HC Deb 22 March 1976 vol 908 cc168-76

10.27 p.m.

Mrs. Judith Hart (Lanark)

In this Adjournment debate I wish to deal with the subject of unemployment in the area of Lesmahagow—an employment exchange in the County of Lanarkshire which now has the highest unemployment rate in the United Kingdom. In the past it had an unemployment rate of 29 per cent. That figure now stands at 22 per cent. I know that my right hon. Friend the Minister of State, Scottish Office, will agree that the area has a persistent unemployment problem.

Perhaps I may set out the history of the problem. In the early 1960s Lesmahagow was an area consisting predominantly of miners and associated workers. During the 1960s pit closures in Scotland led to the displacement of miners and consequently to growing unemployment in the area. This was largely inevitable. There were doubts and arguments about the pace of closures in Scotland during the 1960s, but what was clear was that, give or take a year or two, the Southern Lanarkshire coalfields did not have a future. Furthermore, there were geological difficulties which meant that the area was almost doomed, either at that time or within a few years, to pit closures.

The area was not at the centre of the argument about fuel policy. It was an area about which there were great doubts. Pits in the area took advantage of the Labour Government's subsidy for maintaining them on social grounds. One of the last pits to be closed—Auchlochan, in Coalburn—was kept open for over a year as a result of the social subsidy.

Ultimately our pits were closed. We now have a few miners in the area who travel to pits in Ayrshire. Other than that we rely on the limited amount of employment that has been provided on the small industrial estates in Lesmahagow and in villages such as Douglas. These estates are in villages lying just off the main artery of the A74, which is undergoing a number of improvements to bring it up to motorway standard. We hope that it will reach that standard in a few years. In those villages there are various small factories which would not have come into being without the policies pursued by the Labour Government between 1964 and 1970. All were created during that period.

What do they provide? They provide most valuable jobs—140 here, 40 in another factory, 50 elsewhere. Many of the jobs are for women. Male unemployment in the area has continued to worsen. Since 1969—and I remember, because I was a member of the Cabinet, telling my Cabinet colleagues that in my constituency I had a 29 per cent. unemployment rate—we have remained in this desperate situation, with deep male unemployment. I know that the Minister of State is fully aware of this. I do not expect from him a final answer to the problem tonight.

What is relevant is that since 1968, to my knowledge, there has been the proposal for a new town at Stonehouse.

Stonehouse lies in the northern part of my constituency and is just five minutes away from the A74. Since 1968–69 there has been a clear understanding that a new town was likely to be developed at Stonehouse. We have gone through the various phases of Government decision. The Labour Government's decision was confirmed by the Conservative Government which followed. We have had a public inquiry, designation, and the beginning of building work. The main purpose of this new town for my constituency, and, I believe, for the Government, was to resolve the unemployment problem of these neglected towns and villages of South Lanarkshire following pit closures.

A new town, whether large or small, creates an industrial and social environment to which industry is attracted. This has been the experience with every new town in Britain. My hon. Friend the Member for East Kilbride (Dr. Miller)— I represented his constituency at one time—will confirm that. New towns have something extra in terms of the total environment that industrial estates, advance factories and people who are dedicated to introducing industry to areas which need jobs can achieve.

Had it not been that since 1968–69 it had been confidently expected that the new town of Stonehouse would go ahead, other things might have happened. For example, the then Board of Trade, replaced by the Department of Industry in its responsibilities, and recently succeeded by the Scottish Office in its responsibilities, might have taken a different attitude to the 22 per cent. unemployment rate in the Lesmahagow area, had it not been confidently assumed that Stonehouse new town would go ahead and that it would, even with a delay of three or four years, be the answer to the problems of the villages and small towns in my constituency still suffering from the effects of the pit closures of the 1960s.

My right hon. Friend the Minister of State has been very good about meeting all the conflicting interests. He granted the chairman of my district council and myself a full hour's meeting when we came to put our point of view to him. Three days ago I had a very friendly and constructive meeting with the members of the Strathclyde Regional Council who oppose the decision to continue with Stonehouse new town.

