§ Q1. Mr. Malcolm BruceTo ask the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 4 May.
§ The Prime Minister (Mrs. Margaret Thatcher)This morning I presided at a meeting of the Cabinet and had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in this House, I shall be having further meetings later today.
§ Mr. BruceWill the Prime Minister accept that many of us who do not share her views, nevertheless acknowledge that it is a considerable achievement to be in No. 10 for 10 years? [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] Does she also accept that many people feel that she is now going too far and that she only listens to people whom she describes as "one of us"? Would it not be better for the country and for her if, in future, she went around with her eyes and ears open and her mouth shut?
§ The Prime MinisterThen why does the hon. Gentleman ask me a question so that I have to open my mouth to answer it?
§ Mrs. Ann WintertonMay I ask my right hon. Friend, as one grandmother to another, whether she agrees that the stability of our society is based greatly upon the strength of the family unit? Does she further agree that, when we reform our present outdated Sunday trading law, we should not throw the baby out with the bathwater, but should retain the traditional character of the British Sunday as a family day for rest, recreation and corporate Christian worship?
§ The Prime MinisterI think that we must form a grandparents club in the House of Commons. I think that there would be rather a lot of people in it—and all of them would agree with my hon. Friend that the importance of the family is vital to the health of our society and that it is 357 vital to uphold it. [Interruption.] The family existed as a unit in society long before there was such a thing as child benefit, because people took responsibility for their own families.
With regard to Sunday trading, I think that my hon. Friend will agree that the present law is not fair and not consistent; however, I hope that, before any Bill was ever brought in, there would be virtual agreement in the House on what it should contain.
§ Mr. KinnockWould the Prime Minister be good enough to recall for us today the prayer of St. Francis of Assisi?
§ The Prime MinisterI think that one has achieved that prayer and brought a great deal of harmony where there was a fantastic amount of discord under the last Labour Government.
§ Mr. KinnockIt bears repeating:
Where there is discord may we bring harmony,Where there is error may we bring truth,Where there is doubt may we bring faith,Where there is despair may we bring hope".Can the Prime Minister tell us why, in 10 years, she has failed to live up to a single one of those principles?
§ The Prime MinisterPerhaps the right hon. Gentleman will remember the discord in the winter of discontent of 1979, when, under Socialism, there were strikes in the hospitals and one could not even get the dead buried. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will realise that there is now faith in Britain overseas—[Interruption.]—and perhaps he will realise that the social services are at a level of efficiency and generosity which has brought hope and a higher standard of living than people have ever known before.
§ Mr. Nicholas BennettDoes my right hon. Friend agree that the last thing this country needs is a national dock strike, a strike which would lead to imports being held up and coming in after the strike was over, thereby damaging our export potential? [Interruption.] Does she recall that, when national dock strikes and other strikes which damaged the economy took place under Labour, the Conservative party supported the then Government in opposing them? What does she think of the statement made by Labour Members that, if there was a strike, they would have to support it?
§ The Prime MinisterI earnestly hope with my hon. Friend that there will not be a strike. The national dock labour scheme is being abolished so that the ports to which it at present applies can have a much more prosperous future when it has gone, as can all the people who work in industries in the hinterland. It will be greatly to their advantage. Any strike on behalf of the dock labour scheme would bear extremely heavily on all the other people in the economy who work steadily and well to produce Britain's prosperity and the prosperity of their families.
Q3. Mr. Ted GarrettTo ask the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 4 May.
§ The Prime MinisterI refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
Mr. GarrettThe House will have noted that the Prime Minister splurged about patriotism when replying to the previous question. Is the right hon. Lady aware that there 358 are many anniversaries this year, including one that I consider to be important—the 40th anniversary of the formation of the Council of Europe? Tomorrow, Finland will be the 23rd country to join.
Will the Prime Minister ensure that the vast Government public relations machine highlights the importance of that organisation relative to the other organisation which I can hardly bear to mention but which is based in Brussels? Is she aware that the Council of Europe, which is composed of 177 elected Members of Parliament from the countries concerned, of which Britain has 18, can do infinitely more for the general well-being of this country than can the European Economic Community? Is she further aware that, for that reason, many of our interests in the broader spectrum of Europe coincide with the 23 rather than with the 12?
§ The Prime MinisterI am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for those remarks. I agree that the Council of Europe represents a far wider swathe of Europe than does the Community and that it does an excellent job. I particularly pay tribute to the work done by hon. Members of this House in the Council of Europe, which is also particularly active in human rights and in keeping contact with many countries which would otherwise feel left out of the European Community. I share the hon. Gentleman's sentiments, and I thank him for expressing them.
§ Q.4. Mr. ThurnhamTo ask the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 4 May.
