HC Deb 28 July 1977 vol 936 cc1121-42

12.10 a.m.

Mr. Wyn Roberts (Conway)

My purpose in initiating this debate is to draw attention to the unemployment problem in Wales. We heard earlier this week that the total had now reached 91,988 —8.8 per cent. of all employees. It is a staggering figure. When we were in office I remember being berated by the Labour Party when the unemployment total was about half the present figure. It will now be said that this month's increase of 12,366 is due largely to the school leavers, who account for about two-thirds of the increase, and that they will secure places during the summer and will disappear off the register in due course. This is probably true, but the increase of 2,832 in the total number of unemployed excluding school leavers augurs very badly, especially at this time of year, and the underlying trend is deeply disturbing.

The number of unfilled vacancies, at 6,684, offers very little consolation. The figure has increased by about 1,000 over the year, but this month there was a fall of 400 in the number of unfilled vacancies notified to employment officers and jobcentres, and future prospects are not at all good. I dread to think what the situation will be in the early months of next year, when unemployment is notoriously at its very worst.

An impression is given that to be unemployed these days is somehow not as tragic as it used to be. There is a modicum of truth in this. Nevertheless, we would be greatly at fault if we were at all complacent about it. Although the financial situation of the unemployed person may be very much better than it was, it is still tragic to be without work, especially for the young, some of whom are now getting quite desperate. I know some young people—I am sure that you do, too, Mr. Speaker—who left university last year and are still without a job. This is very tragic.

The Manpower Services Commission realises this only too well and in its latest report says this: Prolonged unemployment has a particularly damaging effect on young people since it reduces the normal opportunities for them to enter working life, to gain practical experience of work, and perhaps to undertake training. The Commission is well aware of the problem. I think that the Government are, too, and so are we on the Opposition Benches. None the less, we feel that what is being done is not adequate to meet the desperate situation which many young people face today.

What arc we to say? It has all been said before. We have the Government's special measures to deal with unemployment, executed through the Manpower Services Commission, and there is no doubt that these measures have created jobs. But have they created jobs in sufficient abundance? Has a truly useful purpose been served by the commission itself?

This is what the Secretary of State for Wales said on 4th July: What should be recognised is the efforts which the Government have made to ameliorate unemployment. Without the catalogue of measures that we have carried out, there would have been 37,000 people in Wales without jobs. That is the achievement of the temporary employment subsidy, the work creation schemes and all the other measures introduced by this Government, and it is evidence of our care, out compassion and our understanding of this major problem."—[Official Report, 4th July 1977; Vol. 934, c. 1017.] But we have to reconcile that with the total number of unemployed in Wales, which is quite out of scale with anything that has been achieved by way of job creation by this Government. Although we may congratulate the Government on creating those jobs which they have created, we must nevertheless emphasise to them the extent of their failure and the extent of the problem which they must face in the total number of unemployed today.

There was a time when the social contract dealt with these matters and actually specified the reduction required in unemployment, but the latest document says nothing about reducing unemployment. The whole question is left wide open.

I have copies of the exchange of correspondence between the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Liberal Party, and I shall quote first from the letter from the Leader of the Liberal Party, apparently dictating to the Prime Minister: The Government, in tackling unemployment, which must be a top economic and social priority, will place particular emphasis on the problem of school leavers, and the potential for increased employment among small businesses. The Government has undertaken to investigate urgently further short-term measures to reduce teacher unemployment. We have urged the Government to initiate an all-party appeal to employers and trade unions to use the employment opportunities which are currently offered to them to help young people with emphasis on apprenticeship and other forms of training. That was the Leader of the Liberal Party writing to the Prime Minister on 27th July. I think that I am in honour bound to read the Prime Minister's reaction to that letter. He said: I reaffirm that the fight against inflation and unemployment will continue as a first priority, and I welcome the support of the Liberal Party in Parliament for policies to secure those objectives. Nevertheless, when it considers those statements by the Leader of the Liberal Party and the Prime Minister, the House will, I am sure, feel that in present circumstances they are quite inadequate.

They certainly do not meet the demands of the present situation. The Minister will recall how the Conservatives were berated when unemployment was less than half the current figure. How does he answer for the present position? It is not covered by the social contract. The latest document says nothing very much about it.

