WEST GERMANY (Hansard, 13 July 1976)

§ Q2. Mr. Adley
asked the Prime Minister if he will pay an official visit to West Germany.

§ Mr. Foot
I have been asked to reply.
As the hon. Member will know, my right hon. Friend visited the Federal Republic of Germany on 30th June, but he has no plans to do so again in the immediate future.

§ Mr. Adley
Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the German National Tourist Board has recently been allocated more resources for the attraction of foreign visitors, in contradistinction to the attitude of Her Majesty's Government, who constantly seem to be attacking service industries in general and tourism in particular, thus causing, for instance, the Chairman of the English Tourist Board to claim that the development land tax will hamper the development of tourism throughout the country? [HON. MEMBERS: "Declare your interest."] Would the right hon. Gentleman—

§ Mr. Speaker
Order. From both sides we have had long questions, and long questions in Prime Minister's Question Time are selfish questions. Mr. Adley, to finish.

§ Mr. Adley
Will the right hon. Gentleman invite the Prime Minister to discuss this matter personally with Herr Schmidt the next time they meet?

§ Mr. Foot
I do not know whether it is necessary to have such discussions and I do not know the exact comparison between the figures spent on tourism in both countries. I should think that the figures also show—this is a guess, but I imagine that it is correct—that many 365 more visitors come to this country than go to West Germany.

§ Mr. Spearing
Is my right hon. Friend aware that the previous time that the Prime Minister went to Germany he went to the Ubersee Club in Hamburg, where he gave an excellent address on the basis of the future of the Community, in which he suggested that the nations of the Community should co-operate, without one country imposing its will on the other? The Prime Minister said that it was his personal view, and my right hon. Friend the Member for Huyton (Sir H. Wilson) said that he agreed. Is it not time that the Government now came to that view themselves?

§ Mr. Foot
The Prime Minister will be returning from Brussels tomorrow and will be making a statement to the House on the discussions that he has had there. My right hon. Friend is of age and he can speak for himself.

§ Mr. Tugendhat
Will the right hon. Gentleman ask the Prime Minister to confer with Herr Schmidt about the absolute shambles of the position into which Germany and Britain got at the recent UNCTAD conference? No one would expect the British Government to accept proposals with which they disagree, but the inflexibility and lack of constructiveness of the British and German positions harmed the Community, the developing world and, most important, this country.

§ Mr. Foot
I know that there were criticisms of what occurred at the UNCTAD conference, but it has also been said by several of my hon. Friends who took a special interest in the matter—including my right hon. Friend the Member for Lanark (Mrs. Hart)—that it was the Prime Minister's intervention which assisted in the last days of that conference, and that that showed the British Government's interest in the matter.

§ Mr. Ashton
With regard to tourism, is the deputy Prime Minister aware that there are nevertheless many instances right now of exploitation and rackets, particularly as outlined in the London Evening News this week? Will he, in his other capacity, set up a Select Committee to examine tourism and perhaps probe some of the allegations made?

§ Mr. Foot
I am not sure whether Select Committees are always the best bodies to examine these matters, but I shall seriously consider what my hon. Friend has said.

§ Mr. Charles Morrison
When the Prime Minister next visits Germany, officially or unofficially, will the right hon. Gentleman ask him to make efforts to discover the connection between the success of the German economy and the German electoral system, which has so much in common with the recent suggestion of the Hansard Society?

§ Mr. Foot
I do not know whether anyone would seriously suggest that the German economic position is due to the electoral system there. One of the matters which the Prime Minister discussed with the German Chancellor when he was there, and which is certainly a subject that I would have thought was connected with industrial performance, was the whole question of industrial democracy. They had very interesting exchanges on that matter and I believe that those exchanges can help this country to progress further and more speedily in that direction.