ahead. Paragraph 37 says, Annual expenditure will rise until around 1976–77…". But on another page we can see that the guaranteed time scale is even shorter than that. For example, in paragraph 13 it timidly informs us that …the Government can review the progress of strategy before giving firm approval to capital expenditure for the second year of the programme and provisional approval for the third year. Let us consider the situation in Wales, which has been mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Newport (Mr. Roy Hughes). The Secretary of State said on 21st December, Wales will"— and again we see the word "will"— have…an investment approaching £900 million."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 21st December 1973; Vol. 848, c. 1576–7.] But the White Paper in Paragraph 47 turns that down and tells us that Investment in Wales could"— not "will" this time— be as much as £900 million. The first thing we want to know is just how much of that £3,000 million investment—and I remind the House that that is reduced from £4,000 million if we look at the original proposals of the British Steel Corporation—is certain and guaranteed. Is the £900 million envisaged for Wales assured or is it speculative?

I must tell the Secretary of State that there is deep suspicion in Wales of the Government's intention on the subject of the £900 million. This suspicion exists not only on this side of the House but even in the Western Mail which the right hon. Gentleman has just quoted. The Western Mail is not, I think, a publication noted for its revolutionary Socialist fervour, but it talked yesterday about grave doubts over the exact size of the steel investment plans for Wales.

These doubts will have been heightened by the remarkable letter sent by the Under-Secretary of State to my hon. Friend the Member for Newport, a letter which confessed that that £900 million was arrived at on the basis of "a very tenative estimate of how the £3,000 million might be divided between the main unions".

These doubts have been heightened by the extraordinary reply given only yesterday by the Minister for Industry to my right hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon (Mr. John Morris). The Minister said: The estimate of as much as £900 million that may be spent in Wales"— again it is "may"— under the BSC's development strategy covers: (a) projects already in progress or announced; (b) those mentioned in the White Paper (Cmnd. 5226); (c) a high level of continuing investment for modernisation and replacement. It is impossible to give detailed estimates for each plant."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 19th February 1973; Vol. 851, c. 5.] No Welshman worried about steel jobs can begin to be satisfied about that kind of waffling and woolly reply.

It is, I think, paralleled only by the plaintive bleatings of the Secretary of State for Scotland when asked to specify details of the £400 million alleged to be earmarked for Scotland. The Secretary of State for Scotland was unable to give these details last month when the Scottish TUC asked for them. He declined to give them to the House when asked to do so by my hon. Friend the Member for Bothwell (Mr. James Hamilton), and the Department of Trade and Industry yesterday flatly refused to give my hon. Friend the Member for Rutherglen (Mr. Gregor Mackenzie) any reliable information whatever about the expected redundancies in Scotland. The House and the steel workers in England, Scotland and Wales have the right to know and have the right to be given precise and detailed facts.

Second, there is the question of the mini-mills. In the debate last month I referred to them as the mobile mini-mills. Now it seems they could be described as the vanishing mini-mills. On 21st December the Secretary of State certainly gave the impression that he was about to scatter mini-mills all over the country like confetti. Every time anybody rose on this side of the House to ask what would happen to his area, the Secretary of State said: "Your area is a candidate for a mini-mill".

Mr. Peter Walker

The British Steel Corporation suggested to me three possible sites in England. When questioned by hon. Members representing constituencies involving those three possible sites, I duly commented in each case that the site was one of those that would be considered by BSC.

I gave hon. Members the facts as they were given me by the British Steel Corporation as to the sites it was considering.

Mr. Varley

Let us explore this further. The impression was certainly given on 21st December that the right hon. Gentleman was prepared to give mini-mills. In last month's debate the Minister for Industry brought us a little closer to reality, saying that there would be one mini-mill in Scotland and another elsewhere. That still added up to the definite prospect of two British Steel Corporation mini-mills.

But again the White Paper tones that down very much further. Paragraph 19 talks about "perhaps two new smaller electric arc steelworks". Paragraph 57 is even more hesitant, referring to Irlam, Bilston and Shelton: These three works are among the possible sites for any further electric arc steelmaking plant that might be needed. Now we see the mini-mill; now we see it taken away from us.

Only last week we heard a new and even more discouraging version from the Secretary of State. He was asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Mr. Golding): Will the right hon. Gentleman say whether it is certain that a steel-producing mini-plant will be provided at Irlam, Bilston or Shelton? The right hon. Gentleman replied in confident ringing tones: That is a separate question. I do not know the details of the answer."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 12th February 1973; Vol. 850, c. 963.] As I have said, on 21st December the Secretary of State was giving the impression that there would be quite a number of mini-mills. We accept what he has said today, but we are not at the end of this saga. We need to know much more about this matter. Perhaps the Minister for Industry will tell us precisely what will happen, especially in the Cardiff East Moors situation. The ignorance of the Secretary of State on that question, and on other matters, is one he is willing to share with us, for throughout this long-drawn-out debate and controversy on the steel industry, the Government have been consistent in one thing and one thing only—their absolute determination to withhold information from the House and from the country.

There is not a word in the White Paper about the deliberations of the constitutional monstrosity, the Joint Steering Group. There is not a word in the White Paper about the McKinsey external consultants. The only document they have deigned to publish is this skimpy White Paper about which The Economist had this to say only a few days ago: It failed to answer any but the most basic questions about the future shape of the industry or to provide much guidance about Government policy. Now we have yet another refusal, a refusal to reveal the reports of the task forces. The Minister mentioned the matter this afternoon, but he did not say that the reports would be revealed. The Secretary of State for Wales only a few weeks ago flatly rejected this request by the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot). He said, "No, you're not going to have the report. It will not be made public."

Why all this secrecy? Why can we not know what was in the Joint Steering Group? Why can we not know what was in the McKinsey report? Why can we not have the reports of the task forces? What have the Government to hide on this subject? What have they to hide, for example, about Brymbo? Brymbo was passed over with scarcely a mention when the right hon. Gentleman made his statement on 21st December. It was fobbed off in the White Paper with 17 dismissive words.

We know a great many things about Brymbo, of course. We know it is a highly successful plant. We know it is a profitable plant. We know it comes top of the league in the list of all British Steel Corporation establishments in terms of return on capital. We know that Raymond Brookes of GKN has his eyes on it. Is Brymbo to be the last victim of the discredited hiving-off policy? Is Lord Melchett being told that he must get rid of Brymbo? Is there to be a forced sale? If that were the case, it would be a scandalous situation. Why can we not be told about Brymbo?

We want to have these facts in the debate. I hope that the Minister for Industry will tell us exactly what is happening in this situation. Will there be a forced sale? Is the British Steel Corporation being forced to dispose of it? What is more, the Government must be more forthcoming about the reports of the task forces.

The Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Peter Thomas)

I am particularly interested in the task forces because in the case of Wales they will be reporting to me.

The task force is composed of officials from various departments. The officials will be using their expert knowledge and the resources at their command in order to analyse a situation and to report back as quickly as possible. These are the reports of officials to Ministers. Does the hon. Gentleman seriously think these reports should be made public? [HON. MEMBERS: "Yes."] Officials would be put in an invidious position if their advice to Ministers were ever to be made public.

Mr. Varley

If right hon. Gentlemen are to have any success in convincing people in the communities concerned that they will do something about jobs in those areas, they must give them the facts. What was all that about open government we heard in June 1970, the ringing declarations of Downing Street that we would have open and honest government? I cannot understand this at all.

Mr. Thomas

The task forces will be consulting widely with all interested bodies. There is no reason why those bodies should not make public their submissions and suggestions to the task forces. But the task forces, as officials, will be reporting to Ministers, and it will be the decisions taken by the Government which will be made public.

Mr. Varley

I can only say to the right hon. and learned Gentleman that in the last debate we mentioned that The Times was saying—as it was—that it was window-dressing. We said that the Government were not window-dressing and that we were not as cynical as that. We wanted to know what the report was and we wanted some power behind the task forces. But the cynicism will return if we cannot have the information.

The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry made a great play about the tri-partite consultative committee being set up by the Department, Lord Melchett and Mr. Victor Feather, on Mr. Feather's initiative. Will Mr. Feather be given the reports of the task forces?

Mr. Peter Walker

If Mr. Feather were dissatisfied with the information given by the Government, obviously he would walk out of such a meeting. The hon. Gentleman knows that the previous Government did not publish the advice by their officials. No Government ever has done that, for very good reasons. For example, if a task force official gave advice on a particular company which could be taken as detrimental to that company, is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that all that should be published?

Mr. Varley

That is a most extraordinary answer. We have a position where Select Committees call for papers, persons and records, and officials and lion. Members go before them and are, properly, questioned and reports made. I see no great difference. There would be no great departure in allowing the task forces to be reported. So far this has been a most discouraging interchange, because more and more people in the steel communities will come to the conclusion of The Times, that this is window-dressing and nothing but that.

Sir Anthony Meyer (Flint, West)

Perhaps I can give the hon. Gentleman an example from my constituency. In the case of the imminent rundown at Shotton, numbers of people have come forward with proposals for supplying additional employment there. A firm in my constituency has put forward a scheme for providing 600 jobs in the Shotton area. The firm has encountered certain difficulties in the past. It seems perfectly obvious that the task force, in assessing the validity of the offer made by this firm, must be in a position to give totally confidential advice on such matters, for example, as the desirability of a change in the management of that firm, before the offer is taken up.

Mr. Varley

In certain circumstances there may well be information of a confidential and commercial nature. But I still think that the Government could find a way round this problem if they were serious about providing information.

Mr. Peter Walker

I very much agree with that. Certainly it will be my inten- tion to see that, in respect of recommendations that the Government can pursue the task forces and the progress of them, there should be regular reports and announcements. But what one cannot do is publish all the advice given by one's officials.

Mr. Varley

All right. There is another example I should like to give of where we think it absolutely essential to have information and where we should know what the task force is advising. Let us take the particular position of Cardiff. We know that GKN want to go ahead with a mini-mill there if the area is not going to be up-graded as a development area. The Secretary of State said that at his Press Conference, reported in The Times on 12th February: The task forces would also be looking at the necessity or otherwise of giving development area status to their respective areas and would also be able to make recommendations on this. This is absolutely crucial. Why cannot we know what the task force recommends in places such as Cardiff? Certainly the right hon. Gentleman knows that designation or redesignation of assisted areas is crucial to the provisions for hard-hit areas. Not only Cardiff is involved, but Shotton, too, which is making claims that it should be upgraded from an intermediate area to a development area. Mr. Tom Jones, the Welsh Secretary of the Transport and General Workers Union, has painted a grim picture of Flintshire: a depressed area sandwiched between two development areas. It is that kind of information which we need, and we want to be told much more about these matters.

We should have much more detailed information about the help that can be expected from the European Commission under Article 56 of the European Coal and Steel Community. We understand that the negotiations have begun. What are the Government seeking, and who and how many will qualify for tide-over payments. We need that kind of information. Perhaps the Minister for Industry will say exactly what is involved in the negotiations with the ECSC. Unless we have that information people may say that it is another public relations gimmick.

We should also like to hear much more about the tripartite consultative group. The Secretary of State mentioned it. Do the Government envisage, for example, that the high level group—it is certainly a high level group—will have a real and continuing rôle to play? Certainly Mr. Victor Feather envisaged that when he proposed it, as did Lord Melchett, obviously, when he so rapidly and readily agreed to support the proposals. But it would be useful if the Government could spell out at some stage exactly how they see the consultative group operating. We need to be told much more on these vital questions of the provisions for jobs.

The Secretary of State had something to say today about 75,000 jobs in heavy electrical, mechanical and civil engineering to be sustained and created by the steel modernisation programme. On 21st December the right hon. Gentleman was unequivocal about this matter. He said: The investment required by the programme will sustain and create a large number of jobs, possibly as many as 75,000."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 21st December, 1972; Vol. 848, c. 1578.] When I had the temerity to ask him about 75,000 jobs, the Prime Minister on that day was so upset and offended that I should ask that question that his head nearly came off because he was shaking it so hard. But on that day the Secretary of State said that the 75,000 jobs would be created.

What we want to know about this is where they will be created. The Secretary of State said that they were likely to be created in the centres concerned. Nothing could have been clearer. But the White Paper, when it eventually appeared, was much more hestitant. It stated that: The Corporation…believes it will provide or maintain employment opportunities for about 75,000 people. Instead of the Secretary of State asserting that 75,000 jobs will be sustained or created, now the responsibility for the figure has neatly been passed to the corporation, which "believes" that 75,000 employment opportunities will be provided.

I went to the corporation the other day and asked for solid statistics about the 75,000 jobs. The corporation very honestly told me that the figure of 75,000 was only a tentative estimate and, what is more, the corporation could not guarantee how many, if any, new jobs would be created. If the corporation told that to me, it must have told the same thing to the Secretary of State. So his brash assertion that jobs would be created is to some extent a deception of the House and, worse than that, a deception of men living in fear of losing their jobs and anxious to hear about the new job opportunities. It is indecent to juggle with figures and with the hopes and the future of workers in that way.

Mr. Peter Walker

Since, as the hon. Gentleman says, I said in my Press statement on steel modernisation that these would be sustained and created—which in fact was part of my first statement to the House—it is outrageous that he should suggest that the House was deceived on this.

Mr. Varley

I am only saying that, again, when we asked this afternoon how many of these jobs would be created—we on this side accept the investment programme in steel making plant and so on—the right hon. Gentleman's use of words smacked of cosmetics. If the British Steel Corporation can tell me, for example, that it cannot say for certain whether one new job will be created, why does the right hon. Gentleman use language like that?

Mr. Walker

If a firm's order book in civil engineering and other sectors in which it is interested is doing badly, those jobs might be sustained by this BSC programme. If it is doing well in other sectors, jobs will be created by the programme. Of course the Corporation cannot say, with any accuracy, that they will be sustained without knowing what is going on in every other industry.

Hon. Members

You said it.

Mr. Varley

In column 1580 of HANSARD on 21st December the right hon. Gentleman said: As to the 75,000 jobs created…"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 21st December 1972; Vol 843, c. 1580.] That is what he said on that day.

The only thing that I am saying is that it is indecent to juggle with words to raise false hopes in the way that the Secretary of State does. We certainly want to know more about the new jobs for the steel workers who may be displaced. The right hon. Gentleman mentioned the advance factory programme, although Shotton has been mysteriously excluded from that. Advance factories by themselves, although extremely welcome, will go nowhere near solving the problem on the scale that is likely.

The Secretary of State has constantly made play with his comparison of the expected redundancies under this strategy, and he did it again this afternoon. This again is in his statement and it is another example of how he used words in that statement. At first, he pretended that the net job losses would be only 30,000. Subsequently, in a rare and welcome moment of frankness, he admitted that they would total 50,000. But he seemed to suggest that even those 50,000 were chicken feed compared with the 404,000 job losses under the last Labour Government.

Of course, those 50,000 are in steel alone. The 404,000, as the right hon. Gentleman admitted, were over a whole range of nationalised industries. But he knows that, even after those 404,000 jobs were lost, unemployment under the last Government finished at 555,000. These 50,000 forthcoming redundancies will be piled on top of 823,000 unemployed. That is the unenviable achievement with which we can credit this Government. Unemployment under the Labour Government was certainly far too high, but our regional policies at any rate softened the impact. This Government had no regional policies after October 1970, because they abandoned them until the Budget of 1972.

But at least the right hon. Gentleman is coming along to some extent. I should like at least to compliment him on the speed with which he repudiated the Minister for Industry on the subject of diversification of the BSC. When asked last month in our debate about the Government's attitude towards joint ventures between the British Steel Corporation and private enterprise, the Minister for Industry confined his approval to ventures which, as he put it, …will be complementary to the activities of the corporation… When pressed by my right hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, South-East (Mr. Callaghan), the Minister budged just a little, saying: I do not close my mind, nor will my right hon. Friend, to joint venture projects, particularly if they have a complementary connection with the corporation's main-line activities. Then he spoiled it all by adding: I believe the effort should be concentrated. The cobbler should keep primarily to his last."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 25th January 1973; Vol. 849, c. 699.] The Secretary of State, I am glad to report, has no such inhibitions. On television on 2nd February Lord Melchett made it clear that the BSC is interested in the possibility of joint ventures. The Secretary of State, who took part in the same programme, was asked by Mr. Robert Mackenzie: But is not that something that the Government has discouraged—that is, nationalised industries going into joint exercises which are outside their immediate purpose? The Secretary of State was suitably indignant at such a reactionary thought. He said: No, not necessarily. Where they have been sensible and have the management resources to do it, this has not been discouraged. Later, he said: But I personally do not want to look at this in a doctrinaire way. I want to look into what is positively good for these communities and for the British Steel Corporation. No one on this side could have put it better.

Then, reading what the right hon. Gentleman had to say at his Press conference two weeks ago and also studying the White Paper, I got the somewhat unnerving impression that it was he who personally nationalised the steel industry against the opposition of a backward-looking Labour Party. No Labour Cabinet Minister could have denounced steel under private enterprise more scathingly than the right hon. Gentleman, when he described it as …a scattered, disparate industry, rapidly falling behind its competitors through inadequate investment. The White Paper told us, in paragraph 16, how nationalisation brought to the British Steel Corporation a large number of works with obsolete technology and low productivity. That is the inheritance which the British Steel Corporation is having to sort out. That is the industry to which the workers in the steel communities were bound and from whose inadequacies they have to suffer today.

Therefore, while placing on record our bitter criticisms of the way in which the Government have mishandled the BSC over the last two and a half years, we at any rate welcome their belated acceptance of its nationalised constitution and structure and its future as an expanding, publicly-owned industry. But we would like the Government to take a still more positive attitude. We should like them to understand the feelings and fears of steel workers in their close-knit communities, which depend on steel for their very existence. We would certainly like them to examine, genuinely and carefully, the representations—often fully documented and researched—which are being put forward by steel communities. We should like a positive attitude towards providing new employment and dealing humanely and compassionately with any casualties which may in the end be unavoidable.

These are human beings, communities with rich and irreplaceable traditions, not just digits on the pages of a White Paper. It is on their behalf and in their interests that we have tabled this amendment, and it is on their behalf and in their interests that we shall be voting tonight.

5.19 p.m.

Mr. Patrick McNair-Wilson (New Forest)

Of course, any debate on the restructuring of a great industry will have a large content dealing with the problems of those whose livelihoods are to be endangered. The hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Varley) was Minister of State, Ministry of Technology when the coal industry under his Government was being decimated. Of course it is right that we, as the House of Commons, should regard most seriously the effect that these changes will have on individuals. I was surprised that the hon. Gentleman did not get beyond this point and did not examine the more significant proposals for the shape of the industry over the next 10 years.

Mr. Dennis Skinner (Bolsover)

Window dressing.

Mr. McNair-Wilson

To say "window dressing" without studying the implications for the whole economy of the country is a facile remark.

Looking at the size of the British steel industry during the period 1955 to 1970, we see that the demand for steel grew at only 1.7 per cent. and that there has been a flat growth in the industry over a very long time.

The Government, in collaboration with the British Steel Corporation, are taking a substantial gamble on the future size of the industry. To push up this target figure from what it was when I was with the British Iron and Steel Federation to the sort of figure that it is today—up by another 11 million tonnes—is a matter which will have a profound effect on the future of the industry.

I do not quarrel with the size of the investment. It is obviously gigantic—the biggest that the industry has ever seen. My quarrel is that today we should allow this investment programme to slip through our fingers without asking ourselves the question: is the Corporation entirely right in the way that it intends to develop this programme? I think that we must ask ourselves the questions: are we to get value for money? Have we embarked upon a policy of putting too many eggs into very few baskets? And—a matter to which I shall come later—are the safeguards written into the White Paper for that quarter of the steel industry in the private sector real or imagined.

Regarding value for money and eggs in one basket, I merely quote from paragraph 10 of the White Paper which states: But for bulk steelmaking the large modern blast furnace and the basic oxygen process are likely to hold sway for many years". When I was in the steel industry in the 1950s and early 1960s I was familiar with the criticism of the industry, as it then was, for investing too much money in the open-hearth furnace when, in 1947, the oxygen converter, after its proving trials in Austria, was showing the way to a totally new technology for this industry.

Looking at this programme and basing ourselves exclusively, as it appears, on the basic oxygen process, I wonder whether we could be in danger of falling into the same trap into which the industry fell in those years of open-hearth investment. Technology in this industry is moving fast and so many changes are taking place that I think we must retain an element of flexibility. I am not suggesting that the existing direct reduction plants are likely to supersede all the plants at present operating in this country and elsewhere. However, I suggest that they are now providing a significant contribution to steelmaking in many parts of the world.

Some hon. Gentlemen may ask: "What about the Japanese? Why do they not do it? They are big and successful." I suggest that it is because the Japanese do not have any natural gas.

If we can go to direct reduction the savings in capital costs and the tremendous contribution to the environment of the area of the plants are indeed great. With the hon. Member for Chesterfield, I have been to the Korff Stahl AG plant in Hamburg and seen the clean air around the plant—something which we do not see around steel plants in this country. This new technology could be of significant importance.

Many other technologies are catching up on the industry all the time. I have here a small plastic bag of what looks like pelletised iron ore. These pellets are made up from blast furnace and oxygen furnace dust. They are bound together and can be fed straight into a blast furnace using those waste products which are found round every plant, burning a nice clean charge.

I move to the question about all our eggs in the one basket. Paragraph 10 of the White Paper goes on to state: and the economies of scale at large coastal works are such that in most circumstances there is a significant saving in concentrating production there". I cannot quarrel with those words, but implied in them is that the whole of our steel producing capacity should be in large works. I question this philosophy. Even at its worst, our steel industry is seldom less than 60 per cent. employed. The top 40 per cent. can disappear in bad times, but we are left with a base of about 60 per cent., which scarcely gets used. We need flexibility for that top 40 per cent. This is the key area of profitability. It is also the key area when it comes to taking up the cyclical slack which the industry so frequently has to endure and enables it to take up the demand which is forced upon it.

Given that the situation I have described is accurate—I believe that my figures are near enough—I suggest to my right hon. Friend that we should think most carefully about the production of that 40 per cent. Here I introduce the word "modularity". I also introduce that now disparaged group of words "mini-mill". We need those types of flexible, smallish units. After all, we are talking about a million tonnes, plant which is not insignificant. We need flexibility of steel production, rolling, and re-heating plants—all the complex of manufacturing techniques required by this industry. If we ensure that the top 40 per cent. can be financed in such a way that we do not have the major capital cost of a great big site which, when that 40 per cent. disappears, leaves us hanging on to a lot of plant which we cannot fully utilise, then this comment in the White Paper could be wrong. I hope that my right hon. Friend will carefully examine the arithmetic regarding the total 100 per cent. realising that it is the 40 per cent. at the top which is more significant than anything else.

I come to my penultimate point which concerns the private sector. Paragraph 38 of the White Paper is headed "The private sector". I find this paragraph somewhat inconsistent. It states: The private sector supplies about a quarter of the United Kingdom's requirements". I do not quarrel with that. I do not think that anybody would. It goes on: The Government are satisfied that the BSC's investment strategy does not threaten the place of the private sector". The investment strategy may not threaten the place of the private sector, but the pricing strategy of the British Steel Corporation does. This has been amply borne out by the recommendation in Lord Hirshfield's report. It is unfortunate that the Questions that I put down for Written Answer yesterday have not yet been answered—there are no doubt good reasons for that—because they centred around what the Government intend to do to restore the situation to which Lord Hirshfield referred. I believe that the private sector is of great significance.

My hon. Friend the Minister for Industry, in an intervention during my speech on 25th January, referring to Lord Hirshfield, said: those recommendations were accepted by the Government and the British Steel Corporation, which said that it would take full account of them."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 25th January 1973; Vol. 849, c. 752.] I still have to find out exactly what that means. I am not aware that it means anything. I believe that this is a significant handicap on the private sector, which is part of the British steel industry and cannot be dismissed as a group of people to whom nobody owes a living.

Mr. George Lawson (Motherwell)

The hon. Gentleman is talking about the private sector, which is overwhelmingly the stainless steel, special steel, sector. We have heard a great deal of condemnation of the bulk steel, nationalised, sector. Doe not the hon. Gentleman agree that Britain has been let down much more by the stainless steel, private, sector, than by the bulk steel sector? Why should we be so concerned about the private sector?

