Steel Industry (Wales) (Hansard, 1 December 1980)

§ Mr. Leo Abse (Pontypool)

I beg to ask leave to move the Adjournment of the House, under Standing Order No. 9, for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter that should have urgent consideration, namely, the failure of the Government observations upon the first report from the Committee on Welsh Affairs to respond to the warning of the Committee of the risks of serious social disorder in the Principality.

My task, Mr. Deputy Speaker, is to persuade you that this is a specific and important issue which should have urgent consideration. That it is specific cannot be doubted. The report was published this morning. That it is important no one would gainsay. Therefore, my comments are to persuade you that urgent consideration is justified.

I claim that it is not open to the Government to postpone further what is described as an essential process of adaptation. The Government ominously refuse to comment on the Committee's view that the total closure of one of the South Wales strip mills and further cuts in 20 finishing units would be a disaster for South Wales. I am expressing a personal view and do not claim to speak for the Committee.

The Government blandly seek to lecture Wales that it should submit to this month's decision by the British Steel Corporation, but Wales is not prepared to submit passively to further butchery of the steel industry. It was an awareness that Wales would not put up with a repeat of the 'thirties, with the apathy and despair that then enveloped so many, that caused the Committee unaminously to state that it was impressed by the conviction of witnesses who stressed the risk of serious social disorder if there were high and chronic levels of unemployment.

The Government's response knocks at the Committee's apprehensions with an inept sense of timing that could come only from an insensitive and floundering Government. The response arrogantly and didactically asserts that there is no evidence to justify the Committee's prognosis last July that social disorder could develop. However, even as the Government's laggard response was doubtless being printed, the Wales TUC met and, in despair with mounting unemployment in Wales, which has the worst figures for mainland Britain, was reluctantly driven to the view that, if Llanwern or Port Talbot were closed, there should be a campaign of civil disobedience directed against the Government. Conscious of the proud record of Wales in industrial relations, which it clearly wishes to maintain, the TUC's targets are not employers, public or private, who are also victims of the Government's policies. The Wales TUC is turning to unorthodox and non-traditional responses because of the dire threat of increasing unemployment for its members. It is now inviting the Wales Labour Party and Welsh Members of Parliament to join the campaign.

Some of us hoped that in this House and through its machinery, particularly the newly created Select Committee, one could draw attention to justified grievances in Wales and obtain remedies. We are left empty-handed and bereft. The Committee's report was unanimous, yet every major recommendation is tossed aside and every warning treated with contempt. The credibility of the effectiveness of that Committee is severely damaged. Those who mock at the effectiveness of our parliamentary institutions will claim corroboration for their cynicism.

It is urgent that the House should resolve that such a cruel answer to Wales be repudiated and that reassurance be given to the steel workers and the miners and railwaymen whose jobs depend on the fate of our steelworks. The failure of the House to debate the issue without delay, before further BSC determination is made, will further stoke the burning resentment felt throughout the Principality.