Commons Sitting of 21 May 1975

Preamble
The House met at half-past Two o'clock
PRAYERS
[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]
PRIVATE BUSINESS
  BRITISH RAILWAYS (No. 2) BILL
  Read the Third time and passed.

  STANDING ORDERS (PRIVATE BUSINESS)
  Ordered,
  That the Amendments to Standing Orders relating to Private Business hereinafter stated in the Schedule be made:—

  SCHEDULE
  Standing Order 1, leave out lines 25 to 37 and insert 'the term "local authority" means any of the following:—
  In England and Wales,

  (a) the council of a county,

  (b) the council of a district,

  (c) the council of a parish or group of parishes or the parish meeting of a parish which has no separate parish council,

  (d) the council of a community or group of communities or the community meetings of a community which has no separate community council,

  (e) the Greater London Council,

  (f) the Common Council of the City of London,

  (g) the council of a London borough:

  In Scotland,

  (a) a regional council,

  (b) an islands council,

  (c) a district council;'.

  Standing Order 4A, line 13, leave out 'or burgh' and insert 'or (in Scotland) the islands area or district'.
  Standing Order 4A, line 19, after 'counties', insert 'or (in Scotland) the islands areas or districts'.
  Standing Order 4A, line 31, after 'county', insert 'or (in Scotland) the islands area or district'.
  Standing Order 4A, line 34, after 'county', insert 'or (in Scotland) the islands area or district'.
  Standing Order 5, line 6, after 'districts', insert 'in England and Wales'.
  Standing Order 6, line 8, after 'district', insert 'in England and Wales'.
  Standing Order 10, line 13, leave out 'or burgh' and insert 'or (in Scotland) the islands area or district'.
  Standing Order 10, line 20, after 'counties', insert 'or (in Scotland) the islands areas or districts'.
  Standing Order 16, line 19, after 'district', insert 'in England and Wales'.
  Standing Order 25, line 21, at end insert 'in England and Wales'.
  Standing Order 27, line 11, leave out 'county council of each county' and insert 'council of each county, or (in Scotland) of each islands area, or district'.
  Standing Order 27, line 20, leave out 'county council of each county' and insert 'council of each county, and (in Scotland) of each islands area or district'.
  Standing Order 27, line 24, at end insert or (in Scotland) the islands area or district'.
  Standing Order 27, line 44, leave out 'county council' and insert 'council of the county, or (in Scotland) of the islands area or district'.
  Standing Order 27, line 47, leave out 'each county council' and insert 'the council of each county, or (in Scotland) each islands area or district'.
  Standing Order 36, leave out lines 13 and 14 and insert—
  '(b) any district or islands area, with the proper officer of the district or islands council;'.
  Standing Order 46, line 14, after 'district', insert 'in England and Wales'.
  Standing Order 47, line 28, after 'districts', insert 'in England and Wales'.
  Standing Order 61, line 14, leave out 'county council of every county' and insert 'council of every county, or (in Scotland) of every islands area or district'.
  Standing Order 61, line 29, after 'county', insert 'or (in Scotland) the islands area or district'.
  Standing Order 62, line 13, leave out 'or burgh' and insert or (in Scotland) the islands area or district'.
  Standing Order 65, line 24, leave out 'or burgh' and insert or (in Scotland) the islands area or district'.
  Standing Order 97, line 2, after 'district', insert 'in England and Wales'.
  Standing Order 136A, leave out lines 28 and 29.—[The Chairman of Ways and Means.]

ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS
  FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS

    Non-Proliferation Treaty (Review Conference)
    Mr. Robin F. Cookasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the progress of the Review Conference on the Non-Proliferation Treaty.
    The Minister of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. David Ennals): The conference has completed its general debate and the two main committees are now conducting a detailed review of the operation of the treaty. Their recommendations are unlikely to be known before next week. A copy of the speech I made to the conference on 6th May has been placed in the Library.
    Mr. Cook: Does my right hon. Friend accept that many hon. Members will welcome and support the statement he made in his speech at the Review Conference that nuclear proliferation is one of the main dangers facing the international community? Will he indicate to the House why it is that Britain is reported as resisting the proposal by Mexico and Sweden that the nuclear weapon States should agree to a fixed timetable for a reduction in nuclear arms that will fulfil the commitment under Article 6?
    Mr. Ennals: I thank my hon. Friend for his comment about my speech. I said that this was the most important single problem.
    The reason why a number of Governments, particularly the nuclear weapon States, have felt it difficult to be tied to a timetable is that nuclear disarmament can be achieved only by agreement. That agreement cannot be set by a timetable because each side has to get concessions from the others. The purpose of the Review Conference will be partly achieved because a new sense of urgency will be pressed upon the nuclear weapons States, and particularly the super-Powers.
    Mr. Newens: Does my right hon. Friend not agree that the determination of Powers which are already in possession
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    of nuclear weapons, including the United States of America, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and now Britain, to maintain and develop their nuclear weapons, represents a real threat to the Non-Proliferation Treaty? Is it not desirable that Britain should make it clear that it does not intend to go ahead? Is it not regrettable that we said last week that we are prepared to have further nuclear tests?
    Mr. Ennals: I cannot add much to what was said by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence on 6th May about Britain's position. We have made it clear—I repeated it in my speech to the conference—that Britain has no intention of moving towards a new generation of strategic nuclear weapons. I believe that both the United. States and the Soviet Union are genuine in their attempts to achieve an agreement through SALT.

    Libya
    Mr. Gowasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what representations he has made to the Government of Libya about the illegal entry of arms, explosives and ammunition into Northern Ireland.
    Mr. Ennals: As I told the House on 18th December, we have made it very clear to the Libyan Government that we regard any support for the IRA as interference in the internal affairs of the United Kingdom.
    Mr. Gow: What evidence do the Government have that arms and ammunition are coming into Ulster from Libya?
    Mr. Ennals: There are indications that the IRA has received some aid and training from Libya, but it represents only a small proportion of all the aid that it receives from external sources. Most of the arms supplied come from countries other than Libya—probably mostly illegally smuggled from the United States. In the past two years we have ensured that no arms which could be of use to the IRA are sold to Libya.
    Mr. Powell: Have Her Majesty's Government made the same representation to the Governments of the other countries from which these arms are coming?
    Mr. Ennals: Certainly we have made it absolutely clear that any support for

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    the IRA, from whatever source and in whatever way, is interference in the internal affairs of the United Kingdom. I was encouraged recently to read a report of a speech made by the Libyan Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs in which he said that Libya does not wish to interfere in Irish affairs. I hope that this means the end of Libyan support for the IRA.
    Mr. Biggs-Davison: Were not the views expressed in Libya by representatives of the Irish Parliament helpful in this respect?
    Mr. Ennals: That is absolutely right. It was a useful visit and did a great deal to bring to the attention of the Libyan leaders the true situation in Ireland. It did a lot to dispel a number of misapprehensions which some of the Libyan leaders clearly had.

    Cyprus
    Mr. Hastingsasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the present situation in Cyprus and the security of the sovereign base areas.
    Mr. Townsendasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on recent negotiations over the future of Cyprus.
    The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. James Callaghan): The first round of the resumed talks between the communities in Vienna was held in a constructive atmosphere, and made some progress. I am urging both Mr. Clerides and Mr. Denktash to participate fully in the second round, which starts on 5th June. There have been no significant security problems affecting our bases recently.
    Mr. Hastings: I am sure that the whole House will hope that these talks will go well. Does the right hon. Gentleman not agree that there is some danger of Her Majesty's Government becoming too closely identified with the interests of Archbishop Makarios? Is it not fair to suggest that his support in Greek Cyprus is now coming overwhelmingly from Akel, the Communist Party, and from no other particular quarter? Now that we—at
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    least, in my opinion—are so unwise as to be withdrawing, is there not a real danger that the Archbishop may decide to invite the Russians in, with incalculable consequences in NATO?
    Mr. Callaghan: On the first part of that question, we recognise the Government of Cyprus. The President of the Government of Cyprus is Archbishop Makarios, and therefore we continue to recognise him as the President of Cyprus. It would not be proper to depart from that position. As regards the policy of the Government of Cyprus, I have no indication of any intention to invite the Soviet Union into the Greek-occupied part or the Turkish-occupied part.
    Mr. Atkinson: Has my right hon. Friend seen the reply to a Written Question yesterday by his right hon. Friend the Minister of State, saying that it was not the policy of the British Government to support the United States Congressional embargo on arms supplies to Turkey? That being so, does he not recognise that the impression created by that answer is that Britain does not now support the policy of the withdrawal of troops from Cyprus and also is not against the partitioning of the island, which the Turkish Government have made a precondition of any continuing talks?
    Mr. Callaghan: I hope that my hon. Friend will not give any countenance to the deductions which he draws from a refusal by the British Government to follow the actions of the United States Congress. It would be extremely mischievous if he gave any countenance to any such thing. We have made it clear that what we expect, in accordance with the United Nations decision, is respect for the sovereignty and integrity of Cyprus and the withdrawal of those troops which are there in defiance of that resolution. That has been our position, and I know of no reason at all to suggest anything to the contrary.
    Mr. Townsend: As a guarantor of the treaty establishing a free and independent Cyprus, what action are the Government taking to persuade our NATO ally, Turkey, specifically to do something conciliatory with its force in this matter?
    Mr. Callaghan: We are engaged in intensive diplomatic activity and in encouraging

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    the talks to which I have referred between Mr. Clerides and Mr. Denktash. We believe that in a difficult situation this is the most helpful way forward. We shall pursue that end.
    Mr. Rees-Daviesasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what proposals he has in mind, in consultation with the Turkish Government, to ensure that British residents in Cyprus have unrestricted freedom of movement throughout the island; what arrangements he has now made to ensure that British residents' property is fully protected not only as to their personal effects but as to their rights of land tenure; and if he will make a statement.
    Mr. Laneasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he will make a statement on the latest situation in Cyprus, so far as British interests are concerned.
    Mr. James Callaghan: I regret to say that the position of British residents in the Turkish-occupied area of Cyprus is not satisfactory. Despite frequent representations both to the local authorities in Cyprus and to the Turkish Government, satisfaction has not been received for damage or loss of the homes and possessions of British residents.
    Arrangements to ensure protection of land tenure are the responsibility of the local authorities, with whom the high commission is co-operating over registration of title. I have asked my right hon. Friend the Minister of State to inform the Turkish Government of my dissatisfaction over these matters during his visit to Ankara, where he arrives today, and to discuss remedies with them.
    Mr. Rees-Davies: I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that fairly detailed answer, which he will be the first to recognise is very unsatisfactory. Does he agree that an embargo on the supply of arms to the Turks is probably the only weapon we have as a bargaining factor in securing the fair compensation and freedom of movement of British residents? Will he consider sending out, with the acceptance of the Turkish Government, a delegation from this House to Cyprus to observe the situation and perhaps to make recommendations which may help to secure a solution?
    Mr. Callaghan: I hope that cutting off the supply of arms is not our only weapon. If so, it will not be very effective. It has not been effective in the case of the US Congress and, frankly, the amount of arms that we supply to the Turks is so infinitesimal that it will make very little difference. What is in prospect is the obtaining of some substantial orders for delivery, which would take some time and would create considerable employment here. I think that the Government would have to consider that question very seriously, in view of employment prospects. On the second part of the question, it has been said before that I would welcome a delegation going from this House, but, alas, I have no funds to send one. If someone could provide some funds, I would welcome an all-party delegation to look at conditions in the island. That would do a lot of good.
    Mr. Lane: Is it not a paramount British interest to repair as soon as possible the damage to the strength of NATO in the Mediterranean—damage which has been caused by this situation and was referred to in answer to an earlier Question? Although we all welcome the talks which are going on at various levels between Greece and Turkey, will the right hon. Gentleman confirm that at the NATO summit at the end of this month the Government will be ready to take fresh initiatives to cover many of the areas of concern which have come up in questions today?
    Mr. Callaghan: I hone that, in addition to Mr. Karamanlis and Mr. Demirel, the Foreign Ministers of Greece and Turkey will also be present at the NATO summit. It is my hope that we shall have bilateral discussions on these matters—or trilateral or even quadrilateral discussions. I am not sure that full discussion in the full council would be helpful, but certainly private conversations will go on.
    Mrs. Jeger: I appreciate my right hon. Friend's difficulties, but I cannot help wondering whether he has given full consideration to the views of the trade union movement and the Labour movement in considering whether jobs are more important than the immorality of supplying arms to Turkey so that Turkey can invade, bomb and loot a Commonwealth country. Will he consider whether he is

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    representing the views of the trade union and Labour movements in this connection?
    Mr. Callaghan: I always like to think so, but I am at the moment representing the views of Her Majesty's Government. As for the supply of arms, if there were any prospect of Turkey's repeating the invasion that she undertook a year ago, clearly we should need to consider the situation afresh, but my hon. Friend should not get this out of proportion. I believe that details of arms supplies are regarded as confidential, and Ministers do not give details of them, but the amount of arms which are going is insignificant. That is why I say that it would not be a particular weapon to cut it off. I trust that, within the period in which there may be considerable supply of armaments, this problem will at least have been settled between Mr. Clerides and Mr. Denktash.
    Mr. Maudling: The right hon. Gentleman thinks that it would be a good idea if a delegation from this House went to Cyprus, but he has no money. Will he not consult the Chancellor of the Exchequer? This is one increase in public expenditure that we should not oppose.
    Mr. Callaghan: I am sure that that is true of every item of public expenditure, but I think that it is for the House itself, if it wishes to take this matter up, to do so.

    European Security and Co-operation
    Mr. Sproatasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the latest progress of the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe.
    Miss Richardsonasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he is satisfied with progress at the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe; and when he expects the conference to conclude its business.
    Mr. James Callaghan: There has been encouraging progress on some of the difficult points outstanding. With a real effort it will be possible to get balanced and satisfactory results, and hold the third and final stage of the conference in the summer.
    Mr. Sproat: Yes, but will the right hon. Gentleman confirm that the Soviet Union is still being obstinately obstructive about, first, military confidence-building measures and, secondly, the freer flow of people and ideas? Will he accept that while we all wish to see a successful conclusion to the conference, and genuine debate, the Soviet Union will have to be much more forthcoming? Will he make it crystal clear to the Soviet Union that we are simply not prepared to agree to a summer summit on the totally inadequate basis so far achieved?
    Mr. Callaghan: The answer to all those questions is, "No, Sir."
    Mr. Canavan: Will my right hon. Friend take this opportunity to assure the public that our membership of the Common Market has nothing to do with European security and co-operation, and to condemn his more extreme pro-Market colleagues, who seem to be so devoid of rational arguments in favour of this case that they are trying to terrify the British electorate into voting "Yes" by raising scare stories about a possible European or world conflict if we leave the Common Market?
    Mr. Callaghan: What is true, although it is rather a long way from the Question, is that membership of the Community has enabled France and Germany to bury the hatchet of conflict of many centuries. I do not see how that can be gainsaid, and I regard it as an important issue. As for terrifying the British electorate into voting on 5th June, I have the feeling that it will go willingly to the polls and will return a large majority in favour of remaining in the Community.
    Mr. Maudling: I agree on that point. May I ask the right hon. Gentleman to take note that while we on the Conservative side share his desire to improve relations with the Soviet Union, and to reach agreement, we are not yet at all satisfied that an adequate basis for this exists? Does he not agree that there must be proper reciprocity on these matters and that the evidence so far available does not show that this exists? What evidence can the right hon. Gentleman give us about the Soviet Union which is calculated to make his optimism justified?
    Mr. Callaghan: I would not want to give details, because confidential discussions are still going on. However, I can give illustrations of the progress so far. Provisional agreement has been reached on nine out of the 10 principles in the Declaration of Principles. We are still looking for clear and non-discriminatory agreement on military confidence-building measures but it is my judgment, in the light of current discussions, that progress may at last be possible. As for the area of human contacts and relations, such as facilitating family reunification, there is still work to be done. It would be untrue to suggest that the Soviet Union has been obstinately obstructive. That is not the way in which we will get agreement. I believe it will be possible to come to some agreement provided we are firm, but not if we keep throwing challenges at the Soviet Union.

    Chile (Submarines)
    Mr. Atkinsonasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he now intends to allow Chile to receive two submarines at present docked at Greenock; and if he will make a statement.
    Mr. Thorneasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he still intends to allow the two submarines lying at Greenock to depart for Chile.
    Mr. James Callaghan: The answer to the first part of the Question is "Yes, Sir." No new export licences for arms to Chile are being granted with the exception of spares and equipment relating to existing contracts.
    Mr. Atkinson: Does my right hon. Friend accept that there is some regret that these submarines are now to be released to Chile? Does he also accept that we should now try to establish throughout the world an understanding about the basis on which arms should be supplied by the great Powers to lesser countries? Does he further agree that there is a degree of international morality in this matter and that where a nation has offended against the moral code throughout the world it should not be supplied with arms? Is it not now time for the United Kingdom to try to raise the moral standing and to give a lead in
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    such affairs by saying that we are not prepared to supply arms in such circumstances?
    Mr. Callaghan: My hon. Friend is right. I do feel some regret about this. We had this discussion a year ago. I am quite clear that as the ownership of the warships had already then passed to the Chilean Government we would be wrong to interfere. I took that view then and have maintained it steadily since. I am concerned, as I think everyone must be, about the question of the supply of arms. We have at the moment about £200 million-worth of arms orders for ships in Latin-American countries. This is a considerable benefit to us in many ways. I have heard it argued—although I think this is more for the Secretary of State for Defence than for me—that we could not maintain an independent arms industry unless we were prepared to engage in this trade. It does present difficult problems for those who have to take these decisions. I ask for understanding from my hon. Friend.
    Mr. Tugendhat: Is the Foreign Secretary aware that what he has said will receive widespread support in all parts of the House? Does he not also agree that when we talk of morality it is important that this country should not give the impression that it maintains double standards? Does he not further agree that this is something which affects not just the Government and Secretaries of State but other organisations within the country?
    Mr. Callaghan: I have pleaded guilty before to double standards. I do try to avoid them. There are times when someone standing at this Dispatch BOY, alas, cannot evade the trap. But I give careful consideration, as does the Cabinet, to this kind of question and—if it is possible—to trying to work out principles that will reconcile with the considerations put by my hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr. Atkinson).

    Southern Africa
    Mr. Ioan Evansasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what response he has received from other Commonwealth Governments at the Commonwealth Conference in Jamaica to his initiatives on Southern Africa; and if he will make a statement.
    Mr. James Callaghan: I would refer my hon. Friend to the reply given by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister on 13th May.
    There was a general welcome from the Heads of Commonwealth countries to Her Majesty's Government's new policy in respect of the position of Namibia, the ending of the Simonstown Agreement, our embargo on supply of arms, Britain's financial assistance to Namibians, and our willingness to contribute to an international fund to assist Mozambique after independence.
    I hope to make a further statement on Rhodesia in the near future.
    Mr. Evans: Will my right hon. Friend say what consideration was given to bringing Namibia into the Commonwealth and to requesting South Africa to end its illegal administration in that country? On the Rhodesian issue, may I ask what action was considered to assist Mozambique during efforts to bring the illegal régime to an end? Did my right hon. Friend find among the representatives of a quarter of the world's population, spanning five continents, any support for the illegal régimes in Rhodesia and Namibia?
    Mr. Callaghan: There was in the communiqué a general invitation from the Heads of Government of the Commonwealth to the people of Namibia to the effect that if, at independence, they wished to become members of the Commonwealth, their application would receive a favourable response. There was no support for the present position in Rhodesia, indeed there was condemnation of it. As for the future of Rhodesia, I wonder whether my hon. Friend would wait for a short while, because there are other Questions about Rhodesia and Mozambique to which I would prefer to give substantive answers.
    Sir Frederic Bennett: The right hon. Gentleman mentioned advancing a subsidy to Mozambique to help in respect of the imposition of sanctions. Since we have a substantial deficit on our foreign exchange, will the Foreign Secretary say where we shall get the money? From which country shall we borrow to lend to Mozambique?
    Mr. Callaghan: It will come out of the overseas aid Vote.

    Singapore (Prime Minister)
    Mr. Christopher Priceasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement about his discussions with Lee Kuan Yew at the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference.
    Mr. James Callaghan: Both the Prime Minister and I had wide-ranging discussions with the Singapore Prime Minister covering the political and economic situation in the world generally and in South-East Asia in particular. Such discussions between Heads of Government are confidential.
    Mr. Price: Was my right hon. Friend present in the House last Tuesday when the Prime Minister agreed with me that Lee Kuan Yew would enormously raise his prestige if he were to let out of gaol those people whom Her Majesty's Government put in there 13 years ago and who have been in gaol without trial ever since? Does he agree with his right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and, if so, will he, in the politest possible way, make representations about this matter to Lee Kuan Yew?
    Mr. Callaghan: I read my right hon. Friend's reply. As is well known, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and I are always in complete agreement—as are all members of this Government, on all occasions. [Interruption.] There is a problem here, as my hon. Friend knows. He has followed this question for some time and knows that Singapore is a sovereign independent State. It became so in 1965. The subject of our representations has to be handled with delicacy. I shall certainly bear in mind what my hon. Friend has said.
    Mr. Eldon Griffiths: Leaving aside the internal affairs of Singapore, may I ask the Foreign Secretary, in the light of the changed strategic situation in South-East Asia following the end of the Vietnam war and the British defence review, what residual obligations lie upon this country in respect of helping to sustain the security of Singapore? Will the right hon. Gentleman say in what way we are now able to carry those out?
    Mr. Callaghan: The hon. Gentleman would help me if he tabled a Question to the Secretary of State for Defence. To

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    the best of my knowledge, our forces intend to continue to visit the area and to exercise there. We shall honour the consultative commitment of the five-power defence arrangements under which we leave a small residual commitment of men to an integrated defence system.

    Brazil
    Mr. Dalyellasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, if he will make a statement on the Minister of State's forthcoming visit to Brazil.
    Mr. Ennals: I leave tonight for visits to Brazil and Venezuela. Her Majesty's Government wish to strengthen our relations with both these leading countries of Latin America which are remarkable for their vitality and growth. I shall be having discussions with the Brazilian and Venezuelan Foreign Ministers and other Ministers, in Brasilia and Caracas, respectively.
    Mr. Dalyell: As a member of the recent IPU delegation, may I publicly express the delegation's thanks to its Brazilian hosts and to the ambassador, consuls-general and their staff? Is there not enormous scope, politically, technically and trade-wise, for expanding contacts with that country?
    Mr. Ennals: I have heard very good reports of the result of the visit of the Inter-Parliamentary Union delegation which was led by my hon. Friend. It was of great value that the members of the delegation were able to see so much of the country and so many leading figures in politics and government. I agree with my hon. Friend that there is an enormous opportunity for expansion of our trading interests and exchange of technology, and we want also to improve and expand our political relations. Brazil is our principal trading partner in Latin America.
    Sir John Hall: Whilst he is in Brazil, will the Minister take the opportunity to see how successful the introduction of indexation has been in that country?
    Mr. Ennals: While I am in Brazil I shall, of course, look as carefully as I can at a whole range of economic and political questions.
    Mr. McNamara: When my right hon. Friend visits Brazil, will he take the
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    opportunity to see what prospects there are for trade expansion outside the EEC? Will he express the concern that many people feel about statements that have been made concerning internal repression in Brazil, the treatment of critics of the present régime, the stories of torture we read and hear so much about, and the repression of religious and other bodies? Perhaps he will say that if we are to trade with that country we should like to know that the country observes a certain decency in its internal affairs.
    Mr. Ennals: In answer to the first part of the supplementary question, I have no doubt that one question that the Brazilian Government will wish to take up with me is that of their own economic relationship with the EEC. I have had their assurance that they look to the significant opportunities and value of their own economic relationship both with the Community and with Britain. As to the second part of the supplementary question, I shall not go around making comments on the country's internal affairs. Neither do I expect Ministers from other countries who come here to discuss political and trade relations to do so.
    Mr. Tugendhat: While the Minister is in Venezuela, will he make inquiries about the nature of the Venezuelan Government's recent discussions with the Shah of Iran, making clear to Venezuela, as an important member of OPEC, how seriously the United Kingdom regards the Shah's recent suggestion that the price of oil should be increased in September? Will he also make clear that the United Kingdom and our allies in the Community and the TEA wish to see a continuation of the present price freeze on crude oil?
    Mr. Ennals: I shall not communicate precisely what I shall say when I go to Venezuela, but there is no doubt that economic questions and Venezuela's rôle in OPEC are very important. We shall discuss a range of economic issues that affect our country and Venezuela, but I shall certainly not breach the confidentiality of the discussions.

    South Vietnam
    Mr. Cryerasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he is yet able to make a statement regarding recognition of the new Government of South Vietnam.
    Mr. James Callaghan: Her Majesty's Government recognised the new Government of South Vietnam on 12th May.
    Mr. Cryer: Is my right Hon. Friend aware that he will have the support of the Government benches for that action? Will he confirm that the takeover by the new Government was effected peaceably, in contrast to the stories circulated by the media and Opposition Members? Will he also confirm that the best action for many refugees—in contrast to the squalid actions of certain commercial interests, such as the Daily Mail—is to return to Vietnam? Will he assure the House that he will give assistance to those people, if so requested?
    Mr. Callaghan: As to the takeover, I understand that Saigon was not—as had been expected—subjected to shelling by the North Vietnamese regular troops who were on the outskirts of the city. There was no killing of the civilian population. The return of refugees is a matter that must be left to them. They will know whether they are likely to be able to satisfy the requirements of the new régime and to live there peacefully. We have a large number of refugees in Hong Kong, some of whom would wish to return but most of whom would not. This will present us with a problem.
    Mr. Goodhart: Is it not plain that all the important decisions about the future of South Vietnam are taken in Hanoi? Why should we recognise two Governments in what is, in effect, one country? What decision has been made about the Vietnamese refugees who want to come to this country?
    Mr. Callaghan: It is not at all plain that all decisions are being taken in Hanoi. We shall have to wait to see how the situation develops. At present, we are one of the 68 nations which have recognised the Government in Saigon and at this moment I think that that is the right thing to do. I believe that the Home Secretary has made a statement on the admission of refugees to this country. I do not think that any quota has been fixed and I understand that all cases are considered on their merits.
    Mr. Ford: Will my hon. Friend give the names of the Prime Minister and
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    Foreign Secretary of the Provisional Revolutionary Government?
    Mr. Callaghan: Why does my hon. Friend ask me such awkward questions?
    Mr. Cormack: Will the right hon. Gentleman at last express his concern at the way in which South Vietnam was taken by the Communists? Will he at last condemn the actions of the North and the Russians, and will he beyond peradventure make plain that the refugees from the South who wish to have asylum here and the children who are already here will be either safely received or allowed to remain?
    Mr. Callaghan: I understand from all the hon. Gentleman's previous questions that he is much more concerned to dig back into the past and to follow up those matters than he is to try to create stable conditions in South Vietnam in the future. Throughout the whole of my experience, I have been in no doubt that there was a large body of people—perhaps the largest body of people—who did not support the Thieu Government, the Communist Government or the PRG, but the PRG is the administrative authority and it is upon that that we base our recognition. As to the future of refugees, the hon. Gentleman should put down Questions about that to the Home Secretary.
    Mr. Maudling: The Foreign Secretary said that the guns threatening Saigon were North Vietnamese army guns. Does he wish to comment on that?
    Mr. Callaghan: There is no need to; it is well known.

    Peace and Security (UN Charter)
    Mr. Churchillasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what steps Her Majesty's Govern-are taking to uphold the principles outlined in Article 1.1 of the Charter of the United Nations.
    Mr. Ennals: We continue to work with other like-minded countries for the maintenance of international peace and security in accordance with the United Nations Charter.
    Mr. Churchill: Bearing in mind that Article 1.1 of the Charter of the United

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    Nations declares that the central purpose of the United Nations is
    "to take effective collective measures for the suppression of acts of aggression",
    and recognising what the Foreign Secretary has just said about the invasion of South Vietnam by regular forces of the North Vietnamese Army, why have the British Government not so far condemned this agression or sought to raise the matter in the United Nations? Are the Foreign Secretary and the Minister of State not concerned that the machinery for keeping the peace seems to be breaking down in the same way as it did before the last war?
    Mr. Ennals: The hon. Gentleman is seeking to fall into the same trap as is his hon. Friend. I agree with my right hon. Friend—as I always do—that the important thing now is to foster a spirit of reconciliation in Vietnam. The interests of the Vietnamese people are not helped by attempts to allocate a percentage of blame to one side or the other. Throughout the whole history of Vietnam the United Nations has never been involved in the problem except from a humanitarian point of view. Neither the Government of the North nor the Government of the South are members of the United Nations, so it would not have been easy for the United Nations to have been involved.
    Mr. Newens: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the massacres which were forecast by Opposition Members never took place, that for the first time there is a genuine peace in Vietnam, and that the people have the opportunity to rebuild their country in a spirit of genuine reconciliation? Will my right hon. Friend make clear that the British Government will take a cordial view of that situation and give full support to the new authorities in South Vietnam and North Vietnam which are seeking to achieve it?
    Mr. Ennals: I think that we have to recognise that over the years terrible acts of violence have been committed by both sides. That is why I think it was with a sense of great relief that when the end came it was found that not many lives were lost. It is the wish of the British Government to assist in restoration, rebuilding and humanitarian assistance.

  EUROPEAN COMMUNITY

    Foreign Ministers
    Mr. Blakerasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement about his latest discussions with the Foreign Ministers of the EEC countries.
    Mr. James Callaghan: I met three of my EEC colleagues yesterday at the Ministerial Meeting of the Western European Union but the last Council of Ministers Meeting I attended was on 14th-15th April. My right hon. Friend the Minister of State attended a meeting of the Council of Ministers on 5th May.
    Mr. Blaker: As Foreign Office Ministers have no doubt been following with interest the debate about British membership that is now going on in this country, will the Foreign Secretary say what his view is on the debate that is taking place on the trade deficiency which we have with the EEC? Does the right hon. Gentleman recall telling the House, in answer to a Question from me in December, that he believes that membership of the EEC has not made much difference to our trading balance with the Community one way or the other? Is that still his opinion?
    Mr. Callaghan: I was very relieved to see my opinion confirmed almost in terms this morning by the report of the National Institute of Economic Research, which is an independent-minded body. It is always a little comforting to know that one has not gone too far out on a limb. It is still my considered opinion. Taking into account the fact that we have been able to buy food much more cheaply from the EEC during the last year and have therefore moved a number of our food purchases from outside to inside, it was inevitable that the deficit should go up. It has gone up by a large extent but, as I understand it, no more, in terms of proportion, than our deficit has gone up in other parts of the world.
    Mr. Frank Allaun: Has my right hon. Friend noted the growing threats of interference by the EEC in political matters, foreign policy and military matters, with distinct cold war undertones? Secondly, might this not lead to the joint nuclear bombing force advocated by Lord Carrington and the right hon. Member

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    for Sidcup (Mr. Heath), which would end our hopes of détente and peace in Europe?
    Mr. Callaghan: For the life of me I do not see any signs of that. Certainly in the EEC they never discuss these matters. The issues that my hon. Friend refers to are spoken about in the process of what is called political co-operation. As my hon. Friend knows, that is entirely different from the EEC. It comprises a meeting of nine Ministers of the countries that make up the EEC. That is part of the treaty. My hon. Friend may be a little scornful, but I remember the occasion when Sir Alec Douglas-Home had to fly from Paris to Copenhagen because the French refused to allow a discussion on political co-operation to take place physically at the same place as the discussion of the EEC. I must say to my hon. Friend that I see no atmosphere among my Foreign Minister colleagues to suggest that they are trying to create a return to the cold war. Indeed, I would say that the situation is rather the reverse.
    Mr. Marten: While recognising that the Belgian Prime Minister is undertaking a survey, may I ask whether it would not be true to say that the Government must now have some ideas of what they mean by political union? Will the Foreign Secretary give us just a peep behind that curtain and tell us what the Government are thinking, and also tell us whether his Conservative allies, who agree with him about the Common Market, share the same view of political union?
    Mr. Callaghan: I am glad to say that I am responsible only for the Government and not for anyone else. If the hon. Gentleman re-reads my speech of 19th December 1974, he will find not only that the curtain was raised a little but that the whole scenario was completely exposed. I think that after 5th June we shall have some very interesting discussions on that. I do not expect my view to change on 5th June from what it is now.
    Mr. Wellbeloved: During his visits to the EEC countries has my right hon. Friend observed that countless millions of trade unionists and Socialists have found the EEC an instrument of peace and prosperity? Has he also observed
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    that not one meaningful, responsible Socialist, trade unionist or Communist in the original Six countries is advocating withdrawal of his country from the EEC?
    Mr. Callaghan: I have noticed that. I have also noticed that Sir Christopher Soames says that it will be the last refuge and bastion of capitalism, while "Communists For Europe" in this country says that it is the only way to build Socialism. The synthesis of these two views brings me back to the view that I have always held, namely, that we should be able to make of the EEC anything that the Governments in the EEC want to make of it.
    Mr. Walters: While accepting that primary responsibility for achieving an acceptable settlement in the Middle East lies inevitably with the United States and the Soviet Union, may I ask whether the Foreign Secretary agrees that Europe has a very important contribution to make, and that such a contribution is expected by countries in that area? Therefore, did he discuss this matter with his colleagues when he met them recently?
    Mr. Callaghan: Yes, Sir. The question of the Middle East is one that constantly comes up in terms of political co-operation, but not in the Community discussions. We have had a number of talks about the ways in which the countries of Europe could be of assistance as regards a settlement in the Middle East, but I have no details that I can give the hon. Gentleman this afternoon.
    Mr. Shepherdasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs when he next proposes to meet the other Foreign Ministers of EEC countries.
    Mr. Ennals: My right hon. Friend will meet the Foreign Ministers of EEC countries at meetings of the International Energy Agency Governing Board and of the OECD Council of Ministers in Paris on 27th and 28th May, respectively. My right hon. Friend the Minister of State will also be meeting them at a ministerial meeting on political co-operation in Dublin on 26th May.
    Mr. Shepherd: I thank the Minister for that comprehensive answer. Will he seek to have placed on the agenda the matter of a common EEC policy towards the

    1401
    Middle Eastern oil-producing States, in view of the recent statements by the Government of Iran covering price increases, especially in view of certain muttered threats by the United States in regard to military intervention?
    Mr. Ennals: I do not want to comment on the words used by the hon. Gentleman, but the subject which he raised will be taken up in the International Energy Governing Board meeting.
    Mr. Hooley: Will my hon. Friend say whether it remains the Government's view that the proceedings of these ministerial meetings should be kept secret? This will have a considerable impact on the views of people about our future conduct within the Common Market.
    Mr. Ennals: As my hon. Friend knows, there are many ministerial meetings not only in the EEC but at other levels and in other forums. It is not the usual practice to give a detailed and full verbatim record of these discussions. But in regard to discussions within the EEC and elsewhere, my right hon. Friend is always willing to answer questions in this House, in correspondence, and in discussions. I believe that a great deal of information is made available to the House on discussions which take place.
    Mr. Spicer: When next he meets his colleagues will the Foreign Secretary give an assurance that they will have consultations on the recent discussions which Sir Christopher Soames has had with China, Mexico, Canada and other countries? Will her further assure the House that he will give Government support to strengthening those ties?
    Mr. Ennals: I am certain that my right hon. Friend and the Minister of State, who have taken part in the discussions, will note the point raised by the hon. Gentleman. The agenda for the meeting on 26th May has not yet been decided but it gives an opportunity for Ministers from each of the Nine to raise any subjects they wish which are of importance to the whole of the Community.
    Mr. Canavan: Will the Minister make a point of discussing with other Ministers the problem of migrant workers within the Common Market, particularly those from non-Market countries, who often
    1402
    have to work for very low wages and suffer deplorable housing and other social conditions? Do not these despicable practices prove that the Common Market is based on international exploitation rather than on international co-operation?
    Mr. Ennals: On the general conditions of the workers in the Community, most hon. Members will recognise that in some countries there are considerably higher standards of wages, conditions and benefits than exist in this country. That is a factor to be recognised. However, we must be careful about seeking to interfere in the internal affairs and sovereignty of other Community countries.
    Mr. Churchill: When the Foreign Sectary next meets his EEC colleagues, does he plan to raise with them the alleged loss of 500,000 British jobs as a result of two years of British membership of the EEC—or do the Government not accept the figure put forward by the Secretary of State for Industry?
    Mr. Ennals: The hon. Gentleman knows that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister made a statement on this matter in answer to questions raised.
    Mr. Powell: In regard to the Minister's reply to the hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley (Mr. Hooley), did the Minister say that Her Majesty's Government are considering how they can best disclose the proceedings in the Council of Ministers?
    Mr. Ennals: No, Sir. I did not say that.

    European Assembly
    Mr. Martenasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will now make an announcement of policy about direct elections to the European Assembly.
    Mr. Moateasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement of Her Majesty's Government's policy towards direct elections to the European Assembly.
    Mr. Ennals: I refer the hon. Members to the reply which my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister gave to the hon. Member for Banbury (Mr. Marten) on 18th March.—[Vol. 888, c. 1477–8.]
    Mr. Marten: Do the Labour Party and the Labour Government agree with the resolution passed at the Common Market Assembly on 10th January, which referred to the integration of the countries in the Common Market and to direct elections to what will be called the European Parliament? Do the Labour Party and the Labour Government agree with direct elections? If so, may we know about this before the referendum, as it is a very important point?
    Mr. Ennals: The hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well that the Prime Minister reserved the British Government's position on the occasion of the communiqué. The issue which we have to decide, and which the country will decide on 5th June, is whether we shall be in or out. If the decision is, as I believe it will be overwhelmingly, that Britain should stay in, I think that we shall all have to consider what sort of future we want to see for the European Assembly. However, all these decisions will depend on the decisions of hon. Members. The first decision will be taken by the people in the referendum.
    Mr. William Hamilton: Does my right hon. Friend realise that many of his hon. Friends very much favour the concept of a directly-elected European Parliament as a means of putting into the EEC the kind of democratic element that we, as pro-Europeans, realise is not there at the moment? Will my right hon. Friend give an assurance that if, as he thinks and I think, the result is an overwhelming "Yes" on 5th June, the Government will work to expedite the provisions of a directly-elected European Parliament?
    Mr. Ennals: No, I do not want to give that assurance. I believe that when the decision of the referendum is known, and if it should be, as I believe it will be, that Britain should stay within the EEC, we shall find within all parties a good deal of disagreement about what change, if any, should be made in the pattern of the European Parliament. There are hon. Members on both sides of the House who believe in democratic election. There are others who think that it would be better to leave the system as it is now. I think that the time for resolving those differences is after the referendum.
    Mr. Moate: Is it not the case that direct elections depend wholly on the assumption
    1404
    that there will be a substantial increase in the supranational legislative powers of a European Parliament? If it is to retain its present powers, does the right hon. Gentleman not agree that there is no case for changing the basis of the election of members? Is it not grossly unsatisfactory for the Government simply to reserve their position on this vitally important matter? Is the right hon. Gentleman suggesting that the British people, too, can reserve their position on this matter on 5th June?
    Mr. Ennals: It would be absurd for the British Government to take decisions or to indicate a conclusion about issues such as these before the British people have decided whether we stay in the EEC. After the decision has been taken by the British people, that will be the time for hon. Members to make any determination on the question whether there should be any changes in the European Parliament.
    Mr. English: Will the Minister say why the Government are being so secretive? The other Minister of State at the Department said that the questionnaire on political union would be answered but that the Government would not publish the answer. What is the reason for the secrecy? Is the Minister frightened of letting people know whether the Labour Government favour direct elections, or a two-Chamber legislature? Why the secrecy?
    Mr. Ennals: My hon. Friend wants to have it both ways. He wants us to take a position which we have not taken, so that he can attack that position. The Government have not taken that view. They have not reached a conclusion—[Interruption.] I do not think my hon. Friends want us to reach a conclusion until the British people have spoken. My hon. Friend and many others who take his view about the Common Market will wish to be consulted if the decision is taken to remain within the Community.
    Sir D. Walker-Smith: Is it not the plain and simple fact that under the treaty it is obligatory, at some time, to have direct elections to the European Parliament? Is not the only question, assuming continuity of membership, when?
    Mr. Ennals: I think there is nothing plain and simple about the issue at all.

    United Kingdom Membership
    Sir A. Meyerasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether any representative of any Commonwealth Government at the recent Commonwealth Conference expressed a wish for the United Kingdom to leave the EEC.
    Mr. James Callaghan: No, Sir. The Commonwealth Heads of Government unanimously placed on record their firm opinion that Commonwealth interests were in no way prejudiced by Britain's continued membership of the Community.
    Sir A. Meyer: I congratulate the Foreign Secretary on a spell-binding performance this morning on "Referendum Call". Will he take the opportunity to dissociate himself totally from the reprehensible attempts being made by certain hon. Members to incite Commonwealth leaders into expressions of qualified disapproval of British membership of the Community?
    Mr. Callaghan: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for what he said. As regards inciting Commonwealth leaders to express their disapproval, my experience is that any such course is totally counter-productive. Because of this factor, a clear statement was made and their interests were not prejudiced.
    Mr. George Rodgers: Is not my right hon. Friend astonished by the amount of attention now paid to the views of Commonwealth leaders, compared with the little regard that we paid to their views before we went into the Market?
    Mr. Callaghan: It is true that because the then Conservative Government negotiated in haste they did not take into sufficient account the position of New Zealand or of other Commonwealth countries. Because we have now got a satisfactory solution to the situation of New Zealand, the developing countries and the Commonwealth sugar-producing countries, I think that we can claim that this is the result of our renegotiation which, in turn, has led many Commonwealth countries to display an active wish for us to remain full members. They see the advantage to them of our staying in.
    Mr. Maudling: Why does the Foreign Secretary spoil it all by talking such nonsense about "our renegotiations"?
    Mr. Callaghan: I was not trying to please the right hon. Gentleman; I was merely telling the truth. It is a great pity that the Conservative Government did not spend longer in settling some of these questions, for we would not then have needed to embark on some difficult renegotiations.

    Parliamentary Questions
    Mr. Rostasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many Parliamentary Questions on EEC matters have been transferred from the Department to which they were originally addressed in order to comply with the Government's guidelines on official Government policy.
    Mr. James Callaghan: Seven, Sir.
    Mr. Rost: Following the Prime Minister's directive, why has the House continued to receive misleading and evasive answers on EEC matters from the Secretary of State for Industry?
    Mr. Callaghan: There is nothing misleading in the answers given; it is only in the reception they receive.

    Heads of Government Meeting
    Mr. Hurdasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what are the principal matters which will be discussed at the forthcoming meeting of Heads of Government of the EEC at Brussels in July.
    Mr. James Callaghan: It is too early so say. A number of possible subjects are under consideration, but the agenda has not yet been agreed.
    Mr. Hurd: Despite that answer, in view of some of the odd things which are being said by some of the Foreign Secretary's colleagues, will he confirm that there is no question of the Government's being obliged to accept any scheme of Community action or integration which has not previously been fully discussed and accepted by this country?
    Mr. Callaghan: I am willing to repeat that assurance, although sometimes it falls on deaf ears. There is no doubt that the degree of integration is dependent on the

    1407
    votes of the Nine member countries acting unanimously. One vote can block any advance in that direction.
    Mr. Spearing: Does my right hon. Friend realise that the only way in which that will work properly is for the British people and the House to be aware of the draft proposals? Is he aware that even the head office of Her Majesty's Stationery Office does not have copies of the draft EEC instruments, and that even the EEC office in London does not have them available for the general public? In that case, how does he think that either the House or the public will be able to understand the draft documents which must be discussed by the Council?
    Mr. Callaghan: I do not accept anything that my hon. Friend said. This House now has more opportunity of debating proposals made by the Commission than it has ever had. The process of consultation is complete. Indeed, many more statutory instruments issued by the Commission are discussed in this House than those issued by the Government. I do not object to that. It is right that Parliament should take a continuing interest in the matter. I hope that that will continue, and that the procedures will be improved. However, it should not be allowed to be believed that it is impossible to discover what the Commission or the Council of Ministers is doing, or that it is impossible to debate those matters before decisions are taken. I have taken the most stringent precautions to ensure that that is not so.
    Mr. Eldon Griffiths: I welcome what the Foreign Secretary said on this and the preceding Question, but does he recognise that the House is in some difficulty when Ministers in the same Government give different advice on the EEC matter? Can he now say, in terms, for the benefit of hon. Members on both sides, whether Questions about the effect of the Common Market—for example, on unemployment—are now to be addressed to himself as the responsible Minister who negotiated this matter, to the Secretary of State for Industry, who said one thing, to the Prime Minister, who said something different, or to the Chief Whip, who said that the Secretary of State for Industry was not telling the complete truth? To whom should these Questions be
    1408
    directed? The House is in some difficulty when different Front Bench Members say different things about this important matter.
    Mr. Callaghan: I did not think that the Opposition were in any difficulty. I thought that they were rather enjoying it.
    The hon. Gentleman will probably recognise that Questions put down today will be answered after 5th June, when, as a result of the resounding "Yes" that I believe is likely to be given, we shall have a united, harmonious, active and determined Government, which will sweep all before them.