Mr. McNair-Wilson

The hon. Gentleman and I have debated steel subjects before. His view and mine about the private sector may be different, even with regard to stainless steel. The contribution of the big companies such as Guest Keen, Nettlefolds to British industry is very significant. I am advised that as a result of the interference with pricing policy they are losing about £1.6 million a year, which is a significant disadvantage

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman and I can discuss the matter on another occasion, because I want to move on to my next point about the private sector—its ability to finance the new plant referred to in paragraphs 38, 39 and 40. By their tremendous generosity to the British Steel Corporation, the Government are now creating two industries within the single steel sector, one of which receives a great deal of Government finance while the other has to raise its money in the open market. The White Paper says: The Government welcome such moves, —referring to the private sector modernising itself— and will be willing to consider proposals under the Industry Act 1972 for assistance in appropriate cases. Can my hon. Friend the Minister give us an idea of exactly what he has in mind?

I should like to add another word of caution on the question of the Japanese samurai, the great Japanese steel giants, who have been cutting down to size industries like our own and making life very difficult. They are likely to find life becoming more difficult for themselves. The currency revaluations taking place across the world will alter the trading performances of many nations. The Japanese have appeared to be the ideal in steel industries, and I have been as guilty as anyone else in believing that But they could well find themselves having a great deal of steel on their hands which they find very hard to shift.

That would have two effects. First, it would make other nations like ours much more competitive. Secondly, while I welcome the fact that we have set aside a vast sum of money to re-equip our industry, my hon. Friend might consider that there is perhaps no need to do everything overnight, that where plants are working effectively and efficiently and jobs are being enjoyed we should not necessarily have to sweep everything away to catch up with our great competitors like the Japanese. It may be wiser to spend our money more gradually, perhaps taking account of some of the points made by the hon. Member for Chesterfield, allowing those plants that are doing a good job to serve a bit more of their useful life.

It is our job to husband the taxpayers' money carefully, to make sure that it is not squandered. The White Paper gives us a marvellous opportunity to modernise the industry. That is what we want ultimately to do, but, to meet the point of social cost, let us recognise that we do not have to limp along behind the Japanese to be a successful industry but that we shall and can be thoroughly competitive with much of the plant that we have today.

The White Paper is a good document, the most encouraging that the steel industry of this country has ever seen. But we must examine very carefully the implications of some of the rather simplistic language in it, so that we make sure that we do not squander the taxpayers' money, and that we obtain value for them.

5.35 p.m.

Mr. Ted Leadbitter (The Hartlepools)

The hon. Member for New Forest (Mr. Patrick McNair-Wilson) began his speech quite well, and I have no need to take issue with him, except on his last remarks. I do not think that the White Paper is a good document. We must compare the performance that it expects with what is happening elsewhere in the world and the projected figures for world steel production during the next decade, the period with which the White Paper is concerned.

The hard fact is that world steel production capacity is about 690 million tonnes and is expected to be about 939 million tonnes by the end of the decade. The projected figures for world steel consumption are of that order. By 1985 consumption is expected to rise to 1,144 million tonnes, compared with the present level of about 595 million tonnes. We are talking of nearly doubling world consumption in the next decade, and nearly trebling it as we approach the second half of the 1980s.

What is this country doing about that situation? We are considering increasing production from 27 million tonnes to 33 million—35 million in 1975, and possibly reaching 36 million—38 million by the first half of the 1980s. Let us compare those increases with what is planned to be done elsewhere by 1975. West Germany is seeking to increase her production by 9 million tonnes by then; Japan by 28 million tonnes; and the United States by 25 million tonnes.

Compared with the rest of the industrialised world, Britain's planning looks poor and dismal. On that account alone we should examine the whole problem again. My hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Varley) was right to recall the 43 million tonnes target figure, which was more realistic in view of the projections of world consumption and the planning of other countries.

The Secretary of State made great play in his speech of the suggestion that investment in the industry was poor. He was trying to make a political point. I do not seek to do that, but simply to address myself to the hard facts. In the middle 1960s investment was running at about £130 million a year. By 1970 it had doubled. By 1971 investment in the whole industry, including the private sector as well as the British Steel Corporation, was over £400 million. Talk of a 10-year programme recalls to me the health service 10-year programme announced in 1963, just before we came to power. A 10-year investment programme of £3,000 million, must be considered realistically. It is an average of £300 million a year. I suggest that this does not reflect what the industry requires, and certainly I would go for the figures which Melchett brought out some 18 months ago. We should be talking in terms not of £3,000 million but of nearer £4,000 million of investment over the decade.

I deal now with the period and not just the investment and the projections of steel demand. Who in this House or anywhere else has ever decided that it is possible to have a strategy for 10 years in the steel industry? Who has ever been able to plan more than three, four or five years ahead? In my constituency the British Steel Corporation built a 20-inch pipe mill. It was established in March 1968 and it has not worked satisfactorily since. Men have been taken on. Men have been laid off. At the moment only one end of the mill is working and in January of this year a further 175 redundancies were announced. In July 1968 the corporation established a 44-inch pipe mill. That, too, has not worked satisfactorily. In 1967 the planners said that they could establish two pipe mills essential to the industry and they were able to claim that they were planning well ahead. Now they are talking about closing them.

The British Steel Corporation has not made out its case purely on a general strategy here because it has been hampered for two years by the present Government. There are many people in the industry with a great deal of experience who agree that it is not possible to go beyond four or five years in planning.

Let us take the Consett Iron and Steel Company. According to the Benson Report which was before a number of hon. Members several years ago, that company was due to be closed. Only 18 months ago when some redundancies were announced I asked a number of questions about the company. It was judged to be a low-cost production plant and was not due to be closed. Now a black mark is on it again.

The oscillations and fluctuations in the industry are such that my submission must be that there is no room for a rigid final posture on the White Paper.

I return to my constituency, and I refer as I must to the intention to close the plant there, where at the highest point of employment some 6,000 people were working and where about 4,750 are working now. The position is that if the White Paper programme is carried out in the Hartlepool constituency we shall have at least 2,800 people deprived of their jobs by 1975–76. At the moment 3,225 people are out of work in the constituency. In addition if the plate mill goes we shall lose the difference between the 2,800 people and the 4,750. The total unemployment position in The Hartlepools therefore will be very black.

To give some idea of the magnitude of the problem and why I am asking the Minister and will ask him again after the debate to look at the problem, I need only remind the House that we have 70 men and boys out of work for every vacancy recorded in the exchange area. Of the 35 employment exchange areas in the northern region 29 have fewer than 22 men and boys out of work for every vacancy registered in their areas. In the northern region, which as a whole has a very unfortunate record, we in The Hartlepools are very seriously placed.

We are used to it, of course. When I came to this House in 1964 we had the highest unemployment figure in the whole of the United Kingdom. If the Government are not careful I shall be fighting the next General Election on the basis of the highest unemployment figure again. Whatever the Government say in the interim, during the period when the Labour Government were in office 7,000 new jobs were given to us. The input of new jobs in the northern region was 15,000 a year. In an earlier intervention I pointed out that since June 1970 redundancies in the northern region have been running at the rate of 2,000 a month. That is the sad situation.

I come then to the rest of the plant at the Hartlepools. Let me point out to the Minister that in 1960 the South Durham steel plant was commissioned for £50 million. In March and June 1968 two pipe mills were established at a cost of £11.2 million. In a decade some £61.2 million was invested in a plant producing steel with a total capacity of 1 million tonnes a year. At the moment it is producing 18,000 tonnes a week working at 90 per cent. capacity. Is not it stark raving madness, with a plant which is just over 10 years old, to have arguments about closing it? Is not it economic madness?

A considerable amount of public money is involved. I was a member of the Standing Committe which considered the Steel Bill, and I took part in advocating acceptance of the principle of a public capital dividend in order to remove the great burden of capital debt from this industry which, according to the White Paper—the Secretary of State was reluctant to say so, but it is in the White Paper—was an industry which had been taken over and nationalised by a Labour Government, an industry with a very bad financial base and an industry with obsolete plant.

When we get round the table to see how best to ease that burden, bearing in mind the other plants of this kind with such recent capital investment in them, it is the madness of political prejudice and nothing else which can arrive at a decision to say to 4,500 men that their jobs are finished.

It is no good the Minister saying, "But what about the multi-million pound Red-car complex which will be producing a third of British steel when it is built." I happen to be discussing redundancies which are earmarked to take place in 1975. The plant at Redcar will not be built until 1980. What are my men to do? What can the Member for The Hartlepools do in the circumstances but say to the Minister, "For goodness sake listen to your colleagues, especially to the hon. Member for New Forest, who talk about not putting all our eggs in a few baskets".

There is a fallacy abroad that basic oxygen steel is a new concept. It is not. It is as old as the hills. There have been many forms of oxygen processing over the years, even since Bessemer. But since 1945 when bulk oxygen was able to be produced, we have been able to bring this into the steel-making context. But I never thought that it would be done on the basis of one process nationally in huge plants which would create many difficulties. There should be an attempt to think in terms of a modernisation of the industry with a reasonable mix. The natural processes arising from management producing that kind of mix are there for us to see. They did not come about through a White Paper.

In 1970 open-hearth production accounted for 47 per cent. of total output. Last year the figure was 35 per cent. Now we are producing only about 8 million tonnes with that method. Experiments in the rest of the world are brushed to one side by Lord Melchett, yet they are production successes which prove that the open-hearth method has a place in future.

I make a submission to the Minister. I ask him not to be too rigid with this strategy. Let him bring some resilience into his thinking. Let him listen to Members of Parliament who have some experience and to the trade union movement. Let him also listen to those who know the position in the constituencies. He cannot justify any kind of reorganisation if it is not balanced with a true and effective consideration for men and their families. If the Minister will give this undertaking we can have a dialogue which will satisfy us all.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Miss Harvie Anderson)

Order. I hope that hon. Members will realise how many wish to take part in this debate.

5.52 p.m.

Mr. David Crouch (Canterbury)

We have been reminded of how important this debate is for so many constituents. The House knows that I do not have constituents involved in the steel industry but I am nevertheless greatly interested in the White Paper and in the industry. My hon. Friend the Member for New Forest (Mr. Patrick McNair-Wilson) gave the House and the Government Front Bench some helpful and constructive thoughts about this £3,000 million investment. I propose to do something similar.

The problem facing us is not so much bound up with closures and redundancies as with modernising a basic industry and providing new jobs for those displaced. That is a quite different thing. These are equally essential factors. Modernisation must be slowed down if we do not produce the jobs for the men so displaced. It is not beyond the capacity of Government to do what is required of them.

In these days of anti-laissez faire which rightly epitomises this Government, when the Government have chosen to entervene responsibly in the economy and in industry this situation is a special challenge. The Government have a responsibility to see that they march ahead, modernise and produce new jobs. We are not talking about one industry but about modernisation of an industrial sector. I hope that what I am saying might even be reported in Hanoi so that the right hon. Member for Cardiff, South-East (Mr. Callaghan), whose presence we miss today, might be aware of it.

I spoke on 25th January and touched on the proposal to close the East Moors site. This poses a problem. Representations have been made today and earlier about this. Cardiff's problem is much bigger than merely being faced with the closure of East Moors and the displacement in three years' time of 4,500 men. Cardiff Corporation see this closure leading to the unemployment of 15,000 men. There is a case for the Government granting special development status to Cardiff.

I turn to the private sector position in Cardiff. East Moors was once part of GKN, which retains a large investment in Cardiff. GKN wants to continue there and enlarge on that investment but it is dependent on certain factors. It is not dependent on the East Moors site continuing, although the men say that they cannot see why it should not. I accept the argument that it would be more economic to produce steel billets for re-rolling at the GKN plants at much larger plants than East Moors.

It is proposed that eventually the supply to GKN should be coming from the great Anchor development about to come on stream. GKN would like to increase its investment in Cardiff by as much as £30 million. We are talking about an investment of £300 million for the nationalised sector yet here we have the not-so-small element of GKN in the private sector thinking in terms of £30 million. It cannot do this unless it gets a return on its investment. I return to what my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest said when he spoke of the price factor. This is an essential factor when considering investment. We must think of the industry, private and public sector, becoming viable.

GKN could make this investment at Cardiff and meet Lord Hirshfield's recommendations dealing with a more sensible price structure for steel. Cardiff would be greatly helped by the granting of development area status. It would make a difference of as much as £6 million or £7 million in investment. We cannot lightly cast aside the intention of GKN to help increase steel production without taking that factor into consideration.

We cannot push to one side consideration of prices even though we may be in the difficult period of phase 2. On 1st April we shall be faced with a crucial choice. It is then that the European Coal and Steel Community will have an opportunity to question our whole pricing policy in this industry and maybe to request that we raise our prices to match those on the Continent. I hope that the Government will take the initiative here and at least make a statement before 1st April so that the entire industry knows where it stands rather than that it should suffer the indignity of being hauled before the International Court at The Hague to explain our new position.

An interesting comment was made by the Chief Secretary about prices in the Committee dealing with the Counter-Inflation Bill last week. He was asked: where did the final decision lie? With the House or the ECSC? In a long answer from the Chief Secretary I understood him to say that, notwithstanding any decisions which may be made in Committee, we cannot break our obligations under the European Communities Act.

On the question of price, I think that the non-implementation of Lord Hirshfield's recommendation is costing all steelmakers, including the BSC re-rolling side and special steel side, and certainly including the private sector, a great deal of money. We cannot go on in this way. It is so bad that the Secretary of State might well be in the position of being asked to pay some compensation to a private sector suffering so seriously in this way.

I should like to make one last point on price. The BSC's policy on prices— influenced, of course, by the Government—is having the effect of squeezing the private sector, because the BSC is the producer of 90 per cent. of the steel billet in this country and 75 per cent. of special steels, finished steels and re-rolled steels, and by increasing its billet prices in relation to prices for re-rolled products it has so squeezed the profit margins of its competitors as to make the business extremely unprofitable for them.

I cannot see that this situation can go on. Lord Hirshfield recommended a price increase of around 4 to 5 per cent.—and I quote from his report: …that a commercially acceptable rate of return be earned and also that the Minister consider the desirability of reviewing the extent to which it is proper for BSC to compete with the private sector in this area of the industry. My hon. Friend the Member for New Forest spoke of his concern lest we become over-impressed by the whole concept of bulk production at coastal sites. I must say I have my reservations, too, but from inquiries that I have been making, particularly in regard to the carriage of ore by sea and land, I have been impressed by the enormous scale on which the carriage of ore is now being contemplated. In the past 20 years this has changed out of all recognition. In 1950, the ship ore-carriers chartered by the British Steel industry were of the order of 15,000 to 20,000 tonners, but today the BSC is chartering ships of 100,000 tons to carry ore. Port Talbot can take vessels of up to 150,000 tons; Teesside can take vessels of up to 150,000 tons: and Hunterston, if it comes into being, will be able to take vessels of up to 400,000 tons.

I find also that there is developing in the carriage of ore, oil and coal, a new version of the triangular trade of another century. This is such that is is having a very great influence on the reduction of the cost of the carriage of ore. We have today, for example, the carriage of oil from the Persian Gulf to Japan, and the same vessel, having unloaded the oil in Japan, travels empty to Australia, where it is loaded with iron ore, probably in slurry form. The iron ore is taken from Australia to the United Kingdom, then the vessel goes empty across the Atlantic to the United States, where it fills with coal for shipment to Japan. Then it starts all over again on the triangular or circular road from Japan. This is making it possible for the carriers to negotiate very low prices for the transport of ore and it is one of the major factors which make it very attractive to think in terms of the development of large coastal sites—and I do not argue with this.

However, it is also possible to move ore on land very cheaply. New techniques are being examined in the United States, and particularly in California, of putting ore in the form of slurry and pumping it across long distances. This is being done in California, Chile, and Tasmania, across distances of 30 to 40 miles. We must not neglect this opportunity to transport ore cheaply in this country—and it can be transported cheaply.

I see no mention of technicalities of this sort in the White Paper. I have no complaint about that, but I maintain that we should think about this pumping of ore, because it will mean that it will not be necessary for us to have deep-water harbour facilities and dock facilities. With this type of process it is possible to pump to a terminal for front-end loading, as with off-loading oil from a vessel harboured in the roads, as it were, and not necessarily in the harbour. It is possible in this way to envisage the use of this essential raw material in many other places in this country.

There is an overpowering argument today for BSC to go big in its modernisation plans in order to be viable and competitive internationally. The economics of producing liquid steel in massive capacities can look attractive at first sight, but this needs further examination, because we must remember that in this country we are not concerned only with liquid steel or steel billets; we are also concerned with steel being turned into about a thousand different versions, in rod and other forms.

It may be that the rationalisation we shall have to see in this country is the reduction of that thousand to a much lower figure in the future. But that is something which must also be examined as we consider the modernisation of the industry. It is nevertheless a fact that it is this great versatility in producing special steels that is part of the special character of our great tradition of steelmaking, particularly in Sheffield, for example.

On this question of economics, I am told by the British Steel Corporation that it considers that the Anchor site will have an economic advantage over the normal small-scale plant of about £8 a tonne, and that even the freight cost of transporting it across country, for example, from Anchor to Cardiff, would add only approximately £2 a tonne. There we have the argument in favour of a large-scale operation, which I accept.

I should like to say a few words about the private sector because paragraph 38 of the White Paper mentions the continued vigour and prosperity of the private sector. Of course, there are only three paragraphs about the private sector, and I make no complaint about that. I should like to refer to what I said earlier. We must see that the private sector is not squeezed out on price. It must be placed within the general strategic plan and not left outside to try to catch up as best it can.

I must say something in criticism of the private sector. It must show that it has the vigour to prosper in this new advance the steel industry is making. What I mean by that is that the private sector is a sector not only of steelmakers but also of the private sector of investment in this country. I want to see the City taking an interest in the private sector of the steel industry. I want the private investor to begin to get some confidence and to come in and back this industry. Here is a chance for the Bentleys, the Barclays and the Broakes to show that they want to take the opportunity to enlarge and develop this basic industry.

As regards the public sector, the British Steel Corporation, I have not been happy with its relationship with the Government. This is not to make an unfair criticism, because the relationship between the nationalised industries and the Government is never an easy one, whichever Government is in power. But I have the feeling that the British Steel Corporation resents very much interference from the Department of Trade and Industry. It seems to react badly. It seems sometimes to go into a bit of a huff. It cannot avoid having a sponsoring Ministry. It cannot avoid having the Treasury and Parliament taking an interest in its affairs. It has to work with them and to satisfy them. But I believe that it must change its attitude, it must be more open, it must tell us more, and it must stand up to its Ministers and, above all, to the Treasury. It owes that to itself, to its workers, to the investors in this country and to the House.

We may have to consider a better way one day of financing the British Steel Corporation and giving it a financial discipline, perhaps away from the Treasury and I hope, at the same time, a greater incentive. By all means let us have a degree of interrogation and interference by the DTI in the technical details of the Corporation's affairs. The BSC now has, in my opinion, a great opportunity. It has the great good will of the public and Parliament behind it. Of course there is concern about the redundancies that must grow out of this big change we are proposing for it. But there are good foundations for the industry and for the British Steel Corporation. Already the Corporation has done two things which are memorable. It has worker directors, and that is a process which is developing well in the corporation, which is encouraging in a major industry. There is within the TUC a steel committee working as an extremely valuable consultative body with the BSC management. We therefore have a framework of a very good industry and I should like to see it get into calmer waters of greater confidence so that it can expand and, with greater encouragement, improve its morale. If ever an industry needed to increase its morale, this is it.

I should like to see less interference from the DTI with more responsibility placed on the corporation for its commercial success.

Mr. Speaker

May I make another appeal to the House? About 15 hon. Members want to catch my eye and there are about 150 to 160 minutes left for the debate. That is a fairly easy calculation to make and if hon. Members confine their remarks to 10 or 15 minutes I should be able to call almost everybody.

6.14 p.m.

Mr. John Morris (Aberavon)

Tomorrow morning the hon. Member for Canterbury (Mr. Crouch) will have the unique experience of finding some of his earlier comments about Cardiff welcomed in the capital of the Principality and in the capital of North Vietnam at the same time.

It would be churlish of me, at the beginning, not to mention two aspects of the Government's proposals. The first is the commitment of £3,000 million—a massive investment for the future. Certainly the Government, in steel and other matters, display a gargantuan appetite for the extension of public ownership, and this will warm the cockles of the hearts of every little voter in Reigate and Cheltenham where all the great battles of steel nationalisation were fought in the 1950s and the 1960s. We are glad that the former Secretary of State has been removed to quieter European pastures, because it was he who made the famous and welcome disengagement speech at the Tory Party Conference in 1970. No lame duck the steel industry: it is a worthy animal, according to the Government, to be fed in abundance with quantities undreamed of.

The Secretary of State made a cheap debating point when he dealt with the low investment of the mid-1960s. My hon. Friend the Member for The Hartlepools (Mr. Leadbitter) has dealt with that point. The inheritance of 1967 was spelt out in the White Paper—financially weak companies with low productivity and with obsolete plant. As soon as the corporation began with its corporate plan we witnessed increased investment, year by year, at a rate of 50 per cent.—substantial investment. Anyone who has been taking part in steel debates or has taken an interest in the subject will recall how private industry failed, and that it was the public purse that had to expand investment in the difficult years at Llanwern, and Colvilles in Scotland.

The Government's judgment of last April has been stood on its head. After nearly two years of inquiries, joint steering groups, and all sorts of weird animals crawling through the hair of the British steel industry, there is now the judgment of—and the word "mini" is popular now—a mini-Solomon. Last April the target of capacity by 1980 was endorsed by the Government as between 28 million and 36 million tons. The Government preferred the lower end and said that the British Steel Corporation was veering towards the top end of the bracket. Well, the veering has won. The poor drunken corporation, pushed from pillar to post, has won the battle. Now there is a complete change in Government attitude—a change that they would be frank to acknowledge. The target is now to be between 33 million and 35 million tons by the late 1970s and a higher figure by the first half of the 1980s. I hope that Government supporters will note that we are to have massive public ownership, coupled with the maximum of misery in many steel areas. I am concerned with the brutality with which those who will suffer job losses have been rejected.

The steelworker is a quiet, moderate and responsible person. However hot the political battles in the 1940s, the 1950s and the 1960s, he got on with the job of producing steel. In my constituency we had redundancies in the 1960s. Between 3,000 and 4,000 men have already gone from Port Talbot. There were negotiations and consultations—real consultations, because the interests of men and women were concerned—and productivity agreements were reached. Rundowns are nothing new to us; we have had them already. They were accepted because steelworkers were confident that new money would come in, along with new industry. The original plan put forward by Lord Melchett for a production figure of 43 million tons would have required investment at the rate of £4,000 million. With some of that the misery could have been saved. We have heard warnings in the course of the debate. Is it wise for the Government to put so many eggs in so few baskets? The British Steel Corporation is not omniscient, and even the most Uriah-Heepish of the Government's back benchers would not say that this is an overwhelming trait of the Government. That is perhaps where a word of caution is necessary. I represent Port Talbot and my constituency will be one of the major beneficiaries of the plan. I believe that the plan, in terms of its broad philosophy and aims, is substantially right. The aim must be for bulk production to take place on coastal sites, but I am worried lest, in such a short time scale, there should be a total dependence upon these major producing centres.

When major investment took place in Port Talbot it took a few years to achieve the record successes of the last couple of years. We had teething trouble after teething trouble. Now we are confident that we can take in as much of the expansion and investment as we can have, but only because we have sweated blood and tears to achieve our present expertise. I do not know whether other areas will be able to achieve a similar record with total dependence upon these producing centres, as specified in the plan. I accept the broad philosophy of the plan because its purpose is to make steel which can be sold in world markets. If we can get basic steelmaking right and produce the goods at the right price, all other matters will fall into line. We are talking in terms of a saving of a little less than £10 a ton. That is the kind of economy that can be achieved if we can get steelmaking right.

What concerns me is the total dependence upon the plan and the lack of any insurance if something goes wrong at any of the major centres, which may lack the experience or the tribulation that those in my area have gone through over the years.

I want briefly to examine the figures. My hon. Friend who opened the debate very kindly drew attention to a Question I put down yesterday concerning the way in which the £900 million is to be spent in Wales. I dare not query how the £3,000 million is made up, but, in my experience, one does not put figures of this kind into a White Paper before they are tested and cross-examined, since one wants to ascertain that there is some basis for them. One does not capture figures from the air and put them in a White Paper. That was why, when criticisms were made in the last two weeks, I sought to exonerate the Government—until yesterday, when, in answer to my request for a breakdown of the figures the Minister replied in the terms read out by my hon. Friend, which I will not repeat at length. The Government then sought to indicate the position.

