HC Deb 01 July 1974 vol 876 cc17-9
11. Mr. Bruce-Gardyne

asked the Secretary of State for Industry what is now his estimate of the savings on the Post Office investment programme during the current financial year resulting from the December 1973 public expenditure statement; how this compares with the original estimate; which specific items he has introduced into the programme; and how these additions will be financed.

Mr. Benn

In accordance with the statement made on 17th December 1973 by the then Chancellor, the Post Office programme for 1974–75, as recorded in the last White Paper on Public Expenditure (Cmnd. 5519), was cut by 20 per cent. For telecommunications, the cut was subsequently reduced by 14 per cent. for the first half of the year, and we have recently reduced it to 12 per cent. so that the cut for this year as a whole will be 13 per cent. Its application is a matter for the Post Office. The partly restored programme will be financed in the same way as the original one.

Mr. Bruce-Gardyne

Will the right hon. Gentleman confirm, particularly in the light of his spineless incapacity to prevent the Price Commission cutting the revenue to the Post Office by £60 million, that the reinstated programme which he has introduced will further swell the Government's net borrowing requirement and thus fly in the face of the Chancellor's budgetary objectives?

Mr. Benn

The true position—the hon. Member knows it better than most—is that we have undone some of the damage done by the previous Chancellor to the Post Office investment programme. We are doing what we can to deal with the accumulated deficit relating to telecommunications never made public under the previous Government.

Mr. Stott

Is my right hon. Friend aware that the reduction of the former Chancellor's capital cuts in the telecommunications industry will be welcomed throughout the whole of that industry? Is he further aware that it will put right a programme which would have set the industry back for at least a decade? Does he appreciate that the membership of my union, the Post Office Engineering Union, welcomes this step?

Mr. Benn

I am grateful for my hon. Friend's comments. I might add, since there are so many pleas that there should be greater confidence in industry about future prospects for investment, that the partial restoration of the damaging cuts by the previous Government will greatly help confidence in the telecommunications industry and save jobs in the development areas.

Mr. Peyton

When the right hon. Gentleman refers, as he constantly does, to the difficulty of securing adequate investment in industry, will he undertake to consult—and that means listening to the opinions of other people, as well as voicing his own—those responsible for the difficult task of running industry? Will he pay attention to such people? Does he realise that unless he does so he is in danger of going down in history as a kind of music-hall comedy Mussolini?

Mr. Benn

I should be happy to have my record compared with the right hon. Gentleman's in history but, beyond that, I think he will agree that in partly restoring the damaging cuts in telecommunications investment the Government enjoyed the full support of the telecommunications manufacturing industry, which would have been worst hit had the last Government's programme of cuts gone forward in full.