Commons Sitting of 3 December 1992

Preamble
The House met at half-past Two o'clock
PRAYERS
[MADAM SPEAKER in the Chair]
PRAYERS
  PRIVATE BUSINESS

    WOODGRANGE PARK CEMETERY BILL [Lords] (By Order)
    Orders for Second Reading read.
    To be read a Second time on Thursday 10 December.

    SECOND REPORT ON THE MAGUIRE CASE
    Ordered,
    That there be laid before the House a Return of the Second Report on the Maguire Case: The Inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the convictions arising out of the bomb attacks in Guildford and Woolwich in 1974, by the Right honourable Sir John May.—[Mr. Jack.]

Oral Answers to Questions
  AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD

    Common Agricultural Policy
    Mr. David Martin: To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what recent proposals have been agreed to combat fraud under the reformed CAP.
    The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. John Selwyn Gummer): First, I congratulate the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East (Dr. Strang) on his first appearance on the Opposition Front Bench.
    The United Kingdom puts a high priority on combating fraud. I therefore welcome the new integrated administration and control system agreed at the November Council, the main purpose of which is to do just that.
    Mr. Martin: I welcome my right hon. Friend's reply. I am sure that he is aware that, for city dwellers in places such as Portsmouth, it is often the horror stories and the costs of the CAP which are more obvious than its benefits. How will the new measures be enforced effectively through the institutions of the EC so that my constituents can be assured that their hard-earned cash will not go to line the pockets of continental con men?
    Mr. Gummer: I would not be too nationalistic about con men. There are people who use systems and they need to be stopped. The new anti-fraud devices will be effective. The Commission has greater powers to inspect inspectorates, and rules will be more clearly and transparently controlled. I remind my hon. Friend that recently it was the Italian Government who discovered Italian fraud and reported it to the Commission, which makes a major change of which I am sure that my hon. Friend and his constituents will approve.
    Mr. Skinner: Will the Minister confirm that last year there was a report that the fraud was of the order of £7,000 million? Although there is fraud in Italy, with olive trees being paid for which exist only on paper, is not it true that fraud also takes place in Britain? Will the right hon. Gentleman confirm that cattle are moved across the border from southern Ireland into Northern Ireland, back and for'ard, back and for'ard; the cattle have done it so often that they know the road themselves and money is made every time? Is not it high time that the right hon. Gentleman looked into not just what is happening on the continent, because that is big, but what is happening here as well?
    Mr. Gummer: I hope that the hon. Gentleman noticed that I said to my hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth, South (Mr. Martin) that one should not restrict one's complaints to those in the rest of the Community. The very point that the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) has raised will be precisely covered in the part of the new measures concerning the identification of cattle. I am sure that that will have his full support.
    Sir Peter Hordern: Will my right hon. Friend commend the measures in the Maastricht treaty that provide for the European Parliament the same kind of research that the Public Accounts Committee does in Britain, allowing the European Commission to carry out a proper standard of inspection and investigation into fraud under the CAP?
    Mr. Gummer: My hon. Friend is right. Another advantage of the Maastricht treaty will be that countries that do not carry out the regulations to which they have given their vote and their name will be able to be brought before the European Court of Justice and fined; what they have supported will then be enforced.

    Bivalve Molluscs
    Mr. Gareth Wardell: To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food by when he expects the European veterinary committee to reach a decision on the application by his Department for approval to be given for the use of the Torry process for processing bivalve molluscs.
    The Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. David Curry): The Standing Veterinary Committee approved the principles of the Torry process on 18 November.
    Mr. Wardell: The Council of Ministers approved two directives relevant to that matter on 22 July last year, so why did it take the Minister's Department a year before an application for the Torry process was made to the European veterinary committee so that, today, none of the cockle gatherers of Penclawdd know that that process has

    379
    been approved? The Minister has sounded the death knell of that industry from 1 January next year, because there is no way that those cockle gatherers can implement the process by the time that the directives come into force. This week, I referred the Ministry to the Parliamentary Commissioner because of its maladministration. I want to know from the Minister what is the recipe for those of my constituents who have worked in an industry that has existed since the middle ages, but which will be closed down on 1 January because the Minister's incompetence.
    Mr. Curry: The hon. Gentleman asked a lot of questions, but clearly he does not understand the answers, which are very clear. Nobody will be closed down on 1 January or 2 January. We will make sure that the regulations are in place, and we will give clear indications to environmental health officers in the hon. Gentleman's local authority that where it is clear that the operator will take the necessary measures to protect public health—
    Mr. Wardell: In three weeks?
    Mr. Curry:—after 1 January, he will be continuing in business. We will apply the regulations with common sense. If the hon. Gentleman fears that a producer is going out of business, he can bring the case to my attention and we will investigate it—but the hon. Gentleman will have precious little to report.

    Agricultural Training Board
    Mr. Fabricant: To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what plans he has to ensure that the services offered by the Agricultural Training Board in central England continue to be at the level required to meet the needs of the region.
    The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Nicholas Soames): We are carefully considering reactions to our plans to change the status of the Agricultural Training Board.
    Mr. Fabricant: Does my hon. Friend agree that training groups are a marvellous way of farmers getting together and provide a perfect forum for disseminating training information to other farmers? Does he also agree that United Kingdom farmers are very strapped for cash at the moment? Will he make a statement confirming that core funding for training, together with some additional funding for overheads, will continue?
    Mr. Soames: It is clear from the response and from comments received that ATB training groups are highly valued by the industry and other agencies operating in the land-based sector. I confirm that if Agriculture Ministers decide, following the consultation exercise, to implement their proposals for changing the status of ATB funding, core funding will continue.
    Mr. Stevenson: In the light of that response, should not the question posed be not so much about core funding for the board in central England but whether or not the boards have a future? Given the Government's negative response in respect of wages councils and similar bodies, will the Minister give a commitment that ATBs will continue with Government support, even if core funding is changed?
    Mr. Soames: The hon. Gentleman raises an important point, and he is right to make such an inquiry. We have a high opinion of the Agricultural Training Board's work, and seek to explore with the ATB ways of making its operations more efficient and less bureaucratic. We have every intention of ensuring that the board continues its good work.

    Alternative Land Use
    Mr. Steen: To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how many acres of land are to be taken out of agricultural use in the United Kingdom under the recent reforms of the CAP; and if he will make a statement on the progress made on his alternative land use policy.
    Mr. Gummer: It is not yet possible to say precisely how much land will be fallowed in the first year of the arable area payment scheme. The Commission has estimated that some 634,000 hectares would be set aside in the United Kingdom as a whole.
    Mr. Steen: I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend's excellent work for farmers throughout the country and particularly in my area. Am I right in thinking that an area of land five times the size of Devon will have to be taken out of agriculture? If so, will that be done by eating into green-field sites on the edges of towns and smaller market villages; by land being taken by recreational, leisure, and tourist interests; or by increasing the number of gardens that people can have? Is my right hon. Friend aware that it is less dangerous to walk across Dartmoor, where the military can fire freely 300 days a year, than in many other parts of my constituency because of the number of golf balls that fly around there?
    Mr. Gummer: My hon. Friend knows that fallowing was part of the rotation of crops for many years, but was stopped recently. Land will be taken out in different ways all over the country. My main concern is that the process should be as environmentally friendly as possible and that we should keep the land in good heart, because there may come a time when we shall need it. No student of history could support the idea that surpluses go on for ever. I hope that people will be imaginative. I agree with my hon. Friend that even gardens may be available, and I hope that no one will try to frustrate that.
    Mr. Martyn Jones: The Minister is aware that there are few alternative uses for hill areas in my constituency and in other parts of Britain. Golf is not an option, as nobody has invented a vertical golf course yet. Will he assure me that the GATT negotiations on the common agricultural policy will not further erode hill livestock compensatory amounts and the ewe premium?
    Mr. Gummer: As the hon. Gentleman knows, there will be little set-aside in the hillier areas of his constituency. I assure him that the GATT agreement is consonant with the common agricultural policy reform and that the payments that he mentioned will not be disciplined under the GATT because they are not production connected.
    Mr. Lord: My right hon. Friend will be aware that many people are deeply concerned about the principle of setting aside fertile agricultural land. Concern is being expressed about the amount of land set aside in Britain and other European countries. Although we do not want

    381
    our farmers to behave like French farmers, will he assure the House that no more than the 15 per cent. already agreed will be set aside in Britain?
    Mr. Gummer: It would be much better if production capacity equalled available land, but it is surely better to set aside land than to have mountains and lakes, which cost a great deal, and surely better to keep the land in good heart and to pay the farmer for looking after it properly so that it is available when the nation needs it than to allow it to be removed from agriculture permanently. I think that my hon. Friend puts the saddest rather than the best aspect of a reasonable policy. I assure him that the CAP reform package that I have negotiated is very much in the United Kingdom's interests, and is very much better than that proposed at the outset.
    Mr. Campbell-Savours: Is not it clear that the Government's position has changed in the past seven days since the President of the Board of Trade gave his answer at the Dispatch Box? When I asked a similar question last week, we received a different response. If the NFU, European Community officials and his own Back Benchers believe it, why does not the Minister admit that the GATT agreement will lead to a substantial increase in set-aside—optimistic assumptions suggest 20 per cent., but pessimistic assumptions suggest as much as 40 per cent. Why does he persist in denying the truth from the Dispatch Box?
    Mr. Gummer: The hon. Gentleman's intervention—for the second time—suggests a staggering unfamiliarity with the facts. The European Commission has made it clear that GATT is compatible with CAP. If the European Commission says that it is compatible, it cannot mean that there will be an extensive extension of set-aside. The situation is quite clear: set-aside, as part of the programme of CAP reform, will not be radically changed by the GATT agreement. The hon. Gentleman knows that from me, he knows it from the Commission and, indeed, he would know it from what the NFU has said if he read it more carefully.

    Farmers (Planning)
    Mr. Moss: To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what assistance his Department is giving to farmers on planning matters.
    Mr. Soames: This Department works closely with the Department of the Environment to ensure that the planning system enables farmers to carry out developments that are necessary to sustain the rural economy.
    Mr. Moss: I thank my hon. Friend for that announcement, which will be warmly welcomed in my constituency of Cambridgeshire, North-East. But given the prospects of deteriorating farm incomes as a result of common agricultural policy reform and the GATT adjustments, does not my hon. Friend agree that planning authorities should adopt a far more sensitive and flexible approach to the development needs of farmers and landowners?
    Mr. Soames: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. He is right. Planning authorities should adopt a positive approach, and their role must be to facilitate sensible diversification. My hon. Friend will be aware that that was
    382
    the message of "The Countryside and the Rural Economy"—planning policy guidance note 7—issued by the Department. The document advises planning authorities that the development necessary to sustain the rural economy must be integrated with the protection of what is best in the countryside. Maintaining a healthy rural economy is by far the best way of protecting and enhancing our countryside.
    Mr. Graham: Is the Minister aware that in Renfrewshire we have been inundated with a flood of applications to build housing on farmland? What type of advice is the Department giving to farmers subjected to such pressure? My constituents in some of my Tory heartlands are sick and tired of spending a fortune to prevent houses from being built on farmland.
    Mr. Soames: I am grateful for the fact that that is a question for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland.
    Mr. Marland: Is my hon. Friend aware that it is important that local planning authorities, as well as allowing and encouraging developments involving surplus farm buildings, should allow the construction of other buildings, too, provided that they are suitably landscaped? Does my hon. Friend agree that all too often vociferous minorities have an influence far beyond what they deserve? Will he use his best offices to discuss with the Department of the Environment ways in which the resolve of local planning authorities may be stiffened to resist some of those vociferous minorities—which all too often come from the Liberal Democratic party?
    Mr. Soames: My hon. Friend is correct. The countryside cannot be preserved in aspic, and only its enemies would propose that it should be.
    Mr. Tony Banks: If it were you would eat it!
    Mr. Soames: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman.
    The proper way to create a vigorous and enterprising countryside is to ensure that farmers can diversify in a sensitive and realistic manner.

    GATT
    Mr. Barnes: To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what assessment he has made of the consistency of the GATT agricultural agreement with the recent CAP reforms; and if he will make a statement.
    Mr. Gummer: The recent agreement between the European Community and the United States on GATT agriculture paves the way for wider agreement in the round. The Commission has made it clear that it is compatible with the reforms of CAP regimes agreed earlier this year, as I said in reply to question 4.
    Mr. Barnes: Even with the reforms, the CAP is protectionist and has considerable subsidy equivalents. Although GATT is not a free trade system, it stands for trade liberalisation. Is the only way in which the circle can be squared between the different principles by taking more and more land out of production, at a time when more and more people in the world are starving?
    Mr. Gummer: I agree with the hon. Gentleman that there is a need to protect the countryside of Europe and to ensure that agriculture can continue sensibly there. If that

    383
    protection is not afforded, the countryside on which we depend will not be the sort of countryside that town dwellers and surburban people want to see. Of course we must protect agriculture to enable townsmen to enjoy the countryside. That can be done, but at a lower cost and with less protection than in the past, both through CAP reform and through a GATT agreement. That is why the Government have pioneered the CAP reform and why we have been at the centre of the battle to ensure that there is a GATT agreement.
    Mr. Dykes: May I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his skilful chairmanship of the EC Agriculture Council during our presidency? Is he now confident that the French will accept the GATT deal and that they will not exercise any vetoes?
    Mr. Gummer: The French Government have made it clear that they are unhappy about some of the details of the arrangements made between the European Community and the United States. They have also made it clear that they wish to see the whole GATT deal in the round before they make up their mind. They will then decide what is in the interests of France. It is inconceivable that it could be in the interests of France not to have a GATT deal which, after all, will help Europe to get out of the recession that has led to more than 3 million people being unemployed in France.
    Mr. John D. Taylor: Under the GATT agricultural agreement, what are the prospects for cheaper feeding stuffs to give an incentive to our intensive sector in agriculture?
    Mr. Gummer: The main ability to reduce the price of feeding stuffs comes from the CAP reform, which is taken up in the GATT agreement. There will be a reduction of 30 per cent. in the support price of cereals, which will have a direct knock-on effect in the price of feeding stuffs. Those feeding stuffs take up a large proportion of the end price of both pigs and poultry.
    Mr. Hawkins: My right hon. Friend will be aware from my previous discussions with him of my concern for the largest mushroom grower in the north of England, which is in my constituency. As part of his work on the continuing CAP reforms, will he pay special attention to the unfair subsidies that are paid to rival mushroom growers in a number of other countries? Will he join me in congratulating Pixie House Mushrooms on combating those unfair subsidies and winning this week the award for business of the year in our area, which was sponsored by First Leisure plc and by the local newspapers?
    Mr. Gummer: After that short break, we come back to the main programme. I agree with my hon. Friend that there are some practices within the Community that fundamentally distort competition and trade. They underline the need for Community action and decisions made across the country so that trade may be fair. I will continue to fight to ensure that British firms have a fair deal in Europe.
    Dr. Strang: I thank the Minister for his earlier congratulations. Is he aware that the Labour party wants international agreement on an overall GATT deal as soon as possible? However, measures will be required to protect the livelihoods of our farmers and farm workers, not least because of the hundreds of thousands of jobs in the food
    384
    and drink industries which are dependent on home agricultural produce. If concessions are made to secure a French agreement on GATT, will the Minister ensure that such concessions do not discriminate against our agriculture and that the British, as consumers and taxpayers, do not bear a disproportionate share of the cost?
    Mr. Gummer: The hon. Gentleman is right to say that a trade deal in GATT is essential. That point has all-party support. I do not see how any agreement under GATT could disproportionately disadvantage the United Kingdom. I am looking closely at the small print of the discussions so far to ensure that that does not happen. I do not believe that the French can object to the agreement under the CAP reform to which they added their vote. It follows that if CAP reform is consonant with GATT and GATT is consonant with CAP reform, there is no place for changes that would benefit one country rather than the others. Any changes that take place over the next few months must, as with any other changes, be fair for all countries, neither disproportionately costing nor disproportionately benefiting countries merely because they have made a lot of noise.