The £900 million was covered first, by projects already in progress or announced. Well, what are they? I analysed them in the debate on 25th May last—Llanwern, £90 million, and Port Talbot, £45 million. Of this, £80 million had already been approved at Llanwern and £20 million at Port Talbot. Therefore, there was only £35 million of new money. It is quite a long way to go from there to the £900 million that we are talking about. Those are the projects that have already been announced.

Secondly, there are those mentioned in the White Paper. Not a single figure for Wales is given in the White Paper—save for the cost that would be incurred in modernising Shotton to bring it up to the same standard as Port Talbot. The figure given is £200 million, but not one figure is given in the White Paper with regard to £900 million for Wales. Who is the Minister seeking to "con"? What whitewashing have we here? Those are the only figures mentioned in the White Paper.

Lastly, there was a reference to the high level of continuing investment for modernisation and replacement. That seems to be an exhortation against sin. I very much hope that when the Borrowing Powers Bill comes before the House the Minister will be better armed than he is now, because we shall be analysing the Bill, clause by clause and line by line, and we will want to have some kind of assurance from the Government.

Regrettably, this is where the worry starts. The British Steel Corporation does not know any better either—or certainly is not prepared to admit it. A letter was delivered to me by hand today from the British Steel Corporation in which it said that it could not give the figures because the whole strategy as set out in the recent White Paper very much represented a "broad brush approach". That is all it could tell me. That is the kind of figure the Minister seeks to give the House.

The Secretary of State for Wales—who is not here—when speaking of the fact that he had failed to save Shotton and Ebbw Vale, beat the drum in a big way and was proud of the fact that £900 million was coming to Wales. He had not bothered to check, or to ascertain the time scale of the expenditure of that money, and where it is to be spent. This afternoon the Secretary of State sought to dismiss the inquiry of my hon. Friend the Member for Newport (Mr. Roy Hughes) and myself, saying he could not bother to give estimates in detail. We are not asking for details of every nut and bolt; we want some indication or apportionment of where and when this money is to be spent. I can assure the Minister that this certainly would not have been good enough for any of the private or public companies with which he was concerned before he became a Minister. He would not have accepted a figure of this kind if his own company had produced it and said, "We will spend £900 million", in a "broad brush approach". Nor would the shareholders have stood for it. They would have wanted clarification, and we, in turn, demand it.

I make one other point, conscious of my hon. Friends' need. Our worry is that if the Government are so lacking in information about such large figures as £900 million and £3,000 million how can we be sure they know the facts, and how can we accept the assurances they have given to us about new jobs? If they are so unsure of the money involved how can they expect us to be persuaded that 1,300 new jobs will come to Port Talbot and 1,500 to Llanwern? In the same way, how can those who will suffer grievously in areas of Shotton and Ebbw Vale—or, indeed in any part of the country—be sure into which part of the country new jobs will come when they are required? That will be the acid test.

In my constituency, in a prime site almost on the forecourt of the station, with access to two new harbours—one of them brand new—and to a motorway, a factory of 75,000 square feet has been hawked from one end of the kingdom to another for the last two years, and no one has taken it. What steelworker, faced with a difficult situation in a remote part of the country, can accept the assurances of this Government, and all the blarney about task forces, the Government's recent conversion to advance factories, and their belated regard for development grants, knowing that a factory in prime condition in a prime site, and in an easily accessible area, has had no taker?

What confidence can people in difficult areas have when factories in good areas cannot be filled? The broad aim of the strategy must be right, but the Government are strangely lacking in facts and figures, and in the assurance which must be given to those who will be deprived of their livelihood if we are to accept the Government's proposals.

6.28 p.m.

Mr. Emlyn Hooson (Montgomery)

I am sure my right hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon (Mr. John Morris) would really agree that this White Paper really deserves a sub-title. The subtitle I suggest is, "How to be Precise, Yet Vague" because this is really what it is like. It is couched in most simplistic terms. It is, I would have said, a typical product of a huge corporation, responsible to nobody, knowing that in the end there is a huge public purse on which it can rest. It is merely proposing to spend £3,000 million without really giving any indication of how that money is to be spent. It is proposing a tremendous reshaping of our steel industry.

I am a firm believer in a mixed economy but I opposed the nationalisation of steel. The hon. Member for Penistone (Mr. John Mendelson) well remembers my opposition to the nationalisation of steel, but I am prepared to accept that the British Steel Corporation has greater expertise on steel than anybody in this House, whatever his expert knowledge. I believe it sat down and planned, with the most modern information available to it, what it thought was the best strategic concept for the future of British steel. Of course, that concept involves very difficult decisions—decisions that must hurt some communities: but this was bound to happen. I do not think that was avoidable once steel had been handed over to a nationalised body.

I do not happen to share this approach to these problems. I never believed that nationalisation would solve the problems of the British steel industry, and I do not believe it now. Let me give a typical example of its defects, from the speech given earlier by the hon. Member for Hartlepools (Mr. Leadbitter), who is no longer in his place—though I told him that I was interested in what he said. He informed the House that in 1968 two pipe works were created in his constituency—one to produce 20 in. and the other to produce 44 in. steel pipes. I checked the detail with him, though I have forgotten how many millions of pounds he said they cost. That was only in 1968, but one of those places is now closed completely while the other is merely ticking over. What is wrong basically with a corporation which so fails when it has a captive market open to it?

This has happened in an area of considerable unemployment. This is expenditure of public money by a public corporation with no return to the public yet, as I say, we have a captive market in pipes. We have the North Sea project. But where did, and where does, the British gas industry get its pipes? From Japan, Germany and Italy. There is something basically wrong with the strategic concepts of a corporation which can open then close down works like that and yet fail to take advantage of a captive market.

It seems, therefore, that we must approach the White Paper with a great deal of cynicism. In the past we have had projections of developments that were to take place but that have not taken place. I know that members of the corporation were greatly impressed by what they saw on their visit to Japan in 1969. A colleague of mine, standing as a Liberal candidate in Flintshire in March 1969, suggested that the Shotton works were in danger of closure from one of the corporation's pronouncements on its return, and I am sure that he was right.

What the members of the corporation saw in Japan was impressive. In theory, that kind of development is probably right for this country, but will it be so in practice? Great technological developments are taking place in the steel industry; some have already been referred to—but I am against the concept of putting all the eggs in one basket. The trouble with a huge corporation like the BSC is that those in charge consider the country as a whole and not as, say, would John Summers, as a private enterprise at Shotton, where they would ask, "How can we best develop in Shotton?"

The BSC kingdom is huge. Those directing its fortunes have to look at the whole country. The Labour Government required them to do so! They say, "We will close these steelworks and go somewhere else", just as someone at Shotton might have said, "We will close this section or branch." The corporation is working on a very much larger scale. The result is that when a mistake is made it is a huge mistake, the consequences of which are tremendous. Therefore, there is a good case to be made for a cautionary note to be sounded, particularly in view of the great social consequences of the strategy propounded in the White Paper.

I have no steel interests in my constituency, but in Wales no less than 7.7 per cent. of the male working population is engaged in steel. Those people will suffer a great deal, and the repercussions of what is suggested will be felt throughout the Principality. Though the strategy may be basically correct, there is a good case to be made for the Government and the corporation to look at the developments of new technology and ensure that there is scope for adaptation. There should be much more scope for flexibility than is set out in the White Paper.

It seems to me that in its overall strategy far too little attention has been given, for example, to the great tradition of good works relationships in such works as those at Shotton and Ebbw Vale. In this day of experimentation not only in the economy of the country but in social affairs and the evolution of ideas as to how industry should be run, could not at least one of the works now proposed for closure be run experimentally? One of the works where steel production is proposed to come to an end might be handed over to the whole range of workers from the shop floor to top management. Let them run the works with the help of capital which would otherwise be spent elsewhere, and let us see how it works.

I do not suggest that that should be done everywhere, but it could be done somewhere, and with proper leadership might well succeed. Such works as that at Brymbo produce steel very successfully, though relatively little capital is invested in them. There is no reason why Brymbo should be so successful, but it is. Shotton also was a very highly successful works though suffering perhaps many theoretical disadvantages.

We are in great danger of looking at the future of the industry as no private businessman would look at his own business. That man wants to rationalise, he wants to get the best results from modern technical advance, and he wants to site his factory properly. He must also have regard, as most people in private industry now do, to the communities involved in any changes. Would such a man really go for a plan in respect of which, if it is wrong, there is no redress? We know that the members of the corporation were impressed by what they saw in Japan in 1969, but by the time of implementation in 1979 that may already be out of date. There is therefore a good economic case for modification of the approach and for allowing far greater flexibility, and a great social case for looking afresh at the whole of the proposals.

As I have said before, I was against the idea of nationalising the steel industry and leaving one corporation to decide its future and shape. The complaints heard from constituencies like Flintshire, Monmouthshire and Newport are the inevitable consequence of letting steel be controlled nationally and telling people that they must think of the industry nationally. The corporation was set up by a Labour Government. Lord Melchett was appointed by a Labour Government. His strategy was to be expected. The corporation's strategy was to be expected.

If I shared the views of the hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside (Mr. Eddie Griffiths) I would agree, as he said in a previous debate, that the corporation's is the only logical and sensible approach, but that is in marked contrast to the views of some of his colleagues, who do share his beliefs but not his detailed views. They believe that there must be a far greater mix. The Government are in grave danger in accepting from this one industry a one-outlook, blinkered approach. There is not enough flexibility in that approach. The whole thing needs re-thinking.

6.39 p.m.

Mr. T. H. H. Skeet (Bedford)

The hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Hooson) speaks of flexibility, but if he refers to paragraph 38 he will see that flexibility is read into the plan. That is the whole idea behind the £3,000 million. It is a matter of allocation of resources. The hon. and learned Gentleman himself indicated that technology can be outdated, so what is required is carefully to provide allocations while allowing scope for flexibility. This approach was clearly laid down in the Minister's reply yesterday when he spoke of allocations being made available for modernisation and replacement later.

I believe that Wales has been dealt with very responsibly. It gets one-third of the total investment. We have here a 10-year programme, and 10 years, both politically and economically, is a long time in which there may be quite substantial changes in technology. We are convinced that the oxygen process will have a long future, but there may be other improvements in technology after that. If we keep some funds in reserve they can be applied as technology changes.

There is a considerable increase in productive capacity at Port Talbot, an increase to 6 million tonnes. The production for the whole of Wales will be up to 9.8 million tonnes, which is a high figure for that part of the country. The strategy in the White Paper is that coastal sites will be considered, and I think that is right. It has been paralleled in Europe by Usinor at Dunkirk, Wendel Sidelor and Usinor at Fos, Hoogovens on the coast of Holland and Finsider at Taranto. The Government are following a consistent philosophy here. They have decided that there should be a little more steelmaking on the east coast, where it will be proximate not only to United Kingdom but to Western European markets. I am concerned that Shotton is 17 miles from Morpeth, on the coast, which makes it unattractive for bulk steelmaking. There will be redundancies of about 6,500. Port Talbot, on the coast, is to be extended. In Scotland, Ravenscraig is 43 miles from the nearest deep water port at Hunters-ton.

Mr. Lawson

Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the narrow belt of Scotland is only about 44 miles across, and that Motherwell, where Ravenscraig lies, is nearly one-third of the way towards the west coast?

Mr. Skeet

I have looked up the figures and I will pursue my argument. There will be an opportunity for the hon. Gentleman to make his own speech in due course.

While it is right to have as much of one's capacity on the coast as possible, it is extraordinary for a strategy to be laid down for coastal steel works while we have steelworks on inland sites being extended, such as Ravenscraig and Scunthorpe—Anchorage—which is 19 miles by rail from Immingham. These two works have been retained and have apparently considerable prospects for expansion. Paragraph 49 of the White Paper states: BSC calculations showed that hot-rolled coil for the Shotton mills would cost substantially more if produced in redeveloped iron and steel making plant at Shotton than if delivered from the expanded Port Talbot. The BSC has looked into this and it may well be right, but what is intended should be spelt out more clearly.

There is thus already a mix in the United Kingdom, and of the five substantial sites for basic steel production some will be inland and some will be on the coast. I back the proposition that the eastern seaboard will serve Europe. According to the White Paper, discussions are going on with GKN about East Moors. Surely, when we have got rid of all the difficulties which have occurred in the Hirshfield Report, it will be up to GKN to go ahead with the development which will make it unnecessary for BSC to move ahead on its own plans. We need more information on that.

In Scotland, £400 million is to be invested. Scottish production of steel is to be advanced by 48.7 per cent. Scotland is to be allocated 13.3 per cent. of the total investment income, and that is a significant figure. The Scottish share of the United Kingdom steel will rise from 11 per cent. to 13.5 per cent., and employment at 26,000 will be reduced by 7,000 to 19,000.

The position of Hunterston is intriguing. We know that it can cope with carriers of 350,000 tons—big by any standards. We know that Korf-Stahl Ag is considering a plant in Hunterston. We know that Oil Refining Services International—Orci—will have a refinery, and have planning permission at Hunterston for a steel rolling plant. If Herr Willy Korf is thinking of setting up a mini-mill of 300,000 tonnes, if Oil Refining Services International is thinking of putting up a steel rolling plant, if BSC has in mind at Hallside an electric are plant of 1 million tonnes, and if BSC is still contemplating direct plant production of iron, what exactly will be the configuration in that area?

Mr. Eddie Griffiths (Sheffield, Bright-side)

If the two foreign investors which the hon. Gentleman says are interested in Scotland go ahead with mini-plants, my belief is that it will put in severe jeopardy the proposed 1 million ingot tonnes electric are plant proposed at Hall-side. Under those circumstances, I do not believe that the BSC would go along with that project.

Mr. Skeet

I understand the logic of the hon. Gentleman's argument. A number of schemes are coming forward now, some of which are inter-related, and it is for the Government to indicate what is likely to be the configuration of Hunterston. Hunterston has the depth, it has the industrial facilities and there is a high rate of unemployment in this quarter. That can be absorbed by further industrialisation, and the Government must bear that in mind.

What we do not want, is to leave Scotland with no steel making processes, but it is assured of adequate capacity because it has Ravenscraig, in any event, to serve the local market.

The whole idea of the 10-year plan is a package. If it is decided that Ravenscraig is to be vastly extended, the Teesside plan would never come to fruition or the Lackenby plan would be cut back. It is no good hon. Gentlemen on the Opposition benches saying that we are prepared to eliminate this one and keep all the old plants going. My great fear about the BSC is that it should become a Montecatini or a Pirelli of Italy. There is no immediate danger that it will have such a dominant position as to fall under Article 86 of the Treaty of Rome. It has to be built up and it has to be structurally sound. It has to have modern technology. All the plants which are to be closed down are open-hearth plants. It is no use suggesting that open-hearth furnaces can be utilised for another eight or ten years and compete with the Japanese and the West Germans.

One of the best illustrations is the Scunthorpe works—the Anchor project—which will be producing 350 tonnes per man per year. That will be competitive with some existing Japanese plants. Plants which are working open-hearth furnaces produce only 100 tonnes per man per year and will go out of business because the price of the steel they turn out will not be competitive in the United Kingdom or overseas markets. Therefore, the prescription put forward by the Labour Party would be a prescription for unemploy- ment. It would not be a prescription for strengthening the BSC which I understand is the Government's object.

Many developments are scheduled for Hunterston but we do not know precisely what will happen there. I hope this will be clarified.

To come to England, I am concerned about the vast contracts which are going abroad for pipes for the North Sea. One difficulty is that there is a great demand in the Middle East, the Soviet Union and elsewhere, and we are not in a position to supply their requirements. This is the fault of the BSC planning. BSC perhaps foresaw the market but did nothing to meet it.

Is it the object on Teesside, which is fairly close to the North Sea developments, that an enormous plant should be built, or will the construction be at Corby? I fully support the plans going forward for Teesside and Lackenby which over phase 1 and phase 2 should bring production up to more than 12 million tonnes. I also fully support the Appleby-Frodingham plant at Scunthorpe where there will be a vast expansion to give England roughly 20 million tonnes over the years.

But surely the philosophy behind the English expansion must be right, too. England has been hit hard by steel redundancies and it is England that has been hit hard by some of the redundancies in coal mining. By putting capacity in the North, many of these workers can be absorbed. I stress that when we consider what Europe is doing and where it is establishing its plants, if we are to compete on a mileage and tonnage basis with Europe, it is essential to be on the right side of the United Kingdom to cut down the mileage and basically to produce cheap and economic steel.

6.51 p.m.

Mr. John Robertson (Paisley)

Strange as it may seem, I do not intend to follow the hon. Member for Bedford (Mr. Skeet) on the question of Hunterston and planning permission given there. If he has that information it is rather strange that the Secretary of State for Scotland has not told us about it, because it is the Secretary of State who will give planning permission, and in fact that has not yet been done.

I want, however, in the interest of brevity, to confine myself mainly to Scotland. This is not a problem principally for the steel industry, but it is a regional problem of the first magnitude. All the noises that this Government have been making over the last year about concern for the regions, particularly Scotland, are meaningless unless in Scotland there is a fully comprehensive, extensive and competitive steel industry. Steel is a raw material and is not an end in itself. We are a manufacturing country and we need a plentiful supply of cheap raw materials on which to work. On that the Scottish economy will depend.

We in Scotland are 200 or 300 miles from the main steel-using industries of the United Kingdom. This puts us at a great disadvantage in relation to the rest of the United Kingdom, particularly with reference to the Common Market. It is unfortunate that the argument about steel in Scotland has centred on the question of whether there should be development at Hunterston or inland. There could be either and, so long as there was development at either, it would not, in itself, be important. We have tended to lose sight of the main problem, which is the problem of the steel-using industries in Scotland.

After 1st April Scotland's interests will be best met by a steel industry producing a wide range of products to suit the needs of the steel-using industries in Scotland as well, of course, as having some share in exports, and with Glasgow designated as a basing point for an equally wide range of finished steel. Information available suggests that Glasgow will be the basing point for only a very limited range of products, strip mill products, plates, universal beams, columns and a limited range of channels and joists which do not include modern metric sizes. That being so, it seems clear that it will be only a matter of time before the secondary mills in Lanarkshire will close for lack of orders. It would also seem clear that the industries using products at a basing point 200 miles away from the steel production will have to think again about their location. The BSC basing point pattern should fill in the blanks in this White Paper, which in the section relating to Scotland is more remarkable for what it does not say than for what is says.

If the Scottish consumer has to absorb the transport costs from English basing points for products which are at present being rolled in Scotland, we shall reach the height of stupidity. This either suggests some kind of cynicism about regionalism and social problems or it is an indication that the BSC is to close down further mills and finishing processes in Scotland. We have great reason for concern about the future of the special steels division and the foundries in Scotland. The products which the Glasgow basing point will have may give an indication of what the BSC sees as the future production pattern of the Scottish steel industry.

Whatever the case may be, whatever is said about it and whatever work we produce in Scotland, if the basing point pattern is as I have been told it is, then it will be infinitely more difficult to attract steel-using industries in Scotland in future than it has been in the past—and it has been difficult enough in the past. The problem in Scotland is one for the steel-using industries and not especially one for the steel-making industry.

The effect of the BSC strategy in Scotland will certainly be to undermine the existing steel-using industries in that country by eliminating mills which supply steel-using industries with their needs. The rod mill in Dalzell was working full out, but was transferred to the North-East coast in the name of rationalisation. It will mean that if we want rods for construction work we shall have to send to England for them. The future for those engaged in construction in Scotland is that they will have to buy steel from the English basing points, and that will make it more difficult and more costly.

We must be apprehensive about the intentions of the BSC in relation to Hall-side. It seems obvious that if we are to produce 1 million tonnes of special steel we should know how it is to be used. Is it to be used in the foundries, is it to be rolled out, or is it to be shipped raw somewhere else? What products which will come from Hallside will be used by customers in Scotland? The whole policy is menacing to Scotland. I see the rationalisation programme carried out by the BSC as a disaster for Scotland. By its nature the BSC must think on United Kingdom lines. That being so, it is quite logical, particularly in the context of the Common Market, to find Scotland outside the orbit of the corporation's thinking. Scotland and Scotsmen must find their own solutions and fight for them.

Rationalisation that has already taken place has had a devastating effect on Scottish steel making and has put the Scottish economy into great danger. Unless we in Scotland fight for a widely diversified steel industry, this danger will continue. I am not concerned about the massive mill at Hunterston, but there should be a plentiful supply of cheap Scottish steel for the Scottish steel-using industries.

Mr. Lawson

I hope that my hon. Friend will underline the fact that Scotland is one of the best points from which to export steel and steel products to Canada, the United States and across the Atlantic.

Mr. Robertson

I take my hon. Friend's point. We in Scotland have always exported steel. I hope he will agree that if we have to depend on steel manufactured in England, then Scotland will be out as a manufacturing nation and our economy will be finished. We cannot depend on the thinking of the BSC or on a Tory Government for the future of Scotland. We must insist that a proper range of products be made in Scotland for Scottish users.

7.0 p.m.

Mr. James Tinn (Cleveland)

I have been concerned in this debate to hear so many hon. Members urging caution and asking the Government to take a second look at the proposed strategy. I cannot imagine what has happened so basically in the technology or the social situation to produce this result in a House which, until the White Paper was published and the recent statement made, had been pressing the Government for a decision about British Steel Corporation's strategy.

The main complaint by the Opposition—and there have been complaints from Government back benchers—has been about delay. The principal charge I would make against the Government and their steel policy is that the necessary decisions have already been delayed for too long. I thought that there was a good deal of common ground on this point, and therefore I was surprised, as well as concerned, to find so many hon. Members urging caution.

Some hon. Members adopted this approach backed by attractive arguments. For example, the hon. Member for New Forest (Mr. Patrick McNair-Wilson) worked from the well-known standpoint involving the highly cyclical nature of demand for steel—meaning, one supposes, that there is likely to be a substantial proportion of capacity unemployed or underemployed at certain times. The hon. Gentleman urged flexibility and cautioned the House against an over-dependence on a monolithic and rigid approach to output and the economic costs of large modern plants.

The hon. Member for Canterbury (Mr. Crouch) also took up this point. He said that because of developments in the pumping of iron-ore in slurry form the cost-saving factors on coastal sites were not as great as had been assumed. These facts have been well known to the corporation for a very long time. They are at least as well able to come to a decision on that basis as is the House of Commons—which, until recent months, has rarely found time for more than a half-day debate on the future of this great industry.

One cannot help suspecting that Members concerned about the implications of the strategy for their own area are anxious that the Government should examine this subject from a different angle. That is an understandable reaction, but it is no way to plan the future of an industry. It might be argued that I am guilty of the opposite of sour grapes because it so happens that my constituency of Cleveland will benefit from the proposal to site the large complex at Redcar. But, as the White Paper points out, the Northern Region has borne the brunt of redundancy hitherto and has suffered a third of the BSC redundancies. We have heard little about this because there are rather fewer Northern Members than there are Welsh and Scottish Members. However, it must be emphasised that in the last five years the Northern Region has lost 10,000 job opportunities against 7,500 in Scotland and Wales put together. I am not seeking to enter a competition in misery on the lines of who has suffered the most, but I am trying to make an honest attempt at putting events in the Northern Region in proper perspective so as to justify in social terms the decision to site the complex at Redcar, a decision which on technological grounds was soundly based.

I do not know whether the Minister can give the comparative costs of alternative sites, but my information is that the savings at Redcar were very substantial. We cannot go on for very much longer considering trends of future production, methods and patterns. Surely the time has now come for decision. I believe that, on balance, the strategy is right.

I am by no means complacent about the impact on the areas concerned of the closures which have been announced. How can I be complacent? I am an ex-steel worker, a member of a steelworkers' union, my home town is Consett and my constituency Tees-side. I see the impact of redundancies in human terms and I am by no means complacent about what is happening. Therefore, I hope that full consideration will be given to phasing the closure of plants, such as those at Hartlepool, to try so far as possible to fit them into any new developments. Will the Minister comment on certain measures that can be taken to ameliorate the hardship that might otherwise be inflicted on redundant steelworkers?

A Press report in a local newspaper in my constituency refers to the negotiations between the British Government and the European Commission in Brussels involving the European Coal and Steel Community. The report suggests that this agreement will give redundant steel-men the best terms ever offered to workers displaced by industrial change. They will be paid 90 per cent. of their previous average weekly wage during periods of re-training and re-settlement and, according to the report, the British Government are pressing the Commission, which will meet half the cost, to allow these payments to be made for up to two years. I hope that we shall be told a little more about these negotiations which are referred to only briefly in the White Paper.

