Engagements

HC Deb 21 November 1985 vol 87 cc413-8

Q2. Mrs. Virginia Bottomley

asked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 21 November.

Mr. Biffen

I have been asked to reply.

This morning my right hon. Friend presided at a meeting of the Cabinet, and is now in Brussels for President Reagan's briefing of the NATO Council.

Mrs. Bottomley

Does my right hon. Friend agree that there will be a welcome throughout the length and breadth of the country for the achievements of the Geneva summit, particularly the agreement that arms control talks are to go ahead with vigour, that President Reagan and Mr. Gorbachev are to meet again soon, and that the establishment of greater understanding and mutual trust is an essential basis for effective negotiation, with concentration on our shared hopes for the future rather than on our differences of the past?

Mr. Biffen

I am sure that, in the context of high profile summitry, being a very hazardous form of diplomacy, there will be a great sense of relief at the achievements that have been secured at Geneva. My hon. Friend appropriately puts the advantages in a way that appeals to the entire House.

Dr. Owen

I warmly welcome the transformation in US-Soviet relations and hope that we may now see deep cuts in nuclear arsenals and concrete agreements in the next year and the year after. However, does the Leader of the House agree that one of the lessons for hon. Members is that the deeply damaging and divisive policies of unilateral nuclear disarmament should be abandoned by the Labour party?

Mr. Biffen

Whatever measure of detente has been secured at Geneva certainly does not derive from a unilateral nuclear disarmament philosophy.

Mr. Dykes

Will my right hon. Friend utterly condemn the outrageous attack on the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland by badly behaved hooligans who call themselves Ulster Unionists, flying in the face of a growing reality that more and more people in the Province and in the rest of Britain are wholeheartedly behind the agreement?

Mr. Biffen

I deprecate, as I am sure all hon. Members will, the physical attack upon my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. I am certain that such action damages the cause of those who perpetrate it.

Mr. J. Enoch Powell

Will the Lord Privy Seal ensure that the Prime Minister has brought to her attention the increasing flood of communications from the length and breadth of England, Wales and Scotland expressing indignation at the terms of the Anglo-Irish agreement and at her personal part in it?

Mr. Biffen

I shall certainly draw my right hon. Friend's attention to the observations that have just been made. Doubtless they will feature in the debate that we shall soon have.

Mr. Viggers

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the arrangements reached by President Reagan and General Secretary Gorbachev in Geneva were firmly based on hard realism? Does he agree that that spirit, not the one-sided disarmament espoused by the Labour party and by one half of the alliance, is more likely to lead to arms control and lasting peace?

Mr. Biffen

Whatever success has been secured at Geneva will be in the context of realism that is both hardheaded and cautious. I am sure that it has been secured by hard negotiations unclouded by the sort of gesture politics that are implicit in the CND.

Q3. Mr. Stephen Ross

asked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 21 November.

Mr. Biffen

I have been asked to reply.

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

Mr. Ross

Does the Lord Privy Seal recall the presentation made to the Cabinet by the Audit Commission during the summer recess? Will he confirm that the presentation clearly revealed that local authorities were keeping their houses in order much better than were Government Departments? Will he take this opportunity to pay tribute to county and borough treasurers, who have had to bear with the Government's restrictions during the past five years?

Mr. Biffen

The Audit Commission plays an admirable role in the discussion about how best to maintain prudent public spending. I notice especially its endorsement of the idea that there should be museum charges and charges for other entertainment provided by municipal authorities. In broad terms, I am happy to concur with what the hon. Gentleman said.

Mr. Couchman

Has my right hon. Friend had an opportunity to read reports that Mr. Ken Livingstone proposes to offer up to £5 million of GLC money to bail out the Trotskyist regime in Liverpool? Will he discuss urgently with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment ways of preventing this municipal embezzlement of London ratepayers' money?

Mr. Biffen

I am happy to concur with my hon. Friend's request, but he will have observed that Mr. Livingstone's exotic gesture does not seem to have succeeded.

Mrs. Renée Short

What does the Leader of the House suppose is the Prime Minister's attitude to the dire straits in which two more teaching hospitals in London find themselves? What advice is she likely to give to the patients who will not be admitted there and to the researchers whose work will not be finished?

Mr. Biffen

Those matters are the responsibility of the North-West Thames area health authority, which will have to judge its priorities within the spending disciplines to which it is subject. But, since I am asked to relate the matter to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, I am sure she will observe that National Health Service spending has increased by 20 per cent. in real terms during the lifetime of this Government, that there are 58,000 more nurses and midwives and that waiting lists have decreased by 80,000 since 1979.