    Food Production Industry
    Mr. Amess: To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will make an official visit to food producers in Basildon to discuss the needs of the food production industry in the United Kingdom.
    Mr. Curry: I would consider an invitation to visit Basildon irresistable.
    Mr. Amess: With that excellent news, will my hon. Friend join me at Basildon Dairy Products and, while tasting the finest yoghurt in the world, listen to the company's concerns about its projected increased cost of raw materials next year and then join me at Faux Brand Products and, while tasting the finest ham in Europe, listen to the company's plans for expansion next year and its concern that while this country honours European directives at increased costs, other member states appear not to do that?
    Mr. Curry: I am looking forward to tasting the products at the plants in my hon. Friend's constituency. Experience tells me that when I am invited to taste products, I am usually required to sing for my supper and I will certainly listen to what those companies have to say.

    EC Surplus Butter
    Mr. Gerrard: To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will make a statement on the arrangements that have been made for the distribution of EC surplus butter.
    Mr. Curry: Three thousand seven hundred tonnes of butter will be distributed by 1,300 voluntary organisations.
    Mr. Gerrard: What does the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food do to ensure that there is adequate publicity so that the people who are entitled to the butter know where and when it is going to be distributed? What checks are carried out afterwards to ensure that the butter has gone to the people who are entitled to it and does not end up on market stalls and in shops?
    Mr. Curry: The publicity must be handled by the organisations concerned. We send the butter to voluntary organisations. It would be an enormous task for MAFF to advertise the locations at which 1,300 organisations make the butter available. The arrangements are subjected to very detailed checks. We check about one third of all recipients annually. We check the records of the produce received and the record of the produce that has gone out. We also check the number of recipients, how much each received and how eligibility was established. Organisations that are shown not to have followed the rules will find it extremely difficult to participate in the scheme the following year.

    Group Marketing Grant
    Mr. Tyler: To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what sums have been awarded to what groups under the MAFF group marketing grant since 1 April.
    Mr. Curry: The Department has so far issued 11 approvals under the scheme to a total value of just over £180,000 in England.
    Mr. Tyler: Is the Minister aware that that is a very disappointing and pathetic take-up after all the hype about the introduction of the scheme? Will the Minister comment on whether too high a proportion of the cost is laid on the groups or whether it has something to do with the criteria for acceptance within the Ministry? At the end of the financial year, will any unallocated funds be sucked back into the Treasury?
    Mr. Curry: The answer to the last question is no. I disagree with the hon. Gentleman's point about the take-up. We have had 39 applications and 18 approvals in the United Kingdom. We deliberately set ourselves to work sensibly to develop schemes and we deliberately decided not to go for a great theatrical send-off for a scheme that might not be well founded. The important point is that we are encouraging people to talk about, discuss and develop schemes with us and we are very encouraged by what is happening. We are now talking to the catering and retail sectors about how they can get hold of the products that they want to help British farmers and to give British consumers the best of British produce.
    Mr. John Greenway: Does my hon. Friend agree that the coming together of a competitive exchange rate, the CAP reform and the GATT settlement provides the best opportunity for a generation of British food manufacturers to make inroads into our huge trade deficit in food products? The marketing grant scheme is crucial to that. Does he also agree that the labelling directive which is under consideration would help our manufacturers a great deal if we could put on the labels of our food the origin of those food products?
    Mr. Curry: I note my hon. Friend's final point. I agree with him entirely. The whole purpose of the scheme is not to persuade people to do things for patriotic purposes, but to ensure that they can get first-rate products from the United Kingdom for our consumers and for the export market. We have some quite remarkable products and we are not justly represented overseas in many of the markets
    386
    in which we should be. The whole point of the scheme is to ensure that British food acquires a worldwide reputation for quality, reliability and innovation.

    Set-aside
    Mr. Pike: To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what progress he has made in introducing the new set-aside proposals.
    Mr. Gummer: A detailed booklet on the arable area payments scheme for 1992–93 was published in early September and copies were placed in the House Library.
    Mr. Pike: Does the Minister accept that while it may be seen as folly to pay farmers not to produce when millions of people in the world are starving, if we have to have a set-aside policy, we must be sure that the farmers will know the rules of the non-rotational scheme in time to plan for the next growing year?
    Mr. Gummer: I certainly want to make sure that when we have the non-rotational scheme which was inserted at British insistence, it will be early enough for people to make that choice and to include within it the areas which they have set aside under the rotational scheme as the first year of a non-rotational project.
    Mr. Gill: What consideration has my right hon. Friend given to the effect of set-aside on tenant values when dilapidations are settled at the end of a farm tenancy?
    Mr. Gummer: My hon. Friend raises a point which we have looked at carefully and it is one of the things that are informing our present discussions about the reform of landlord-tenant arrangements. I hope very much to be able to make decisions on that and, when legislative time is available, wholly to reform our landlord-tenant arrangements which are wildly out of date and do not provide enough land for tenants to take up.
    Mr. Alan W. Williams: Does the Minister accept that his policy on set-aside is quite unsatisfactory? It applies to no other industry; it has a very dubious effect on the environment and there is the further danger that farmers will increase the productivity of their remaining land to make up what they have lost on set-aside. Would it not be wiser to encourage less intensive agriculture?
    Mr. Gummer: The hon. Member has obviously not read our statements, which show that we are doing precisely that. It is our purpose to encourage less intensive arrangements, but set-aside is a necessary part of the whole policy and he does not do his own farmers any good by perpetuating myths about set-aside which they would disagree with.
    The fact is that we are over-producing and that we cannot use what we over-produce to help the developing countries, as every aid agency would tell us. The hon. Member must not blame us for not doing something for which every aid agency would attack us if we did. Secondly his comments about the environment would be entirely undermined by most of the environmental agencies in this country. Set-aside has been welcomed by a number of them. A mixture of rotational and no-rotational set-aside would have their widespread support. The hon. Gentleman should not intervene when he has not done his homework.
    Mr. Clifton-Brown: Further to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Mr. Gill), my right hon. Friend will be aware, having completed his consultation on landlord and tenant reform, that there is a window of goodwill from all organisations that this reform should succeed. May I urge him to come forward with a White Paper or legislative proposals as soon as possible?
    Mr. Gummer: The point about set-aside is that it again underlines the need for the arrangements between landlords and tenants to be left to the landlords and tenants and not to a panoply of legal arrangements. I do not believe that we shall get sufficient land forward, so that tenants who want to come into the industry will be able to take it, unless we ensure that decisions are made between two grown-up people and not interfered with by a lot of people who have arrangements that are based on laws that are long out of date.
    Mr. Maclennan: Does the Minister agree that we would be less dependent on set-aside if farmers in this and other countries in the Community were more able to meet their agricultural feedstuff requirements from their own resources? Will he look particularly at the exports of maize gluten and other feedstuffs from America in the context of the GATT round?
    Mr. Gummer: We have been discussing this, not in the context of the GATT round but in the context of the GATT panel finding on two separate occasions that we in Europe have for too long excluded the products of the United States and other countries, having given them tariff-free entry.
    The Commissioner has achieved what I believe to be a good deal for Europe on that issue and we should congratulate him on what he has done, because it has paved the way for a wider GATT agreement.
    Mr. Morley: I am sure that the Minister will agree that without constructive and positive uses for set-aside land, we shall face a new wasteland policy in this country because of land that is left uncultivated. We are looking forward to proper proposals to ensure that land is used constructively, without a negative waste of public funds. Bearing in mind what the Minister has said about the impact of the GATT agreement, can we take it that he is giving the House an assurance that no more than 15 per cent. of agricultural land will be set aside in this country?
    Mr. Gummer: There is no question of the GATT agreement increasing substantially the costs of the common agricultural policy reform for the farmer, and among those is set-aside. I do not change from that position. The hon. Gentleman talks about set-aside as if it were an innovation, when there has been crop rotation throughout the history of agriculture. Large areas of land have always been left to rest, and the hon. Gentleman cannot start some terrible scare about it. Farmers are being paid to look after the land. The rules that I have laid down are tougher than in other European countries because I have environmental support—[Interruption.]—if hon. Gentlemen ask questions and expect answers, they should not interrupt people when they are trying to answer.

    Right to Fish
    Mr. Sproat: To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will make a statement on official procedures for informing fishermen when their right to fish is to be stopped.
    Mr. Curry: Fishermen are informed of fishery closures by means of variations to their licences, wherever possible immediately before a closure.
    Mr. Sproat: While fish quota management is extremely difficult, surely there is something seriously wrong with the system when the fishermen of Harwich and the Thames estuary can be told their quotas for the rest of the year on 27 October, and they plan on that basis, only to be told two weeks later that the quotas have been slashed by three quarters and a week later that they have been abandoned all together, thus wiping out their livelihood for the last six weeks of the year. Can my hon. Friend assure me that he is looking for, and will find, a more fair and effective method of quota control?
    Mr. Curry: If my hon. Friend wishes us to move to individual transferable quotas, where the fisherman is given a clear quota to exploit throughout the year, I shall be happy to examine that, but the fishing industry has shown strong hostility to it. Under the present rules, the one thing that we cannot control is how frequently fishermen go to sea and how much they catch. There is always a delay of a couple of weeks before statistics are available. If we say that we are going to close a fishery in five or six days, every fisherman in creation will set out to sea, stay there for as long as possible, and come back with a large catch, which will represent a significant overfish. I understand the problem, and have told each group of fishermen where problems occur. If there is any justification for reopening I shall do it, and I have already met a significant number of groups of fishermen. If we can improve management we shall be open to doing so.
    Mr. Austin Mitchell: The Minister is going to have to stop a lot of other fishermen, in the dictatorial way in which he has just stopped the Grimsby producer organisations' cod quota, if the multi-annual guidance programme targets that he has just agreed in Brussels come into effect. How can the Minister justify an agreement which cuts by one fifth the British fishing effort—the nation which provides the majority of the fish stocks in the Common Market pool—and leaves the massive Spanish effort with a 4 per cent. cut only?
    Mr. Curry: I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on the flag of convenience that he is wearing. As usual, he has got his facts wrong. The multi-annual guidance programme targets are identical for all member states. The effort that they have to apply to each sector depends on how their fleet is divided between various sectors. We shall monitor carefully what the Spanish and everyone else is doing. We have an outstandingly good deal for the British fleet, which I shall explain to him at length and very slowly if he so wishes.
    Mr. Harris: Is my hon. Friend aware that the Cornish fishermen, especially those from my constituency, are hopping mad because of what they regard as the premature closure of the hake fishery? Two days ago they were suddenly told, without warning, that the Minister had closed that fishery, even though the Cornish fish

    389
    producers organisation has 20 tonnes of unused quota at its disposal. Surely they are being penalised because they have managed their sector of the quota well, whereas others have managed it badly.
    Mr. Curry: The people who are hopping mad are the quota hoppers, because they are the people who are most affected by this closure. When we have the up-to-date figures, I am sure that my hon. Friend will find that there is no deficiency left on the tonnages which have been taken. I give him an assurance, as I do all fishermen, that if we find that there is so much as one fish left, we will authorise them to go and catch it.
    Mr. Salmond: The Minister claimed in Standing Committee that opinion in the industry was divided on the question of borrowing forward on the haddock quota. Given that the entire Scottish industry was in favour of this proposal, can the Minister name the fishing organisation that was against it?
    Mr. Curry: I can name the organisation that failed to administer its quota effectively this year, and that is the producer organisation that is supposed to be disputing that decision on haddock. Those haddock are on the margin of the minimum landing size. If they are caught next year they will be bigger fish, better fish and worth a great deal more to the industry. The sensible thing is to catch them next year when they have a reasonable and sensible quota.