Later in the Press report there is a reference to the surprise caused in Brussels at the fact that these moves for a better deal for steelworkers have not been supported by the Department of Trade and Industry in submitting projects designed to create alternative jobs in closure areas to prevent confidence draining from the regions. If the report is correct, the Commission obviously is a little ahead of the Government. Therefore, I hope the Department will speedily catch up and will produce some of the projects which are so eagerly awaited by the Commission.

Finally, I should like to say a few general words about the future of the industry. I have never been a Jeremiah about the future of the steel industry. Many of the international comparison figures made on productivity grounds are highly selective ignoring such factors as capital costs in the countries where labour costs are low.

I was interested by, and somewhat amused even, to read recently in the December issue of German International of 1972 an article on steel which shows that very many of the fears and concerns we have so often heard about our own steel industry are shared by the German steel industry, and with a good deal of reason. The article pointed out that the output rise experienced by the German steel industry last year cannot hide the fact that it was an appalling year for the profits of the industry. It showed that in the first nine months of 1972 there was a decline of 7 per cent. in German steel consumption. By rationalisation the labour force was cut by 4.6 per cent.—36,000 people—in the first six months of 1972. The competition likely to follow from the British steel industry on our entry into the Common Market was viewed with great concern.

The hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Hooson) I observe has left the Chamber and the Liberal benches are in their normally deserted state. This is a pity, because I wish to pick up one of the criticisms he was making of British steel. Apart from the fact that it is publicly-owned, which is of course anathema to the Liberals, the hon. and learned Member thought its very great size inevitably meant that the decisions were not only wrong but catastrophic. Yet it is precisely the size of the British steel industry which gives it such an advantage over the German steel industry which, by the process of amalgamation it is attempting to carry out only belatedly, can compete with us in the creation of large coastal-based sites on which the future of the steel industry must, not entirely but very substantially, depend.

7.12 p.m.

Sir Anthony Meyer (Flint, West)

The hon. Member for Cleveland (Mr. Tinn), as a beneficiary of the strategy, gave a much warmer and more generous reception to that strategy than did the right hon. Member for Aberavon (Mr. John Morris), who sought to pick holes in it.

By and large, apart from the efforts of the hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Varley), in what I thought was an unworthy speech spreading gloom and despondency among the ranks of steelworkers, there has been an astonishing measure of agreement on both sides of the House in the debate so far—a general, if reserved, welcome for the strategy coupled with doubts about the wisdom of putting all our steel eggs in five baskets, and a repeated demand for rather more specific information than is available to us in the White Paper.

The strategy appears to be based on four assumptions. The first assumption is that only very large units, by which I mean up to or above 5 million tonnes, are viable as steel-making units in the new climate of world competition. Secondly, such major units must be sited very close to deep water in order to secure the economies which flow from the transport of ore in very large carriers. The third assumption is that the BOS is the most effective process and has completely superseded the open hearth processes and adaptations of open hearth processes. The fourth assumption is that these three factors, taken together, mean that steel produced in these conditions is so much cheaper that it far outweighs the additional costs involved in transporting the semi-finished product in the form of hot-rolled coil to the process-finishing plants whence it is sent to the users.

I propose to deal briefly with all four of these factors, and take first the concentration of the production of steel in five centres. It is incontestable that this will bring economies of production, but, as many hon. Members on both sides of the House have pointed out, with those economies of production will go not only a loss of flexibility but an increase of vulnerability. A dispute at any one of these five major steel-producing centres could completely cut the supplies of steel to the finishing plants which are dependent on them. Moreover, a delay in the construction of one of these five major sites or a snag in the commissioning of one of these sites could have the same crippling effect on those who are dependent for their supplies on these major producers.

We also bear in mind that the five major steel-producing plants, which will inevitably have to assemble large labour forces possibly drawn from outside the ranks of traditional steelworkers, must reasonably expect to have difficulties about shaking down and possibly certain labour troubles at the outset. Any one of these factors could gravely upset the calculations which led to the decision to concentrate steel production at these five works in the first place.

Mr. Tinn

I am not certain whether I heard the hon. Gentleman correctly. Was he assuming that the Redcar site on Teesside would draw its workers from those inexperienced in steel? If so, I can assure him he is entirely wrong. Even after the first stage of development takes place there will still be unemployed skilled steelworkers on Teesside.

Sir A. Meyer

I am ready to accept the assurance of the hon. Gentleman that in the case of Redcar all the additional workers drawn in will be men already living in, and part of, the steel industry. But this will not necessarily be the case with all five of the major steel producers.

I do not want to place too much weight on this factor. I suggest merely that it could alter the basis of calculations. I am not suggesting that because of these factors the strategy should be revised, but that, because of the existence of these factors, it is wise to build a safety margin into the strategy which to my mind is conspicuously lacking.

Mr. Skeet

This is not a question of an atomic power plant, where the technology is new and, as a result, there are difficulties. As these plants are conventional and built all over the world, serious problems are not likely to arise.

Sir A. Meyer

I hope my hon. Friend is right.

Of the possible snags I have pointed out, by far the most telling is the likelihood of delays in construction. Almost every major construction project embarked on in recent years in this country has attracted the attention of trouble-makers brought in from outside. I am not talking about steelworkers; I am referring to a vast expansion in the construction industry, which is much more susceptible to the kind of strikes my hon. Friend has in mind.

The second factor is proximity to deep water. It is obvious to anybody that this confers enormous cost advantages, but "enormous" is a loose word. The figure of an economy of £8 per tonne was quoted for steel produced as a result of proximity to water, as opposed to steel produced when the steelmaking plant is far away from deep water. Here again certain developments, although they will not entirely invalidate the conclusion, will alter the equation slightly. My hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr. Crouch) has already referred to the pumping ashore of iron ore in the form of slurry in a process known, I am told, as the Marconaflow process, which could radically alter the relative cost advantages of having the steelworks situated by deep water. It is, I believe, unlikely that remove those advantages can be entirely removed, but this could considerably alter the figure of £8 per tonne.

Taking the example of Port Talbot, according to the British Steel Corporation it will cost about £2 or £2-minus per tonne to convey hot rolled coil from Port Talbot to Shotton. But again, according to the corporation's calculations, it will be £8 per tonne cheaper to produce the steel at Port Talbot than it would nave been to produce it at Shotton.

Those seem to be the kind of figures against which one cannot argue. They may stand up to the factors about which I have been talking. They may resist any assaults from the relative cheapness of pumping ashore iron ore in the form of slurry. They may stand up to arguments about the possible delays and difficulties of commissioning new plant. All the same, I believe that we need rather more information on this than is available in the White Paper to enable us to form our judgment.

There is also the factor which does not, as far as I am aware, appear in the very rudimentary calculations in the White Paper, that in the particular case of Shotton—obviously I am more concerned with Shotton than with any other plant—it is very much nearer to the end users or a large number of them than is Port Talbot. Therefore, it seems that this item also ought to enter into the equation, because if we have the problem of transporting hot rolled coil from Port Talbot to Shot-ton, we also have the problem of transporting the finished coated steel from Shotton to the very large number of end users in the area surrounding Shotton. That, too, ought to be a factor which enters into the equation.

Thirdly, I turn to the question of the equipment used for steelmaking. There is no doubt that in the present state of technology the BOS process is the most efficient. It has rendered open hearth steelmaking obsolete. But though it is of proved efficiency the BOS process is by no means new, and its supremacy may not last for ever. That point has been made by a number of hon. Members on both sides of the House. What is certain is that the BOS process requires colossal capital expenditure.

What also appears to be the case is that some of these new methods reduce the amount of capital expenditure required in that they enable use to be made of existing open hearth installations, not merely the buildings but also the furnaces. There is, for example, a project being discussed whereby for, in these terms, the trifling sum of £7 million the existing open hearth furnaces at Shotton could be linked in tandem so as to expand steel production at Shotton sufficiently to provide the steel which is necessary at present to keep the finishing lines at Shotton busy.

I do not for one moment suggest that this process is one that could last indefinitely or that it could possibly compete in cheapness with the BOS process. The point I want to get across is that if by this relatively modest expenditure it is possible to keep the Shotton option open, bearing in mind the very large capital expenditure which is required to install really up-to-date equipment and bearing in mind the enormous cost of capital in present circumstances, it becomes very difficult to rule out altogether the expenditure on what one might call running repairs, the £7 million, in order to enable Shotton steel-making to continue in existence.

Mr. Eddie Griffiths

In all fairness, if the hon. Member is advocating that solution for Shotton he must also advocate it for Ebbw Vale, East Moors, Irlam, and any other open hearth furnaces. Therefore, he has completely negatived the idea of an expansion of the steel industry. He is settling for something that is second best.

Sir A. Meyer

The hon. Gentleman must always be listened to with great respect because he speaks with deep knowledge and complete honesty on the subject. I am making a special case, but it is a special case which has two sides. First, it is possible at Shotton or anywhere else to continue steel-making by the kind of running repairs about which I have been talking. But that in itself would not justify me in putting forward my argument. My argument would go on to say that Shotton is well placed to continue as a 2 million to 2½ million tonne producer with expenditure on the newer kind of steel technology, which I believe would be justified at Shotton bearing in mind its proximity to the end user of the scheme and the balance of costs in the social question which arise from balancing the costs of keeping Shotton going against the cost of producing new jobs in the same area.

On that basis there is a very strong argument, because to allow Shotton to go out of the steel-producing business will mean about 6,500 redundancies in the area. To provide alternative employment would cost, on the cheapest figure being bandied around, about £10,000 per new job. I have not yet heard a much lower estimate than that; though these estimates can vary enormously. In the oil refinery business I think it is about £1 million per job. But £10,000 is generally accepted as about the lowest figure of capital expenditure on which one can be fairly sure of providing a new job.

On that basis it will require about £65 million of capital investment in the Shotton area to produce jobs for those who are made redundant. For £65 million, in the present state of knowledge, it will be possible to provide a real modernisation of Shotton's open hearth equipment—not running repairs—by one of the newer processes, such as SIP or QBOP processes, which are now coming up for consideration.

It is on this balance between the way in which steel making at Shotton can be prolonged for a shortish period by expenditure of about £7 million and then continued into the indefinite future by the adoption of the very latest steel-making techniques, and because this is justified on the grounds of Shotton being well placed for expansion with plenty of land on which to build, being close to the users and having available at Morpeth, near Birkenhead, facilities for the piping ashore of iron ore in the form of slurry, that this adds up to a very powerful argument in favour of keeping open the Shotton option.

Be that as it may, I hope that my hon. Friend will very carefully consider these arguments and balance them against the case put forward by British Steel. I hope he will decide that there is a powerful case for changing the decision about steelmaking at Shotton.

One thing seems absolutely incontestable. This was a point made in particular by the hon. Member for The Hartlepools (Mr. Leadbitter). It is simply not practical to think in terms of providing new jobs in these steel-making communities within the kind of time scale which seems to be envisaged in the White Paper.

Paragraph 49 of the White Paper talks about beginning the closure of steelmaking capacity at Shotton in the second half of this decade. That is grim enough, but from remarks let slip by senior officials of the BSC it has become evident that the second half of the decade means some day after 31st March 1974. I find this very alarming, as, I believe, does the Secretary of State for Wales.

With this fate hanging over our heads, I feel so intensely unhappy and worried about the future of the jobs of the men whose whole livelihood revolves around that great works that I must ask by hon. Friend whether he can give me an unequivocal assurance that the Corporation will not be prompted to begin the rundown of steel making at Shotton in 1974 or 1975—I hope, for very much longer. Unless I get a firm assurance that a rundown at any time during 1974 or 1975 is ruled right out of court, I am very sorry, but I will not be able to support the Government in the Lobby tonight.

7.32 p.m.

Mr. Donald Coleman (Neath)

The hon. Member for Flint, West (Sir A. Meyer) accused my hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Varley) of spreading gloom and despondency. Having listened to him, I must say that the hon. Member himself has not done very much to help the feelings of gloom amongst the steel workers at Shotton. This is a matter for him to deal with with his own constituents, many of whom work in this works. My purpose is not to take up a parochial point of view but rather to place on record the views and feelings of the organisation which is most concerned with the steel workers in this country.

The views of the Government on the steel industry fortunately show that there has been a turning away from the previously held rigid position, which they deployed in the early flush of victory during the summer and autumn of 1970, and which favoured the killing off of lame ducks.

That is to be welcomed, but it does not relieve us of the responsibility of expressing in this debate the anxieties about the future that have been expressed to us. When one contemplates the Government's handling of the nation's industrial affairs, one frequently unearths situations of anguish. The present problems of the gas industry, the hospital workers, and the Civil Service are but examples of the Government's mishandling of industrial situations that have caused ordinary decent law-abiding working people to adopt the actions of those who are thrust down by despair. We have not yet reached that situation in the steel industry, but we are sufficiently advanced along that road for the anxieties to have become visible.

On 18th April, in London, the Iron and Steel Trades Confederation has convened a national conference so that it may discuss the serious concern in which the Confederation holds the proposals for the steel industry. Such a conference has never been held before in the history of this Confederation.

The White Paper, awaited with almost bated breath after two and a half years of frantic study by the Government on what it expects of the British Steel Industry, advanced us no further than the Secretary of State's statement to the House before the Christmas Recess. This is an indication of the insensitivity of the Government and Ministers to the feelings that motivate those engaged in the steel industry. When will the Government realise that the workers of this nation are people who respond best when they know what they are being called upon to respond to?

The White Paper tells us the good news and the bad news but it gives us very little information about what the good news really means. No one who is familiar with the steel industry will deny that large sections of the industry need bringing up to date. The open-hearth furnace method of large-scale steel making, for instance, cannot for much longer compete with the basic oxygen converter, and, like the old puddling furnaces of the last century, will soon in its turn become obsolete. Technological change and economic pressure have forced a geographical shift in the places where steel is being made to the proximity of deep water ports through which large tonnages of rich ore can be shipped at minimum transport costs.

This the British steel worker knows for himself. He is a realist about his industry. He has never feared facing up to new methods of production. If he had, the post-war revolution in the tinplate industry of South Wales would not have been achieved with the harmony which ensured its success. The British steel worker is aware of the economic arguments which encompass his industry and of the alarming effects of the invasion of the world's steel markets by Japan, using the most modern steel-making methods.

He has also recognised the opportunities of increasing their steel exports to Britain that are afforded to other EEC countries, following Britain's accession to the Community. He knows only too well that the economic case for a modern steel industry in Britain is indisputable.

The Iron and Steel Trades Confederation, whose members will bear the brunt of the redundancies foreshadowed in the White Paper, have always advocated modernisation of the British steel industry, which cannot be said of the former private owners. Had they been as convinced of this as the workers have been, some of the difficulties that steel workers will have to face over the rest of this decade would have been avoided.

Writing about this recognition by the workers of the need for a modern steel industry, Sir David Davies, the General Secretary of the Confederation, quoted from a policy document published in 1931, which entirely summed up the attitude of the steel worker towards his industry, and which is as true now as it was then: We recognise that, in the process of adjusting an unorganised industry, displacement of labour must occur, but this would be taken into account and, as far as possible, provided for in the conscious planning of the industry. The document also warned against …the disregard of social obligations in respect of the effect upon local communities by the closing of works without any preconsidered arrangements as to the disposal of the labour displaced". It is 42 years since that declaration by the Iron and Steel Trades Confederation in 1931, times which were more disadvantageous for the workers than today, but they spell out the attitude of the Confederation towards the modernisation of the British steel industry currently being expressed. It is an attitude which says "Yes" to modernisation, but which also demands that the industry lives up to its social responsibilities. This means that, as the nation is now the owner of the major proportion of Britain's steel industry, the Government must assume the social responsibilities for it.

The Confederation makes it abundantly clear to the Government that, while its policy is to co-operate in the modernisation of the steel industry, its co-operation is dependent upon the recognition, in tangible terms, that the Government have a responsibility towards the workers displaced from the industry and the communities from whence they come.

The Confederation will not tolerate steel workers being made redundant while there is no alternative employment available for them. The Government need to show more recognition of this resolve on the part of my union than they have in the White Paper. I suggest that Ministers individually should show a recognition of this resolve, too.

Recently during Welsh Questions the Secretary of State for Wales showed himself to be niggled at the fact that I put to him my concern about how the workers will fare who will be displaced at Ebbw Vale, Cardiff and Shotton. I spoke then, as I have today, as a member of the union which will find its members bearing the brunt of this modernisation. I demand, as does my union, to know more of what is in the Government's mind to help these workers and their communities. The White Paper does not advance our knowledge or confidence very much. Because of this, I emphasise again that it is the Government's responsibility to give a firm guarantee that alternative employment will be available before the closure of any steel plant is permitted.

The steel workers of this country are amongst the most responsible people in our land. When they recognise the need for modernisation and that it can be carried through only with their cooperation, they have the right to demand protection for themselves and their communities.

7.43 p.m.

Mr. Eddie Griffiths (Sheffield, Bright-side)

In recent weeks I have been reading with a great deal of interest about alternative proposals in some of the works that will be in jeopardy in the next 10 years. I have read about various techniques of improving productivity in those works by adapting open hearth furnaces. Indeed, the hon. Member for Flint, West (Sir A. Meyer) illustrated some of these techniques.

It is right to remind ourselves that we are dealing not with 14 separate companies, each looking after a given works and trying to improve the profitability, the efficiency and the competitiveness of the material produced in those works, but with a nationalised corporation which has many options open to it. It is not part of its remit to insist that steel making should continue at plant A, B, C, or D. Indeed, it is asked by all Governments to run its production efficiently and profitably and to compete both at home and internationally. Therefore, when we talk about £3,000 million over the next 10 years, it is incumbent upon the BSC to invest that money to produce the cheapest possible steel, to get the most for its money, and to get a return on the capital invested.

As I said in an intervention during the speech by the hon. Member for Flint, West a particular plant does not have the sole right to be modified. What is good for Peter should be good for Paul. We cannot salvage one works, improve its efficiency slightly, and say that it is all right for 15 years. We must go right through and modify all the plants.

The White Paper covers four broad points. The first is the need for a steel industry in the 1980s. I suspect that many people think in terms of the steel industry of the present or of the immediate past. The White Paper is concerned about the industry in the 1980s and beyond. We should be talking about that, not about the past.

The second point concerns the size of the industry, the third the type of industry that we shall have, and the fourth, certainly not least in importance, the social problems which this change will bring about.

The need for a steel industry in the 1980s is beyond doubt. It is not even a debating point between the Government and the Opposition, so we can dismiss that.

On the size of the industry I have a major quarrel with the BSC plan endorsed by the Government in the White Paper. I still believe that they are being too conservative. I should have liked 5 million to 7 million ingot tonnes of modern steelmaking capacity to be laid down for the 1980s. I accept that if my idea had come to fruition it would have meant, as the Secretary of State said, an acceleration of the closing of obsolete plants—plants based on open-hearth practices, and badly located plants.

I believe that we have dilly-dallied too much with the steel industry. It has been messed about and become a football for the politicians. The industry does not have a good competitive stance. There have been years of neglect and time is not on our side.

Looking at the escalating imports of both finished and semi-finished steel products and considering the price advantage that we now enjoy in international steel prices, I believe that we could reduce imports to a great extent and produce the steel ourselves. I am sure that we could make a substantial breakthrough in the export markets. Coupled with the price advantage, which I think we shall still have even after the increases of 1973, I believe that we can go out and sell our steel competitively. We are approaching boom conditions in the industry. We are already hearing of lengthening delivery dates. It is tragic that an industry, which is the pillar of the British economy, should have to tell its customers: "We are sorry. You cannot have your steel in six weeks. It is more likely to be six months." Our whole economy can suffer as a result.

Enough has been said about the type of industry that we shall have. The emphasis is on coastal sites—BOS plants. I believe that this will be a competitive method of making steel certainly until the late 1980s and possibly into the 1990s. Some hon. Members have mentioned various new technologies. There is no need to rule out these techniques and technologies. For example, if in the post-1975 period direct reduction comes into vogue, what is to stop the Government or the BSC from saying, "We shall put down 3 million ingot tonnes capacity of direct reduction techniques"? If another method is developed, there is no reason why it and other innovations should not be superimposed on the plan we are discussing.

Not very much has been said about special steels, the manufacture of which is carried out mainly in the Sheffield-Rotherham area, though it is also carried out throughout the country. Some capital investment is to go to that sector.

I endorse some of the points made by the hon. Member for New Forest (Mr. Patrick McNair-Wilson) about the private sector. The time is ripe for the Government to instigate a study of that sector and report on its problems and how it can be helped by Governments in the future.

Some of my hon. Friends may say, "We don't recognise a private sector", but I am a realist. Whether I like it or not, the private sector produces about 3½ million ingot tonnes a year. The bulk of the private sector is in Sheffield, and if it disappeared our unemployment would increase dramatically from 3.8 per cent. possibly well into the range of 6–7 per cent. We must consider sympathetically the needs of the private sector, which contributes substantially to the industry.

I turn now to the social problems resulting from change. I agree with the strategy in the BSC's proposals and endorse 100 per cent. the selection of the expansion points. I am delighted about Redcar, and I believe that the plans for Port Talbot, the extension of "Anchor" and Llanwern, which is now going through, and the development at Ravenscraig are right. With the best will in the world, modernisation means that the obsolete go out.

The social problems fall into two categories—the problem of the present steelworker and the problem of the job loss in a given area, which I believe is the bigger problem. For example, if there are to be 6,000 redundancies in Ebbw Vale, unless jobs are replaced there will be a loss of that number of jobs for all time, however well the redundant steelworkers are treated.

One of the deplorable things about the British steel industry is that there are still people of over 65 working in it. That is condoned by the unions representing them in many cases. The matter should be examined immediately. When a steelworker who has sweated his inside out for some 50 years has to continue after the age of 65, it is a tragedy and a condemnation of the industry. There should be immediate discussions between the BSC and the unions to bring about a scaled retirement, starting in 1975 and finishing in 1980, so that workers aged 60 and over can leave the industry with dignity and a decent pension.

The question of manning should be considered, and the Minister should also say something about redundancy payments. I can visualise a steelworker working alongside a docker unloading iron ore, with the docker receiving £4,000 redundancy pay and the steelworker, made redundant for the same reason, receiving £600, £700 or £800. What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. Severance pay should be examined in detail.

Many people are cynical about the task forces. We are concerned about the 50,000 jobs that will be lost in the next 10 years. It may have escaped most hon. Members' attention that between January 1966 and November 1972, 71,000 steel jobs disappeared, a rate of 12,000 a year. Now we face a problem of 5,000 a year. I sympathise with those concerned about their own interests, and understand their anxiety. But the sooner we on the Opposition side in particular feel for all redundant workers, whether post office workers, coal miners, British Rail employees, or steelworkers, the better. The tragedy is that if we come from a steel constituency we are concerned with steelworkers. Pits have been closed throughout the country, and the steelworker has not given the matter a thought. The railways have contracted, and the steelworker has not given that a thought. Now it is the turn of the steelworker. The lesson is that we should look intelligently and sympathetically at all job contractions.

I do not take a cynical view of the task forces. Their innovation may prove successful, and I sincerely hope that it will. I ask the Minister to make available to Members all the figures made available to works councils and local authorities, so that we may examine these matters objectively.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Neath (Mr. Coleman) said, the British steelworker has never said that the steel industry owes him a job throughout his life. But the industry and the steelworker do say that he is entitled to work. I come from the same union as my hon. Friend and can confirm the position of the Iron and Steel Trades Confederation, that, unless there is evidence that alternative jobs are coming to the areas hardest hit, including those affected in the past six years since nationalisation, the unions concerned will feel resentment. The Government's biggest task after the White Paper is to show the steelworker evidence that jobs are coming to the places hardest hit.

7.58 p.m.

Mr. Peter Rost (Derbyshire, South-East)

It is a great pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside (Mr. Eddie Griffiths), because I agree with so much of what he says, and because he talks more sense than the whole of his Front Bench put together.

The modernisation of the steel industry is long overdue. The Financial Times put the matter rather well on 22nd December, when, commenting on the preparation of the White Paper, it said: The British steel industry has slipped back in the past few years, partly because of the prolonged uncertainty over its ownership, its organisational structure and its overall development plans…. The main requirement is simply that the BSC should behave commercially. The new investment programme should at last provide the equipment that the Corporation needs to do its job effectively. But the history of the British Steel Corporation since nationalisation does not inspire me with a great deal of confidence that the performance can match the hopes in the White Paper, which says: The Corporation estimates that more than half the expenditure can be met from depreciation provisions and retained profits;". I hope that I do not appear to be too cynical if I suggest that there has not been much evidence of profits so far.