I know that the Minister will always press us to say what we would do. I have great pleasure in telling him what we would do. We feel very strongly that if only we were able to relax the conditions for employment in Wales now we could cure the unemployment problem that is afflicting us.

What then, shall we do? We shall reduce direct taxation and restore a single positive rate of value added tax. We shall increase the VAT threshold to at least £10,000 and see that it is adjusted to take account of future inflation. We shall remove the present injustices of the 714 certificate scheme for the self-employed. We shall seek to reduce the volume of form-filling and simplify the planning procedures, which are such a handicap for firms seeking to establish themselves or to develop. We shall revise, particularly for the small firms, all those laws which, although designed to promote employment, have the effect of creating unemployment. In other words, we shall free industry to allow it to create the jobs that we so desperately need.

12.23 a.m.

Sir Anthony Meyer (Flint, West)

After a series of very late night sittings, it is encouraging to find my hon. Friend the Member for Conway (Mr. Roberts) here, in the small hours of the morning, upholding the interests of the people of Wales, and in particular the interests of the people of North Wales, who are indeed very hard-hit by the present appalling rate of unemployment which has settled like a blight on the Principality.

I must say a few words as the parliamentary representative of a constituency that includes Rhyl, which, as the Minister knows only too well, is in the unhappy situation of being excluded from the Welsh development area and is denied even those crumbs of comfort which accrue to the rest of the Principality through the operation of the Government's regional aid programmes.

Indeed, we in Rhyl feel very much as if we are bereft of all help. We are excluded from the development area. We have been refused any help whatever by the Government with the biggest single project in the area, designed to expand the facilities of our principal industry, the tourist industry—in other words, the Rhyl Sun Centre. It has not only been denied any help by the Government; the Government used their best endeavours to bring the work on it to a halt. Where they failed, building agitators have succeeded. But one of the consequences has been that the borough council, having had to commit all this locally determined expenditure on one project to avoid disaster, finds itself so short of cash that it is in grave difficulties in developing the one area in Rhyl that is reserved for industrial development.

I shall shortly be getting in touch with the Minister to ask whether there is any way in which he can use his good offices to break what appears to be a bottleneck here. At any rate, I am getting reports that the Marsh Road industrial estate programme is being held up because of a temporary cash shortage. The Government should make good their words and use their good offices with the Welsh Development Agency, or what-have-you, to ensure that this difficulty is surmounted.

I do not wish to speak only of the problems of Rhyl. In common with all hon. Members representing Welsh constituencies, to me these terrible unemployment statistics represent people who cannot get jobs and their children who see little or no prospect of finding employment when they leave school. If, when a boy leaves school, he has little prospect of finding a job for a year or so, it seems like a lifetime. This has a profoundly depressing effect on all of us.

My hon. Friend the Member for Conway was, if anything, over-indulgent in his attitude towards the Government's policies on employment. I give the Government credit for good intentions. I know that they are as concerned as are the Opposition about unemployment. I do not suggest that the Government's policies alone have produced the unemployment figures that we have today. Of course it is not their policies alone that have created the problem. Every country has a serious unemployment problem. But I do suggest that the Government's policies have resulted in Britain's unemployment problem being more persistent and harder to get rid of than that of any of our EEC partners and of most of our competitors in the rest of the world. One has only to look at the relative inflation rates in Britain and in the countries with which we have to compete to realise that this is only the beginning of a story that will become more tragic as time goes on.

In the light of that situation I find it hard to accept that the Government are doing their best to deal with the problem. I am sure that the motives behind the job creation programme are entirely honourable, but I cannot rid myself of the idea that, because of its cost, which has to be borne by the rest of industry, in the long run the programme could do more harm than good. I believe that the jobs that are created as a result of the programme would otherwise have been created by an unshackled private industry that did not have to bear these additional burdens.

I believe that if we are to tackle the long-term problem of unemployment that besets us there must be a major leap in imagination. We must face the fact that, in order to create stable employment in an expanding economy, we must go through a phase of a very large loss of jobs in the unproductive sector. If that sounds like a paradox, I suggest that we turn it the other way round and imagine the result of accepting the policies of the extreme Left, of vastly extending the number of jobs in the unproductive sector. The Tribune Group claims that we can solve our unemployment problem by making pretty well everybody civil servants or employees of nationalised industries. When we reflect that this country must earn its living in the world, the nonsense of that solution appears immediately.