  PRIME MINISTER

    Engagements
    Ql. Mr. Congdon: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 3 December.
    The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major): This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be having further meetings later today.
    Mr. Congdon: Is my right hon. Friend aware that many businesses are finding it difficult enough without the added burden of bureaucratic interference and excessive regulation? Can he assure businesses in my constituency that he will do everything he can to reduce the number of petty rules and regulations emanating both from Whitehall and from Brussels?
    The Prime Minister: I can certainly give my hon. Friend that assurance. I think that it is time that we stood back again and looked at the whole burden of regulation—that imposed by the House, that imposed by the Community and that imposed by local authorities. That is precisely what I have asked my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade to do. I shall be calling in all Cabinet Ministers in the new year to discuss how we can cut that red tape still further. Today I have announced a new scrutiny involving the private sector, which will look at the way in which EC regulations impact upon business. My right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade will announce details of this shortly.
    Mr. John Smith: On the day when the Post Office has made a staggering announcement of 15,000 job losses, will the Prime Minister tell the House what action he proposes to take to stern the rising tide of unemployment?
    The Prime Minister: Everyone, of course, regrets job losses wherever they occur. In the case of the Post Office, I am glad that these are both to be spread and to be sought voluntarily. The only way to create long-term sustainable jobs is to create the right policies that produce long-term sustainable growth. That is precisely what we are putting in place.
    Mr. John Smith: Does the Prime Minister not realise that we have heard both these regrets and these excuses in every month of the two years in which he has been Prime Minister? Does he not accept the reality of modern Britain, that there are 52 unemployed people seeking every job vacant in the west midlands and 72 seeking every job vacant in London? What does he propose to do about it?
    The Prime Minister: The right hon. and learned Gentleman should have been listening a moment or so ago. If he is really concerned about jobs, why does he not drop his commitment to a payroll tax, the social chapter and the minimum wage? The right hon. and learned Gentleman should remember what happened last time a Labour Government—of which he was a member—tried to buy its way out of recession: 27 per cent. inflation and no growth.
    Mr. John Smith: Is it not pathetic that, after 15 years of Conservative Government and after the Prime Minister has been in office for two years, he is still seeking to blame others for unemployment? Does he not realise that redundancy does not just affect the Post Office; in this week alone, we have the Post Office, Ford and Cammell Laird? Does he not understand that unemployment is now a cancer eating up the fabric of British society? When, at long last, will he take some action against unemployment?
    The Prime Minister: The right hon. and learned Gentleman expresses concern about Cammell Laird. The defence policies that his party espouses would put hundreds of thousands of people out of work. He conveniently forgets that labour spent the first half of this year calling for swingeing tax increases that would have put many other people out of work. Our priority has been to create the right conditions for growth. We have cut inflation to under 4 per cent., we have cut tax rates for businesses and earners and we have reduced interest rates to 7 per cent., the lowest in the Community and half the level of two years ago.
    Perhaps the right hon. and learned Gentleman missed the latest Community survey in the Financial Times—[Interruption.] I gather that he did. If he had not, perhaps he would be better informed. That showed that British business men are now displaying much more confidence in British prospects than their continental counterparts are showing in their prospects. When will the right hon. and learned Gentleman start talking this country up and stop talking it down?
    Mr. King: Against the background of the further attempts by the IRA to mount a bombing campaign in Northern Ireland and on the mainland, did my right hon. Friend note in the recent elections in the Republic of Ireland that Sinn Fein massed the masive total of 1·6 per cent. of support and that of the 42 candidates who stood, 40 lost their deposits? Does my right hon. Friend agree that that demonstrates that any attempt to pretend that there is popular democratic support for the campaign of violence is totally fraudulent?
    The Prime Minister: I certainly noted the statistics to which my right hon. Friend refers. They reflect the disgust that is felt not only in this country but in the Republic of Ireland about the way in which the IRA seeks to bomb, kill and damage people's lives indiscriminately.
    Mr. Mullin: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 3 December.
    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Mullin: Does the Prime Minister recall that in September 1986 he filled in a questionnaire sent to him by the author Mr. Martin Short agreeing that police officers, magistrates, Members of Parliament, councillors and other public officials who were Freemasons should disclose that fact? If he has forgotten, I have with me a copy of the questionnaire with his signature at the bottom of it. Is that still his position and, if so, may I expect his support for my Secret Societies (Declaration) Bill which comes up for Second Reading on 29 January?
    The Prime Minister: I commend the hon. Gentleman for his ingenuity and research. It remains my personal view, as set out at that time. I shall examine his Bill and my timetable and see what answer I come up with.
    Sir Geoffrey Johnson Smith: Is my right hon. Friend aware that in the last week alone, 17 convoys of British troops have delivered nearly 1,000 tonnes of food to the stricken citizens of Bosnia? Will he reassure the House that it is not the Government's intention to deploy British troops in a combat role, whatever the merits of enforcing a no-fly zone, in what is essentially a civil war?
    The Prime Minister: As my hon. Friend knows, we already have 2,000 troops in Yugoslavia. They are there to deliver humanitarian aid. They are, as my hon. Friend points out, doing that with great skill, persistence and bravery. We have taken a leading role in many aspects in Yugoslavia, in sanctions monitoring in the Adriatic, and that has now been stepped up. We have, of course, supported the establishment of a no-fly zone. If further action is needed to enforce that no-fly zone, we should wish to consider that with our allies and partners in the United Nations, but we have no immediate plans to go further.
    Mr. Ashdown: Does the Prime Minister not yet realise that, despite the best efforts of our troops on the ground, the situation in and around Bosnia is not getting better but worse? Does he not realise that time is running out for saving lives and for stopping the spread of the conflict? Does he further not realise that whether it is in London in August or in Geneva in two weeks' time, peace efforts will continue to fail for so long as agreements on paper are not backed by the will to enforce them on the ground?
    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman refers to the London conference on Yugoslavia, which this country called and which set a new framework for negotiations. He is right in saying that when those negotiations are there it is necessary for those who reach agreements to keep them, and we will certainly do what we can to ensure that.
    The right hon. Member, like everyone else, wants to see an end to the fighting and suffering in the former Yugoslavia. I have to tell him that we are not talking about the invasion of one country by another; we are talking, as
    392
    my hon. Friend the Member for Wealden (Sir G. Johnson Smith) said, effectively about a civil war. It is all too easy to be heroic with the lives of other people.
    Those who talk glibly about bombing from the air should consider the risk of retaliation to our troops who are, at present, delivering humanitarian aid. Those who go further and talk about putting ground forces in should realise that, were the circumstances necessary and we and others did so, we would be committing those troops to a very long and bloody fight with the absolute certainty of serious casualties. If we have not put in troops, as the right hon. Gentleman clearly thinks we might have done, it is not out of neglect; it is out of our judgment of what is best, what is feasible and what is responsible.
    Mr. Watts: Can my right hon. Friend confirm that our European Community partners understand clearly that any attempt to interfere with the rebate of Britain's excessive contributions to the EC budget would have a dramatic effect on his ability to secure a smooth passage for the Maastricht Bill through the House?
    The Prime Minister: I am sure that my hon. Friend has just made his own point in an inimitable fashion, and I note it. I am grateful for what he had to say.
    The abatement, which is worth about £12 billion to the United Kingdom so far, ensures that we pay only our fair share to the Community budget. I have to say that there is no justification whatever for reducing that rebate, and we shall not agree to reduce it at Edinburgh. On most issues at Edinburgh, there may be room for negotiation. On this issue, there is no room whatever for negotiation.
    Mr. Burden: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 3 December.
    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave some moment ago.
    Mr. Burden: Is the Prime Minister aware that this year more than 2,500 jobs have been lost in manufacturing in my city of Birmingham, and that, every working day that he has been Prime Minister, 750 manufacturing jobs have been lost? Given the virtual vote of no confidence which the Engineering Employers Federation gave to the President of the Board of Trade last week, when will he start listening to what the manufacturing industry is saying?
    The Prime Minister: I advise the hon. Gentleman to read the "Autumn Statement". He obviously missed it.
    Mr. Conway: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 3 December.
    The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave some moment ago.
    Mr. Conway: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the people of this country never wanted to celebrate the Marxist anniversay of May day? Given the new spirit of European co-operation, will my right hon. Friend consider replacing the May day bank holiday with a bank holiday to mark the anniversary of the battle of Trafalgar, the battle of Agincourt or, better still, the battle of Waterloo?
    The Prime Minister: I share my hon. Friend's enthusiasm for removing the May day bank holiday in precisely the same way in which are seeing the removal of

    393
    the political system that it supports. Perhaps Trafalgar day would be appropriate; perhaps other days, but certainly not May day.
    Mr. Hattersley: Which does the Prime Minister think would most increase the choices available to a poor family—all the charters that he has announced, some of which he relaunched this morning, or £10 a week more on child benefit?
    The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman should realise that many people in this country want to ensure that they get a better quality of public service than they have had in the past. We are determined under the charter programme to ensure that they get that better quality of service. I find it astonishing that the Labour party talks about public service, but does nothing in reality to ensure that people receive it.
    Mr. Streeter: Does my right hon. Friend agree that competitive tendering has brought real improvement and value for money where it has been introduced in local authority services? Does he, like me, welcome the fact that compulsory competitive tendering is to be introduced into housing management?
    The Prime Minister: I certainly agree that competitive tendering has produced substantial cost savings so far, and will no doubt continue to do so in future. It has done so with the same or improved standards of performance. I welcome the extension of compulsory competitive tendering to housing management—it is a little overdue, but now it is there, I very much welcome it.
    Mr. Pike: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Thursday 3 December.
    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Pike: Does the Prime Minister recognise that the main underlying message of the churches lobby on housing this week was that, despite the slight change of direction announced in the autumn statement, that has only touched the surface of the many housing problems created as a result of Government policies during the past 14 years? Will the Government make more resources available to tackle the problems, reduce unemployment, improve the market sector and improve the British economy?
    The Prime Minister: As the hon. Gentleman will be pleased to know, the plans that the Government have announced enable them to meet the manifesto pledge of 153,000 new homes. In addition, as the hon. Gentleman will know, the housing market should benefit significantly from the extra £750 million set aside to reduce the overhang of empty properties. That should provide another 20,000 properties for the public sector. The reduction in interest rates will help both the public and private sectors.
    Madam Speaker: Order. Time is up; we now move to the private notice question—Mr. Ron Davies.
    Mr. Churchill: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. Would it be in order for my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister to convey the Government's sympathy to the victims of the bombings in Manchester?
    Madam Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman may have an opportunity to raise his point of order later. However, as he knows, I cannot take it now, however sympathetic I might feel.