RHODESIA
The following Question stood upon the Order Paper:
Mr. BIGGS-DAVISON: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, whether he will make a statement about Rhodesia.
Mr. Maudling: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. In reply to earlier supplementary questions the Foreign Secretary referred to a Question on Rhodesia, which was not reached. Is it possible for permission to be given for the Question on Rhodesia to be answered now?
Mr. James Callaghan: The hon. Member who was to ask the Question was not present. I am in the hands of Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Ioan Evans: I raised this question with my right hon. Friend. I understand that the situation was that the hon. Member was not present and that the Foreign Secretary would answer the Question later when dealing with other Questions.
Mr. Speaker: The right hon. Gentleman says that he is in my hands. It is for him to say whether he wishes to answer the Question.
Mr. Callaghan: I shall be happy to answer the Question if the House would like me to do so. The answer is as follows:
Hon. Members will be aware of the answers given by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister on this matter on his recent return from the Commonwealth Heads of Government Conference. I am

1409
now considering the next steps to be taken in the matter of Rhodesia, and I hope to make a further statement in the near future.
Mr. Grimond: Is the Foreign Secretary aware that there are still 300 people in detention in Rhodesia? The Government made a great fuss when one of our citizens was kept in detention for a short time. What steps have been taken to obtain the release of 300 people who have been in detention for many years?
Mr. Callaghan: We have made continuing representations to Mr. Smith on this matter and to Mr. Vorster in the course of our discussions. This issue is a matter of constant discussion in diplomatic discussions with Mr. Vorster. It is our view that the constitutional talks will not proceed satisfactorily unless the Lusaka agreement is carried out in its entirety. That agreement provided for the release of people who are detained.
Once again, in response to the right hon. Gentleman's question, I wish to make it clear that in our judgment and the judgment of the Government these talks on the constitution will not proceed until progress of a substantial nature has been made in releasing those who are now detained.
Mr. Ioan Evans: It is understood that Mozambique has cut off sea links for, and rail links with, Rhodesia. That could have a tremendous effect on Rhodesia in the near future. Did my right hon. Friend hold discussions with the Rhodesian African leaders, and make representations to other African countries, to bring pressure to bear on South Africa to prevent entry to Rhodesia from that source?
Mr. Callaghan: Yes, Sir; there were discussions with the other African leaders, including those from Rhodesia. I am loth to forecast the impact of the closure of the links by Mozambique. I am certain that that will be a considerable handicap to Rhodesia. However, I do not think that we should expect that that will necessarily by itself bring the régime to a full
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stop. I think that the pressure on South Africa will come mainly from its own railways and ports systems, which will not be able to handle the goods which have hitherto been transmitted through Lourenco Marques and Beira.
Mr. Blaker: Does the right hon. Gentleman recall that the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Communiqué dealt with Rhodesia and Mozambique in the same passage? May I therefore ask him to expand on the answer he gave earlier about the Government's intention to give aid to Mozambique? Is it the intention of the Government to give such aid unilaterally or is it to be given only if a joint scheme can be worked out with the Commonwealth or in the United Nations? Is the commitment open-ended, or is there to be a terminal date?
Mr. Callaghan: It is our hope—as it was the hope of the Commonwealth Prime Ministers—that there will be an international fund of this sort. I have raised with other countries the question of contributions to such a fund, although I shall not specify which countries. I indicated that we should be willing to make a substantial contribution to that fund, but that if the response was poor it would still be the British Government's intention, in view of our special responsibilities, to make such aid available. However, in view of the nature of the Frelimo Government—it is a sovereign Government—it would not be right for me to indicate conditions at this stage or until we have had full discussions with the new Frelimo Government.

STATUTORY INSTRUMENTS
Ordered,
That the draft Agriculture (Miscellaneous Provisions) (Northern Ireland) Order 1975 be referred to a Standing Committee on Statutory Instruments.
That the draft Defective Premises (Northern Ireland) Order 1975 be referred to a Standing Committee on Statutory Instruments.
That the draft Roads (Northern Ireland) Order 1975 be referred to a Standing Committee on Statutory Instruments.—[Mr. Pavitt.]

SEXUAL OFFENCES (AMENDMENT)
3.38 p.m.
Mr. Jack Ashley: I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to amend the law relating to rape.
The purpose of the Bill is to change the law relating to rape, because as it stands it is more likely to protect criminals than to prevent crime. It is a deterrent to reporting crime rather than a deterrent to crime itself. It provides a loophole for the villain rather than a shield for the victim.
Rape is often seen by men with Tarzan minds and Tom Thumb imaginations as a bit of a game—an inevitable result of skylarking between two promiscuous people. In fact, in many cases rape is a vicious and degrading crime—far more important and far more evil than crime against property. Yet, as everyone knows—despite the Home Secretary's astounding statement that he has no evidence—the majority of raped victims do not report these crimes. In all other crimes, the first reaction is to telephone the police. Why, therefore, are so many crimes of rape not reported? I believe that the reason is that the balance of law—between protecting an innocent victim and an innocent defendant—is tipped much too heavily against an innocent victim of rape.
In the absence of statute law for rape we have to depend on common law. This law has now been clarified by the Law Lords, who have specified that a man cannot be convicted of rape if he believed that the woman consented, however unreasonable that belief may have been.
The central theme of my Bill is that a man's belief that a woman consented should be considered only if it is put forward on reasonable grounds. To consider a belief based on unreasonable grounds, as the present law does, is to belittle the victim and to befriend the rapist.
I am aware that many lawyers are content with this judgment and claim that it will have little, if any, effect. Unfortunately for them, that claim has been undermined by one of the Law Lords who gave the judgment. He said
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that if the three men in that case had claimed their belief that the woman was play acting when she struggled, rather than claiming that she did not struggle, they might have been acquitted. In other words, if rapists tell the right kind of lies, they will be acquitted and get away with it.
The alibi, that a rapist thought his victim was play acting when she struggled, has now acquired a new respectability and requires no reasonable basis.
Juries are not clairvoyants and they will be doubtful about convicting a rapist now that it is abundantly clear, after this judgment, that he needs no reasonable ground for holding any belief, however bizarre it may be. Doubt is a formidable weapon in the hands of a defence counsel, already well armed, well trained and well able to demolish most respectable women in the witness box.
This ruling will make a difference to the attitude not only of juries but of women. Many of them are already reluctant to report rape, and they will now be even more unwilling to come forward.
A victim of rape must not only endure the original assault, police interrogation, medical examination and counsel's cross-examination but now listen to the rapist claim his "belief", on unreasonable grounds, that she was willing to accept what she received. Clearly, very few women will feel able to suffer that kind of injustice on top of rape, and women will be unwilling to report to the police. If women do not report rape to the police, how shall we catch the rapist?
I am convinced that the effect of this judgment will be to accelerate an already escalating rate of increase in the number of rapes. Therefore, we need urgent action by the Government. Failing that action, I shall continue again and again to press this Bill until the law is changed.
I intend to bypass the legal thickets surrounding the interpretation of the existing law and seek to change the law itself. Therefore, I suggest that the offence of rape should now be changed so that it shall be defined as follows:
"A man who has sexual intercourse with a woman without her consent, and without reasonable belief in her consent, is guilty of rape."
I understand that this Bill is to be opposed, but effective opposition will

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require more than a defence of the existing legal situation on rape. It will now also require a rejection of my new proposition.
In addition, I propose that the Criminal Law Revision Committee should be asked by the Home Secretary to consider, first, a guarantee of anonymity of rape victims in court and, secondly, the prohibiting of the disclosure of a woman's past sex life in court, because that is irrelevant to the question of sexual assault anyhow. However, I urge the Home Secretary not to refer my proposal for a change in the law requiring reasonable grounds for a belief to the Criminal Law Revision Committee because the need for this change is urgent. I suggest that he should consider and bring forward this change of his own accord.
The present Home Secretary will go down in history as, among other things, one of the most compassionate and enlightened men ever to grace that high office. I hope that today he will not vote against my Bill but will take it to the Home Office for detailed scrutiny during the Whitsun Recess and that when the House reassembles in a few weeks, he will announce his intention to introduce urgent legislation and to act on these lines. If he does that, he will reduce violent crime, remove the fears aroused by this judgment, and earn the gratitude of millions of women throughout this land.
3.47 p.m.
Mr. John Lee rose—
Mr. Speaker: Does the hon. Gentleman wish to oppose the Bill?
Mr. Lee: Yes, Mr. Speaker.
I think that the whole House will have sympathy with the motives of my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, South (Mr. Ashley) because the problems that have precipitated his interest are of undoubted concern. However, it is important to realise what the Bill is not about and what the law certainly has no ambiguities about.
The situation that has arisen in Cambridge recently is not one about which the present state of the law should give us any reason for concern. My greatest objection to the Bill is that my
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hon. Friend's proposal would relax both the burden of proof relating to serious crime and to some measure, if I understand him correctly, the degree of scrutiny to which a witness who makes an allegation of rape is subjected.
It is never pleasant for a witness to give evidence in a serious matter, but my hon. Friend is in error if he thinks that it is necessarily more unpleasant for a woman to give evidence in this kind of case than for witnesses in many other cases. I have in mind, for example, persons involved in blackmail cases.
The important point is that this is an area of human relationships where the tendency or the incentive to tell lies is to be found in almost equal balance. In a snatch and grab rape situation, such as the Cambridge syndrome, as I will call it for ease of reference, which is clearly not within the compass of matters that we have under consideration and would be regarded as rape in any circumstances, either party might easily be lying.
My hon. Friend referred to a defendant in a particular case telling a story and the jury believing him and wrongfully acquitting him. It is equally true that a promiscuous woman, repenting of her promiscuity, might decide to tell lies, as it were, to give a gloss of respectability to her situation. I certainly would not mention the name of the case—it would be professionally improper—but 18 months ago I prosecuted in an alleged rape case where a somewhat similar situation arose. Although the evidence, on the face of it, was very strong, the amibiguities of the woman witness and the contradictions that she made in the box led me, at any rate, in the privacy of my own thoughts, to have considerable anxiety. I was as relieved as were, I think, others in the court that after a long deliberation the jury acquitted.
My hon. Friend is, I know, concerned about the recent case of Morgan and others which appeared in the House of Lords. In that case the House of Lords held by a majority that it was necessary only for a person honestly to believe that the woman concerned had consented and that it was not necessary for that belief to be reasonably held. Let me remind the House that in that case the jury did not believe, and the House of Lords

1415
said no jury could believe, and the appeal was dismissed with no damage done.
The real point here is this: honesty of belief is fundamental to criminal law. If one honestly believes an act, sometimes in quite improbable circumstances, that is, in all but absolute offences, such as offences under the food and drugs legislation, the essential defence. It seems to me profoundly disturbing that there should be any attempt to relax the stringent requirements of the law in relation to a serious offence. In fact, the reverse should be the case. The more serious an offence, the more onerous should be the burden on the prosecution, the more it should be demanded of a witness that he or she should be subjected ruthlessly to cross-examination, and the more one should be required to look into the frame of mind of the person concerned.
It is said repeatedly in addresses to juries that one cannot unscrew the top of a man's head and see what is in his mind. However, one can see in what he does, in the demeanour he adopts and the stories he tells, whether he is behaving honestly.
The law is perfectly adequate as it stands. The House of Lords decision is not a licence for a sophisticated rapist. There is still the requirement of a defendant that he shall have an honest belief.
In addition, anyone who engages in sexual activities outside marriage is, I submit, presented with many hazards. This is, above all, an intimate field of emotional human relationships where
rationality is not always to be expected of human beings. I use the phrase "She did not say 'Yes', she did not say 'No'", and that represents a hazardous situation.
The letter to The Times by Professor J. C. Smith on 7th May, in condemning an editorial in that newspaper of two days previously, said:
"A man who intends to have sexual intercourse with a consenting woman may have an immoral intention but it is scarcely the kind of criminal mind which should make him liable for an offence carrying a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
The fact that he ought to have known that the woman was not consenting is not a valid ground for imputing to him an intention which he did not possess. To do so is to impose the same kind of objective test of criminal liability as was applied by the House of Lords in DPP v. Smith".
That was a case of murder.
One must always look at the frame of mind of the person concerned. Once one moves away from that one moves in the direction of absolute offences, and once one moves in that direction the dangers of the conviction of the innocent become greater. It always has been a fundamental principle of our law that it is far better for a guilty person to go free than for an innocent person to be condemned. For these reasons I oppose the Bill.
Question put pursuant to Standing Order No. 13 (Motions for leave to bring in Bills and nomination of Select Committees at commencement of Public Business):—
The House divided: Ayes 228, Noes 17.

Division No. 214.]

AYES

[3.55 p.m.

Adley, Robert

Callaghan, Jim (Middleton & P.)

Doig, Peter

Allaun, Frank

Campbell, Ian

Dunlop, John

Ashley, Jack

Canavan, Dennis

Dunn, James A.

Ashton, Joe

Carmichael, Neil

Dunwoody, Mrs. Gwyneth

Bain, Mrs. Margaret

Carter, Ray

Durant, Tony

Baker, Kenneth

Carter-Jones, Lewis

Dykes, Hugh

Barnett, Guy (Greenwich)

Chalker, Mrs. Lynda

Edge, Geoff

Beith, A. J.

Clark, Alan (Plymouth, Sutton)

Edwards, Robert (Wolv SE)

Benn, Rt. Hon. Anthony Wedgwood

Clemitson, Ivor

Elliott, Sir William

Berry, Hon. Anthony

Cocks, Michael (Bristol S.)

Ellis, John (Brigs & Scun)

Biggs-Davison, John

Cohen, Stanley

Ellis, Tom (Wrexham)

Blenkinsop, Arthur

Coleman, Donald

English, Michael

Booth, Albert

Cope, John

Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)

Boothroyd, Miss Betty

Corbett, Robin

Evans, Ioan (Aberdare)

Bottomley, Rt. Hon. Arthur

Costain, A. P.

Evans, John (Newton)

Boyson, Dr. Rhodes (Brent)

Cox, Thomas (Tooting)

Fairgrieve, Russell

Bradley, Tom

Craigen, J. M. (Maryhill)

Fell, Anthony

Braine, Sir Bernard

Cryer, Bob

Fitch, Alan (Wigan)

Bray, Dr. Jeremy

Cunningham, Dr. J. (Whiteh)

Flannery, Martin

Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)

Dalyell, Tam

Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)

Brown, Ronald (Hackney S.)

Dean, Joseph (Leeds West)

Forrester, John

Buchan, Norman

Delargy, Hugh

Freeson, Reginald

Butler, Adam (Bosworth)

Dempsey, James

Freud, Clement

Fry, Peter

Litterick, Tom

Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)

Garrett, John (Norwich S.)

Loveridge, John

Rooker, J. W.

George, Bruce

Loyden, Eddie

Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)

Golding, John

Luce, Richard

Rost, Peter (SE Derbyshire)

Graham, Ted

Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson

St. John-Stevas, Norman

Grant, Anthony (Harrow C.)

McCartney, Hugh

Scott-Hopkins, James

Grant, George (Morpeth)

McCrindle, Robert

Sedgemore, Brian

Gray, Hamish

Macfarlane, Neil

Selby, Harry

Griffiths, Eldon

MacGregor, John

Shaw, Arnold (Ilford South)

Grimond, Rt. Hon. J.

McMillan, Tom (Glasgow C.)

Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)

Grist, Ian

McNamara, Kevin

Shepherd, Colin

Grocott, Bruce

Madel, David

Sillars, James

Hamilton, James (Bothwell)

Mahon, Simon

Sims, Roger

Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)

Marks, Kenneth

Sinclair, Sir George

Hampson, Dr. Keith

Marten, Neil

Small, William

Hannam, John

Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin

Smith, Cyril (Rochdale)

Hardy, Peter

Maynard, Miss Joan

Smith, Dudley (Warwick)

Harrison, Col Sir Harwood (Eye)

Meacher, Michael

Spriggs, Leslie

Hatton, Frank

Mellish, Rt. Hon. Robert

Stanley, John

Hayman, Mrs. Helene

Meyer, Sir Anthony

Steel, David (Roxburgh)

Henderson, Douglas

Mikardo, Ian

Stewart, Rt. Hon. M. (Fulham)

Hicks, Robert

Miller, Hal (Bromsgrove)

Stoddart, David

Higgins, Terence L.

Miller, Dr. M. S. (E Kilbride)

Taylor, Mrs. Ann (Bolton W.)

Holland, Philip

Moonman, Eric

Tebbit, Norman

Hooley, Frank

Moore, John (Croydon C.)

Thomas, Ron (Bristol NW)

Hooson, Emlyn

Morgan-Giles, Rear-Admiral

Thompson, George

Horam, John

Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)

Thorne, Stan (Preston South)

Hordern, Peter

Morris, Michael (Northampton S.)

Thorpe, Rt. Hon. Jeremy (N Devon)

Hoyle, Doug (Nelson)

Mudd, David

Tierney, Sydney

Huckfield, Les

Nelson, Anthony

Tomlinson, John

Hughes, Mark (Durham)

Neubert, Michael

Townsend, Cyril D.

Hughes, Roy (Newport)

Newens, Stanley

Tugendhat, Christopher

Hunter, Adam

Normanton, Tom

Urwin, T. W.

Irving, Charles (Cheltenham)

Onslow, Cranley

Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne V.)

Jackson, Colin (Brighouse)

Orbach, Maurice

Wainwright, Richard (Colne V.)

Jeger, Mrs. Lena

Page, Rt. Hon. R. Graham (Crosby)

Wakeham, John

Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)

Pardoe, John

Walker, Terry (Kingswood)

Johnson, James (Hull West)

Park, George

Watkins, David

Johnson Smith, G. (E Grinstead)

Parkinson, Cecil

Weatherill, Bernard

Jones, Dan (Burnley)

Pavitt, Laurie

Wellbeloved, James

Jopling, Michael

Peart, Rt. Hon. Fred

Welsh, Andrew

Kelley, Richard

Penhaligon, David

White, Frank R. (Bury)

Kilfedder, James

Peyton, Rt. Hon. John

Whitelaw, Rt. Hon. William

Kimball, Marcus

Prescott, John

Whitlock, William

King, Tom (Bridgwater)

Price, William (Rugby)

Wiggin, Jerry

Kitson, Sir Timothy

Prior, Rt. Hon. James

Wigley, Dafydd

Lamborn, Harry

Radice, Giles

Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)

Lamond, James

Reid, George

Wise, Mrs. Audrey

Lane, David

Richardson, Miss Jo

Woodall, Alec

Leadbitter, Ted

Ridley, Hon. Nicholas

Woof, Robert

Le Merchant, Spencer

Roberts, Albert (Normanton)

Lester, Jim (Beeston)

Roberts, Wyn (Conway)

TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

Lewis, Arthur (Newham N.)

Roderick, Caerwyn

Mr. Peter Snape and

Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)

Rodgers, George (Chorley)

Mr. A. W. Stallard.

Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)

NOES

Brotherton, Michael

Fletcher, Alex (Edinburgh N.)

Sandelson, Neville

Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)

Jessel, Toby

Stanbrook, Ivor

Critchley, Julian

Lawrence, Ivan

Wilson, William (Coventry SE)

Davies, Bryan (Enfield N.)

Lee, John

Davis, Clinton (Hackney C.)

Mates, Michael

TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

Drayson, Burnaby

Mayhew, Patrick

Mr. Russell Kerr and

Edelman, Maurice

Powell, Rt. Hon. J. Enoch

Mr. Marcus Lipton.

Question accordingly agreed to.
Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Jack Ashley, Mrs. Lynda Chalker, Miss Janet Fookes, Mr. John Hannam, Mrs. Helene Hayman, Mr. Emlyn Hooson, Mr. David Lane, Mrs. Millie Miller, Mr. A. W. Stallard and Mr. Brian Walden.

SEXUAL OFFENCES (AMENDMENT)
  SEXUAL OFFENCES (AMENDMENT)
  Mr. Jack Ashley accordingly presented a Bill to amend the law relating to rape: and the same was read the First time and ordered to be read a Second time upon Friday 11th July and to be printed. [Bill 168.]
ORDERS OF THE DAY

  BRITISH LEYLAND BILL
  Order for Second Reading read.
  4.5 p.m.
  The Secretary of State for Industry (Mr. Anthony Wedgwood Benn): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
  Mr. Speaker: I have not selected the amendment in the name of the Leader of the Liberal Party and his hon. Friends.
  Mr. Benn: I do not believe that there will be any dissent on either side of the House if I say that this Bill is one of the greatest importance, involving a major investment by Government in an important industry. I would be less than fair to the House if I did not admit at the outset that in matters of Government involvement with industry, under all Governments, we are feeling our way towards arrangements with which we do not have a great deal of familiarity.
  Although the Liberal Party's Amendment has not been called, perhaps I may be allowed to allude informally to the point contained within it and to say that the Government themselves do not dictate the time scale or the timing of industrial problems that come before them. Were it possible for the Government to anticipate every problem in its entirety, and to have time to review every alternative with academic leisure, we might make better progress. I recognise that the Liberal Party's admendment contains a point to which I have to turn my mind, even though you, Mr. Speaker, have chosen not to call it.
  The Bill would empower the Government to implement the Ryder Report which, as the House knows, has been accepted by the Government as the basis for their policy towards British Leyland. Perhaps I may refer to something else which I know will arise—because it has arisen in Questions—about the parts of the Ryder Report that have not been published, but have been omitted. When I made my initial statement in the House I said that it would not be possible, for reasons of commercial confidentiality, to publish the whole report but that I hoped to publish as much as could be
  1420
  published. I can give the House the assurance that the parts that were omitted, were omitted at the suggestion of the Ryder team and not of the Government—that is to say, we are publishing the edited version that was given to us by the Ryder team and the Government have not of themselves determined which parts should not be published.
  I know that this bears on another matter which is being discussed, in the context of the Industry Bill, about the confidentiality of commercial information, and I think I could reasonably argue, and would argue, that in recognising that some information is commercially confidential, the Government have perhaps indicated through their action in this case their recognition that these issues of confidentiality have to be taken seriously.
  May I repeat what my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said in paying tribute to Sir Don Ryder and his team and, to set the statutory position straight, say that the Industrial Development Advisory Board had the Ryder Committee's recommendation before it, but that, as its own chairman was one of the members of the team and another, Mr. Urwin, was also a member of the team, the Industrial Development Advisory Board was happy that the Government should proceed on the recommendation of the team without a parallel and separate examination by the IDAB.
  Since the Prime Minister's statement in the House of Commons, I have had the opportunity of meeting not only Lord Stokes and others informally but also the board of British Leyland, and I had a very good meeting two or three days ago with Sir Don Ryder and the Confederation of Shipbuilding and Engineering Unions, representing workers in British Leyland. We are now proceeding as fast as we can to make provision for the progressive implementation of the Ryder approach. Sir Don himself, with the help of two members of the team, Mr. Clark and Mr. McWhirter, plus departmental officials from the Treasury, the Department of Industry and the Department of Employment, are now engaged in the current work arising from the report.
  Let me add one word also about Lord Stokes, who came to see me last week about the valuation of the shares at 10p.

  1421
  He has a statutory duty to his shareholders, many of whom are small shareholders—many of them workers in British Leyland. He came to me with others from the board—Mr. Lucas and Mr. Park himself—to query the valuation at 10p—I have no doubt that this point will arise in the debate—and to ask the Government to reconsider the matter. In the course of discussion with him I explained, as I would have done any way to the House, the reasons why we had determined as a Government that the Ryder recommendation here was the right one, that the asset valuation was in fact unrealistic, given the state of the company, that the share value which had itself been very much reduced, at any rate before the suspension of dealings in the shares, indicated that 10p was a reasonable offer to make, and that the provision for shareholders to be able either to sell at 10p or to buy in, under the arrangements that we have provided for the special rights issue, was reasonable. I report this to the House because it is right that the House should know that Lord Stokes made separate, distinct and firm representations to me on behalf of his shareholders.
  Apart from that one issue, on which the board has its own duty to perform, it has been helping very much to try to carry through the main recommendations of the Ryder Report. Mr. Alex Park has been appointed acting chief executive, together with four managing directors for the four divisions—Car, Bus and Truck, International, and Special Products—and although the chairman has not yet been appointed, Lord Stokes in his capacity is working on the problems of implementation.
  I say a word now about the background to British Leyland, going back some time, because this, too, might be of interest to the House. My own involvement came first in 1966 when Chrysler decided to buy Rootes and there was anxiety then that this might lead to difficulty in British-owned motor industry. It was at that time that the discussions between Sir George Harriman of British Motors and Sir Donald Stokes of British Leyland began. We had at that time hoped—and I reported this to the House in January 1967—to establish a British motor corporation which would have absorbed Rootes rather than see it absorbed into
  1422
  Chrysler. However, the merger, when it came later, was between the two major companies, and we know now from the Ryder Report that the merger did not succeed in achieving its objectives, Certainly the investment was not available on the scale required, and there were other problems which remained unresolved.
  It is no part of my purpose in moving the Second Reading of this Bill to criticise anyone in British Leyland, because the company has formidable difficulties. But we have now an opportunity to consider what needs to be done, and that may throw some light on the inherited difficulties of the company.
  I want to put on the record the fact that I had discussions last summer with Lord Stokes about the investment programme of the company to see whether there were possibilities of expanding that programme. It was out of joint studies of that kind that the company's difficulties came to light and I made my statement to the House before Christmas, this corresponding with a period of worldwide difficulty for the motor industry not confined to British Leyland in this country and not confined to motor companies in this country, as the House will know from studying events in the United States and on the Continent.
  The guarantee was granted and given, the Ryder Committee was set up, and the Government have now accepted its report as a basis. The Bill provides an opportunity, if the House so chooses, for the Government to proceed themselves and to finance their part of the recommendations.
  I turn to the basic proposals, recommendations or conclusions of the Ryder Report. The first matter to which Sir Don Ryder and his team turned their attention related to the basic question whether Britain should remain in, and seek to remain in, vehicle production and what should be the rôle of British Leyland in that picture. There are long passages in the report bearing on this matter, and the conclusion to which it comes is that, despite the problems of the motor industry due to the present world recession, and despite the problems which have struck the motor industry due to the rise in oil prices, the motor manufacturing industry will, worldwide, remain a major industry, that

  1423
  Britain should remain in it and that British Leyland should be, and could properly be recommended to be, a major producer of motor vehicles, buses, trucks and other vehicles.
  This issue comes to be discussed in the House today, and I put it to the House that, after examining the Ryder recommendations and considering the matter in the light of independent studies which have been undertaken by the Government, we have concluded that that was a correct recommendation to make.
  If we consider the rôle of the motor industry in Britain's foreign trade performance, our exports of motor vehicles are running—to quote the year 1973—at £1,800 million gross with a net export surplus of £1,000 million. Those who argue, as sometimes it is argued in academic and newspaper comment about the motor industry, that we would do better to reallocate the skilled resources into other industries have to be sure before putting forward that view that we could easily shift these highly skilled people from one type of export production to another. We accept what Sir Don recommends, namely, that these figures should influence our mind in these matters.
  On the third question, about whether it was right to sustain British Leyland at this moment or to go for a course involving bankruptcy, there is, again, ground for disagreement, and I dare say that that disagreement will emerge in the debate today.
  In the case of Rolls-Royce in 1971, the last Government opted for bankruptcy, and that had effects which I need not go over in detail now. But it is one thing to bankrupt an aero-engine company dealing with a relatively small number of aircraft manufacturers where the Government would clearly be involved in the ongoing business, and it is another to bankrupt a company linked to a series of suppliers and distributors world wide. In our view, it would have been wholly irresponsible for us to have adopted the course of bankruptcy with British Leyland. When I say that we considered it, I suppose that every option has to come up on a piece of paper at some stage or other. But I must not give the impression that in our view there was any merit in that method of proceeding. The right hon.
  1424
  Member for Down, South (Mr. Powell) said, in an intervention the other day, that bankruptcy was an inevitable part of our capitalist economics. That may be so, but it is certainly not a practicable or a correct way of handling matters of this kind.
  When making his statement my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister drew attention to the fact that there were about 1 million jobs in all at stake here, and that the Midlands had handing over it the spectre of becoming a development area, like other parts of the United Kingdom, or an industrial desert. If British Leyland had been allowed to go into liquidation, in our view that danger would have become a great deal more real. Therefore, I believe that our decision was correct.
  Sir John Hall: Will the right hon. Gentleman explain a little further the figure of 1 million unemployed which was referred to by his right hon. Friend the Prime Minister? It is difficult to understand precisely how that figure was arrived at.
  Mr. Benn: I must not do more than quote my right hon. Friend's figures. I understand that what my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said—I think I am quoting him correctly—was that a million jobs hinged upon British Leyland and that 165,000 people were directly employed. The motor car industry is an assembly industry. About 80 per cent. is bought in. It is centred around the Midlands. The hon. Gentleman will know, at least as well as I do, that there are literally hundreds, if not thousands, of firms whose whole livelihood depends upon components, in part to British Leyland. Therefore, we felt it right to reach the decision not to allow a bankruptcy with all the chaos, uncertainty and risks of further bankruptcies, secondary and teritiary, that would follow from that.
  Mr. Tam Dalyell: We in Scotland have learnt something about what happens when a firm is bankrupt and we try to bring it back into the public sector. We know how inefficient that is. Heaven help us if that happened to any factory in the Midlands. This is the most inefficient way of doing it.
  Mr. Benn: I am trying not to be too controversial in presenting this matter,

  1425
  otherwise I should have gone into past issues as well.
  I should like to make one other point about profitability. It is always open to a firm, by a ruthless chopping of its uneconomic activities, to restore itself to profitability, as might have been done if British Leyland had closed Austin-Morris, for example, and we might have had a small profitable British-owned motor industry, but the vacuum created by so doing would have led to a huge flood of imports of motor cars from abroad—those imports are already running at a hair-raising level—and it would have affected our exports as well.
  I come to the next question which arises from the Ryder recommendations and from the Bill; namely, the need for investment on a very large scale. A lot is written about the motor industry, and I want to come back later to some of the things that have been said.
  Mr. James Prior: The right hon. Gentleman has now left the Ryder recommendation that we should have an indigenous motor car industry of our own. He has given the reasons why Ryder favoured this course. What he has not done is to say whether Ryder considered other alternatives. There is no mention in the document of other alternatives which could have been pursued. Have the Government given consideration to this?
  Mr. Benn: I shall try to answer the right hon. Gentleman's question as best I can. I cannot speak for Sir Don Ryder, but my understanding of his approach and the approach of his team was that in a matter of this magnitude it would be right for them to make a firm recommendation to the Government and not simply to work for four months and present a range of options. They thought it right to make a firm recommendation.
  Mr. Michael Heseltine rose—
  Mr. Benn: Let me finish as best I can the answer to the right hon. Gentleman's question.
  The Government considered the Ryder report, and, as is inevitable in ministerial examinations of such matters, they noticed at any rate that there were alternatives of a different character, including bankruptcy,
  1426
  to which I have referred. We concluded that the recommendation made was the right one.
  Mr. Heseltine: No one disputes that it was reasonable for the Ryder team to make a recommendation. That was not the question put by my right hon. Friend. My right hon. Friend asked whether the Ryder team considered a range of options of support.
  Mr. Benn: The Ryder team was a self-contained team that gave me, on the time and date promised, its report. The Government were not involved in discussions with the Ryder team during the progress of its work. The Ryder team presented its report to the Government, which it was commissioned to do. The Government then set up their own internal procedures for examining it. I am now presenting to the House our view, which, as the hon. Gentleman knows, is based on the belief that the Ryder recommendation was correct.
  Mr. Heseltine: It seems a little curious that the Government have accepted a commitment to an expenditure of £2·8 billion without knowing whether there were alternative ways of saving the British Leyland company.
  Mr. Benn: I anticipate, as I am sure the House does, with interest the hon. Gentleman's speech. In my opening remarks I made a comment about the Liberal amendment, and I said that the Government did not, in the circumstances, find it easy to sit back with time and leisure to consider a wide range of options and did not always have all the information that they would like to have when reaching decisions of this kind. I can do no more than put forward the Ryder recommendation upon which we reached our own view.
  Mr. Hal Miller: It must be within the right hon. Gentleman's knowledge, as he was holding discussions with the company last summer, that British Leyland itself had a £5 million investment plan. What consideration was given to that at the time, and was this taken into account on receipt of the Ryder report?
  Mr. Benn: I answered that point too eliptically a moment ago when I said

  1427
  that last summer. I went to see the company to inquire about its investment plan and to see whether it felt that there was a level of investment it would like to see that was beyond its current capacity because of difficulties over finance. Out of the joint examination of these problems which took place between British Leyland and my own officials was revealed a much graver problem which led to my coming to the House for permission to give the guarantee and to the Ryder recommendation. In the Ryder team's examination of the British Leyland problems, Sir Don himself—I speak subject to correction—has readily recognised that he was able to draw upon its own plans and the possibilities that it has considered and to incorporate those which he thought sensible in his recommendation. To that extent the Ryder team reflects clearly the thinking done within the company.
  What I was dealing with a moment ago was the fact that one could have made the company profitable by the most ruthless amputation of unprofitable volume car work, which would have left us with a profitable company but a flood of imports, substantial unemployment, and a loss of exports and would not have been the right course to adopt. Therefore, the hon. Gentleman will appreciate that consideration has been given to this matter.
  I turn to investment, because this is a very substantial investment programme. I have said elsewhere that there is probably a Ryder report to be written about a lot of other companies, some of which are not in difficulties. There has been over a 10-year span a substantially lower level of investment in British plant, equipment, tools and tackle compared to that of our major competitors. When this big reinvestment programme is brought forward it indicates, in the context of one company, the measure of the gap that there may well be in other companies. I was handed today an item on the tape—it may be in the evening papers—which indicated that the President of the Machine Tool Trades Association said that the investment that would flow from the Ryder recommendation would be such that the machine tool industry would not, in his judgment, be able to meet the demand.
  1428
  It is a fact that while British Leyland was running down for lack, in part, of modern machine tools Alfred Herbert was running down for lack of orders for machine tools. This collaborative decline, this parallel decline, has been going on throughout a great deal of the British engineering industry. It explains a lot of our weakness. It is certainly our hope—we have already set up working parties to look at it—that the expenditure flowing from the Ryder Committee's report, if the Bill is passed by the House, will find its way to sustain by orders and secondary re-equipment other parts of our engineering industry.
  Mr. Richard Wainwright: I accept what the right hon. Gentleman has said about the enormous amount of leeway in investment which a vast range of British manufacturing industry has to catch up. Can he give a reassurance that his Department is now engaged in assembling as best it can estimates of the size of the gap and the resources which it would take to fill it?
  Mr. Benn: Any Minister would like to be able to assure the hon. Gentleman, as I would, that his Department had answers to every question put to him. But the magnitude of the problem is very great. We are opposed in general to the idea of doing our paper planning at Whitehall level without regard to the experience of industry. The whole concept of the planning agreement is to seek to identify and to meet the gaps, in so far as they can be identified from tripartite discussions between the major firms and the management and the unions—and not confined to firms in difficulty. We need to be able to identify the gaps and to seek to meet them if we are to match our major international competitors.
  As regards investment in industry, we should have to be thinking in terms of about doubling our present level, progressively. That again would be a figure one could arrive at if one were thinking of creating jobs in manufacturing industry at about the rate at which they are disappearing. That is a much wider question. From close studies in the NEDC planning agreements and in other ways, we hope to get an assessment of what is necessary to make British industry competitive again.
  The Bill provides, if the House assents, for £265 million to allow the Government

  1429
  to acquire shares and liabilities in the new British Leyland Company. Of this, £65 million is the upper limit for equities and £200 million to underwrite a new issue, assuming that both are fully needed. The new company, British Leyland Limited, would be empowered to offer one new share at 50p for each 10 existing 25p shares. The Government would offer to acquire each share at £1 a share, in all costing £60 million if every one of these shares was sold, and amounting to 10p a share, to which I made reference. That would be the £60 million. If the convertible loan stock were converted to British Leyland shares that might involve a further £5 million. The £65 million is, therefore, an upper limit for that purpose.
  The second part of the Scheme of Arrangement would be that £200 million of new capital would be available to underwrite a special rights issue of 50p shares at £1 a share, and these would be underwritten by the Government. The details will be circulated to the shareholders, meetings will be held under the auspices of the court, and we hope to have final sanction from the court in July and to complete the arrangements in September.
  However, I stress to the House that it is urgent that we should get this new investment going, and meanwhile, in another order which will come forward from my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary, who will be moving it after this debate, we are seeking the necessary extra guarantees for the interim time involved.
  Looking beyond that matter, beyond the immediate issues raised by the Bill, we are, as the House knows from the Prime Minister's statement, ready to make a further £500 million of capital available from 1976 to 1978, which would come from the Industry Act—Section 8 and conceivably Section 7—and from tranches available under the new Industry Bill through the National Enterprise Board. That would be the statutory cover for this action.
  The Government will be making this available in such a way and in such a form as seems right, but it will be adjusted if necessary to see that with this substantial investment of public money there is a majority control of the company. The shares would be held, subject to the Industry Bill being enacted by the
  1430
  House, by the National Enterprise Board, which would have responsibility as the shareholder for seeing that a level of management efficiency was achieved.
  The new British Leyland would have a planning agreement of a kind that, again, arises under our industrial policy, and the normal provisions for discussions between the Treasury and the Department of Industry, as for a nationalised industry, would be operating to monitor the new investment.
  That is the broad framework of financial support and investment which we propose.
  Mr. Alan Clark: Knowing the right hon. Gentleman's very great propensity for discussing his arrangements with the workpeople concerned, may I ask whether he has mentioned to them that it is possible to give a golden handshake of £10,000 to every employee of Austin-Morris out of less than half the total of public money to be paid into the corporation?
  Mr. Benn: The hon. Gentleman puts in a very vivid form a recipe for the expiry of Britain as a major manufacturing nation—that is, giving golden handshakes to persuade people to leave manufacturing industry and to emigrate elsewhere, where work is no doubt readily available. The hon. Gentleman highlights a point I made earlier. It is always possible to reduce by amputation manufacturing firms which are in difficulties to a smaller profitable part. The question for the House is how seriously we now take the spiral of contraction in the manufacturing industries, because this lies at the core of Britain's weakness and difficulty in so many areas. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman is right and is cleverer at his economics than I am. But even if it were practicable so to do, such a policy would not or should not recommend itself to the House of Commons.
  I come to the particular point which the hon. Gentleman raised in opening his intervention—the point about the relationship of this policy to the people who work in British Leyland. The Ryder Committee, in making its report, attached absolutely correct priority to this question. The consultative arrangements which have been hammered out by the Ryder Committee in consultation with the management and the unions lie

  1431
  at the heart of the prospects of success of this enterprise.
  The discussions which I have had over many months—of course not only in this context but particularly the recent meeting with the confederation and the principal shop stewards concerned—have certainly persuaded me—although I did not need persuading—that the trade unions recognise that a very substantial change needs to be made in British Leyland to make it successful and that their anxiety and prime concern is that they should have opportunities, through new machinery, to play a much fuller part in the successful development of their company under those new arrangements.
  I have read many public comments about the need for copper-bottomed guarantees from trade union leaders and workers before a penny goes into the firm. I am sometimes puzzled by these comments because I should like to know exactly in what form, with whom and with what validity treaties of this kind can be arrived at between Secretaries of State and large bodies of workpeople who, in our free society, work voluntarily. There are many histories littered with examples of people who came back with pieces of paper that did not turn out to have any real basis.
  I would only say to the House that what we are being asked to do here—for everyone has a part to play in the recovery of British Leyland—is to look again perhaps in part at the attitude that as a nation we take to motorcar workers, as we invite them to look again at the rôle they may play in British Leyland. No doubt many hon. Members—all those with motorcar constituencies—will have had the opportunity on many occasions, as I have had on few occasions, of seeing the great assembly plants. They are the most dehumanising forms of manufacturing known to man. It was not for nothing that Charlie Chaplin's "Modern Times" struck a responsive chord when it was first shown to the world, because he demonstrated with comedy and insight the tragedy of those locked in as people to the great production lines.
  I must say, without making any reference which could be held controversial in the House, that I am amazed
  1432
  that this body of workers in our industry, who contribute £1·8 billion of exports a year, should be so reviled, so attacked and so identified for special disapproval generally in the society in which we live. Perhaps they are better paid, perhaps they are better organised, perhaps we as a nation are guilty in that we worship the golden car instead of the golden calf. Perhaps our holy spirit is found in five stars at the petrol pumps and that somehow as a nation we feel guilty about it.
  Whatever the reason, it is perhaps astonishing—and only the dockers, I think come into the same category—that in the Press, on television and on radio, and notably, I suspect, in the BBC, I have yet to find programmes or articles which recognise the contribution made by the people in the motor car industry. I am not saying this provocatively, but if one-thousandth as much time were given by the BBC—I take that example to show that I am not appearing even to attack the opposition Press—to industrial diseases, or industrial accidents, or the need for re-equipment, as is devoted to industrial disputes in the motor industry alone, this country might not have needed to wait for a Ryder Report before it recognised one of the main reasons why we have fallen behind our competitors.
  Mr. Christopher Tugendhat: In the light of what the right hon. Gentleman has said about the motor car workers and the consideration they deserve from Government and public at large, does he not feel that the taxpayers are also worthy of some consideration? Does he not agree that, when he is dealing with very large sums of taxpayers' money in this way, to say that one cannot make an agreement is an unsatisfactory way of handling other people's money?
  Mr. Benn: I do not dispute what the hon. Gentleman has said. But motor workers are taxpayers and taxpayers are motor drivers, and this tendency to divide us between the long suffering motorist and the poor group here or there is wrong. We are all people. We as a society depend on our motor workers, and yet, through our public Press and media, we find very little recognition of the dehumanising work they do, without which our society would not manage. I wanted to

  1433
  put that on record without offence, and I will give one example.
  The example is that of the Cowley engine tuners. They had a dispute. That dispute was flashed over every bulletin and newspaper. It sold newspapers for weeks. But I had to search very hard to find a quarter-of-an-inch-long story on the back page of the Financial Times some weeks later to find it reported that the engine tuners had won their case at an independent arbitration.
  Whenever there is trouble—and everyone who knows industrial trouble as I do will agree—there is public clamour for sackings and redundancies and copper-bottomed guarantees. Why should that always be the way the community discusses these problems, without recognising the contribution that is made by the workers concerned? I say seriously to the House that it is very curious that, with all the marvels of mass communication at our disposal—high speed presses, television and radio—we should have had to wait for the Ryder Report to tell us that at the heart of the problems of the industry were bad facilities for people to contribute well and a lack of investment.
  If it is true—that sometimes out of an accident we discover what is happening—there may now be a wind of change, to recall Harold Macmillan's famous phrase, in British industry, we have to recognise it as being as relevant as it was when Mr. Macmillan used that phrase in South Africa many years ago. I say this because I do not think that it would be right for the House, representing the community, to complete its examination of the problems of this industry without recognising that, within it, are highly skilled people, including shop stewards, who are anxious in the case of British Leyland, and also in the case, I believe, of Ford and other companies, to make a contribution which we have not yet been able to institutionalise as we must now try to do.
  Of course, in the examination of these matters and the further progression of the proposals I am putting before the House, there will be monitoring, both internal and external. The Department of Industry has its role. Reports will be made to the House from time to time and the situation will be subject to such
  1434
  special inquiry as the House may wish to conduct.
  I want to set this problem against the background of the spiral of decline of British manufacturing industry which has been in progress, under all Governments, over the last 30 years and has accelerated in recent years—namely, that we have been losing workers capable of manufacturing cars, ships, motor cycles and many other products, and as a result we have lost export markets and seen greater import penetration. Quite apart from the slump which now affects the world, if this spiral is not reversed by investment and a new spirit and a new opportunity for industry, it will de-industrialise the United Kingdom.
  What I fear, and what I think the House and the country must fear, is that when the upturn comes in world trade we shall have so demobilised our manufacturing industry that we shall not be able to take advantage of the upturn. There must be a substantial increase of investment. Meanwhile, there must be support for great manufacturing traditions so that the opportunity to regenerate them will occur. There must be a big rôle for the Government in this because, without Government and public funds, properly matched by investment, accountability and a sharing in the profits, it does not seem at present that under any Government we can get the investment we need. We must do it by democratic discussion with those concerned, with the people who work in industry—people who are not able, under present arrangements, to contribute what they are capable of contributing by their skill and ability.
  I do not wish to over-dramatise the Bill or the motor industry, but I genuinely believe that the future of Britain as a manufacturing nation will begin when we can turn the tide of decline, but, above all, when we can begin to express more positively our confidence in the people who ultimately produce our wealth.
  4.48 p.m.
  Mr. Michael Heseltine: Unlike the Secretary of State, I actually represent some of the people who work in the Cowley plant of British Leyland. As I listened to the right hon. Gentleman describing the conditions on the assembly lines—and I have a certain sympathy for

  1435
  what he said there—I could not help picturing the scene with which certainly all of my constituents are familiar, as are many constituents of hon. Members opposite, who will recognise it very readily themselves. It is that there are jobs available all over my constituency, in the magnificent countryside of the Chilterns, in small businesses where a more personal sort of atmosphere exists. They offer all sorts of jobs which might give a more human approach and environment in working conditions, but which are not filled because my constituents opt to work at the higher levels of earnings that Cowley offers.
  When the right hon. Gentleman depicts this heart-rending story in the graphic language he uses, the fact is that it has nothing to do with the determining motive of the men and women who have to decide the purpose for which they go to work. If the right hon. Gentleman would understand for one brief moment that the language he uses to describe Britain's deteriorating industrial position is totally divorced from the realities of the impact his speeches make upon the people who make the decisions which will effect the prosperity and livelihoods of those working people he claims so often to represent, he would know that never has there been a time at which investment prospects were so gloomy and when the prospects were declining so fast as in the period since he took responsibility for British industry.
  As I listened to the right hon. Gentleman depict this curious contrast between the settlement of the Cowley tuners' strike and the headlines that attended upon the strike itself, I saw a parallel which all of us who have watched him at work would not fail to notice. The Secretary of State for Industry's particular message and his personal impact are headlined across every newspaper in the land every day and are on every television screen every night, because he has decided to create a degree of trouble for the Government which has not been equalled in modern times.
  The Secretary of State for Industry is dominating the media because he has learnt to harness the forces of protest in this country. Other members of the Government, who go about their task, loyally serving their Prime Minister and
  1436
  their party, are excluded from equivalent coverage by the media. Everyone knows that that is what the Secretary of State for Industry has proved beyond doubt.
  Mr. Russell Kerr: Absolute nonsense.
  Mr. Heseltine: I understand that Labour Members do not wish to have the difficulties of the extreme Left of the Labour movement ventilated in public. However, if they were able to persuade the Prime Minister about the truth of the protest they make this afternoon, it would not be necessary for him, on an escalating scale, to do the job of the Secretary of State for Industry.
  The Secretary of State for Industry has created his own vested interest in difficulties. He has learnt, as no politician in the top ranks of the Labour movement, the vested interest of causing dissension, which has its own premium in media time.
  Mr. Martin Flannery: Last night during a television programme with workers from Sheffield, one of the fortuities, which the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton (Mr. Clark) made just now about £10,000, cropped up. One of the shop steward conveners in Sheffield stood up and said that they were asking for full employment and not hand-outs of money which would be gone in a few months.
  It amazes me that the hon. Gentleman can refer to the newspapers attacking my right hon. Friend without mentioning the fact that those newspapers, to a man, are owned by the deadly enemies of working people and endlessly pour out lies and innuendoes about the Secretary of State when any—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. George Thomas): Order. It is the custom in this House for whoever has the Floor to decide how long an interruption should last. However, I would draw the hon. Gentleman's attention to the fact that he may have a chance to speak later.
  Mr. Heseltine: The editors of the national Press will draw their own conclusions—
  Mr. Flannery: I am sure they will.
  Mr. Heseltine: —about the pressures to which they are subjected.