There are two deeply-held economic and philosophical views. One is that if we continue with Stonehouse new town we shall diminish the capacity of the West of Scotland conurbation—I carefully do not say "Glasgow"—to revive and revitalise its area. The other view is that to revitalise an area one does not necessarily have to create industry in the centre of a conurbation. One can contemplate, although it is a new thought, that people do not necessarily travel into a conurbation to work; they may travel out from it to work. Indeed, the more thought one gives this proposition the more attractive it is, because it would solve the traffic and employment problems and, for the people who travel out to work it would not detract from the vitality of living in the city.

There is also the possibility—I know that my right hon. Friend the Minister of State is well aware of it—that one need not go ahead with the original concept of the target population of Stone-house new town in order to meet the industrial needs of the area. It is possible, as the East Kilbride and Stone-house Development Corporation believes, to have a modified population target, providing for a transfer of fewer people in housing and population terms but nevertheless creating the essential total environment that will succeed in attracting industry.

I am sure my right hon. Friends will give most serious consideration to finding a way through the dilemma that we are facing in the conflict between the regional council and the views of all my constituents of every party and the Lanark District Council. Unemployment in my constituency is the worst in the United Kingdom, and the situation demands the continuance of the industrial element in the development at Stonehouse new town.

We are at a new point in our consideration of new town development. I have lived in a new town, worked on research for a new town development corporation, and represented a new town. The vision of the 1940s is not necessarily a vision for all time. We need to consider the regeneration and revitalisation of the conurbations, but if a change of policy is required in the light of careful, thoughtful reconsideration of the objectives and the need to reconcile housing and employment in terms of the regeneration cities, the right moment to do that is not when one betrays the expectations, hopes and what seemed certainties of resolving the highest rate of unemployment in the United Kingdom.

10.43 p.m.

Mr. Alexander Wilson (Hamilton)

I wish to support my right hon. Friend the Member for Lanark (Mrs. Hart) in this crucial debate. I hope that my right hon. Friends on the Front Betch will take cognisance of the debate but that it will not engender bitterness because of Press statements and the utterances of some people on the Strathclyde Regional Council who have misinterpreted the term "urban deprivation"

I have lived in this area all my life. We have lost thousands of jobs, and I have seen pit closures right through my native village and into my own neighbouring constituency of Hamilton. We have lost 25,000 mining jobs in the past 20 years, at least 2,000 railway jobs in the last 15 years, and at least 1,000 jobs in the knitwear industry. When my hon. Friend receives the representatives from Strathclyde Regional Council will he ask them whether they know the meaning of the term "rural deprivation"?

For long this area has hoped that the Labour Government would come to a concrete, quick decision to establish a new town in the Stonehouse area. It was pressure from the Labour Party that forced the previous Tory Government to raise their sights in relation to housing development in the area. We have now reached the stage at which we have accepted the concept of the new town. My hon. Friend the Member for East Kilbride (Dr. Miller), who is in his place as usual, knows how industry is attracted when a new town is envisaged by central Government.

I throw my full weight behind my right hon. Friend the Member for Lanark on behalf of my constituency. I may be using harsh words, but the utterances of certain members of the Strathclyde regional authority are made through sheer ignorance of the locality. The convenor of that authority said that if Stonehouse went ahead, Larkhall, in my constituency, would become a ghost town. My view is that if Stonehouse does not go ahead Larkhall will become a ghost town. In Larkhall the unemployment rate is far too high for comfort. Why has a factory of 127,000 sq. ft. been empty for years? A new town in Stonehouse would attract the necessary industry, as the Director of East Kilbride and Stonehouse Development Corporation says. The new town will be a saviour in the area. Lanark District Council and Hamilton District Council are both agreed on the necessity of setting up Stonehouse new town. There has been a public hearing, and my constituency and Lanark constituency have said that the setting up of the new town would alleviate the urban deprivation from which the area has suffered for so long.

I intervene in the debate because a large area in my constituency, including Larkhall, Netherburn and Ashgill, is involved. The evidence is there, the hearings have been held, the local authorities have put their evidence, and the Members of Parliament in the areas involved have made their representations. It is time for the Government to make up their mind and decide that Stonehouse new town should go ahead.

10.49 p.m.