Flooding (Wales)
3.30 pm
Mr. Ron Davies(by private notice): To ask the Secretary of State for Wales if he will make a statement on the recent severe flooding in Wales—[Interruption.]
Madam Speaker: Order. Will hon. Members leaving the Chamber please do so quietly so that we may make progress on the private notice question?
The Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. David Hunt): In Wales we have experienced severe flooding caused by exceptionally heavy rain since Sunday, following above-average rainfall during the previous four months. Between Sunday afternoon, 29 November, and Wednesday afternoon, 2 December, 244 mm—9·61 in—of rain fell at Treherbert in the Rhondda. That is almost 10 in three days. During the past few days, river levels have been high over a wide area with no fewer than 20 rivers being placed on red alert. I am pleased to be able to inform the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Davies) that the recent flooding has largely abated and we hope that weather conditions will continue to improve. This afternoon, the only river on which a red alert remains in force is the River Wye.
There have been numerous cases of local flooding, although few problems of flooding from major rivers, and the flood defences have performed reasonably well. The problems, in many cases, appear to have been caused by culverts on small side streams becoming blocked. There has also been widespread flooding of flood plains.
One of the worst affected areas has been Pontypridd, where nearly 100 business and private properties have been flooded. Many properties have also been flooded in Treorchy, Tredegar and other parts of Wales. During the early hours of yesterday morning, a slip of material occurred from the face of a coal tip and covered part of a school playground at Tredegar. The cause of the slip is said to have been a blocked culvert, uphill from the tip, which caused water to flow on to and through the tip. Fortunately, there were no injuries or structural damage, but the school was closed and 900 pupils were sent home. The clean-up is continuing and the school will remain closed until next week. The tip is now being carefully monitored. I am sure that the House will wish to join me in expressing sympathy with those who have been in any way affected by those recent events.
Since the last major flood in 1979, some £34 million has been spent on flood defences in south Wales. As a result, many communities have been spared flooding on this occasion.
I am sure that all hon. Members would wish to join me in expressing appreciation for the dedicated work of the National Rivers Authority flood defence staff, the police, local authorities and all the other emergency services and voluntary organisations involved.
Mr. Davies: I thank the Secretary of State for his statement. I wish to associate myself wholeheartedly with the tribute that he has paid to the emergency services, particularly to the local authorities and, of course, the National Rivers Authority. South Wales has been badly hit over recent days and all the emergency services have performed their duties magnificently.
396
There is no doubt that millions of pounds' worth of damage has been done in Wales. Transport has been disrupted; there have been landslides; hundreds, if not thousands, of homes have been flooded; and livestock and farmland have been lost. I understand that, in the opinion of the emergency services in the three south Wales counties of Gwent, Mid Glamorgan and West Glamorgan, most damage was caused by the inability of the outdated water and sewerage infrastructure to cope with higher than normal rainfall. Will the Secretary of State therefore undertake to review the effectiveness of the flood control measures in affected areas and make the necessary capital available to remedy any shortcomings identified by that survey?
Given the tight financial settlement for local authorities this year, does the Secretary of State intend to fund emergency expenditure? In particular, will he guarantee that any overspending in the current year will not result in penalties?
Many of the flood victims will have been under-insured. Does the Secretary of State have in mind any proposals for a compensation scheme? If the Government can find £60 million for the uninsured Windsor castle, can we have equal treatment for the people of Wales?
Mr. Hunt: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for the words of praise which he gave to the emergency services. As I pointed out in my initial response, a substantial sum has been spent in Wales since the last major flood in 1979, including £10 million by the Welsh Office. Of course, there have been contributions from other sources as well. I will carefully review all the schemes in the light of the experience of this flood; I give the hon. Gentleman that assurance.
The current flood defences performed well, and in many parts of Wales prevented significant flooding.
I should like to say a special word about Pontrypridd, where there is a need for flood schemes. The flooding was predominantly from complex drainage systems within the town of Pontypridd. Works are going on in Zion street and Hopkinstown. I hope that proposals will be coming forward which we can look at and take action upon.
As to further help, the hon. Gentleman will know that Ministers have power to activate schemes of special financial assistance to local authorities under the Bellwin scheme where storms or flooding cause serious financial problems. I am not aware of any circumstances that would give rise to the use of those powers in this case, but I shall monitor the position carefully.
As the hon. Gentleman will know, it is the responsibility of individual householders to ensure that they have adequate insurance. I will be visiting many of the affected areas tomorrow and I will bear in mind what the hon. Gentleman has said.
Mr. Roger Evans: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the River Wye, which he told us was still under a state of red alert, is still rising at Hereford, upstream, which normally means that Monmouth town will be affected within 24 hours? Is he aware that the flood alleviation scheme which was carried out in Monmouth town some years ago is widely believed by one school of thought to be ineffective due to the porosity of the ground undermining the effectiveness of the embankments? Will he give us an assurance that the position in Monmouth town will be monitored carefully?
Mr. Hunt: I am very happy to give my hon. Friend that assurance. He has been alerting me to the potential problems in Monmouth, and I have just come from a meeting with my officials at which we were keeping the situation in Monmouth under careful review. We shall continue to do so.
Mr. Alex Carlile: May I join the right hon. Gentleman in his praise for the statutory services, which did a marvellous job? Does he accept, however, that many private householders in Wales are not only under-insured but uninsured, because they simply cannot afford the premiums currently required, particularly if they are unemployed? Will he give an undertaking that he will be prepared to look outside the Bellwin scheme if there are large numbers of private householders who have modest but, to them, important claims which will need to be met in order to put their homes back into a habitable condition? Or are we to take it that they will simply be told that it is bad luck that they were not insured?
Mr. Hunt: Not at all. I thank the hon. and learned Member for his remarks about the emergency services. I am aware of several hundred properties involved, but not the thousands that might have been suspected originally. I will be visiting several of the most severely affected areas tomorrow and I will bear in mind what he says, but I see no reason at present to go outside the Bellwin formula.
Mr. Colin Shepherd: Does my right hon. Friend recall that the River Wye hydrological basin extends across the border from the Principality into Herefordshire and that the county of Herefordshire has been very adversely affected by the flooding to which he has referred? I reinforce the compliments paid to the emergency services, which, in Herefordshire, have performed with great effectiveness. Will my right hon. Friend tell the House what conversations he has had with the National Rivers Authority in respect of a review of the effectiveness of the flood defence arrangements in the lower Wye valley?
Mr. Hunt: I recognise that there are a number of problems in England, particularly in areas adjoining Wales, which have been caused by this enormously severe rainfall; for nearly 10 in to fall in just three days presents a very serious situation. By and large, however, the emergency services have coped magnificently.
I shall seek a meeting with the NRA to have a look at all the lessons that need to be learned from this experience, which I very much hope is now over; we can look back and see what lessons are to he learned. I shall bear in mind what my hon. Friend has said.
Mr. Peter Hain: Frankly, the Secretary of State has offered us only a flood of crocodile tears. Is he not aware that the people of Neath have suffered a downpour nightmare, that the A465 was under 5 ft of water in some places and yet the Welsh Office has still not offered to reconstruct it, that Pontardawe town centre was flooded, that valley villages were cut off and that many parts of Neath were flooded? Why has he not promised us proper funding under the Bellwin scheme? Why will he not allow the Department of Social Security to restore the entitlement to benefits and payments for household and buildings insurance which were withdrawn, because many people in Neath are on low incomes or on benefits? Why
398
has he not implemented the recommendations of the Welsh Consumer Council after the Towyn tragedy over two and a half years ago? He is being utterly complacent.
Mr. Hunt: Once again the hon. Member for Neath (Mr. Hain) has gone over the top. I do not know what consultations he has undertaken with his local authority, but it is aware, as he is, of the Bellwin formula. I am not aware that I have received any notification at all from Neath borough council or from West Glamorgan county council that they anticipate the need to activate the Bellwin formula in this case. Perhaps if the hon. Gentleman were to keep in close consultation with his own local authority, he might keep me informed.
Mr. Hain: I have been in touch with both Neath and West Glamorgan today.
Mr. Hunt: I do not believe that the hon. Gentleman is communicating to me the fact that they are asking for the Bellwin formula to be activated. They are aware how it operates; they should get in touch with me if they believe that the moment has arrived.
I recognise the serious nature of the problems and I pay tribute, as I did earlier, to the people in the hon. Gentleman's constituency and elsewhere in Wales who have had to put up with difficult conditions. I shall monitor the situation carefully, but, as I said before, I am not aware of any need to do anything other than follow the normal practices which have been laid down for many years.
Of course I am aware of the situation in Towyn. I visited the area and have done so on many occasions. I have done my best to ensure that we implement many of the recommendations that have been made not only by the Welsh Consumer Council but by the many other bodies, including the Select Committee on Welsh Affairs, which looked into the circumstances of that tragedy.
Mr. Jonathan Evans: My right hon. Friend will be aware of the widespread concern in the Principality about the incident to which he has already referred at the school in Tredegar, my home town. That brought back to some of us those terrible images from our childhood of the Aberfan disaster. In light of the further slip of coal refuse, albeit, happily, on this occasion with no injury to life, will my right hon. Friend ensure that there is an urgent review off all coal tips that are in any sort of proximity to school or other private premises, in order that nothing like that happens again.
Mr. Hunt: My hon. Friend raises an important point, but the House may recall that, following that tragedy, it passed the Mines and Quarries (Tips) Act 1969, under part II of which disused colliery spoil tips are inspected regularly by county councils, which are responsible for their safety. But my hon. Friend is right. Before I came into the Chamber I was assured that all tips are inspected regularly, especially those where there are suspected—[Interruption.]
Madam Speaker: Order. Interruptions are most disconcerting for the entire House and particularly for the Secretary of State at the Dispatch Box. Let us have a little more order now. [Interruption.] Order. Mr. Secretary Hunt.
Mr. Hunt: As I was saying, all tips are inspected regularly, especially those where heavy rain may cause

399
problems. I have asked my officials once again to liaise with the other authorities to ensure that all tips are inspected, particularly in view of what has happened recently. I shall bear heavily the responsibility that my hon. Friend has put on me and which I readily assume.
Mr. Ted Rowlands: I draw the Secretary of State's attention to the fact that landslides are not only a function of coal tips; some of the slides have been coming from the mountainside itself, reviving genuine fears and concerns in more than one valley community. May we have a task force, established by the Welsh Office and county and district authorities, to investigate the stability of our hillsides, not just the coal tips, many of which have been removed?
Mr. Hunt: In view of the hon. Gentleman's experience in these matters, I respect his advice. I shall put in train the inquiries that he has requested. We are aware of all the circumstances of landslides and I shall ensure that they are all inspected. I shall take advice on how best to meet the hon. Gentleman's other points.
Mr. Gareth Wardell: One of the lessons of Towyn was the importance attached to the speed with which insurance companies responded to claims. Will the right hon. Gentleman meet the Association of British Insurers as soon as possible to encourage it to respond to claims quickly so that the damage that has been incurred can be put right as soon as possible?
Mr. Hunt: Yes, I will.
Mr. Allan Rogers: As someone whose own home was affected by the floods, I too pay tribute to the emergency services in the Rhondda area, which is always badly affected by any rains. As the Secretary of State says, we are constantly learning lessons, but when will they be acted upon? The Secretary of State mentioned the 10 in of rain in Treherbert, which led to a disaster all the way down the valley. We have an outdated trunk and rainwater system which badly needs investment. The lessons are there to be learnt from the floods of just a few years ago.
There are disasters waiting to happen in south Wales. A recent survey identified hundreds of potential land slips in the valleys of south Wales. If they do not happen in Blaencwm or Blaenrhondda, they will happen elsewhere. Only last week, the survey said that every coal tip in south Wales was safe, but this Monday one flowed. A disaster will occur and there will be a substantial loss of life unless the Secretary of State gets to grips with the problem.
Mr. Hunt: I treat seriously the hon. Gentleman's comments, but in Wales we have the legacy of the old mine workings, which imposes on us a special responsibility. The Welsh Development Agency is pursuing the largest land clearance programme anywhere in Europe, and the Welsh Office must work together with all agencies to ensure that that work is as effective as possible. I recognise that we must be vigilant and ensure that the necessary mechanisms are in place to deal with the kind of situation that the hon. Gentleman mentioned.
Mr. Alan Williams: Will the Secretary of State provide additional help for the National Rivers Authority's flood prevention work? It did some good work in Carmarthen after the 1987 floods, but several villages,
400
such as Abergwili and Whitland, quickly fall victim to flooding. Whitland has flooded for the third time in six years.
Mr. Hunt: I have been watching the situation in and around the hon. Gentleman's constituency with concern. The improved flood defences were adequate, and further works will go ahead as soon as the route for the new eastern bypass is agreed. We are watching the situation carefully, and have reserve emergency plans if it worsens. We hope that the worst is now past. I again pay tribute to the police, who have done a great deal to comfort people through the advertised helpline—the number of which, I repeat, is 0656 766066. That helpline is still open, and if people are concerned about anything they should contact the police.
Mr. Ray Powell: Is the Secretary of State aware of the amount of flooding in Pontypridd? Although it is not my constituency, one third of the borough of Taff Ely is in my constituency of Ogmore. My hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Dr. Howells) cannot be present because he is in Pontypridd trying to solve the problems created by the flooding of the whole town and of 30 commercial properties. The right hon. Gentleman referred to the flooding in 1979. Hon. Members well remember the difficulties and problems that our constituents suffered on that occasion—and some of them have still not yet received compensation. Some of us have been experiencing flooding since we were young schoolboys in Treorchy, and no Government—including the present Government—have made any attempt to protect people against it. Since 1979 there has been privatisation, and it is disgusting that the salary of the chairman of the Welsh water authority has trebled and that people are picking up money from investing in Welsh Water when money should be spent on flood prevention in Wales.
Mr. Hunt: I will confine my reply to the situation in Pontypridd, which I hope to visit tomorrow to see the conditions there for myself. The local Member for Parliament has been in touch with me and my office to ensure that we are aware of the seriousness of the problem. There are complex drainage systems in the town of Pontypridd and I want to investigate how much that contributed to the problem. I understand that propoals to protect the town's commercial area are under review by the relevant authorities. I am impatient for that review to be brought to a speedy conclusion, so that action can be taken.
Mr. Elfyn Llwyd: The Secretary of State said that he believes that the NRA is doing a good job. Is it not self-evident from what he said today that two blocked culverts gave rise to large-scale flooding of the Tredegar slip and in Pontypridd? Is not it self-evident that the NRA is not doing its job properly, and will the Secretary of State undertake to take that up with the authority immediately to ensure that such a disaster does not happen again?
Mr. Hunt: I do not think that I can promise that culverts will never be blocked; nor do I draw the same conclusion as the hon. Gentleman. I stressed that the National Rivers Authority performed its duties very effectively by issuing flood warnings promptly and

401
correctly. I shall, of course, examine the points that he has made, because there will be lessons to learn from what has happened.
Mr. Jon Owen Jones: As my hon. Friend the Member for Ogmore (Mr. Powell), said, my hon. Friend the Member for Pontrypridd (Dr. Howells) cannot be here, but may I say on his behalf that as a schoolboy I travelled through Pontypridd for more than 10 years? On at least half a dozen occasions, I was unable to make the journey because of flooding. A proper flood prevention scheme is clearly long overdue. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will seek an early meeting with my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd to discuss a flood prevention scheme for the town.
Mr. Hunt: Yes. I hope to have such a meeting after I have seen the situation for myself tomorrow.

Business of the House
3.56 pm
Mrs. Margaret Beckett: Will the Leader of the House please give us the business for the forthcoming week?
The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Tony Newton): The business for next week will be as follows:

MONDAY 7 DECEMBER—Committee and remaining stages of the Social Security Bill.

TUESDAY 8 DECEMBER—Opposition Day (7th allotted day). There will be a debate entitled "Unemployment" on an Opposition Motion.

Motion on the Mink Keeping Order.

WEDNESDAY 9 DECEMBER—Debate on the common fisheries policy on a Government motion.

Consideration of any Lords amendments which may be received to the Sea Fish (Conservation) Bill.

THURSDAY 10 DECEMBER—EStimateS Day (1st allotted day, 1st part). There will be a debate on Government support for coastal zone protection and planning. Details of the estimate concerned and the relevant Select. Committee report will be given in the Official Report.

Motion on the Banking Co-ordination (Second Council Directive) Regulations.

Motion on the Package Travel, Package Holidays and Package Tours Regulations.

At Ten o'clock the House will be asked to agree the outstanding civil and defence votes on account and winter supplementary estimates.

FRIDAY I I DECEMBER—Private Members' Bills.

MONDAY 14 DECEMBER—Motion for the Christmas Adjournment.

Proceedings on the Consolidated Fund Bill.

The House will also wish to know that European Standing Committees will meet on Wednesday 9 December at 10.30 am to consider European Community documents as follows: Standing Committee A: Document No. 8372/92 relating to Common Market Organisation for Bananas—[Interruption.] A lot of hon. Members have been waiting for that one. Standing Committee B: Document No.6718/92 relating to development co-operation policy in the run up to the year 2,000.
Mrs. Beckett: I thank the Lord President for that statement. Is he aware of Labour Members' concern that it has been left to us to find time for a debate on an issue of the most pressing concern to the British people—unemployment? We find that particularly extraordinary when the Secretary of State who should be dealing with this is spending her time abolishing May day, which is not the most pressing example of need. May I express the hope, therefore, that it will not be left to us but that the Government will find time to debate the problems that are still arising between small businesses and the banks, which continue to be a major worry?
May we press the Leader of the House for an early statement on the developing situation in Somalia, where there is still anxiety about people working for the aid agencies? Many hon. Members would welcome an account of how the Government see the position.
Finally, I ask the Leader of the House to seek a statement reviewing the guidelines for voter registration, which seem to need not only reviewing but strengthening.