We must face the need to make massive reductions of employment in the non-productive sector in order to release resources for employment into the productive sector. When f speak of the productive sector I do not just mean the private sector. Many productive jobs are in the public sector. There must be a massive transfer from non-productive to productive.

This leads to a more awkward conclusion. Even if this is done, the whole world is moving towards an era in which full employment will cease to be an automatic. On both sides of the House we must think in terms of work sharing, earlier retirement and a three-day working week. Last time we had a three-day working week, production was rather higher than in the preceding four-and-a-half and five-day working weeks. We must move towards the three-day working week, with much higher productivity during those three days.

A three-day working week must not become an excuse by some unions to pay people more for doing less. If that occurs, disaster will follow. We must be prepared for a major reorganisation of attitudes towards work sharing, and it is idle to look towards the Labour Party for this imaginative leap. The Government are incapable of fresh thinking on this subject.

Only the Conservative Party can provide any new thinking here. The policies of the Government are leading us downhill steadily, and until they go there is no hope whatever for my constituents.

12.33 a.m.

Mr. Ian Grist (Cardiff, North)

This debate must be somewhat of an embarrassment to the Minister. At the end of a similar debate in 1972 on the same subject at a similar time of year, he said that the unemployment figures of 51,000 in Wales were "tragic". He told us at some length of the effects of this tragedy on his constituents and the Welsh people generally. I look forward to hearing how he describes the present unemployment figure which is 40,000 higher than it was at that time.

We are discussing these appalling unemployment figures at a time when the Prime Minister is telling us that all the economic indicators are set fair. It is very odd to me if they are so fair, because the Labour Party throughout its existence has had the rallying cry of "Jobs for the People".

As his ministerial colleague the hon. Member for Rhondda (Mr. Jones) said in the last debate on 2nd August 1972: For most of Wales unemployment and Tory Governments have become synonymous"[Official Report, 2nd August, 1972; vol. 842, c. 736]. I think that there is a slightly different synonym now.

My hon. Friend the Member for Conway (Mr. Roberts) mentioned the global figures in Wales, and my hon. Friend the Member for Flint, West (Sir A. Myer) spoke of his constituency. I shall quote some figures for the part of Wales that is supposed to be the most prosperous—my own constituency. Male unemployment in the Cardiff travel-to-work area is 9.4 per cent. In South Glamorgan, which is supposed to be the most prosperous county of Wales, the unemployment figure is 3,000 higher than last year. A total of 843 boys and 739 girls are out of work in Cardiff alone. One must remember also that more than 300 of those boys are last year's school leavers.

Those figures indicate that two-thirds of this year's school leavers in Cardiff have yet to find a job. For the total number of 1,081 Cardiff school leavers who are out of work there are 88 vacancies. In the Vale of Glamorgan, in the same county, there are nine vacancies for 469 unemployed school leavers.

No doubt the Minister will talk about the Government's rather futile gestures of conscience—the job creation scheme, the work experience scheme, and other such schemes. In South Glamorgan there are 253 people employed in work experience schemes and 78 in job creation schemes. That is what those futile gestures have meant to my county.

What has been the cause of all this? There is the world economic recession, but my hon. Friend the Member for Flint, West has given perfectly good reasons why the unemployment figures in this country are worse—and this is a long-standing position that is likely to continue—than those of other EEC and Western European countries. Government action, such as the Employment Protection Act, has exacerbated the problem, particularly for smaller firms.

If the Minister talks to employers in small firms he will find out the truth. The Minister and his colleagues must know that jobs have been lost in Wales as a result of the abrupt withdrawal of the regional employment premium. It was not the withdrawal of the premium that riled so many people, especially Conservatives, but the way in which it was done without any rundown or warning. That was extremely damaging and foolish. Can anyone imagine the mud that would be thrown at a Tory Government who dared to do the same thing?

The figures will be made much worse unless the country can improve productivity, as it so desperately needs to do. I fear that Wales will do particularly badly in that matter. The miners have turned down the pay productivity scheme, and I regret that the Welsh pits were perhaps among the leaders in turning it down. It was a sad day for certain Welsh pits when they did that.