The truth is that nationalisation has propped up obsolescence and has subsidised inefficiency and held back productivity. Moreover, it has isolated the industry from competition and stifled growth and modernisation. The nationalisation of the industry and the management which has accompanied it has converted profits into losses and deprived the industry of cash flow that it desperately needs to modernise. Meanwhile, although the productivity of the industry has been rising, it has been rising only at about half the rate of our overseas competitors. I blame the management almost entirely for these inadequacies.

The competition which the BSC has comes primarily from private enterprise steel in Germany, the United States and Japan. Because our industry has been in a political dogfight for more than 20 years the investment which has been desperately required was withheld prior to the industry's nationalisation by the Labour Government who, following nationalisation, neglected it even further. The Sunday Telegraph summed it up rather well in an editorial on 24th December. It said: The fear of public ownership had made private steel producers shy away from putting new money into their businesses and investment in modern plant was sadly neglected as a result. That was before nationalisation. We know that since it has been starved even further.

This House should be realistic and admit that nationalisation as a form of ownership and control of this industry has been a catastrophic failure. It has failed to meet the demands of the market and the customers, it has been a disaster for the taxpayer, and it has been a drag on the economy. What is more, the inefficiency which has been generated through nationalisation and the uncommercial and unenterprising attitudes of the industry's bureaucratic management has deprived the industry of profits and cash flow and therefore of investment—

Mr. Lawson

Reading.

Mr. Rost

If the hon. Member for Motherwell (Mr. Lawson) wishes to intervene I shall be happy to give way to him.

Mr. Lawson

We do not want a speech read out. Let us have a contribution that the hon. Member for Derbyshire, South-East (Mr. Rost) thinks about while he is on his feet.

Mr. Rost

In my view the industry should have generated far more of its own capital investment for expansion over these years than it has, and there is nothing in the White Paper which inspires me with confidence that the situation is likely to change in the future.

Mr. Lawson

Still reading.

Mr. Rost

Moreover the Corporation have failed as a monopoly—

Mr. Lawson

On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Is it in order for an hon. Member on the back benches, as distinct from a Government spokesman who is opening a debate, to read every word of his speech?

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Robert Grant-Ferris)

Of course it is not the custom of the House for an hon. Member to read his speech. The practice is always deprecated by the Chair and by all lion. Members. But it is the custom to allow Members to refresh their memories from copious notes.

Mr. Rost

I am sorry that the hon. Member for Motherwell does not regard my contribution to the debate as a serious one. Beyond saying that, I can do little to please him.

As a monopoly the corporation has failed to meet even the captive British market. The large-scale underwater pipes required for North Sea gas have to be imported from Japan, and only the American steel industry appears capable of producing the high-quality steel which may be required for our future nuclear power industry. Now we even find that a proportion of high-quality sheet steel is to be imported from the Continent.

That leads me to ask whether the present management can be trusted with an investment of £3,000 million. Can we see any reference in the White Paper to whether the Government are satisfied on this point? The White Paper does not even seem to ask whether the corporation will make the right decisions in the future.

In Derbyshire my steel constituents refer to the bureaucratic hierarchy in the head office of the BSC as the "ex-United Steel Mafia". That may be a slight exaggeration, but there is no doubt that what is going on in the management seems to be the subject of a fair amount of covering up.

A number of hon. Members opposite have referred to the McKinsey Report. If the industry is accountable to the public, we require some clue about whether the McKinsey Report's recommendations are being or will be implemented. We need to be satisfied on this point.

If I may be allowed to quote for the third and final time, the Economist summed it up on 23rd December when it said: If the Government is going to throw money around like this in the nationalised industries, the least the country have a right to expect is that the industries are run as efficiently as possible. When is the shake-up coming at the British Steel Corporation? That brings me to my conclusion, which is that since nationalisation the industry has not inspired me with a great deal of confidence that the vast Government financing operation which is proposed in the White Paper is capable of being handled properly by the present management without suitable supervision from outside. I believe that such vast Government financing can be acceptable to the public only if there is some reassurance that an improved financial discipline will be imposed. In my view that can come only through the discipline of a competitively orientated management in a competitive situation, with account- ability to shareholders and to an outside capital market. In my view, therefore, it can come only through the introduction of private capital.

I believe that the industry should never have been nationalised. It should now be partially returned to private enterprise. With that proviso, I believe that the White Paper is the most exciting development that the industry has had for more than three decades.

8.8 p.m.

Mr. John Smith (Lanarkshire, North)

It is unfortunate that more people who have an interest in the future of the steel industry were not able to hear the ridiculous speech which has just been made by the hon. Member for Derbyshire, South-East (Mr. Rost). It is depressing that Government supporters should be invited to give knock-about turns to keep their side of the House represented in the debate when there is a tremendous pressure by Opposition Members who are deeply interested in the future of the industry and are competing for a share of the brief time available. Sadly, that is a situation that we are used to in debates affecting regional policy in relation to some of our basic industries.

I have no intention of taking up the futile and barren attack of the hon. Member for Derbyshire, South-East upon the concept of nationalisation. It is sufficient to say that on page 8 the White Paper passes a comment about the steel industry as it was under private ownership. It says: Nationalisation brought to the BSC a large number of works with obsolete technology and low productivity. That is a sufficient epitaph for the way in which the steel industry was run when in private hands.

This debate is about a much more important topic than that sterile dispute; it is about the whole future of a great industry and of many areas which are dependent upon that industry for employment and future growth. The Opposition have been wise to criticise the lack of information which is apparent throughout the White Paper. It makes it extremely difficult for people trying to grapple with the implications for their areas to make much sense from what is proposed.

In his typical salesman approach the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, introducing the debate, did not take the opportunity to fill out the gaps and deal with the doubts and uncertainties in the White Paper. He stressed the size of the investment to be made and tried to play down the loss of jobs—fiddling about with regional statistics, telling us how many jobs had been attracted to Scotland from 1960–69, without telling us the number of jobs that had been lost. We have to deal with net figures, instead of playing round in a juvenile way like that.

Before we get too lyrical about the size of the investment, let us remember that it is spread over 10 years and that the White Paper says, at paragraph 37, that the Corporation would have had to invest up to £200 million a year simply to maintain the existing asset structure. We would be committed to £200 million just to keep running on the spot. When we bear this in mind we can see that this is not such a bountiful venture as the Government sometimes make out. It is not necessarily an over-ambitious investment programme. We are now talking in terms different from the 43 million tones of which we once spoke. I do not think that that was a figure plucked from the air. It was based on planning by the corporation not so long ago.

It is clear from a study of the White Paper that the Government have rejected what they called the bold, high investment course, in favour of a policy which has a large element of minimising risks. The importance of looking at the White Paper is to see what it spells out for areas which are dependent upon steel for their livelihood. The White Paper refers to this in paragraph 33. Recognition is given to the need for concern about the effect on regional economies. It particularly mentions Scotland, as well it might, because of the important steel-using industries such as shipbuilding, engineering, and North Sea oil developments.

The White Paper blandly concludes that since a wide range of products will continue to be produced in Scotland there is not much cause for concern. I beg leave to differ. This White Paper sees the end of the Hunterston dream, the whole concept of which has stirred the imagination of West and Central Scotland. It was felt that in the deep-water facilities provided there, there would be a real power-house of regional regeneration, that we would be able to see through that, not only an expansion of the steel industry, but of the whole of our industrial life in West and Central Scotland.

All of that would have been given a great boost, up to a new level of activity and promise for the future. This White Paper dashes that dream completely and for ever. I beg the Government not to rule out the possibility of any future developments at Hunterston. They must be flexible in their thinking so as not to condemn Hunterston to sterility. I hope that the options will be kept open.

There is a certain irony in the fact that as soon as the Government made clear that the corporation was not going ahead at Hunterston, a number of competing developments have sprung up, including a proposition for a foreign mill. There is considerable confusion at present about what is intended for the area. I very much regret that we have missed a great opportunity there. Scotland will take a long time to recover from the loss of morale which has been brought about by the dashing of its hopes, which at one time senior representatives of the Government in Scotland encouraged.

The Under-Secretary of State for Trade and Industry (Mr. Peter Emery): Will the hon. Gentleman tell the House whether he believes that the Government should impose on the BSC management a "Hunterston solution" which would be contrary to the corporation's view about the best possible management of Scottish steel?

Mr. Smith

I would want to see a much bigger programme for British steel. I believe that, if left to its own devices, the corporation would be operating a much bigger programme. If it were able to operate the 43 million tonne programme there would be a real future for a green field site somewhere in the United Kingdom. There would be a fight about its location but Hunterston would be a strong contender. Now it seems that possibility is to be denied to us. I ask the Government to regard the current Scottish figure as a floor and not a ceiling. The Government and the corporation should keep their options open to enable them to increase the range of activities of the Scottish steel industry.

It is important that we retain the capacity to produce a wide range of steel products in Scotland so that we can service the wide range of steel-using industries there. Steel forms the sinews and raw material of industrial development. It is important that we have a wide range of products for Scottish industry. I ask that consideration be given to the introduction of a tinplate galvanising plant in Scotland to extend the range of products.

There is great difficulty in determining what the White Paper means. I do not know why the section on Scotland is phrased in the way it is, but it creates more mysteries than it solves. We are told that some new high-grade specialist products will be introduced. We do not know what they are. We are told that in some cases primary rolling will cease at many mills, but we are not told which ones. We are not told when the closures will take place, which areas will suffer redundancies, or the time scale for these events. It would have been better if the Government had given much more information.

It is not even clear where the promised £400 million is to be spent. The Government have attempted to clear this up, yet the confusion is as great as ever. We can pin down about £200 million, but that still leaves another £200 million to be accounted for. I gather from my hon. Friends from Wales that they are in the same difficulty. If we have a real plan for the future we need to know its details, so that we can assess its effects in our areas. This plan does not give us that detail, and the Opposition are right to table the critical amendment, which I hope the House will approve.

8.18 p.m.

Mr. Eric Cockeram (Bebington)

While I heard the earlier speeches in the debate, I apologise for the fact that my other parliamentary duties have caused me to miss some of the more recent speeches. Like all other hon. Members I am pleased that the Government have shown their confidence—

Mr. Roy Hughes

On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I have great respect for your judgment in these matters but is it not rather nauseating that the hon. Member for Bebington (Mr. Cookerham), who has just come into the debate, should be called when some of us have been sitting here for five hours waiting for a chance to speak?

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Robert Grant-Ferris)

Order. The hon. Gentleman knows that these matters are for the Chair to decide. I am most anxious to get everyone who wants to speak into the debate. The less time we waste the better.

Mr. Cockeram

I am pleased that the Government have shown their confidence in the future of British steel by suporting this massive investment. It is essential for the steel industry to remain competitive, particularly if it is to increase its output and to sell the increased quantities envisaged in this White Paper. Some of the steel will have to be sold abroad, hence the need for the corporation to be effective.

Investment on this scale will involve substantial productivity increases. This seems to pose two problems. The first is that the increased ouput will clearly have to be sold because production is not an end in itself. Consumption is the end and production is but the means to that end. It is no good steel companies or anybody else producing a product which cannot be sold. Secondly, it will involve a reduction of manpower in the steel industry. Similarly, therefore, this problem has to be solved.

I believe that, fortunately, the solution to both these problems is on the same lines—namely, acceptance of the fact that as a country becomes more sophisticated in its production techniques so a smaller percentage of the employed population is engaged in production and an increased percentage of the employed population is engaged in distribution. This can be seen in advanced countries around the world.

Hence, I support the Government in their tactics in taking measures at this stage, in advance of the implementation of the proposals for the steel industry, to stimulate demand in this country. I think the Government were completely right, for example, not to seek to continue the process whereby one aspect of employment, distribution, was singled out for penalty in taxation and another aspect of employment, production, was singled out as somehow wholly desirable. I refer, of course, to SET. I am very pleased that we are moving over to a tax which does not appear to discriminate in this way.

Similarly, I am pleased that the Government have taken measures to remove the penalties of hire-purchase control which existed previously, because this likewise stimulates consumption. We have already seen the benefit of the ending of these restrictions, which is to the advantage of the steel industry, make no bones about it. In the motor car industry, the washing machine industry, and others, output is up, and that is to the benefit of the steel industry, because it is no good the steel industry producing if it cannot sell its product—and it can sell only to consumers. That is why it is important that the Government get that aspect of their policy right in advance of this substantial investment.

For that reason I support this programme, bearing in mind the fact that it is inevitable that such an investment, involving modern methods of production, will mean that fewer persons are engaged in that production. It must, therefore, be associated with stimulating demand by consumers, which the Government are doing. That is why I think the Government have their priorities and their timing right.

Mr. Deputy Speaker

We have about 40 minutes left, and I think I can get in all the speakers who passionately want to be called. I hope that, as I call them, they will look at the time and divide the 40 minutes up between them.

8.24 p.m.

Mr. Roy Hughes (Newport)

Certainly this White Paper which we are debating has told us little that we did not know before. Paragraph 37 points out that £200 million annually is needed to maintain the existing asset structure of the corporation and that an average of £300 million annually is now needed to expand at the level proposed in the document. Presumably this is where the figure of £3,000 million for the decade comes from.

Out of this £3,000 million, of course, £900 million could be, as the White Paper puts it, for Wales. That figure is shrouded in mystery. Certainly the answer was not forthcoming in the debate on the industry which we had on 25th January in this House, and it was certainly not forthcoming from the Secretary of State in his opening address this afternoon.

I have pursued this matter of investment in Wales with the Minister by letter, and on 15th February I received a letter from him which I can only say, with great respect, added confusion to confusion. I and some of my colleagues have been speculating about how this £900 million is to be allocated. We have thought in terms of £400 million for Port Talbot, which would bring production there to 6 million tonnes annually. It would also, according to the document, provide 1,000 jobs at Port Talbot. It is remarkable, though, that as late as 1971 over 2,000 jobs were lost at Port Talbot owing to open-hearth closures.

The questions I want to ask this evening are the following. First, what is the gross investment at Port Talbot, including the replacement of outdated equipment? Secondly, what proportion relates to new investment? How much is earmarked to build new plant and how much is to replace or maintain existing plant? For example, I understand that Port Talbot has an ageing hot-strip mill. It was apparently built in 1953 to a prewar design and it will need replacement or considerable modernisation. This could cost as much as £200 million. Here there is no new expansion, but presumably this figure is included in the overall figure of £900 million for Wales. Thus if the bulk of the £900 million is merely to bring Port Talbot up to date, I say that £900 million is quite inadequate even to bring our major plants up to the level of technology at which they should be now.

Then the plot deepens, as one might say, because the Minister's letter pointed out to me that this development at Port Talbot was not expected to cost anything like the amount I had envisaged.

I am also told that there will be continuing expenditure on schemes already under way, of which the major one, the Minister pointed out, was to expand the steelmaking capacity at the Spencer works, Newport. The major factor here is the provision of a third blast furnace. I was not told by the Minister that this was first announced on 21st January 1970 —that is over three years ago. It cannot be believed that our competitors work in such a vague and retrospective manner. The Spencer, according to the plan, is to be one of the two integrated works in Wales that will be left out of the proposed closures. It is well sited, inasmuch as it is now connected to the two principal motorway networks. Nevertheless, according to Lord Melchett's definition, it is still a three-legged animal, because it has no iron-ore terminal, and certainly the workpeople there cannot be satisfied until they get one. If we are to emulate Japanese methods, this iron-ore terminal is vitally necessary.

Certainly these matters of investment call for full public explanation, and the workpeople concerned should certainly know what is happening about their future. We need to know all about the 2,500 jobs which, according to Lord Melchett, are to be lost in Wales. Can we be given straight answers when the Minister replies and not evasion which we have had hitherto?

There is no joy in the proposals for either Ebbw Vale or East Moors. I hope that that aspect of the proposals will not be implemented. However, the corporation has said that it wants to help these areas. It has set up task forces. One of the practical ways in which it can help these areas will be to develop the Spencer works. Both of the works are within commuter distance of Newport with its iron ore terminal and the other developments which are now needed at the Spencer works.

I am disturbed at the rumours that the principal trade union involved in the steel industry has accepted the proposal put forward by the Government and the BSC. The General Secretary of that union has been silent on these matters. Sir David Davies, as he is so affectionately known in the steel journals, should now be leading a fight against the closures. My hon. Friend the Member for Neath (Mr. Coleman) pointed out that the union was having a national conference to discuss these matters. National conferences in the Iron and Steel Trades Confederation are a new venture. I noticed in my local newspaper, the South Wales Argus, on 1st January this year the headline Knighthood for ex-mill boy and I am sure this is a well-deserved honour for Sir David. But if these proposals go through there will be a lot of other ex-mill boys in Ebbw Vale and they will not be given knighthoods—they will probably end up in a dole queue.

It is becoming apparent in Wales that we shall have to unite to fight these closures. We have a right to demand that before such closures take place new work is provided and communities are not left derelict.

8.32 p.m.

Mr. George Lawson (Motherwell)

We have waited a long time for the White Paper. It is getting on for three years since we were told that this deep-rooted analysis and study of the steel industry was to be carried out. I would have thought we would have had an exciting document after all this time. I am amused that the term "exciting" has been used so many times. The Secretary of State was almost unable to contain himself in the use of the word, and the hon. Member for Derbyshire, South-East (Mr. Rost) referred to the "exciting prospects" for the industry contained in the document.

With the short time at my disposal I shall confine myself to the situation in Lanarkshire and ether parts of Scotland away from Hunterston, because most steelmaking industry is in Lanarkshire, apart from the works at Glengarnock, Ayrshire. I have to a considerable degree supported the steps to be taken to ensure that we have a sensible industry in Scotland, but if we examine what is proposed in the document we find that it is certainly not "exciting".

Paragraph 44 says that investment in modern plant will raise BSC capacity in Scotland from the present 3,700,000 tonnes to 4,500,000 tonnes by the early 1980s. To raise steelmaking capacity in Scotland from 3,700,000 tonnes to 4,500,000 tonnes in 10 years is to step up capacity by only 2 per cent. per annum. If the Minister is saying that there is something exciting about an expansion of Scotland's steelmaking capacity by 2 per cent. per annum over a period of 10 years, I have a rather different idea about what "exciting" means. If he says it is better than was achieved before, I refer him to the White Paper where in paragraph 4, it says that during the period when the steel industry, both in private and public ownership, was being so badly treated the average growth of industry was 1.7 per cent. That is not very different from what it was between 1955 and 1970. The average growth then was 1.7 per cent., so that 2 per cent. is not so very different or so exciting in terms of the prospects that confront us in Scotland.

I put it to the hon. Gentleman, and through him to the Secretary of State, that he ought to withdraw the word "exciting". This is a very modest and very cautious plan. Lord Melchett talks about his flexibility. The very root of this flexibility is the caution with which the whole thing is envisaged. We talk of £3,000 million being spent, but that is a projection into the future. It is thought that approximately £300 million a year will continue to be spent, but nobody can give us any figures. It is very much a guess in the dark. It is hoped that this kind of expansion can go on, but it can be more than that. These are some of the specified things to be done.

It is fair to say that at Ravenscraig it is intended to step up production to 3.2 million tons. It is fair enough to say that that will cost a certain amount. It is fair to speak of a development at Clydesdale and say that development of the ore terminal at Hunterston is to cost £36 million—a very necessary thing. I trust that it is not all a question of hope. We are told that it is intended to develop a 1 million ton capacity electric are plant at Hallside to give us steel—because we must have steel and if we were to get anything less than 4½ million tons in this period it would be a deplorable development. I tell the Under-Secretary of State that the very minimum that we may look for is 4½ million tons, and I would hope we can get substantially more.

Mr. Emery

The whole House has the highest regard for the hon. Member for Motherwell (Mr. Lawson) with his many years of service, but will he understand that I and the Government accept his desire for flexibility? The flexibility in the plan provides for greater expansion, if we can do it, as well as for the scheme overall.

Mr. Lawson

I am crediting the hon. Gentleman and the Government with trying to do these things. I want to see them done, and I will back them if they are genuinely trying to do them. But I am underlining the point that we want these things done at the very least. In terms of the works we have, which the hon. Gentleman may not have properly appreciated, there is a great deal of talk about Ravenscraig, but there is also the Dalzcll works, with 2,800 people. We do not know what is happening there. There is the Lanarkshire works, with about 1,600 workers. We do not know what is happening there. No one knows what is to happen at the Craigneuk works, with a further 1,400 to 1,600 people. There is certain talk about finishing processes, but we cannot employ all these workers on the basis of finishing processes.

It is about time the British Steel Corporation was able to tell us what it intends to do about works of that kind. It is about time we had more information. We have had no information at all. Certainly, after all these years of studying the matter, it is time we knew what was happening to those works and what is to happen to the Craigneuk special steel section. We do not know. At the present time this is a very important jobbing mill. It is doing a very good job, and those in the area think that it ought to continue.

Similarly, we do not know what will happen with the steel foundry in the area. These are the matters about which we must have information.

The Government must be a little more humble about the plan—it is very modest and cautious—and cut out words like "exciting". I have not found anything exciting about it. I should like to he excited, but on this basis I cannot be. We want more information.

8.40 p.m.

Mr. John Mendelson (Penistone)

The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry ought to be present to hear more of the debate, because it is no substitute to have the constant interruptions of the Under-Secretary, the hon. Member for Honiton (Mr. Emery), who just takes more time from those who represent the steelworkers and others in the industry—

Mr. Emery

Thank you very much.

Mr. Mendelson

The Secretary of State showed that he was interested more in propaganda than in making the case for Cabinet policy. It is the absence of a case so far that ought to be remedied later in the debate by the Minister for Industry.

There is therefore not much to discuss in what the right lion. Gentleman said at the introduction of what is a very important event, because this is the major occasion for the House of Commons to pass judgment on a plan that has been worked out, we are told, by the British Steel Corporation and approved by the Government. It is also important because of the right hon. Gentleman's attempt to pretend that he is the only man in the country and in the House who is in favour of the expansion of the industry—with, perhaps, the notable exception of my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside (Mr. Eddie Griffiths) whom he also allowed to enter into the very rarified atmosphere of that small circle.

Mr. Eddie Griffiths

When you are in, you are in.

Mr. Mendelson

That is not quite the position. The people who work in the industry and earn their living in it have always declared, and certainly made it clear in discussions with the former Labour Government, that they wanted a complete modernisation of the industry and would give such modernisation their full support. This is therefore no new attitude developed suddenly by some of my Front Bench colleagues, as the Secretary of State tried to allege. But those in the industry added, when they discussed these matters with that Labour Government, that there must be a common understanding that modernisation would mean not a decline in jobs because of a declining industry but a decline in the number of jobs because it is a highly modern industry. This is the decisive factor that must be understood.

That fact was appreciated at that time, and there was a compact between the Labour Government of that day and the steelworkers' representatives that full support would be given to modernisation but that at the same time we had to see to it that more jobs were created in the industry as the new plants came into existence. I heavily emphasise that the first part of the contract was more jobs in the industry. There was a compact that if as a result of the vast technological changes that would then come about, which were foreseen then and which we are seeing today, redundancies should occur, new job opportunities must be brought into the steel areas before the process of modernisation was completed. That is the important point.

I speak for members of the Stocks-bridge Joint Committee of steelworkers and I use almost their very words to bring the facts to the knowledge of the House. They say constantly at their meetings that it is not good enough to speak of a general commitment to provide alternative jobs. That is not specific enough. It is no good the Government trying to ride off with such a general assurance. We need something which ties the Government much more to a policy of provision of new job opportunities that can be regarded by the people in the industry as a commitment and not just a general promise.

If we want to keep the younger element within the industry, those who will develop high specialisation and get into positions of importance and responsibility, it is important that they should know that there will be opportunities in the industry for them. Therefore, it is no good the Government saying that they have done their duty by issuing a general statement about task forces. My hon. Friends and I have good reason for pressing the Government to go beyond that.

It is not a question of diplomatic secrecy and saying that commercial secrets might be involved. It is not beyond the wit of man so to provide information that that particular part of it remains isolated. Such information is provided to large corporations in other industries. I could give chapter and verse of some Government Departments which are not tight-lipped with their friends who represent big corporations, and the information is spread round the gin and tonic tables, as my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition said on an earlier occasion. The Government should be listening to the debate and should reply positively before the vote is taken.

I wish to refer to the whole approach of the chairman of BSC. The Secretary of State has said constantly this afternoon that all he is doing is putting forward the corporation's proposals. One would almost think that the Government had nothing to do with the White Paper, that it had been written by somebody else and was nothing to do with the Cabinet. That is a lot of nonsense. The real story is quite different.