403
Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the alarming situation in the Conservative-controlled borough of Brent, in which the number of voters on the register has fallen by 26,000 since last year, and the council has refused to take steps to rectify the situation—steps which have been taken in, for example, the Conservative-controlled borough of Barnet? As the right to vote is the cornerstone of our democracy, will the Leader of the House consider arranging an early statement on the matter?
Mr. Newton: The hon. Lady's remarks on the economy and the proposed debate on unemployment in Opposition time on Tuesday are a fraction ungenerous, as I have responded to her request last week for some Opposition time, and it is less than two or three weeks since the Government provided two full days for a complete debate on the autumn statement. I do not accept her criticism.
I should have thought that some of what the hon. Lady said about small businesses might prove to be in order during that debate—although that will of course be a matter for you, Madam Speaker. The hon. Lady will know that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer has asked the Bank of England to look into the banks' charging practices, and that he is also discussing those matters directly with the clearing banks.
I cannot undertake to provide time for a debate on Somalia in the near future, although there will be considerable opportunities in the business that I announced towards the end of my reply—the debates on the Christmas Adjournment and on the Consolidated Fund Bill. The hon. Lady may like to note that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs is due to be here next Monday to answer questions.
On the subject of voter registration, my understanding is that more than 95·5 per cent. of those eligible are believed to be on the register. Nevertheless, I shall draw the hon. Lady's remarks to the attention of my right hon. Friend.
Mr. Patrick Nicholls: May I ask my right hon. Friend to consider an urgent debate next week in the light of information that has come to me which suggests that facilities of the House are being grossly abused by the hon. Member for Neath (Mr. Hain), to whom I have given notice.
Mr. Peter Hain: No.
Mr. Nicholls: Is my right hon. Friend aware that a letter was sent out on House of Commons stationery, using the pre-paid post—[Interruption.]
Madam Speaker: Order. Of course I want to hear the hon. Gentleman, if his point relates to the business statement and next week's business. If he can do that directly, I want to hear him.
Mr. Nicholls: I ask my right hon. Friend——
Mr. Hain rose——
Madam Speaker: Order. Will the hon. Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) make his position clear about next week's business?
Mr. Nicholls: I have given the hon. Member for Neath notice by writing to him and placing a letter on the board of the House. How often he checks the board is not a matter for me.
The matter that I have raised is important, and should be debated as a matter of urgency. If pre-paid stationery is sent out inviting people for
"a full silver service dinner, which will be followed by the evening's political lecture by the Leader of the Labour party, John Smith MP",
and if such matters are being dealt with using the facilities of the House, that urgently requires a debate next week. If it is legitimate to pick over the contents of Ministers' Access statements, it is legitimate to talk about the grotesque waste of public money by Labour Members.
Mr. Hain: I have had no notice of the matter at all.
Mr. Newton: It may not surprise my hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls), if I say that I do not believe that it will be possible for me to fit in a debate on that matter next week. No doubt the hon. Member for Neath and others, including you, Madam Speaker, may feel it right to consider the point that my hon. Friend has raised. Certainly it is my understanding that the use of the free post would not be appropriate for letters of that kind.
Mr. Simon Hughes: As the Queen has now said that she is willing to pay income tax, and the Lord Chief Justice and the Master of the Rolls have said that they believe that we should sign up to the European convention on human rights, and implement it as part of the British legal system, and as there is great concern about future legal aid provisions, and widespread interest in how subsidiarity abroad might become subsidiarity at home, could we have a debate either in the remaining part of this year or early next year on the constitutional agenda that the Government consider to be relevant not just for this year but for the decade to come?
Mr. Newton: There have been considerable opportunities in the past two days to raise constitutional matters in various relationships, and I expect that there will be further opportunities after Christmas. I do not promise a further debate specifically on those matters.
Mr. Michael Stephen: I too wish to ask my right hon. Friend whether he will make time available next week for a debate on the activities of the clearing banks. Many right hon. and hon. Members will have seen the annual report published this week by the banking ombudsman. I readily acknowledge that the banking ombudsman system was set up by the banks themselves and I also acknowledge that the banks are not charitable institutions. However, the report is a depressing litany of negligence, overcharging and failure to pay compensation. We have also recently seen an appalling example of a breach of the duty of confidentiality. Will my right hon. Friend make time available for an early debate on the subject?
Mr. Newton: I note what my hon. Friend has said. In expressing his concern, he speaks for many hon. Members of all parties. I have already made some comment about what my right hon. Friend the Chancellor has said and done in that respect. To the extent that many people allege that the problems have contributed to unemployment, it may be in order to raise them in the debate on Tuesday.
Mr. Alfred Morris: Is there to be a ministerial statement on the terrorist attack this morning on the citizens of Manchester, about which the city's representatives are, of course, utterly appalled and deeply concerned? What is the Government's latest information on the outrage, and are Ministers keeping in close touch with its effects on the life of the city?
Mr. Newton: I assure the right hon. Gentleman and all hon. Members who are concerned that my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary is taking a very close interest in the matter. He will, of course, be concerned to do anything that can be done to support the efforts of the police both to track down those who perpetrated the events and to prevent them from recurring.
Mr. Winston Churchill: Will the Home Secretary or, in his absence, my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, convey the Government's sympathy to the more than 65 victims of the terrorist bomb blasts in the city of Manchester this morning? Will my right hon. Friend further confirm that the Government will in no way be intimidated by such outrages and that the British people will never give in to terrorism?
Mr. Newton: I wholly endorse the latter part of my hon. Friend's remarks, and I assure him that I shall ensure that my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary, on behalf of all of us in the Government and in the House, conveys to the people who have had their lives damaged in Manchester today the thoughts that my hon. Friend has expressed.
Mr. Eddie McGrady: Is the Leader of the House aware that the details of forthcoming public expenditure have not yet been announced for Northern Ireland? I understand that the details are to be announced next week by the Secretary of State, not in the House, but in Belfast, I presume, thereby depriving Northern Ireland Members of a debate on the consequences of the public expenditure proposals which, I understand, will be very drastic. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that it is most frustrating for Northern Ireland Members to know that parties outside the House will be briefed before the announcement is made?
Mr. Newton: I will draw the hon. Gentleman's remarks to the attention of my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. I cannot promise an oral statement next week.
Mr. David Sumberg: May I join my colleagues of all parties in echoing the call for a statement in relation to the awful tragedy that occurred in Manchester this morning? Will my right hon. Friend not only send a message of sympathy to those affected, but express our thanks to those who are helping the injured? Will he send a message to those who perpetrated the action that just as the people of Manchester resisted the Lufwaffe 50 years ago, they will equally resist the terrorists of today?
Mr. Newton: Again, I not only note my hon. Friend's remarks, but very much wish to echo them, not least by paying tribute to the work of those who helped to cope with the incidents and to keep the harm done by them to the lowest possible level.
Ms. Angela Eagle: I draw the attention of the Leader of the House to early-day motion 981 which
406
was placed on the Order Paper yesterday following the announcement by Vickers Shipbuilding and Engineering Ltd. that it intended to close Cammel Laird shipyard after 60 years of shipbuilding on Merseyside.
[That this House, mindful that Cammell Lairds was bought from taxpayers for £1, by VSEL, calls upon the owners, who have announced that they see no future for Lairds, to hand back this industrial asset so that others with drive and vision can begin planning a successful future for Lairds and so help safeguard the manufacturing base of Britain.]
That disgraceful decision threatens to put 900 people directly out of work and will withdraw £30 million of expenditure from the local economy and affect 5,000 other jobs. In the light of that economic holocaust which is threatened on Merseyside, will the Leader of the House allow time for us to debate the issue next week?
Mr. Newton: It is very clear that the issue raised by the hon. Lady, which manifestly relates to employment problems, could be included in the debate that is to take place on Tuesday. The Government and I personally very much regret the closure of Cammell Laird which reflects the worldwide reduction in the demand for warships. The Government are participating in activities designed to develop a redevelopment strategy for the site with the aim of creating new employment and give very substantial aid to the Merseyside development corporation.
Mrs. Edwina Currie: Am I right in thinking that, on the timetable that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House has given us, we are likely to have only one more day's debate on the Maastricht Bill before the Christmas recess? Given the enormous majorities in the House last night, which must have warmed the cockles of my right hon. Friend's heart and those of the Patronage Secretary and of everyone else on the Government Front Bench, why do we not get on with it rather more quickly? We are aware that there are other things to debate in the House, but surely we can get on with the Maastricht Bill, get it out of the way, and then continue.
Mr. Newton: I would not want to mislead my hon. Friend. In the business that I announced until Monday 14 December, I did not announce another day on the European Communities (Amendment) Bill, but there is a substantial amount of important business in the programme that I announced which the House also needs to get through, including the discussions on fisheries matters which are of interest in several quarters of the House. However, I note with approval the enthusiasm of my hon. Friend the Member for Derbshire, South (Mrs. Currie) for making progress on the Bill which will certainly be shared in some, if not all, quarters of the House.
Rev. Martin Smyth: The House will share the sympathy that I extend from the people of Northern Ireland to the people of Manchester, especially during a week when the people of Belfast have suffered continuously.
May I ask the Lord President whether we can have an urgent statement next week from the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland to clarify the situation whereby there seem to be conflicting comments from the Minister of State and the Northern Ireland Office vis-a-vis meetings with councillors from Sinn Fein, the protagonists of the IRA, at a time when councillors in Northern Ireland are asked to

407
sit with them and when Northern Ireland courts are saying that they must be on sub-committees in the city hall when we know that even in this House, minority parties are not necessarily guaranteed places on committees—and they are certainly not guaranteed that in local government throughout the nation? I press for a statement, especially in view of the possibility—the Leader of the House may wish to consult the Attorney-General—that the next court case might oblige Ministers of the Crown to consort with them.
Mr. Newton: In view of the suggestion in the latter part of the hon. Gentleman's remarks, I will certainly have a conversation with my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General and will draw the remarks generally to the attention of the Attorney-General and my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. The whole House—and certainly those hon. Members who represent Manchester and the people of Manchester—will be grateful for the sentiments that the hon. Gentleman expressed at the beginning of his remarks.
Mr. James Hill: Will my right hon. Friend find time next week for a debate on value added tax? The bloodstock industry and fine arts, antiques and charity shops are staggering under the imposition of VAT. The whole issue must be totally reviewed in the new era of directives on VAT from Brussels.
Mr. Newton: I note what my hon. Friend says and I know that the Treasury Ministers are aware of the concerns being expressed, but I cannot promise that we can have a debate on this next week.
Mr. Greville Janner: As part of its inquiry into the unemployment effects of pit closures, the Select Committee on Employment is due tomorrow to go down a pit at Silverdale and the pit at Thentham. As the chairman of British Coal at first refused permission for my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Mrs. Golding) to descend the pit in her constituency and, I am informed, has today reinforced and restated his ban on the media entering the colliery premises during that visit, could we have a debate, because it is surely important that Select Committees of this House should receive full co-operation from British Coal and from all other employers causing major unemployment by their decisions?
Mr. Newton: I sense from what the hon. and learned Gentleman says—that the chairman of British Coal at first refused permission—that that implies some change.
Mr. Janner: Yes, the hon. Lady will be coming down the pit with us, but there is no change in the banning of the media entering the colliery premises.
Mr Newton: Now I am slightly confused about what the hon. and learned Gentleman is saying, but the basic thrust of his point is clear and it would be the hope and expectation of the Government that proper co-operation would be given to a Select Committee of this House on a visit. On the other hand it must also be acknowledged—this is a problem that sometimes occurs when visits are made to DSS offices, as I well know—that it is necessarily a matter for management to decide whether there should be access by the media and I do not think that it necessarily
408
follows from co-operation with the Select Committee that the media should be allowed access to the site. That has to be a matter for the management.
Mr. Patrick Cormack: Would my right hon. Friend reconsider the business for next Thursday and would he, instead of that business, arrange a debate on foreign affairs on the Adjournment of the House, so that, before the Edinburgh summit, the House can consider, among other things, the destruction and devastation of an internationally recognised sovereign state and the progressive slaughter of a large number of its people, because many of my hon. Friends were much encouraged by the more positive noises coming from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office yesterday and hope that the Community will be able to adopt a firmer policy towards Serbia, which is undoubtedly the aggressor?
Mr. Newton: My hon. Friend's concern with these matters is very well known and he will have heard what the Prime Minister said during Question Time an hour or so ago. I cannot promise a debate of the kind he seeks next week, but I will ensure that his concern is drawn to the attention of my right hon. Friends.
Mr. Harry Barnes: The Guardian newspaper has special links with Manchester, having been at one time The Manchester Guardian. It is therefore unfortunate that on 23 November it published an article by Ronan Bennett almost eulogising the activities of the IRA which is now seen to be particularly inappropriate to the situation which has developed in Manchester. I am sorry that we are not to have a statement today on Manchester, but perhaps at least the Leader of the House could support those people who intend to hold a vigil against this in Manchester on Saturday. Vigils are now being held persistently in London, Belfast, Manchester and wherever violence takes place, the peace movement is there.
Mr. Newton: I note the hon. Gentleman's comments on a particular newspaper article, which I am sure will be noted by the newspaper as well. On the subject of the vigils, I express my sympathetic support for anything which can contribute to preventing this sort of violence.
Mr. David Lidington: Will my right hon. Friend please find time in next week's business for either a debate or a statement on the future of the Stoke Mandeville hospital, which is of enormous concern to my constituents in Aylesbury? In particular, will he find an occasion for his colleagues from the Department of Health to assure both the House and my constituents that the £20 million capital programme now in preparation for that hospital will be given urgent and sympathetic consideration when it gets to that Department?
Mr. Newton: Having visited the hospital when I was Minister for Health about four or five years ago, I am conscious of the strong support that it has in the community and of the excellent work done there. Beyond that, I can help my hon. Friend by telling him that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health and her fellow Ministers are due to be here on Tuesday next week to answer questions.
Mr. Ray Powell: Will the Leader of the House consider a debate next week, because, as numerous organisations and traders have accepted the Home