There must also be improved productivity in the steel industry. Governments have repeatedly listed how many tons of steel are produced in this country per worker and how many by the workers of our competitiors. In a world in which there is heavy steel production —as there now is—only those with the highest productivity will survive. Unless we increase productivity our steel industry will be in a sad plight. If we do not pull our industry out of the mire and bring it into the modern world thousands of jobs will be lost in the industry. I should not have to say that to the Minister, because he and 1 share that particular problem, with the reduction of steel production in our constituencies and nearby areas in the relatively near future. I ask the Minister how he proposes to absorb all those thousands of jobs that will, I fear, be lost.

The position is worsened by the Labour Party's attack on the whole philosophy of enterprise and thrift. It has most certainly been worsened by yesterday's TUC and Labour Party document, which must have been designed to destroy jobs—unless someone knows of some means by which abolishing the House of Lords will produce work for people other than journalists. I should like to look at some of the proposals now. There will be a tighter capital gains tax. I doubt that that will do much for jobs. There will be an agreed bracket for top salaries. That will be very nice, but will it encourage our managers and investors and foreign firms to set up in Wales, to employ managers in Wales with agreed top bracket salaries? Why should they do that when they could easily set up in France, Germany or any other EEC country and pay the sort of international salaries that are demanded in those countries?

The document says that there will be no wealth tax this side of a General Election. How very kind!But surely the idea that there will be a wealth tax the other side of an election will not hurry along the higher investment that the document also calls for. Apparently we shall need that investment and import substitution to be able to reach the economic growth rate of well over 3 per cent. a year up to 1980 to make a deep impact on unemployment.

So there is to be income and wealth redistribution, a wealth tax after the election, a tighter capital gains tax and a hammering of managers with agreed brackets. Presumably the investment will come from the National Enterprise Board, the Welsh Development Agency and other State set-ups that use taxpayers' money. Is that the way to en- courage investment in productive industry? Will it not go to job-saving industries? Will it keep going to the shipbuilding industry and the British Leylands of this world? Or will it be left to those who want to invest money where it can make a profit? If we do not allow that, other countries will do so and the unemployment will stay here and it will persist particularly in those parts of the United Kingdom, such as Wales, that have been dependent on the old, heavy industries and that desperately need the newer productive, modern industries.

Our temper in this debate should be the one that would be shown to any Conservative Government that were presiding over 1½ million unemployed in the United Kingdom and 90,000 in Wales. My goodness, how the right hon. Member for Ebbw Vale (Mr. Foot) would be ranting and roaring up and down the valleys. If he were sitting on the Opposition Benches—and I wish that he would give us the chance to arrange for him to have to sit on this side—we should see his forensic skills at their finest.

In that 1972 debate, the hon. Member for Rhondda said that we were all looking forward to a rest after our exertions during the summer. He added: However, for 51,496 Welshmen and women the tragedy is that they have had too long a period of rest. It has been more than rest; it has been enforced idleness which the Government have imposed upon them because of their failure not only to fulfil their election promises…but to deal with the important political, economic and social consequences of extremely high and long-lasting unemployment in Wales."—[Official Report, 2nd August 1972; Vol. 842, c. 728.] Perhaps the Minister could add to that—just as the Government have added 40,000 to the unemployment level that the hon. Member complained of in 1972.

12.45 a.m.

Mr. Bruce George (Walsall, South)

I make no apology for joining in a debate on Welsh affairs. I am a Welshman, and one of the growing army of Welshmen representing English constituencies—what might be called Llewellyn the Great's revenge on the English. I shall not follow the political knockabout that we have just heard. The earlier speeches with the exception of the last were restrained and sensible, though I disagreed with many of the points that were made.

The hon. Member's remarks in favour of ending the support of British Leyland almost caused the hon. Member for Bromsgrove and Redditch (Mr. Miller) to collapse in his seat. Support for the abolition of the shipbuilding industry, the decimation of the steel industry and the renewed Tory knocking of the miners is a recipe for industrial strife and further unemployment.

Mr. Grist

The hon. Gentleman could not have been understanding my remarks. The money that goes into shipbuilding, British Leyland or the coal industry must get a proper return. Productivity must be improved to warrant that investment. Without improved productivity there is no point in pouring in good money after bad.

Mr. George

I shall let the hon. Member for Bromsgrove and Redditch argue that point with the hon. Gentleman.

I wish to talk about a subject that is of importance to Wales and other areas—namely, the work of the Professional and Executive Recruitment service. Like other public bodies, it is constantly subjected to attack inside the House and outside. We are always told that nationalisation is synonymous with mammoth losses. Perhaps the events of the past couple of weeks will prove to the knockers that public enterprise is productive and can be highly profitable.