  1437
  The Secretary of State for Industry quoted a statement, which the Prime Minister made to the House—I have it here—about the possibility that if British Leyland was not rescued in the way envisaged, a million jobs would be endangered. I know of no conceivable way—and I am sure the House will have noticed this afternoon that the right hon. Gentleman was not able to indicate any way—in which more than a fraction of those jobs could have been endangered, no matter how harsh the sanctions are that have been brought to bear on that company.
  The attractive word from the political point of view is to refer to the "bankruptcy" of the company. I have never heard anyone urge that that company should be declared bankrupt. I have heard many people suggest that it should go into receivership. That would mean that the profitable parts of the company would continue in a free-standing rôle and, therefore, the jobs involved would be protected and the suppliers to those sections of the company would be protected. There would then be an isolated question surrounding the Austin Morris problems, which would have to be dealt with one way or another.
  Whichever way we look at the possible solutions to the British Leyland problem, 1 million jobs could in no conceivable situation disappear or be in any way endangered. To use the language used by the right hon. Gentleman is completely to misunderstand the nature of the problem with which British Leyland is confronted—unless we are trying to appeal, over the heads of people who understand the realities, to people who want to be given political platitudes in order to feed their own convictions.
  The whole IRC strategy was designed to solve the problems of Austin-Morris, to cure those problems and to bring about a free-standing and credible story which would enable the jobs of those concerned to be made more secure. Today Austin-Morris is losing £1 million a day. The whole IRC strategy of the Secretary of State lies in tatters. That is what this legislation is all about. The right hon. Gentleman is coming round the track for the second time and the arguments are exactly those we heard when he passed the starting point the first time round.
  1438
  The reality is that he failed to tell us that there is a very different series of arguments, depending upon which part of British Leyland a person works for. There was no serious analysis of whether, if British Leyland had not been formed, the additional opportunities for the workers at Jaguar, Rover and Triumph would have provided real and lasting jobs in the towns and cities where the companies are based, and whether Britain would not have earned higher levels of exports by backing the successful former Leyland and Jaguar operations, rather than holding them back, without solving the problems of the Austin-Morris complex. That is the argument.
  To trivialise that with references to 1 million jobs is simply to debase the whole language of industrial political decision making to the level of the street corner. The Secretary of State for Industry, better than anyone in Britain, knows it.
  I turn to, perhaps, the most staggering revelation in terms of the sums of money involved. The Secretary of State was not able to answer the questions by my right hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) and myself about the way in which the Ryder Report team had reached its strategy. I find it incredible that a sum of £2·8 billion can have been recommended to this House, with all the implications of that recommendation, and that the Secretary of State not only did not know what alternatives there were, but had never asked. In other words, he has not even done the basic homework that any responsible Minister in a Government Department would do for £50 million. Yet he has committed us to an expenditure of £2·8 billion.
  I should like to trace through the answers to the questions that the Secretary of State was unable to give the House, because I have taken the trouble to read the background. When we heard about the financial assistance to be given to British Leyland on 18th December 1974, the Secretary of State quite clearly gave the House the impression that a thoroughgoing review of all the options and alternatives for British Leyland would be undertaken by the Ryder team. I supported him—from this Box—in just that purpose. When the Prime Minister

  1439
  was telling us on 24th April of the conclusions of the Ryder Report, which we had not then had time to study, exactly the same impression was given about the overall comprehensiveness of the investigation and of the options that had been carried out.
  It was not until 1st May in a letter to shareholders that Lord Stokes explained the more specific task that was actually undertaken:
  "The capital investment programme in the report consists, with minor amendments, of figures produced by the corporation for a 10-year concept study requested by the team. The assumptions for the study including the availability of finance and the projected rates of inflation were laid down by the team."
  That is a rather weaker position perhaps than that put forward by the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State.
  It was not until 7th May that John Barber filled in the precise scope of the terms of reference given to the corporation and upon which the decisions and activities of the corporation in carrying out the work of the Ryder team were based. He told the Expenditure Committee of the House:
  "We were asked to develop a concept study over ten years on certain assumptions. The two main ones were a rate of inflation and a fairly free availability of cash."
  He went on to describe the work and the company's attitude towards it:
  "It did not pretend to be a plan. As soon as we gave it to the team I set in motion the refinement of that concept study into a detailed plan. I also set in motion to look at an alternative. We came up with a certain amount of money required; and I also set in motion working at lower sums of money in order to reach a plan."
  In other words, the Ryder team took a general conceptual plan, British Leyland worked on its refinement into a proper plan and, at lower levels of expenditure, into other plans. The Ryder Report is based only on the first conceptual plan of the British Leyland figures. The alternatives have never been studied by Ryder and have never been provided to the House.
  Mr. Maurice Edelman: The hon. Gentleman has spoken of the alternative plans put forward by the Leyland Company and of the later plan, the strategic concept, put forward by the Ryder team. Is it not
  1440
  the case that every time the company put forward some projection of the amount of money that it would require for its future operations and as soon as that was accepted, it promptly escalated its demands until it approached the figure with which Ryder has now come forward?
  Mr. Heseltine: I think that that argument has validity. The British Leyland figures are the figures that Ryder has put forward on the basis of certain rates of inflation and a fairly free availability of cash. That does not sound to me exactly like pressing an examination of all the options available to the company to see which way it should go.
  So, what was claimed to be an overall assessment of the company's prospects turned out to be a single calculation for the team on one set of circumstances—and the most expensive and ambitious set. That is the basis of the plan presented to Parliament. There is no evidence at all—indeed, very much the reverse—that any alternative strategies were properly costed or examined. Only the company did that and we have not seen the results. The Ryder team has not asked for them and Parliament therefore cannot examine exactly the implications of the Ryder Report. On his own admission, it has never occurred to the Secretary of State that he should have done so.
  It is hardly surprising, against that background, that the Prime Minister should describe the results as one of the greatest single investments in manufacturing industry which any British Government have ever contemplated. On the basis of the preparation that I have outlined, the surprise would have been if it had been anything else. That is the background which obviously comes as a surprise to the Secretary of State for Industry. It is hardly surprising that, having started on so global and unquestioning a basis, once one pursues the detail down the tracks one is carried over the hurdles with hardly a faltering step.
  First of all, it was necessary to find out the size of the world market likely to be available over the next decade or so in order to project the part that British Leyland might play. For that sort of information, one has to go to the other motor manufacturers. To be fair, the view of the Ryder team is broadly in line

  1441
  with the forecasts of all the major manufacturers, but not of course in line with the independent European Automobile Industry Data Bank's forecasts, which are more pessimistic. But in judging the validity of the motor manufacturers' forecasts, we should remember that they have succeeded in creating a world capacity of 20 million cars to meet a world demand of 12 million.
  Having dealt with the background of the figures against which we are operating, it might be worth while to pursue the arguments about how British Leyland is supposed to respond to that hypothetical and vastly optimistic assessment of the future of the automobile industry. First of all, about 50 per cent. of British Leyland's output is for Britain. Ryder believes that, by 1985, that market will be little different in magnitude from the level of 1·6 million vehicles that it reached in 1973, and which was served by existing capacity. The United States is seen as part of the same pattern. It accounted for 15 per cent. of Leyland's overseas sales and that too, it was assumed, would be catered for by existing capacity.
  The biggest upward trend in world markets is seen in Europe, which it is estimated will be about 26 per cent. higher in 1985 than in the peak year of 1973. The target here—apparently a modest one—is to increase the British Leyland share of the car market from 3 per cent. to 4 per cent. Perhaps it would have been more helpful if the Ryder team had spelled out what that meant instead of making it necessary for the Sherlock Holmeses of industrial politics to work it out for themselves with their slide rules. But perhaps I can fill in what it means.
  It means that the 200,000 units sold in Europe last year by British Leyland—about 3 per cent. of the present European market—is expected to rise to 400,000, or 4 per cent. of a much larger market of 10 million, by 1985. So that nominal 1 per cent. increase is in fact a doubling of British Leyland's sales in Europe over the next decade.
  This is despite the fact that the models are not in operation today to do it, the fact that British Leyland is being forced, for a number of reasons, to abandon part of its dealer network—for example, in Spain, as a result of the contraction of
  1442
  the manufacturing base—and the fact that it is well known that the best way to establish a dealer network is to have the right product and buoyant sales, which gives one the best available dealers. British Leyland, in the context of improving its position in Europe, will have to create a dealer network without the model range upon which alone success can be built, on a scale which completely ignores Leyland's past record in exporting to Europe.
  The evidence for this can be found in the issue on motor business produced by the Economist Intelligence Unit for the first quarter of 1975. That shows the magnitude of British Leyland's task. First, the level of British Leyland's exports is now 12 per cent. lower than at the time of the merger in 1968. Then, exports accounted for 397,501 cars, or 48·6 per cent. of output. By 1973 only 347,998 cars or 39·7 per cent. of output was exported. Yet this is the background against which the Ryder strategy sees grounds for assuming a doubling of sales to Europe in what will be the most ruthless and competitive half-decade the motor industry has ever had to face.
  A 1 per cent. increase may seem tiny. But in absolute terms of over 200,000 cars it seems wildly optimistic. Nowhere in Ryder does it indicate whether the calculations are based on our continued membership of the EEC or the reverse. The only certainty is that we know it cannot be based on both assumptions. What I should like the Secretary of State to say in committing this £2·8 billion on the strength of the one buoyant market that Ryder sees in Europe is what he thinks the effect will be if we are not in the EEC in a fortnight's time.
  What calculations—could he wake up? I wonder whether we could get the Secretary of State to take some miniscule interest in what goes on in this House just for one brief moment. Could he think about the implications of what he is doing and find out whether he knows what the implications of Ryder are in or out of the Common Market? Perhaps he will tell the House whether the Ryder assumptions are based upon us being in or out of the Common Market—[Interruption.] The right hon. Gentleman knows. If not, everyone except the Secretary of State knows that the Ryder

  1443
  assumptions are based upon us remaining in Europe. The whole future of British Leyland depends upon us staying in Europe. Yet the Secretary of State, to plead the narrow, non-governmental view that suits his own case, is trying to tell the people of British Leyland that they will be interfered with by the Commission. He knows that the whole of the strategy he has put to the House is dependent upon this country remaining in the Common Market. I do not wonder that he sits fast asleep on the Government Front Bench.
  Mr. George Park: Earlier the hon. Member referred to chopping off the unprofitable sections of British Leyland as being his idea of dealing with the problem. That must mean that he would chop off the Mini range. That being the case, there would be only one comparable car produced in this country to meet whatever demand there was for such a model, the Hillman Imp. If the Mini went out of production the customer who wanted that size of car could get it only from the Common Market or Japan.
  Mr. Heseltine: Perhaps I can clarify that. I never in any way suggested that we should do what the hon. Gentleman suggests—chop off parts of the company and therefore close down the Austin-Morris production plants. What I said was that we would be right to isolate the problem of British Leyland which now, as it was in 1968, is Austin-Morris and then seek solutions to deal with that. I will come to what I think the solutions might be.
  I come to my next question for the Secretary of State. The Ryder team worked its calculations on the basis of certain rates of inflation. Are those rates of inflation accepted by the Government and if not, where do they come from? If the Ryder team is working on different rates of inflation could we know what are the Government rates so that we can see whether Ryder is pessimistic or optimistic in his assessments? If we do accept the levels of inflation predicated in this report may I ask whether the Government have considered the implications for the whole of British investment based on an environment in which that is the level of inflation?
  1444
  How is British industry to bridge the gap in those inflationary circumstances between what industry has and what it is in need of for investment purposes? May I also ask whether the Government have considered the implications for the whole pensions industry when numeorus pensions will be unfunded if we have rates of inflation approaching the levels that Ryder has assumed necessary for the purposes of his study?
  I move to a number of other serious defects in the report. First, it totally fails to deal with the bewildering spread of factories throughout the United Kingdom from which British Leyland operates. It rightly refers to the need to rationalise the model range. But how can a serious report of this sort do anything more than skirt the immense social and human difficulties of carrying this out in practice? Everyone knows the problems that are to come. How is it that, in all responsibility, a Government or a team, because this was an independent team, cannot deal with the details of the implications for the men and women of British Leyland?
  In 1968 British Leyland had 74 plants. It has now reduced that number to 55. I cannot understand why there is no reference in the report to any further necessary contraction of those plants and the implications of so doing. What we do know is that whereas Chrysler operates from 13 plants and Ford from 21, British Leyland still has 55. I do not believe that there is an independent observer of the motor industry of this country who believes that that situation can continue. If it is not to continue, and this is the fundamental issue of the debate, would it not be more frank to explain to the people of British Leyland the implications of that change, show them the way in which the Government can legitimately help and then to call upon them to respond because they have been trusted with the information, rather than leaving them either with the delusion that they can go on as before or with fear that the certainty which it is the impression of the Government to create is illusory?
  Equally, I have great reservations about the vague assumptions on manning and productivity. Paragraph 14.11 quantifies £400 million as the contribution from the work force by 1982. The report in no way indicates the number of jobs likely

  1445
  to disappear as a consequence of that quantification. I have written to the Secretary of State setting out six different ways in which those figures can be built up. I do not know whether they are right. I make no claim for them other than that they are arithmetically correct. It is relevant to ask, first, why the Secretary of State has not replied to my letter, and second, why he has not told the House how many jobs are going from British Leyland so that the work force can understand what is expected from them in the clearly stated monitoring, step-by-step process to which the Prime Minister referred in making his first statement to the House.
  Since the bulk of the eight years, particularly in the earlier period, will be in circumstances of severe world overcapacity, sluggish markets and ruthless competition, the one thing that cannot be argued is that those jobs will be protected as productivity increases by rising sales. The whole basis of Ryder is that it does not in the early years look for rising sales on any scale. Yet it does look for rising productivity. There is a question-mark of £400 million over the jobs in British Leyland. I think we should tell the people what it means.
  A word now about what perhaps those of us who have sat for many long months on the Industry Bill Committee will have found surprising about the remarks of the Secretary of State. We found them surprising for two reasons. The first was that anyone who has studied the Ryder Report and has taken part in the Committee deliberations on the Industry Bill will have been confronted by the stark difference between the information which is to be extracted from British industry, handed over to the trade unions and conceivably released to the four corners of the globe, and the way in which identical information has been deleted from the Ryder Report and kept from this House and the public.
  The Government cannot, have it both ways. I have great reservations about the disclosure powers in the Industry Bill. I am perhaps, being optimistic, and taking slight encouragement from what the Secretary of State said this afternoon to the effect that the Government were sensitive to the commercial considerations. Perhaps at last we are beginning to get the message through. While the Ryder
  1446
  Report says that certain details of sales cannot be published, the Industry Bill insists on details of sales over undisclosed periods in the future being published.
  While Ryder omits the capital investment programmes in the divisions of the BLMC, the Industry Bill insists that capital investment programmes can be revealed in company after company across the land. The Government cannot have it both ways. It is either dangerous and damaging, as the Secretary of State argues, or it is not, as the Industry Bill argues. I know that the House will insist upon this incredible confusion being clarified at an early date.
  Mr. Benn: The hon. Gentleman has created so many myths in the course of his speech that perhaps I may deal with this one before it escapes from his mouth into the high-speed printing presses. If the Industry Bill went through as drafted, the Minister would have the right to exclude information where confidentiality was necessary to preserve the interests of the company.
  Mr. Heseltine: No.
  Mr. Benn: Yes, in the national interest.
  Mr. Heseltine: In the national interest, yes.
  Mr. Benn: There would then be an appeal to an independent committee which would have the opportunity to examine, beyond that, whether it would be damaging to the interests of the company concerned. The editing of the Ryder Committee Report was undertaken by the Ryder Committee, and the Government in endorsing the publication of the report in its edited form were also endorsing the judgment of the Ryder Committee that the information excluded would be damaging to the company and to the country, because British Leyand is a very important company. Therefore, the very opposite of what the hon. Gentleman says is true. The editing of the Ryder Report shows that the Government, despite the provisions in the Industry Bill which yet fall to be considered, are extremely sensitive, and always would be, in the exercise of their judgment not to damage British industry. Thus, all the hon. Gentleman's arguments about disclosure fall to the ground.
  Mr. Heseltine: It is perhaps indicative of the interest which the Secretary of State takes in the details that at the beginning of his intervention he succeeded in getting the interpretation of the Bill totally wrong. The fact of the matter is that the Secretary of State has no power to prevent the handing over of information to trade unions on the ground of its confidential interest to the company. He has powers to do so only on the ground of national interest.
  At the point at which the information is to be handed over to the trade unions, there is an appeals procedure. The House will be familiar with the appeals procedure, in which the trade union is informed of what it is one is not prepared to tell it and then there is argument in front of a committee about whether the information should be given to the trade union. That is a procedure that is likely to cause so much harm and havoc, and so much uncertainty because of speculation about what one is not prepared to say that the amount of commercial security attendant upon that procedure is ludicrous and laughable, and the Secretary of State knows it.
  The debate in Commitee on the disclosure clauses has been concluded—once again the Secretary of State for Industry has it wrong. The justification for the clauses put forward by the Under-Scretary of State was not on the ground of the protection of the commercial interests of British companies but on the ground that we have to ensure that the unions are brought fully into the picture and are given all this information because that is what we believe in. For the Government Front Bench to come forward with a distorted representation of what the Prime Minister understands has nothing to do with the original White Paper pledges is simply to fight a last battle in defence of an Industry Bill which is the rape of British industry.
  The Under-Secretary of State for Industry (Mr. Michael Meacher): I know that the hon. Gentleman is not often present in Committee and he may therefore have missed the point. If there is a further application to the independent Central Arbitration Committee, as I have explained on two occasions when the hon. Gentleman was absent, that is done in such a way as to ensure complete confidentiality
  1448
  of the information. It will not be revealed publicly, and there will be no revelation of the transactions of the committee which would reveal it publicly. There will be only the declaration of the decision of the committee, so there is no loss of confidentiality.
  Mr. Heseltine: I realise that I am a relatively insignificant person sitting within three feet of the Under-Secretary of State every time he utters this canard. He is aware, as I am, that anyone in industry who has studied the provisions realises that the appeals procedure is a farce which will lead to a continuing leak of information. It is incredible that virtually every activity of the Department of Industry in dealing with companies is leaked to the national Press before it is announced to the House of Commons. If that happens when Ministers alone are supposed to be in charge of information, what hope is there for British industry when all this information is being dealt with by the appeals procedure to which the trade union is a party? In a whole range of damaging and sensitive areas this procedure will prejudice jobs and investment still further.
  The last area of the report with which I wish to deal is the level of profitability that is assumed for British Leyland in future to ensure that the £1·4 billion that is to be self-generated will be achieved. The House will realise that this is a two-way deal in which the taxpayer is being asked for £1·4 billion in inflated money and the company is expected to generate the same amount. The Ryder Report is silent on the level of productivity that is expected, but if one pieces one's way through the details and extracts the relevant facts one can make the calculations for oneself.
  Paragraph 14.9 anticipates sales in inflated money of £5,935 million in 1981–82. Paragraph 14.12 tells us that the profits before depreciation and amortisation, interest and tax as a percentage of sales are expected to increase to 11 per cent. by 1981–82. From those two paragraphs it is possible to say that there will be a gross profit of £650 million in 1981–82.
  If we take £200 million for depreciation and £184 million for interest, we are left with a net pre-tax profit of £266 million in inflated money. Today's equivalent is

  1449
  £120 million or thereabouts. For the House to begin to understand the significance of that estimate of £120 million by 1981–82 I must first explain that the average of British Leyland's profits since 1968 is £28·5 million.
  The House is being asked to believe that in the face of a quite different trading climate, when the main markets open to British Leyland will not have returned to the 1973 level, the company will make four times as much profit in 1982 as it has made on average since its creation. That, I believe, is a very optimistic assumption. Any failure to meet it will be compensated for by adding to the already committed £1·4 billion of taxpayers' money by further increasing the load on the taxpayer.
  There are several other areas that must be dealt with beyond detailed criticism of the Ryder Report. I find it incredible that, having committed themselves to the Ryder strategy, the Government should set the internal CPRS to work on a long-term review of the world motor industry. We should at least wait until we have the conclusions from the study of long-term world markets before accepting so expensive a strategy which must be influenced by those conclusions.
  There is no attempt made to calculate the effect of allocating so large a part of the available resources for investment in this country to this one company in this one form. For the Government to commit £1·4 billion of taxpayers' money to investment in British Leyland is, in effect, to say that no other manufacturing company in Britain will invest a penny piece for six months. That is the order of magnitude of the commitment, with no calculation of the resource opportunities that are being missed by the Government.
  Our duty as parliamentarians is to expose the fact that if we maintain this loss-making company by adding to the burdens already placed upon the taxpayers, we are expanding the burden of tax-financed opportunities and activities and reducing the base of tax-generating activities upon which everything else depends.
  Mr. Sydney Bidwell: I have a Leyland factory in my constituency. Why is the hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) such a Dismal Jimmy?
  1450
  My workers are interested in truck and bus production. They are exceedingly optimistic about being able to get down to the task. Why does the hon. Gentleman think that he is doing Britain a great service by adopting this kind of attitude?
  Mr. Heseltine: I am most grateful for the intervention of the hon. Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr. Bidwell). I hope that he will explain to his constituents the sacrifice that they have made over the past seven years to finance long-run car production at Cowley and Longbridge, which has held back his constituents by depriving them of export opportunities and higher wages. That is the choice in which they were never asked to take a part. That is the choice that the hon. Gentleman is voting for tonight.
  The commitment to maintain British Leyland in its present form virtually without question is having an effect on the morale of management and men throughout our manufacturing industry. If this record of mismanagement and this abysmal record of industrial relations is to be supported in this way, what possible incentive is there for anyone to try to maintain a company in a viable form anywhere else in Britain ever again?
  If that is not the lesson of the moment, what was the Prime Minister trying to say when he told the strikers of Chrysler that there was not another penny? Was he trying to say that the lessons which had been applied to British Leyland, and which must have had an effect on the attitudes of the Chrysler people, are to be withheld if Chrysler is brought to the same situation as British Leyland?
  Why is it that the Prime Minister needs to come in so often to make the sort of statement that I would have thought a Secretary of State for Industry would regard as his responsibility? Was it to the strikers of Chrysler that the Prime Minister was talking when he referred to the politico-industrial ambitions which are bringing that company to its knees, or was it in reality one of his own Ministers that he had in mind? Was that phrase the signal of the end of the road for the Meridens, the Kirkbys, the Bear Brands, the Ferrantis and the steel review intervention? Is that what the Prime Minister was trying to say? [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] We shall see whether it was or was not.
  Mr. Denzil Davies: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Heseltine: No.
  Mr. Denzil Davies: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. In the course of his speech the hon. Gentleman has not said what his proposals would be for the Austin-Morris Division of British Leyland—
  Mr. Speaker: Order. What on earth has that to do with the Chair?
  Mr. Heseltine: I shall answer the hon. Gentleman's intervention in substance by arguing exactly what I believe the Government should have done and what I believe they should do even at this late hour. First, I reject the concept that we can put a team of outside experts on the task of examining a company, produce a report and then expect management and men to adhere to the standards and objectives of the report. That is the wrong way of going about the matter. The management should have been invited to produce its report and to show the options available to bring British Leyland back to profitability and independence, either in whole or in part and either on its own or in partnership with other private sector companies. That is what should have happened.
  The failure to do that, and the approach adopted by the Government of producing the Ryder Report and leaving that as the target for management, has produced for management an alibi for everything that goes wrong in future. It was essential to obtain the support of management and men. That is not what has happened, because the responsibility has now been taken firmly by the Government.
  Mr. Leslie Huckfield rose—
  Mr. Heseltine: No, I must get on. I believe that the resulting conclusions of a management investigation would have been unpalatable. We shirk our duty unless we make the position totally clear. It would be right to be honest with the people—namely, the unions, the work-people and the management. It would be right to do so in the same way that the taxpayers are to be faced with honesty by contributing to the maintenance of this company. It is clear that no one else is being asked to face his responsibilities.
  1452
  The standards of monitoring and the checks which the Prime Minister has outlined in his statement should not apply after the first £260 million has been injected; they should be applied before that injection. They should be conditioned upon a proper scheme being produced which can be set up in whatever form is appropriate before the commitment is made. That would give us a real opportunity for a new start for everyone employed in the company, and for a new and urgent attempt to be made to get the company back to a relevant form to cope with the problems that it will undoubtedly face in future.
  If that approach were adopted, I believe that British Leyland would emerge in a form much more attuned to the competition that it will be forced to meet. All the resources of the State would be necessary to deal with the human and social problems which such an investigation would throw up, and which I am the first to admit have been created for reasons that I have no interest in trying to apportion.
  For many years things have not gone as we would have liked. Anyone who wishes to magnify the problem and to try to spread alarm and despondency had better understand that British Leyland has lowered its work force by 17,000 since the beginning of last year and by 6,000 since the Secretary of State first started talking to Lord Stokes.
  Matters of redeployment can be dealt with in a humane and reasonable method provided that the Government have the will to deal with the problems. It is true to say that British Leyland lies at the centre of our manufacturing capacity. To create illusions that jobs can be maintained in loss-making circumstances if the price, quality and reliability of the product do not match those of our competitiors will mean that we shall have to accept an ever-increasing burden in future.
  If we intend seriously to survive in the modern world we shall in the end be forced to meet the standards of our competitors. I have no doubt that people would rather be told the truth today than to learn it sadly disillusioned by the emerging doubts and difficulties. That truth requires leadership which is not given by the Bill. Its strategy certainly does not provide leadership. For that

  1453
  reason I recommend my right hon. Friends to vote against it.
  5.38 p.m.
  Mr. Ray Carter: When one passes from Government into Opposition it seems that there are certain changes in one's personality. The speech that we have just heard from the hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) cannot be equated in any way with what I used to hear him say throughout the four years of Tory Government between 1970 and 1974.
  Although we can charge the hon. Gentleman with inconsistency, the hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley) stands beside him as a model of complete responsibility in terms of consistency. I have no doubt that we shall be hearing from the hon. Gentleman in much the same vein as we heard from him from time to time between 1970 and 1974 during the office of the Conservative Government of which his hon. Friend the Member for Henley was a member. No doubt he will be telling us that there are simpler, easier and more direct ways of dealing with the British Leyland problem.
  Let me take the hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury back to the course to which his hon. Friend referred a short while ago—namely, the circuit involving the IRC. He said that my right hon. Friend had been round it before and that he had watched him. It was not a flat course. There were a few hurdles and obstacles in the way.
  The Tory Government through the hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury announced their decision to the House to abolish the IRC. I had an Adjournment debate on the subject in 1970 and appealed to the then Government to think again and to save the IRC. I thought, as did most of industry, that it had done a valuable job. Indeed, even the CBI sought to retain the IRC.
  However, there was another philosophy in existence at the time, of which the hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury was one of the arch disciples. It was known as the lame duck philosophy and related to the whole area of competition. It was certainly the case that the IRC fell foul of that philosophy at the time. It was not a philosophy which received any enthusiasm from the hon. Member
  1454
  for Henley. At a later stage, the then Tory Government changed their mind and began to interfere in industry and saved various sectors of it, and the hon. Gentleman was one of the principal supporters of that change of policy.
  The IRC was abandoned—and I emphasise that it was a fine instrument of industrial intervention which had operated for some years and had carried out good work. We entered a period of industrial decline—indeed we are now in the middle of it—which resulted in the difficulties with Upper Clyde and Rolls-Royce. The then Government's policy was supported by almost everybody on the Conservative benches. Furthermore, BSA and Ferranti tumbled and now we face the problem of British Leyland.
  All those concerns had at their centre one simple reason for falling into difficulty—namely, the failure of all those industries over the years to invest. The Labour Party identified the problem and, through the IRC and other instruments, sought to intervene to put matters right. However, that action never once received the support of the Tory Party, the Press, the media or the CBI.
  It is a tragedy that we should now spend so much time talking about that failure to invest when in the past so little attention was paid to warnings on this score. We all know of the enormous investment effort that went into property deals, service industries and similiar activities, most of which are entirely nonproductive. British Leyland and the rest of British industry have had to suffer. Lord Stokes on many occasions referred to the fact that one block of property in London, Centre Point, is worth four times the value of the whole British Leyland empire. That is a sad reflection on the way in which the financial establishment of the United Kingdom looks at the heart of the economy—namely, the industrial sector.
  Mr. Ian Lloyd: The hon. Gentleman is putting forward a crucial point, but what does he think potential investors of British Leyland should have done when British Leyland achieved a profit of £28 million, at that time its highest profit? The union leaders at that time made a direct public threat that never again would the profit

  1455
  of British Leyland be allowed to exceed that figure. What incentive was there to invest in British Leyland?
  Mr. Carter: I cannot challenge the hon. Gentleman's remarks directly since I am unaware of the circumstances to which he refers, but in my experience no trade union leader of any standing would have made a remark of that nature. I am on very good terms with shop stewards in my constituency and am in almost weekly contact with them. They have the strongest interest in seeing British Leyland put in a profitable situation. I have never once heard them say that they want to remove profits altogether. I believe that the story related by the hon. Gentleman is a complete fabrication.
  Mr. J. W. Rooker: Does my hon. Friend not agree that the Ryder Report said that year after year British Leyland's profits had been pushed out in dividends? Is it not obvious that that money should have been ploughed back in the company? The trade unions rightly said that they would not stand for that practice because their jobs were at stake.
  Mr. Carter: My hon. Friend only adds weight to the complexity of the subject. This is an extremely complex issue and it is a complex industry. The manufacture of cars is not an easy business. I find it strange at times how politicians on the Conservative benches, who did not do such a brilliant job in Government in running the country, tend to take a certain view of those who are engaged in industry.
  Mr. Nick Budgen: Will the hon. Member explain why if politicians have done so badly in their own business they should be let into the industry?
  Mr. Carter: It will be a business that is independently run. I believe that with the co-operation of everybody in the company success could be achieved. They will have the resources to do the job—resouces which they have not had in the past. Let me quote from page 29 of the Ryder Report:
  "In the automotive industry, most machinery is replaced after 8–12 years. In British Leyland more than half the machines and equipment are over 15 years old."
  1456
  That is the state of British Leyland, a company which is Great Britain's principal export earner. That is a desperate state of affairs and we must do something about the situation. There may be controversy over how we should set about the problem, but the Ryder Report and the Government's intention to implement it offer a method by which we can get to grips with it.
  The important consideration of investment is not the only weak factor in the situation. I know the company well and the people in it, and I also have a good deal of knowledge of its industrial relations. Certainly management leaves a lot to be desired. The Ryder Report was critical of industrial relations in every sector of the car industry, not only in the United Kingdom but throughout the world. Its industrial relations are not a mess but, compared with other industries, those relations are extremely bad. I repre-an area of the industry where the industrial relations are good. But in other areas of British Leyland, such as Cowley, the industrial relations are bad. Clearly we must do something about the situation. The overriding factor in the British Leyland story is the inability of the company to command sufficient resources to build modern plant and to create good conditions of employment to allow the employees to go about their job of producing motor cars—which is not a pleasant job—in the best of all possible ways.
  In regard to past management of British Leyland, I have always had the greatest co-operation from its members when I have tried to represent industrial fears. Although John Barber has left the company, I must point out that my personal relations with him have always been of the best and I have found him an extremely kind and courteous man. He has always given me the information that I wanted. Although he fell foul of the report, I sincerely hope that he manages to find employment in other directions. Certainly Mr. Barber should not carry the entire blame for what went wrong with British Leyland.
  The Ryder report offers a complete break with the past. The amounts to be invested will be greater than those invested in the past. A reorganisation will undoubtedly have to take place on a massive scale. Undoubtedly there must be an improvement in industrial relations.

  1457
  Everybody knows that. Nobody is more aware of it than the trade unions, who will do all they can, within the new structure offered to working people in British Leyland by Ryder, to ensure that industrial relations are better than they were in the past.
  Mr. Nicholas Ridley: Why does the hon. Gentleman think that with 10 years' guaranteed taxpayers' money the trade unions are more likely to improve industrial relations in British Leyland over those that existed in the past 10 years, during which there was a threat of trouble resulting from bad industrial performance?
  Mr. Carter: I do not hold the view that threats hanging over the heads of working people are necessarily conducive to good industrial relations. On the contrary, if working people are given a decent environment in which to work and the opportunity of security there is a much better chance of obtaining good industrial relations. Hon. Members may say that that is a plain statement of faith. I live by that more than anything else in politics. We must put our faith in people. The trouble with British industry over the past 50 years has been the fact that management was not prepared to put faith in the working people. The Government say that they intend to change that attitude so that we put more faith in working people now than we were prepared to do in the past.
  British Leyland and its work force recognise that special treatment is being accorded to them. British Leyland will ensure that throughout all the activities of the plant full note is taken of the fact that no other industry in the United Kingdom is receiving such treatment from the Government—or has received such treatment from any past Government—as British Leyland will now receive.
  Some members of the Opposition doubt the wisdom of that action. I do not doubt it, nor does the right hon. Member for Worcester (Mi. Walker). He knows that if we allowed British Leyland to go to the wall—that was the only alternative offered to the Ryder plan—our balance of payments account would look a complete mess compared to today's, because we should have drawn in imports and lost the income derived from our exports.
  1458
  Success or failure rests entirely on those who work within British Leyland. This is probably the last chance. The Government have offered British Leyland management and trade unions the opportunity to put the company on a sound basis. They have offered it security, and the possibility of becoming not only Britain's biggest manufacturer of motor cars but possibly the biggest future European manufacturer.
  I have faith in the plan, in the management and in the workforce. I hope that there are sufficient members of the Opposition who recognise how vitally necessary it is for the Government to propose this plan. If the Government had not put it forward there would have been massive redundancies in almost every industiral city in the United Kingdom. I hope that the Bill will be given an overwhelming vote of confidence so that British Leyland will be able to embark on a new future, producing cars which can compete with any produced throughout the world.
  5.54 p.m.
  Mr. Richard Wainwright: The Liberal amendment gives the main Liberal reasons for voting to tonight against the Bill, and the Money Resolution and also the resolution made necessary by the Conservatives' Industry Act 1972. I am glad that there has been appreciation that this gateway will be opened to other hon. Gentlemen, for voting. Those reasons are summarised on the Order Paper. Whatever judgment hon. Members may pass on the Liberal reasons, they will agree that at least they are concise, especially in comparison with the 53 minutes or so which the hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) took to expound his point of view.
  With its customary understanding the House has realised the difficulties experienced by the spokesmen of the other Opposition parties in the past 12 months in presenting a case of their own in a distinctive way. However, I shall not show lack of consideration by taking a period of time equivalent to that taken by Front Bench speakers.
  I do not intend to inflict on the House my own version of the British Leyland analysis, which was developed lengthily by the hon. Member for Henley. The House will understand that out of consideration for other hon. Members I shall

  1459
  not express as deeply as I might wish my feelings about the importance of employment to everybody working in the industry. It will be accepted that no one representing the legendary Socialist Stronghold of Colne Valley could possibly afford to neglect the vital importance of reasonably secure and prosperous employment.
  There are two surrounding factors to the debate which will render the outcome inevitably unsatisfactory. First, we are landed in a shotgun situation where an extremely important exporting industry, on which a vast number of jobs directly depend, must be dealt with at very short notice. This is not only unsatisfactory. It could have been avoided. It is an unnecessary situation.
  The Ryder Committee was obliged to hurry its work. That work shows many signs of haste, which the members of the committee privately deplored. The committee had to accept a great deal that was shuffled out to it by the existing British Leyland management. That fact was made clear in the recent British Leyland report to its shareholders. The House must deal with a fantastic sum of money at very short notice, when compared with the size of the problem.
  This situation has been unsatisfactory ever since the original merger occurred. The accounting record, in terms of the profit and loss account and the balance sheet, has at all times been of an alarm bell nature. Eventually, if the credit of Parliament is to be sustained, we must discover why during all those years such a vastly important British industry was allowed to continue in its desperately dangerous state by successive Secretaries of State, who had overall responsibility.
  We wonder what on earth people in positions of responsibility have been doing when year by year it was made manifest that this vast enterprise was doing nothing like enough to provide for the replacement of its plant and machinery. It was in a classically illiterate situation as regards its accounting.
  Never, even taking into account the dividends which might have been retained, as the hon. Member for Birmingham, Northfield (Mr. Carter) has said, even if we add back the dividends and
  1460
  assume that the shareholders went without any return, which meant that the company sacrificed every chance of raising money on the market, even so, the net profit of the company, including the exceptional year 1973, was dismal. That figure never reached £30 million in any one year. When we compare a pathetic figure like that with the £2,800 million, required by Ryder, admittedly allowing for inflation, we see how pathetic was the financial record of this company.
  As regards the balance sheet position, year by year the company published, apparently to an unheeding Whitehall, net liquid assets of dangerously small amounts and latterly its total operating capital was manifestly not viable in a period of rapid inflation. The last Conservative Government, including the hon. Member for Henley, must bear a heavy load of guilt for that.
  The other unsatisfactory circumstance which accounts for the fact that no one on either side of the House can put forward a satisfactory solution today is the lack of a comprehensive budget and, according to the Secretary of State for Industry, the lack of the means for compiling a comprehensive budget, of the likely capital requirements of British manufacturing industry which it cannot hope to generate itself, but which are urgently needed for capital reinvestment.
  The rest of the developed world must think us crazy to consider voting the beginnings of such a huge capital sum today without any means whatever of putting this figure into the context of the total needs of all our vital manufacturing industry. There is no hint of what the other priorities might be or of the scale that they will add up to.
  I must protest at the attitude of the Secretary of State for Industry in his reference to the Liberal Party's amendment. The right hon. Gentleman said that the Government were not in a position to sit back with time and leisure to compile a budget of the possible calls on the Government for capital investment assistance of this kind. That was the language of manufacturers 30 years ago when I was trying to persuade them to introduce budgetary control. It is a generation out of date. They used to say: "You cannot ask us in our uncertain industry, when we cannot predict from month to month what export orders

  1461
  may come, to compile a year's budget." It took a little time for budgetary control to be adopted in this country after being the accepted thing in the United States for a generation.
  The Secretary of State said that we could not expect Her Majesty's Government, with all their resources, regional offices, endless contacts with industry and the questionnaires which they send out, to come to this House with even a rough approximation of the total needs of British industry against which, in an orderly and, I hope, constructive way, we could set the undoubted needs of British Leyland. I cannot accept that antiquated approach by the Secretary of State. I hope that on reflection he will realise that he will drift into deeper and deeper difficulty with both sides of the House if he does not quickly assemble a budget. Indeed, one wonders what Neddy and the other agencies have been doing all these years.
  It is not only a Liberal, even an Opposition, feeling that we are debating in an unreal atmosphere because we have no scale of priorities. Yesterday, in The Guardian, the Labour chairman of the Association of Metropolitan Authorities Housing Committees, a formidable figure in local government, Councillor Kevin Gould, said:
  "there has to be a closer look at priorities.… Closer attention must be paid to other organisations benefiting from Government subsidies and grants. Political adventures in Bristol South-East, Stepney and Huyton must be curtailed. Above all, what is needed "
  —continues this Labour chieftain—
  "is for central and local government to plan its financial resources over a five-year programme so that we in local government are not constantly subject to their whims".
  In the different context of British Leyland that is absolutely true of our debate today. Without a scale of priorities we are being asked to shoot an arrow at a venture which we on the Liberal Bench are certainly not prepared to do.
  As everybody knows—I will not labour the point—we can now see with hindsight that the original merger in the form that it took was a mistake. I am not putting Forward a partisan view that the Leyland part was all right and the Austin-Morris, BMC, part was an unsatisfactory partner. Far from it. The inheritance of Triumph which Leyland brought into the merger was a handicap to the new
  1462
  corporation from the start. Fortunately, there is one ray of hope. There remain today in a more or less indentifiable form some very important and wholly viable parts of this great corporation. The only trouble is that they have been starved of investment.
  We readily concede that it is proper that massive help should be given by the Government to the bus and truck division, to the specialist car division and to sectors such as Coventry Climax and Aveling Barford. But there is no evidence, either in the Ryder Report or elsewhere, that, without further investigation, not merely ordinary assistance but massive reinvestment should necessarily and immediately be put into the volume car side of the enterprise.
  The Secretary of State in an eloquent passage this afternoon talked about the dehumanising nature of the mass assembly of volume cars. The Ryder Report, unfortunately—no doubt due to the lack of time—deals only with unsupported assertions. For instance, without any argument and without citing any material facts, Ryder states that
  "vehicle production is the kind of industry which ought to remain an essential part of the United Kingdom's economic base … British Leyland should remain a major vehicle producer …"
  That dogmatic assertion may be right or wrong, but it is not argued by Ryder.
  Again, as another example of Ryder's dogmatism, the report states that the committee has noted that it has been queried whether the Austin-Morris division could posibly cope with the far greater volume production of the major European and Japanese mass producers—Volkswagen, Toyota, Fiat, Renault, and so on.
  The only answer given by Ryder is the five dogmatic words,
  "We do not accept this."
  The House is surely entitled to more reasoning than that before devoting rather more than half of this vast projected expenditure to the at least, arguable project of massively re-equipping for many years ahead the mass production of volume produced cars. This is a time at which there is still a chance to pause and take saner counsels. The Ryder Report makes very clear that these different sectors of British Leyland are still identifiable and largely separate. For instance,