409
Secretary's decision to allow trading on Sunday and will open on the Sundays before Christmas, shop workers could be compelled to work on Sundays? Can I draw his attention to early-day motion 989, which was put down yesterday and signed by 67 hon. Members, dealing with the sacking of 89 persons who refused to work on Sundays?
[That this House roundly condemns the actions of Middlebrook Mushrooms and its parent company Booker Plc in sacking 89 of its part time staff and replacing them with casual labour at lower rates of pay; congratulates the Transport and General Worker's Union on its attempts to negotiate with both Middlebrook Mushrooms and. ACAS; expresses its grave concern that this situation has developed as a direct result of supermarket chains such as ASDA and Sainsbury's decision to open on Sundays; believes that the 89 sacked are amongst the first casualties of Sunday trading; and urges proper protection of pay and conditions not only for retail workers but for those who supply and transport goods in any new legislation on Sunday trading.]
That is an escalation of what is happening throughout the country, when workers refuse to work in shops and other establishments on Sundays. It is a direct result of the Home Secretary's failure to ensure that the Shops Act 1950 is complied with by all the people in this country. I ask for an early debate next week, so that the matter can be resolved.
Mr. Newton: The hon. Gentleman has tabled a private Member's Bill on the subject, which we are due to see and to hear more of in the new year. He is very well informed about the matter and knows that my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary made a full statement on the position and the Government's intentions last week. The Government have outlined how they will proceed, once the uncertainty caused by the present European Court of Justice hearing is resolved.
Mr. Nigel Evans: May I press my right hon. Friend on the same matter that my hon. Friend the Member for Shoreham (Mr. Stephen) mentioned—for a debate next week on the banks? It is required not merely because of the shocking report from the banking ombudsman, which showed a 62 per cent. increase in complaints received this year, on top of a 60 per cent. rise last year, but also following the creation of the Banking Action Group—an organisation looking after the interests of small businesses, which have faced high interest charges, over-charging and high commission charges, as well as the short term approach of some banks in their lending policies towards small businesses.
Mr. Newton: I appreciate why my hon. Friend has thought it right to press me further on that matter, but perhaps he will understand that I cannot add to the answers that I have given on two previous occasions. I do not think that it would be beyond his ingenuity to devise a speech in next Tuesday's debate which could relate to some of those matters.
Mr. Hain: First, is it in order, Madam Speaker, to ask for an apology from the hon. Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls), who gave me no notice of his statement?
Madam Speaker: Order. The hon. Member for Teignbridge said that he had put a letter on the board. I am
410
afraid that the hon. Member for Neath cannot seek an apology through me. He must find some other method. I ask him to respond to the business statement.
Mr. Hain: Could we have a Government statement next week on the massive job cuts announced today in the Post Office? More than 16,000 jobs are due to go in Post Office Counters and the Royal Mail letters divisions. Why has the President of the Board of Trade sanctioned those job cuts, and the wholesale reorganisation of the Post Office involved without first getting Parliament's approval? In July, he announced a review of the Post Office, but he has pre-empted it before reporting back to Parliament, by allowing the cuts together. Surely they are a dress rehearsal for Post Office privatisation.
Mr. Newton: The hon. Gentleman will have noted that my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade is here and will have heard what he said, although he is present to deal with other business. While I understand the hon. Gentleman's concern, the decisions are primarily operational matters for Post Office management and are certainly not directly related to the review of its structure and ownership, nor do they require my right hon. Friend's permission.
Mr. Bob Cryer: I wonder whether time could be allocated for a debate on the new rules for the Register of Members' Interests. It has been outstanding for many months. Indeed, the report was presented in the last Parliament, not this. If the debate had been undertaken and conclusions reached, it would have helped answer the question raised in early-day motion 988, tabled by my hon. Member for Halifax (Mrs. Mahon), in which a question is raised as to whether the Chancellor of the Exchequer ought to have registered the £19,000 which had been given to him as a gift, because that would have clarified the rules.
[That this House urges the Chancellor of the Exchequer to register through the Register of Members' Interests the source of the £19,000 paid on his behalf in settlement of the balance of a personal legal bill and to indicate if, under section 153 of the Income and Corporate Taxes Act 1988, he has paid income tax on the total amount involved.]
I realise that the Chancellor is confused about the economy, about his position and about this gift, but he is setting a very bad example of non-registration of business interests by failing to declare a huge gift such as that.
Mr. Newton: My right hon. Friend would not have been in a position to declare the source of this payment because he had no knowledge of the source, as he made clear earlier in the week.
On the principal point of the hon. Gentleman's question—the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) I know has a close interest in these matters—I said last week that we have now achieved the setting up of the new Select Committee on Members' Interests, which I think has now had its first meeting. That should pave the way for publishing the Register for the new Parliament. I hope that the Chairman of the Committee will not mind my saying that I have already had an informal discussion with him with a view to identifying the appropriate way to proceed on the matters which the hon. Gentleman has raised.
Mr. Alex Salmond: Can the Leader of the House focus on the debate on fishing next

411
Wednesday? I accept that it is probably correct to have the common fisheries policy debate and the Lords amendments to the Sea Fish (Conservation) Bill on the same day, but will he ensure that the timetabling for the CFP debate will be such as to allow the huge numbers of hon. Members with fishing interests to contribute to that debate on what is an absolutely vital change in a fundamental policy affecting many tens of thousands of people?
When it comes to the conservation Bill, will he consider the possibility of a free vote on the Lords amendments, because he will be aware that many of his hon. Friends have had to choose between their constituents and their party on that issue. It would be nice, just for a change, to allow hon. Gentlemen representing fishing communities to vote with their consciences rather than for their careers.
Mr. Newton: The hon. Gentleman will be aware that he will get a very cautious answer to the latter part of that question, since among the things that are certainly not my responsibility is the advice that is offered to my hon. Friends about how they should approach these or any other votes. There may be somebody else in the Chamber who has heard what the hon. Gentleman has said, however. With regard to the timing of the debate, the Common Fisheries Policy debate allocation is a full day. I cannot, of course, promise at this stage that there will not be any statements or anything else that may eat into the time a bit, but it is a full day's debate and there should be ample opportunity for all those who wish to speak, provided that they do so reasonably succinctly.
Mr. David Winnick: Would it be possible for the Foreign Secretary to make a statement early next week on what steps are being taken by the Government to draw the attention of other European countries and, in particular, the United States to the death and destruction committed by the Provisional IRA, so that they may understand the terror campaign being waged on the mainland and, as we saw again tragically during the week, the destruction of much of a centre in Belfast, with many severe injuries? Should not people abroad, therefore, understand that we are dealing with murderers—people who, as was demonstrated in the recent Irish general election, have no electoral support whatsoever among the Irish people? That is the message that we should get across internationally, and as soon as possible.
Mr. Newton: It is very clear that many hon. Members on both sides of the House will warmly welcome those remarks by the hon. Gentleman. I will draw them to the attention of my right hon. and hon. Friends concerned, because they make persistent efforts to ensure that the nature of the incidents that happen here is properly understood abroad.
Several Hon. Members rose ——
Madam Speaker: Order. We must now move on. Before I call the Secretary of State——
Mr. Ken Eastham: On a point of order, Madam Speaker.
Madam Speaker: Order. I have to take points of order, as the hon. Gentleman knows, after——
Mr. Eastham: I am a Manchester Member and I would like to say something about what happened in Manchester.
Madam Speaker: I am sorry. It was most remiss of me. I will give the hon. Gentleman an opportunity. I call Mr. Ken Eastham.
Mr. Eastham: Thank you, Madam Speaker, and I am sure that I speak for all the people of Manchester when I say that, following the atrocity that occurred there, we are grateful for the sympathy that has been expressed in the House.
Is the Leader of the House aware that, within the last 10 days, I have passed to the Home Office a petition signed by a good number of Manchester citizens complaining about inadequate police provision? Yesterday I received a letter from Lord Ferris saying that there would be no extra funding this year or next year to allow for the provision of more police. Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that instead of just sympathy, the people should be offered more protection through the police?
Mr. Newton: I appreciate why the hon. Gentleman felt it right to make that point, and I shall ensure that my right hon. and learned Friend is made aware of it. But I think it has been right to put the main emphasis this afternoon on expressing our distaste for what has happened. Indeed, that is a very mild word to use. It is right to express distress and offer our sympathy to the people involved, including the police, and at the same time congratulate the police on their work in that connection.

Consolidated Fund Bill
4.30 pm
Madam Speaker: I have a short statement to make about arrangements for the debate on the Motion for the Adjournment which will follow the passing of the Consolidated Fund Bill on Monday 14 December.
Hon. Members should submit their subjects to m y office not later than 10 pm on Wednesday 9 December. A list showing the subjects and times will be published the following day.
Normally, the time allotted will not exceed one and a half hours, but I propose to exercise discretion and allow one or two debates to continue for rather longer, up to a maximum of three hours. Where identical or similar subjects have been entered by different hon. Members whose names are drawn in the ballot, only the first name will be shown on the list.
As some debates may not last the full time allotted to them, it will, of course, be the responsibility of hon. Members to keep in touch with developments if they are not to miss their turn.

One-stop Shops
4.31 pm
The President of the Board of Trade and Secretary of State for Trade and Industry (Mr. Michael Heseltine): With permission, I should like to make a statement about a major new strategy to establish one-stop shops for the delivery of business advisory services.
I have been reviewing Government support services for business, in conjunction with a steering group consisting of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment, my noble Friend Baroness Denton, the Small Firms Minister, and representatives of chambers of commerce, training and enterprise councils, the Confederation of British Industry, local authorities, the National Training Task Force and Business in the Community.
We have looked particularly at the needs of established small and medium firms. We all wish to ensure that those firms have access to world class support in the areas of information, advice, counselling, development of business skills, exporting, technology transfer, innovation, design and other services.
There are already numerous schemes to help business provided by Government and other organisations. Those schemes are run by a wide variety of bodies. Some are excellent, others less good, but they all suffer from three main weaknesses: first, the profusion of advice of varying quality makes it difficult for business to know what is available and where; secondly, many schemes are narrowly defined and more supplier than customer driven; and thirdly, many businesses which could benefit from the help available are not even aware of its existence. We need to tackle all those problems.
That is why I have decided to establish a number of pilot one-stop shops for business. I have today published a prospectus seeking competitive bids to establish up to 15 such shops in England. I have arranged for a copy to be sent to all hon. Members. Copies will also be available in the Vote Office.
A key aim of the one-stop shops is to simplify the present confusing array of support services. To win, a bid must demonstrate a real and effective partnership to which all the main local providers of business support services are committed. I am asking the training and enterprise councils to draw together bids, but it is a requirement that other key providers, such as the chambers of commerce, enterprise agencies and the local authorities where they are active in support activities, should be fully involved. I am confident that private sector companies will wish to demonstrate their support.
Each bid for a one-stop shop must show how it will provide a wide range of high quality services, both those available locally and, using modern technology, those provided in other parts of the country or even outside this country.
My Department is committed to playing its full part in the one-stop shops. The shops will be the main local point of access to and promotion of all DTI services. I am ready to consider imaginative ideas about how that might be achieved, including proposals for co-location and, subject to any legal constraints, sub-contracting of services.
I cannot anticipate the nature of the bids I shall receive or the scale of the resources that local organisations will offer to put behind them. I can, however, say that I have

415
made provision within my own budget for an initial sum of up to £3·5 million to fund the winning bids in the first year. I look to local contributions to augment that figure. I hope to see a move to a position of self-sufficiency as rapidly as possible.
My Department will also be working with the pilot one-stop shops to develop a new diagnostic service, as promised in our manifesto. That will help businesses to analyse in depth their strengths and weaknesses, and the options open to them, and to identify the help that they need. That will be a new and important service to be provided by one-stop shops.
Bids must be submitted by 29 January. Winners will be announced in mid-March, and the pilots will get under way as soon as possible thereafter. If the pilots are as successful as I expect, it is my intention to develop a national network of one-stop shops across England.
The publication of the one-stop shop prospectus marks an important further step in our long-term strategy to improve the support that we provide to business in this country. We must have a single point of access to services which must be of the highest calibre. One-stop shops will achieve that and pave the way for a radical overhaul of business support arrangements in each area of the country. That will improve the competitiveness of our companies and provide a springboard for the development of our local and national economies.
Mr. Derek Fatchett: In the past 24 hours, Cammell Laird has made 900 people redundant, the Post Office has announced redundancies for 16,000 people, Royal Ordnance have announced redundancies for more than 1,000 people, and Ford is talking about further job losses. The House will be surprised that the President of the Board of Trade made no statement on that further decline in the British manufacturing industry.
There is a widespread recognition of the need to provide more co-ordinated advice to small businesses which frequently, as the President of the Board of Trade rightly said, do not have the time or resources to deal with the range of departments and schemes available from the Government. However, there will be disappointment among business people about the size of the Government's contribution.
Can the President of the Board of Trade clarify his comments that his nationwide scheme will apply only to England? Is it not the intention at a later stage to cover Wales and Scotland? Why are Wales and Scotland excluded at an early stage? Can the President acknowledge that his statement today will offer little immediate help to those small businesses that are faced with punitive interest rates imposed by the banks or to those businesses that face severe cash flow problems because of late payment? Can the President confirm that his statement will offer no help at all to the tens of thousands of small and medium businesses which have already gone to the wall during the recession caused by the Government, and the 120 small businesses which today alone will go bankrupt?
Above all, does the President of the Board of Trade understand that the economic policies of his Government are the root cause of the problems faced by small businesses in Britain? Does he recognise that, when a shipyard such as Cammell Laird on Merseyside or a plant such as British Aerospace in Hatfield closes, or when the
416
Post Office announces 16,000 redundancies, the effects are felt by not only the workers who lose their jobs but by the local small firms which supply those plants and the corner shops which sell to the local families?
Although we welcome today's statement, Labour Members, together with organisations such as the Engineering Employers Federation and many other people outside the House, including the thousands who have lost their jobs today, will wonder why the Government have not made a statement on industrial policy for the manufacturing future of Great Britain. After seven months as President of the Board of Trade, all that the right hon. Gentleman has announced today is a pilot scheme, not an industrial strategy for Britain's future.
Mr. Heseltine: I am sad that the hon. Gentleman should seek to widen the subject of the statement in order to hide what is an overdue Government proposal that will be widely welcomed—but his attitude is characteristic of the Labour party. Of course the news from Cammell Laird is deeply disappointing after so much has been done to try to help that company. I also recognise the concern that has been expressed about the redundancies in the Post Office. However, it is important to state that 170,000 people work for the Post Office. It has been announced today that, over five years, there will be 15,000 fewer jobs—about 3,000 a year, when about 7,000 a year go through natural wastage. The Post Office has made it clear that it expects the redundancies to be voluntary and to come from a process of natural wastage.
To return to the issues in the statement, I do not think that there will be disappointment about the size of the Government's contribution. I think that the figure of 15 shops announced today is of the order of magnitude expected by those with whom I have discussed the matter. It forms the basis to which others, locally, will add the resources at their command and make imaginative bids within the process that I have outlined.
The hon. Gentleman's question about Scotland and Wales is properly a matter for my right hon. Friends the Secretaries of State for Scotland and for Wales, who are interested in and fully informed about today's announcement. However, they have a different—some would argue, a more co-ordinated—set of arrangements, originally based on the proposals of the Scottish and Welsh Development Agencies. Therefore, they have not had to deal with the problem that I faced due to the unco-ordinated approach that had been taken to the issues.
The hon. Gentleman asked about the small industrial sector. He failed to say that Barclays bank estimates that, in the first three quarters of 1992, there were more than 300,000 new starts in that sector.
Sir Michael Grylls: Does my right hon. Friend accept that most people, listening to today's statement in a less jaundiced way than the Opposition, will welcome it as a progressive move that will improve the flow of information that is so vital for the success of small and medium firms, which are expanding rapidly despite the recession? As my right hon. Friend acknowledged, the provision of export information is important. About 70 per cent. of smaller firms do not export, and with the arrival of the internal market, it is vital that more small firms should be able to export. The