In the spring of 1970 the chairman of BSC submitted a 10-year plan to the Government. The plan, step by step and year by year, outlined development to a higher figure of expansion than is proposed in the White Paper, and the cost was given for each year. But, as Lord Melchett told some of us a year later, delay could be very dangerous for the corporation's prospects because of galloping inflation. Any project may cost twice as much if 18 months are allowed to pass. It is all very well to talk about £3,000 million, but I am not happy with that figure. Had we started in March 1970, we might have achieved similar or better results at a lower level of investment. We should have got better value for money in those days. The figure that the Government are parading is an inflated one, and they are entirely to blame for the delay.

I hope that one day there will be appointed a Select Committee to consider the steel industry and the Government's conduct towards BSC. The Government have never agreed to such a Select Committee. A Select Committee would tell us about the influence of the American company that the Government appointed. There was the Joint Steering Group, there was no time to be wasted and everything should have been done quickly. But the Government did not leave well alone. They called in yet another group of consultants and there was delay, month after month.

Once we have put the record straight it will be seen that the Secretary of State has lost all reason for thinking that he is doing the work of the Lord for the industry. The projects should be developed as quickly as possible and there should be a clear understanding that where there are skilled resources an opportunity will be found to keep most of the men at work in medium-sized works as well as large works.

I turn to one local point referring to my constituency. There is a reference in the White Paper concerning special steels to Stocksbridge and Tinsley Park. There is a stroke between the names of those two, but that is all that is said about them. The Government must provide clear and definite information as to what they have in mind. I recognise, as do all hon. Members representing steel constituencies, that the Government have a duty, just as the men in the trade union have, to say categorically that we want to take a national view of the industry. While we must represent the interests of our constituents—more directly even than the unions can do—we must also take the overall view.

Therefore, anyone finding himself in a position similar to that of my hon. Friend the Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) the other day would be equally duty bound to represent those interests, as he did in the detailed case he made. At the same time we, of course, take the national view. We want a modernised and big British steel industry able to compete with other steel-producing countries.

I see that the Minister of State has just returned to the Chamber. I make no complaint about his having been absent for a time. He had to prepare the reply to the debate. I do complain, however, about the Secretary of State not being present. He should have been here all the time. It is important to the future prospects of the modernised industry that an interest should be shown in the local communities; it is therefore the duty of the Minister to see that guarantees and assurances are given by the Government that wherever in the process of modernisation redundancies occur, the maximum number of new steel jobs will be provided as soon as possible. I go further and say that the timing of the modernisation process should be dependent on and closely allied to the provision of new jobs and that public money should be spent in keeping steelworks operating longer than might otherwise be the case so as to provide employment until new plant is ready. We have not had that commitment from the Government.

In an area where a certain part of steelmaking work will come to an end, there will perhaps be the production of some new end product. We hope that will be the case in a number of instances. That will be useful, but it will not provide the number of jobs which are lost. There must be a firm Government commitment that alternative employment will be brought to such an area before the steel works are closed.

I say this to the Secretary of State who made an attack this afternoon. As a member of the Parliamentary Opposition, I see nothing contradictory between what my hon. Friend the Member for Ebbw Vale said on behalf of the Opposition in the speech quoted by the Secretary of State and the attitude which we from the steel areas have always adopted. My hon. Friend tied it to a specific policy commitment. That commitment still stands. It is up to the Government to show that they feel equally seriously about the future prospects of workers in the steel areas

8.55 p.m.

Mr. Michael Roberts (Cardiff, North)

The hon. Member for Penistone (Mr. John Mendelson) rightly pointed out that the modernisation of steel inevitably leads to the loss of many jobs. He rightly went on to say that we must ensure that the steelworkers made redundant are given job opportunities. But in the Cardiff area—where we face 4,000 redundancies, or 3,500 redundancies if the mini-mill is constructed—if the task force within two or three years were able to provide all the jobs, the loss of steelmaking to Cardiff would still be a great loss to our community and we would deeply regret it. Even if other well-paid jobs were provided in the city—and we should welcome them—we would want to look closely to see whether the corporation's calculations were justified.

At one stage we were led to believe that BSC thinking was along the lines of the maintenance of some of the smaller mills. We now know that its thinking has changed and that within the corporation a decision has been made on the lines of a larger steelworks. Until we see the figures and can analyse them we are not convinced that the present calculation is best suited to the needs of the steel industry and our community.

I wish to make specific reference to the East Moors steelworks. It is in the constituency of the right hon. Member for Cardiff, South-East (Mr. Callaghan), but constituents in Cardiff, North and Cardiff, West—and indeed in the whole area—work in that complex and may face redundancy. The special case put forward by the works committee—and that case demands careful consideration—is that the customers for the East Moors works are not scattered throughout the United Kingdom and are not even overseas. They are to be found just over the wall, in GKN, within a stone's throw of the smelting and steelmaking process in Cardiff. Those who are knowledgeable about steelmaking in Cardiff do not believe that it would make economic sense to bring 750,000 tonnes of steel all the way by rail down to Cardiff and there to process it, when there are requirements for 100 specialist steels all of which could, and in their view should, be provided by the steelmaking process immediately adjacent to the GKN works.

I have not sufficient time to develop all that I would like to say about the East Moors situation. Some time ago I wrote to my right hon. Friend and asked what investigation the Government had made concerning the use of the submerged injection process and about the continuation of East Moors as a profitable steelmaking process. I hope that they are closely investigating this matter.

We were told by Lord Melchett when he visited us in Cardiff that 30 alternative schemes had been considerered before the corporation reached the conclusion that the East Moors works should be declared redundant and that a mini-works employing 500 people should be put up in its place. The people of Cardiff, and the steelworkers in particular, reject that thinking. They have not yet seen the details of the 30 alternatives mentioned by Lord Melchett. They ask and expect the Government seriously to consider their case.

9.0 p.m.

Mr. Barry Jones (Flint, East)

I hope that tonight I can dismiss the undeserved lachrymose reputation that I have previously earned.

I rate the strategy as questionable. It certainly proposes the desolation of traditional steel towns and the wastage of loyal and skilled work forces in steel. It seems to show an obsession with things Japanese, but just how profitable is the steel industry in Japan?

America is restructuring her industry by installing cheaper, smaller, more flexible and more profitable methods of making steel. I hope the Government have not accepted a strategy which could be heavy industry's equivalent of the Concorde fiasco.

Since my constituency is scheduled to lose 7,200 job opportunities, will the Minister, before the flood of public money starts flowing, order a public inquiry into the Shotton situation? Will he also enable the consultants of the Flintshire County Council to have access to the calculations of the corporation with reference to Shotton? Steelworkers in my constituency fear that the rundown will begin a year early, in the spring of next year. Will the Minister deny this by confirming that one of the blast furnaces will soon be relined, with a view to immediate re-use? Will the Minister also tell us the return on capital expenditure on the tandem furnace scheme submitted by the Shotton action committee to Lord Melchett?

The White Paper refers to the special study that was made of Shotton because of the grave social and economic consequences. I urge the Secretary of State to reverse his decision and keep Shotton open, as an insurance against the late commissioning or malfunctioning of any of the proposed large sites.

9.2 p.m.

Mr. Michael Foot (Ebbw Vale)

Like my hon. Friend the Member for Flint, East (Mr. Barry Jones), who has put the case for Shotton so effectively and passionately over so long a period, I wish to devote a considerable part of my remarks to the position of those areas which are threatened with steel closures. Inevitably we must do that because, as many of my hon. Friend from this side of the House have stated, and as I am sure the House appreciates, we have a deep obligation to the people who have sent us here when we are faced with problems of this magnitude.

I wish to make clear at the beginning that we on this side of the House who have to deal with the possibilities of closures and all the awkward consequences which would follow are also deeply concerned about the future of the steel industry as a whole. But because we are concerned with our individual problems, it is not at all the case that we are not also eager to see the steel industry expanded on the best possible basis. That is why we say in our amendment that we welcome the conversion of the Government to the commitment to an expanded steel industry.

The right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State has not, like many of us, had the advantages of attending many steel debates over several years. The right hon. Gentleman is therefore not always quite aware of the situation. I can remember the previous debates we have had on this matter. If he had attended those debates, the right hon. Gentleman would have discovered that the demands for an expanded steel industry came almost entirely from hon. Members on this side of the House whereas almost the only people doubtful about the proposition were hon. Gentlemen on the other side of the House. It is no good anybody contesting this proposition. For about two or three years we had to deal with those whom, in those distant days, we described as the bowling alley boys, the two Ministers who were in the right hon. Gentleman's Department previously and who had enunciated a doctrine that it was just as good to expand bowling alleys as steelworks if a higher profit could be gained from them.

Therefore, if the right hon. Gentleman had attended these debates or been able to do so he would not have got out of proportion and out of scale what is the position. Moreover, he would have discovered that the figure of 28 million tonnes as the target to be developed—we are all very glad to see that that figure is now discarded—was never produced by anyone on the Opposition side of the House. The figure was never suggested.

The Minister for Industry was the first to mention the figure of 28 million tonnes in the House, as far as I can recall. As the right hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well, that was the figure that the Government put to the Steel Corporation, and the Opposition contested that idea right along. Again, it is no good hon. Members on the Government side of the House thinking that we are concocting some fairy tale when we say that we are glad to see that the Government have been converted to the view of an expanded steel industry, which we have preached throughout. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will understand that.

It is also no good for the right hon. Gentleman or anyone else coming to lecture those of us from the steel constituencies about the painful choice which may be involved in expansion. We are well aware of it. We have already been dealing with the situation. In Ebbw Vale, for example, over the past 10 years we have reduced the total in the steel works there by some 3,000, and the same applies to many other steel works up and down the country, for instance, in the North East, as my hon. Friend the Member for Cleveland (Mr. Tinn) indicated.

It is no good the right hon. Gentleman coming and preaching some sermon to us as though he were teaching us the elements of these matters, because we are aware of these matters. The difficulty for the right hon. Gentleman, is that in a sense he has entered the stage in the middle of the play and he has not taken too much effort to discover what went on beforehand. I dare say that even the eloquence of Mark Antony would be a bit diminished if he were not aware of the fact that Ceasar had been murdered. The right hon. Gentleman has taken up the drama on the assumption that he had merely suffered from inflammation of the bowels. Naturally, the right hon. Gentleman is not exactly aware of the situation. Now we shall try to put him right.

However, it is partly for this reason that we criticise the way in which the Government have presented the expansion programme. That does not mean that we are opposed to the best possible expansion programme that can be secured for the steel industry as a whole. What we complain about in the White Paper in this respect, however—this has come from my hon. Friends, whether they are fully sympathetic to the programme or whether they have qualifications—is that, whatever view one takes about the way in which the steel industry could be developed, there is no defence to this White Paper because it does not even make the good case which possibly the British Steel Corporation may have.

This White Paper, I insist, is not a White Paper presented by the corporation. It says on the front—which is the truest part of the whole document— Presented to Parliament by the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry by Command of Her Majesty. I am not sure about the "Command of Her Majesty" part, but the other part is the accurate part of the White Paper.

The right hon. Gentleman has presented a White Paper describing how £3,000 million is to be invested over this period and how we are to embark on what he himself has described on dozens of occasions, as my hon. Friend the Member for Motherwell (Mr. Lawson) said, as the most exciting and creative programme that has ever been put before the British steel industry. If that were so, in the White Paper there ought to have been a much better defence of the position, for example, particularly as the right hon. Gentleman has come upon the scene in latter days and particularly because he used the phrases from the Dispatch Box about the figure of 43 million tonnes "trickling off the tongue" of my hon. Friends. The figure of 43 million tonnes is again a figure which was thought up originally by the Corporation. If there were to be a lower figure in the strategy for the next 10 years than that which the Steel Corporation itself had presented to this same Government a year and a half ago, there should have been an explanation in the White Paper as to how it was that the Government had decided to abandon that target of 43 million tonnes with all these other implications.

Then there is the whole matter of the "missing" £300 million, as we call it in Wales—the figure to be provided for investment in Wales. Particularly because the Secretary of State has boasted so much about the £900 million, we are entitled to have in the White Paper a detailed account of how this money is to be allocated or how it has been calculated. Where does it come from? How was it estimated? There must be documents in the Department, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon (Mr. John Morris) pointed out so effectively, which show how this figure was reached. Why can we not have them in the White Paper, so that we can test them? Also, as my hon. Friends from Scotland have said, Scotland does not know how the £400 million is arrived at.

This is an astonishing state of affairs. The Secretary of State and the Government blow their own trumpets very loudly, saying, "We have a magnificent programme", and we must all accept that as the last word. Yet when we ask for even the most elementary explanation of the figures, we are not given it. It certainly is not in the White Paper.

This is all the more important, because the strategy is not self-evident. It may be that the British Steel Corporation's strategy of concentrating upon the coastal sites, on the form of development and the basic oxygen process, is perfectly correct. Perhaps all that can be proved, but it is not self-evident. It should be argued out in the White Paper.

The hon. Member for Flint, West (Sir A. Meyer) was quite right. He and many others, like the hon. Member for New Forest (Mr. Patrick McNair-Wilson) and many of my hon. Friends, have pointed out that there are many arguments about how one changes to that kind of industry —if indeed one should do so at the pace and on the scale which is proposed. That is not an argument against an expanded steel industry. We can still have an expanded steel industry in Shotton and Ebbw Vale and some of the other places that have made a considerable contribution.

Moreover, if the argument is to be the other way around—a number of people in the industry know about this—that is to say, if we are to be told that Shotton, Ebbw Vale and East Moors are finished and are to be chopped and no more steel making is ever envisaged there, there will be many changes in many such steelworks on the Continent and in the United States. I calculate—we shall be putting this to the British Steel Corporation and it will have to supply the answers—that there are 15 or 16 such strip mills in Western Europe which are not in such a different situation from us. In the United States, 50 per cent. of their production is still from some form of open-hearth process.

I am not saying that they are not making changes—of course they are—but they are also taking into account what those of us who put the case for Shotton, Ebbw Vale, East Moors and the rest are asking should be taken into account—the capital costs involved and the investment already made in those industries.

What those of us who are threatened with closures are determined to see is these figures worked out in detail. They should have been in the White Paper, too. There is a case, because the right hon. Gentleman told me today that the British Steel Corporation is sending to us in Ebbw Vale the details of how it worked out some of these figures. We do not know yet how far it will go, because we have put to it many matters and we are entitled to the most detailed replies. Many of the figures should have been in the White Paper. They would have been a concrete illustration and we would have been able to examine them in the open. That would have been the proper way to do it.

It is peculiar that the British Steel Corporation made the announcement about Ebbw Vale on 16th November. We asked the corporation to show us the figures, because we had arguments against them. The corporation told us that we would have to wait, and it did not produce the first lot of figures or the first meeting until the end of January. Only now, in the middle of February, has it produced its first set of figures—figures which one would think it would have had available before making the decision.

On this aspect of the matter the White Paper is totally inadequate as an indication whether the BSC has made the right decisions in its major strategy and whether the Government have been right to approve them in the form—as we understand it—that the BSC presented them to the Government. We shall need to have many more debates to discover whether they are jusified. All of us representing threatened areas are demanding —it was our first demand, when we first heard the decisions—that the corporation must produce the details and prove its case. We have experts—people who know about the steel industry and have given their working lives to it—who have knowledge of how these kind of operations are done. These figures will be examined in detail. We have a right, indeed an absolute duty to the people we represent, to do that.

I turn from that general aspect, which applies to the country as a whole, to the detailed question of Ebbw Vale. I shall not spend all my time on Ebbw Vale, but I must mention it in view of the statement made by the Secretary of State today. The right hon. Gentleman has repeated the same kind of statement that so many Ministers have made about the Ebbw Vale position, not taking into account what we have told them on various occasions. I wish that Ministers would listen to what we have to say, because we know what we are talking about on this subject. These are matters of the gravest importance from our point of view. Whether we shall be able to carry through any change in Ebbw Vale of Shotten sensibly depends upon whether any form of trust remains in those communities in the people who are saying what is to be their future.

I will attempt, once and for all, to clear up the question of 1970 which is referred to in the White Paper. These proposals for Ebbw Vale are not solely about Ebbw Vale. Naturally enough, they take into account the rest of the steel industry.

When Lord Melchett came to Ebbw Vale, he said: You can be assured that a great deal of thought has been given to the future of Ebbw Vale by my colleagues and the board of the Corporation. It has not been an isolated study of Ebbw Vale on its own, but of the strip mill division as a whole of which this is one of the important works. That is what Lord Melchett said when he came to Ebbw Vale not a few weeks ago, but in 1970. After such a statement we were entitled to take literally what he said to us.

The right hon. Gentleman's White Paper purports to state what Lord Melchett said to us in 1970, namely, However, following the Corporation's announcement in 1970 on the future of steelmaking, BSC announced in November 1972 its proposals to close iron and steelmaking in 1975 and 1976 and the hot strip mill later in the decade with, in all, the loss of about 4,500 jobs. That is so much of a half truth as to be a downright lie. In 1970 Lord Melchett not only said that he was proposing to bring steelmaking in Ebbw Vale to an end; in the same statement he gave a pledge of the maintenance of 8,000 jobs. Even more important he said, "You will have a development for your hot mill costing about £8 million or £9 million and the introduction of the improvements in the hot mill will go forward at the same time as the phasing-out of the steelmaking." Therefore, the pledges made by Lord Melchett in 1970 should stand as strongly as his proposal that the steelmaking would be brought to an end.

I plead with the Government to try to understand the effect in Ebbw Vale and other places where we have been similarly treated, although we naturally concentrate on the pledges given to us. What do they think is the effect in Ebbw Vale when, after we put the case to the Minister and he came to Ebbw Vale to listen patiently to what we said, he produced a White Paper in which the same half truth or, as I prefer to call it, downright lie is still incorporated? Does he want to bring Ebbw Vale out on strike? That is the way to do it.

Mr. Skinner

Let us have a general strike.

Mr. Foot

The Minister acted in the very way calculated to cause bitterness and anger among people who were seeking to deal with the whole question in the most constructive manner.

The very least the Government and Lord Melchett should do is to return to the pledges and undertakings they gave in 1970. It is not merely a question of Lord Melchett personally. It has been said in some quarters that in 1970 he came to Ebbw Vale and said something that he had not quite expected to say. That is not so. At the moment when he made that statement in Ebbw Vale Dr. Finniston read out to me the same statement in the offices of the corporation. His personal honour is just as committed as Lord Melchett's. The Government have implicated themselves in the business by presenting to Parliament a White Paper that purports to describe the true position of Ebbw Vale, when it does nothing of the sort.

What must be done, not only about Ebbw Vale but about all the areas threatened with closures? First, we have the right to examine in detail the propositions. I have already discussed that. Elaborate efforts are being made at Shotton, Ebbw Vale, East Moors and elsewhere to see that our case is put in detail. We have a right to have that case examined and to have the necessary time devoted to it. It cannot be done in a week or two; it will take a few months to examine propositions of such far-reaching significance. Secondly, we demand that the pledges we were given in 1970 shall be fulfilled.

Our third demand was put to the right hon. Gentleman with all the force we could muster when he came to Ebbw Vale, but it applies to other places. The dates proposed for the closures of Ebbw Vale, Shotton and East Moors are intolerable and impossible. It is impossible for the Government to seek to bind us to them—that is, to have more than 1,000 new jobs created in Ebbw Vale by 1975 and another 1,500 or so in 1976.

In any case, the Government are as much implicated as the corporation—or more so. They cannot shed the responsibility and say, "It is no business of ours when the closures take place". If they do, they cannot guarantee that they can bring in the other jobs. The two processes must be dovetailed in—the process of closures, if they are to happen, and the process of bringing in the new jobs. The Government, not the corporation, are the people finally responsible.

I say that no one in Wales, Scotland, or anywhere else will take the Government's pledges seriously, whether or not they are backed by task forces. I say at once that I am not against the idea of a task force. I think that it will come back and report, as one of its first pieces of advice to the Government, that these dates are impossible. But if the Government say that they refuse to play any part in fixing these dates, that they are not too certain about the dates, and that they are solely a matter for the corporation, I say that no one in Wales, Scotland or anywhere else will take seriously their promise to bring in new jobs before the redundancies take place.

The Secretary of State mocked me when he said that I was ill-advised to give the undertaking that I did, on behalf of the Labour Party, that when a Labour Government came to office we would suspend the operation of these dates and halt the closures, pending a review of the position in the industry and in the light of the new jobs that had been made available. That does not mean that the dates might not be reimposed later. It means that the Labour Party undertakes the commitment that this Government ought to undertake, which is that the dates will be within the control of the Government.

Instead, the Secretary of State says, "We cannot do that," and, "Fancy anyone saying that we should intervene on the dates." The right hon. Gentleman says that the Labour Government never did. But that is what did happen. It happened in the coal industry. I can remember making a number of speeches from below the Gangway on the Government side of the House about the coal industry. I was critical of the Labour Government about the pace of the rundown of the coal industry. I think that even in that Government many people who supported the rundown at the pace then agreed now agree that it was an error.

I should have thought that both political parties would have learned from this. Even so, it is not the case that the Labour Government refused on all occasions to intervene on the detailed closures. In The Times of 30th September 1967 there was a report of a statement made at Scarborough by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition, then Prime Minister, about the way in which the Labour Government were intervening to hold up some of the closures. I remember quoting that report. As a result, Section 5 of the Coal Industry Act 1967 covered the whole situation. In fact, the Government intervened on some of these closures. It is no good the Secretary of State's trying to use that as a defence.

There is an even simpler argument which affects the whole situation. Here again, it may be that we must attribute the right hon. Gentleman's failure to understand the situation to the fact that he has not realised what has happened in the steel industry in the past 2½, years. His Government have interfered with the detailed running of the steel industry on a scale which has not been attempted with any nationalised industry in the history of nationalisation. We have had not only the Prime Minister's arbitrary interventions on the subject of steel prices—and we all remember those occasions; we have had the establishment of what we called at the time the "constitutional monstrosity" of a joint steering group whereby responsibility between the Steel Corporation, the Government and the Civil Service was blurred. It was a committee set up—

Mr. Peter Walker

indicated dissent.

Mr. Foot

The Secretary of State shakes his head. Everyone in the British Steel Corporation knows that that is the case. Of course the right hon. Gentleman is not familiar with these matters. But the fact is that the joint steering group established by the Government had surveillance over a whole range of detailed matters including individual investment programmes. Yet this Government, who have been responsible for such intervention as that over a period of two and a half years now say at the end of it, "Please do not ask us to permit the constitutional impropriety of ever daring to interfere with the dates for closures laid down by the BSC."

The right hon. Gentleman should understand the position. We can see from the experience of the coal industry, or at any rate from the experience we have had of the steel industry in the last year or two—from all the knowledge we now have—how difficult is the operation of changing over from one industry to another. It is difficult enough, in all conscience. Everyone knows the problems are enormous.

It may not be so difficult in some of the bigger cities. In communities like ours the whole livelihood of the area could be shattered. We have to sustain the morale of whole townships during this period. We have to sustain the morale of people working in the steelworks because the steel is still needed. If they cannot produce the steel in Ebbw Vale and Shotton over the next two or three years we will not be able to get the finished products. If we cannot produce the steel in those threatened towns which have been told that they will be shut up after two or three years the loss to the corporation will be reckoned in millions of pounds.

Why is it that the corporation says, now with the backing of the Government, that this has to take place in 1975 or 1976? It has nothing to do with the prosperity or profitability of Ebbw Vale or Shotton. It is due solely—we asked the Minister for an answer to this last time; I hope he will give it now—to the calculation of the corporation that it will have such a surplus of steel in 1975–76 that for its own profitability and its operations it must close us down as soon as it can.

Those matters, too, must be examined. We have a right to see whether what the corporation is saying is true. Our livelihood depends upon it. Our whole chance of preserving civilised communities—some of the best communities in the country—depends on our capacity to be able to carry out the changes, some of them inevitable, in a decent and civilised way. I am sure that when the right hon. Gentleman came to Ebbw Vale he saw a community which was determined to do this. We have a right—we do not come here to beg—to demand from the Government the assistance which great democratic communities ought to have from this House. This is what we said and this is what we stand on. If this Government will not give assistance to places like Shotton, Ebbw Vale and all the others that are threatened, the next Labour Government will.

9.33 p.m.

The Minister for Industry (Mr. Tom Boardman)

It is always delightful to listen to the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Michael Foot) although it is not particularly enlightening on occasions such as this.

Mr. Robert Mellish (Bermondsey)

My hon. Friend is concerned about people getting the sack. If that is not enlightened, what is?