In Wales, from which I departed 10 years ago, I believe that PER will be able to play a vital râle in future in placing professsonal and executive personnel in better and more suitable jobs. Its rÔle is vital, especially in times of high unemployment. There was a time when the industrial scrapheap was reserved for working people. However, people of a higher social status—those in managerial jobs—have found a lack of job security over the past couple of years. The work of PER will be vital in assisting those who are unemployed or those who wish to change their jobs.

Surely the Government's rÔle is not to contract PER but to expand it. Let us pay little heed to the screams of the commercialised agencies, the private "head-hunters", who are seeking to attack this public recruitment agency. They are attacking it because it is doing a great job. Indeed, it will improve as the years continue. It is providing an excellent recruitment service. In a debate on 7th March my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Employment said: Its staff have worked long and hard to develop a much more sophisticated and comprehensive service and the range and coverage of its facilities are second to none."—[Official Report, 7th March 1977; Vol. 927, c. 1164.] In Wales, which is part of the South Wales and West region of PER, there is one of the largest and most diverse areas covered by this importance service. It covers the mining valleys, which were declining areas, the more prosperous and dynamic regions, and agricultural regions such as Devon and Cornwall. PER's scope for expansion is enormous. It has considerably improved its performance since reorganisation despite considerable pressure from the private commercial agencies. Last year 7,000 vacancies were filled by PER. It has a highly competitive rate for those who subscribe to it—namely, 10 per cent. of the salary of the first year. That is highly competitive vis-á-vis the private agencies. Last year it received over £2½ million in fees. I am certain that its deficit will be wiped out.

PER does a great deal of valuable welfare work, unlike most of the commercial agencies. Many of its clients are unemployed. Many of them are placed on courses to help them retrain. Many workers involved in PER are involved in liaising with social security offices over payments. The costs of placing personnel through PER are much lower than those of private agencies.

Therefore, I believe that there are successes, and in looking to the future one must look to expansion. I hope that the PER will attract more people in higher paid jobs. At present the average salary of persons placed through the PER is £3,800. However, I dislike the critics who say that the PER is really a high-powered agency for low-calibre staff, because a survey done last year showed that 33 per cent. of people on its books had degree or degree-equivalent qualifications. That indicates that high-calibre personnel are going to the PER.

I hope that better use is made of the PER by local authorities. Perhaps I may refer to a Question that I asked the Secretary of State for Employment. I asked if he was satisfied with the use made of the PER by local authorities. The answer was: No. I am informed by the Manpower Services Commission that the use made of PER by local authorities varies from authority to authority. In general, however, the Commission would very much like to see local authorities making much greater use of PER's recruitment services and PER, itself, will continue to do everything possible to develop closer relationships with local government. Therefore, I hope that local authorities will make much fuller use of the PER in the future.

As a nation, we must properly utilise our scarce resources. We have considerable managerial skills, and I hope that people with those skills will receive assistance in seeking different jobs and, in many cases, better jobs.

The PER is ideally suited to assist in the private and public sectors. With its network of offices throughout the country and its use of sophisticated computers, it is ideally equipped to assist.

Mr. Wyn Roberts

In the hon. Member's earlier remarks, was he saying that 10 per cent. of the people registered with the PER had been placed in jobs? Secondly, when he was talking about the financial deficit on the PER service, was he implying that people actually had to pay for being dealt with by the service?

Mr. George

Conservatives want things both ways. They criticise if a public enterprise is not making money, saying "Let us imbue this enterprise with the spirit of capitalism and management expertise." In response to the criticism, the agency decides to make a charge, which is much less than the charge of the commercialised services, and the Conservatives criticise that. They cannot have both arguments simultaneously. The PER makes a charge. That charge ought to be made. It is not running a charity. Conservatives are the last people in the world to expect public enterprises to be run on a charitable basis.

The PER has a number of assets. I hope that the day will come when it occupies a position at the commanding heights of the executive recruitment market. I am not saying that commercial agencies should have no right to function. Of course they should. On the other hand, they should not deny the right of the PER to extend and expand and to prosper.

We must properly utilise our reserves of skilled professional and managerial personnel in our society. Many people have highly developed skills, and this is imperative to themselves and to the enterprise in which they are operating. It is absolutely vital to the country as a whole that these people are properly trained and properly placed.

