§ 28. Mr. Jayasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether his proposed policy for £ sterling is a fixed exchange rate or a fixed but adjustable rate; and when this will be put into force.
§ Mr. Patrick JenkinWe intend to return as soon as conditions permit to the maintenance of a fixed parity within agreed margins, against the background of an international monetary system based on a regime of fixed but adjustable parities.
§ Mr. JayWill the hon. Gentleman make rather clearer than he has done in his answer whether what the Government propose to adopt is a regime of fixed parities or of fixed but adjustable parities?
§ Mr. JenkinI am well aware that the right hon. Gentleman seeks to find some inconsistency between the use of the phrases "fixed rate" and "fixed but adjustable rate". There is none. What we shall return to is a fixed rate. If the right hon. Gentleman wants to find an implication that membership of the Communities means that parities must be immutably fixed now, he will not be able to do so. In the first stage, and probably in the second stage, of the move to European economic and monetary union—although that is still a good way ahead—changes of parity during those phases will be possible.