  1463
  it speaks strongly of the loyalty of the workers in the Jaguar division to their particular occupation.
  Mr. Prior: I am interested to hear the hon. Gentleman say that there is still time for this matter to be discussed and for other views to be put forward. There is time if a tranche of money is made available. There is not time if no tranche of money is made available. I understand that the Liberal Party will be voting against the £50 million. Therefore, I cannot see how the hon. Gentleman could find time to get his survey or review carried out.
  Mr. Wainwright: Out of consideration for other hon. Members, I do not wish to be led astray. It must be understandable to the whole House that we are being asked to press the trigger now on the whole of this vast expenditure. It would be sheer humbug for hon. Members to pretend that tonight's sum of money are only housemaids' babies and there will come another time at which to dig our heels in and say "No further". I was about to come to that point and will come to it immediately.
  I have canvassed in the accountancy profession people who are far more up to date than I now am on Ryder's suggestion that this vast sum can be administered in doses, described as tranches, and that at each stage there can be an opportunity to say "No more". The universal reply I have had from my professional colleagues who are engaged in these sort of matters is that this is an unreal suggestion. Most of them said that it would be unreal even in a purely commercial case. Once there is a commitment to a vast modern complex of capital expenditure for a sophisticated industry it is necessary to go on with it and, come muck or nettles, to carry it through.
  However, when politics are also involved, who can be so simple—surely not the right hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior)—as to suppose that the Government can suddenly, perhaps on the eve of an election, be as sober as a judge and say "It has not worked out. British Leyland has not made the profits we expected. There have been a few strikes and we shall therefore leave the new complex half built and half the new machines missing"? This approach is just not on
  1464
  in the motor industry, and I am sorry that the Ryder Report has fallen below normal professional standards in introducing this unworked-out, half-baked concept of administering a vast amount in separate doses.
  The decision is to be taken tonight and we all understand that the vote, if it goes in favour, will be the trigger for the whole operation. It would be possible, if the House rejected the Bill tonight and the Government had to think again, to grant immediately all the capital investment needed, on a crude calculation, to maintain about half the existing British Leyland operation. The other half could then be kept going on a quarter-by-quarter basis. There could be a profound investigation as to whether the mass production of volume cars is an operation in which Britain wants to engage in the long term. Clearly that activity could not be brought to an end in a short space of time.
  Mr. Leslie Huckfield: Many of my hon. Friends and I have been absolutely fascinated at what two of the Opposition parties propose to do with the Austin-Morris Division of British Leyland. Since the Conservatives have not made clear their intentions, will the hon. Gentleman say what his party proposes for Austin-Morris?
  Mr. Wainwright: I was in the process of doing so. I was saying that having given a boost to British Leyland morale by granting all necessary capital investment assistance to half the company, which is indisputably viable although badly in need of re-equipment, it would be necessary to sustain the Austin-Morris operation on a quarter-by-quarter basis. I am not prepared to say how long it would take to go into these matters thoroughly. The House cannot be bludgeoned into a shotgun approach to this operation. Vast ranges of British industry with a record, to put it very cautiously, no worse than that of British Leyland—and most industries would claim that their record was a good deal better—feel that they have an equal claim on the resources of the State for capital reinvestment. I have met deep hostility in my industrial constituency in West Yorkshire that industries which are considered to be far less well managed with a far lower standard of application than those in my area are getting away

  1465
  with support to the tune of £2,800 million, half of which has to come from Government sources, yet an entire industry such as wool textiles, which has an export record as good as British Leyland, is left with only £15 million to re-equip.
  This cannot be sustained by the Government, and they will find when they have to go out into the country that this is a matter of very great embarrassment. This factor may have played a part in some of the local election reverses they have suffered. The industry we are discussing is still of doubtful long-term viability, and that such an industry should be able, to use the Prime Minister's words, to pre-empt this disproportionate share of taxpayers' resources and our diminishing borrowing power is an affront to the judgment of the House of Commons.
  6.15 p.m.
  Mr. Maurice Edelman: I deplore the Liberal intention to vote against the Bill tonight. That vote will be a vote in favour of allowing British Leyland to bleed slowly to death. That is why I fervently hope that the Opposition will not have their way, that the Bill will be carried and that we shall be able to sustain British Leyland in the general terms recommended by the Ryder Report.
  However, I do not wish to give the Ryder Report a clean sheet or to say that those of us who have been concerned with British Leyland over many years have done our duty adequately in bringing home to the country the fact that the company has been in slow decline over many years. I do not tonight wish to seek scapegoats. I do not want to name those managers who must bear a certain share of the burden of blame. Some of them undoubtedly imagined that by coming home from foreign parts and waving pieces of paper at London Airport saying that they had brought back orders for 100 buses, meant that all would be well in the best of all possible worlds for British Leyland. That has not been so.
  The case against the management of British Leyland is that it failed to develop a fundamental strategy for restructuring the company and for enabling it to modernise and re-equip itself and to compete with those abroad who tonight, listening to reports of our debate, will be
  1466
  waiting with relish on the outcome hoping that somehow or other British Leyland will continue in the parlous condition it has suffered for the last several years.
  Although the Ryder Report took three months to produce, it has much of the nature of improvisation. After reading it carefully one can see various facts with which we are familiar. There is the old criticism of the illogical distribution of the company's 55 plants. There is the criticism, long developed, of the inadequacy of its plant and equipment, of its lack of modernisation and so on. All that is there and so are the ideas about participation. All of them are valid criticisms which Lord Stokes in his report to the last shareholders' meeting said he had brought to the attention of the public many times in the past. That may well have been the case, but nothing was done about them. The company continued to limp on until it reached the stage at which a massive rescue operation must be mounted.
  I was one of the first to welcome the recommendations in the report to help the company. I welcomed them not only because of the vast employment consideration but because of the dominant position which the company occupies in the export and domestic trade. It is a fact, and I did not understand why the hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) challenged it, that although British Leyland employs about 167,000 menthe number continues to fluctuate, but it is about that figure—if one includes all the component manufacturers and all the dependent companies related to British Leyland, the total number of people who rely for their livelihoods upon the British Leyland complex is probably nearer 1 million. Therefore no Government, of any complexion, could have allowed a company of this size and importance to the nation to collapse. That is my basic reason for welcoming and continuing to support the general purposes of the Ryder Report.
  Having said that, I must add something not yet said in this debate and which will not be welcomed by the Opposition. I believe that the idea of having some sort of hybrid company—a company which is part private enterprise and part Government-participatory—will not work. I believe that in the long run it will not

  1467
  work because the two philosophies inherent in such a company are contradictory. What we should have done, and what we may yet have to do, is to nationalise British Leyland. Just as in the past the Chrysler company came to Britain and took over part of the shares and eventually acquired all the shares of Rootes, so I believe that eventually, because our specific purposes are different from those of private enterprise, British Leyland will have to be taken into public ownership.
  It is clearly necessary for the company to be restructured, modernised and re-equipped. It may be necessary for certain plant to be rationalised. For that purpose there will have to be full consultation with the workers, and agreements about the social consequences of that restructuring and of that modernisation and re-equipment, which will result in changes in the pattern of employment.
  Where there is a private shareholding which is basically concerned with the profitability of the company and the payment of dividends to those who are shareholders in the company, there are different considerations operating from circumstances where the public interest in the company is concerned, perhaps above all, with the economic and social consequences of that ownership, quite apart from any commercial considerations. That is why I believe it is essential that there should eventually be a form of public ownership which will have full public accountability.
  In all these matters, wherever there is any kind of Government participation, ultimately the question is what sort of accountability there is to be to those who put up the money, namely, the public. The Prime Minister has used the new term "monitoring". Concorde has been monitored, yet it has been an open-ended commitment resulting in a disastrous outpouring of public funds for which there has not been adequate public accountability. The RB211 contract was another of those unfortunate undertakings entered into without adequate consideration of the form or means of public accountability. All those great public investments, without accountability to the public, should be awful examples of what must be avoided in relation to the recommendations of the Ryder Report.
  1468
  In looking to the way in which the company may be restructured, we ought to consider that the traditional capitalist way to deal with these things is to perform surgery with an axe. The speech of the hon. Member for Henley was full of contradictions. One thing which emerged very clearly, however, was that if he had the management or implementation of any form of rationalisation of British Leyland he would simply close down the so-called unprofitable areas of that company, irrespective of the consequences to employment. In other words, the creation of unemployment would be inherent in the strategy which would be adopted by a capitalist management.
  Mr. George Rodgers: Does my hon. Friend agree that the hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine), who spoke along those lines did not have the political courage to say precisely that—that he hinted at it but that that was his intent?
  Mr. Edelman: I am obliged to my hon. Friend and I entirely agree. The hon. Member, when challenged, did not have the guts to stand up and say that in order to make British Leyland profitable, if he had the management of it, he would close down parts of it and create unemployment in order to achieve that profitability.
  Mr. Tom King: It should be put on record that what has just been said is a total distortion of the remarks of my hon. Friend, who made clear that our objection is against lumping the whole lot together and that there are successful and vital parts of the enterprise which have suffered by too close an association with the other parts and will continue to suffer under the plan proposed by the Ryder Report. The problem areas should be isolated and dealt with not by closing down but in a special way.
  Mr. Edelman: Those are bland words, but we should look at the reality behind what was said. Euphemisms have been used for what is simply the creation of unemployment by hiving off the unprofitable areas and possibly closing them down, turning them into derelict areas and removing them from the general profitable scope of the central parts of the firm.

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  I now move to another aspect related to my firm belief that this company should be nationalised. It affects the constituencies of all hon. Members in the Midlands and elsewhere in which British Leyland plants are located and where there is much concern about the possibility of nationalising a company such as British Leyland. There have been dire suggestions that somehow or other the nationalisation of British Leyland would be contradictory to the Treaty of Rome, and that somewhow or other the European Economic Community might intervene to prevent such a nationalisation.
  I regret very much that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Industry is not here tonight to hear this point, which I should have liked to put to him and which, no doubt, his hon. Friend the Under-Secretary will convey to him. There is absolutely nothing in the terms of the Treaty of Rome to prevent the nationalisation of any British company. I underline this because in a large number of constituencies the canard has been put about—a canard which has not been discussed—by those who are opposed to our remaining in the EEC that somehow or other the EEC would inhibit or prevent the nationalisation of or Government participation in a firm such as British Leyland. I asked my right hon. Friend this very question the other day and did not get a satisfactory answer.
  I have considered this point and should like to confirm tonight that Article 222 of the Treaty of Rome clearly declares that the rights of Governments within the EEC to hold property in industry are fully safeguarded, and that there is absolutely no reason at all why a firm such as British Leyland should not be either partly or wholly controlled and owned by the Government.
  Mr. Denzil Davies: I do not think that any hon. Member has argued that the Treaty of Rome inhibits nationalisation. Under Article 92, any aid by a member State which distorts Community competition is void, and the Commission can so declare. Our worry is that aid to British Leyland will be declared void.
  Mr. Edelman: I am aware of the article concerned with the distortion of competition. Nothing that I am saying is relevant to that point. I am talking of the right
  1470
  of the British Government to take a participatory part in or total holding of a firm such as British Leyland, or of British Leyland itself. It is essential to establish this point, as one of the assumptions of the Ryder Report—although not explicitly said—is that in order to fulfil its projections we shall need to remain in the EEC. The whole emphasis of the Ryder Report is on the Western European market, the fastest-growing market in the whole world.
  Therefore, in dealing with the Ryder Report it is important to recognise its underlying assumption that the markets of Western Europe will be available to British Leyland. It is no accident that the leaders of the motor industry have consistently gone on record to declare that entry into that market is essential for the prospects of the British motor industry.
  I invite some of my hon. Friends, I hope with total good will, to consider what the alternative would be to membership of the Common Market. If we opted out of the Common Market and the remaining countries within the Community raised an 11 per cent. tariff barrier against our cars and a 23 per cent. tariff barrier against our trucks, I invite my hon. Friends to consider the difficulties which would then lie before the British motor industry and the virtual impossibility of fulfilling the purposes which the Ryder Report describes.
  There are two final matters that I wish to discuss. I have said before when discussing this outpouring of public money that there is in this country, unhappily, what might be described as a bran-tub syndrome. There is a collection of illusions leading to the belief that somehow the public purse is inexhaustible, that it is possible to go on dipping into that purse and that there is no end to it. Last night the Prime Minister himself underlined the fact—not too soon—that this is not the case. However, the illusions will persist.
  In dealing with this Bill, we should not think in terms of open-ended commitment to any amount of money made available by the Exchequer. I do not hesitate to use the term "austerity". We must have a much more austere attitude to public expenditure. I do not believe that this policy of simply pouring out money because someone has a good idea

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  is the proper way to run the nation's affairs or manage the nation's budget. It is essential in the context of British Leyland to examine carefully what Mr. Gladstone used to call "candle ends". When looking at the "perks" of managements, it is extraordinary to see the golden handshakes amounting to a literally incalculable total being distributed at British Leyland and being determined by its management. It is also extraordinary to see the various "perks" which are available in the form of company houses and so on. All these matters should be examined with great care, and in the monitoring of the money allocated to British Leyland they should all come under the closest investigation.
  I come finally to industrial democracy. I am not sure whether this question of industrial democracy was tossed into the Ryder Report as a bone to keep people happy with a view to allowing them to nibble at it indefinitely. The form of industrial democracy is specifically not declared in the report. The Ryder team shies away from any form of decision as to the way in which industrial democracy should be carried out. In only one negative respect is it precise, and that is that the idea of participatory democracy shall not apply to the Special Products Division. I regret that, because it is in the Special Products Division of Coventry Climax that we have seen the greatest enthusiasm by workers for co-operation with the management.
  Generally speaking, we have to consider whether there is to be a real form of industrial democracy and industrial participation. I believe firmly that without industrial democracy and worker participation, all the abstractions of the Ryder Report will not work. Unless we have a work force which is prepared to accept the consequences of modernisation and re-equipment and which is prepared to co-operate in improving efficiency and raising productivity, and unless that is sustained by a general industrial democracy, the Ryder Report will not work.
  I am optimistic about the future of the company. It is a great company. It may be that in two years the whole motor industry will present a completely different picture. Until then, it is necessary to support British Leyland. For that
  1472
  reason, I shall go into the Lobby tonight in support of the Bill.
  6.34 p.m.
  Mr. Reginald Eyre: In the light of the world situation of the motor industry, in the immediate future there is, in my belief, no choice but to mount a salvage operation of some kind for British Leyland, assisted with public funds. But I have fundamental reservations about the way in which the Government are conducting this present operation, and on those grounds I shall vote against the Bill tonight and withhold positive support for the motion.
  The substantial reason for my reservations—it is one which is widely understood in Birmingham—is that I do not believe that the Government can, on the unrealistic basis of the Ryder Report, make safe the jobs of British Leyland employees or of the dependent motor component manufacturers and their work forces.
  We should all remember that the Secretary of State does not have a good record in these matters. British Leyland was his own unsuccessful creation in 1966 under the planning of the Labour Government's Industrial Reorganisation Corporation. Yet now, in Chapter 4 of the Ryder Report, it is suggested that the contrived merger of that date bringing British Leyland into existence stood almost no chance of success unless an unprecedented breakthrough in profits was achieved. The ailing BMC was simply not generating enough cash to make the necessary investment. It appears that the same fatal flaw affects the present calculations.
  In his report, Sir Don proposes that the Government should provide £700 million in the next three years and a further £700 million if this cannot be provided by the market, making a total of £1,400 million to be injected over the next eight years. But, as is well known, the total design provides for this sum to be matched by another £1,400 million which Leyland may generate out of its own resources over the eight years. How likely is this to be achieved—an investment of £1 million a day over eight years—against the background of the Ryder Report? I fear that this plan is even less likely to succeed than the 1968 effort, for all the reasons spelt out by my hon. Friend

  1473
  the Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) in his extremely telling speech and because the report takes practically no account of the motor industry which Britain is likely to need in 1983 and onwards.
  If we try to apportion blame fairly for the present situation, it could be argued to apply in the following proportions. About one-third of British Leyland's problems come from the worldwide difficulties of the motor industry. Many expert reports indicate that the car market in the United Kingdom, as in the rest of Europe and the United States, is likely to grow much more slowly than markets in other parts of the world.
  Another one-third of the problems arise from failures of management, mainly because essential changes were not brought about quickly enough after 1968. The remaining one-third of the problems come from the unions and industrial disputes. Anyone who studies the history of industrial disputes at Cowley, for example, must have great sympathy with the management which struggled to cope with them.
  The Ryder Report, or the censored version of it that we have seen so far, does nothing to deal with the last two problems—management and labour relations—which were the two problems within its capacity to do something effective about. Therefore, I am not inspired with hope for the future, although, as a Birmingham Member, I hope very much that the industry will have a successful future. But I cannot feel the confidence or share the optimism which Government supporters have expressed.
  On the credit side the report makes sensible proposals for fewer types of cars, fewer components, rationalised production and better marketing. But all this has been promised before and repeatedly put forward under the old management, which simply could not achieve enough progress of this kind because of the fantastic web of plant and union complications.
  Therefore, with all these substantial doubts I cannot accept that the Secretary of State has justified the Government's proposals to embark upon this massive programme of spending which will have to be subsidised by private industry and the individual taxpayer.
  1474
  There is a special West Midlands view about this matter which is shared by the medium and small companies in that region. In the West Midlands there is a good record of production and complete reliability of working without interruption by industrial disputes. The people in the companies there know that, as a result of what the Government are doing, over the years they will be deprived of resources which they believe they could put to much better use and which, by the Government's redeployment, could endanger the future of the success of those companies.
  Mr. Rooker: This point has been discussed widely in the West Midlands. Will the hon. Gentleman accept that much of this investment and the massive figures that we are talking about will not go solely into the British Leyland Company? There will be the spin-off to all the component suppliers whom we have heard about which for a start will take the form of equipment and continuity of work. When we consider the position of the small firms, the picture is not as black as the hon. Gentleman has painted it.
  Mr. Eyre: I understand the pleadings of the hon. Gentleman, and there is something in what he says if we consider the tool-making industry. However, I ask him to examine honestly whether all this investment will be aimed at producing a result which is a profit-making industry. Unless on a commercial basis all the investment is related to bringing about a really competitive and effective industry, we cannot guarantee future jobs for people in the West Midlands or the industrial areas throughout the country. The major problem and the crux of our argument is whether the massive sums are wise, effective and productive investment.
  I am expressing serious doubt about the basis on which the Secretary of State is making this enormous decision. I emphasise that to produce these enormous resources we have to tax other people and we have to tax other companies. Therefore, no one should think that the Government have unlimited resources for mere job saving exercises in the limited term. A genuine basis for successful and competitive industry must be obtained, otherwise great disillusionment and disappointment for working people will inevitably follow.

  1475
  It is strongly believed in the West Midlands that the Government have been less than frank about the redundancies which will be brought about in British Leyland factories. Undoubtedly a considerable investment in retraining will be necessary. What worries me is that the Department of Employment's allocation for this vital purpose is less than half of the investment now proposed for British Leyland. I strongly question that allocation of resources, because I believe that there will be a need for a considerable expansion of retraining procedures so that we make proper and effective use of our work force. The Government's approach shows a lack of realistic concern for the redeployment of skills and abilities and also a lack of concern for human and social considerations which follow the necessary changes that take place as industry moves on through modern developments.
  Human and effective concern about retraining and other conditions is a prime requirement in our industrial areas today. The Government have got their allocation of priorities wrong, as has been demonstrated.
  Mr. Carter: I am trying to follow the hon. Gentleman's train of thought and his argument. I cannot see the consistency in what he is saying. He is criticising the report and the level of expenditure that will be incurred as a result of it. From what he is saying it appears to me that the alternative would have been to have severely rationalised British Leyland, which, as he knows, would have meant a massive impact on Austin-Morris. For Longbridge and Birmingham, it would have meant massive redundancies. I am sure that the hon. Gentelman would not welcome that. However, he is telling the House that there will be redundancies as a result of the Ryder Report. I can accept that, but I cannot follow his concern for redundancies that arise out of the Ryder Report when, on the other hand, he is demanding that far more drastic measures could have been adopted in place of Ryder.
  Mr. Eyre: The hon. Gentleman knows that I share his concern about the future of British Leyland and especially the contribution it can make to the economy of Birmingham and the West Midlands. However, he must not seek to put words
  1476
  into my mouth. I was trying to explain as clearly as I could that I believe that there is an inadequate examination of Ryder which leads me to conclude that the proposals for spending on this scale have not been properly prepared and, therefore, involve a considerable degree of waste of resources. I further said that even if we accepted the Ryder proposals, buried within them is still in any event a considerable amount of redundancy. It would have been reasonable and proper to have used some part of what I regard as wasted resources to make provision for retraining which inevitably will be necessary in view of the Ryder Report, because I believe that we really will have to make very special efforts on retraining to move men to other parts of what can be successful manufacturing industry in the Midlands.
  My fear, which stems from the debate this afternoon and from these proposals—and it is shared by many working people in Birmingham—is that after an inadequate examination of the report the Government have embarked upon a short-term job-saving exercise which I fear will fail and that the waste of resources in this way will take us as a country further along the road which leads to an industrial graveyard.
  6.48 p.m.
  Mr. George Rodgers: It is my good fortune to represent the township of Leyland in Lancashire, wherein is located the major portion of the bus and track division of the British Leyland Motor Corporation. Indeed, this small town was the birthplace of Leyland Motors. The community of this town is almost entirely dependent on the well-being of this one industry, as is the whole of the surrounding constituency. Many thousands of my constituents are employed at British Leyland factories. Apart from those directly employed in the factories and the plants and the families of those employees, there are a wide range of local shopkeepers and small business men who are well aware that their prosperity or poverty is inevitably linked to the success or the failure of the BLMC.
  Quite obviously the decline of the industry has been viewed with deep anxiety by many people of different income groups and political persuasions. They are all influenced and affected by

  1477
  the existence of the British Leyland plant. In our area of Lancashire we have witnessed the withering away of the textile industry and the savage contraction of the coal industry, with devastating consequences to the economic well-being of the whole region. Had the motor industry been allowed to slither into bankruptcy, I believe that the area would have assumed the appearance of an industrial cemetery. Although the bus and truck division is generally accepted as being viable, the Ryder Report has recommended an investment of several hundreds of millions of pounds, and if that investment had not been forthcoming—it would not have been forthcoming under the previous régime—this area, too, would have again gone into deeper decline.
  Therefore, the people I represent are overwhelmingly relieved that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Industry and his departmental colleagues have acted so decisively to prevent an economic calamity which would have affected not only the industry but the whole community.
  Some of us bitterly resent the campaign of vilification which has been mounted by Opposition Members against the Minister responsible for carrying out one section of Government policy, but we now see that that campaign is beginning to boomerang. It is seen as a squalid manoeuvre, politically motivated and not at all related to the problems of those whose welfare and living standards are interwoven with and directly dependent on the survival and success of this major British industry.
  I find it incredible that we still hear objections from those who resent the fact that the industry must become accountable to the public. Surely it must be appreciated by Opposition Members that the shareholder has an entitlement to accountability. The public are providing the wherewithal in this case for the mission of mercy. Surely it cannot seriously be suggested that they are not entitled to accountability. If that were so, I would suggest that those hon. Members who appear to be so desperately concerned about democracy within the trade union movement could well turn their attention to private industry, where that commodity is evidently in short supply.
  1478
  The Ryder Report contains a damning tale of managerial inefficiency over a long period. There has been huge incompetence. However, that will come as no surprise to those of us who have read "The Leyland Papers", a document which described the ludicrous machinations, manoeuvrings and miscalculations that took place at the time of the amalgamation to create the British Leyland Motor Corporation.
  The failure of the corporation to invest in new plant and equipment has been very well ventilated. Indeed, it was ventilated by the right hon. Gentleman who led the previous Tory Government. He had some harsh words to say on that very subject when he was in office. He addressed his remarks to the motor industry. As the Ryder Report states,
  "To make matters worse nearly all the profit was distributed as dividends instead of being retained to finance new capital investment."
  The situation exposes the absurdity and contradiction of relying upon private investment to generate prosperity in industry.
  Many industrialists, particularly young industrialists, are now recognising the nonsense of a system which requires them continually to glance over their shoulders to see who is holding the reins and to respond to the urgings of those who have investment powers within their hands. This applies to individuals and institutions that can take their money elsewhere and can take it anywhere when in pursuit of a quick return and a fast buck. It must be terribly difficult for industrialists, relying upon this, and being aware of his background, to secure the necessary investment.
  The Ryder Report pays fair tribute to the work force and, indeed, to the trade union movement. They have provided a great deal of the evidence. Much good will has been created. It would be a great pity if that good will were casually squandered. The trade unions have demonstrated that they have a clear understanding of the problems that face the industry and that they are also aware of how best to remedy those problems.
  I have often hear the phrase "brain drain" used in reference to people with skill and ability who leave our shores and secure appointments overseas. I think that there is an internal brain drain

  1479
  in this country. We have people of great skill and ability within the country but we do not utilise the massive talents which are apparent and have become evident among the ordinary working people of the nation. If we are to take advantage of them and to harvest these skills, and to take advantage of the recommendations proffered by the Ryder team and of the capital that is to be made available by the Government, we must also avail ourselves of the third ingredient, that ingredient of industrial democracy. By "industrial democracy" I am not referring to changing the colour of a toilet door or the quality of tea in a canteen. There must be genuine participation and consultation.
  I am confident that the BLMC in its new and revitalised rôle can generate a tremendous prosperity. The Government must retain their courage and common sense. At long last we can see a situation in which capital can be the servant of labour rather than labour being the constant tool of capitalism. The old system has been tried and found wanting. It is obsolete and obsolescent, rather like some of those who have tried to defend its shortcomings. Perhaps it is a little melancholy to realise that we are simply responding to events rather than shaping what should be the future industrial scene. I hope that in times to come we shall avoid the necessity of having to launch a lifeboat at public expense in order to extract private industry from quagmires of its own creation.
  Along with those whose livelihoods depend directly on the existence of a striving motor industry, I welcome the Bill and look towards the emergence of a healthy, prosperous and democratic industry as a consequence of its provisions.
  6.57 p.m.
  Mr. J. Enoch Powell: It would have been quite wrong if the hon. Member for Chorley (Mr. Rodgers) had not taken part in this debate. After all, as the representative of Leyland itself, he is almost what the Greeks would have called the eponymous Hero of the occasion.
  It is, of course, right that the House should remember not only the anxieties of the thousands upon thousands directly
  1480
  affected by the fortunes of British Leyland but also the sense of relief which they are bound to feel when they suppose that the action of the Government, of this House and of the taxpayers will alleviate or remedy those anxieties.
  A week ago, in another context, the Secretary of State for Industry reminded hon. Members that the fear of redundancy is something which is not known to us in the sense that it is ever-present to many of our fellow citizens. I thought it was unreasonable that his observation should have been so angrily received in certain quarters of the House, for certainly when we discuss economic policies of which the consequences may well be—indeed, must be—substantial redundancy and the movement of large numbers of people from one group of employments to another, we in this House ought to do so with a due sense of humility. But we ought not to be deterred by fear of the pointed finger from saying what we believe is in the long-term interest not only of the economy as a whole but of the very people who may have to change their employment and may suffer in the process of adjustment.
  The Secretary of State—and it is a pity that he has had to desert us through most of our deliberations—quoted a remark I made in the context of another firm, I think only a week ago, when I invited him to agree that the official Opposition could neither defend nor propound capitalist enterprise unless they were prepared to declare that there was no substitute for bankruptcy. But today I wish to argue that it is not only Her Majesty's Opposition who need to recognise, and recognise much more frankly than I think has happened yet, that there is no substitute for bankruptcy.
  We are concerned, in this report and in this debate, with the prospects of profitability, the prospects of what is called viability. The Government's case, the Bill, the motion and the Ryder Report all rest upon speculation about the future profitability of an enterprise. Now, bankruptcy does not occur, the liquidator does not go in, unless and until intensive consideration has been given to the future prospects of the undertaking in question, unless those whose business it is to scrutinise and weigh acidly the prospects and probabilities have given their best attention to the likelihood of

  1481
  the enterprise in question, by an infusion of capital, by a further extension of credit, by alterations in the management, by reorganisation, becoming profitable within a manageable and foreseeable future.
  I am no uncritical admirer or adulator of experts, certainly not of experts when they go outside the sphere in which they are experts. The bankers, the financiers, the investors, the whole range of people whose judgment is brought to bear before bankruptcy occurs, are highly fallible not only when they go outside the sphere where their experience lies but when they are themselves responsible, directly or indirectly, for the rightness or wrongness of their forecasts. No human judgment is fallible; and I suppose that theoretically, there would be no bankruptcies if it were not that the prospects of future profitability are misjudged by those whose business it is to judge them rightly. To be human is to err; but what we are concerned about is to minimise error, and the process of which bankruptcy is a part is a process which, humanly speaking, minimises error in the assessment of future prospects for the profitable employment of resources.
  When bankruptcy does occur—that is to say, when rightly or wrongly the judgment is given that the prospect of profitability does not exist, that there is no means which would be justifiable of opening up the likelihood of future profitability—then what bankruptcy brings about, and it does so harshly, is to make it possible for the resources which have been devoted to making a loss to be reapplied in ways which are more likely to make a profit.
  We use the terms "loss" and "profit"; but they disguise a much cruder reality—and that cruder reality is destruction and creation. When men are employed in an undertaking which, year after year, is making a loss, those men—who are the last people to blame—are actually destroying that which their fellow workers are creating. Less is going out than comes in; they are involuntary parasites upon the economy. The benefit which bankruptcy confers, the benefit which makes it indispensable, is that it enables resources which would otherwise be locked in the work of destruction to be released for different applications, different combinations,
  1482
  different circumstances, in which they can again be creative.
  Immediately, however, public money comes upon the scene, immediately public money is to be injected into an undertaking, all the criteria which would otherwise be brought to bear fly out of the window and are replaced by a very different outlook. The private, cautious, calculated, experienced, almost cynical estimation of the likely prospects for the future is replaced by the public commitments, by the political pressures and by the freedom from responsibility which come of spending public money, money which is there to hand.
  I do not suppose that one can have a context in which misjudgment upon the prospects of future profitability is more likely than that in which public money is being injected into industrial activities. The whole tendency—the very pressures we have seen in the course of this debate—will not be to put money where it is likely to produce a profit but to put it where it will be politically profitable, where it will answer the immediate anxieties which press upon us as politicians from our constituencies, where it will earn the sort of harvest which, as politicians, it is our business to garner if possible—the harvest of votes.
  But there is more to it than that. The commitment of public money is a public act and Ministers, public men, have to stand up and make predictions upon which they claim to base their decisions that the public money shall be applied. The temptation is almost irresistible, first, to overestimate those possibilities, to fudge the prospectus, to paint it in warm colours, and, secondly, having once made it, to stick to it through thick and thin by throwing more good public money after that which it appears has been wasted.
  There is a clear example in this debate and in this report of the sort of motivation which inevitably comes in with public money. The right hon. Gentleman paraphrased accurately the Ryder Report's statement that "Britain ought to have an automobile industry". That is not an economic statement; that is a political statement. It is a statement which does not arise from calculations of maximising return to capital employed and to the effort of brain and hand. It is

  1483
  a statement about prestige, about an entity, Britain, which is not even an economic entity but is a political entity.
  So once we move away from the area of bankruptcy by the infusion of public money we substitute for the process which is most likely to guess the future aright the process which is most likely, which is almost designed, to guess the future wrong.
  The Labour Party believes—and it is the purpose for which it exists—that there are many ways in which the power of the State can beneficially be used in industry, that it can be used beneficially to social ends, that it can be used beneficially to economic ends. In consequence of that, Labour Members naturally tend to welcome further introductions of public money, control and ownership—the two should go hand in hand—into the British economy. One should make no criticism of that: it is for that proposition that they have stood and it is on that proposition that they have been elected.
  However, I wish to put this to the Government and to the Labour Party. What they do not intend to do, but what they are in danger of doing, is to be led on, by virtue of infusing public money first into one and then into another activity where, by definition, the prospects of successful creative activity are poor or non-existent, into a position where the State presides over an area of the economy which is parasitic upon the rest, where the men employed—and I repeat, they are the last people who are or would be to blame—are destroying what an ever-diminishing profitable sector of the economy is creating.
  If the Labour Party, in the pursuit of its philosophy and its objects, is to escape that danger—it is certainly a danger that it cannot wish to court—it must use, and it can as little as anyone dispense with, the disciplines which bankruptcy exerts. It must be able to use and apply the criteria which the sort of judgment that lies behind bankruptcy and liquidation brings to bear. So it is not only for the defenders of capitalist enterprise, if there are still such people—I am never quite sure—it is for the Labour Party and the Government, indeed, it is for the
  1484
  nation which has to make its way in a cruel and competitive world, that bankruptcy is indispensable and that there is no substitute for the judgment of bankruptcy and for the liberating power of bankruptcy.
  Many people believe that the expression "mixed economy" is one of those terms whereby politicians enable themselves to climb out of tight corners, that it is a method of papering over cracks inside a party or of avoiding coming to grips with the logical consequences of the policies we are advocating. However, there is a sense in which a mixed economy and the preservation of a mixed economy—that is to say, preservation of an economy in which the discipline of bankruptcy exists and is effective—is entirely in the interest of the purposes of the Government and the Labour Party.
  This is a debate, therefore, in which these facts should be openly recognised. I shall vote—I do not think there will be a frisson of astonishment as I complete this sentence—not only against the Bill but against the motion which follows it. If we are not to go down the path of infusing more and more public money on a probability upon which no one would commit his own money or the money of others for which he was responsible—except in the sense that we are responsible for that of the taxpayer—it will be more effective, kinder and will give more leadership to the country if we take the decision now.
  I was sorry that the official Opposition were unable to bring themselves to state clearly that the only logical alternative to the policy they were attacking was, preferably through liquidation, to ensure that the resources in such portions of this enterprise as could not be profitably employed were diverted to other uses. The time has to come when the realities of public ownership, of a mixed economy, and of the disciplines which they require of hon. Members have to be recognised. Perhaps that recognition may have the effect not of dividing both sides of the House more sharply, but bringing us both to recognise that, deep though our ideological differences may be, there are many respects and many areas in which our duties to our constituents coincide.
  7.15 p.m.
  Mr. Sydney Tierney: I shall not follow the argument of the right hon. Member for Down, South (Mr. Powell) who made his learned contribution on economic viability and short-term and long-term solutions. I make my contribution on the basis of my understanding of the Leyland factories in my constituency and the people who work in them.
  I welcome the Bill and what it offers to do in ensuring the continuance of a British motor car industry, the saving of many hundreds of necessary jobs and the removing of uncertainties from many families.
  I support some of the main points made in the Ryder Report. I welcome and support what that report says about industrial relations and their special significance in this difficult situation. The Ryder Committee comments that throughout its inquiry, although it was aware that there were many proposals to make British Leyland competitive, such as fewer models, improved facilities in design, solutions to engineering and production problems and changes in organisation and management. British Leyland's success would depend most of all on the skills, efforts and attitudes of its 170,000 employees.
  The report does not subscribe to the view that all the ills of British Leyland can be laid at the door of a strike-prone labour force. Quite a lot has been said by the Conservative Party about this. It has been pointed out that the man-hours lost in 1973–74 represented only 3 per cent. of the total of some 300 million man-hours in that year. Indeed, in the first nine months of 1974 British Leyland's record was better than Ford's or Chrysler's. Nevertheless, it is clear that if British Leyland is to compete more effectively in the future in a market which is subject to increasing competitiveness, man-hours lost must be reduced.
  I am sure that all hon. Member will understand that not all man-hours lost are due to industrial disputes. The report says this in no uncertain terms. It mentions the breakdowns in plant and equipment and shortages of materials, which make their contribution. It is important that these points be made because British
  1486
  Leyland, as a company, has suffered a good deal in recent years from adverse publicity about its work force. Its strike record has been the subject of large areas of newsprint and many stories about serious overmanning. Those reports have damaged British Leyland, its reputation and its ability to compete overseas. This trend must be reversed. Whatever hon. Members say about industrial relations, cynicism will not help us to sell cars overseas.
  We should welcome also the fact that the report says that industrial relations are of major importance. The essence of its proposals is to promote a deeper sense of commitment among the workers to the success of the enterprise on which their livelihood depends. While specific measures have to be taken to deal with improvements in payments systems—there is a good deal of dispute about that—and in collective bargaining procedures, the most crucial feature of improving industrial relations is the committee's strong recommendation of significant progress towards industrial democracy. The report says:
  "Means must be found to channel the ideas, the energy and the enthusiasm of workers in planning the business on which their livelihood depends."
  The trade unions have made submissions to the committee, which it welcomed. The readiness of union representatives to consider the creation of joint management-union committees is a great step forward. Their development will need much time and patience and no doubt the Government's help will be readily available. There is a new and progressive development in British industry and a new attitude towards solving industrial relations problems. The responsible rôle adopted by Leyland unions over the disputes of recent months is symptomatic of that new attitude and should be welcomed.
  The report goes into some detail about co-ordination within the car business and between that business and British Leyland's other activities. As it says, the car divisions are responsible for five plants manufacturing components. Although they supply many components to the car industry, in many instances they supply only part of Leyland's own requirements. The rest are supplied by other component firms. Many thousands of workers, apart

  1487
  from the 170,000 employed by British Leyland, will find their jobs in danger, too. These are the workers in the components industry.
  I support the report's recommendation that a senior executive should be responsible for the manufacture of parts and the co-ordination with other agencies. The British car components industry is a large one, much affected by Leyland's fortunes. In this appraisal the manufacturing side of Leyland and the components industries should be brought closer together. Those employed in the components industry have been on short time for months. They are always affected by the fortunes of the motor industry.
  I support the Leyland campaign to get people to buy British, but I invite the Government to share my concern for the components industry and to use their influence—they will certainly have more than they had—to ensure that Leyland uses British components, so that its cars are British in the strictest sense. A number of components firms in the West Midlands, Birmingham and elsewhere have been badly affected by the company's use of foreign components. Leyland should practise what it preaches in this instance.
  I support the Bill, which is in the best interests of British industry. British Leyland workers and those thousands of other workers who are affected by the fortunes of the motor industry.
  7.27 p.m.
  Mr. Nicholas Ridley: The hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley (Mr. Tierney) was right in one thing at least—that the nationalisation or virtual nationalisation of British Leyland will in due course affect the situation in the car components industry. That is the first recognition of the fact that what we are doing today will lead to the control and ultimately the public financing of the components industry by the State.
  What has happened in other industries which have been nationalised? As the area in which men have to be responsible both for their action and for the use of other people's capital contracts, so more and more wish to join that area where they hand responsibility over to the State. We shall see that the car component workers will find it attractive
  1488
  to cede their independence in order to pass on their responsibility for the efficient use of resources to the State, just as the car industry has done.
  But, as industry after industry, firm after firm, activity after activity, passes its responsibility for running its own affairs properly and using capital effectively to the State, as our individual responsibility is destroyed, so the State acquires an ever greater collective responsibility. It is this growing collective responsibility which hon. Members are not prepared to face up to, which they prefer to ignore.
  I was flattered last week, when I spoke in the debate on the Adjournment, by the Lord President, who told me and the hon. and learned Member for Montgomery (Mr. Hooson) that because we had dared to talk about the state of the pound and measures to support it, we were knocking the currency, being unpatriotic. But in truth, the publication of the Ryder Report and this Bill have done far more harm to this country's economic prospects than anything that the hon. and learned Member and I could ever say. Indeed, would that I had such economic power that I could rival the overwhelming, overburdening effect of the publication of this report upon the confidence of foreigners in the maintenance of the parity of sterling.
  The truth is that the economic consequences of this report have not been discussed. They will be conveniently discussed tomorrow, when all hon. Members will say that something must be done about the economy and the deterioration in our finances. But there will be not a word today. Today is solely for talking about the jobs of the British Leyland workers. It will be tomorrow, when the Bill has safely been given a Second Reading, that we shall seek to say that something must be cut, that there must be some sacrifices, that the standard of living must be held down or reduced—but nothing specific.
  I want to spell out the economic consequences of this Bill. First, it will cost £1,400 million of public money plus presumably the other £1,400 million which will not be earned in profits by the company, and in the next financial year £265 million and more. This sum has not been allowed in the Estimates and it will swell the Budget deficit. It will cause the

  1489
  already overburdened printing presses of this country to work more overtime. That will be the growth industry as a result of the Bill—because the money is not there.
  Labour Members talk as if we had some savings in the bank and not to release them to this company was due to some stinginess, a lack of compassion and inhumanity. I would respect those who support the Bill if they were prepared to say, "Yes. Let us allocate this finance, but to make way for it let us raise taxation by an equivalent amount or cut this programme or this welfare service or some other activity so that at least we have the money." At the moment they have not got one penny and they never will have. The money does not exist.
  This Bill might swell the money supply by a per cent. or two as a result of putting the Ryder Report into action. That in turn will rest upon the collective responsibility of all citizens because they will have to bear the slightly higher rate of inflation which it will cost. But that is not the main argument. The main argument is that if this company can be rescued with all the enormous costs involved, why not the next one also? It is not necessary to increase the money supply to pay for higher wages which will be claimed. But if higher wages are claimed and if they threaten the solvency of other major employers and finally bring them down, the commitment is there as clear as can be that the State will intervene to rescue them and to inject money.
  This action will cause wages to be demanded on an ever greater scale, causing a need for ever greater printing, ever greater deficit financing. I do not believe for one moment that any single worker in the Chrysler company believed the Prime Minister when he said last night at some banquet—how many Chrysler workers were at the banquet to hear him I do not know—that no one should take the BLMC rescue as a precedent for their company.
  I remember making that statement when I was a junior Minister. The only difference was that I meant it—and that I still mean it. I believe that this is at the heart of our economic problems. The Prime Minister no more means what he said then than he has ever meant anything
  1490
  that he has said, if I may use the phrase, in a solemn and binding form—for instance his declarations over his intentions towards the Common Market.
  Great play has been made about the export performance of this company. The Secretary of State's main argument for the rescue, apart from jobs, was the enormous contribution the company makes by way of exports. Yet he misunderstands, because if the deficit is, as it is, £9,000 million now, to rise to perhaps £9,500 million as a result of the Bill, that printed money represents money in the pockets of the people which is not backed by the production of domestic goods and services.
  This causes them, in spending that money, to find that they cannot obtain the resources at home which they demand. As a result, imports are increased. Imports or exports are not therefore caused by the failure or success of British manufacturers, by the cleverness or otherwise of workers and salesmen. They are caused by one thing only—an excess of demand for goods over the domestic supply. If we have heavy car exports, we have equally heavy imports of oil, timber and other raw materials. It is the total balance at which we should look. That total balance can be achieved and improved only if there is a reduction in the excess of domestic demand.
  Whether or not we do something to save British Leyland will not affect the export performance of this country except in this way. If we print more money, that will put into the pockets of the people more money than is represented by goods and services. That money will be spent and will cause more imports to be sucked in, which will make the balance of trade even worse. The effect of this Bill is quite different from the effect which the Secretary of State suggested. He spoke about maintaining a growing, exporting motor car industry. The effect of the Bill will be to cause demand pressures and to suck in more imports.
  I do not believe there are any halfway houses. I say this to my right hon. and hon. Friends on the Opposiition Front Bench. We cannot get out of this dilemma by saying that there should be more strings attached to the Ryder Report or that it has been done the wrong way or that there are other ways of looking