Despite the criticism of the PER both inside and outside the House, it must expand. I hope that the Government will not listen to those who seek to denigrate this organisation but will give it all the support they can and expand its activities, which would be of enormous advantage to people in Wales and in my constituency, and to the country as a whole.

12.54 a.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Barry Jones)

I am glad to follow the penetrating and perceptive speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, South (Mr. George) on the merits and virtues of PER, which has finally established itself in a competitive area and, I understand, is currently earning about £2 million a year in fees. Some of those fees go to Wales.

The Government's record, considered against the magnitude of the difficult problems that we are facing—problems which the Opposition when in power never had to tackle and which, judging by the pronouncements in this House, they would be incapable of dealing with now—is one that I am always happy to defend.

We are entitled to know in some detail what the Opposition would propose to do, especially about unemployment, upon which the hon. Member for Conway (Mr. Roberts) concentrated.

Mr. Wyn Roberts

The Minister mentioned the PER. Does he really think that it should charge for its services, which are to find jobs for people?

Mr. Jones

I support the policies of the Government on this matter. I do not wish unnecessarily to widen the discussion, which is essentially to do with manpower services in Wales.

I was about to put a question to Opposition Members. Would they increase public expenditure on this front while cutting back public expenditure elsewhere? If so, what would be sacrificed; financial assistance to industry, regional assistance, or what? I and my colleagues would welcome the chance to examine detailed proposals rather than vague generalities. We are not too proud to adopt any measures which will help to defeat this scourge of unemployment wherever they originate—the problem is far too serious for that.

The level of unemployment, whether considered in the context of the United Kingdom as a whole or within the Principality remains unacceptably high. The latest figures for July are indeed a grim reminder of the combined effects on employment of the worldwide recession and a growing labour supply, the latter reflecting the birth boom of the late 50s and early 60s, and increased movement by married women back into the employment market.

The hon. Gentleman asked what we were doing about the problem and I shall tell him. The Government are tackling this on two main fronts: the first is to regenerate British industry. Our policies to secure industrial regeneration are beginning to take effect, admittedly somewhat slower than we would like. But the pond is stable—indeed, rising against the dollar—our reserves are up, interest rates are down, the balance of payments is moving into surplus and manufacturing investment is increasing.

There are also hopeful signs in Wales. The level of inquiries and visits by industrialists in the early part of this year was sharply up on the corresponding period of last year. Applications for selective financial assistance also show a welcome increase.

With regard to visits and inquiries, in the first four months of 1977, there were 127 inquiries and 44 visits. In the first four months of 1976 there were 95 inquiries and 27 visits. That points to an increase in the number of inquiries this year of about 33 per cent. and in visits of about 63 per cent.

Sir Anthony Meyer

By how much does the Minister expect unemployment to rise by the end of the year?

Mr. Jones

I have not brought my crystal ball with me. I shall not be tempted into a rash of optimism. I am attempting to indicate what we are trying to do to help defeat the scourge of unemployment in Wales and to-put the case for the better times ahead.

I was about to say that this year we have had 23 applications for selective financial assistance from North Wales firms. A total of 16 offers of assistance have been made.

The other side of the coin consists of our measures to safeguard or create employment. A substantial part of this month's increase in unemployment in Wales was due to the influx of nearly 10,000 school leavers seeking employment for the first time. Undoubtedly next month's figures will show a further increase in this category, although in the normal course of events the numbers can be expected to drop steadily throughout the autumn and early winter. That of course is no consolation to anyone experiencing unemployment. It is a personal tragedy, especially for a young person seeking employment for the first time. The corrosive effects of enforced idleness are hard enough to resist for those thrown out of work for no fault of their own but how much harder for youngsters who have never had a job at all?

That is why the Government are concentrating their main efforts—but not all of them—on measures to deal with the younger unemployed. Hon Gentlemen will need no reminding of the Government's acceptance of the Holland Report recommendations. Indeed, in some instances we have gone somewhat further than the recommendations, which were welcomed by the whole House. The wide-ranging programme of opportunities for young people which the MSC is now preparing, involving the provision of opportunities for over 230,000 young people each year, at a cost of some £160 million, will provide a comprehensive coverage for all our youngsters. The programme in Wales will be geared to our own needs.