417
provision of proper information near the place of work, perhaps through computer terminals, could be useful and improve the number of exports.
Mr. Heseltine: No one knows more about the problems of small firms than my hon. Friend. He has drawn our attention to important aspects of our proposals. Of course it is important to improve the quality of export advice available, which is certainly at the forefront of our intentions. We hope to do so by improving the quality of staff available and the access to databases nationally and internationally.
I understand my hon. Friend's view that not enough small firms export. A significant number of small firms are not, perhaps, aware of how many of their products find their way into the export market through the clients to whom they provide the products. My hon. Friend will also be aware that I have invited 100 of our largest companies to second to my Department a member of staff with experience in exports in order significantly to enhance our export drive, which is so timely in view of the competitive value of our currency.
Mr. Paul Tyler: Is the President aware that Liberal Democrats genuinely congratulate him on the initiative, not least because it contains the idea of one-stop advice shops, which featured in our manifesto, but not the Conservative party's? However, we are concerned that the limited number of pilots may not lead on to the necessary network throughout the country. Will the right hon. Gentleman ensure that the pilots are geographically spread to represent regions of high unemployment and high business failures, such as the south-west, particularly Cornwall? In what sort of areas does he anticipate placing the pilots—regions with assisted area status or shire counties? Will they necessarily be the same size as the districts covered by the training and enterprise councils?
The timing is important, as a review of the assisted area status and geography is currently under way, and local government reorganisation is under review. Can we be assured in the House that, as soon as the evidence of the hoped-for success of the pilots is available, it will be fed into the processes of the assisted area and local government reorganisation reviews?
Mr. Heseltine: I am very aware that a proposal along similar lines to the one that I announced today featured in the Liberal Democrat manifesto, a copy of which I have in front of me. I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for welcoming the initiative, and glad that it will make it easier for him to vote for the Conservative party in the next election.
The hon. Gentleman asked interesting questions about how the judgments will be made. The choice of pilot schemes will be made as a result of competitive bids, and the test will be one of quality, not regional policy or high unemployment. It is critical that the 15 are seen as pace setters, even if that results in districts that might have the most immediate need having to wait for a period in order to follow the quality. We do not want to take inadequate standards from districts with pressing needs and so debase the process. I assure the hon. Gentleman that the purpose of the competition is to show the standards that can be achieved and to initiate one-stop shops where people come
418
forward with the most impressive schemes. That is our intention, which we hope to fulfil in the early part of next year.
Sir Peter Emery: I congratulate my right hon. Friend, and I think that the rather mean welcome from the Opposition does them no credit, and it seems odd, as they say that they want to help small businesses. My right hon. Friend will realise that small businesses in the south-west have probably been more adversely affected than those anywhere else. My right hon. Friend spoke of the siting of the pilots based purely on quality. Will he ensure that his Department sets out ideal specifications so that those tendering bids have an idea of the quality required to enable them to ensure that Plymouth, Exeter and Bristol or wherever are able to obtain the quality necessary? It is important that we do not consider that Bristol is able to cope with the south-west, when it is further away from most of the south-west than it is from London. There is a need for geographical consideration when making judgments.
Mr. Heseltine: I very much respect the voice that my hon. Friend brings to the cause of small businesses generally, and particularly in the south-west. The House will appreciate that, whenever one launches a scheme designed to reflect local needs, there is always a temptation for people to say, "Lay down centrally what you think should happen." We very much want to avoid taking a prescriptive approach, see what local people want, and allow them to set standards and come forward with ideas.
I have tried to avoid taking an over-centralist approach, which means that I am reliant on the quality of local initiative. Therefore, once the process is under way, I must not become too institutionalised about the way in which the results are spread, as that might mean that we make choices not based on quality but to suit a pattern of regional disposition.
Mr. Dennis Skinner: Is the Minister aware that I have never heard so much flannel in my life? The Government are capable of trotting out a load of baloney, day in and day out. There are 4 million people on the dole according to the real figures, when the kids on slave labour schemes are added. There is a £14 billion balance of payments deficit. Manufacturing industry is going down the pan. He comes here talking about setting up advice shops. I have some advice for the Government—"Shut up your shop and let somebody else take it over."
Mr. Heseltine: I just have this to say to the hon. Gentleman: if he has never heard so much flannel, it would be simple for him to go to the Library of the House and get recordings of his endless, repetitive and tedious interventions day after day after day.
Mr. Richard Tracey: Unlike the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner), many hon. Members will thank my right hon. Friend for what he has announced. Nine years ago, in my area of Kingston upon Thames, I was involved in setting up exactly the sort of thing that he is talking about; it was called the Kingston small business advice service. It has prospered and grown and has worked with the local authority and with our TEC, AZTEC, which covers Kingston, Merton and Wandsworth. Recently, it has done excellent work at the British Aerospace works in Richmond road, Kingston, which closed down. May I recommend it to him as one of

419
the pilots? May I suggest that he involves the academic and university world too? We involved the former Kingston polytechnic, now Kingston university, and the regional management centre. We found that they have a great deal to offer.
Mr. Heseltine: I am very much aware of my hon. Friend's long-standing interest in the whole subject. It sounds as though we may have a competitive bid, based on considerable experience, from Kingston. I heard what my hon. Friend said about the involvement of the academic world. It is up to local initiative to determine the extent to which it draws together the academic opportunities and advice that are available. That is very much up to those who are formulating competitive bids.
Mr. Tam Dalyell: Had they been in existence, what assistance would one-stop shops have been to the three directors of Matrix Churchill who faced a prison sentence? Would the management of one-stop shops have been knowledgeable enough about the facts that were known to the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne, in his department, to the right hon. Member for Bristol, West (Mr. Waldegrave) in the Foreign Office and to the Minister of State who is sitting beside him, the right hon. Member for Hove (Mr. Sainsbury)?
What advice will one-stop shops dealing with some of the firms that export the most sensitive armaments and armament-making machinery give to anybody exporting arms, for example, to Iran? Will they be briefed in such a way that never again can there be a repetition of the disgraceful episode involving many civil servants and ministers who had read the papers and who knew that those three directors of Matrix Churchill were not themselves responsible for that for which they faced trial?
Mr. Heseltine: I have listened carefully to what the hon. Gentleman has had to say. I will make it my personal responsibility to see that Lord Justice Scott is fully apprised of the interest which the hon. Gentleman expressed in linking the initiative of one-stop shops with the Matrix Churchill affair. If the whole concept is as improbable to Lord Justice Scott as it is to me, I will give the hon. Gentleman a further assurance: I will refer the whole matter to my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Defence to see whether he can find some equally improbable link with the sinking of the Belgrano.
Mr. James Hill: My right hon. Friend will be aware of the importance of my constituency, Southampton, in the export trade. For a long time, the local chamber of commerce, which is very active, has been co-operating not only with the local council but with the local newspaper and various people in the area who deal with the accountancy work of export. No doubt, a proposition for funding will be put forward from my area. I hope that the golden opportunity to make an application will be taken up because the geographical position of Southampton would no doubt entitle it to be one of the 15 pilots.
Mr. Heseltine: I know that my hon. Friend will use his considerable endeavours to persuade his local industrial and commercial community to respond to the initiative. I hope that he will make the point that it will not be the
420
regional location of Southampton which will play a role in the judgment that we reach but the quality of the bid that is put forward. I look forward to seeing a bid.
Mr. D. N. Campbell-Savours: I have looked forward to the statement of the President of the Board of Trade, and I support the proposition that he has put before the House. In a small way it is an important initiative. Cumbria TEC will bid for a one-stop shop. We intend to win and we will make it successful in exactly the same way as we made the enterprise zone successful in the early 1980s. All we have to do is win the competition.
Mr. Heseltine: I thank the hon. Gentleman for a wholly constructive view. I make no secret of the fact that it was precisely because he approached the issue of an enterprise zone in Cumbria in that manner, and with enthusiastic endorsement, in the early 1980s that he helped persuade me that there should be an enterprise zone in that part of the world. I believe that it has been a great success. Without wishing to be partisan, I would only say that if his hon. Friends were to adopt as constructive a view to the policies on offer, they might find that their areas gained a great deal more than they do as a result of the somewhat daunting interventions of his hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner).
Mr. Bernard Jenkin: I welcome the statement of my right hon. Friend, particularly on behalf of the businesses and people of my constituency. Does he recall that there was recently a successful DTI one-day export initiative, arranged in conjunction with the local chamber of commerce, to which DTI officials had to come from outside the county, thereby demonstrating the need for our own one-stop shop? Will my right hon. Friend enlarge on the criteria which will be used to assess quality so that we may submit a bid for a pilot scheme?
Mr. Heseltine: I am most grateful to my hon. Friend. He raises an important point which is of concern to us in government—that, so often with these initiatives, civil servants from regional offices or from central Government have to go to local areas to promote activities which it would be far more desirable to see initiated, promoted and managed by local people.
As to the precise ideas that are involved, they are obviously substantial. Large numbers of organisations provide many and varied services. It is precisely because I want all hon. Members to understand the nature of the opportunity that I have taken the liberty of sending them directly their own personal copy of the prospectus that I have announced today.
Mr. Bob Cryer: Will the Secretary of State accept that the initiative will not stop the haemorrhage of jobs and that small firms in the main depend on large firms which under the Government are going bust in considerable numbers? Will he accept that the Labour Government, which experienced unemployment of one third the current level of nearly 4 million, established one-stop shops for small businesses—the small firms information centres, which had a common logo and identity throughout the country?
That Government also established small firms counselling schemes, which used experienced business men and women to advise businesses on how to develop. In his scheme, surely there should be some regard to unemployment and to the areas which need most

