HC Deb 28 October 1975 vol 898 cc1285-7
Q1. Mr. David Steel

asked the Prime Minister if the public speech given by the Secretary of State for Employment at Blackpool on Wednesday 1st October, on economic policy, represents the policy of Her Majesty's Government.

The Prime Minister (Mr. Harold Wilson)

My right hon. Friend did not speak from a prepared script, but in the light of the Press reports and television recordings of extracts from his speech which I have seen, the answer is clearly "Yes, Sir".

Mr. Steel

Is the Prime Minister aware that I had the advantage over him of being present at the Tribune rally on that occasion? I greatly enjoyed the speech in question, but I found it remarkable. The Secretary of State's message was that the Labour movement should rally behind the present Government until they have an adequate parliamentary majority to introduce public ownership on a vast and unimagined scale. If that is the Government's policy, how does he think it will affect their current appeals to private industry to invest? Is it not like saying to a man "We are going to shoot you, but will you please lay in good food supplies for the future?"

The Prime Minister

I accept that the hon. Member for Roxburgh, Selkirk and Peebles (Mr. Steel) had the advantage over me. I think that all parties welcomed his presence in Blackpool with the BBC on that occasion. All the reports I have seen justify the answer I have given. The Government are carrying out the manifestos on which we fought the last two elections. Anything beyond that is a question for the manifesto for the next election, which we shall win as well.

Mr. Tomlinson

Is my right hon. Friend aware that the major deficiency in our economic policy has nothing to do with the Secretary of State for Employment, but with the failure of the Opposition to come clean and tell us what they are going to do by way of the public expenditure cuts they keep telling us about?

The Prime Minister

Since the Opposition are concentrating mainly on public expenditure, I am still awaiting a message from the Leader of the Opposition to say what they would cut.

Mrs. Thatcher

Is the Prime Minister aware that under his Government we have had record inflation, record unemployment, record borrowing and record taxation? Why, then, does he display record complacency and record incompetence?

The Prime Minister

It must have taken most of the morning to draft that—[Interruption.] I can answer these important questions only if I can be heard, in view of the mechanical defects which exist today. The right hon. Lady will know from the record of her Government, from which she dissociates herself on almost every question, that the decline in industrial production began under that Government—and she never complained about it then—and that her own newspapers were saying that they should go to the country in January last year because of an expectation of 18 per cent. inflation that year.