Mr. Boardman

The hon. Gentleman intervened earlier in the speech of my right hon. Friend and said that the next Labour Government would cancel all closures and begin a review of the whole system. He repeated that a few moments ago during his speech. He moved straight from that to condemn the review body, the Joint Steering Group that was set up to do the task which he presumably now thinks should be done by the committee he wishes to appoint. His inconsistencies are quite remarkable.

The hon. Gentleman spent some time condemning the Government for not requiring the corporation to intervene and cancel the closure of Ebbw Vale and other such places. He moved on to criticise the Government for "intervening in the affairs of the British Steel Corporation on a scale never before attempted." He must make up his mind which way he wants it—whether he believes the Government should intervene or that the corporation should run its affairs.

The hon. Gentleman's speech was delightful to listen to, but was slanted, understandably, towards his constituency of Ebbw Vale. It omitted any reference to other areas which for the Front Bench would be of importance—Port Talbot, Teesside, Ravenscraig. Are they of no importance to the hon. Gentleman? Is Ebbw Vale all that he cares about?

Mr. Michael Foot rose—

Mr. Boardman

I will not give way. There were speeches from hon. Members on both sides which, with varying degrees of reservation, gave broad support to the White Paper strategy.

There were three speeches of particular significance. I have already referred to the hon. Gentleman. There was also—I hope the hon. Gentleman will not be embarrassed at being referred to twice—the speech by the hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside (Mr. Eddie Griffiths), who, as my right hon. Friend has said, has a great knowledge of the steel industry and talks more sense about it than many other Opposition Members. There was a very interesting speech, too, from my hon. Friend the Member for New Forest (Mr. Patrick McNair-Wilson), who speaks with great knowledge. He raised a number of points, some of which I hope to take up in a few moments. Then there was, of course, the opening speech by the hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Varley). I do not imagine that any hon. Member who heard that speech would have thought that he was speaking on the largest investment programme that has ever been undertaken in this vital industry.

The hon. Member spoke as though, if he understood the White Paper—and I believe that he must have read it—he was doing his best to conceal his knowledge of it. He spent all his time in a nitpicking exercise, trying to find some conflict between what the Secretary of State said and what I said. [Interruption.] If the hon. Gentleman does not like it, he can leave the Chamber.

Mr. George Thomas (Cardiff, West) rose—

Mr. Speaker

Order. Up to now we have had a fairly orderly debate. Will hon. Members please calm down?

Mr. Boardman

To justify what is said, the hon. Member for Chesterfield spent some minutes trying to draw a distinction between what my right hon. Friend said—"what will be approximately £900 million"—and "could be as much as £900 million". That was the level of his contribution to the debate on this great investment programme. What a way to set about dealing with an issue of such enormous significance.

The hon. Member for Ebbw Vale, and, indeed, other hon. Members, begged the question as to what is the rôle of the Government in this strategy. Certainly it is not for me—nor do I think my right hon. Friend would assume the task—to take upon myself the rôle of Chairman of the British Steel Corporation and dictate its management policy. It would be even less suitable for this House to assume for itself the judgment of a board of directors of the corporation. This is, indeed, a criticism which is often somewhat unevenly aimed at us by the Opposition. Our job—and I make this quite clear—is to ensure that the strategy makes sense against the general economic background, taking full account of regional, social, balance of payments and other factors for which the Government have a special responsibility. That is what we have done.

Throughout the debate a number of points have been raised by hon. Members on both sides as to the degree of flexibility in the plan. I would draw the attention of hon. Members to the White Paper and particularly to paragraphs 11, 12, 13 and 14, which make the position clear. Paragraph 28 in particular refers to the emphasis placed on flexibility in the corporation's proposals, and the whole question of flexibility is a fundamental part of the strategy. The whole planning is on the basis not of a rigid plan but one that can be adjusted to the needs of the moment.

One hon. Member opposite said that to make a firm, rigid plan looking 10 years ahead is a nonsense. I agree, and this has been avoided. I draw the attention of hon. Members to the planning process that is undertaken, and has been undertaken by the corporation, and with which the Government have been closely involved. First, it is the drawing up of the strategy, deciding, looking at the blueprint of the steel industry for the 10 years ahead, the broad outlines and the way one sees it developing, coastal sites as against inland sites, and so on.

There is then the corporate plan to be prepared by the corporation, to be submitted to and approved by the Government. That plan will show how, based on the strategy, the corporation is planning its future. That will be followed by the five-year investment programme, and it is at that stage that the outlines of the investment begin to firm up for the requirements of the five years ahead. Then follows the detailed appraisal of projects and investment approvals.

As an illustration of that, I have today given formal approval to the corporation for capital expenditure on fixed assets in the United Kingdom in 1973–74 up to a total of £305 million at March 1972 prices. This compares with the authorisation of £265 million at 1971 prices for the previous year and is in line with the rising trend of capital investment by the corporation shown in the Public Expenditure White Paper (Cmnd. 5178). In addition, my right hon. Friend has given provisional approval for capital expenditure up to £300 million in 1974–75, covering a proportion—90 per cent.—of the total programme. That is the size of the programme we have authorised. Therefore, we shall have the corporate plan coming forward, projects being appraised, investment approval being given firm for the year ahead, and 90 per cent. approval for the year beyond that.

Hon. Members have asked for an explanation of where the £400 million goes. I can say that it flows from this planning process. I shall return to that point in a moment. Compared with our figure of £305 million the average level of capital expenditure—still at 1972 prices—during the six years when Labour were in power was £130 million, and they wonder why the industry is in difficulties! Hon. Members have asked how the corporation will spend the £400 million in Scotland and the £900 million in Wales. To expect detailed answers on that point shows a complete misunderstanding of the problem.

Mr. John Robertson rose—

Mr. Boardman

Let me finish my argument. If the hon. Member then still wishes to intervene I will give way to him.

It is forecast in the White Paper that the average annual expenditure will be at the rate of £300 million a year in the next 10 years. It is explained how that will be divided roughly between the different areas. The expenditure which we can now go firm upon is in respect of those projects which are already under way, projects for which approval has been given and projects which have reached an advanced planning stage. In no investment appraisal and in no industrial arrangement for improving investment is it possible, 10 years ahead, to say precisely how the money will be divided between, say, project A and project B. The pattern of investment will flow from the strategy that has been adopted. That clearly indicates that the level of investment in Wales will be up to the level of £900 million, and £400 million in Scotland as stated in the White Paper.

Mr. Robertson

The point is that the £400 million is the Government's figure and not the figure of anybody on the Opposition side of the House. Surely it must be based on some facts, or is the Minister plucking the figure out of thin air? The people who know about the Scottish steel industry can count up to only £275 million on the projects forecast in the White Paper.

Mr. Boardman

It is not the Government's figure; it is the British Steel Corporation's figure. [Interruption.] If the hon. Member has not followed what I have been saying, perhaps when he reads it tomorrow he will understand it.

Mr. William Ross (Kilmarnock)

Scottish MPs and the STUC have tried to get an explanation of these figures from the Secretary of State for Scotland. He said he would try to find them out from the hon. Gentleman's Department. Who will tell us how this £400 million is to be spent? Surely they had in mind certain projects that are to cost that amount. If they have not, then let them tell us that they just do not know themselves.

Mr. Boardman

The right hon. Gentleman must follow the ordinary basic principles of investment decision-making. If I can translate it into the simplest possible terms, he will probably know approximately how much he will be spending on his household next year but he cannot say how much will go on sheets or shoes. I have tried to reduce it to elementary language to make it understandable. [Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker

Will hon. Members please calm down?

Mr. Boardman

The amendment refers to publication of reports of the task forces, but my hon. Friend has dealt with this and I do not propose to add anything further in the time available. The amendment also refers to the representations of the steel communities which are threatened with closures.

I remind the House—as I believe hon. Members who have been concerned with constituencies having these problems will know—that my right hon. Friend and I and other of my right hon. Friends have made ourselves available and have seen all the deputations and delegations concerned. We have consulted closely with all organisations and we have taken full account of views that have been put to us. All these have been taken into consideration.

Mr. Neil McBride (Swansea, East)

The hon. Gentleman says there have been the fullest consultations and all Ministers have been informed of developments. He will remember my leading a deputation representing 23 Welsh Labour councils to the Secretary of State and in his hearing the Secretary of State saying that he had not known about the proposals until two days beforehand. What a Government!

Sir Harmar Nicholls (Peterborough)

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. We have had to listen to Welsh interruptions and Scots interruptions. Cannot we hear an English voice?

Mr. Speaker

The choice of speakers is a matter for the Chair.

Mr. Boardman

A number of points were raised about Shotton. I apologise to my hon. Friend for referring to Wales again. The corporation has proposed that closures should be phased from 1975 to 1979 but has made it clear that this will be subject to discussion with the unions and other interested parties. My hon. Friend the Member for Flint, West (Sir A. Meyer) asked specifically about the earliest date of closure. I can tell him, despite allegations that closure might be as early as 1974, that the corporation has assured me that this is not so, and that to comply with its obligation to give two years' notice of major closures the first closure at Shotton could not take place until after March 1975.

I do not wish to dwell at least on the detailed points raised by the hon. Member for Ebbw Vale because we have had numerous discussions on this matter, but I would inform him that I have a letter from the corporation which confirms that the facts are that in April 1970 the chairman told the Ebbw Vale work force that iron and steelmaking would come to an end probably between 1974 and 1976. Mr. Gray told them in 1971 that the date would be nearer the beginning than the end of that period. The date now proposed is 1975, which is fully consistent with what has been said to the work force officially, and is on record. It is a full five years after firm proposals were put forward. The hot mill closure was a new fact, first communicated informally to Mr. Hudson and Mr. Borton in October, and formally later, that the works would close in November. The closure date proposed is November 1978, more than five years' notice being given.

At the meeting on 16th November of the works council, neither Mr. Hudson nor Mr. Morton made any charge of bad faith or broken promises against Lord Melchett in respect of the October meeting. The hon. Gentleman should know that.

Mr. Foot

I know all these facts but the Minister does not face them. Why has the corporation any right to make a statement about what was to happen in 1970 and then to tell us two years later that it intended to abide by one clause and abandon two other clauses in the proposition, particularly when as a result of that agreement we accepted the closing of the coke ovens with a loss of some 300 jobs? All that was part of the agreement of 1970. Now we are told that the corporation can abandon some of the undertakings it gave—and very important undertakings, involving investment of £9 million or £10 million. The Minister now says, "Oh, the hot mill was a new factor". The corporation has no right to abandon its undertaking. Why does not the hon. Gentleman try to seek some sense of honour in the matter?

Mr. Boardman

The hon. Gentleman knows that those facts are very strongly disputed by the corporation.

I realise that hon. Members are concerned about the future of the Brymbo works and the protracted nature of the discussions between GKN and the corporation about acquisition. I am in touch with the parties to see how we can assist in arriving at a successful outcome, but on the basis of recent assessment the corporation believes that it would be economic to continue operations at Brymbo for the expected life of the works if they are not acquired by GKN.

I am also in touch with GKN and the corporation about the future of steel making in Cardiff. We are most anxious to see a continuation of steel making there and the GKN plans going ahead, although the corporation had plans to go ahead if GKN decided not to establish its own steel making facilities.

Mr. George Thomas

Can the Minister say whether it is possible to delay the proposed date of closure? Lord Melchett told us quite clearly that they had it in mind that maybe a three-year scale would provide for the redundancies.

Mr. Boardman

That is a matter that probably should be raised with Lord Melchett. I cannot comment on it here.

A number of questions were raised on the private sector. I reaffirm what is said in the White Paper about the importance the Government attach to having a strong virile private sector supplied with die most competitive crude steel and able to make a better contribution to exports and to the general economy.

Questions were also asked about the report of Lord Hirshfield. The corporation has assured me that in moving to the ECSC pricing system it is their intention, so far as market conditions allow to give effect to Lord Hirshfield's recommendations on the margins between prices of billets and certain billet-derived products.

The hon. Member for The Hartlepools (Mr. Leadbitter) asked for confirmation of the value of the site investment and its relative cost effectiveness against other products. I confirm that all the evaluations gave Teesside a substantial cost advantage over all other sites. The White Paper refers to it as having a cost advantage of some £20 million a year. As the hon. Gentleman pointed out—and perhaps, as has been said, the voice of England has been somewhat muted in this debate—it is an area which suffered most from the fall in steelmaking in recent years.

The siting of this plant on Teesside for once does what is both economically right and what would appear on those grounds also to be fair.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bedford (Mr. Skeet) spoke about planning permission having been granted for Hunterston. I understand that no planning permissions have yet been granted. They are still under consideration by the Secretary of State.

I will refer briefly to the question of job losses. We know the consequences and we accept the responsibilities for this. We refuse to accept that in the time-scale involved we cannot provide the necessary jobs. The tools are available to us, and if we need further tools we shall not hesitate to seek them.

I draw attention to the ECSC provisions about which I have been asked. We are in the middle of negotiating with ECSC for re-adaptation payments to help people who are made redundant by paying them a proportion of their previous earnings, a free training supplement and for a period of added unemployment pay if they are unemployed. Discussions are also current on the mechanics of reconversion payments.

I remind the House of what was said in the previous debate and what is said in the White Paper, that the finding of alternative employment is our primary task and the primary rôle that we seek to fill. We recognise that the loss of job opportunities creates particular problems in particular areas, and to the best of our ability we must find alternative jobs. The cornerstone of job replacement is growth in the economy. This job loss is to take place in a buoyant, growing economy with decreasing unemployment, and a fundamental basis of such an economy is a growing, competitive and efficient steel industry such as this strategy represents.

The White Paper outlines the strategy designed to carry BSC into the forefront of the world's steel industry and to keep it there. It is designed to give British industry steel of a quality and at a price which will enable us effectively to compete in world markets. It is designed to provide secure jobs, albeit fewer of them, for our steel workers. It anticipates the loss of job opportunities that will result and sets out the realistic way in which the Government, working with the unions and BSC, and making full use of the power they have, are tackling the problem. It contains the degree of flexibility that is essential in looking forward into the next decade.

Against this background the speeches of hon. Members on the Opposition benches strike discordant notes. On the one hand, they ask for greater capacity, regardless of the market projections and of whether the output can be sold. On the other hand, they seek to keep open

almost every existing steel plant, regardless of the effect that this would have upon the cost and quality of steel. They have once more displayed their ignorance of the economic facts of industrial life.

Whilst the Government and BSC must take full account of the social and regional problems that this strategy presents—and have done so and will continue to do so—nevertheless, at the end of the day, BSC must be a competitive and profitable business, making its full and vital contribution to the economic prosperity of the nation. We believe that the strategy outlined in the White Paper does just this. I therefore ask the House to reject the Opposition amendment and to approve the White Paper.

Question put, That the amendment be made:—

The House divided: Ayes 257, Noes 295.

Division No. 59.]	AYES	[10.0 p.m.
Abse, Leo	Davidson, Arthur	Hamilton, William (Fife, W.)
Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)	Davies, Denzil (Llanelly)	Hannan, William (G'gow, Maryhill)
Allen, Scholefield	Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)	Hardy, Peter
Archer, Peter (Rowley Regis)	Davies, Ifor (Gower)	Harper, Joseph
Armstrong, Ernest	Davis, Clinton (Hackney, C.)	Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)
Ashley, Jack	Davis, Terry (Bromsgrove)	Hart, Rt. Hn. Judith
Atkinson, Norman	Deakins, Eric	Hattersley, Roy
Bagier, Gordon A. T.	de Freitas, Rt. Hn. Sir Geoffrey	Healey, Rt. Hn. Denis
Barnes, Michael	Dell, Rt. Hn. Edmund	Heffer, Eric S.
Barnett, Guy (Greenwich)	Dempsey, James	Hilton, W. S.
Barnett, Joel (Heywood and Royton)	Devlin, Miss Bernadette	Hooson, Emlyn
Baxter, William	Dormand, J. D.	Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas
Beaney, Alan	Douglas, Dick (Stirlingshire, E.)	Howell, Denis (Small Heath)
Benn, Rt. Hn. Anthony Wedgwood	Douglas-Mann, Bruce	Huckfield, Leslie
Bennett, James (Glasgow, Bridgeton)	Driberg, Tom	Hughes, Rt. Hn. Cledwyn (Anglesey)
Bidwell, Sydney	Duffy, A. E. P.	Hughes, Mark (Durham)
Blenkinsop, Arthur	Dunnett, Jack	Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen, N.)
Boardman, H. (Leigh)	Eadie, Alex	Hughes, Roy (Newport)
Booth, Albert	Edelman, Maurice	Hunter, Adam
Bottomley, Rt. Hn. Arthur	Edwards, Robert (Bilston)	Irvine,Rt.Hn.SirArthur(Edge Hill)
Boyden, James (Bishop Auckland)	Edwards, William (Merioneth)	Janner, Greville
Bradley, Tom	Ellis, Tom	Jay, Rt. Hn. Douglas
Broughton, Sir Alfred	English, Michael	Jeger, Mrs. Lena
Brown, Hugh D. (G'gow, Provan)	Evans, Fred	Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)
Brown, Ronald (Shoreditch & F'bury)	Ewing, Harry	Jenkins, Rt. Hn. Roy (Stechford)
Buchan, Norman	Faulds, Andrew	John, Brynmor
Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)	Fisher, Mrs. Doris (B'ham,Ladywood)	Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)
Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)	Fitch, Alan (Wigan)	Johnson, James (K'ston-on-Hull, W.)
Campbell, I. (Dunbartonshire, W.)	Fletcher, Raymond (Ilkeston)	Johnson, Walter (Derby, S.)
Cant, R. B.	Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)	Johnston, Russell (Inverness)
Carmichael, Neil	Foot, Michael	Jones, Barry (Flint, E.)
Carter, Ray (Birmingh'm, Northfield)	Ford, Ben	Jones, Dan (Burnley)
Carter-Jones, Lewis (Eccles)	Forrester, John	Jones,Rt.Hn.Sir Elwyn(W.Ham,S.)
Clark, David (Colne Valley)	Fraser, John (Norwood)	Jones, Gwynoro (Carmarthen)
Cocks, Michael (Bristol, S.)	Galpern, Sir Myer	Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda, W.)
Concannon, J. D.	Garrett, W. E.	Judd, Frank
Conlan, Bernard	Gilbert, Dr. John	Kaufman. Gerald
Corbet, Mrs. Freda	Ginsburg, David (Dewsbury)	Kelley, Richard
Cox, Thomas (Wandsworth, C.)	Golding, John	Kerr, Russell
Crawshaw, Richard	Gourlay, Harry	Kinnock, Neil
Cronin, John	Grant, George (Morpeth)	Lambie, David
Crosland, Rt. Hn. Anthony	Grant, John D. (Islington, E.)	Lamborn, Harry
Crossman, Rt. Hn. Richard	Griffiths, Eddie (Brightside)	Lamond, James
Cunningham, G. (Islington, S.W.)	Griffiths, Will (Exchange)	Latham, Arthur
Dalyell, Tam	Grimond, Rt. Hn. J.	Lawson George
Darling, Rt. Hn. George	Hamilton, James (Bothwell)	Leadbitter, Ted
Lee, Rt. Hn. Frederick	Orbach, Maurice	Smith, John (Lanarkshire, N.)
Lestor, Miss Joan	Orme, Stanley	Spearing, Nigel
Lewis, Arthur (W. Ham, N.)	Oswald, Thomas	Spriggs, Leslie
Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)	Owen, Dr. David (Plymouth, Sutton)	Stallard, A. W.
Lomas, Kenneth	Padley, Walter	Steel, David
Loughlin, Charles	Palmer, Arthur	Stewart, Donald (Western Isles)
Lyon, Alexander W. (York)	Pannell, Rt. Hn. Charles	Stewart, Rt. Hn Michael (Fulham)
Lyons, Edward (Bradford, E.)	Pardoe, John	Stoddart, David (Swindon)
Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson	Parker, John (Dagenham)	Stonehouse, Rt. Hn. John
McBride, Neil	Parry, Robert (Liverpool, Exchange)	Strang, Gavin
McElhone, Frank	Pavitt, Laurie	Strauss, Rt. Hn. G. R.
McGuire, Michael	Peart, Rt. Hn. Fred	Summerskill, Hn. Dr. Shirley
Mackenzie, Gregor	Pendry, Tom	Swain, Thomas
Mackie, John	Perry, Ernest G.	Thomas,Rt.Hn.George (Cardiff, W.)
Maclennan, Robert	Prentice, Rt. Hn. Reg.	Thomas, Jeffrey (Abertillery)
McMillan, Tom (Glasgow, C.)	Prescott, John	Tinn, James
McNamara, J. Kevin	Price, William (Rugby)	Tomney, Frank
Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)	Probert, Arthur	Torney, Tom
Marks, Kenneth	Reed, D. (Sedgefield)	Tuck, Raphael
Marsden, F.	Rees, Merlyn (Leeds, S.)	Varley, Eric G
Marshall. Dr. Edmund	Rhodes, Geoffrey	Wainwright, Edwin
Mason, Rt. Hn. Roy	Richard, Ivor	Walden, Brian (B'm'ham, All Saints)
Mayhew, Christopher	Roberts, Albert (Normanton)	Walker, Harold (Doncaster)
Meacher, Michael	Roberts,Rt.Hn.Goronwy(Caernarvon)	Wallace, George
Mellish, Rt. Hn. Robert	Robertson, John (Paisley)	Watkins, David
Mendelson, John	Roderick, Caerwyn E.(Brc'n&R'dnor)	Weitzman, David
Millan, Bruce	Rodgers, William (Stockton-on-Tees)	Wellbeloved, James
Miller, Dr. M. S.	Roper, John	Wells, William (Walsall, N.)
Milne, Edward	Rose, Paul B.	White, James (Glasgow, Pollok)
Mitchell, R. C. (S'hampton, Itchen)	Ross, Rt. Hn William (Kilmarnock)	Whitehead, Phillip
Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)	Rowlands, Ted	Whitlock, William
Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)	Sandelson, Neville	Williams, Alan (Swansea, W.)
Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)	Sheldon, Robert (Ashton-under-Lyne)	Williams, W. T. (Warrington)
Morris, Rt. Hn. John (Aberavon)	Shore, Rt. Hn. Peter (Stepney)	Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)
Moyle, Roland	Short,Rt.Hn.Edward(N'c'tle-u-Tyne)	Wilson, Rt. Hn. Harold (Huyton)
Mulley, Rt. Hn. Frederick	Short, Mrs. Renée (W'hampton,N.E.)	Wilson, William (Coventry, S.) Woof, Robert
Oakes, Gordon	Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford)
Ogden, Eric	Silkin, Hn. S. C. (Dulwich)
O'Halloran, Michael	Sillars, James	TELLERS FOR THE AYES:
O'Malley, Brian	Silverman, Julius	Mr. Donald Coleman and
Oram, Bert	Skinner, Dennis	Mr. James A. Dunn.
NOES
Adley, Robert	Channon, Paul	Fookes, Miss Janet
Alison, Michael (Barkston Ash)	Chapman, Sydney	Fortescue, Tim
Allason, James (Hemel Hempstead)	Churchill, W. S.	Foster, Sir John
Amery, Rt. Hn. Julian	Clark, William (Surrey, E.)	Fowler, Norman
Archer, Jeffrey (Louth)	Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)	Fox, Marcus
Astor, John	Cockeram, Eric	Fraser,Rt.Hn.Hugh(St'fford & Stone)
Atkins, Humphrey	Cooke, Robert	Fry, Peter
Awdry, Daniel	Coombs, Derek	Gardner, Edward
Baker, Kenneth (St. Marylebone)	Cooper, A. E.	Gibson-Watt, David
Balniel, Rt. Hn. Lord	Cordle, John	Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, C.)
Batsford, Brian	Cormack, Patrick	Gilmour, Sir John (Fife, E.)
Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton	Costain, A. P.	Glyn, Dr. Alan
Bell, Ronald	Crouch, David	Goodhart, Philip
Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Gosport)	Crowder, F. P.	Goodhew, Victor
Benyon, W.	Davies, Rt. Hn. John (Knutsford)	Gorst, John
Berry, Hn. Anthony	d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, sir Henry	Gower, Raymond
Biffen, John	d'Avigdor-Goldsmid,Maj.-Gen.Jack	Grant, Anthony (Harrow, C.)
Biggs-Davison, John	Dean, Paul	Gray, Hamish
Blaker, Peter	Deedes, Rt. Hn. W. F.	Green, Alan
Boardman, Tom (Leicester, S.W.)	Digby, Simon Wingfield	Grieve, Percy
Body, Richard	Dixon, Piers	Griffiths, Eldon (Bury St. Edmunds)
Boscawen, Hn. Robert	Dodds-Parker, Douglas	Grylls, Michael
Bossom, Sir Clive	Douglas-Home, Rt. Hn. Sir Alec	Gummer, J. Selwyn
Bowden, Andrew	Drayson, G. B.	Gurden, Harold
Braine, Sir Bernard	du Cann, Rt. Hn. Edward	Hall, Miss Joan (Keighley)
Bray, Ronald	Dykes, Hugh	Hall, John (Wycombe)
Brewis, John	Eden, Rt. Hn. Sir John	Hall-Davis, A. G. F.
Brinton, Sir Tatton	Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)	Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)
Brocklebank-Fowler, Christopher	Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)	Hannam, John (Exeter)
Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)	Elliott, R. W. (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne,N.)	Harrison, Brian (Maldon)
Bruce-Gardyne, J.	Emery, Peter	Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)
Bryan, Sir Paul	Eyre, Reginald	Haselhurst, Alan
Buchanan-Smith, Alick(Angus,N&M)	Farr, John	Hastings, Stephen
Buck, Antony	Fell, Anthony	Havers, Sir Michael
Bullus, Sir Eric	Fenner, Mrs. Peggy	Hawkins, Paul
Burden, F. A.	Fidler, Michael	Hayhoe, Barney
Butler, Adam (Bosworth)	Finsberg, Geoffrey (Hampstead)	Heath, Rt. Hn. Edward
Campbell, Rt.Hn.G.(Moray & Nairn)	Fisher, Nigel (Surbiton)	Heseltine, Michael
Carr, Rt. Hn. Robert	Fletcher-Cooke, Charles	Hicks, Robert