The Minister of State, Scottish Office (Mr. Bruce Millan)

My right hon. Friend the Member for Lanark (Mrs. Hart) put her case in a fair and moderate way, but I know that she feels extremely strongly about the problems of this area and, in particular, about the uncertainty that has inevitably been created by the decision of the Strathclyde Regional Council that it would wish the proposed Stonehouse new town to be abandoned.

I start by saying something about the new town, which is the key factor in the Lesmahagow situation. As my right hon. Friend knows, I have had meetings about this matter not only with the regional council but with the East Kilbride and Stonehouse Development Corporation, and with the Hamilton and Lanark district councils. My right hon. Friend was present. I can fairly say, therefore, that I have some understanding of the different points of view on this issue. As my right hon. Friend has said, there are two strongly held points of view, and the final decision, which is for the Secretary of State, is not easy.

The regional council has taken the strategic decision that, in producing its regional report, it will have a number of objectives, of which the most important are to arrest the present drain of population from the main conurbations of the region to other parts of the region or out-with it and to revitalise the economic heart of the region and improve the social and economic conditions of those living in areas of poor opportunities and urban deprivation, whether in Glasgow or other parts of the region.

These main objectives are very much in line with the Government's thinking for the region as a whole in this matter, as my right hon. Friend appreciates. We have to listen extremely carefully to anything that the regional council says, because by statute it is specifically the regional planning authority for the area.

On the other hand, there is a very strong case for Stonehouse new town. That case was looked at in 1974 by the Government in the then context of recommendations from certain planners that Stonehouse should no longer go ahead. At that time—this was before the establishment of the regional council and its appraisal of the situation—we accepted, and it was a balanced decision, that the new town should go ahead.

We agreed to the go-ahead for very much the reasons that my right hon. Friend the Member for Lanark and my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton (Mr. Wilson) have indicated. We believed and still believe, that a new town at Stonehouse would be a very attractive site for new jobs, not only for the immediate area but for the region as a whole. Indeed, the site itself is extremely attractive. We had in mind at the time, and have in mind now, that there are certain areas around Stonehouse—Larkhall and Lesmahagow included—where there are very serious unemployment problems. They did and do look to Stonehouse new town as an important contribution towards the solution of those problems.

We accept that the regional council has adopted a strategy to which it has given a good deal of thought, that in its essential principles is very much in line with what the Government would like to see it do for the region. On the other hand, that strategy involves it, as it believes, in abandoning the new town, which, however, is looked upon as being equally important for the area concerned in solving these very difficult problems of unemployment.

Any decision that we reach on this matter is not going to be easy, and if a decision were taken—no decision has yet been reached—to abandon the new town, it should not be taken as an indication that we have abandoned all hope for the area and in particular it should not be taken as any kind of indication that we are not concerned with the extremely serious problems of Lesmahagow and other parts of my right hon. Friend's constituency.

When I met my right hon. Friend some weeks ago, I promised to visit the area, and I did so quite unofficially. I hope that she does not mind my having done that. I did not meet anyone officially from the regional council or from local authorities in the area. I made a quite unofficial visit less than a fortnight ago, on 12th March, so that I could see the area for myself. I accept what my right hon. Friend said about the area, about its history, and about the very serious problems that there are, especially in Lesmahagow at present.

There is a sense in which the unemployment figures are misleading, for certain technical reasons. However, I do not place any emphasis on that, because even if some of the technical considerations are eliminated one is still left with a severe and long-standing unemployment situation in the Lesmahagow area—a situation that has been accentuated by the fact that the Turfholm mill, which used to provide a good deal of employment in Lesmahagow—

Mrs. Hart

That was for women.

Mr. Millan

I accept that, but it is not providing any kind of employment at all at present, and that is one of the serious aspects of the situation in Lesmahagow.

Just as the previous Labour Government gave special attention to Lesmahagow by giving it special development area status in November 1967—

Mrs. Hart

I apologise for interrupting my right hon. Friend, but will he kindly note that in this discussion of the desperate situation concerning my constituency, there is no representative of the Scottish National Party present?

Mr. Alexander Wilson

That goes for my constituency, too.

Mr. Millan

I have noted that. I have very limited time, but I might just say about that factory and other premises in the Lesmahagow area that the industrial development division of my Department—

The Question having been proposed after Ten o'clock 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 three minutes to Eleven o'clock.