§ The Prime MinisterI refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
§ Mr. ThurnhamWill my right hon. Friend bear in mind the way in which the strength of the economy has helped the sick and the disabled, whose real benefits have nearly doubled in the last decade? Does she agree that much more work lies ahead, especially to help find families where needed for the 5,600 handicapped children still in institutional care?
§ The Prime MinisterI agree that greater prosperity has enabled us to do far more for the disabled. Indeed, when we came to office, expenditure on the disabled was £1.8 billion a year. It is now £7.3 billion, and helps many more people. In particular, the mobility allowance has been made non-taxable. We have increased spending on the mobility allowance by nearly six times.
With regard to finding new families for handicapped children, I should like to pay tribute to what my hon. Friend has done and to the great lead that he has taken on the matter. Grants have been made to a number of voluntary agencies, in particular to the British Agency for Adoption and Fostering, which next week launches a new family-finding campaign entitled "Families Forever". We wish it well in this great work.
§ Q.5. Mr. Chris SmithTo ask the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 4 May.
§ The Prime MinisterI refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
§ Mr. SmithWill the Prime Minister tell us what the British balance of payments position was in 1979, and what it is likely to be in 1989? How proud is she of the change that she has brought about?
§ The Prime MinisterI am very proud indeed of the fact that this country has overseas assets of enormous dimensions, which have gone up over the past 10 years and which, together with economic policies, enable people to keep confidence in this country, and enable us to import many goods for higher investment to give higher productivity in future. That is a situation that was never attained under the last Labour Government.
§ Mr. GorstDuring the course of her busy day, will my right hon. Friend have time to address herself to what she might be able to announce to the House on 4 May 1999 as her major achievements in the next 10 years?
§ The Prime MinisterNot today, but I hope very soon to be giving some thought to that prospect.
§ Q6. Mr. SillarsTo ask the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 4 May.
§ The Prime MinisterI refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
§ Mr. SillarsMay I refer the Prime Minister to her earlier remarks about the increased overseas aid given by Britain? Is she aware that that does not apply to the colony of Hong Kong? Will the right hon. Lady acknowledge that there has been a serious breach of our moral obligations to the Chinese population in Hong Kong? Will she and the Government seriously take on board a review of the present policy, which denies those people the fundamental right of a vote in a democratic country?
§ The Prime MinisterI am delighted that the hon. Member seems to think that in Scotland there is much greater faith in the United Kingdom.
§ Mr. SillarsThat is not a reply.
§ The Prime MinisterAh, but it is a reply. The hon. Member did not say that Scotland lacked faith in the future of the United Kingdom, and I quite understand why, because Scotland has benefited enormously from a higher standard of living. I am so glad to recognise that, on this our 10th anniversary.
The lease on Hong Kong ends in 1997 and we did extremely well to negotiate an agreement with China to keep the present capitalist regime going for the next 50 years. I believe that that is much welcomed in Hong Kong. The hon. Gentleman must have run out of original ideas, because he repeats the same question that he has asked before, and I give him the same answer.
§ Q7. Mr. ButterfillTo ask the Prime Minister if she will list her official engagements for Thursday 4 May.
§ The Prime MinisterI refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
§ Mr. ButterfillIn view of the appalling incompetence and maladministration of the European Commission revealed by the Court of Auditors' report, does not my right hon. Friend agree that it is extraordinary that it 360 should seek to extend its activities to language training and to the medium-term transport infrastructure fund? Does she not feel that it would be better employed looking after the matters for which it already has responsibility, in particular, removing the barriers to takeover bids that presently exist in the European Community?
§ The Prime MinisterI agree with my hon. Friend that we need to be on our guard against the Commission's attempts to extend existing Community competence into new areas. That seems to happen a lot at present. I agree with him that one area where t could usefully make more use of its existing powers would be in ensuring fair competition in Europe. For example, a number of countries still give heavy subsidies to industry, although they pay lip service to fair competition. Italy, Germany and France still give heavy subsidies to industry, and if they really believe in fair competition in 1992, those subsidies will have to go. More effective use of existing powers and competence should have priority over trying to extend that competence or dreaming up yet more institutions.
§ Mr. Alfred MorrisIf the NHS White Paper is such a huge success, as the Prime Minister persists in claiming, why was the visit of the Secretary of State for Health to the Vale of Glamorgan such a disastrous flop? Does the right hon. Lady still expect her 10th anniversary to be marked by victory in the vale?
§ The Prime MinisterI hope that we shall achieve victory in the vale. We deserve it. I hope that one factor will be the Government's excellent record on the Health Service. As pointed out at Question Time on Tuesday, for every El spent on the NHS by the previous Labour Government, this Government have spent £3. There are more doctors and nurses and they are better paid, more patients are treated and each doctor has a smaller list. The right hon. Gentleman should help us to put the facts across instead of the fiction released by the Opposition.