As to our present measures the hon. Member for Conway has formed his own judgment of their effectiveness. Everyone is entitled to his own view. But I would ask the hon. Gentleman to consider how much worse the situation would have been without them. The Government measures, ranging from the temporary employment subsidy scheme, the job creation programme, the youth employment subsidy and so on, down to our most recent small firms employment subsidy scheme in the special development areas, have, up to the end of the first week in July, been responsible for sustaining and creating nearly 39,000 jobs at a cost of about £35 million. A total of 4,700 of these jobs have been in Gwynedd and a quarter of them—1,200—in the Conway constituency. About 10,500 jobs have been saved or created in that way in North Wales. That is a substantial achievement, by any standards. Of course, many of these schemes do not provide permanent employment—we never suggested otherwise —but they do, in a crisis such as we have experienced, ease the unemployment situation and have been very effective in this.

Before I conclude, I wish to say a few words about the recent transfer of responsibilities for the Manpower Services Commission activities in Wales to my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Wales. The Secretary of State considers this to be a very important transfer. Already he has responsibilities for many aspects of domestic policy which are vitally important for industrial development—for example, major road developments; approval of the Welsh Development Agency's programme for site provision, derelict land reclamation and advance factories; the provision of Section 7 financial assistance to incoming or indigenous industries, and so on. These are essential components of the overall programme for securing the regeneration of the Welsh economy. The addition of responsibility for the Manpower Services Commission's activities in Wales provides a further opportunity for ensuring a co-ordinated approach to this objective.

No one would doubt the importance of ensuring a proper match between the availability of skilled labour and the creation of jobs; the importance of determining the needs appropriate to particular areas in Wales; and the need for effective and sensible training policies. Already my right hon Friend has asked the Commission to undertake certain studies in Wales identifying the trends of surplus and shortage of particular skills and to consider a survey in depth of the manpower needs of one or two particular areas so that we can better understand how to meet local needs.

In this connection I know that the provision of training facilities in Gwynedd has been a matter of some concern. I am glad to say, however, that the Chairman of the MSC has now been able to tell the Gwynedd County Council that in view of the needs of the area, the Training Services Agency will provide funds for a small permanent extension to the Gwynedd Technical College, Bangor, on condition that the facilities will be used for an increase in the number of craft courses under the training opportunities scheme. This will be of direct benefit to the hon. Gentleman's constituency. The General Manager of the Training Services Agency in Wales will shortly be discussing this offer with the Council.

The hon. Member for Cardiff, North (Mr. Grist) referred to steel closures, but I would remind him that it was the Tory Government who proposed the steel closure at East Moors and a Labour Government who put back the closure date and gave development area status to the Cardiff travel-to-work area. That gave the city a chance to fight back and attempt to reorganise its employment pattern.

Mr. Grist

In his annual report Sir Charles Villiers said that one of the weaknesses of the British Steel Corporation was closure of the loss-making plant within the five-year period promised by the Corporation. Are the Government intending to override that demand?

Mr. Jones

I shall not be tempted at this late hour into a detailed discussion of policy matters concerning other Departments in Whitehall and the domain of other Ministers. I feel that I touched a raw nerve in reminding the hon. Gentleman that it was a Conservative Government who were prepared to axe so many steel jobs so speedily throughout the Principality. The Labour Government have done a great deal in our period of office since 1974 to help to regenerate the economy of South Wales.

We have pushed ahead with the M4, and there are now 30 miles of motorway under construction or in use. We are spending more than £90 million on the M4 in South Wales. The hon. Gentleman man will recall the recent announcement of nearly £900 million to be invested at the Port Talbot steelworks, and will not have forgotten the recent announcement of a £5 million share for Wales of the construction industry package. I have already reminded him, perhaps to his discomfiture, of the Labour Government's granting of development area status to Cardiff.

District general hospitals are reaching the planning stage for Swansea, Llanelli and Bridgend, entailing the expenditure of £24 million or more.

Mr. Wyn Roberts rose—

Mr. Jones

I shall come to North Wales, and give the hon. Gentleman an equally impressive checklist of action by the Government there.

Mr. Wyn Roberts

As the hon. Gentleman talked about investment, particularly in the steel industry, may I ask whether he is happy with the Government's proposed investment of £10 million to £20 million at Shotton?