Q4. Mr. Thurnham

asked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 21 November.

Mr. Biffen

I have been asked to reply.

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

Mr. Thurnham

Does my right hon. Friend welcome the efforts of Mr. Eric Hammond in persuading the TUC to accept the use of Government funds for union ballots?

Mr. Biffen

Yes. I have no wish to prejudice the success of the Government's financing of strike ballots by warmly endorsing it to trade union leaders, but I suspect that there will be a growing recognition of the virtue of that legislation, just as Labour Members now realise that there is great virtue in the sale of council houses.

Q5. Mr. Madden

asked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday, 21 November.

Mr. Biffen

I have been asked to reply.

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

Mr. Madden

If low pay leads to the creation of new jobs, why is it that in Bradford, where most people in work have always been paid low wages, there are now 35,000 men and women desperately looking for work?

Mr. Biffen

I am sure that if the hon. Gentleman had some compelling or demonstrable statistical information for that assertion he would have given it.

Q6. Mr. Marland

asked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 21 November.

Mr. Biffen

I have been asked to reply.

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

Mr. Marland

Is my right hon. Friend aware that the youth training scheme is enormously well thought of, not only by those who are trained, but by the trainers and the job providers? The extension of the training period to two years is widely welcomed. However, there is some worry about the future funding of the scheme. Will my right hon. Friend use his best offices to ensure that future funding is kept to a maximum, so that the least well qualified who are currently on mode B will be affected as little as possible?

Mr. Biffen

The point that my hon. Friend raises is echoed in many quarters of the House. We have designed the funding of the two-year scheme to help mode B1 providers, so that they will be generally eligible for premium grants. Many will receive special transitional help next year.

Mr. Kinnock

Has the right hon. Gentleman seen the parliamentary answer from his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment, which makes it clear that there will be a further cut over the next year of at least £135 million in the Government's captial allocation for housing, housebuilding and house improvement? Does the right hon. Gentleman recall that just last week the Prime Minister rather glibly claimed in the Guildhall that she saw a process of renewal taking place throughout the country? Does he think a cut in housebuilding adds to or retards that process of renewal?

Mr. Biffen

I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will take account of the fact that the prospects for housebuilding relate not only to the allocations but to the local authorities' access to their own capital receipts. When these are taken in totality, it is the view of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment that next year will show an increase over this year.

Mr. Kinnock

Does that mean that the right hon. Gentleman, at least, thinks that local authorities should be permitted to use more than 20 per cent. of the money raised by a variety of means that they want to dedicate to housing? Is he satisfied with the fact that we have the lowest housebuilding starts of any year since the war, that 250,000 building workers are unemployed and that young and old people are in desperate need of houses? If he is concerned about those things, will he use his influence to persuade the Government to change their policy, make those allocations, and allow local authorities to spend more on creating jobs and homes?

Mr. Biffen

It is the avowed policy of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment that decisions on allocations are taken in the context of the local authorities' access to capital receipts. There will be greater spending next year.

Mr. Patrick Thompson

Has my right hon. Friend had time today to reflect on the increasing amount of damage being done to the education of our young people because of the continuing teachers' dispute? The National Union of Teachers has initiated a series of strikes in selected constituencies, including that of my hon. Friend the Member for Norwich, South (Mr. Powley). Does my right hon. Friend agree that such action is counter-productive and is not the right way to seek to persuade Members of Parliament to support the teachers' cause? Surely negotiation and discussion is the right way forward.

Mr. Biffen

I totally agree with my hon. Friend. Many of the tactics being adopted will create an acrimony that will linger long after a settlement.

Q7. Mr. Simon Hughes

asked the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 21 November.

Mr. Biffen

I have been asked to reply.

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

Mr. Hughes

Will the Leader of the House unreservedly condemn the stubborn and self-serving attitude of the leaders of Liverpool city council, who this morning rejected the last olive branch to save their city from municipal bankruptcy? Will he ask his right hon. Friend to make recommendations immediately to the Court of Appeal, so that the date for the hearing of an appeal against disqualification can be brought forward? Even if the councillors are determined on kamikaze tactics for themselves, at least the people of Liverpool can be bailed out and given a chance to change political direction before it is too late.

Mr. Biffen

The breakdown of this morning's discussions was absolutely deplorable and can cause but further difficulties for the electors and citizens of Liverpool. The responsibility still remains with the city council to put its affairs in order, and it seems to me that the AMA and the Stonefrost reports show how that might be done. As to the possibility of the court action being accelerated, I am not clear what would be the status of my right hon. Friend in the matter, but I shall refer the hon. Gentleman's comments to him.