  1491
  at the future of the industry which have not been properly gone into. The overriding, overwhelming force of the argument is that actions of this sort are not only damaging in themselves to our economic prospects but are cumulative and are the cause of ever-worsening economic situations.
  We must either say that we are prepared to go along with this sort of action and devise such machinery as we can for improving the mechanisms and be prepared to see both an ever greater State sector, growing faster and growing more inefficient—as the right hon. Member for Down, South (Mr. Powell) said, a greater parasite upon the profitable sector—or we must take a firm stand and say that this is not the way forward.
  I do not see what strings can be put upon the spending of this money which would be meaningful and realistic. Only red tape will be put upon it, and red tape can snap very easily. What British Leyland has done is to consume its existing capital. It has eaten up all the money invested in it. What is to stop it consuming all of its new capital which the Bill gives to it? What is to stop that new capital going even before it has been paid, because the mere mention of the £2,800 million will surely whet the appetite of those who work in this company? Although there can be two accounts, one called revenue and one called capital, the fact that one goes deeper and deeper into deficit and the other looks healthy is in encouragement to those who can read balance sheets and understand accounts. More information will also, happily perhaps, have to be disclosed to trade unions but there is no check upon where this money goes.
  What should have been done? I would not be honest if I did not say that I believe we should have appointed a receiver. I want to make this distinction. That is not declaring the company bankrupt, as the Secretary of State has said. Bankruptcy would have meant bringing in a liquidator. I spoke of a receiver. The receiver would have run the company for several months as he ran Rolls-Royce. If necessary, he could have been given a little money by the Government to make sure that he had enough time. He could have used that time to sell off those parts of the enterprise which were profitable
  1492
  and which people would have sought to buy. He could have taken other parts of the enterprise and made them efficient. Some parts he could have closed down. He would have proceeded in this way until he had produced a company which was using its capital and labour effectively instead of ineffectively.
  I am not an expert in receivership or in industrial management and it is not for me to say what would have happened, how many jobs would have been lost, how many would have been saved, which companies would have gone where and what would have been the result, but I have no doubt that "a million jobs lost" is an absurd and rather dishonest epithet to stick on this course of action, because clearly more than half the jobs in British Leyland are viable and more than half of the supplies jobs are viable—perhaps many more.
  I do not know what would have been the redistribution of labour from unprofitable enterprises into more profitable enterprises nearby. As my hon. Friend the Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) said, there are plenty of jobs in the part of the country which I represent which are unfilled. That is the right way to deal with the problem.
  We must not talk only about investment. Investment of £2,800 million requires perhaps a return of £300 million a year, to put it conservatively, just to service that investment. Where this company with its record will find profits of £300 million simply to service the investment which we seek to put into it is a little puzzling, to say the least. It may be that the investment is much too large and that we should seek first to use more effectively the existing equipment and small quantities of new equipment. If British Leyland has been unsuccessful in the past, that could in some measure have been because it did not use effectively such equipment as it had.
  It is dangerous for the Secretary of State always to say that what is required is more investment, as if every pound put into investment will automatically do him good, instead of saying that what is required is better investment and better use of existing and future investment. That is what is needed throughout the whole of British industry.
  Of course the Secretary of State cannot say that, because he has done a disservice

  1493
  to the cause of productivity. He has deliberately sought to force a State industry—the British Steel Corporation—to retain more jobs than it says it needs. I notice that the right hon. Gentleman is talking gaily through my speech It would be a good idea if he gave me his attention. I should like him to listen to this: he has done great disservice to the cause of productivity by telling the British Steel Corporation that it should keep more jobs than it needs The purpose of the Bill and the Ryder Report is also to insist upon there being more jobs in British Leyland than there should otherwise be. It is wrapped up in the word "investment", but investment means fewer people, proper manning schedules and higher productivity, and the right hon. Gentleman is not prepared to take that part of the coin.
  Mr. Benn: I am listening intently to the hon. Gentleman, who speaks with great clarity and seriousness on these matters, but the more I listen to him the more I am utterly convinced that his argument leave,, out pf account that there is not only the balance sheet but the ballot box. He speaks of people as if they can be moved at the behest of the owners of industry without regard to the political and social factors which are the basis of our standing in the House. If the Government of whom the hon. Gentleman was a member reversed their policies, it was because even they recognised that the people represented through the ballot box intend to exercise, and do exercise, a countervailing power to the use he would wish to make of them as pawns in a financial game.
  Mr. Ridley: The right hon. Gentleman has given the game away. He now admits that what he is after is not the profitability of industry but the ballot box. He said that over and over again. He is not trying to get prosperity with this money, he is not trying to get a return on capital, he is trying to buy votes. When my hon. Friend the Member for Henley accused him of political corruption, he denied it, but he has now admitted that this is so.
  Mr. Benn: The hon. Gentleman should recognise that we adopted parliamentary democracy in this country to give to those without money power equal to that possessed by those with money.
  1494
  That is the strength of Parliament. To attempt to ignore the rights of people expressed through the ballot box, as does the hon. Gentleman, is not only immoral but unrealistic.
  Mr. Ridley: The hon. Gentleman is again wrong. He ignores the fact that the way to prosperity, stable prices, profitability in industry, harmony and happiness is through efficiency.
  I am prepared to advocate in my constituency, the views that I have here advocated, and on some occasions I have been returned at the ballot box by the votes of more than half the electorate. So I am not accepting that comment from the right hon. Gentleman. If he insists on putting unprofitability and the wastage of national resources as one of his main platforms in appealing to the electorate for support for his Government, the only answer is to point out to him and to the electorate at large that, although that approach may appeal superficially and in the short term to a small section of the population, the rest of the people will turn the Government out, because, the Government are destroying the economy upon which we are trying to earn our living and have our enjoyment. It is only by using our resources, our capital and our assets profitably that we can hope to look the people in the eye and say "We have done the right thing by you".
  7.46 p.m.
  Mr. Leslie Huckfield: If the speech we have just heard from the hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley) delights the farmers of his constituency, it certainly does not delight the car workers of Nuneaton and Coventry. I welcome the hon. Gentleman's contribution and the contribution made by the right hon. Member for Down, South (Mr. Powell), because they at least have the courage and the honesty to spell out the alternative. When the hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) spoke from the Opposition Front Bench—presumably we shall get the same sort of fudged speech when the debate is wound up—he did not have the courage to spell out the alternative. The alternative which the Opposition Front Bench are thinking up is the selling off of the profitable parts of British Leyland and,

  1495
  presumably, the near obliteration of parts which they do not think will make a profit.
  What the hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury and the majority of the Conservative Party have in mind is the disappearance of the part of British Leyland we know as Austin-Morris. The consequences of that in terms of the balance of payments deficit, import penetration and the future of the British motor industry would be devastating to investment, to the working people of this country and, above all, to the economic situation.
  Mr. Tom King: The hon. Gentleman is repeating something that has already been clearly contradicted. It is arrant nonsense to suggest that the only two options which the House faces are the Ryder Report in toto or the total abolition of Austin-Morris. That shows a lack of commercial understanding and intelligence that I should not expect from him.
  Mr. Huckfield: I am not sure whether the hon. Gentleman was present to hear the whole of the speech of the hon. Member for Henley. Several hon. Members made unsuccessful attempts to find out exactly what was the Opposition's strategy for Austin-Morris.
  Mr. Tom King: Now the hon. Gentleman is inventing it.
  Mr. Huckfield: I wish the Opposition would invent a strategy themselves. So far we have not heard precisely the kind of strategy that the Opposition or the Liberal Party would like to put forward for the salvatio—and I suspect otherwise—of Austin-Morris.
  I represent 20,000 constituents who are involved in Jaguar, Triumph, Morris engines, Coventry Climax, and component manufacturers which serve British Leyland and other car manufacturing companies in Coventry. I recognise that the strategy which has been adopted by my right hon. Friend is the right one. I have always felt that British Leyland should be preserved in its entirety. However, I do not agree with all the Ryder recommendations. I suggest that the Austin-Morris Division should be saved. If that does not happen, the smaller and
  1496
  medium end of the British Leyland range will be open completely to Fiat, Renault, Volkswagen and, above all, the Japanese manufacturers. If we are to do something about turning our balance of payments around and about stopping import penetration of foreign producers, one of the best and most effective ways of doing so would be to ensure the preservation of the Austin-Morris Division.
  I applaud the strategy which my right hon. Friend has adopted, but I say quite frankly that I do not think that merely putting money into British Leyland will save the British car industry. We must adopt additional policies. For example, we must seriously examine the possibility of short-term import controls.
  Like the hon. Member for Henley, who is no longer in the Chamber, I feel that the Ryder Report's market sales and profitability projections are optimistic. The National Economic Development Office published a thorough and comprehensive study of the motor trade in January 1974. It referred to up to approximately 2·3 million new registrations a year and to labour shortages in key skills in the car industry. I am sure that many hon. Members on both sides of the House recognise that with the oil embargo and energy constraints the situation has changed dramatically since those thorough and comprehensive forecasts were made. That is why I query the projection made in the Ryder Report that we shall return to the 1973 peak of 1·6 million new registrations by 1980. I query the projection which has been made of aspiring once more to 1·7 million new registrations by 1985.
  I cannot help feeling that, just as we have been rather optimistic in some of the market projections, we have also been too optimistic in some of the labour requirement predictions. The Ryder Report should have been much more positive and definite about the kind of labour requirements that the British motor industry will have in future. According to my calculations, if we are to put nearly £3,000 million of working and fixed capital into British Leyland by 1982 we shall give the company about the same sort of capital-output ratio as Datsun. Although Datsun might have a similar output to British Leyland, if we examine the manning figures it is obvious that at that level of capital British Leyland will

  1497
  require only about half of the manning and half of the labour which is at present proposed.
  The Ryder Report should have been much more candid about the labour consequences and the manpower consequences of injecting such a large sum of fixed and working capital into the company by 1982. When the report mentions that some £400 million will be saved as a result of better industrial relations, better manning procedures and more mobility, I fear the job consequences for my constituents. If we are investing in new equipment and in new machinery, presumably that will mean more productive machinery which will need less labour. That surely must mean fewer jobs for my constituents.
  Although I welcome the large amount of financial assistance that the Government intend to put into British Leyland, I do not think we can ignore the possibility that it will be labour-saving investment. My constituents should not be deceived into thinking that the number of jobs that we now have in the British Leyland combine will exist in future, given that level of capital investment.
  I also worry about some of the Ryder market projections as regards sales of 1·6 million and 1·7 million by 1980 and after. Already we have a situation in which the Shah of Iran has announced that there may be another OPEC increase at the end of this year. Similarly, we have a situation where neither the Treasury nor the Transport and Road Research Laboratory have yet calculated what I would call a planning price for energy resources over the next 10 years. I am bound to say that in asking the Central Policy Review Staff to try to project the British car industry's sales over the next 10 years, we have asked them to do an unbelievably impossible task. In these days of fluctuating oil prices, and, as we have yet to establish a planning price for energy consumption, I do not think we can make market projections that far ahead.
  I submit that market forecasts of worldwide demand for cars are very uncertain. When the Ryder Report suggests that British Leyland will maintain 33 per cent. of the domestic market and that it is hoped that it will increase its share in the European market from 3 per
  1498
  cent. to 4 per cent. in 1985, I cannot help feeling that many of the calculations of the other major manufacturers have been ignored. No doubt similar optimistic calculations have been made by Volkswagen, Fiat, Toyota, Mazda and Honda. What account has been taken of all these optimistic forecasts?
  Has account been taken of the way in which Ford, in this country, managed to increase its market share at the expense of British Leyland during the 1960s? What account has been taken of the fact that in April of this year import penetration amounted to 38 per cent. of new registrations? What account has been taken of the fact that this last month Dat-sun alone imported 10 times as many cars into this country as it did in the same month of the previous year? What account has been taken of the fact that Nissan, Toyota, Mazda, Honda and all the major Japanese producers have almost doubled their import penetration over the first quarter of this year compared with the same period last year?
  I welcome the total commitment contained in the Ryder Report. I do not disagree with that, but I wonder whether we are not being too optimistic in our overall market forecasts. Are we not being too optimistic as regards British Leyland's share of the market? I suggest to my right hon. Friend that merely putting money into British Leyland will not be sufficient. The Government should now be seriously examining the policy of short-term import controls.
  I know that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Industry will say that we do only about 2 per cent. of our trade with Japan. He will add that the visible deficit which Britain has with the Japanese is more than compensated for by an invisible surplus. But to make sense of the Ryder Report and to provide confidence for our car workers and some security for my constituents' jobs, the Government should seriously examine the possibility of import controls in the short term to assist in the implementation of the Ryder strategy.
  I wish to refer to one more point which has been alluded to by the hon. Member for Henley, unfortunately in the usual grossly over-critical manner to which we have become accustomed from him.

  1499
  Paragraph 3·8 of the Ryder Report says bluntly:
  "The fact that British Leyland is represented in all the major sectors of the car market is a potential strength."
  That seems to represent the adoption of what I call the "George Turnbull philosophy", because his philosophy of running British Leyland lay in attacking all the sectors of the market. The opposite theory might be called the "John Barber theory"—namely, that one adopts less ambitious sales strategy, goes for volume production as opposed to mass production and tries to shift the whole range up-market. I wonder whether the Ryder proposals are not a little too ambitious in going for that total commitment to all sectors of the market. I should have liked to see far more examination of the philosophy that British Leyland should aim at being competitive in all sectors of the market.
  Paragraph 3·10 of the report says that British Leyland:
  "cannot match the very high volumes of the major European and Japanese producers, notably Volkswagen, Toyota, Nissan, Fiat and Renault."
  I fear that in going for such an ambitious total commitment British Leyland could be in danger of losing out at both ends of the range. If we look at the import penetration made by Fiat, we see that that company has a tremendous domestic base, including a fast-growing market in southern Italy. We have also heard about Japanese import penetration and have only to look at the model range of Volkswagen and Renault and the way in which they are tooling up.
  Is it intended as a result of the implementation of the Ryder proposals to tool up British Leyland to match that kind of productive capacity? Is it intended to compete with Fiat, Volkswagen and Datsun? We must remember that in that range we are obviously talking about large mass production. We are talking of producers who can produce 2 million units a year compared with 800,000 units of total production by British Leyland in recent times. That is a large commitment and I wonder whether the Ryder forecasts are too optimistic.
  I should like finally to refer to the larger end of the range—namely, to Jaguar, Rover and Triumph in Coventry.
  1500
  I understand that the strategy on which British Leyland will produce cars in future will be highly integrated, based on a strategy involving five basic body shells. If the strategy is to amalgamate Jaguar and Rover and if it is intended that the next Rover car will simply have a Jaguar badge on the front, I am sorry to say that I fear that the market carved out by Jaguar could be eaten into by Mercedes, and that the market which Rover has successfully captured could be eaten into by BMW. I fear that if we try to amalgamate and integrate on too great a scale, the market carved out by Triumph may be lost to the continental producers.
  It is undoubted that Jaguar, Rover and Triumph cars have a particular niche in the market. They have been successful components of British Leyland. I recognise that things may have to change, but we should not try to integrate these into other parts of British Leyland since I regard them as the brightest jewels in the British Leyland crown.
  There is a supplementary point which I should like to make about Jaguar cars. Under the auspices of Geoffrey Robinson, a unique experiment in labour relations and productivity has been conducted. Any manager or chief executive who can reduce labour turnover from 1·75 per cent. to 0·67 per cent. in 18 months, or who can reduce disputes from 23½ shifts lost in 1973 to only one shift lost in 1974, or who can increase Jaguar's share in the market from 0·7 per cent. in 1972 to 1·1 per cent last year when there was a large slump in the domestic market; any chief executive or management and labour unit who can notch up that kind of performance, deserves encouragement and should be kept together. What worries me and many of my constituents is that such a unique experiment in industrial participation may be lost if the intention is to produce the successor to the XJ6 as a Rover with a Jaguar badge on the front.
  Therefore, I believe that in going for the strategy of covering the whole market and the whole range the Ryder Report is too ambitious. Of course there must be a total commitment to British Leyland. Let me summarise my remarks by saying that I want to see Austin-Morris reorganised. I do not want to see that part of the concern put into receivership—and on that point I certainly disagree with the hon. Member for Cirencester and

  1501
  Tewkesbury. I believe that there is a future for the whole of the British Leyland range.
  Mr. Leslie Spriggs: My hon. Friend said that he believed in a total commitment to British Leyland. Is he aware that British Leyland has not a total commitment to British industry? It buys all its glass for vehicle production from abroad, and this means that many of my constituents who work in the glass industry are on the unemployed register?
  Mr. Huckfield: I am sure that if I were to go into a British Leyland factory in Coventry I should find not only foreign glass but machine tools made in Germany and Italy. I appreciate my hon. Friend's point.
  I welcome the report and applaud its strategy of support and aid to British Leyland. I believe that it is possible to assist British Leyland only as a whole rather than in parts. But I wonder whether we are not being too optimistic in our projections and whether there should be the kind of complete and total integration of which the report speaks. I ask my right hon. Friend whether it is not possible for Jaguar, Rover and Triumph to maintain a certain amount of independence and status. I hope that there will be no attempt to damage or destroy some of the brightest jewels in the British Leyland crown.
  8.9 p.m.
  Mr. Nick Budgen: Many of the contributors to this debate represent parts of industrial Britain. When we deal with the subject of employment, we are talking of the deepest fears and frustrations of our fellow citizens. Therefore, we must deal with these matters extremely carefully.
  Not only do I represent a Midlands constituency but I come from a family which has worked for three generations in the Black Country and which understands some of the scars which unemployment leaves in the subconscious of many of our fellow citizens. Indeed, my brother works for British Leyland.
  Surely each of us, in approaching this grave problem must not seek short-term popularity in his or her constituency or family. We must avoid trying to persuade frightened people that there is a short-term cure for their deep fears. Most
  1502
  of all we must avoid trying to delude them into hoping that there is security where there is no security. For all the reasons which I shall shortly put, I shall vote against the Bill and the subsequent motions.
  I believe that the only solution to the problems of British Leyland is that it should go into receivership. I believe that that must be said in a word, because any other solution would be unfair. First, it would be grossly unfair to the employees of British Leyland. The Secretary of State said that their work was unpleasant, boring and monotonous. I agree with that. Surely the logical extension of that argument is that we want people to cease working in such demeaning conditions.
  Would any humane man want to see his fellow citizens working hour after hour on the production line at Cowley? Would any humane man say "Let us subsidise that activity so that not only their children but perhaps even their grandchildren may continue that horrifying work"? Is it not clear that if men work in such horrible conditions they are bound to need high wages to compensate them for those disadvantages? If I were employed in such work I should immediately become a militant trade union leader. Why perpetuate this misery?
  The subsidy and the proposed nationalisation constitute a grave insult to the men concerned, because their vigour, their ability and their stamina will ensure that they find alternative jobs very soon.
  Mr. Leslie Huckfield: Where?
  Mr. Budgen: Anywhere in places where men with that ability can be employed.
  Mr. Huckfield: If the hon. Gentleman were a trade union leader he would first have to be elected—presumably by postal ballot as well, as he would have it. The hon. Gentleman has quite a few constituents at Longbridge and at Castle Bromwich. Where else would his constituents find work in the Midlands at present?
  Mr. Budgen: There are small employers throughout the Midlands who are crying out for skilled labour.
  Mr. Huckfield: At what rates?
  Mr. Budgen: Perhaps in the short term those made redundant at British Leyland would find that they must accept employment at slightly lower wages. Perhaps they would find an advantage in that compared with the unpleasant conditions in which they worked at Long-bridge or at Cowley. I know not. Surely men of that ability are not so lacking in self-confidence as to think that they must lie on the scrap heap for ever. Those are the people for whom employers throughout the West Midlands are crying out.
  The argument with regard to British Leyland is slightly different from that concerning Chrysler. Most of the factories employing British Leyland men are situated in areas of high employment and varied industrial activity. I believe that the proposals are unfair to the British economy because the subsidy prevents men, plant and capital being used in a profitable way elsewhere. They lock men, plant and capital into a loss-making enterprise. Most of all they prevent steady, organic change in British industry.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Hall Green (Mr. Eyre) put that argument well. This is what worries small employers in Wolverhampton. They cannot see how the perpetuation of a loss-making industry can in the long term help British industry or the West Midlands.
  This proposal is also grossly unfair to the British taxpayer. If the Budget is ever to be balanced, if the present £10 billion borrowing requirement is ever to be reduced, there must be vast cuts in public expenditure. In the short term, however, there will be no way of balancing the Budget except by an increase in taxation. This Bill means that in the first year under these proposals £265 million will be loaded on the back of the British taxpayer. This means that companies which are at present profitable may become unprofitable or loss-making. It may also mean that the hard-hit, small, self-employed business man may be pushed out of business. The Government propose that we should take chances with the remainder of British industry to subsidise the loss-making part of British Leyland at Morris and Austin.
  The proposal is also unfair to the other industries which will not be subsidised in
  1504
  future. Look, for instance, at the argument put forward by the Chrysler workers. The Prime Minister told them that they must abandon their politico-industrial ambitions. But why should they? Look at the arguments advanced to justify this subsidy and nationalisation. Chrysler can use the argument that it is engaged in manufacturing industry. If Britain should have a stake in the production of British Leyland cars, I suggest that there is no reason why the British should not have a stake in the production of Chrysler cars. Chrysler has many important export contracts. Chrysler can produce a subsidiary argument which is not open to the employees of British Leyland. Many of the plants at which Chrysler personnel are employed are situated in areas of high unemployment. Therefore, those Government supporters who accept the argument have a much stronger case in respect of Chrysler than in respect of British Leyland.
  The precedent of subsidising and nationalising British Leyland creates a great area of unfairness. That leads me to the proposition that these proposals are not merely unfair but are dangerous. Most of all, the proposals are in breach of the rule of law. The rule of law is not only a narrow concept of lawyers. It requires first that there should be equality under the law. Secondly, I accept the definition put forward by Hayek. "Stripped of all technicalities, this means that the Government in all their actions are bound by rules fixed and announced beforehand, which make it possible to foresee with a fair degree of certainty how authority will use its coercive powers in given circumstances and to plan our individual actions on the basis of that knowledge."
  Adherence to this principle of the rule of law as so defined is vital to our survival in the perilous times ahead. The single most difficult task that any Government have for the future is to be able to say "No", to mean it and to act upon it. The Government must be able to say "No" to important and powerful interest groups. The alternative to the rule of law is arbitrary, political, discretionary interference. Such interference leaves the Government open to every form of pressure. It gives substance to the belief, which is now widespread, that the Government will always give way as long as the

  1505
  pressure is sufficiently strong or even violent.
  This is an important moment in the history of the Tory Party. It is no secret that the official position of the Tory Party is plainly a compromise. It will not be the first time—I dare say that it will not be the last—when we shall see the Tory Party divided between the Liberal free traders and the Tory paternalists. I find this division reflected in myself.
  By deepest inclination I am a Tory paternalist. I recognise that Tory paternalism, with its muddled, inconsistent decency, has done more than anything else in our society to bridge the gaps that divide this House and the nation. After all, it is the Tory paternalist who most of all strives towards the ideal of one nation.
  Equally, by intellectual conviction, I am a Liberal free trader. I recognise that the harsh logic of Liberal free trade has brought most of the wealth and power that this country has at present. If there is a single concept which may bridge the gap between the paternalists and the free traders, it may be the rule of law. I believe that as we stagger towards hyperinflation, as we try to rebut the suggestion that Britain is now ungovernable, it may be only by the rule of law that we shall be saved.
  8.22 p.m.
  Mr. Denzil Davies: I hope that the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Budgen) will forgive me if I do not follow him on the rule of law, Hayek and the road to serfdom. The hon. Gentleman was advocating increased unemployment. I have been brought up to believe that one aspect of serfdom is unemployment.
  At least we have had more candour from the Opposition back benches than from the Opposition Front Bench. At least from the back benches we have been told that some hon. Gentlemen would like to see a receiver appointed for British Leyland and for the receiver to make his dispensations. Those sitting on the back benches have had the intellectual courge to follow that argument through to its logical conclusion.
  What would happen if a receiver were to move in? The profitable parts of British Leyland—that would definitely
  1506
  exclude the Austin-Morris Division—would be sold off and the receiver would be left with the Austin-Morris Division.
  The hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) was unwilling and did not have the courage to face that situation. If the receiver were left with the unprofitable Austin-Morris Division, as he would be, the only realistic choice would be either to sell it for scrap or to offer it for sale to the Government. The Government—even a Tory Government—would probably be forced to buy the Austin-Morris Division rather than allow the receiver to sell it for scrap. We would have the same kind of situation as with Rolls-Royce But the profitable parts of British Leyland would have gone to private industry and the Government would be left with the unprofitable part. I believe that the Opposition would have gained more in respect if they had put forward and followed the logical consequences of their argument.
  I am glad to have this opportunity to speak in the debate. I got the impression—I make no criticism—that the British Leyland problem related solely to the Midlands. In Llanelli there are two British Leyland factories employing 4,500 people, and I calculate that another 1,000 are dependent on the existence of those factories. The stark reality of the situation is that if Austin-Morris had been allowed to become bankrupt or had been sold for scrap, the unemployment rate in my constituency would have increased to about 25 per cent. That would have been a rate of employment far higher than anything we have seen since the war. We would have to look back to the 1930s for such a high rate of unemployment.
  I assure the hon. Members for Wolverhampton, South-West and Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley) that there are no other jobs in my constituency to which those 4,500 workers could go. They would be thrown on the dole. They would be unemployed.
  I welcome the Ryder Report, the Bill and the plan to inject into and invest massive sums in British Leyland. But I recognise that the provision of money alone will not solve British Leyland's problems.
  One of the major fears in my constituency was that the Ryder Report would recommend as a way of solving British

  1507
  Leyland's problems that factories on the periphery of the central operations of the company should be sacrificed in the interests of the greater whole. I am glad that the report came out clearly in page 28, paragraph 8.5, saying that British Leyland must
  "live with its existing plants."
  There is no evidence that the proliferation of factories has contributed to the economic difficulties of British Leyland.
  Llanelli has the best industrial record of all the factories within the British Leyland complex. Indeed, this point has been singled out in the report. I do not know whether this measure of decentralisation and the fact that we can decide things for ourselves is the reason for our good industrial record. But I am glad that the report has recognised that factories on the periphery must not be sacrificed to try to achieve better economic viability.
  My constituents accept that within that basic framework there will have to be changes in the nature of the work carried out at factories on the periphery. It does not make sense to move goods from one end of the country to the other. Therefore, there will have to be some rationalisation on that basis.
  I appeal to the Government and to everybody concerned that, before any decisions are taken, the people working in those plants should be fully consulted and allowed to participate in decisions which may affect their livelihood. There is nothing worse than for a man to go to his place of work and find that decisions taken miles away in other factories affect his job and livelihood. If we can explain the reasons for decisions, I believe that we shall get the co-operation that we desire.
  The importance of industrial democracy seems crucial to the whole venture on which the Government are embarking. If we cannot set up proper machinery in British Leyland to enable the men to participate in decisions which affect their future, I believe that this bold venture may not succeed.
  I implore the Government not to wait for changes in the structure of company law before setting up some machinery within British Leyland to solve the problem of industrial democracy. The TUC
  1508
  has put forward some imaginative proposals for the reform of industrial democracy within British Leyland. The Ryder Report did not accept them all. However, I think that there is a basis for agreement. I implore the Government, as a first step towards getting British Leyland back on its feet, after consultation with the trade unions and management, to set up a framework of industrial democracy with joint committees at plant, department and division level so that people may know the reasons why decisions have been taken. I believe that if they could see the reasons they would co-operate and the inevitable consequences of this kind of investment would not be as traumatic as might otherwise have been the case.
  There is finally the question of the Common Market. My constituents fear genuinely that as a result of the operation of certain articles in the Treaty of Rome the money which the Government have earmarked for British Leyland might be stopped or greatly reduced by the European Commission and the court in Luxembourg. Article 92 will be a considerable stumbling block if we vote to stay in the EEC. It sets out quite clearly that aids which distort competition are incompatible with the Common Market and are void. The EEC Commission has acted under Article 92 in the past and there is a considerable body of case law from the last 10 or 15 years as a result. The latest decision was in December last year when the Commission prevented the Italian textile industry from receiving Government support because, it was decided, that was an aid which would distort intra-Community trade.
  I want the Government to say that they will do their best, but if the country decides to stay in the Common Market the final decision on whether British Leyland will get this massive investment will lie not with the British Government but with the Commission in Brussels and the nine judges who sit in Luxembourg. This has nothing to do with the nationalisation issue. The Treaty of Rome does not forbid nationalisation, but it forbids aid whether to a nationalised body or to private industry which distorts competition. If Britain stays in the Common Market the issue will be decided outside the ambit of this House and outside the power of the British Government.

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  It has been said that the injection of funds into British Leyland will not solve its problems, and I agree with that. The only way to solve these problems is to promote a radical, practical system of industrial democracy within British Leyland so that the people there can see why the money has been put in. They will then co-operate in these decisions. If we do not press ahead with industrial democracy the British Leyland venture might fail, and if that happens it will spell the end of the British motor industry, with consequent damage not only to our economy generally, but to our balance of payments in particular and to the rest of our manufacturing industry.
  8.32 p.m.
  Mr. Hal Miller: The hon. Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies) will forgive me, I hope, if I say that I remember his town better for Stradey Park than for its contribution to British Leyland, and I carry with me still a pair of cauliflower ears to prove it.
  Tonight the Secretary of State for Industry was uncharacteristically restrained. He was restrained in providing the House with a good deal of the facts surrounding the genesis of the Ryder Report and the part played by the EEC and the rest of Western Europe in the plans on which the future of British Leyland has been based in that report.
  I have a strong constituency interest in British Leyland. I pay my tribute to the skills and endeavours of all who work in that great enterprise. However, I recognise full well the fears expressed by other West Midlands Members, notably by my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Hall Green (Mr. Eyre) at the very mixed feelings excited by the motor industry in the West Midlands. This is because very largely employment in it is of a highly cyclical nature. Orders from suppliers are suddenly cut off for indeterminate periods and without warning, and suddenly there is a demand for those orders not only to be reinstated but in some cases to be doubled.
  When business improves, labour has to be sucked into the factories and the only way that can be done is by greatly increased rates of pay with consequent damage to other firms in the West Midlands. Those rates of pay are not sustainable when the level of activity falls,
  1510
  which is part of the cause of British Leyland's present trouble.
  I want to consider the question of investment, some of the assumptions in the Ryder report, the question of management and, finally, the Government's purchase of shares, which has excited a great deal of rhetoric on both sides of the House.
  In dealing with investment, I should like to pay tribute to the clarity of thought of my hon. Friend the Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley), even if I do not follow him the whole way. The Government have a naive and primitive belief that investment and what they call industrial democracy will solve all the problems of British industry. These are the twin pillars, to quote from Shelley's "Ozymandias":
  "… Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert …
  Nothing beside remains."
  Nothing beside remains of Government policy except these
  "two vast and trunkless legs of stone."
  Investment by itself will not prove the cure-all for the problems of British Leyland. Indeed, there is very good reason for supposing that the industry has over-invested since the boom year of 1964. There has been an excess of capacity that has not been utilised. That is one of the reasons for the company having such high unit costs and for its product becoming uncompetitive. Part of the reason for the under-utilisation can be ascribed to the disputes of various sorts among the suppliers or among the motor factories, but there has been excess capacity. Therefore, an increase in investment to increase that capacity is by no means the answer.
  Let not the Secretary of State pretend that investment of the order proposed in the report is intended merely to refurbish or replace the outdated equipment about which so much play has been made. Investment of that order must mean considerable investment in new capacity, as anybody who is familiar with figures of this magnitude will be aware. I am fearful, therefore, that investment will not prove all that helpful in solving the problems of British Leyiand.
  It will also undoubtedly mean, as was made plain by the hon. Member for

  1511
  Nuneaton (Mr. Huckfield) in a very thoughtful contribution—which would have come much better from the Government Front Bench, if I may say so, showing some real understanding of the problems involved—that this re-equipment investment must mean fewer jobs. Could we have, please, from the Government Front Bench an indication of the order of jobs involved? It is not fair to anybody and it is highly misleading to pretend, as so many Government Members have attempted to pretend, that this investment will necessarily protect the existing level of employment, because it will not.
  One of the reasons for the machinery in parts of British Leyland being outdated is exactly that in this fluctuating industry—its fortunes have fluctuated very often as a result of Government policy, and I shall turn to that subject shortly—it has often been more efficient to have less capital-intensive equipment and a greater reliance on labour, which has up to now been laid on and off and caused a great many of the problems in the industry, particularly in industrial relations.
  It is not just a matter of the management deliberately failing to replace equipment with the most up-to-date equipment available. There is a very real problem, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Hall Green was very right to draw attention, of the need to assist the mobility of employees in the motor industry at present, and the only result of the investment in British Leyland on the scale proposed will be to increase the need for retraining.
  I referred earlier to the under-utilisation of capacity. It is significant that in the Ryder Report the figure of 20 per cent. loss of production owing to disputes was given for the last quarter of 1974. Apart from the manning levels, there is a need to get to grips with work practices and with absenteeism. Until there are some concrete assurances on that score, I do not see how this House can be justified in voting the huge sums of money involved in this case.
  I turn briefly to the Ryder Report. The Secretary of State was less than frank with the House about the genesis of the forecasts in that report. I hope that
  1512
  I shall be corrected if my understanding is wrong, but I have been led to believe from sources at a high level inside British Leyland that the Ryder team went in and asked them for their most optimistic "blue skies" forecast over the next 10 years assuming no restraints on money, no restraints from industrial disputes and no restraints on the market.
  The hon. Member for Nuneaton pointed out some of the constraints on the market which are most likely to arise. Other hon. Members have referred to the fact that the public purse is by no means bottomless and that there is a real need to consider how many resources can be made available to the motor industry. That is the other deficiency of the Ryder Report. It does not consider the motor industry as a whole. We have no case here of sectoral planning. We are trying to deal with the problems of one firm in isolation without regard to what is happening in the rest of the industry.
  It is wrong that the Government should bring forward this measure without a considered opinion from, for instance, the Central Policy Review Staff or even a report from the Select Committee of this House which currently is investigating the motor industry. We need to consider the industry as a whole because, as the hon. Member for Nuneaton said, all the manufacturers are making their own assumptions and the probability is that they will all be over-invested, as happened before, in 1964 and onwards.
  Another extraordinary feature of this affair is that the Ryder Report in its entirety was not made available even to the British Leyland Board—at least, not at the time that its representatives last gave evidence before the Select Committee, which was only a week or two ago. It is quite extraordinary that a committee should be commissioned to inquire into a company and that the company should not have the elementary right of seeing what that report contains.
  I want now to take up one or two of the remarks of the hon. Member for Nuneaton about the model policy and the market strategy. How is the current market penetration of British Leyland to be maintained by a reduction in the number of models on offer? This is a real problem which has been skated over in the report. But the hon. Member for

  1513
  Nuneaton dealt with it fairly fully, so I shall not detain the House further by enlarging upon it. However, we need some answer about it from the Government.
  This House has become rightly suspicious of these broad-brush strokes across the canvas about the need for greater investment, the regeneration of British industry and industrial democracy. We need to examine closely the implications of these.
  I leave the Ryder Report with the comment that its assumptions about inflation pass all belief. I hope that the Under-Secretary will refer to those assumptions, especially the assumptions that wages will not outstrip prices and that the British rate of inflation will remain the same as that across the world or will be equalised out in exchange rates. We need to hear a great deal more about the background to those assumptions.
  I turn now to the management of British Leyland. In his evidence before the Select Committee, Lord Stokes made is quite plain that at the time of the formation of British Leyland he well understood the problems and what was needed to rationalise the number of plants and the production processes. He also made it plain that in the current political climate, following Weinstock's operation on GEC, he doubted whether it would be politically acceptable. That was the point which the Secretary of State was trying to make rather unsuccessfully when he intervened in the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Circencester and Tewkesbury. This is something we must face, and we cannot just buy our way out of it. It is dishonest to pretend that industrial democracy will also wish it away.
  I turn to the position of Mr. Barber, his strategy and his management of the company. He has been quite strongly criticised in the Ryder Report for his views on how the management of the company should be organised. I defy any industrialist or any manager, in a situation where a company is losing money as fast as British Leyland was losing money, not to take a tight grip on affairs. It is essential in a situation of such danger to have an effective central control.
  1514
  To have a successful car company it is necessary to have successful models, and these are the result of the flair of an individual and not of a committee or a delegation here and there. Somebody has to be reponsible for the model policy. Mr. Barber has shown, by his introduction of a new 18–22 series, a very successful grip on that policy. A head had to roll, and he was most unfairly chosen as the scapegoat.
  The problem of the Austin-Morris Division is that it is a volume car producer that is not producing volume on European terms. Therefore, the only future for that division, a large part of which rests in my constituency, is to evolve an up-market policy. That is what Mr. Barber has been trying to do with the 18–22 series and the Allegro.
  I turn to the more controversial subject of the Government's purchase of shares as proposed in the Bill. I start from the premise that the Government—indeed, Governments of both complexions—have been largely responsible for the fluctuating fortunes of the car industry by their manipulation of demand. The effect of that can be clearly seen in the home sales and the home production of the domestic manufacturers since 1964.
  Apart from these fluctuations and their effect on capacity and utilisation, the Government have also encouraged inflation, as the right hon. Member for Down, South (Mr. Powell) was at pains to point out. Moreover, there have been the interest rates which have also resulted from Government action.
  The combined effects of inflation, interest rates and loss of production from disputes made British Leyland unprofitable. It is nonsense to suggest, as the Ryder Report tries to suggest, that it was merely the dividends paid to shareholders, many of whom were employees of British Leyland, that made the company unable to provide for necessary re-equipment.
  The company has been driven near to bankruptcy by Government action. The Government have also induced a climate in the country in which private investment for industry, not only for this company but for many others, simply cannot be found. Therefore, I see no realistic alternative to the provision of

  1515
  Government money in such circumstances on strict bench marks for strict periods, which we have not had laid down for us in the report or in the Secretary of State's presentation this afternoon.
  It is idle to pretend that the accountability of a company is increased in any way by its being nationalised. We have before us the example of countless industries already nationalised, and all hon. Members must be constantly aware from their mail of exactly how unaccountable those industries are to the public in any shape or form. Hon. Members are also well aware how impossible it has proved to exercise in this House any effective control over nationalised industries, despite the efforts of the Select Committee.
  I believe that the ownership of shares as such is no longer a real issue. What is an issue is the question of management. Taking the example of Shell, I believe it to be idle to suppose that the management of Shell is in any way really responsible to the shareholders, because Shell generates so much internal funds that its management is able to pursue policies without call on the shareholders, who are so widely spread that they cannot form any effective opinion. I believe that the argument truthfully is no longer about the ownership of shares. It is about the management of the company.
  Therefore, I conclude that the Secretary of State has shown himself this afternoon as wildly over-optimistic as any car manufacturer has shown himself to be. He has, indeed, joined the club. Apart from that, however, he has deliberately set out to mislead thousands of ordinary people in this country by suggesting that merely by nationalisation, merely by public investment, their employment will be safeguarded.
  The hon. Member for Nuneaton asked that the Opposition should deploy a strategy. I shall try to give him an answer. What we need is a short-term holding operation such as is provided for by the monetary motion on the Order Paper, for which I shall be voting, and thereafter we need to get down to a critical examination of the Ryder Report—not just a Second Reading debate on a one-clause Bill. We need to establish bench marks, we need to have commitment
  1516
  and we need to have a statement from the Government of the resources which are really available before we come to a decision.
  Therefore, I shall not be voting for the Bill and I shall be voting for the motion for a holding operation.
  8.54 p.m.
  Mr. George Park: The hon. Member for Bromsgrove and Redditch (Mr. Miller) talked about two vast and trunkless legs of stone. There is no doubt that if the ruthless advice highlighted by the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Budgen), the market philosophy, were followed, that is about all I should have left in my constituency, because I have there plants belonging not only to BLMC but to Alfred Herbert, and many hundreds of my constituents work for Chrysler. Therefore, I have them all. If they were all advised to seek pastures new, as the hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) was advocating, there would need to be a mass exodus from Coventry in order to fulfil the philosophy outlined today by Opposiiton Members. The hon. Member for Henley said "They opt to work in the car industry but there are plenty of jobs in the rolling Chiltern Hills around there". He still seems to be suffering from the idea that lots of people go to work to wear out their old suits and do not work to earn money. Since people have only their labour to sell, they will do the same as investors do with their money—they will invest it where it brings the greatest return.
  I must admit that in the car industry this often produces false horizons because of the wildly fluctuating demand, well away from the present situation. This means in ordinary times that in any given year it is wrong only to look at hourly rates. It is far more sensible to examine what people get for a full tax year. Some hon. Members might be surprised if they examined the full year's pay. It might even persuade some people in the car industry to look instead for some of those jobs in the Chiltern Hills. However, people in the car industry are eternal optimists, and although some parts of the Ryder Report may appear to be optimistic, those of us who have worked in the trade would hesitate to say that it was entirely wrong in being so optimistic.

