HC Deb 15 November 1984 vol 67 cc794-6
Q3. Mr. Marland

asked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 15 November.

The Prime Minister

I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.

Q4. Mr. Neil Hamilton

asked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 15 November.

The Prime Minister

I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.

Mr. Hamilton

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the movement back to work in the car factories and the mines shows how dangerously out of touch extreme Left-wing trade union members are with their members? Does she further agree that, far from tightening the noose around the nation's neck, as the extreme Left wingers intend, they are tightening it around their own necks, as Mr. Norman Willis discovered to his discomfiture?

The Prime Minister

I was delighted that there was such a forthright condemnation of violence by the General-Secretary of the TUC. I agree that if industries go on strike they will lose customers and jobs. That is the weakness of the Opposition's case, when they talk about unemployment, but support every strike that destroys existing jobs.

Mr. Tony Banks

Is the Prime Minister now aware that she misled the House on Tuesday and that the pay-outs from the Secretary of State for Transport for those whom he sacked from the London Transport board were the responsibility of the Secretary of State, and not of the GLC? Is she further aware that the proposed 6,000 redundancies on London Regional Transport will cost the taxpayers £36 million? How will that assist travellers in London?

The Prime Minister

The size of the compensation is related to the length of the remaining term of office. The GLC appointed these members for five years, when it already knew that its control of London Transport would shortly be coming to an end. That was thoroughly irresponsible, but compensation is related to that period, and had the size of the compensation been anything less my right hon. Friend could have been taken to court to give proper compensation.