Mr. Jones

I am glad to have the opportunity of saying that the Labour Government have prevented about 6,500 steel workers in my constituency from joining the dole queue. But for the hon. Gentleman's intervention I might have forgotten to tell the House that the Labour Government granted development area status to Deeside, as well as preventing the loss of 6,500 jobs. If the hon. Gentleman visited East Flint he would be able to obtain the views of ordinary working people there. He would find that they are very happy to have a Labour Government and that they do not contemplate with pleasure even the remotest possibility of a Conservative Government.

The Government have also pumped in £2 million for the reorganisation of secondary education in Dyfed and Gwent, and some district general hospitals are coming on stream at Merthyr and Withybush. All these developments will have an effect on employment.

I turn to some of the stimuli that we are giving to jobs in North Wales. We have just begun the building, in the hon. Gentleman's constituency, of an £18 million district general hospital at Bangor, and we have indicated our willingness to begin within a few years a £6 million district general hospital at Wrexham. Of direct importance to the hon. Gentle- man's constituency is the £10 million construction scheme for the Britannia Bridge, as well as the multi-million pound Dinorwic hydro-electric scheme of the CEGB, which employs about 2,100 men at present.

Over the past two years the Government have accepted in full the transport supplementary grant bids by the county authorities, which have a direct effect on busmen's jobs and road maintenance jobs.

I also remind the House of the job creation programme and the investment on the narrow-gauge railway into Blaenau Ffestiniog. This Government has also given special development area status to Gwynedd, and the proposal to spend £2½ million on a Queensferry roundabout flyover later this year, which, together with the switch of all available moneys very largely for road building in the immediate years into the A55 dual carriageway—a 56-mile scheme, costing £146 million—will greatly help the employment situation.

Mr. Wyn Roberts

We are of course deeply appreciative of the fact that we have special development area status in North-West Gwynedd, but along the coast we have special development area status, development area status and intermediate area status, affecting the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Flint, West (Sir A. Meyer). Are the Minister and the Government content with the fact that we have this great variety of status on different parts of the North Wales coast?

Mr. Jones

The Government are not complacent or over-content. Assisted area status extends over about 68 per cent. of the land mass of Great Britain. That sort of figure shows the difficulty in merely increasing the coverage of development area status. There would be little point in all of Britain being a development area. It is difficult for the Government to get the mix right, for they have to measure all the demands of the various areas. Those areas are right to make their claims to the Government, but the Government have to make the decisions.

I take on board the remarks by the hon. Member for Flint, West (Sir A. Meyer) about Marsh Road industrial estate, Rhyl. He asked whether the Welsh Office would use its good offices in this matter. Yes, it will. If the hon. Gentleman gives me at a later date the full details I shall certainly have the point looked at immediately. I shall then respond to him as soon as I can about it.

None of us can be anything but deeply concerned about the level of employment; none of us on the Government side is complacent or under any illusions about the severity and long-standing nature of this problem; none of us expects anything other than a a long gruelling battle to overcome our difficulties on this front. As the Prime Minister said in the House earlier this week, it would not be in anyone's interests if we were to pretend there was some magic solution for our underlying problems. There is not. We know it, and the Opposition know it.

Where we differ perhaps is that we have introduced policies which will strike at the root causes of the present situation. The Opposition seem to have no policy other than to call for further unspecified cuts in public expenditure. I am not being unfair, however, when I remind them that they all want these public expenditure cuts to affect interests other than those within their own constituencies; indeed, the cry is for more expenditure, not less, for their constituencies.

This hopelessly confused position clearly shows that in their hearts they know how painful the consequences would be if their hostility to public expenditure and particularly to expenditure in the area of the social services were ever to be translated into action. They lack the courage to spell this out, however.

We, for our part, make no facile claims that our policies will offer any early or painless solution to our difficulties. The Government labour under difficulties greatly in excess of those which the previous Government faced from 1970–74. It was a little unfair of the hon. Member for Cardiff, North and his hon. Friends to berate the Government so. They omitted to remember that in November 1973 oil prices world wide increased fivefold, and that that factor triggered off a worldwide slump unprecedented in peace time. Our policies, however, offer a constructive and coherent attack upon the underlying economic weaknesses which give rise to unemployment, as well as blunting the worst of its effects. By contrast, the Opposition have offered us no constructive proposals here tonight, and nothing they have said suggests that Wales or its problems are anything other than very low in their order of priorities.