  1517
  The hon. Member for Henley was concerned about the disclosure powers in the Industry Bill and the confidentiality aspect. He suggested that the information would be spread on the four winds to the far corners of the earth. Anyone who knows the car industry will be surprised by that comment. Over the years, as new models have been produced, the employees engaged in developing them have deliberately, for their own benefit, made sure that the details were not common knowledge outside the firm. I do not think that they would take much convincing that any information they were given which might be helpful to their competitors should be kept as carefully as in the past.
  An unjustifiable scare is being raised about the disclosure powers and the confidentiality attached to them. We on this side of the House wish British Leyland every success under the new proposals, but I get the impression that while hon. Members opposite may wish it success, they are doing so with tongue in cheek, on the basis that at some future stage they may be able to say, "I told you so".
  While the car industry is monotonous to work in, if the work people are given a full involvement, whereby they feel that they are part of the company and there is an identification with it, a great deal of the monotony can be tolerated because they will feel that they have a stake in the company. The participation which can take place under the Government's proposals will, I believe, yield great dividends in better industrial relations.
  The hon. Member for Henley said that the management should have produced this report, not outside people. I have watched the situation in British Leyland for a long time—indeed, before the different firms became British Leyland. I watched the in-fighting that went on between the managers of the various parts which went to make up that empire. It would be hardly surprising if some of the bad habits of the management in refusing to co-operate and co-ordinate—people who want to remain barons in their own right—had not rubbed off on to the workforce. I agree that Lord Stokes was managing to get a better climate of opinion. The proposals outlined in the Ryder Report to weld this into an efficient, economic, profitable unit will see British
  1518
  Leyland assume, once more, its rightful place in our industry.
  I do not want to follow the examples of my hon. Friends the Members for Llanelli (Mr. Davies) and for Coventry, North-West (Mr. Edelman) in developing the Common Market argument on this subject. In or out of the Common Market, British Leyland must become efficient and profitable. It has every possibility of doing so, provided that it has the willing co-operation of the workers.
  I underline the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Nuneaton (Mr. Huckfield) when he made a plea that in driving towards this situation we should not snuff out entirely the identity that has been established, particularly in the Jaguar range of cars. That would be a great pity and would take away a vital ingredient in ensuring the full co-operation of the workers at that plant.
  It is true that Opposition Front Bench spokesmen have offered no solution. Other hon. Members who followed them were more straightforward. I was completely shattered at the comments of the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Wainwright) when he referred to a quarterly review of the situation. This revealed a total ignorance of the car trade which was quite astonishing. To suggest that any car firm could live from quarter to quarter and endeavour to arrange supplies from the thousands of suppliers who produce the parts that make up a modern car, is beyond the bounds of all credulity. The hon. Member could not have been thinking about what he was saying. It would not work.
  I welcome the Ryder Report, in spite of all its weaknesses. It contains the possibility not only of retaining and reviving this vital sector of the industrial scene in this country but of giving a further opportunity to show that if we release the talents of the work people within these plants, some of the predictions and forecasts in the report may not be as optimistic as some hon. Members believe.
  9.04 p.m.
  Mr. James Prior: When the hon. Member for Coventry, North-East (Mr. Park) said that there were some Conservative Members who might be disposed to say "It did not come off, I told you so", may I tell him that no one

  1519
  on this side of the House would wish the scheme to fail if it goes through. However, many of by right hon. and hon. Friends feel that this is not the right scheme and should not be attempted.
  If it is the will of Parliament that it should go through, we shall accept that will and try to make the scheme work, because we are parliamentarians and believe in Parliament being able to say what is right and the Government implementing that decision. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will not think that some hon. Members take a different view.
  Strangely enough, I have a constituency interest. I notice from the Ryder Report that the coachworks at Lowestoft is one of the few works that the team did not visit. If they had, they would have found a long-suffering and hardworking labour force in a works in which, as far as I know, there has been no investment for the last 20 years. How my constituents have stuck working for such wages and under such conditions for the last five or 10 years, I do not know.
  A little unfairly, I thought, two hours before I was scheduled to pay a long-arranged visit to the works on one occasion, the shop stewards had been informed that the works was going on to a three-day week. They had been given no indication and I got the thick end from my constituents. So I have some sympathy with those parts of the report which throw doubt on the quality of British Leyland management. I know that some of my hon. Friends could tell similar stories.
  I have heard no one from this side of the House pay a warm tribute to Sir Don Ryder and his team. I think that Sir Don has an absolutely unenviable task. I cannot understand why he took it on—and probably he cannot understand it now, either. But he is a public-spirited man. He thought that there was a job to do and that he could do it. We should pay tribute to public-spirited men who are prepared to stick their necks out in this way. I pay my tribute to him and his team. I do not agree with everything in the report, but at least we can go that far.
  I would also say a word of support for Lord Stokes who has for some years
  1520
  headed this great firm—a leading exporter and employer—which has brought a great deal of employment and prosperity. Whatever one may say about the way in which he has managed, I should have thought that, thinking back to the enthusiastic days when he took control, he probably wishes that he had remained with Leyland and never got mixed up with BLMC. Lord Stokes and Mr. Barber have been very much in the firing line. We do our industrialists no service if we spend our time pulling them to pieces. It is probably easier to pull to pieces the management and competence of British Leyland than to put it together.
  The Secretary of State was more restrained than usual today. Perhaps he was a little tired from his outside activities. He seems singularly out of touch with events in the House, and some of us can understand the reason. He failed to make the case for the Government and the Ryder Report, and was ill informed when questioned about it.
  This debate has been carried on against a background of unreality. In by far our most serious economic situation since the war, we are gaily, in an almost empty House, preparing to spend £2,800 million. I sometimes doubt whether the seriousness of our economic situation is properly appreciated by Labour Members, let alone by people outside this House. Time and again we have sat here and heard Governments of both parties saying how much money they intended spending on this, that and the other—on programmes that were rolled forward year after year. All the while the money has not been there to carry them through. The first question we have to ask is; will the money be there to carry through this grandiose scheme put forward by the Government? Or is it the case, as the Secretary of State for the Environment tells us, that the party is over?
  I had intended to compliment the hon. Member for Nuneaton (Mr. Huckfield) on what I am told—I did not hear it all—was an interesting speech. It no longer seems to be the custom in this House for hon. Members to come back and listen to the closing speeches, even though some hon. Members have spoken in the debate earlier. I sometimes wonder why we bother.

  1521
  There has been a chorus from Labour Members, including the hon. Member for Nuneaton, asking what we would do about British Leyland and in particular about Austin-Morris. A good deal of debate has centred on this because the presumption is that if Austin-Morris were split from the rest of British Leyland there would be, in what remained, a viable operation which could if it wished obtain money from the market and make a profit.
  It is right therefore to concentrate on what should happen to Austin-Morris. That is not an easy question to answer. We have had no clear answers from the Government except for a blind adherence to the Ryder Report. The Ryder Report makes it difficult to decide what should happen. We know that Austin-Morris has never been properly integrated. It was never properly integrated when the two firms originally came together, let alone within British Leyland. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove and Redditch (Mr. Miller) pointed out in an extremely interesting speech, Mr. Barber was trying to up-market Austin-Morris cars, to go for the Allegros and the higher-priced cars rather than concentrating on volume production.
  We know that there was over-manning at Austin-Morris. That comes through clearly in the report. One of the difficulties Mr. Lowry had when he introduced the new system of payment was that he could not get agreement for measured day work without accepting over-manning. We also know that there has been a good deal of under-investment. We know, too, that the lion's share of investment went into Austin-Morris rather than into the other car, lorry and coach-building businesses which might have earned a greater return. I often think that if only we could have produced those extra Land Rovers and Range Rovers we might have had a rather better profit story from British Leyland.
  One complaint about the report is that there has been no consideration or published evidence dealing with the other options open to the Government and to Parliament. It is not good enough for the right hon. Gentleman to say that other inquiries have been made—of which we have no details—but that the Government have decided to accept the Ryder Report. What about the CPRS report
  1522
  which is due later in the year? Why did the Government wait until a few weeks before the Ryder Report was due before setting up the CPRS study? What good will the study do if the Government have already committed themselves to follow the line of action suggested by Sir Don Ryder? Will the CPRS report be published? Will the facts be made available to us so that we can all judge? What will happen if the report is strikingly less optimistic than is Sir Don Ryder?
  We have said that Austin-Morris is overmanned and under-invested. It is also losing a lot of money and the volume car market seems to have many difficulties. It is surprising, for example, that a loss is made on every Mini that is produced.
  The right answer for Austin-Morris is to run it at a lower level of production, with a lower level of manning. During last year, this year and next year Volkswagen will have reduced its labour force in Germany by between 45,000 and 50,000 by means of early retirement, natural wastage and—as pointed out by my hon. Friends the Members for Birmingham, Hall Green (Mr. Eyre) and Bromsgrove and Redditch—by providing cash not just for investment in an industry which is overmanned and too large but for anyone in Germany who is prepared to set un a new industry to take labour away from Volkswagen. That is a much more profitable approach than freezing the level of employment in a particular industry.
  The right policy for Austin-Morris is lower production, the phasing out over a period of the overmanning which undoubtedly exists and the carrying out of rationalisation to achieve lower production. It is not a question of all or nothing. There are other options available within those two approaches. It is possible to go for lower production rate and still keep a profitable motor industry at the lower end of the range.
  Mr. Edelman: The right hon. Gentleman talks of curtailing production in certain lines. Is he aware that if the production lines is shortened the unit cost will rise and the motor cars will become less competitive? Is not the problem of the British motor industry precisely that the production lines are too short to

  1523
  enable a reduction to be made in the unit cost?
  Mr. Prior: Not entirely. That is one reason why I am in favour of producing a better quality car. I am by no means certain that we in Britain are well suited to producing a people's car. There are other companies that succeed in this. What is important is investment.
  The Government cannot have it both ways. They are saying that we shall have this great investment in British Leyland and maintain the present labour force. All of us know that that is not possible or true. We do no service to the employees of British Leyland or the component manufacturers by trying to pull that sort of wool over their eyes. We know that that is not possible and they know it as well.
  Mr. Kenneth Lewis: I confirm what my right hon. Friend is saying by giving an example of what happened in the package tour end of the travel industry last year, when there was too much availability of space and two companies went bust. As a result, there was a reduction in the labour force and an increase in price. The package tour end of the travel industry is now more successful than it has ever been.
  Mr. Prior: My hon. Friend confirms the point I am making.
  To return to the car industry, the tendency within the industry at the moment is for new investment to take place in Eastern European countries or in the developing countries. It is significant that when there was a row within Austin-Morris last year and Mr. Turnbull was dismissed, he went to South Korea to help start up its car industry. The truth of the matter is that it is the developing countries and the countries with cheap or cheaper labour which are developing their car industries. They will be the countries which will mass-produce cars.
  I have a tremendously high opinion of the British worker. I hope I shall not be ruled out of order if I say that on the whole I think he is a pretty bloody-minded person. He is independent and he likes to get his own way. I do not think that he is temperamentally suited to slogging it out on the assembly line. That is not the sort of job he should be
  1524
  doing. It is not really the sort of job that a highly sophisticated country should be doing which has to use its brains and its skills to survive. We should be using our skills in a better way than that.
  What worries me about the Government's attitude is that they are trying to freeze the industry into the present employment position. If they had sought to freeze the agriculture industry as it was in 1959 the industry would now be employing approximately 325,000 more people. In the mining industry we would be employing nearly 400,000 extra people, there would be 230,000 extra people in textiles and 200,000 extra people on the railways. If in 1959 any of us had been brave enough to say that in the following 16 years we would reduce our labour force in those basic industries by that amount, it would have been said in the House, and particularly by the Labour Opposition at that time, "You ruthless so-and-sos. You are throwing all these people out of work." But all those people have left those jobs and they have found others. At least, that was the position until the right hon. Gentleman came into office. Not only that, an extra 1·3 million people are now employed who were not employed in 1959.
  It is quite wrong to try to freeze the pattern of employment in the way that Labour Members want to do.
  Mr. Leslie Huckfield: Surprisingly enough I would agree with some of the right hon. Gentleman's projections, but if my constituents are not to make cars in Coventry and if workers are not to make cars in Birmingham, the Midlands and the rest of British Leyland's factories, and they are to be thrown out of work as the right hon. Gentleman appears to be suggesting, what else can they do?
  Mr. Prior: That is a serious point and I want to deal with it in a serious way. I am not prepared to stand at this Dispatch Box or to sit on the Opposition Front Bench or anywhere else on this side of the House and hear Labour Ministers slam my party, the Conservative Party, for being the party that wants to see unemployment. We do not take that view. If we look at the record of the Conservative Party since the war, we find that we have a considerably better record of employment than have any Labour Government.
  Mr. Eddie Loyden: What about the three-day week?
  Mr. Prior: The hon. Gentleman talks about the three-day week. There are very many people who, as a result of the policy of the Secretary of State for Industry, are now on a no-day week.
  I do not believe it would be right—and this is the whole basis of our case—to put the company into receivership and suddenly to close great sections of the motor car industry, whether it be Austin-Morris or any other part of it. I believe that these matters must be agreed by consultation, and should involve voluntary redundancies and natural wastage. I also believe that over a period of time we should seek to build up other industries to take the place of those which are being run down.
  One of the great problems is that very many of our older industries are centred on certain areas and that if they are reduced too quickly it will result in large-scale unemployment. It is not such a difficult problem in the South-East of England, as GEC discovered when it closed down certain works since its employees were able to find alternative employment. However, it would not be so easy in the West Midlands—although it would be easier in that area than in certain parts of the country where other jobs would be extremely difficult to obtain.
  Furthermore, we must face the fact that we shall have a smaller manufacturing industry. As the country gets richer—and we hope that over the years we shall get richer and more prosperous—many people will be employed in service industries rather than in manufacture. I understand that in the United States the balance between manufacturing and service industries is now about fifty-fifty. This must be a long job and should be tackled compassionately.
  Of course one cannot throw people in their thousands on to the streets. I want to make it absolutely plain that it is no part of our policy that that should happen. I do not agree with the Secretary of State for Industry on the question of requiring the signing of agreements with the unions before investing large sums of money. I believe that the unions can deliver the goods and should sign
  1526
  on the dotted line. I do not take the right hon. Gentleman's view—namely, that it is only a piece of paper which can be torn up overnight. I believe that the unions should sign such documents, and if those signatures are obtained I believe that it will help enormously in getting the situation right.
  I have one or two questions which I should like to put to the Government and to the Minister who is to reply. What do the Government intend to do about Chrysler? I believe that the Government are committing a great mistake over Chrysler. The whole tendency at present is to blame the workers at Chrysler. They are being blamed because it is being said that they are on strike since they know that the Government will bail them out. Why blame the workers for taking that view? Does not the blame lie with the Secretary of State for Industry and his governmental colleagues? I see that the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State is yawning away, quite bored with the House of Commons. Is not he the person who is responsible for allowing those people to think that all they have to do is to strike, bankrupt their company and the right hon. Gentleman will come along and take them over? Is that not the impression he gives? Is it not that which is so wrong? We know, and he knows, that that is not possible and never could be possible.
  Mr. Spriggs: Rubbish.
  Mr. Prior: The hon. Gentleman shouts "Rubbish'.
  Mr. Spriggs rose—
  Mr. Prior: No, I cannot give way to the hon. Gentleman. There are some people—the Prime Minister said this—who are under the false illusion that if they strike, or if they are not satisfied with their employers, sooner or later the Government will bail them out and take over their firms. I have every reason to believe that the right hon. Gentleman has done his best to encourage that attitude over the years.
  The right hon. Gentleman ended his speech by calling for a new spirit and a new approach. We can do with that. Both parties in their periods of office have not been entirely successful in running British industry. Indeed, British

  1527
  industry has steadily declined during the whole of this century. It has declined more rapidly in the past 30 years largely because of under-investment, which has come about because of lack of profit. Until we allow industry to make reasonable profits, the necessary investment will not be made. That is true of large sections of British industry.
  No party has done more harm to the cause of investment—which they now wish to espouse and to encourage—than the Labour Party by their constant, tedious repetition of their attacks on profit. [HON. MEMBERS: "Too long."] The Opposition need not worry. The last speaker also over ran his time. I am allowed a minute or two extra.
  I hope that the Opposition will now stop knocking those companies which are successful and make profits, and start praising them instead. The more profits which are made, the less companies will find themselves in the difficulty now experienced by British Leyland.
  I believe that the wholehearted approach of Government supporters to British Leyland and to the Ryder Report is mistaken. I understand the view expressed by some of my hon. Friends, who feel that no more money should be invested and that a receiver should be brought in, but I believe that that approach is unrealistic. The right approach is to put more money in while a proper plan is worked out for Austin-Morris, and while the rest of British Leyland is allowed to stand on its own feet. It is only in that realisation, the realisation of the state of the British economy and the problems created if we allow inflation to go unchecked, that we shall at last start to make sense in Parliament and in the country.
  I hope that my right hon. and hon. Friends will vote against the Bill but will allow the order to go through, so as to allow the Government time for second thoughts and to produce a proper policy for Austin-Morris.
  9.34 p.m.
  The Under-Secretary of State for Industry (Mr. Michael Meacher): The right hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) ended his speech by referring to the need for a new approach. Many of us have been looking to the Conservative Party
  1528
  for a new approach tonight. Even before this debate the Opposition declared their intention to oppose the Government's proposals for British Leyland. We therefore await with considerable eagerness the new Conservative philosophy of ambulant therapy.
  The Ryder team and the Government have been accused by the Opposition in this debate of lack of realism in their approach to such fundamental issues as manning levels—on which most of the Opposition speeches have exclusively concentrated—and on productivity, markets, and the return on investment. In addition the Government have been accused, both here and elsewhere, of being over hasty in their acceptance of this report.
  If we had thought that a cohesive alternative policy would emanate from the Opposition between the hard line lame duck shooters, on the one side, and the faint heart members of the RSPCA, on the other, we would have been greatly disappointed.
  Mr. Norman Tebbit: What about Our Dumb Friends' League behind the Minister?
  Mr. Meacher: We have not heard any seriously considered assessment of the plan for revitalising British Leyland. We have heard only a patchwork of criticism which has been presented under the guise of safeguarding the taxpayer or of second thoughts which are little more than concealments of wide gaping divisions which have been glaringly obvious amongst hon. Gentlemen opposite.
  Mr. Eyre: Will the Under-Secretary deal with a realistic aspect of the matter? The Secretary of State for Industry was asked to say whether the assumptions in the Ryder Report were based on Britain being in or out of Europe. Since the situation would be seriously affected by this decision, will the hon. Gentleman confirm that the assumptions in the Ryder Report are based on the proposition that Britain remains in Europe?
  Mr. Meacher: Sir Don Ryder made it clear to the Trade and Industry subcommittee that it made very little difference to his estimate of export penetration in to Europe. The Opposition may not accept his view. I am giving the view of the author of this report who had undertaken an examination of these

  1529
  matters with a thoroughness which they certainly have not shown. It is also a matter of the arrangements which would be made if we were to come out. It is predicated by that.
  Mr. Heseltine: The hon. Gentleman said that it is predicated by the arrangements that we make if we come out. Will he explain the basis of the arrangements which would have to be made to validate the Ryder conclusions?
  Mr. Meacher: I suggest that the hon. Gentleman addresses the question to Sir Don Ryder. [Hon. MEMBERS: "No."] It is the report of Sir Don Ryder.
  Mr. Heseltine: It is the Government's report.
  Mr. Meacher: It is not the Government's report. It is the report of Sir Don Ryder. The hon. Gentleman should understand a little about this report which he purports to have read.
  Mr. Heseltine rose—
  Mr. Meacher: I will not give way again.
  Mr. Heseltine rose—
  Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) had 52 minutes.
  Mr. Meacher: If the hon. Gentleman pretends to have read the report carefully, he ought at least to have read the opening page. It is not a Government report. It is a report prepared independently without any influence or control from the Government. That is its value. I am repeating what the author of that report said.
  I turn, first, to the charge of haste. The right hon. Member for Lowestoft asked why the Government were going ahead with some haste. I remind the House that the Government set up the Ryder team before Christmas last year. Sir Don Ryder and his team began work on the report immediately. The House knows that the report was prepared very speedily. But it is important to remember that the team, which was aided by a whole group of professional advisers, spent three months on detailed examination of British Leyland's activities and had full discussions with the management, the work force and all other parties
  1530
  involved. Subsequently the Government spent nearly four weeks in detailed consideration of the report.
  In contrast it took the Leader of the Opposition only 10 days to reach the view that the Government were wrong and that the recipe for success was to provide piecemeal assistance to British Leyland with no clear assurance about the future of the company. The views which we have heard from the Opposition this evening and the views of the right hon. Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher) make it clear where the charge of over-haste and superficiality lies.
  The hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) made two points. Whatever views one may have about slimming down British Leyland, the hon. Member's very long speech could have done with a good deal of slimming down. The first was the very important one of whether Ryder had reviewed other alternatives. The hon. Member makes great play of having studied the report, but he does not appear to have got even to page 3, because paragraph 12 makes it clear that the Ryder team examined the following issues:

  "(i) Whether there is a future for BL as a vehicle producer.

  (ii) Whether BL should diversify into non-vehicle activities and divest itself of its existing peripheral activities.

  (iii) Whether BL should remain a producer of both cars and commercial vehicles.

  (iv) Whether BL should remain a producer of both volume and specialist cars.

  (v) In which geographical areas BL's marketing effort should be concentrated."

  All these were examined and the hon. Member, who pitched the whole of his case on the assumption that other alternatives had not been properly reviewed, is quite wrong.
  The hon. Member's other point concerned export penetration at projected levels of profitability. Of course, his allegation of over-optimism in the targets to which he drew attention was based on the obvious but fatal flaw that the forecast was based on a static view of the company and on past performance. There is no point in a comparison of forecasts with past performance, because past performance—this was the whole point of the Ryder Report—was the result of inadequate investment. Inadequate productivity inadequate

  1531
  model succession and inadequate effort in overseas marketing.
  It is absurd to make a comparison of future profitability purely on the basis of all that past inadequacy. Obviously the aim and the whole reasonable expectation of making this massive investment is to increase significantly the company's productivity and competitiveness in the markets so that these targets can be achieved.
  Mr. F. A. Burden: Will the Under-Secretary say what the situation would be if there were a decline in the world demand for cars and if in present circumstances there were a great increase in production by British Leyland and other car firms? What would they do with all those cars? Is not the quickest way to bankruptcy to produce far more than can be sold?
  Mr. Meacher: The hon. Member's case is the usual one based on slimming down the company because of the existence of a poor current market. It takes a long time to equip for an upturn, which is certainly coming and is widely expected here and abroad. It is necessary to re-equip now.
  My central and overriding criticism of the hon. Member for Henley is that he entirely failed to come clean with the House on what alternatives he is offering. He spoke of dividing off the profitable Jaguar, Rover and Triumph sectors and concentrating attention on the unprofitable Austin-Morris complex.
  That leads me to put two questions to the hon. Gentleman. So far, he and many of his hon. Friends have slid around them. Is he proposing that the profitable sectors of the company should remain in private enterprise while the loss-maker should go into public ownership as a result of receivership? If so, this is really Rolls-Royce Mark II, with the unprofitable aero-engine company brought into public ownership and hiving off the profitable part into private ownership. If that is all the hon. Member is suggesting, his party has learned nothing and forgotten nothing in two years.
  The second point I wish to put—because I do not think that that was the intention of what the hon. Gentleman was saying—[Interruption.] I think that what
  1532
  he was really saying—he can speak for himself, and I shall be glad to give way to him—is that he would hive off Jaguar, Rover and Triumph and close Austin-Morris. Will the hon. Gentleman come clean and tell us? Is he proposing to bring merely the loss-maker into public ownership, or is he proposing to close Austin-Morris? Will he give the House an answer?
  It is all too clear. I am well aware that the right hon. Member for Lowestoft suggested a different and third solution and that many of his hon. Friends suggested other solutions. The right hon. Member for Lowestoft suggested that the proper answer was to reduce Austin-Morris, to slim it down. He made no answer to my hon. Friend's perfectly proper riposte that there will be higher unit costs if it is separated. It will lead to much less viability, and this means less security for the jobs of the workers in those firms. It will mean higher imports. The right hon. Gentleman himself said that he had a preference for moving up-market. That is in the opposite direction to the way the market is going—towards smaller cars.
  Mr. Prior: If the Under-Secretary now admits that all is profitable except Austin-Morris, and since Austin-Morris accounts for only about half the labour force of British Leyland, will he now say once and for all that the figure of 1 million unemployed, which the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State keep putting forward, is totally false?
  Mr. Meacher: The kinds of schemes put forward by the hon. Member for Henley would be certain to lead to redundancies, when one takes into account the suppliers, amounting to several hundred thousand, and it could be up to 1 million.
  Mr. Heseltine: As the Government have accepted the strategy, and as the Ryder Report quantifies the redundancies at £400 million, how many lost jobs does that represent?
  Mr. Meacher: I am coming to the points made by the hon. Gentleman, who has a passion for redundancies and for setting down the exact figures. The Ryder Report is an independent report, and as a result of that we are expecting the

  1533
  action on it to be taken by those whom it concerns. I know that the hon. Gentleman is always talking about Government interference in private industry. In this case it is not so much a matter of saying that the man from Whitehall knows best how many will lose their jobs. It is the man from Conservative Central Office who knows how many jobs will be lost.
  In his speech the hon. Gentleman did not seem to understand the urgency of the situation and the loss of confidence which would follow from the further delay he seemed to want by providing merely a little help here and there and seeing how we get on. He predicted that the right measures, as he saw them, would be unpalatable, but immediately, when there was an intervention, he rejected very strongly the idea that his proposals would mean the end of production of the Mini. I suggest that his views are inconsistent and that he is unwilling to face the consequences of what he is proposing.
  The Ryder Report stressed clearly the conclusion that vehicle production is the kind of industry we ought to retain and that British Leyland should remain a major vehicle producer. That is a view which is held on both sides of the House.
  In answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Nuneaton (Mr. Huckfield), who was concerned about Jaguar losing its identity, perhaps I should say that although the Ryder team recommended that the whole of British Leyland's operations should be better integrated, and although the Government accept that view, the report says that this need not detract from the distinctive identities of specialist cars.
  In his interesting and important speech, my hon. Friend the Member for Nuneaton also asked whether a full model range was too ambitious. The Ryder Report specifically considers whether British Leyland should withdraw from the small and light sector, which would mean no replacement for the Mini. It concludes that this would be wrong both on commercial grounds, because it is important for marketing reasons to have a full range, and also on national economic grounds, because of the immense increase in imports which it would lead to in this sector.
  Mr. Leslie Huckfield: Since my hon. Friend has referred to Jaguar, although he says that Jaguar should be able to maintain its independent entity, if the integrated management of the Browns Lane and Radford plants are already split up, with the result that Jaguar is being managed by the same management as Rover, how can he say that Jaguar should be able to keep its independence?
  Mr. Meacher: The management question, as a result of the reorganisation of the structure carefully mentioned in the report, is one about which there will have to be a great deal of further discussion. But I do not think my hon. Friend believes that the reorganisation of the management structure, which is what he was talking about, will lead to any reduction in the distinctive nature of one sector, namely, the specialist cars to which he referred.
  The right hon. Member for Down, South (Mr. Powell) made his own forthright contribution to the debate, rejecting the main proposals in the Ryder Report and getting a good deal of support from his former colleagues, though they were a great deal more mealy-mouthed about it. However, even the right hon. Gentleman has not yet applied his very stark economic theories about the indispensability of bankruptcy and the need for bankruptcy and rebirth in the case of the British Leyland of Northern Ireland, namely, Holland and Wolff.
  Mr. Powell: I have been consistent in my views.
  Mr. Meacher: If the right hon. Gentleman is consistent even in that case, I pay tribute at least to his consistency if not to his wisdom.
  There is a sentence in the Ryder Report which in my view has received far too little serious attention. It reads:
  "If the UK were to opt out of vehicle production, it is not easy to see where the process of opting out would end."
  This Government do not intend to preside over the descent towards a tourist economy. [Interruption.] The views expressed by the right hon. Member for Lowestoft were recommending a degree of rationalisation, slimming down and cutting back, which is indicative of that kind of approach.

  1535
  We do not accept the views of those who would abdicate what we believe is properly the responsibility of a Government to some vaguely-defined concept of natural commercial forces. Criticis of this kind misread the essentially temporary setbacks which have affected this industry throughout the world. Serious though the circumstances are, I deplore the suggestions which have come from some quarters in the debate today that the right course for the Government is simply to stand on the sidelines acquiescing in the destruction of such a valuable national asset for all those who work in it.
  Mr. Alexander Fletcher: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that he is asking the House to sign the biggest single cheque in history? Is he aware that in doing so he owes not only to this House but to the British people some pledge of security or some safeguard that can be offered in return for the extremely risky investment that he is asking us to approve tonight?
  Mr. Meacher: Of course this is a very major investment, but there are enormous ramifications throughout the whole economy. This is not concentrated on one single company. It is not concentrated only on the motor industry, crucially important though that is to the engineering industry. Fifteen per cent. of employment throughout the engineering industry is in British Leyland. When one takes into account the ramifications of this, one can appreciate that we are providing a security, and those who oppose the Bill and the following motion will have a great deal to answer for to the people of this country.
  Mr. Spriggs: Sir Don Ryder's report does not cover one of the most important component parts of British Leyland motors and buses, and that is glass. Before we decide this issue, will my hon. Friend give an undertaking to the House that in exchange for this large sum of money there will be an inquiry as to why British Leyland imports foreign glass for all its vehicles?
  Mr. Meacher: My hon. Friend is quite right to raise on behalf of his constituents the issue of the importance of the work
  1536
  which they provide through the Pilkington factory for motor cars. I wholly respect that point. My Department is extremely conscious of this matter. If I had more time in this debate, I would discuss the negotiations which are in progress in order to preserve work in the Pilkington factory at St. Helens.
  The report rightly pinpoints that the success of British Leyland in the next decade will depend mainly on the skills, efforts and attitude of its employees. This will apply to everyone—
  Mr. Nicholas Winterton: What about the textile industry?
  Mr. Meacher: —from the shop floor up to top management. The report identifies as the most crucial factor in improving industrial relations the need to make real progress towards industrial democracy. The report makes specific proposals for the establishment of a new structure of joint councils, committees and conferences in which the shop stewards will have a major rôle.
  The Government believe that this now provides an opportunity, for the first time for this company and, indeed, for the first time in this industry's history, for a new spirit of partnership to emerge in British Leyland.
  Mr. Nicholas Winterton: What rubbish.
  Mr. Meacher: We firmly believe that those who work in the plant on the shop floor and have shop floor responsibilities, as well as full-time trade union officials, should have the opportunity—indeed, the obligation—in the light of their deep knowledge and experience of this industry to contribute constructively to the solution along the lines that this team has put forward, in particular in accordance with the proposals in the Industry Bill for planning agreements. We intend that workers will be able to participate in matters relating to the general strategy of the company, industrial investments and export markets, from which until now they have always been excluded.
  I believe that the Bill is very important and a major move in the Government's plans to regenerate British industry.
  Mr. Nicholas Winterton: What rubbish.
  Mr. Meacher: This is not a time, contrary to what the Conservatives have indicated, for doubts and delays. The Ryder Committee has recommended a clear line of development. The Government for their part have responded with real urgency and a willingness to face up to the problem. I therefore strongly recommend to the House that we pass
  the Bill, which in terms of massive investment and industrial democracy will play a major rôle in regenerating British industry.
  Question put, That the Bill be now read a Second time:—
  The House divided: Ayes 282, Noes 261.

  Division No. 215.]

  AYES

  [10.0 p.m.

  Allaun, Frank

  Edwards, Robert (Wolv SE)

  Kelley, Richard

  Anderson, Donald

  Ellis, Tom (Wrexham)

  Kerr, Russell

  Archer, Peter

  English, Michael

  Kilroy-Silk, Robert

  Armstrong, Ernest

  Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)

  Kinnock, Neil

  Ashley, Jack

  Evans, Ioan (Aberdare)

  Lamborn, Harry

  Ashton, Joe

  Evans, John (Newton)

  Lamond, James

  Atkinson, Norman

  Ewing, Harry (Stirling)

  Leadbitter, Ted

  Bagier, Gordon A. T.

  Faulds, Andrew

  Lee, John

  Bain, Mrs. Margaret

  Fernyhough, Rt. Hon. E.

  Lestor, Miss Joan (Eton & Slough)

  Barnett, Rt. Hon. Joel (Heywood)

  Fitch, Alan (Wigan)

  Lever, Rt. Hon. Harold

  Bates, Alt

  Flannery, Martin

  Lewis, Arthur (Newham N.)

  Bean, R. E.

  Fletcher, Raymond (Ilkeston)

  Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)

  Bann, Rt. Hon. Anthony Wedgwood

  Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)

  Lipton, Marcus

  Bidwell, Sydney

  Foot, Rt. Hon. Michael

  Litterick, Tom

  Blenkinsop, Arthur

  Ford, Ben

  Lomas, Kenneth

  Boardman, H.

  Forrester, John

  Loyden, Eddie

  Booth, Albert

  Fowler, Gerald (The Wrekin)

  Lyon, Alexander (York)

  Boothroyd, Miss Betty

  Fraser, John (Lambeth, N'w'd)

  Lyons, Edward (Bradford W.)

  Bottomley, Rt. Hon. Arthur

  Freeson, Reginald

  Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson

  Boyden, James (Bish Auck)

  Garrett, John (Norwich S.)

  McCartney, Hugh

  Bradley, Tom

  Garrett, W. E. (Wallsend)

  MacFarquhar, Roderick

  Bray, Dr. Jeremy

  George, Bruce

  Mackenzie, Gregor

  Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)

  Gilbert, Dr. John

  Mackintosh, John P.

  Brown, Robert C. (Newcastle W.)

  Ginsburg, David

  McMillan, Tom (Glasgow C.)

  Brown, Ronald (Hackney S.)

  Golding, John

  McNamara, Kevin

  Buchanan, Richard

  Gould, Bryan

  Madden, Max

  Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)

  Gourlay, Harry

  Magee, Bryan

  Callaghan, Jim (Middleton & P.)

  Graham, Ted

  Mahon, Simon

  Campbell, Ian

  Grant, George (Morpeth)

  Mallalieu, J. P. W.

  Canavan, Dennis

  Grant, John (Islington C.)

  Marks, Kenneth

  Cant, R. B.

  Grocott, Bruce

  Marquand, David

  Carmichael, Neil

  Hamilton, James (Bothwell)

  Maynard, Miss Joan

  Carter, Ray

  Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)

  Meacher, Michael

  Carter-Jones, Lewis

  Hardy, Peter

  Mellish, Rt. Hon. Robert

  Cartwright, John

  Harper, Joseph

  Mendelson, John

  Castle, Rt. Hon. Barbara

  Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)

  Mikardo, Ian

  Clemitson, Ivor

  Hart, Rt. Hon. Judith

  Millan, Bruce

  Cocks, Michael (Bristol S.)

  Hatton, Frank

  Miller, Dr. M. S. (E Kilbride)

  Cohen, Stanley

  Hayman, Mrs. Helene

  Miller, Mrs. Millie (Ilford N.)

  Concannon, J. D.

  Healey, Rt. Hon. Denis

  Molloy, William

  Conlan, Bernard

  Heffer, Eric S.

  Moonman, Eric

  Cook, Robin F. (Edin C.)

  Henderson, Douglas

  Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)

  Corbett, Robin

  Hooley, Frank

  Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)

  Cox, Thomas (Tooting)

  Horam, John

  Morris, Rt. Hon. J. (Aberavon)

  Craigen, J. M. (Maryhill)

  Howell, Denis (B'ham, Sm H.)

  Mulley, Rt. Hon. Frederick

  Crawshaw, Richard

  Hoyle, Doug (Nelson)

  Newens, Stanley

  Crosland, Rt. Hon. Anthony

  Huckfield, Les

  Oakes, Gordon

  Cryer, Bob

  Hughes, Rt. Hon. C. (Anglesey)

  Ogden, Eric

  Cunningham, G. (Islington S.)

  Hughes, Mark (Durham)

  O'Halloran, Michael

  Cunningham, Dr. J. (Whiteh)

  Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen N.)

  O'Malley, Rt. Hon. Brian

  Dalyell, Tam

  Hughes, Roy (Newport)

  Orbach, Maurice

  Davidson, Arthur

  Hunter, Adam

  Orme, Rt. Hon. Stanley

  Davies, Bryan (Enfield N.)

  Irvine, Rt. Hon. Sir A. (Edge Hill)

  Ovenden, John

  Davies, Denzil (Llanelli)

  Irving, Rt. Hon. S. (Dartford)

  Owen, Dr. David

  Davies, Ifor (Gower)

  Jackson, Colin (Brighouse)

  Padley, Walter

  Davis, Clinton (Hackney C.)

  Jackson, Miss Margaret (Lincoln)

  Palmer, Arthur

  Deakins, Eric

  Janner, Greville

  Park, George

  Dean, Joseph (Leeds West)

  Jay, Rt. Hon. Douglas

  Parker, John

  Delargy, Hugh

  Jeger, Mrs. Lena

  Parry, Robert

  Dempsey, James

  Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)

  Pavitt, Laurie

  Doig, Peter

  Jenkins, Rt. Hon. Roy (Stechford)

  Peart, Rt. Hon. Fred

  Dormand, J. D.

  Johnson, James (Hull West)

  Pendry, Tom

  Douglas-Mann, Bruce

  Johnson, Walter (Derby S.)

  Perry, Ernest

  Dunn, James A.

  Jones, Alec (Rhondda)

  Phipps, Dr. Colin

  Dunnett, Jack

  Jones, Barry (East Flint)

  Prentice, Rt. Hon. Reg

  Dunwoody, Mrs. Gwyneth

  Jones, Dan (Burnley)

  Prescott, John

  Edelman, Maurice

  Judd, Frank

  Price, C. (Lewisham W.)

  Edge, Geoff

  Kaufman, Gerald

  Price, William (Rugby)

  Radice, Giles

  Spriggs, Leslie

  Watkins, David

  Reid, George

  Stallard, A. W.

  Watkinson, John

  Richardson, Miss Jo

  Stewart, Donald (western Isles)

  Weetch, Ken

  Roberts, Albert (Normanton)

  Stoddart, David

  Weitzman, David

  Roberts, Gwilym (Cannock)

  Stott, Roger

  Wellbeloved, James

  Robertson, John (Paisley)

  Strang, Gavin

  Welsh, Andrew

  Roderick, Caerwyn

  Strauss, Rt. Hon. G. R.

  White, Frank R. (Bury)

  Rodgers, George (Chorley)

  Summerskill, Hon. Dr. Shirley

  White, James (Pollok)

  Rooker, J. W.

  Swain, Thomas

  Whitehead, Phillip

  Roper, John

  Taylor, Mrs. Ann (Bolton W.)

  Whitlock, William

  Rose, Paul B.

  Thomas, Jeffrey (Abertillery)

  Willey, Rt. Hon. Frederick

  Ross, Rt. Hon. W. (Kilmarnock)

  Thomas, Mike (Newcastle E.)

  Williams, Alan (Swansea W.)

  Rowlands, Ted

  Thomas, Ron (Bristol NW)

  Williams, Alan Lee (Hornch'ch)

  Ryman, John

  Thompson, George

  Williams, Rt. Hon. Shirley (Hertford)

  Sandelson, Neville

  Thorne, Stan (Preston South)

  Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)

  Sedgemore, Brian

  Tierney, Sydney

  Wilson, Gordon (Dundee E.)

  Selby, Harry

  Tinn, James

  Wilson, Rt. Hon. H. (Huyton)

  Shaw, Arnold (Ilford South)

  Tomlinson, John

  Wilson, William (Coventry SE)

  Sheldon, Robert (Ashton-u-Lyne)

  Tomney, Frank

  Wise, Mrs. Audrey

  Short, Rt. Hon. E. (Newcastle C.)

  Torney, Tom

  Woodall, Alec

  Short, Mrs. Renée (Wolv NE)

  Urwin, T. W.

  Woof, Robert

  Silkin, Rt. Hon. John (Deptford)

  Varley, Rt. Hon. Eric G.

  Wrigglesworth, Ian

  Sillars, James

  Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne V.)

  Young, David (Bolton E.)

  Silverman, Julius

  Walden, Brian (B'ham, L'dyw'd)

  Small, William

  Walker, Harold (Doncaster)

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

  Smith, John (N Lanarkshire)

  Walker, Terry (Kingswood)

  Mr. Donald Coleman and

  Snape, Peter

  Ward, Michael

  Mr. John Ellis

  Spearing, Nigel

  NOES

  Adley, Robert

  Drayson, Burnaby

  Howell, David (Guildford)

  Aitken, Jonathan

  du Cann, Rt. Hon. Edward

  Howell, Ralph (North Norfolk)

  Alison, Michael

  Durant, Tony

  Hunt, John

  Amery, Rt. Hon. Julian

  Dykes, Hugh

  Hurd, Douglas

  Arnold, Tom

  Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)

  Hutchison, Michael Clark

  Atkins, Rt. Hon. H. (Spelthorne)

  Elliott, Sir William

  Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)

  Awdry, Daniel

  Eyre, Reginald

  Irving, Charles (Cheltenham)

  Baker, Kenneth

  Fairbairn, Nicholas

  James, David

  Banks, Robert

  Fairgrieve, Russell

  Jessel, Toby

  Beith, A. J.

  Farr, John

  Johnson Smith, G. (E Grinstead)

  Bell, Ronald

  Fell, Anthony

  Jones, Arthur (Daventry)

  Bennett, Sir Frederic (Torbay)

  Finsberg, Geoffrey

  Jopling, Michael

  Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Fareham)

  Fisher, Sir Nigel

  Joseph, Rt. Hon. Sir Keith

  Berry, Hon. Anthony

  Fletcher, Alex (Edinburgh N.)

  Kaberry, Sir Donald

  Biffen, John

  Fletcher-Cooke, Charles

  Kellett-Bowman, Mrs. Elaine

  Biggs-Davison, John

  Fookes, Miss Janet

  Kershaw, Anthony

  Blaker, Peter

  Fowler, Norman (Sutton C'f'd)

  Kilfedder, James

  Body, Richard

  Fox, Marcus

  Kimball, Marcus

  Boscawen, Hon. Robert

  Fraser, Rt. Hon. H. (Stafford & St)

  King, Evelyn (South Dorset)

  Bowden, A. (Brighton, Kemptown)

  Freud, Ciement

  King, Tom (Bridgwater)

  Boyson, Dr. Rhodes (Brent)

  Fry, Peter

  Kirk, Peter

  Braine, Sir Bernard

  Galbraith, Hon. T. G. D.

  Kitson, Sir Timothy

  Brittan, Leon

  Gardner, Edward (S Fylde)

  Knight, Mrs. Jill

  Brotherton, Michael

  Gilmour, Sir John (East Fife)

  Knox, David

  Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)

  Glyn, Dr. Alan

  Lane, David

  Bryan, Sir Paul

  Godber, Rt. Hon. Joseph

  Langford-Holt, Sir John

  Buchanan-Smith, Alick

  Goodhart, Philip

  Latham, Michael (Melton)

  Buck, Antony

  Goodhew, Victor

  Lawrence, Ivan

  Budgen, Nick

  Goodlad, Alastair

  Lawson, Nigel

  Bulmer, Esmond

  Gorst, John

  Lester, Jim (Beeston)

  Burden, F. A.

  Gow, Ian (Eastbourne)

  Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)

  Butler, Adam (Bosworth)

  Gower, Sir Raymond (Barry)

  Lloyd, Ian

  Carlisle, Mark

  Grant, Anthony (Harrow C.)

  Loveridge, John

  Carr, Rt. Hon. Robert

  Gray, Hamish

  Luce, Richard

  Chalker, Mrs. Lynda

  Grieve, Percy

  McAdden, Sir Stephen

  Churchill, W. S.

  Grist, Ian

  McCrindle, Robert

  Clark, Alan (Plymouth, Sutton)

  Grylls, Michael

  Macfarlane, Neil

  Clark, William (Croydon S.)

  Hall, Sir John

  MacGregor, John

  Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)

  Hall-Davis, A. G. F.

  Macmillan, Rt. Hon. M. (Farnham)

  Clegg, Walter

  Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)

  McNair-Wilson, M. (Newbury)

  Cockcroft, John

  Hampson, Dr. Keith

  McNair-Wilson, P. (New Forest)

  Cooke, Robert (Bristol W.)

  Hannam, John

  Madel, David

  Cope, John

  Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)

  Marshall, Michael (Arundel)

  Cordle, John H.

  Harvie Anderson, Rt. Hon. Miss

  Marten, Neil

  Cormack, Patrick

  Hastings, Stephen

  Mates, Michael

  Corrie, John

  Havers, Sir Michael

  Mather, Carol

  Costain, A. P.

  Hawkins, Paul

  Maude, Angus

  Critchley, Julian

  Hayhoe, Barney

  Maudling, Rt. Hon. Reginald

  Crouch, David

  Heseltine, Michael

  Mawby, Ray

  Crowder, F. P.

  Hicks, Robert

  Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin

  Davies, Rt. Hon. J. (Knutsford)

  Higgins, Terence L.

  Mayhew, Patrick

  Dean, Paul (N Somerset)

  Holland, Philip

  Meyer, Sir Anthony

  Dodsworth, Geoffrey

  Herders, Peter

  Mills, Peter

  Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James

  Howe, Rt. Hon. Sir Geoffrey

  Miscampbell, Norman

  1540

  1541

  Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)

  Renton, Rt. Hon. Sir D. (Hunts)

  Stanley, John

  Moate, Roger

  Renton, Tim (Mid-Sussex)

  Steel, David (Roxburgh)

  Molyneaux, James

  Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon

  Stewart, Ian (Hitchin)

  Monro, Hector

  Ridley, Hon. Nicholas

  Stokes, John

  Montgomery, Fergus

  Ridsdale, Julian

  Stradling Thomas, J.

  Moore, John (Croydon C.)

  Rifkind, Malcolm

  Tapsell, Peter

  More, Jasper (Ludlow)

  Rippon, Rt. Hon. Geoffrey

  Taylor, R. (Croydon NW)

  Morgan-Giles, Rear-Admiral

  Roberts, Michael (Cardiff NW)

  Taylor, Teddy (Cathcart)

  Morris, Michael (Northampton S.)

  Roberts, Wyn (Conway)

  Tebbit, Norman

  Morrison, Hon. Peter (Chester)

  Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)

  Temple-Morris, Peter

  Mudd, David

  Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)

  Thatcher, Rt Hon Margaret

  Neave, Airey

  Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)

  Thomes, Rt. Hon. P. (Hendon S.)

  Nelson, Anthony

  Rost, Peter (SE Derbyshire)

  Thorpe, Rt. Hon. Jeremy (N Devon)

  Neubert, Michael

  Sainsbury, Tim

  Townsend, Cyril D.

  Newton, Tony

  St. John-Stevas, Norman

  Trotter, Neville

  Normanton, Tom

  Scott, Nicholas

  Tugendhat, Christopher

  Nott, John

  Scott-Hopkins, James

  van Straubenzee, W. R.

  Onslow, Cranley

  Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)

  Vaughan, Dr. Gerard

  Oppenheim, Mrs. Sally

  Shelton, William (Streatham)

  Viggers, Peter

  Osborn, John

  Shepherd, Colin

  Wainwright, Richard (Colne V.)

