HC Deb 10 July 1978 vol 953 cc999-1001
3. Mr. Litterick

asked the Secretary of State for Industry what steps he is taking to prevent the further decline of the British machine tool industry.

Mr. Alan Williams

Under the machine tool industry scheme, my Department has made some £30 million available to the industry to promote the development of new products and the modernisation and rationalisation of production facilities. Assistance for the development of new products is also available under the product and process development scheme and through the Mechanical Engineering and Machine Tools Requirements Board. In addition, we are working actively with the machine tools EDC to ensure the achievement of its industrial strategy objectives for the sector.

Mr. Litterick

I am grateful for that answer, but is my right hon. Friend aware that the level of import penetration in the British machine tool market has now reached 48 per cent. and is apparently still growing? Is he also aware that, in addition to the recent devastating announcement of 700 redundancies at Herbert's, we are informed that the training school is being closed, which represents a retreat by that crucial organisation from the business of creating the next generation of skilled labour which is so essential to the survival of the British machine tool industry?

Mr. Williams

I fully appreciate my hon. Friend's long-standing concern for the health of this industry. My hon. Friend will know that recently an additional £10 million in funds has been raised in respect of the Alfred Herbert company. Most of those funds are to be devoted to the modernisation, rationalisation and development of new products. One of the difficulties with Edgwick is that it is a plant with a rather low technology compared with the rest of the industry.

On the general question of import penetration, we put the figure at about 46 per cent. Some of this results from international specialisation through which British firms enter into arrangements with overseas companies so that they complement each other's product range, but the industry is making a surplus on its payments.

Mr. Ridsdale

Will the Minister look into the fact that the Employment Protection Act is preventing some of the smaller firms expanding in order to achieve delivery? As evidence of this, will he bear in mind that several of the machine tool exhibitors at the industrial exhibition in Korea told me that the Act was having precisely this effect?

Mr. Williams

If the hon. Gentleman has information, I should like to see it and I shall naturally draw the attention of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment to any points relevant to his Department. I must emphasise that the fact that a firm is small does not mean that we should expect its workers to accept standards of protection and security of employment which are lower than those elsewhere.

Mrs. Wise

Is my right hon. Friend aware that, out of desperate anxiety about the state of their industry, the machine tool workers in Coventry have set up the Coventry machine tool workers committee, with the blessing of the appropriate district committees of their respective unions, with the intention of formulating a plan for their industry? Will he look with favour on such a plan when it is forthcoming?

Mr. Williams

We welcome any such initiative by a work force demonstrating its concern for the future of its industry. Trade unions are represented on the sector working parties. It is worth bearing in mind that the investment plans of the industry are higher than for any of the last eight years and, in money terms, are more than double the best of the past eight years. In real terms, too, they are considerably above the plans for any of those years.

Mr. Richard Wainwright

Can the Minister say whether the Government's denationalisation of Kearney Trecker Marwin is producing the benefits that the Government expected?

Mr. Williams

That is a specific question and I should prefer notice of it, but from the latest information that I have seen there is nothing to suggest that it has not been beneficial.