Higglns, Terence L.	Mawby, Ray	Scott, Nicholas
Hiley, Joseph	Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.	Shaw, Michael (Sc'b'gh & Whitby)
Hill, John E. B. (Norfolk, S.)	Meyer, Sir Anthony	Shelton, William (Clapham)
Hill, S. James A.(Southampton,Test)	Mills, Peter (Torrington)	Shersby, Michael
Holland, Philip	Mills, Stratton (Belfast, N.)	Simeons, Charles
Holt, Miss Mary	Miscampbell, Norman	Sinclair, Sir George
Hordern, Peter	Mitchell, Lt.-Col. C. (Aberdeenshire, W)	Skeet, T. H. H.
Hornby, Richard	Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)	Smith, Dudley (W'wick & L'mlngton)
Hornsby-Smith.Rt.Hn.Dame Patricia	Moate, Roger	Soref, Harold
Howe, Rt. Hn. Sir Geoffrey	Molyneaux, James	Speed, Keith
Howell, David (Guildford)	Money, Ernie	Spence, John
Howell, Ralph (Norfolk, N.)	Monks, Mrs. Connie	Sproat, Iain
Hunt, John	Montgomery, Fergus	Stainton, Keith
Hutchison, Michael Clark	More, Jasper	Stanbrook, Ivor
Iremonger, T. L.	Morgan, Geraint (Denbigh)	Stewart-Smith, Geoffrey (Belper)
Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)	Morrison, Charles	Stodart, Anthony (Edinburgh, W.)
James, David	Mudd, David	Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir M.
Jenkin, Patrick (Woodford)	Nabarro, Sir Gerald	Stokes, John
Jennings, J. C. (Burton)	Neave, Airey	Stuttaford, Dr. Tom
Jessel, Toby	Nicholls, Sir Harmar	Sutcliffe, John
Johnson Smith, G. (E. Grinstead)	Noble, Rt. Hn. Michael	Tapsell, Peter
Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)	Nott, John	Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)
Jopling, Michael	Onslow, Cranley	Taylor,Edward M.(G'gow,Cathcart)
Joseph, Rt. Hn. Sir Keith	Oppenheim, Mrs. Sally	Taylor, Frank (Moss Side)
Kaberry, Sir Donald	Owen, Idris (Stockport, N.)	Taylor, Robert (Croydon, N.W.)
Kellett-Bowman, Mrs. Elaine	Page, Rt. Hn. Graham (Crosby)	Tebbit, Norman
Kilfedder, James	Page, John (Harrow, W.)	Temple, John M.
Kimball, Marcus	Parkinson, Cecil	Thatcher, Rt. Hn. Mrs. Margaret
King, Evelyn (Dorset, S.)	Peel, Sir John	Thomas, John Stradling (Monmouth
King, Tom (Bridgwater)	Percival, Ian	Thomas, Rt. Hn. Peter (Hendon, S.
Kinsey, J. R.	Peyton, Rt. Hn. John	Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon, S.
Kirk, Peter	Pike, Miss Mervyn	Tilney, John
Knight, Mrs. Jill	Pink, R. Bonner	Trafford, Dr. Anthony
Knox, David	Pounder, Rafton	Trew, Peter
Lambton, Lord	Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch	Tugendhat, Christopher
Lamont, Norman	Price, David (Eastleigh)	Turton, Rt. Hn. Sir Robin
Lane, David	Prior, Rt. Hn. J. M. L.	Vaughan, Dr. Gerard
Langford-Holt, Sir John	Proudfoot, Wilfred	Waddington, David
Le Marchant, Spencer	Pym, Rt. Hn. Francis	Walder, David (Clitheroe)
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)	Quennell, Miss J. M.	Walker, Rt. Hn. Peter (Worcester)
Lloyd, Ian (P'tsm'th, Langstone)	Raison, Timothy	Walker-Smith, Rt. Hn. Sir Derek
Longden, Sir Gilbert	Ramsden, Rt. Hn. James	Wall, Patrick
Loveridge, John	Rawlinson, Rt. Hn. Sir Peter	Walters, Dennis
Luce, R. N.	Redmond, Robert	Ward, Dame Irene
McAdden, Sir Stephen	Reed, Laurance (Bolton, E.)	Wells, John (Maidstone)
MacArthur, Ian	Rees, Peter (Dover)	White, Roger (Gravesend)
McCrindle, R. A.	Rees-Davies, W. R.	Wiggin, Jerry
McLaren, Martin	Renton, Rt. Hn. Sir David	Wilkinson, John
Maclean, Sir Fitzroy	Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon	Winterton, Nicholas
McMaster, Stanley	Ridley, Hn. Nicholas	Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick
Macmillan,Rt.Hn. Maurice (Farnham)	Ridsdale, Julian	Wood, Rt. Hn. Richard
McNair-Wilson, Michael	Rippon, Rt. Hn. Geoffrey	Woodhouse, Hn. Christopher
McNair-Wilson, Patrick (NewForest)	Roberts, Wyn (Conway)	Woodnutt, Mark
Maddan, Martin	Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)	Worsley, Marcus
Madel, David	Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)	Wylie, Rt. Hn. N. R.
Maginnis, John E.	Rost, Peter	Younger, Hn. George
Marples, Rt. Hn. Ernest	Royle, Anthony
Marten, Neil	Russell, Sir Ronald	TELLERS FOR THE NOES:
Mather, Carol	St. John-Stevas, Norman	Mr. Walter Clegg and
Maude, Angus	Sandys, Rt. Hn. D.	Mr. Bernard Weatherill.
Maudling, Rt. Hn. Reginald

Question accordingly negatived.

Main Question put:—

The House divided: Ayes 295, Noes 260.

Division No. 60.]	AYES	[10.12 p.m.
Adley, Robert	Benyon, W.	Brocklebank-Fowler, Christopher
Alison, Michael (Barkston Ash)	Berry, Hn. Anthony	Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)
Allason, James (Hemel Hempstead)	Biffen, John	Bruce-Gardyne, J.
Amery, Rt. Hn. Julian	Biggs-Davison, John	Bryan, Sir Paul
Archer, Jeffrey (Louth)	Blaker, Peter	Buchanan-Smith, Alick(Angus,N&M)
Astor, John	Boardman, Tom (Leicester, S.W.)	Buck, Antony
Atkins, Humphrey	Body, Richard	Bullus, Sir Eric
Awdry, Daniel	Boscawen, Hn. Robert	Burden, F. A.
Baker, Kenneth (St. Marylebone)	Bossom, Sir Clive	Butler, Adam (Bosworth)
Balniel, Rt. Hn. Lord	Bowden, Andrew	Campbell, Rt.Hn.G.(Moray & Nairn)
Batsford, Brian	Braine, Sir Bernard	Carr, Rt. Hn. Robert
Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton	Bray, Ronald	Channon, Paul
Bell, Ronald	Brewis, John	Chapman, Sydney
Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Gosport)	Brinton, Sir Tatton	Churchill, W. S.
Clark, William (Surrey, E.)	Hornsby-Smith.Rt.Hn.Dame Patricia	Parkinson, Cecil
Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)	Howe, Rt. Hn. Sir Geoffrey	Peel, Sir John
Cockeram, Eric	Howell, David (Guildford)	Percival, Ian
Cooke, Robert	Howell, Ralph (Norfolk, N.)	Peyton, Rt. Hn. John
Coombs, Derek	Hunt, John	Pike, Miss Mervyn
Cooper, A. E.	Hutchison, Michael Clark	Pink, R. Bonner
Cordle, John	Iremonger, T. L.	Pounder, Rafton
Cormack, Patrick	Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)	Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch
Costain, A. P.	James, David	Price, David (Eastleigh)
Crouch, David	Jenkin, Patrick (Woodford)	Prior, Rt. Hn. J. M. L.
Crowder, F. P.	Jennings, J. C. (Burton)	Proudfoot, Wilfred
Davies, Rt. Hn. John (Knutstord)	Jessel, Toby	Pym, Rt. Hn. Francis
d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry	Johnson Smith, G. (E. Grinstead)	Quennell, Miss J. M.
d'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Maj.-Gen.Jack	Jones, Arthur (Northants, S.)	Raison, Timothy
Dean, Paul	Jopling, Michael	Ramsden, Rt. Hn. James
Deedes, Rt. Hn. W. F.	Joseph, Rt. Hn. Sir Keith	Rawlinson, Rt. Hn. Sir Peter
Digby. Simon Wingfield	Kaberry, Sir Donald	Redmond, Robert
Dixon, Piers	Kellett-Bowman, Mrs. Elaine	Reed, Laurance (Bolton, E.)
Dodds-Parker, Sir Douglas	Kilfedder, James	Rees, Peter (Dover)
Douglas-Home, Rt. Hn. Sir Alec	Kimball, Marcus	Rees-Davies, W. R.
Drayson, G. B.	King, Evelyn (Dorset, S.)	Renton, Rt. Hn. Sir David
du Cann, Rt. Hn. Edward	King, Tom (Bridgwater)	Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon
Dykes, Hugh	Kinsey, J. R.	Ridley, Hn. Nicholas
Eden, Rt. Hn. Sir John	Kirk, Peter	Ridsdale Julian
Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)	Knight, Mrs. Jill	Rippon, Rt. Hn. Geoffrey
Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)	Knox, David	Roberts, Wyn (Conway)
Elliott, R. W. (N'c'tle-upon-Tyne,N.)	Lambton, Lord	Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)
Emery, Peter	Lamont, Norman	Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)
Eyre, Reginald	Lane, David	Rost, Peter
Farr, John	Langford-Holt, Sir John	Royle, Anthony
Fell, Anthony	Le Marchant, Spencer	Russell, Sir Ronald
Fenner, Mrs. Peggy	Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)	St. John-Stevas, Norman
Fidler, Michael	Lloyd, Ian (P'tsm'th, Langstone)	Sandys, Rt. Hn. D.
Finsberg, Geoffrey (Hampstead)	Longden, Sir Gilbert	Scott, Nicholas
Fisher, Nigel (Surbiton)	Loveridge, John	Shaw, Michael (Sc'b'gh & Whitby)
Fletcher-Cooke, Charles	Luce, R. N.	Shelton, William (Clapham)
Fookes, Miss Janet	McAdden, Sir Stephen	Shersby, Michael
Fortescue Tim	MacArthur, Ian	Simeons, Charles
Foster, Sir John	McCrindle, R A.	Sinclair, Sir George
Fowler, Norman	McLaren, Martin	Skeet, T. H. H.
Fox, Marcus	Maclean, Sir Fitzroy	Smith, Dudley (W'wick & L'migton)
Fraser,Rt.Hn.Hugh(St'fford & Stone)	McMaster, Stanley	Soref, Harold
Fry, Peter	Macmillan,Rt.Hn.Maurice(Farnham)	Speed, Keith
Gardner, Edward	McNair-Wilson, Michael	Spence, John
Gibson-Watt, David	McNair-Wilson, Patrick (New Forest)	Sproat, Iain
Gilmour, Ian (Norfolk, C.)	Maddan, Martin	Stainton, Keith
Gilmour, Sir John (Fife, E.)	Madel, David	Stanbrook, Ivor
Glyn, Dr. Alan	Maginnis, John E.	Stewart-Smith, Geoffrey (Belper)
Goodhart, Philip	Marples, Rt. Hn. Ernest	Stodart, Anthony (Edinburgh, W.)
Goodhew, Victor	Marten, Neil	Stoddart-Scott, Col. Sir M.
Gorst, John	Mather, Carol	Stokes, John
Gower, Raymond	Maude, Angus	Stuttaford, Dr. Tom
Grant, Anthony (Harrow, C.)	Maudling, Rt. Hn. Reginald	Sutcliffe, John
Gray, Hamish	Mawby, Ray	Tapsell, Peter
Green, Alan	Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.	Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne)
Grieve, Percy	Meyer, Sir Anthony	Taylor,Edward M.(G'gow,Cathcart)
Griffiths, Eldon (Bury St. Edmunds)	Mills, Peter (Torrington)	Taylor, Frank (Moss Side)
Grylls, Michael	Mills, Stratton (Belfast, N.)	Taylor, Robert (Croydon, N.W.)
Gummer, J. Selwyn	Miscampbell, Norman	Tebbit, Norman
Gurden, Harold	Mitchell,Lt.-Col.C.(Aberdeenshire,W)	Temple, John M.
Hall, Miss Joan (Keighley)	Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)	Thatcher, Rt. Hn. Mrs. Margaret
Hall, John (Wycombe)	Moate, Roger	Thomas, John Stradling (Monmouth)
Hall-Davis, A. G. F.	Molyneaux, James	Thomas, Rt. Hn. Peter (Hendon, S.)
Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)	Money, Ernle	Thompson, Sir Richard (Croydon, S.)
Hannam, John (Exeter)	Monks, Mrs. Connie	Tilney, John
Harrison, Brian (Maldon)	Montgomery, Fergus	Trafford, Dr. Anthony
Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)	More, Jasper	Trew, Peter
Haselhurst, Alan	Morgan, Geraint (Denbigh)	Tugendhat, Christopher
Hastings, Stephen	Morrison, Charles	Turton, Rt. Hn. Sir Robin
Havers, Sir Michael	Mudd, David	Vaughan, Dr. Gerard
Hawkins, Paul	Murton, Oscar	Waddington, David
Hayhoe, Barney	Nabarro, Sir Gerald	Walder, David (Clitheroe)
Heath, Rt. Hn. Edward	Neave, Airey	Walker, Rt. Hn. Peter (Worcester)
Heseltine, Michael	Nicholls, Sir Harmar	Walker-Smith, Rt. Hn. Sir Derek
Hicks, Robert	Noble, Rt. Hn. Michael	Wall, Patrick
Higgins, Terence L.	Nott, John	Walters, Dennis
Hiley, Joseph	Onslow, Cranley	Ward, Dame Irene
Hill, John E. B. (Norfolk, S.)	Oppenheim, Mrs. Sally	Wells, John (Maidstone)
Hill, S. James A.(Southampton, Test)	Owen, Idris (Stockport, N.)	White, Roger (Gravesend)
Holland, Philip	Page, Rt. Hn. Graham (Crosby)	Wiggin, Jerry
Holt, Miss Mary	Page, John (Harrow, W.)	Wilkinson, John
Hordern, Peter
Hornby, Richard

Winterton, Nicholas	Woodnutt, Mark
Wolrige-Gordon, Patrick	Worsley, Marcus	TELLERS FOR THE AYES:
Wood, Rt. Hn. Richard	Wylie, Rt. Hn. N. R.	Mr. Walter Clegg and
Woodhouse, Hn. Christopher	Younger, Hn. George	Mr. Bernard Weatherill.
NOES
Abse, Leo	Foot, Michael	Maclennan, Robert
Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)	Ford, Ben	McMillan, Tom (Glasgow, C.)
Allen, Scholefield	Forrester, John	McNamara, J. Kevin
Archer, Peter (Rowley Regis)	Fraser, John (Norwood)	Mallalieu, J. P. W. (Huddersfield, E.)
Armstrong, Ernest	Galpern, Sir Myer	Marks, Kenneth
Ashley, Jack	Garrett, W. E.	Marsden, F.
Atkinson, Norman	Gilbert, Dr. John	Marshall, Dr. Edmund
Bagier, Gordon A. T.	Ginsburg, David (Dewsbury)	Mason, Rt. Hn. Roy
Barnes, Michael	Golding, John	Mayhew, Christopher
Barnett, Guy (Greenwich)	Gourlay, Harry	Meacher, Michael
Barnett, Joel (Heywood and Royton)	Grant, George (Morpeth)	Mellish, Rt. Hn. Robert
Baxter, William	Grant, John D. (Islington, E.)	Mendelson, John
Beaney, Alan	Griffiths, Eddie (Brightside)	Millan, Bruce
Benn, Rt. Hn. Anthony Wedgwood	Griffiths, Will (Exchange)	Miller, Dr. M. S.
Bennett, James(Glasgow, Bridgeton)	Grimond, Rt. Hn. J,	Milne, Edward
Bidwell, Sydney	Hamilton, James (Boihweil)	Mitchell, R. C. (S'hampton, Itchen)
Blenkinsop, Arthur	Hamilton, William (Fife, W.)	Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)
Boardman, H. (Leigh)	Hannan, William (G'gow, Maryhill	Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)
Sooth, Albert	Hardy, Peter	Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)
Bottomley, Rt. Hn. Arthur	Harper, Joseph	Morris, Rt. Hn. John (Aberavon)
Boyden, James (Bishop Auckland)	Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)	Moyle, Roland
Bradley, Tom	Hart, Rt. Hn. Judith	Mulley, Rt. Hn. Frederick
Broughton, Sir Alfred	Hattersley, Roy	Oakes, Gordon
Brown, Hugh D. (G'gow, Provan)	Healey, Rt. Hn. Denis	Ogden, Eric
Brown, Ronald (Shoreditch & F'bury)	Heffer, Eric S.	O'Halloran, Michael
Buchan, Norman	Hilton, W. S.	O'Malley, Brian
Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)	Hooson, Emlyn	Oram, Bert
Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)	Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas	Orbach, Maurice
Campbell, I. (Dunbartonshire, W.)	Howell, Denis (Small Heath)	Orme, Stanley
Cant, R. B.	Huckfield, Leslie	Oswald, Thomas
Carmichael, Neil	Hughes, Rt. Hn. Cledwyn (Anglesey)	Owen, Dr. David (Plymouth, Sutton)
Carter, Ray (Birmingh'm, Northfield)	Hughes, Mark (Durham)	Padley, Walter
Carter-Jones, Lewis (Eccles)	Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen, N.)	Palmer, Arthur
Clark, David (Colne Valley)	Hughes, Roy (Newport)	Pannell, Rt. Hn. Charles
Cocks, Michael (Bristol, S.)	Hunter, Adam	Pardoe, John
Cohen, Stanley	Irvine, Rt. Hn Sir Arthur (Edge Hill	Parker, John (Dagenham)
Concannon, J. D.	Janner, Greville	Parry, Robert (Liverpool, Exchange)
Conlan, Bernard	Jay, Rt. Hn. Douglas	Pavitt, Laurie
Corbet, Mrs. Freda	Jeger, Mrs. Lena	Peart, Rt. Hn. Fred
Cox, Thomas (Wandsworth, C.)	Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)	Pendry, Tom
Crawshaw, Richard	Jenkins, Rt. Hn. Roy (Stechford)	Perry, Ernest G.
Cronin, John	John, Brynmor	Prentice, Rt. Hn. Reg.
Crosland, Rt. Hn. Anthony	Johnson, Carol (Lewisham, S.)	Prescott, John
Crossman, Rt. Hn. Richard	Johnson, James (K'ston-on-Hull, W.)	Price, William (Rugby)
Cunningham, G. (Islington, S.W.)	Johnson, Walter (Derby, S.)	Probert, Arthur
Dalyell, Tarn	Johnston, Russell (Inverness)	Reed, D. (Sedgefield)
Darling, Rt Hn. George	Jones, Barry (Flint, E.)	Rees, Merlyn (Leeds, S.)
Davidson, Arthur	Jones, Dan (Burnley)	Rhodes, Geoffrey
Davies, Denzil (Llanelly)	Jones,Rt.Hn.Sir Elwyn(W.Ham,S.)	Richard, Ivor
Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)	Jones, Gwynoro (Carmarthen)	Roberts, Albert (Normanton)
Davies, Ifor (Gower)	Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda, W.)	Roberts, Rt.Hn.Goronwy (Caernarvon)
Davis, Clinton (Hackney, C.)	Judd, Frank	Robertson, John (Paisley)
Davis, Terry (Bromsgrove)	Kaufman, Gerald	Roderick, Caerwyn E.(Brc'n&R'dnor)
Deakins, Eric	Kelley, Richard	Rodgers, William (Stockton-on-Tees)
de Freitas, Rt. Hn. Sir Geoffrey	Kerr, Russell	Roper, John
Dell, Rt. Hn. Edmund	Kinnock, Neil	Rose, Paul B.
Dempsey, James	Lambie, David	Ross, Rt. Hn. William (Kilmarnock)
Devlin, Miss Bernadette	Lamborn, Harry	Rowlands, Ted
Dormand, J. D.	Lamond, James	Sandelson, Neville
Douglas, Dick (Stirlingshire, E.)	Latham, Arthur	Sheldon, Robert (Ashton-under-Lyne)
Douglas-Mann, Bruce	Lawson, George	Shore, Rt. Hn. Peter (Stepney)
Driberg, Tom	Leadbitter, Ted	Short, Rt.Hn.Edward(N'c'tle-u-Tyne)
Duffy, A. E. P.	Lee, Rt. Hn. Frederick	Short, Mrs. Renée (W'hampton, N.E.)
Dunnett, Jack	Lestor, Miss Joan	Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Depttord)
Eadie, Alex	Lewis, Arthur (W. Ham, N.)	Silkin, Hn. S. C. (Dulwich)
Edelman, Maurice	Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)	Sillars, James
Edwards, Robert (Bilston)	Lipton, Marcus	Silverman, Julius
Edwards, William (Merioneth)	Lomas, Kenneth	Skinner, Dennis
Ellis, Tom	Loughlin, Charles	Smith, Cyril (Rochdale)
English, Michael	Lyon, Alexander W. (York)	Smith, John (Lanarkshire, N.)
Evans, Fred	Lyons, Edward (Bradford, E.)	Spearing, Nigel
Ewing, Harry	Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson	Spriggs, Leslie
Faulds, Andrew	McBride, Neil	Stallard, A. W.
Fisher,Mrs. Doris (B'ham,Ladywood)	McElhone, Frank	Steel, David
Fitch, Alan (Wigan)	McGuire, Michael	Stewart, Donald (Western Isles)
Fletcher, Raymond (Ilkeston)	Mackenzie, Gregor	Stewart, Rt. Hn. Michael (Fulham)
Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)	Mackie, John

Stoddart, David (Swindon)	Varley, Eric G.	Williams Alan (Swansea, W.)
Stonehouse, Rt. Hn. John	Wainwright, Edwin	Williams, W. T. (Warrington)
Strang, Gavin	Walden, Brian (B'm'ham, Alf Saints)	Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)
Strauss, Rt. Hn. G. R.	Walker, Harold (Doncaster)	Wilson, Rt. Hn. Harold (Huyton)
Summerskill, Hn. Dr. Shirley	Wallace, George	Wilson, William (Coventry, S.)
Swain, Thomas	Welkins, David	Woof, Robert
Thomas,Rt.Hn.George (Cardiff,W.)	Weitzman, David
Thomas, Jeffrey (Abertillery)	Wellbeloved, James	TELLERS FOR THE NOES
Tinn, James	Wells, William (Walsall, N.)	Mr. Donald Coleman and
Tomney, Frank	White, James (Glasgow, Pollok)	Mr. James A. Dunn.
Torney, Tom	Whitehead, Phillip
Tuck, Raphael	Whitlock, William
Question accordingly agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House approves the White Paper, British Steel Corporation: Ten Year Development Strategy (Command Paper No. 5226).