  Page, John (Harrow West)

  Shersby, Michael

  Wakeham, John

  Page, Rt. Hon. R. Graham (Crosby)

  Silvester, Fred

  Walker-Smith, Rt. Hon. Sir Derek

  Pardoe, John

  Sims, Roger

  Warren, Kenneth

  Parkinson, Cecil

  Sinclair, Sir George

  Weatherill, Bernard

  Pattie, Geoffrey

  Skeet, T. H. H.

  Wells, John

  Percival, Ian

  Smith, Cyril (Rochdale)

  Whitelaw, Rt. Hon. William

  Peyton, Rt. Hon. John

  Smith, Dudley (Warwick)

  Wiggin, Jerry

  Pink, R. Bonner

  Speed, Keith

  Winterton, Nicholas

  Powell, Rt. Hon. J. Enoch

  Spence, John

  Young, Sir G. (Ealing. Acton)

  Prior, Rt. Hon. James

  Spicer, Jim (W Dorset)

  Younger, Hon. George

  Raison, Timothy

  Spicer, Michael (S Worcester)

  Rathbone, Tim

  Sproat, Iain

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

  Rawlinson, Rt. Hon. Sir Peter

  Stainton, Keith

  Benyon and

  Rees, Peter (Dover & Deal)

  Stanbrook, Ivor

  Mr. Spencer Le Marchan

  Rees-Davies, W. R.

  Question accordingly agreed to
  Bill read a Second time.
  Bill committed to a Committee of the whole House.—[Mr. Pendry.]
  Committee tomorrow.

  BRITISH LEYLAND [MONEY]
  Queen's Recommendation having been signified—
  Motion made, and Question put,
  That, for the purposes of any Act of the present Session to authorise the Secretary of State to acquire shares in British Leyland Motor Corporation Limited and in a company formed for the purpose of acquiring shares in British Leyland Motor Corporation Limited, it is expedient to authorise the payment out of moneys provided by Parliament of—

  (a) such sums, not exceeding £265 million, as may be paid by the Secretary of State for shares acquired under the Act; and

  (b) any other expenses incurred by him been in pursuance of the Act—[Mr. Meacher.]

  The House divided: Ayes 279, Noes 250.

  Division No. 216.]

  AYES

  [10.15 p.m.

  Allaun, Frank

  Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green)

  Davidson, Arthur

  Anderson, Donald

  Callaghan, Jim (Middleton & P.)

  Davies, Bryan (Enfield N.)

  Archer, Peter

  Campbell, Ian

  Davies, Denzil (Llanelli)

  Armstrong, Ernest

  Canavan, Dennis

  Davies, Ifor (Gower)

  Ashley, Jack

  Cant, R. B.

  Davis, Clinton (Hackney C.)

  Ashton, Joe

  Carmichael, Neil

  Deakins, Eric

  Atkinson, Norman

  Carter, Ray

  Dean, Joseph (Leeds West)

  Bagier, Gordon A. T.

  Carter-Jones, Lewis

  Delargy, Hugh

  Bain, Mrs. Margaret

  Cartwright, John

  Dempsey, James

  Barnett, Rt. Hon. Joel (Heywood)

  Castle, Rt Hon Barbara

  Doig, Peter

  Bates, Alf

  Clemitson, Ivor

  Dormand, J. D.

  Bean, R. E.

  Cocks, Michael (Bristol S.)

  Douglas-Mann, Bruce

  Benn, Rt. Hon. Anthony Wedgwood

  Cohen, Stanley

  Dunnett, Jack

  Bidwell, Sydney

  Coleman, Donald

  Dunwoody, Mrs. Gwyneth

  Blenkinsop, Arthur

  Concannon, J. D.

  Edelman, Maurice

  Boardman, H.

  Conlan, Bernard

  Edge, Geoff

  Booth, Albert

  Cook, Robin F. (Edin C.)

  Edwards, Robert (Wolv SE)

  Boothroyd, Miss Betty

  Corbett, Robin

  Ellis, John (Brigg & Scun)

  Bottomley, Rt. Hon. Arthur

  Cox, Thomas (Tooting)

  Ellis, Tom (Wrexham)

  Boyden, James (Bishop Auck)

  Craigen, J. M. (Maryhill)

  English, Michael

  Bradley, Tom

  Crawshaw, Richard

  Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)

  Bray, Dr. Jeremy

  Crosland, Rt. Hon. Anthony

  Evans, Ioan (Aberdare)

  Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)

  Cryer, Bob

  Evans, John (Newton)

  Brown, Robert C. (Newcastle W.)

  Cunningham, G. (Islington S.)

  Ewing, Harry (Stirling)

  Brown, Ronald (Hackney S.)

  Cunningham, Dr. J. (Whiteh)

  Faulds, Andrew

  Buchanan, Richard

  Dalyell, Tam

  Fernyhough, Rt. Hon. E.

  Fitch, Alan (Wigan)

  Lewis, Arthur (Newham N.)

  Rowlands, Ted

  Flannery, Martin

  Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)

  Ryman, John

  Fletcher, Raymond (Ilkeston)

  Lipton, Marcus

  Sandelson, Neville

  Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)

  Litterick, Tom

  Sedgemore, Brian

  Foot, Rt. Hon. Michael

  Lomas, Kenneth

  Selby, Harry

  Ford, Ben

  Loyden, Eddie

  Shaw, Arnold (Ilford South)

  Forrester, John

  Lyon, Alexander (York)

  Sheldon, Robert (Ashton-u-Lyne)

  Fowler, Gerald (The Wrekin)

  Lyons, Edward (Bradford W.)

  Short, Rt. Hon. E. (Newcastle C.)

  Fraser, John (Lambeth, N'w'd)

  Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson

  Short, Mrs. Renée (Wolv NE)

  Freeson, Reginald

  McCartney, Hugh

  Silkin, Rt. Hon. John (Deptford)

  Garrett, John (Norwich S.)

  MacFarquhar, Roderick

  Sillars, James

  Garrett, W. E. (Wallsend)

  Mackenzie, Gregor

  Silverman, Julius

  George, Bruce

  Mackintosh, John P.

  Small, William

  Gilbert, Dr. John

  McMillan, Tom (Glasgow C.)

  Smith, John (N Lanarkshire)

  Ginsburg, David

  McNamara, Kevin

  Snape, Peter

  Golding, John

  Madden, Max

  Spearing, Nigel

  Gould, Bryan

  Magee, Bryan

  Spriggs, Leslie

  Gourlay, Harry

  Mahon, Simon

  Stallard, A. W.

  Graham, Ted

  Mallalieu, J. P. W.

  Stewart, Donald (Western Isles)

  Grant, George (Morpeth)

  Marks, Kenneth

  Stott, Roger

  Grant, John (Islington C.)

  Marquand, David

  Strang, Gavin

  Grocott, Bruce

  Maynard, Miss Joan

  Strauss, Rt. Hon. G. R.

  Hamilton, James (Bothwell)

  Meacher, Michael

  Summerskill, Hon. Dr. Shirley

  Hamilton, W. W. (Central Fife)

  Mellish, Rt. Hon. Robert

  Swain, Thomas

  Hardy, Peter

  Mendelson, John

  Taylor, Mrs. Ann (Bolton W.)

  Harper, Joseph

  Mikardo, Ian

  Thomas, Jeffrey (Abertillery)

  Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)

  Millan, Bruce

  Thomas, Mike (Newcastle E.)

  Hart, Rt. Hon. Judith

  Miller, Dr. M. S. (E Kilbride)

  Thomas, Ron (Bristol NW)

  Hatton, Frank

  Miller, Mrs. Millie (Ilford N.)

  Thompson, George

  Hayman, Mrs. Helene

  Molloy, William

  Thorne, Stan (Preston South)

  Healey, Rt. Hon. Denis

  Moonman, Eric

  Tierney, Sydney

  Heffer, Eric S.

  Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)

  Tinn, James

  Henderson, Douglas

  Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)

  Tomlinson, John

  Hooley, Frank

  Morris, Rt. Hon. J. (Aberavon)

  Tomney, Frank

  Horam, John

  Mulley, Rt. Hon. Frederick

  Torney, Tom

  Howell, Denis (B'ham, Sm H.)

  Newens, Stanley

  Urwin, T. W.

  Hoyle, Doug (Nelson)

  Oakes, Gordon

  Varley, Rt. Hon. Eric G.

  Huckfield, Les

  Ogden, Eric

  Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne V.)

  Hughes, Rt. Hon. C. (Anglesey)

  O'Halloran, Michael

  Walden, Brian (B'ham, L'dyw d.)

  Hughes, Mark (Durham)

  O'Malley, Rt. Hon. Brian

  Walker, Harold (Doncaster)

  Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen, N.)

  Orbach, Maurice

  Walker, Terry (Kingswood)

  Hughes, Roy (Newport)

  Orme, Rt. Hon. Stanley

  Ward, Michael

  Hunter, Adam

  Ovenden, John

  Watkins, David

  Irvine, Rt. Hon. Sir A. (Edge Hill)

  Owen, Dr. David

  Watkinson, John

  Irving, Rt. Hon. S. (Dartford)

  Padley, Walter

  Weetch, Ken

  Jackson, Colin (Brighouse)

  Palmer, Arthur

  Weitzman, David

  Jackson, Miss Margaret (Lincoln)

  Park, George

  Welsh, Andrew

  Janner, Greville

  Parker, John

  White, Frank R. (Bury)

  Jay, Rt. Hon. Douglas

  Parry, Robert

  White, James (Pollok)

  Jeger, Mrs. Lena

  Peart, Rt. Hon. Fred

  Whitehead, Phillip

  Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)

  Pendry, Tom

  Whitlock, William

  Jenkins, Rt. Hon. Roy (Stechford)

  Perry, Ernest

  Willey, Rt. Hon. Frederick

  Johnson, James (Hull West)

  Phipps, Dr. Colin

  Williams, Alan (Swansea W.)

  Johnson, Walter (Derby S.)

  Prentice, Rt. Hon. Reg

  Williams, Alan Lee (Hornch'ch)

  Jones, Alec (Rhondda)

  Prescott, John

  Williams, Rt. Hon. Shirley (Hertford)

  Jones, Barry (East Flint)

  Price, C. (Lewisham W.)

  Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)

  Jones, Dan (Burnley)

  Price, William (Rugby)

  Wilson, Gordon (Dundee E.)

  Judd, Frank

  Radice, Giles

  Wilson, Rt. Hon. H. (Huyton)

  Kaufman, Gerald

  Reid, George

  Wilson, William (Coventry SE)

  Kelley, Richard

  Richardson, Miss Jo

  Wise, Mrs. Audrey

  Kerr, Russell

  Roberts, Albert (Normanton)

  Woodall, Alec

  Kilroy-Silk, Robert

  Roberts, Gwilym (Cannock)

  Wool, Robert

  Kinnock, Neil

  Robertson, John (Paisley)

  Wrigglesworth, Ian

  Lamborn, Harry

  Roderick, Caerwyn

  Young, David (Bolton E.)

  Lamond, James

  Rodgers, George (Chorley)

  Leadbitter, Ted

  Rooker, J. W.

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

  Lee, John

  Roper, John

  Mr. Laurie Pavitt and

  Lestor, Miss Joan (Eton & Slough)

  Rose, Paul B.

  Mr. David Stoddart.

  Lever, Rt. Hon. Harold

  Ross, Rt. Hon. W. (Kilmarnock)

  NOES

  Adley, Robert

  Bennett, Dr. Reginald (Fareham)

  Bryan, Sir Paul

  Aitken, Jonathan

  Biffen, John

  Buchanan-Smith, Alick

  Alison, Michael

  Biggs-Davison, John

  Buck, Antony

  Amery, Rt. Hon. Julian

  Blaker, Peter

  Budgen, Nick

  Arnold, Tom

  Body, Richard

  Bulmer, Esmond

  Atkins, Ronald (Preston N.)

  Boscawen, Hon. Robert

  Burden, F. A.

  Awdry, Daniel

  Bowden, A. (Brighton, Kemptown)

  Butler, Adam (Bosworth)

  Baker, Kenneth

  Boyson, Dr. Rhodes (Brent)

  Carlisle, Mark

  Banks, Robert

  Braine, Sir Bernard

  Chalker, Mrs. Lynda

  Beith, A. J.

  Brittan, Leon

  Churchill, W. S.

  Bell, Ronald

  Brotherton, Michael

  Clark, Alan (Plymouth, Sutton)

  Bennett, Sir Frederic (Torbay)

  Brown, Sir Edward (Bath)

  Clark, William (Croydon S.)

  1544

  1545

  Clarke, Kenneth (Rushcliffe)

  Irving, Charles (Cheltenham)

  Powell, Rt. Hon. J. Enoch

  Clegg, Walter

  James, David

  Prior, Rt. Hon. James

  Cockcroft, John

  Jessel, Toby

  Raison, Timothy

  Cooke, Robert (Bristol W.)

  Johnson Smith, G. (E Grinstead)

  Rathbone, Tim

  Cope, John

  Jones, Arthur (Daventry)

  Rawlinson, Rt. Hon. Sir Peter

  Cordle, John H.

  Jopling, Michael

  Rees, Peter (Dover & Deal)

  Cormack, Patrick

  Joseph, Rt. Hon. Sir Keith

  Rees-Davies, W. R.

  Corrie, John

  Kershaw, Anthony

  Renton, Rt. Hon. Sir D. (Hunts)

  Critchley, Julian

  Kilfedder, James

  Renton, Tim (Mid-Sussex)

  Crouch, David

  Kimball, Marcus

  Rhys Williams, Sir Brandon

  Crowder, F. P.

  King, Evelyn (South Dorset)

  Ridley, Hon. Nicholas

  Davies, Rt. Hon. J. (Knutsford)

  King, Tom (Bridgwater)

  Ridsdale, Julian

  Dean, Paul (N Somerset)

  Kirk, Peter

  Rifkind, Malcolm

  Dodsworth, Geoffrey

  Kitson, Sir Timothy

  Rippon, Rt. Hon. Geoffrey

  Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James

  Knight, Mrs. Jill

  Roberts, Michael (Cardiff NW)

  Drayson, Burnaby

  Knox, David

  Roberts, Wyn (Conway)

  du Cann, Rt. Hon. Edward

  Lane, David

  Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)

  Durant, Tony

  Langford-Holt, Sir John

  Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)

  Dykes, Hugh

  Latham, Michael (Melton)

  Rossi, Hugh (Hornsey)

  Edwards, Nicholas (Pembroke)

  Lawrence, Ivan

  Rost, Peter (SE Derbyshire)

  Elliott, Sir William

  Lawson, Nigel

  Sainsbury, Tim

  Eyre, Reginald

  Lester, Jim (Beeston)

  St. John-Sieves, Norman

  Fairbairn, Nicholas

  Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)

  Scott, Nicholas

  Fairgrieve, Russell

  Lloyd, Ian

  Scott-Hopkins, James

  Farr, John

  Loveridge, John

  Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)

  Finsberg, Geoffrey

  Luce, Richard

  Shelton, William (Streatham)

  Fisher, Sir Nigel

  McAdden, Sir Stephen

  Shepherd, Colin

  Fletcher, Alex (Edinburgh N.)

  McCrindle, Robert

  Shersby, Michael

  Fletcher-Cooke, Charles

  Macfarlane, Neil

  Silvester, Fred

  Fookes, Miss Janet

  MacGregor, John

  Sims, Roger

  Fowler, Norman (Sutton C'f'd)

  Macmillan, Rt. Hon. M. (Farnham)

  Sinclair, Sir George

  Fox, Marcus

  McNair-Wilson, M. (Newbury)

  Skeet, T. H. H.

  Fraser, Rt. Hon. H. (Stafford & St)

  McNair-Wilson, P. (New Forest)

  Smith, Cyril (Rochdale)

  Freud, Clement

  Madel, David

  Smith, Dudley (Warwick)

  Fry, Peter

  Marshall, Michael (Arundel)

  Speed, Keith

  Galbraith, Hon. T. G. D.

  Marten, Neil

  Spence, John

  Gardner, Edward (S Fylde)

  Mates, Michael

  Spicer, Jim (W Dorset)

  Gilmour, Sir John (East Fife)

  Mather, Carol

  Spicer, Michael (S Worcester)

  Glyn, Dr. Alan

  Maude, Angus

  Sproat, Iain

  Godber, Rt. Hon. Joseph

  Maudling, Rt. Hon. Reginald

  Stainton, Keith

  Goodhart, Philip

  Mawby, Ray

  Stanbrook, Ivor

  Goodlad, Alastair

  Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin

  Stanley, John

  Gorst, John

  Mayhew, Patrick

  Steel, David (Roxburgh)

  Gow, Ian (Eastbourne)

  Meyer, Sir Anthony

  Stewart, Ian (Hitchin)

  Gower, Sir Raymond (Barry)

  Mills, Peter

  Stokes, John

  Grant, Anthony (Harrow C.)

  Miscampbell, Norman

  Tapsell, Peter

  Gray, Hamish

  Mitchell, David (Basingstoke)

  Taylor, R. (Croydon NW)

  Grieve, Percy

  Moate, Roger

  Tebbit, Norman

  Grist, Ian

  Molyneaux, James

  Temple-Morris, Peter

  Grylls, Michael

  Monro, Hector

  Thatcher, Rt. Hon. Margaret

  Hall, Sir John

  Montgomery, Fergus

  Thorpe, Rt. Hon. Jeremy (N Devon)

  Hall-Davis, A. G. F.

  Moore, John (Croydon C.)

  Townsend, Cyril D.

  Hamilton, Michael (Salisbury)

  More, Jasper (Ludlow)

  Trotter, Neville

  Hampson, Dr. Keith

  Morris, Michael (Northampton S.)

  Tugendhat, Christopher

  Hannam, John

  Morrison, Hon. Peter (Chester)

  van Straubenzee, W. R.

  Harrison, Col. Sir Harwood (Eye)

  Mudd, David

  Vaughan, Dr. Gerard

  Harvie Anderson, Rt. Hon. Miss

  Neave, Airey

  Viggers, Peter

  Hastings, Stephen

  Nelson, Anthony

  Wainwright, Richard (Colns V.)

  Havers, Sir Michael

  Neubert, Michael

  Wakeham, John

  Hawkins, Paul

  Newton, Tony

  Walker-Smith, Rt. Hon. Sir Derek

  Hayhoe, Barney

  Normanton, Tom

  Warren, Kenneth

  Heseltine, Michael

  Nott, John

  Weatherill, Bernard

  Hicks, Robert

  Onslow, Cranley

  Wells, John

  Higgins, Terence L.

  Oppenheim, Mrs. Sally

  Whitelaw, Rt. Hon. William

  Holland, Philip

  Osborn, John

  Wiggin, Jerry

  Hordern, Peter

  Page, John (Harrow West)

  Winterton, Nicholas

  Howe, Rt. Hon. Sir Geoffrey

  Page, Rt. Hon. R. Graham (Crosby)

  Young, Sir G. (Ealing, Acton)

  Howell, David (Guildford)

  Pardoe, John

  Younger, Hon. George

  Howell, Ralph (North Norfolk)

  Parkinson, Cecil

  Hunt, John

  Pattie, Geoffrey

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

  Hurd, Douglas

  Percival, Ian

  Mr. W. Benyon and

  Hutchison, Michael Clerk

  Peyton, Rt. Hon. John

  Mr. Spence Le Marchant.

  Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)

  Pink, R. Bonner

  Question accordingly agreed to.

  BRITISH LEYLAND (FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE)
  10.29 p.m.
  The Under-Secretary of State for Industry (Mr. Michael Meacher): I beg to move,
  That this House authorises the Secretary of State to pay or undertake to pay sums by way of financial assistance under section 8 of the Industry Act 1972 in respect of a guarantee or guarantees to be given to the bankers of British Leyland Motor Corporation Limited and any of its subsidiaries covering borrowing facilities made available by the bankers to those companies, insofar as the amount paid or undertaken to be paid under the guarantee or guarantees is in excess of £50 million, being the maximum amount authorised by resolution of this House on 18th December 1974, but does not exceed £100 million.
  We have had a full debate on the Bill which enables the Government to acquire a substantial share in the enlarged equity of the company—a Bill which the House has approved. I do not intend to rehearse the arguments.
  The House is aware from what my right hon. Friend said that these arrangements will take some time to implement. The motion now before the House is to increase the guarantees to British Leyland's bankers. It is essentially an interim arrangement to meet British Leyland's requirements while the longer-term scheme and the steps necessary for its implementation are considered by the various parties concerned.
  This is necessary because the company accepts that the facilities authorised under the order approved by the House on 18th December will be fully utilised by the beginning of next month. The need for this interim measure does not mean that British Leyland's position is suddenly worse than expected: it is simply to meet the requirements of the business in carrying on normal trading until the arrangements under the Bill have been completed.
  10.31 p.m.
  Mr. Tom King: It might come as a shock to some of my hon. Friends to realise that that incredibly brief speech was to ask the House to approve £50 million. It is a measure of the inflation that has hit the Government's spendings that £50 million is dismissed in such an abrupt way.
  It will be clear that we have the most substantial reservations about the proposals
  1548
  that the Government have put before the House in the British Leyland Bill. If we had any lingering doubts about those reservations they would hardly have been removed by the Under-Secretary of State's speech.
  The Government seek to claim that we are dealing with the first part of the regeneration of British industry, but on Second Reading every time that the Under-Secretary of State was questioned on any particular aspect of the Government's proposals he immediately ducked away and said that it was merely a proposal in the Ryder Committee's Report. The Government appeared to be disowning it. That is the appalling way in which the Secretary of State originally presented the Bill. He suggested that it was the Government's adopted proposal and subsequently the Under-Secretary of State did everything he could to disown it. After that speech, and reports of that speech, it would not be surprising if a letter came from Downing Street to the effect "Come back Eric, all is forgiven."
  We now move from the Bill to consideration of this important motion for further guarantees to cover £50 million. About the only fact that the Under-Secretary of State gave was that the company's facilities will run out at the beginning of next month and that the money is needed unless other action is taken. The money is essential to provide bridging finance until the more permanent arrangements envisaged in the Bill can take effect or until more sensible policies can be evolved.
  It will be well known to those hon. Members who were present—my right hon. Friend the Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) made this clear—that we have opposed the proposals contained in the Bill in the strongest possible terms. However, we think it right to let this motion proceed, as it is essential.
  The Under-Secretary of State has tried to suggest that the Ryder Committee had considered all the options that were open. The fact is that it did not. It considered a number of different aspects, but the first basic assumption was that Government money would be available. The committee was required to advise how much Government money was needed. That was a fundamental assumption and

  1549
  there were a number of different options that should have been considered.
  The committee was also advised by the Government—dangerously advised, as some of my hon. Friends would believe—as to what the rate of inflation might be. When the Government came forward with the original proposal my hon. Friend the Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) said that we should give them time to consider their longer-term proposals. It is clear that time has been lost. We must accept that fact. We believe that time has largely been wasted and that the alternative strategies open to British Leyland have not been considered.
  There is obviously an urgent need for a more realistic approach to this problem. The Minister tried to suggest that all the criticisms of Ryder had come from the Opposition benches, but I thought that one of the most constructive speeches made in the debate came from the hon. Member for Nuneaton (Mr. Huckfield), who blew hole after hole in the Ryder Report and in the assumptions on which it was based. A summary of his speech could only be that he challenged the total conclusions reached by the Ryder Report.
  In this situation we believe that alternative proposals must be considered urgently. We do not accept the Secretary of State's suggestion that it is impossible to get any forms of undertaking or assurance from union leaders. I regard that attitude as a gross insult to many responsible union leaders who in serious situations are prepared to enter into assurances. Of course we accept that there are problems. The unions have not the power to control their members, but it is palpably unsound that they should not attempt to try to get reasonable assurances and undertakings on matters such as overmanning.
  We believe that the matter must be looked at seriously, that it should be urgently considered now, and that we should try to produce what my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition described as a recipe for success, and not the present formula with all the appalling risks inherent in it.
  I accept that there are divided views among hon. Members about the situation
  1550
  on this order. I accept that it is a finely balanced judgment. I accept that many of my hon. Friends feel that a receiver at that stage would be the correct policy. That is a view I recognise and many of my hon. Friends have misgivings about the situation, including my hon. Friend the Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley). However, I do not believe that that is the best policy in this situation. One cannot ignore the impact which that policy would have on the profitable parts of the company—on Austin-Morris and on the world-wide reputation of Jaguar, Rover and Triumph and the other component parts of the whole organisation—but also the effect which it would have on the supplier companies and the difficulties which would thus be created.
  The present situation is different from the situation that existed at the time of Rolls-Royce, because there is now a more difficult economic climate—and there is the uncharming thought that this might force many of the component-supplying companies into the unwelcome arms of the Secretary of State for Industry. There is also a real risk to the distribution network of British Leyland—a valuable asset of the company and one which many other competitors would like to obtain. I believe that the disruptive involvement at this stage caused by bringing in a receiver in a complicated situation might mean that the immediate beneficiaries are likely to be Messrs. Datsun and Renault. We must instead see that the time available is used to make an urgent and much more realistic appraisal of the alternatives.
  The Secretary of State for Industry (Mr. Anthony Wedgwood Benn): I am grateful to the hon. Member for explaining the Opposition's view. May I take it from what he said that the Shadow Cabinet, under its new Leader, now explicitly rejects receivership as the right solution to this problem, given the fact that the guarantees in this order, while allowing more time for consideration, do not leave open receivership as a viable proper course for the Government to pursue? In other words, are we to take it that the new Shadow Cabinet, under its new Leader, has rejected Selsdon policies and is adopting the view put forward by the hon. Gentleman?
  Mr. King: That is what I said about this order, at this time and in this situation.
  I now come to a further reason why this situation is especially applicable. I refer to the alternative to a receivership. Many of my hon. Friends feel that not a penny more should be put into this industry, and that receivership is the correct action to take. [Interruption.] I say this to my hon. Friends who are now cheering loudest.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Myer Galpern): Order. It is the custom for hon. Members to address the Chair—not the Deputy Serjeant at Arms.
  Mr. King: I apologise, Mr. Deputy Speaker, if you were feeling neglected in this situation.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: I was unable to determine whether or not the hon. Member was in order. That is all.
  Mr. King: I apologise, Mr. Deputy Speaker. No discourtesy was intended.
  I referred to the question whether any further money should be put into British Leyland. My hon. Friend the Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury pointed out that if a receiver were appointed it might be necessary to provide further money to enable the receiver to discharge his functions. This is not a clear-cut situation of saying "From this moment no further money will be provided."
  We are now facing an order for £50 million to allow time for urgent and more realistic consideration of the British Leyland situation. We are two weeks away from the referendum. We do not know what the situation will be after that referendum, the state of the economy, the position of the Secretary of State for Industry, or the Government's plans in respect of other matters. We do not know whether economic circumstances will compel the Government to abandon some of their policies. We do not know when the responsibility to face the situation might return—it may be sooner than Government supporters realise—to the present Opposition.
  We believe that it is right to allow this order to proceed now, but only on the clear understanding that a much more realistic approach is taken to the British
  1552
  Leyland problem than is contained in the Ryder report.
  Mr. Benn: It is important that we should understand exactly what is the Opposition view. Have the Shadow Cabinet and the Shadow Law Officers given consideration to the impact of their support for this order, which is a guarantee of £50 million, under Section 332 of the Companies Act, in so far as it might commit the Government to a responsibility, in the event of the Opposition later changing their mind and saying that the company should go into a receivership?
  Mr. King: I am not clear why the Secretary of State made that intervention. There is no difference between this occasion and the time when the matter was discussed on a previous order.
  The Secretary of State seems to be trying to exploit this situation, in the present uncertain economic situation and during a period immediately prior to the referendum. We do not even know whether we shall have the pleasure of the company of the Secretary of State afterwards. Circumstances may change.
  However, while recognising that the appointment of a receiver might cause problems, and acknowledging the strength of feeding and the validity of the arguments of many of my hon. Friends, on balance we feel that it is right to let this order proceed tonight.
  10.45 p.m.
  Dr. Rhodes Boyson: Some of us feel strongly about the order—enough to vote against it—because we do not like the inverted funnel syndrome: that once money is put into something it is in there permanently because, as it goes down, the funnel gets wider and takes more in. I advise the Minister to study the inverted funnel syndrome. Once Government money goes in, more pours in because it is said that, having put in £10 million or £25 million, more must go in or we shall lose what we put in at the beginning. For every penny that goes in, hundreds, thousands, millions, even billions of pounds of inflated money go after it.
  There are two reasons for British Leyland's present state. One is the result of Government intervention. The other is the worship of size which swept the

  1553
  country as a fashion in 1968. For example, we had huge tower blocks, large comprehensive schools, huge local government reorganisation—[Interruption.] It does not matter who did it. It is either right or wrong. I am saying that it is wrong. There are free men on this side of the House. We have free thoughts.
  When any Government come into industry it means that politicians and civil servants make decisions, but they do not suffer when they are wrong. Dr. Johnson said that hanging concentrated the mind. I trust that none of us experience that concentration. But the risk of losing one's own money concentrates the mind in a way that no civil servant or politician making his decision does, because somebody else suffers, not him.
  I suffered in education from local and national government decisions. The parents of the children in schools, not the politicians, have to pick up the pieces.
  The £25 million put into British Leyland in 1968 by the IRC began to take the company away from a genuine market. Having got £25 million from the Government, it was known that more would be coming. It is a tap which can be turned on. Having corrupted people in that way, they will come back for more like Oliver Twist. Unlike Oliver Twist, they will get more each time they come back.
  Under the Conservative Government we saw a similar situation with Upper Clyde and Rolls-Royce. Businessmen began to think that if they made losses there was no need to worry, they would be able to stay on the boards of their companies, because the Government would bail them out.
  Another result is unrealistic wage claims. Every man wants the most that he can get to take home because he wants the maximum standard of living. That is his right. People know that they can make vast pay claims and not bankrupt companies and become unemployed because the Government will bail them out. I suggest that they will continue to do that in the light of present policies.
  Whatever the Prime Minister said at a banquet last night, the Chrysler workers know better. They know that if money goes to British Leyland, it will also go to Chrysler. The Government should learn from Theodore Roosevelt—talk softly and
  1554
  walk with a big stick. But the Government appear to be talking loudly and walking with a little stick.
  The Economist states that one in six cars produced by British Leyland in the last six years has been lost by strikes. There again the Government have bailed out the company. If the Government are prepared to undertake bailing out operations, why should not a man take a day off if it is fine and sunny and he has a 10-pole allotment to tend? Men will take the initiative in that way if the Government are foolish enough to encourage them to do so.
  What can we do? First, not pay the money. Suggestions have been made by my hon. Friends that a receiver should be brought in. The right hon. Member for Down, South (Mr. Powell) last week said that bankruptcy is part of the capitalist society. I believe that is so. The trouble is that this country wants heaven without hell. We cannot have it. That is why the Church of England is empty. We must pay the price for everything. The price for capitalism is bankruptcy. The price for Socialism is a totalitarian society, whether we like it or not.
  It seems better to accept the price of bankruptcy than the price of a totalitarian society which, in the ultimate, is what the Labour Party offers. If the receiver had moved in, various parts like the truck and bus division would have continued profitably and would have moved on their own. Possibly some of the other parts would have been picked up. Even Aston Martin found a buyer after being in the market for long enough.
  Eventually the rest of the industry—the machine tool industry and the other related concerns which make the parts—would have moved of their own accord. I am amazed at the lack of belief in the ingenuity of the working class of this country on the Labour back benches. They must always, it seems, be led by the hand. They cannot find the ingenuity or the initiative to think for themselves. Are we to believe that the Midlands tool industry, which made its name in the nineteenth century, is so lacking in initiative that if it lost the work from British Leyland it could not find more work elsewhere? If it could not find other work it would not deserve to survive.
  I was told by a distinguished professor last week that it was the cut-back in the

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  aircraft industry that brought together the team that has produced the advanced passenger train. That is an example of what these people can move on to. They will not throw their initiative and skill into the Thames, they will take it and use it elsewhere.
  If we agree to the order tonight, under the interesting prospect of the inverted funnel syndrome more money will go in. I remember as a boy that my grandmother had a mangle. I trust that hon. Members know what a mangle is. I sometimes wish that I could put Labour Members through it, but I realise that that is completely uncharitable. It was explained to me that this mangle turned only one way, and if my finger was put into it the only way to get it out was by continuing to turn the mangle until I had gone right through. That, basically, is what we are doing now with this money. The wheel is like that of the mangle and more money will be taken in. Once turned in one direction it will never come back again. If British Leyland is to feed at the public feeding trough, Chrysler and everyone else will join them there.
  Do we believe that turning out cars in this way is an economic form of production? Fifty per cent. of British Leyland's cars are exported and they must be made and sold at the right price in the right place if the standard of living of the car workers is to be maintained at the right level. I sometimes wonder whether Labour Members want us to be like the Cambodians, each with a 5-pole allotment on which to make a living, each of us knowing we are equal at the bottom.
  While preparing for my speech tonight I was reminded that in 1830 at the time of the Poor Law—and these measures are the Government's new form of Poor Law—men were given work on hand loom weaving. They were paid very little for it. Hand loom weaving was out of date. The products could not be sold. They had to be given away to the old ladies. The factories were coming equipped with the new machines, and hand loom weaving was done only by the men on outdoor relief. The Government are doing the same here. They are giving outdoor relief on old-fashioned, vintage cars.
  It would be a good thing for this country to take a ride back to reality.
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  Any party which adopted that course would draw great support from the entire country. We realise that the social contract is the emperor with no cloches. There is all this talk of industrial democracy, but people do not know what to do with industry. With all the committees which have been set up—seven or eight of them, I believe—there is so much activity in that direction that there is no time to work. In view of the source of our external debts it may be apposite to say that we are not living in the Arabian Nights. We are living in Arabian day dreams, and I trust that by voting against this order we may move a little nearer to a sense of reality.
  10.55 p.m.
  Mr. A. G. F. Hall-Davis: We are being asked to approve this motion so that British Leyland may continue its operations for some weeks further. I should like to ask the Minister three simple and direct questions to which I hope he will give answers before he comes back with a request for more money to sustain the company in operation.
  The first question is whether it is the intention of the Government, in the period in which this interim support is available, to give information to this House which will enable it to form a proper opinion on the validity of the recommendations contained in the Ryder Report. I submit that the essential information on which a judgment can be formed by this House has been omitted from the Ryder Report. There are no fewer than five chapters—and in my view the five most vital chapters—that have been censored from that report. I looked through them one by one, and when I came to chapter 11, in the summary, and saw "Controls and systems", I thought that here at least, in this general field of management technique, we would have some interesting comment which might help us to judge whether the taxpayers' money was being properly accounted for. Chapter 11 reads:
  "[This Chapter describes and assesses the management controls and systems operated within BL and is omitted for reasons of commercial security.]"
  In this House we exercise, and have the responsibility for exercising, the ultimate judgment in these matters, and I

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  was appalled by the response of the Under-Secretary in his reply at the close of the earlier debate, when all he could say was that this is not the Government's report, this is the Ryder Report.
  In my humble back-bench capacity I believe that I was sent to this House by my constituents to say whether I disagree with the good and the great. I was not sent here to accept a report on the nod of the Government, without being given sufficient information to enable me to exercise what judgment I possess concerning the validity of the report.
  I believe that much of the conclusions in those five chapters in the Ryder Report could have come to this House and to the country, and that there is some risk that there might be marginal damage to the commercial interests of British Leyland. It is highly arguable whether there would be but I accept that there might be marginal damage to the commercial interests of British Leyland. I am sure that if that information is not made known in this interim period, and before the House really commits itself in the way that my hon. Friend the Member for Brent, North (Dr. Boyson) outlined to us, there is a real risk, if we cannot examine and debate those fundamental elements, that there will be major damage to the whole economy of the country resulting from a grave misdirection of investment resources.
  If the information is not to be provided, and the Government stick to what I believe to be their wrong policy of accepting without question the recommendations of the Ryder Committee that this information should be omitted, I ask the Under-Secretary to give the House an assurance that before he comes back to us for more money we shall be given the judgment and the commitment of those who are to carry the can for this operation. By that, I do not mean the Secretary of State. The Secretary of State bungled this operation once before in 1968. It is true that he is having a second stab at it now. But I am certain that he will not be in a position where he will be called upon to answer for the success of what he is recommending now in four or five years. I can think of many things which may have happened to him, but I guarantee that the likelihood is that
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  he will not be answering the questions of hon. Members from the Treasury Bench.
  The people from whom I want a judgment and a commitment are those who will constitute the board of directors of the company and who will be responsible for seeing it through the next difficult years. What worries me is that the only people appointed to that board will have given a prior commitment to accept the premise outlined in the Ryder Report. That would be the gravest disservice that the Government could do this House.
  Before we are requested to support the voting of more money, therefore, ask that the Government give the board of directors an opportunity to give this House the benefit of its judgment and its commitment to the fact that it has a sporting chance of success, and that the Government will give an assurance, before asking for more money, that there will not be a series of unquestioning yes-men appointed to the board of British Leyland in the months ahead.
  Finally, when the Government return at the end of this interim period asking for more money, I hope that they will have done as regards the trade unions and employees of the company what the Secretary of State has been advocating up and down the country in recent months, namely, that the Government, the Secretary of State and the board of British Leyland will have told their employees the true implications of the report and recommendations of the Ryder Committee. It is ludicrous that the Secretary of State should pay lip-service to full disclosure to employees of matters vital to their future interests and that the very matters which are vital to their future interests should be deleted from the report, with the agreement of the Government. I shall place great weight on the reaction of the employees of British Leyland to the prospects ahead for that company when they have been told the truth about what lies ahead of them.
  When we are being asked to vote an initial sum for only a very short period—it will run out in terms of days in the general vista of the length of this report—I believe that the Government have no case for sitting back and doing nothing. There is far too much still to be told

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  about what lies ahead for British Leyland. I hope to be assured that my reasonable requests will be met before the Government come back for more money.
  11.4 p.m.
  Mr. Richard Wainwright: My brief task in explaining the Liberal intention, which was made clear earlier, of dividing the House on this order has been made very much easier by the brilliant speech of the hon. Member for Brent, North (Dr. Boyson). Nevertheless, I want briefly to explain the reasoning behind the intention which we made clear earlier.
  It is really not worth while addressing any substantial list of questions to the Treasury Bench, because the Under-Secretary demonstrated in replying to the earlier debate that he and his right hon. and hon. Friends have become so inured to responding only to force—the force of Meriden, force on the docks, force in the mines and force from Mr. Scanlon—that the only way to get an answer of any kind from them is to squat or stand in this House for 53 minutes, as the hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) did.
  I am coming to admire the hon. Gentleman's capacity for abusing the time of the House. At least today he succeeded in getting some gesture from the Treasury Bench. However, other contributions which may have been slightly more precise were passed over in studied silence, especially the point on which we Liberals feel very deeply and to which there has been no reference except an extraordinary admission by the Secretary of State that the House is passing the initial stages of £1,400 million of taxpayers' money or "borrowing" money without any capital budget whatever embracing the overall needs of British industry.
  All that the Secretary of State said today was that the Government had not got around to budgetary control—would you believe it?—because they had not got the time or the leisure—using his words—to sit back to compile such budgets. Any business man, even of the smallest character, listening to the Secretary of State saying that Her Majesty's Government, with thousands of civil servants of the highest quality, could not
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  compile a budget—we know that they have to be revised as things go along, and we are not asking for the Tablets of Stone—would find that an appalling admission. I hope it will haunt the political career of the Secretary of State—during its remaining 14 days.
  I put one question to the Under-Secretary. He made great play of this matter, as indeed did his Prime Minister, to whom occasionally he pays a passing tribute in Committees as being a minor figure in the Government. The Under-Secretary repeated the absurd legend, for which there is not a word of warrant in the Ryder Report, that 1 million jobs are at stake in this debate for which the Government have given such inadequate preparation tonight. In spite of my not going on for the whole of 53 minutes, I hope the Under-Secretary will answer this question.
  The figure of 1 million jobs, on his own admission, depends upon bringing into the computation all the employees of the automotive components industry. From what major units of that industry have the Government received representations supporting the nationalisation of British Leyland? If the hon. Gentleman can read out a letter from Guest, Keen and Nettlefolds saying that the whole future for its industry depends upon this vote tonight, or if Lucas or Dunlop have told him that the motion is essential to the preservation of their work forces, we shall listen with respect. I hope that he will tell us what he has heard from the industry, which we all want to preserve and which I believe can look after itself.
  As regards the hon. Gentlemen who are to join Liberal Members in the Lobby—
  Mr. Nigel Lawson: You are joining us.
  Mr. Wainwright: Let us leave the nursery school for the present, because accommodation there is very crowded. The point is that although my hon. Friends voted against the Conservatives' Industry Act and have often criticised it as being a charter for nationalisation, the Act has the one redeeming feature that it makes it necessary for the Government to come to the House for approval of a motion such as that which is before

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  us. So, one up for the Conservatives' Industry Act. We shall rejoice in using one piece of this mechanism in a few minutes' time.
  The hon. Member for Brent, North exposed in a brilliant way, for which I am full of envy, the cringing and timid attitude of his own Front Bench. To suppose for a moment that approval of the motion is required in order to keep British Leyland alive until the Conservative Front Bench rescues it, and that the right hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior), with his detailed knowledge of turnips and fish, will stride into British Leyland and rescue it as a result of it having survived nationalisation, is the most awful supposition.
  I offer only two reasons. I do not want to deprive the Lobby of one hon. Member tonight. Is the Tory Front Bench seriously supposing that now that the nationalisation Bill has received a Second Reading, by a deplorably substantial majority—a tender subject which I shall not press—the banks in this new situation would now want to foreclose on British Leyland? The prospect is too absurd.
  Mr. John Biffen: I am much entertained by the hon. Member's speech. Can we conclude that he agrees with us that receivership is the desirable policy in these circumstances?
  Mr. Wainwright: If the hon. Member, with his customary diligence, which I am sure was honourably employed elsewhere, had been in the Chamber this afternoon after the 53 minutes of his right hon. Friend, he would have heard why we do not go along completely with his solution. I made our position clear earlier today.
  The second conclusive reason that the Conservative Front Bench are showing an absurd degree of humbug is that the whole of the Ryder plan which we are being asked to trigger tonight is for capital spending, and their pretence that they are graciously allowing some revenue overdraft to be extended is miles from the truth. We are being asked to support a great programme of capital expenditure, which the Liberals believe is wholly misdirected. We therefore intend to vote against the motion.
  Mr. Tom King: Since the hon. Gentleman accused us of humbug, would he tell us his wonderful solution? If he is opposed to receivership but will oppose the order, he must be realistic. He cannot have it both ways. What would he do?
  Several Hon. Members rose—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Myer Galpern): Order. The Chair made a mistake. I thought that the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Wainwright) was giving way. But he is not responding, so he must have finished.
  11.12 p.m.
  Mr. Nicholas Fairbairn: We are being asked to approve an order which fines every man, woman and child in the United Kingdom £1 a head to sustain for one day more an organisation which was brought into being by an absurd Civil Service fantasy and which was never likely, as a result of Government intervention, to be viable. Whatever the objective, that is the price.
  For too long, this country has based its philosophy upon the fantasy that if one runs into difficulties, one has only to pass the problem to a board, a commission or art extension of the Civil Service and obtain Government money. Governments are regarded as God is to man, as a source of genius, of finance, which is infinite. But not at all. Governments steal all the money that they spend, they borrow all the brains that they have, and they use neither as well as either is used outside. It is merely postponing our problems to imagine that a problem is solved by being put into the hands of Government.
  The National Enterprise Board is intended to create and make more efficient an internationally competitive British industry. The purpose of this motion and all that flows from it is to ensure that an inefficient and uncompetitive part of British industry is perpetuated. That is the purpose of the expenditure. There is not a word in the report to suggest that this expenditure will make British Leyland more efficient. All that it will do is to sustain it artificially in surroundings in which it cannot survive naturally.
  The Ryder Report is based on a number of preposterous fantasies and was prepared horribly, as all reports seem

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  to be nowadays, with a sort of sycophancy which requires the author of the report to write a report which will find favour with the Government of the day. This absurd course is based on two already out of date fantasies. One is that inflation will be brought into check—something which it is certain the Labour Party is determined it shall never be. The second fantasy is based on the belief that for some extraordinary reason the world will start buying more motor cars and will desire efficient and well-run British Leyland motor cars rather than those terrible broken-down Mercedes, Alfa Romeos and other things which people might otherwise choose.
  The great complaint of the Under-Secretary and the Secretary of State in Committee on the Industry Bill is that we lack investment and that industry is overmanned. But we are not dealing with investment here. This money is a subsidy, a charity to keep the firm continually overmanned, to keep people from being unemployed. This move has no purpose in the regeneration of British industry. It is part of the philosophy of this Government of which the social contract is an example, of which the Prime Minister's address on television is an example, of which the bland assurances which the Under-Secretary will give us from behind his bullet-proof spectacles will be another example. That philosophy is that all will be well if we do nothing and give the firm £50 million from an inexhaustible kitty being supplied by goodness knows who. That is called buying time. It is also buying trouble.
  Mr. Ian Gow: And votes.
  Mr. Fairbairn: Temporarily, perhaps. Not for long. Far from being in the interests of those who work in British Leyland, far less the subsidiary companies, it is extending the frightfulness of the penalty the Government will have to pay. But it is delaying it for a bit longer in the hope of saving the Government in the meantime.
  The Secretary of State for Industry, who I regret to see has left the Chamber, asked about the application of Section 332 of the Companies Act. What more relevant question could anyone have asked? He is the man who has told us that it did not apply to the unfortunate
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  creditors of Upper Clyde Shipbuilders, who were persuaded by the Government to go on supplying credit to an insolvent company and have now been left holding the debts. He is the person who wishes to perpetuate an identical situation and who will not put in his Bill any provision to save those who will suffer if the Government funk it when the cost rises from £50 million to £500 million to £5,000 million. Who will hold the debt and go to gaol under Section 332? The people who should go to gaol are on the Government Front Bench and I trust that they will.
  It appears to be the Government's intention to ruin the company by their policies and taxation, to put out the eyes of the people, mock them for their blindness and in perpetuity give them a subsidy to wander around with a white stick in the age of the technological revolution. There is no logic in what they are doing and there is no charity in it. Their pretence to be on the side of working people is false, it is a charade. What they want is power over working people not for working people, and they think that this is one way of getting it. I trust that the House will condemn them for their cynical attitude.
  11.20 p.m.
  Mr. David Crouch: I listened with great interest to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Kinross and West Perthshire (Mr. Fairbairn) who spoke with fervour in criticising the Government for their irresponsibility. I accept his criticism of the Government for their loose acceptance of the Ryder Report, but I cannot go all the way with him in his criticism of the Government's approach to the £50 million.
  I listened with great interest to the delightful speech made by my hon. Friend the Member for Brent, North (Dr. Boyson). I was amused, but not impressed, by its medieval overtones. There will always be differences between the two sides of the House, and I am not convinced—[Interruption.]—I am not prepared to allow the right hon. Member for Down, South (Mr. Powell) to interrupt me from a sedentary position, quietly as he always does. There is no more gracious man in the House than the right hon. Member, and I give way to him graciously.
  Mr. J. Enoch Powell: I rise simply to say that there is nothing specifically medieval about bankruptcy.
  Mr. Crouch: No, but there is something remarkably medieval about my hon. Friend the Member for Brent, North, although there is much in him that I admire. He spoke of his grandmother's mangle. I do not want to put BLMC through the mangle—
  Dr. Boyson rose—
  Mr. Crouch: Let me finish my sentence.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Myer Galpern): Order. After all, it was the family mangle of the hon. Member for Brent, North (Dr. Boyson) and the hon. Member for Canterbury (Mr. Crouch) should allow him to intervene.
  Mr. CrouchLet us hear about the mangle.
  Dr. Boyson: My Hon. Friend has not quite understood the purpose of my tale about the mangle. I did not suggest that British Leyland should go through the mangle—whether a medieval, nineteenth century or twentieth century mangle. My grandmother pointed out to me that if I got a finger stuck in the mangle and she turned the wheel I should go all the way through. I used that as an illustration of a painful process. My illustration—which I hope will be remembered in the House for a long time—was intended to show that paying this £50 million is like putting one's finger in the mangle. The wheel will turn and take one through. That was the basis of the analogy.
  Mr. Crouch: That is a very clear exposition. The £50 million is one finger in the mangle.
  Dr. Boyson: This is £100 million—two fingers.
  Mr. CrouchThere is nothing worse than mixing our metaphors. I have no intention of using two fingers in regard to British Leyland—but I want to change the metaphor now because we may get mangled in the process.
  I do not think that it would be wise—indeed, it would be irresponsible—after our criticism of the British Leyland situation, of the Ryder Report and of the
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  Government's decision to put so much of the taxpayers' money behind the imaginary success of British Leyland in future as detailed in the report, to take the hammer and try to break British Leyland up.
  I echo what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King). I will not take the hammer. It would be wrong. It would be irresponsible. I say in all earnestness to my hon. Friends, none of whom is irresponsible in this matter—if I use the word "medieval" it is in the House of Commons context, and I hope that it will be taken as such—that I do not think it would be right for us to take any decision which would be comparable to taking a hammer which could break this undertaking up.
  It is not a pleasure to see the possible break-up of British Leyland into many parts which would not necessarily be successful. One can talk about Rover, Triumph, Jaguar and other parts of British Leyland which could be successful on their own, but I am concerned about the total. At the moment, I am not prepared to accept much of what is in the Ryder Report—and there is much in it that is admittedly only in two-line sentences and does not say much—but I am equally not prepared to let British Leyland go on as it has been going on in the past, and no one in this House should be prepared to do that. Nor am I prepared to take a hammer at this stage, even if it is only a small one, and say, "I have done the right thing and broken it up". I am only saying that we must now give the management a chance, and, what is more, tell it so. We are considering the situation of any Government, and any Government might have this responsibility for 190,000 workers and many thousands of others in the Midlands and elsewhere associated with British Leyland. How many constituencies are not touched by British Leyland?
  Mr. Percy Grieve: My hon. Friend said that he was not prepared to let British Leyland go on as it has in the past. Does he not appreciate that this vast ingestion of public money into British Leyland is precisely an encouragement to it and to other industries throughout the country which do not appreciate the economic and financial realities of today to go on precisely as they have been doing in the past?
  Mr. Crouch: I agree with my hon. and learned Friend, I do not want to see British Leyland broken up because that would jeopardise so much in the country, but I accept that there is a danger that we might be feeding irresponsibility into the community, into the unions, into management and into the Government and all Members of Parliament. I accept that such irresponsibility can be fed by more and more money. Perhaps I am wrong. [Hon. Members: "Hear, hear".] I hope I have support elsewhere. At least my right hon. Friend the Member for Down, South, who never agrees, when he disagrees is so nice about it. Perhaps I shall not carry many of my hon. Friends with me in what I am saying, but I believe that we should take pause and give the Government this small opportunity, with the reservation that British Leyland cannot carry on as it has in the past.
  From my careful reading of the Ryder Report and my study of the matter, I believe that in British Leyland there has been inadequate rationalisation, an inadequate appreciation of the range of models, inadequate costing, inadequate pricing, inadequate management generally and—this I am sure we all accept—inadequate industrial relations management. There has been over-manning. Everyone knows it. It has to stop. There has to be better management, and better management will come by giving the management a chance now rather than taking a hammer to British Leyland.
  Mr. Norman Tebbit: Will my hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Crouch: Yes, very briefly.
  Mr. Tebbit: I thank my hon. Friend. It will save my attempting to make a speech. I have a difficulty, in which my hon. Friend can perhaps help me and persuade me of his point of view. I was not sent here because I thought I knew whether BLMC should make Minis or cars with a Jaguar or Triumph badge. I was sent here to look after my constituents' money. Is my hon. Friend willing, on the prospectus of the Ryder Report, to put his money into BLMC? Indeed, is the Minister willing to put his money into it? If not, why should I put my constituents' money into an operation into which my hon. Friend would not put his money?
  Mr. Crouch: I do not think I am being invited at this moment to put money into British Leyland. [Hon. Members: "Oh, yes, you are.") Very well. I have had money in unsuccessful ventures such as BSA and NVT. I have had experience in some of these problems.
  However, I do not want to detain the House. I have said that I am not prepared to tolerate inadequate rationalisation, but nor am I prepared—and this must be a warning, even if it is only from me, to the Government and to the Minister—to accept incompetent nationalisation if that is the outcome. All that I am talking about tonight is not taking a hammer, not trying to destroy, but trying to give the corporation an opportunity.
  11.31 p.m.
  Mr. Ian Gow: Almost exactly six months ago, on 18th December 1974, the Secretary of State came to the House of Commons at a quarter past 10 in the evening and made a speech which lasted for 11 minutes asking the House to approve a guarantee of £50 million for British Leyland. Tonight the Under-Secretary has spent three minutes in asking the House of Commons to approve a further guarantee of £50 million to British Leyland. On those grounds alone—the contrast between December and now, the contrast between the Secretary of State and the Under-Secretary, the contrast between the 11 minutes in December and the three minutes tonight—I believe that the House of Commons, as guardian of the nation's purse, would be justified in opposing this motion tonight.
  But there are other grounds as well, and the second ground is that if ever there were a time when the Government should act as trustee for the nation, this is it. It is the duty of a trustee to invest money wisely, and a trustee can be called to account for the way in which he invests the money with which he is entrusted. I do not believe that there is any justification for a trustee—and tonight I believe that the Government are acting as a trustee—investing another £50 million without any explanation and without any reason being given to the beneficiaries—all the people of this country—why this further £50 million is needed. It is a very grave dereliction of duty that the Under-Secretary should

  1569
  spend three minutes only in telling the House tonight why he is asking for another £50 million.
  The third reason why my hon. Friends and I will oppose the motion is that we believe that the granting of another £50 million at this time and in the circumstances can only be a further encouragement along precisely the road that the Prime Minister himself warned against in his speech last night at the CBI dinner.
  What will be the lesson drawn by industry if tonight this motion is passed'? The lesson will be drawn that despite the brave words of the Prime Minister last night it is the Secretary of State for industry who is running the Government.
  Mr. Kevin McNamara: I wish he were.
  Mr. Gow: I think that Labour Members below the Gangway can draw comfort tonight from what is happening. If ever there were a clear dichotomy between what the Prime Minister said last night and what the Under-Secretary of State is asking for tonight, it is to be seen in this further request for £50 million.
  The final reason for opposing this motion is that it will add still further to the public sector borrowing requirement at a time when we should be looking most zealously at ways of reducing any further increases in the sums which the Chancellor of the Exchequer is borrowing from abroad. For all those reasons my hon. Friends and I will oppose this motion.
  11.36 p.m.
  Mr. Kenneth Warren: The wheel has turned. It was the Secretary of State for Industry who created British Leyland and now, years later, he comes back and tells us that it did not quite work out and that the merger was not successful. We are now being asked to perpetuate that which has not been successful. Only last week the right hon. Gentleman gave an entirely different account of his views about mergers. On 14th May he said:
  "the idea that somehow a merger is the answer to the problems of a company does not now seem to be as sensible as at one time it seemed …".—[Official Report, 14th May 1975; Vol. 892, c. 463.]
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  That was said by the right hon. Gentleman when answering a question following the Ferranti statement, yet here we have the fantastic situation of the Secretary of State admitting that his business mechanisms are wrong. However, we are being asked to supply further taxpayers' money.
  We object to being asked to authorise the Secretary of State and his cronies to pay this money. Surely he is a discredited man. It is ridiculous that we should be asked to spend our time in this way when the right hon. Gentleman has already failed. Surely that is the most compelling reason of all to stop him in his tracks from taking British Leyland into the bankruptcy which will inevitably result. It is about time, if there is so much money available, that some money is used to back firms in which hard work and success do not find the reward from this Government that is needed.
  11.38 p.m.
  Mr. Meacher: Silently my right hon. and hon. Friends have been witnessing an interesting spectacle—namely, an internal debate within the Tory Party. It has been a debate full of contradictions and divisions. They have been all too apparent. With the possible exception of the hon. Member for Canterbury (Mr. Crouch), every Conservative Member has shown his deep contempt of and opposition to the line taken by his own Front Bench. They all opposed the kind of compromise that the hon. Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King) was forced to adopt. We can understand the hon. Gentleman's difficulties.
  Mr. Hall-Davies: I am sorry to keep the House for even 15 seconds, but the hon. Gentleman is telling an untruth. I made no reference at any point in my speech to the attitude expressed by my Front Bench. I put a series of direct questions to the hon. Gentleman which I hope he will answer.
  Mr. Meacher: The hon. Gentleman asked questions and I shall answer him, but it is clear—
  Hon. Members: Oh.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Myer Galpern): Order. If the House wishes to hear the reply, surely we can have a

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  little peace and quiet to allow the Minister to be heard.
  Mr. Meacher: The hon. Member for Bridgwater made it clear that he was not accepting the proposal of a receivership. He obviously fears the electoral consequences of adopting that as the official party line, even though his hon. Friends are only to eager to follow that line, as is all too obvious, but he resisted adopting the rather stronger, harsh-line Selsdon attitude of some of his hon. Friends. But he rather spoiled matters by saying that although he strongly objected to this money being given in the quantities in which it was being invested, he would not vote against the order. Indeed, he entered the caveat that he would not vote against the order provided that the time so bought was used for further studies. I would inform the hon. Gentleman that detailed studies have already taken place over a period of several months involving a whole string of professional advisers, and there have been visits to 35 plants or more and exhaustive discussions with the work force and with management.
  Mr. Tom King: I hope that the Minister will not debase the Opposition argument by suggesting that we are merely weighing the matter in terms of votes. The Secretary of State for Industry certainly made it clear that the matter of votes was his only consideration. We called not merely for further studies but for a realistic and effective solution to those studies which can produce an effective answer for British Leyland.
  Mr. Meacher: The hon. Gentleman calls for effective solutions, but Opposition Members are entirely inconsistent in their views. The solutions proposed by the hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine), the alternative put forward by the right hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior), and the rather tougher line taken by the number of his hon. Friends were all entirely different and showed the total split among the Opposition as to how the matters should be tackled. The hon. Gentleman certainly cannot say that there is any lack of information, because it is all contained in the Ryder Report.
  I turn to the speech made by the hon. Member for Morecambe and Lonsdale (Mr. Hall-Davis) who made a genuine
  1572
  contribution to the debate and asked for answers to three quite proper questions. First, he objected that the facts on which he believed judgments needed to be made were omitted from the Ryder Report, and he cited the fact that certain chapters had been cut out on grounds of commercial confidentiality. He perhaps does not realise it, but that is entirely contrary to the line taken by several of his hon. Friends, notably the hon. Member for Henley, in Committee. They suggested that the release of any kind of information about a company's future plans is bound to be damaging and could undermine the commercial interests of the firm concerned. Chapter 5 of the Ryder Report is concerned with product range and marketing, and that is an area of commercial sensitivity which it would be against the interests of the board, the working force and the nation as a whole to reveal. There was careful consideration as to what should be cut out. It was cut out not by the Government but by the Ryder team in the interests of British Leyland.
  Secondly, the hon. Gentleman asked who would carry the can in this operation. The hon. Gentleman mentioned the board. I hope that he accepts that the work force is included in that category. But he asked who would carry the can. We shall be implementing the Ryder proposals for a new system of works councils and committees along the lines suggested in that report. There is the closest collaboration between the board and Sir Don Ryder, as the Government's industrial adviser and chairman designate of the National Enterprise Board, under which British Leyland will ultimately come.
  The views expressed by the Opposition about the Ryder proposals will be made known publicly. There can be no question but that British Leyland management is by and large extremely pleased with the Ryder proposals.
  Mr. Ralph Howell: Will the hon. Gentleman tell us whether the unpublished part of the Ryder Report contained comparisons between British Leyland and its overseas competitors?
  Mr. Meacher: No. They were not cut out of the report. The information about production per man hour cannot be standardised because it is impossible to provide standardised comparisons with

  1573
  regard to the manufacture of heterogeneous products such as cars, trucks and buses. For that reason the Ryder Committee decided that such comparisons would be highly misleading and omitted them from the report. But they were not contained in the part of the report which was excised.
  Thirdly, I was asked to state whether employees would be informed of the implications of the Ryder Committee's proposals. I give a full assurance on that point. It is our intention that for the first time in the motor industry a planning agreement shall be made between the company and the Government. The basis of that will be that the items detailed in paragraph 15 of the White Paper on the regeneration of British industry must be discussed with the work force and receive the agreement and acceptance of the work force, otherwise no effective planning agreement can be made by the board with the Government.
  Mr. Hall-DavisWhen will that information be disclosed?
  Mr. Meacher: The Liberal spokesman, the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Wainwright), is entitled to receive an answer to his question. At the end of his speech, in a rather casual aside, which was all the more indicative, he said that British Leyland could look after itself. I submit that he got himself into a knot. He was asked, I think, by the hon. Member for Oswestry (Mr. Biffen), whether he believed in receivership. The hon. Gentleman replied that he did not. That was an important question. Will he provide for the continuance of this company? The alternative to receivership is presumably discontinuance. If he votes against this order, as is his declared intention, he is not permitting that alternative, either. It is a totally nonsensical position.
  Mr. Richard Wainwright: I rise because I have been deliberately misrepresented, not for the first time. Has the Minister any evidence, now that the Bill has received its Second Reading, that the banks would dream of foreclosing on British Leyland in its new form?
  Mr. Meacher: The hon. Gentleman cannot escape as easily as that. He is opposed to receivership, but he is also
  1574
  opposed to British Leyland receiving another £50 million from the banks, provided that sum is guaranteed by the Government as a result of this order. If he votes against the order he will block that. His position is wholly illogical.
  I think that I have spent too much time on what was said by the hon. Member for Henley and I should like to reply to the main point that has been made in the debate. The suggestion was that there should be a more comprehensive public investment strategy on the basis of which the allocation of so much money on a relatively concentrated area of the economy could be rationally decided. The key point is that the Government do not have the time that they would like in this matter. I do not know whether the hon. Member for Colne Valley was making mock of my right hon. Friend's words and trying to suggest that it was his misunderstanding budgetary control. With respect, the hon. Gentleman misunderstands the point.
  Mr. Michael Morris: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. The hon. Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Wainwright) did not mention any of the points that the Minister is now answering.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: That is not a point of order.
  Mr. Meacher: Several hon. Gentlemen opposite made points which had very little to do with the order and must have been straining the mind of the Chair as to their relevance.
  The point is that the Government had to take a decision and to act quickly. We have not the time to wait until September for the introduction of this rights issue of £200 million. We must act quickly. The position is stark. It is not possible to do what, I accept, the hon. Gentlemen would like to do in an ideal world.
  The concentration of investment in one area is probably a better way of providing aid than threadbare tenuous amounts spread throughout the economy. There is evidence to suggest that aid given in this way is not very effective. Because of the ramifications in other industries, this is probably as effective a way as providing assistance in engineering generally.

  1575
  The hon. Member for Eastbourne (Mr. Gow) indicated that there had been no explanation of what the order was for. There has been a full explanation. It is to guarantee the provision of £50 million in extra bank overdraft for British Leyland, because its existing overdraft is likely to run out in the early part of next month, and to provide a bridging loan until the money provided in the Bill, which has now been given a Second Reading, comes through.
  The arguments have been stated at considerable length. Contrary to the extreme divisions in the Opposition, which have been made only too apparent tonight, the only clear and consistent view which has come forward is that enshrined in the Bill. On that basis, I have no hesitation in commending the order to the House.
  Question put:—
  The House divided: Ayes 226, Noes 58.

  Division No. 217.]

  AYES

  [11.54 p.m.

  Allaun, Frank

  Faulds, Andrew

  Lyons, Edward (Bradford W.)

  Anderson, Donald

  Fernyhough, Rt. Hon. E.

  Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson

  Archer, Peter

  Fitch, Alan (Wigan)

  McCusker, H.

  Armstrong, Ernest

  Flannery, Martin

  Mackenzie, Gregor

  Ashton, Joe

  Fletcher, Raymond (Ilkeston)

  Mackintosh, John P.

  Atkinson, Norman

  Fletcher, Ted (Darlington)

  McMillan, Tom (Glasgow C.)

  Bagier, Gordon A. T.

  Ford, Ben

  McNamara, Kevin

  Bain, Mrs. Margaret

  Forrester, John

  Madden, Max

  Bates, Alf

  Fowler, Gerald (The Wrekin)

  Magee, Bryan

  Bean, R. E.

  Fraser, John (Lambeth, N'w'd)

  Mahon, Simon

  Benn, Rt. Hon. Anthony Wedgwood

  Freeson, Reginald

  Marks, Kenneth

  Bidwell, Sydney

  Garrett, John (Norwich S.)

  Marquand, David

  Blenkinsop, Arthur

  George, Bruce

  Meacher, Michael

  Boardman, H.

  Gilbert, Dr. John

  Mellish, Rt. Hon. Robert

  Booth, Albert

  Ginsburg, David

  Mikardo, Ian

  Bray, Dr. Jeremy

  Golding, John

  Millan, Bruce

  Brown, Hugh D. (Provan)

  Gould, Bryan

  Miller, Hal (Bromsgrove)

  Brown, Robert C. (Newcastle W.)

  Graham, Ted

  Miller, Dr. M. S. (E Kilbride)

  Brown, Ronald (Hackney S.)

  Grant, George (Morpeth)

  Miller, Mrs. Millie (Ilford N.)

  Buchanan, Richard

  Grant, John (Islington C.)

  Molloy, William

  Callaghan, Jim (Middleton & P.)

  Grocott, Bruce

  Moonman, Eric

  Campbell, Ian

  Hamilton, James (Bothwell)

  Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)

  Canavan, Dennis

  Hardy, Peter

  Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)

  Cant, R. B.

  Harper, Joseph

  Morris, Rt. Hon. J. (Aberavon)

  Carmichael, Neil

  Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)

  Mulley, Rt. Hon. Frederick

  Carter, Ray

  Hart, Rt. Hon. Judith

  Newens, Stanley

  Carter-Jones, Lewis

  Hatton, Frank

  Oakes, Gordon

  Cartwright, John

  Hayman, Mrs. Helene

  Ogden, Eric

  Castle, Rt. Hon. Barbara

  Heffer, Eric S.

  O'Halloran, Michael

  Clemitson, Ivor

  Henderson, Douglas

  O'Malley, Rt. Hon. Brian

  Cocks, Michael (Bristol S.)

  Hooley, Frank

  Ovenden, John

  Coleman, Donald

  Horam, John

  Owen, Dr. David

  Concannon, J. D.

  Hoyle, Doug (Nelson)

  Palmer, Arthur

  Conlan, Bernard

  Huckfield, Les

  Park, George

  Cook, Robin F. (Edin C.)

  Hughes, Rt. Hon. C. (Anglesey)

  Parker, John

  Corbett, Robin

  Hughes, Mark (Durham)

  Parry, Robert

  Cox, Thomas (Tooting)

  Hughes, Robert (Aberdeen, N.)

  Pavitt, Laurie

  Craigen, J. M. (Maryhill)

  Hunter, Adam

  Peart, Rt. Hon. Fred

  Crawshaw, Richard

  Irvine, Rt. Hon. Sir A. (Edge Hill)

  Pendry, Tom

  Cryer, Bob

  Irving, Rt. Hon. S. (Dartford)

  Perry, Ernest

  Cunningham, G. (Islington S.)

  Jackson, Colin (Brighouse)

  Phipps, Dr. Colin

  Cunningham, Dr. J. (Whiteh)

  Jackson, Miss Margaret (Lincoln)

  Prescott, John

  Dalyell, Tam

  Janner, Greville

  Price, C. (Lewisham W.)

  Davidson, Arthur

  Jeger, Mrs. Lena

  Price, William (Rugby)

  Davies, Bryan (Enfield N.)

  Jenkins, Hugh (Putney)

  Radice, Giles

  Davies, Denzil (Llanelli)

  Jenkins, Rt. Hon. Roy (Stechford)

  Reid, George

  Davies, Ifor (Gower)

  Johnson, James (Hull West)

  Richardson, Miss Jo

  Davis, Clinton (Hackney C.)

  Johnson, Walter (Derby S.)

  Roberts, Gwilym (Cannock)

  Deakins, Eric

  Jones, Alec (Rhondda)

  Roderick, Caerwyn

  Dean, Joseph (Leeds West)

  Jones, Barry (East Flint)

  Rodgers, George (Chorley)

  Dempsey, James

  Judd, Frank

  Rooker, J. W.

  Doig, Peter

  Kerr, Russell

  Roper, John

  Dormand, J. D.

  Kilroy-Silk, Robert

  Rose, Paul B.

  Douglas-Mann, Bruce

  Lamborn, Harry

  Ross, Rt. Hon. W. (Kilmarnock)

  Dunlop, John

  Lamond, James

  Rowlands, Ted

  Dunnett, Jack

  Leadbitter, Ted

  Ryman, John

  Dunwoody, Mrs. Gwyneth

  Lee, John

  Sandelson, Neville

  Edge, Geoff

  Lestor, Miss Joan (Eton & Slough)

  Sedgemore, Brian

  Edwards, Robert (Wolv SE)

  Lewis, Arthur (Newham N.)

  Shaw, Arnold (Ilford South)

  Ellis, Tom (Wrexham)

  Lewis, Ron (Carlisle)

  Short, Rt. Hon. E. (Newcastle C.)

  English, Michael

  Litterick, Tom

  Silkin, Rt. Hon. John (Deptford)

  Evans, John (Newton)

  Loyden, Eddie

  Sillars, James

  Ewing, Harry (Stirling)

  Lyon, Alexander (York)

  Silverman, Julius

  Small, William

  Tinn, James

  Williams, Rt. Hon. Shirley (Hertford)

  Smith, John (N Lanarkshire)

  Tomlinson, John

  Wilson, Alexander (Hamilton)

  Snape, Peter

  Urwin, T. W.

  Wilson, Gordon (Dundee E.)

  Spearing, Nigel

  Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne V.)

  Wilson, William (Coventry SE)

  Spriggs, Leslie

  Walker, Terry (Kingswood)

  Wise, Mrs. Audrey

  Stallard, A. W.

  Ward, Michael

  Woodall, Alec

  Stoddart, David

  Watkins, David

  Woof, Robert

  Stott, Roger

  Watkinson, John

  Wrigglesworth, Ian

  Strang, Gavin

  Weetch, Ken

  Young, David (Bolton E.)

  Strauss, Rt. Hon. G. R.

  Welsh, Andrew

  Taylor, Mrs. Ann (Bolton W.)

  White, Frank R. (Bury)

  TELLERS FOR THE AYES:

  Thomas, Mike (Newcastle E.)

  White, James (Pollok)

  Miss Betty Boothroyd

  Thomas, Ron (Bristol NW)

  Whitlock, William

  and Mr. John Ellis.

  Thompson, George

  Williams, Alan (Swansea W.)

  NOES

  Aitken, Jonathan

  Knight, Mrs. Jill

  Shepherd, Colin

  Beith, A. J.

  Lawrence, Ivan

  Sims, Roger

  Biffen, John

  Lawson, Nigel

  Skeet, T. H. H.

  Biggs-Davison, John

  Lloyd, Ian

  Spence, John

  Body, Richard

  Macfarlane, Neil

  Spicer, Jim (W Dorset)

  Bowden, A. (Brighton, Kemptown)

  McNair-Wilson, P. (New Forest)

  Stanbrook, Ivor

  Boyson, Dr. Rhodes (Brent)

  Marshall, Michael (Arundel)

  Steel, David (Roxburgh)

  Brotherton, Michael

  Mather, Carol

  Stokes, John

  Budgen, Nick

  Mayhew, Patrick

  Taylor, R. (Croydon NW)

  Clark, Alan (Plymouth, Sutton)

  Mills, Peter

  Tebbit, Norman

  Cope, John

  Moate, Roger

  Thorpe, Rt. Hon. Jeremy (N Devon)

  Cormack, Patrick

  Molyneaux, James

  Townsend, Cyril D.

  Fairbairn, Nicholas

  Morris, Michael (Northampton S.)

  Wainwright, Richard (Colne V.)

  Fletcher, Alex (Edinburgh N.)

  Morrison, Hon. Peter (Chester)

  Warren, Kenneth

  Fletcher-Cooke, Charles

  Nelson, Anthony

  Wiggin, Jerry

  Glyn, Dr. Alan

  Osborn, John

  Winterton, Nicholas

  Gow, Ian (Eastbourne)

  Pardoe, John

  Grieve, Percy

  Powell, Rt. Hon. J. Enoch

  TELLERS FOR THE NOES:

  Hannam, John

  Ridley, Hon. Nicholas

  Mr. Clement Freud

  Hordern, Peter

  Ross, Stephen (Isle of Wight)

  and Mr. Cyril Smith.

  Howell, Ralph (North Norfolk)

  Rost, Peter (SE Derbyshire)

  Question accordingly agreed to.
  Resolved,
  That this House authorises the Secretary of State to pay or undertake to pay sums by way of financial assistance under section 8 of the Industry Act 1972 in respect of a guarantee or guarantees to be given to the bankers of British Leyland Motor Corporation Limited and any of its subsidiaries covering borrowing facilities made available by the bankers to those companies, insofar as the amount paid or undertaken to be paid under the guarantee or guarantees is in excess of £50 million, being the maximum amount authorised by resolution of this House on 18th December 1974, but does not exceed £100 million.

  BRITISH LEYLAND (FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE)
    ADJOURNMENT
    Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Pavitt.]

  NATIONAL HEALTH SERVICE (COMPUTERS)
  12.4 a.m.
  Mr. Andrew Bowden: I am grateful for the opportunity to raise this subject in this Adjournment debate, and I am glad that the Minister of State is here to reply to it, in view of the number of Parliamentary Questions that I have put to him in recent months.
  1578
  I believe that there is a growing fear among many people about what I call "computer power". Computer power is the ability to record, keep and collate a great deal of information about every one of us, and it is a power which could be misused or exploited against the individual.
  I want to examine this growing computer power within the National Health Service. There are about 2,000 people involved in all types of work dealing with computers in the NHS. More than 100 of them are systems designers—men and women who are specialised in preparing new systems and new types of record in order to make the present system, as they see it, more efficient—combined with some 150 computer operators.
  I wish to make it clear that I do not accuse any of those involved in this work of anything other than the highest motives. But, in the long term, the position which could be created, as I hope to show in my later comments, is more frightening than that in George Orwell's "1984".
  I want to examine the Annual Review of National Health Service Computing 1974, Parts 1 and 2. I find these documents both fascinating and frightening. They are fascinating because they are

  1579
  clearly well thought out, with the idea of building up a massive number of computer record systems within the NHS based, initially anyhow, upon the regional health authorities. They are frightening because they will mean that the medical records of children to come will go on to a computer from the moment that they are born to the moment that they die.
  I quote from Part 1, where the intentions are clearly stated. Section 13 on page 8 says:
  "Since the last Review in 1973 the work of Regional computer installations has continued to grow and the reorganisation of the NHS has brought with it not only a need for improved management information systems but also responsibility for work previously undertaken by local health authorities, which itself was growing. There is no doubt that the range of computing activities in the NHS is expanding and will continue to expand for many years ahead."
  There we are told openly what the intentions are.
  A look at some of the computer records that the Department wishes to set up builds up an alarming picture. I take, for example, the Multipurpose Child Surveillance computer record on page 79 of Part 2. There we read:
  "In general, a computer-held record is established with the birth of the child."
  That is priority No. 1.
  Then I move to the Surveillance Registers computer record:
  "These records give information on those members of the population at risk of developing various diseases or disabilities."
  I submit that that could have a very wide interpretation.
  Then we come to a Pre-Registration Hospital Record. This would mean that in advance of patients attending at hospital, to this first record would be added all the patient's subsequent hospital records.
  We then run into the In-Patients Admissions Computer Records System. I quote from page 108:
  "Retrieval of previous information as appropriate is carried out … providing relevant data for a variety of purposes."
  Then we come to the point when we are discharged from hospital. We have the Discharge Computer Record System, which involves the transfer of information to other health agencies.
  1580
  However, it is in relation to the next batch of systems that I find the greatest cause for worry and concern about the future. These are called the Personal Medical Record Systems, which include systems for a basic patient record, an abbreviated patient record, an extended clinical record—the final aim of this is to eliminate written hospital or GP case notes entirely—a personal health record, and then an integrated patient record, with information about both hospital and GP treatment.
  Any of those record systems taken in isolation may not appear very important, but when one looks at them together to see what the aim and the intention is, one appreciates that it will mean a very comprehensive record of the entire medical history, experience and life of every man, woman and child in the country.
  Many of these developments are in the future. As I said, they will be based on the regional health authorities. But if these systems are set up they will inevitably lead—perhaps the Minister will confirm this—to a national computer record. A number of questions arise from these proposals and intentions and the general thinking of the Department at present.
  The first relates to confidentiality. As the Minister will know, I am not a tremendous fan of the Lane Report in many of its aspects, but on page 99 at paragraph 316 these words are used:
  "There is another aspect of confidentiality to which we desire to draw attention. Confidentiality should be preserved not only in respect of communications between doctor and patient but also in relation to communications between doctors and to reports of all kinds, including social reports."
  If systems of the type I have outlined are set up and are working as I am sure they are intended to work, confidentiality will go out of the window. It will mean that many people will not feel totally and completely free to talk to their doctors about any and every problem. Men or women who talk to their GP about their sexual problems or other difficulties do so at present in the firm and complete knowledge that anything they say to their doctor will never go outside the room. Once records are built up in the way proposed and thought of in the National Health Service, that will not be the case.

  1581
  As more information is stored, the chances of theft and misuse become more tempting and more likely. What about the type of information which will inevitably go on to the discs and tapes, which would record that a woman had had a child before marriage, or an abortion, or that a man had been an alcoholic in his teens or twenties? All this sort of information would be bound to end up on such a computerised system. This could gravely damage confidence between doctors and patients.
  Mistakes are inevitable. How can they ever be put right once they are recorded on this massive system? In a Written Answer on 28th January, the Minister told me:
  "A patient, whether an in-patient or an outpatient, has no right to examine the medical records relating to him"—[Official Report. 28th January 1975; Vol. 885, c. 90.]
  When this computerised system is more advanced, the Department will have to find ways and means by which records can be checked or disputed to ensure protection for patients. The problem needs a new approach.
  There are four great dangers in computer power. First, when conflicts arise between individuals and the authorities, like the National Health Service, the individual is at a disadvantage now. When faced with a computer which stores information, perhaps linked to other computers, he will be at an monumental disadvantage. Second, information obtained now for perfectly good reasons could be misused in future, intentionally or accidentally, and the risk will increase as the system becomes more sophisticated.
  Third, once established, computer systems are difficult to destroy. A computer can be dismantled, but that will happen rarely. Even then, a more efficient machine will be installed. To be effective, one would have to get hold of the records—tapes, discs or microfilm. So their power increases. Fourth, there could be errors of information which are difficult to correct and which could easily and gravely damage an individual.
  New laws are needed to establish a strong inspection body, to enforce stringent checks and safeguards, to control tapes, discs and microfilm. One day, someone will think of linking up all the computers in the great Departments
  1582
  of State. If that happens, the individual will lose his privacy and freedom and will be at the mercy of an all-powerful and inhuman system.
  12.19 a.m.
  The Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Security (Dr. David Owen): The hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Mr. Bowden) has raised an important subject, which he discussed as "computer power". Discussion of this subject should be open. The documents he quoted were documents that I sent to him in the belief that the wider the discussion and the greater the information about these developments the better. So I do not take the view that this area should be swept aside. The more we consider the problems involved the better.
  I do not therefore propose to describe in detail the wide range of activities applied within the National Health Service, described in the two volumes which I have sent to the hon. Member. In many areas, for example financial and administrative work, their use reflects accepted commercial and industrial practice. In those areas, as a major employer—the largest single employer in the country—we would be expected to be using the newest techniques. I propose to limit my remarks to those activities on which the hon. Gentleman concentrated, mainly where computers handle information about patients. In looking at these activities it is necessary to keep a clear distinction between those activities which are common within the NHS and those which are limited to a small number of experimental sites.
  There are only a few applications involving patients' data which extend throughout the NHS. The only computing facilities operating throughout the NHS are those provided by the installations managed by regional health authorities which provide bureau facilities for their areas and districts. All regions either have a computer which can provide facilities on the scale required or share one as a temporary measure. It is these computers which process the administrative and financial applications of health authorities. At the present time the main application which they process involving data on patients is the statistical work arising from "Hospital Activity Analysis".

  1583
  This system has been progressively introduced into the NHS over the past six years. Its main purposes are to give individual doctors a summary of data on his patients and to provide an aggregation of such data for general clinical and management purposes. Coded data on diagnosis and operations are held by the computer. Patients' names are not generally required for hospital activity analysis and are usually obliterated before data capture forms leave the hospital. Some authorities do however include this item in response to a request from clinicians for named clinical summaries. Addresses are not included, residence details being reduced to a code so that catchment areas can be analysed. Over 90 per cent of non-psychiatric hospitals participate in this scheme.
  In future these regional machines are likely to process the registration and other work of family practitioner committees. A pilot study in this area has been encouraging and a further trial is to be mounted. Under this system the identification details of patients on doctors' lists would be held on computers with the primary purpose of calculating the remuneration of general practitioners but not clinical information.
  Another widespread application is to be found in the field of child health. A large number of local health authorities had systems prior to the reorganisation of the NHS and many area health authorities have continued to operate these systems on local government computers. The most common use and one which has been most beneficial, is the administration of immunisation procedures which ensure that GPs and parents are informed when further immunisation is due. The main items of data held relate to identification details about attendances and immunisations, which are crucial to the system. I would add that it is quite widely believed that the use of computers for this purpose has contributed to the high immunisation rates achieved in many parts of this country. I believe it has been a successful use.
  These are the only widespread applications in use or envisaged at present. In addition there is a good deal of experimental activity but the number of sites involved is relatively small. Fourteen
  1584
  projects are being financed by my Department to explore the extent to which computers can be used to improve the management of hospital resources. These experiments inevitably involve the computer holding details about patients since hospitals revolve around the needs of patients. We cannot exclude that. The tasks for which these computers are used include making out-patient appointments, maintaining waiting lists for admission, and handling the administrative procedures involved in admitting and discharging patients. Identification details and some limited clinical information, for example, diagnosis and operation planned, are needed to carry out these tasks.
  Some systems go a little further and hold what amounts to an abbreviated version of the medical record. This is what has mainly concerned the hon. Gentleman. The intention is that data on patients should be readily available at all times, a situation not always possible with a manual system. To have such details as current diagnosis, blood group, drug therapy and known drug sensitivities available can be of particular value in an emergency. I should add that in no case does the computer contain the entire clinical record and in no case does it replace the existing case notes, which are still maintained manually. I do not want to exclude that situation from developing.
  In addition to these systems there are a larger number, financed both by my Department and by health authorities out of their normal budgets, which involve a small computer dedicated to a particular scientific or clinical use. Many are in pathology or radiology departments. These systems hold identification details of patients to enable requests for investigations and tests and their results to be handled speedily. There is a growing demand for tests and investigations of all sorts and it is hoped that computers will be able to solve the problems posed by the clerical processing of requests and reports.
  Only one of the experimental projects handles general practitioner records and there are currently no immediate plans to extend this work or to mount further experiments of this nature. The family practitioner committee system I have already mentioned will not hold medical data, merely identification details.

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  I should like to mention the particular use of a computer for organ matching purposes. The South Western Regional Health Authority machine holds a file of over 900 potential recipients of kidney transplants in the United Kingdom. When a kidney becomes available, details of the matching characteristics are telephoned to the National Tissue Typing Reference Laboratory at Bristol and fed into the computer, which makes complex comparisons with the characteristics of potential recipients and produces results in the form of the best matches. The organ matching service and the doctors concerned agree the distribution of the kidneys and arrangements are made for their transportation. The possibility of introducing an international organ matching service is being explored by the EEC.
  I should at this point stress again that in relation to the number of hospitals in the NHS, the number who have any form of computer is very small. We are still experimenting with the use of computers in the administration of health care, and it is still too early to say whether the benefits of using a computer will compare sufficiently favourably with the costs to justify their wider use. It is, however, my belief that, given the demands for health care and the limited resources available, we should be looking at new methods of using computers to see whether we can make better use of our limited resources.
  The conduct of these experiments, however, must involve the use of data relating to individual patients and to that extent I share the hon. Gentleman's concern that adequate steps should be taken to safeguard the confidentiality of such data. The planning of an experimental computer project requires a real partnership between professionals in health care and in computing. Medical and nursing staff participate in all stages of the development of a project and bring to this work the traditions and ethics of their professions. They are dealing all the time with manual records of patients, and the standards of confidentiality used on them have to be applied to computer records. They are determined to maintain or even improve upon the traditional confidentiality of the doctor-patient and nurse-patient relationship. In the course of their involvement some have come to
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  the view that, rather than pose a threat, computers can provide a higher standard of security and confidentiality of patient information. There are some doctors and nurses who are worried about the proposals.
  My Department has both encouraged the active participation of medical and nursing staff in the design of these systems, in itself an important safeguard, and issued advice to authorities managing experiments on methods for keeping data secure, and on a whole range of aspects. This advice covers such matters as the physical security of computer installations and equipment; the storage of computer records; built-in safeguards such as limiting access to certain data to particular classes of person and times of the day—for instance, while the out-patients' department is open; methods of identifying people seeking access to information, such as passwords; methods for logging access to information; and advice on the clauses to be written into staff contracts to bring home to the staff the serious nature of any breach of confidentiality.
  The hon. Gentleman suggested that patients ought to be able to see their medical record, particularly when it is held on a computer. In my view the fact that some part of the medical record is held on a computer is secondary to the general principles governing the disclosure to patients of the content of their medical record. The same issues arise whether it is a traditional manual record or a computer record. The hon. Gentleman has a point in what he says about the transfer of such information but, as I have explained, there are considerable safeguards in that respect.
  A patient—whether in a hospital or of a general practitioner—has no right as such to know the contents of the medical records relating to him. It is for his doctor to decide, in his professional judgment, what information should be given to the patient.
  I know that many people take the view that they are entitled to know as much about their own state of health as their doctor does. Others—and I believe that most doctors in this country agree—think that how much a patient should know depends on a large number

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  of different factors, and especially on the patient's own circumstances.
  There will certainly always be some cases where a doctor is convinced that it would not be in the patient's well-being for him to have access to his full medical record, and, indeed, that this could be severely distressing. There cannot be any hard and fast rule about such matters. The long-standing policy of my Department has been, and remains, that it would not be right to attempt to intervene in professional medical opinion on matters of this kind. If we were to make a change in relation to computers, we would have to make a change for overall records. It is for the doctor to decide, in his professional opinion, which information should be given. I think that there is already a great deal more openness and frankness between doctors and patients in discussing medical conditions.
  So far as the accuracy of a patient's record is concerned, the prime difficulty is in deciding who can form a judgment. Apart from basic factual information, most of a case note involves professional judgments by doctors. Whether it is correct or not is therefore largely a question of medical opinion. I cannot see how we could make available what may be only an opinion or even a query put forward by a doctor to alert another doctor who may be giving treatment in future.
  In the event of a patient gaining access to his record and disagreeing with what is found there, the matter can be resolved only by a discussion between the patient and the doctor concerned. This is getting into the whole intimacy of the doctor-patient relationship, an area in which it would be difficult and unsuitable for the Department to lay down regulations.
  There has been some concern over the length of time records may be kept, and the possibility of their becoming a source of embarrassment in later years. Case
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  notes are weeded at the end of each episode and some are retained for six to seven years in case they are required as evidence in legal proceedings. Certain records are retained in hospital beyond this time, for example because the patient's malady is of a continuing or recurrent nature or because there are features of the case which may assist with research. One would have to consider that aspect, too. I do not think that all these questions can be divorced from the whole consideration of information being given to patients.
  I am satisfied that the confidentiality of the information held on the computer systems which I have described is adequately safeguarded and I can assure the hon. Member that no proposal for linking health information on a national basis would proceed without full public discussion. We would not want to wake up and find that it had suddenly occurred.
  We should be prepared to discuss these issues. I think that the hon. Gentleman's main anxiety was if this information, taken in the context of medical treatment and for the Department of Health, were to be made available to other Departments and other areas of Government. I agree that the transferability of information is a much more serious issue and raises fundamental questions of privacy, which the Government are looking at. But if one confines the question within the medical system, there is wide access already to medical records in transfer from doctor to doctor and for medical research which goes beyond particular districts—
  The Question having been proposed after Ten o'clock on Wednesday evening and the debate having continued for half an hour, Mr. DEPUTY SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.
  Adjourned at twenty-six minutes to One o'clock.