421
assistance. Is it true that he could award three or four contracts to the same area, which would be absurd when another area in much greater need failed the competition?
May I ask the Secretary of State about self-sufficiency? Under the Labour Government, the first counselling session was free, and there was free access to the service of the Small Firms Advisory Bureau. Will that be the case under his scheme, or will the charges which produce self-sufficiency mean that small businesses will be unable to afford to use them?
Mr. Heseltine: I am interested to hear the hon. Member for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer) say that the things that I have announced this afternoon were already in practice under the last Labour Government. I find that mildly surprising, as the last Labour party manifesto included a commitment to do many of the things that I have announced this afternoon, making it quite apparent to me that they did not exist on the scale and with the degree of coherence that I have announced. They were never one-stop shops on the basis that I have announced this afternoon.
The loss of jobs, the recession that we face and the consequences for large and small companies are not things that have flowed from the policies of this Government; they are a consequence of the most severe and prolonged world recession that we have seen, one which is affecting the capitalist world across the globe. It serves no purpose, in trying to understand how we cope with the problems, to try to pretend that somehow or other the solution of these problems is in the hands of any one government.
I will not be persuaded to try to adopt a process of allocating these schemes as a result of the competition in a way that reflects what is called broadly fairness across the country, because the consequences of doing so is to decide the winners, not on the basis of the quality of the scheme but on other factors. When the hon. Gentleman says, "But shouldn't it be done on the basis of need?", I very much agree with the thinking behind that, but one may well address the need more urgently and realistically by waiting a little and allowing the quality that can be achieved to be demonstrated elsewhere before one addresses the need in the areas where it is greatest. That is why I am preoccupied with ensuring that it is the quality of the scheme that is the determining factor and not other issues of the sort that the hon. Gentleman has drawn to our attention.
Mr. Cryer: What about cost?
Mr. Heseltine: As to cost, we have found that, where charges are made for services, they have not been a deterrent for companies taking them up. Companies are used to buying a service that is of quality, and the test is often not whether it is free, but whether it is good. If it is good, companies will pay for it. As for helping companies, as hon. Members know, we have a consultancy scheme which has been a significant success and to which companies contribute. I am looking at whether we can continue with that scheme and, if so, on what terms. The fact is, however, that payment has not been a deterrent to the success of the scheme but its desirable quality which has made the scheme a success.
Mr. Richard Spring: May I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his most welcome announcement today? The Suffolk TEC will be submitting
422
a bid on behalf of the community of Bury St. Edmunds. The local business community is very much behind the scheme and very supportive. Will my right hon. Friend, however, give an assurance that, in the provision of the database, there will be adequate information, particularly on the availability of British goods and services?
Mr. Heseltine: My hon. Friend is reflecting the clear indication which has developed in the course of questions on my statement that we will have a significant number of bids, and I am delighted to hear that the Suffolk TEC is helping to co-ordinate that from Bury St. Edmunds.
An attempt now to demarcate British goods is out of keeping with the fact that as from 1 January 1993 we are moving to a single market. It is very important, as I am sure both my hon. Friend and the whole House will agree, that we persuade British industry very rapidly to adjust its thinking to that of a manufacturer or a provider of service in the whole of the single market and not just in the British sector of it.
Mr. Peter Hain: I welcome the President's statement, but I ask him to refer to the Secretary of State for Wales consideration of the Neath Development Partnership as a pilot project in Wales.
May I also remind the President that over 19,000 small businesses are small post offices? Why, in addition to making his statement on one-stop shops, did he not have the courage to come to the House and say that he supported the colossal loss of jobs in the Post Office, which will directly limit the ability of local post offices and the small businesses running them to do their jobs properly? Is this not a precursor of privatisation? Why has he flouted the authority of the House by allowing this announcement to be made before he has completed the review that he announced in July?
Mr. Heseltine: I have long admired the work that has been done in Wales in providing a more co-ordinated approach to many of the policies discussed this afternoon. It is because my right hon. Friends the Secretaries of State for Scotland and for Wales have, within their overall responsibilities, a much more flexible way of handling many of these policies that they have not felt it necessary to move in the way that I have with my announcement this afternoon. That is not to say that they are not interested in what has happened. They have looked very carefully at the proposals, and I have no doubt that if they see advantage in them they will themselves seek to adapt them to the interests of their territorial responsibilities.
I have, I think, dealt with the issue of the Post Office. The Post Office has not announced that a significant number of people will be made redundant: it has announced its employment profile over the next five years and has clearly indicated that it does not expect to see compulsory redundancies; it simply expects that, of those who naturally leave the Post Office, some 7,000 a year, not all will be replaced. The reason is that the Post Office is seeking to maintain its reputation for excellence and is mechanising its services, as it is now able to do, in order to improve and maintain them. This means that, on average, over the five years 3,000 jobs will not be replaced. That is very different from suggesting that the Post Office has announced 15,000 redundancies——
Mr. Hain: Nineteen thousand.
Mr. Heseltine: Nineteen thousand.
Mr. Gary Streeter: I thank my right hon. Friend for his excellent statement, which will be widely welcomed by the business community in Plymouth. I would like to encourage him not to listen too carefully to some of the moaning minnies on the Opposition Benches who rejoice in bad news and cannot stomach good news. Can he confirm that the coming of the single market on 1 January 1993, to which he has already referred, will be a significant boost to our own businesses to enable them to compete with our rivals, both in Europe and elsewhere in the world?
Mr. Heseltine: I am most grateful to my hon. Friend. I know very well the area that he represents today. I believe that what we have announced is designed to improve the quality of service to British companies, companies operating in this country. The services that they now receive are often good, but one of the issues that emerged from the research that I did on taking this job was that only 40 per cent. of companies took advantage of the services provided by the chambers of commerce, the Confederation of British Industry and the Department of Trade and Industry. That means that some 60 per cent., albeit many of them smaller companies, do not take advantage of them, either because they do not know of the services or because they do not believe them to be any good.
There is therefore a considerable responsibility on all of us who are responsible for these services to ensure that the customer—in this case, the customer who is not taking advantage of our services—is listened to and consulted, and we must tailor our services to meet his needs. That we intend to do in a much more proactive way, with a much higher quality and better co-ordination of our services.
Mr. Patrick Nicholls: This is a very worthwhile initiative, and it will take someone who is uniquely ignorant of the needs of small businesses to dismiss it as an irrelevance. A number of local authorities, of which Teignbridge district council is one, have a very good track record in promoting particular initiatives to increase employment. Will my right hon. Friend say what role local authorities like that will have? Much of the expertise in knowing what is available to small businesses will lie in Departments of State and, in particular, in my right hon. Friend's own Department of Trade and Industry. How will pilots be able to bring forward proposals which might incorporate civil servants who have that particular expertise?
Mr. Heseltine: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising two very important issues.
I am fully aware that there are local authorities which have been drawing very much closer to the wealth-creating sector. A principal reason for this is that Government policy has given them every incentive to do so; with the use of schemes such as city grant and city challenge, a partnership has been been fused between local wealth-creating and local bureaucratic services, greatly to the benefit of both.
The scheme is based on exactly the same philosophical approach to try to give local authorities and the wealth-creating sector every incentive to come together to prepare the best services possible to meet local needs. It is for them to decide how the services that they provide can be fitted into the concept of a one-stop shop.
424
My Department provides many services on a regional basis, which may therefore be too remote from the customer's immediate needs. I intend to leave the initiative to explore how the departmental services can best be tailored into the competition to those participating in the competition. As can be seen from the prospectus, I have instructed officials in my Department that they are to be constructive and co-operative and must allow the private sector and local authorities to explore how they can sub-contract, provide locally or collocate the services of the DTI wherever legally possible. We are in an exploratory stage, in which there is a great deal of opportunity and from which we all have much to learn.
Mr. Jim Cousins: The President of the Board of Trade has pledged a universal and comprehensive service, but he has committed the resources and cash for only a single year's experiment. How fast does he expect the scheme to expand? Where will the money come from, apart from charges on small businesses, as he made clear in an answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer)?
Mr. Heseltine: I can give an indication to the House and share my preliminary views—it is important that I do so—but this is an experiment. Within my budget, I have significant resources available for the support of small and medium enterprise. I expect an increasing part of that to be used year by year to extend the range of small one-stop shops if they are successful. The rate at which we do that can be explored in the light of the response.
All hon. Members will have been impressed by a clear theme that has emerged from this afternoon's statement, which is the number of bids that we shall get from all round the country. The training and enterprise councils are now hard at work in mobilising resources locally. hope—I can but express it as a hope—that, when the first 15 have been chosen and the first tranche of public money is available to support them, a significant number of other bidders will say, "We don't wish to wait for the second or third competition: this is an idea whose time has come," and they will then make progress. It is well within their ability to do so, because revenues are available to the chambers, local authorities have the capacity to support them if necessary, and private companies can contribute additional cash.
All those opportunities exist. We shall see how it goes, but my present intention is to announce 15 pilot schemes by the early part of next year and then extend the opportunity on a second and third-year basis, provided that there is support from within my Department.

ROYAL ASSENT
Madam Speaker: I have to notify the House, in accordance with the Royal Assent Act 1967, that the Queen has signified her Royal Assent to the following Acts:

Sporting Events (Control of Alcohol, Etc.) (Amendment) Act 1922

Car Tax (Abolition) Act 1992

Llanelli Borough Council (River Lliedi) Act 1992 Durham Markets Company Act 1992

City of Bristol (Portishead Docks) Act 1992

Orders of the Day

  Judicial Pensions and Retirement Bill [Lords]
  Order for Second Reading read.
  5.13 pm
  The Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department (Mr. John M. Taylor): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
  This important Bill has passed its stages in another place and now comes to this House for our consideration. It makes new arrangements for judicial pensions and amends the law relating to the date on which certain judicial office holders are required to retire.
  It may help to inform our discussion if I say a little about the Bill's history and describe some of its main provisions. Let me start with pensions. As my noble and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor said in another place, the occasion for the Bill was the change in the tax position of pension schemes brought about by the Finance Acts of 1987 and 1989.
  The Finance Act 1987 established 20 years as the minimum accrual period for a tax-approved pension scheme to provide maximum pension benefits. The Finance Act 1989 requires the salary on which benefits from tax-approved schemes are calculated to be capped at a specific level. That level increases annually in line with price inflation. The level for this tax year is £75,000. All private sector schemes were automatically capped by the 1989 Finance Act for new entrants from the time that Act came into force—for most people that was on or after 1 June 1989. The same result was achieved for members of public sector pension schemes by amending regulations.
  By July 1989, the only group of pension scheme members who were excluded from the cap was the judiciary. The judicial pension schemes can be changed only by legislation, because the judicial schemes are statutory in recognition of the need to safeguard judicial independence. We are making the necessary legislative changes in the Bill.
  The Bill, however, does much more than simply bring the judicial schemes more into line with the standards that now apply to all other pension schemes in the public and private sectors if they are to benefit from the privileges of a tax-approved scheme. The Government have taken the opportunity provided by the Bill to make some much-needed changes to the current judicial pension arrangements. Those changes were trailed in consultation papers published by my noble and learned Friend, the Lord Chancellor, and my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Scotland, in December 1990. The Government announced in July 1991 how they intended to proceed; this Bill, introduced in another place on 4 June this year, is the result.
  I said that changes were needed for the simple reason that the existing judicial schemes are rife with anomalies and inflexibilities. They are extremely complicated and carry a good number of difficulties for those who have to try to make out their rights under them. That is hardly
  426
  surprising, given that each class of the judiciary has its own scheme. The result is some half a dozen different judicial pension schemes, all with different accrual rates.
  For instance, in England and Wales, High Court judges, circuit judges and chairmen of industrial tribunals have 15-year accrual periods; stipendiary magistrates, district judges and members of the Lands Tribunal, on the other hand, have a 20-year accrual period; and for the immigration adjudicators, the accrual period is 40 years. Those disparities are perhaps even more marked when one looks north of the border and across the Irish sea.
  Mr. Roger Evans: Is it in the slightest bit surprising that there are different accrual periods when High Court judges are normally appointed in their 50s and immigration appeals adjudicators are normally young boys who have undertaken a qualification period of three years' practice at the Bar? It does not follow as a matter of reason or consistency.
  Mr. Taylor: We are making progress in the name of reason and consistency and I shall have more to say later about the age of appointment of High Court judges. Although my hon. Friend has already shown, not only by his text but by his tone, that he has a dispute with the measures currently on offer, I may be able to engage his sympathy in an alternative suggestion.
  Mr. Paul Boateng: I would not bet on it.
  Mr. Taylor: The book is not open.
  There must be something to be said for having much greater homogeneity in the various classes of judges' pension arrangements, not least to assist the most able in gaining promotion. My hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth (Mr. Evans), perhaps with a measure of exaggeration, suggested that some adjudicators started as mere boys. Be that the case or not, I should like to see, and my hon. Friend might too, a more homogeneous overall pension structure that enabled people to be promoted and take greater responsibility without facing hideous actuarial decisions in middle life when they should be going forward without pressure or obstacle and taking greater responsibility.
  I was seeking to describe the further range of differences that apply if one looks north of the border or across the Irish sea. For example, Scottish sheriffs have a 20-year accrual span compared with the 15-year span enjoyed by their English and Welsh counterparts, the circuit judges. District judges and supreme court masters in Northern Ireland have a 30-year span compared with the 20-year span of their English counterparts.
  Those differences are the result of history and cannot be justified today. Apart from the glaring anomalies that exist between the different judicial offices, the different schemes can make it disadvantageous for a judge to move, on promotion, to a different office. I do not think that this is the right time to go into the technicalities of the aggregation rules, but their general effect is that a judge who wishes to take the pension of the second office loses the benefit of his years of service in his first office. A judge who wishes to aggregate his service in both offices may do so, but only on retirement and only on the basis of the salary and the pension scheme of the lower office. This is not only unfair, it can act as a disincentive—not merely an obstacle—to promotion.

  427
  There are other anomalies. For instance, certain judicial officers in schemes with a 20-year accrual span have to serve for two years before qualifying for a pension on the ground of ill-health. No minimum period of service is, however, required of office-holders in 15-year schemes.
  It seemed to the Government that the obvious way to cure the existing anomalies and inconsistencies was to create a unified pension scheme in which service throughout a judge's career would count towards his or her final pension. The new scheme should cater equally for all members of the judiciary. So far as the public are concerned, a judge is a judge, regardless of the level of judiciary to which he or she belongs. The Bill meets those objectives and it does so on the basis that in general the new arrangements do not prejudice the pension position of those already holding judicial office.
  By virtue of clause 1, the new scheme will apply to new entrants to the judiciary, to those in the existing schemes who elect to go into the new scheme and to those serving under the present arrangements who are promoted to an office with a different pension scheme after the new arrangements come into force. Clause 3 provides for a single accrual span of 20 years for all the judicial officers holding on a salaried basis an office listed in schedule 1. As I have already explained, the reason for the 20 years is that it is now the minimum period allowed for a tax-approved pension scheme.
  Much time was spent in another place debating whether that period was appropriate for members of the higher judiciary. It was argued that those judges tended to take up appointment relatively late in life and that, with the reduction in the retirement age to 70, many of them would not be able to qualify for a full pension. It was said that that was contrary to the public interest because it would discourage those best qualified to accept judicial office. Furthermore—this was said with a particular reference to the circuit judges who currently have a 15-year scheme and can retire with a full pension at 65 provided that they have served for 15 years—it would encourage some judges to stay on the Bench for longer than perhaps they would otherwise wish, simply to accrue their maximum pension entitlement before their 70th birthday. That too was said not to be in the public interest.
  The Government's answer, given many times in another place by my noble and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor, is this: the quality of our judiciary is, and must always be, paramount. The pension arrangements for all members of the judiciary must be as generous as the public purse will allow. However, there can be no reason, so far as the 20-year accrual is concerned, for treating the judiciary any differently from other members of society. What the Government can do—and have done—is to recognise the special position of the judges, who come to this career relatively late in life, by ensuring that they can keep in full the benefits of any pension arrangements that they have made prior to taking up judicial office. In other words, they can keep those, and are entitled also to whatever pension benefits they have accrued under the statutory judicial scheme.
  The judiciary are in a unique position here. Revenue rules would normally require those in pension schemes with an accrual period as short as 20 years, to bring into account for pension purposes any retained benefits—that
  428
  is, previous pension arrangements—in assessing at the end of the day whether their pension was within the Revenue's overall limit of two thirds of final remuneration. The judges do not have to do that—a significant benefit to those judges who have taken advantage of the tax rules to build up personal pension provision during practice. It is the position under the present pension arrangements. It is retained by clause 18.
  It was argued in another place that that was all very well, but that that special concession was of no help to those judges who had no retained benefits. The Government's answer to that is this: the Revenue recently agreed that, provided retained benefits are brought into account, the judiciary may, if they wish, buy added years or make additional voluntary contributions to increase the value of their judicial pensions. As the scheme will be recognised as a tax-approved scheme, judges will qualify, in the same way as anyone else, for tax relief on their contributions. Clause 10 provides the means for establishing the voluntary contribution schemes for the new arrangements. Schedule 3 amends the existing legislation so that voluntary contribution schemes may now be established for those covered by the present arrangements.
  Let me tell the House briefly what will be the pension position of those covered by the Bill. The full pension after 20 years' service will be half the salary paid to the judge in whatever period of 12 months during the previous three years gives him the best result. For service of less than 20 years, the pension will be one fortieth of the salary paid to the judge—in whatever period of 12 months during the previous three years gives him the best result—multiplied by the whole length of the judge's service, calculated in years and days. In addition, judges will be entitled to a lump sum of two and a quarter times the annual rate of their pension. At present, the lump sum is twice the rate of the pension. There will be provision for a death gratuity of twice pensionable pay. That was raised from one and a half times pensionable pay by a Government amendment in another place. As now, there will be provision for spouse's and children's pensions.
  Any judge who has served for five years will be entitled to an immediate pension at the age of 65. Judges between the ages of 60 and 65, who have served for five years, will be able to take early retirement with an immediate pension that is actuarially reduced. Those limits do not apply to ill-health retirement, the payment of a death gratuity, or the payment of spouses' and children's pensions. As a result of amendments by the Government in another place, the Bill now provides for enhancement of service in respect of ill-health pensions and for an increase in the lump sum payable following early death after retirement. Again as a result of Government amendment in another place, the scope of those eligible to receive a children's pension was considerably extended.
  The Government believe that the new pension arrangements set out in the Bill are fair and reasonable to not only the judiciary but the public purse from which the pensions are paid. On 10 November, my noble and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor placed in the Libraries of both Houses, tables prepared by the Government Actuary comparing a range of pension benefits for stipendiary magistrates and district, circuit and High Court judges under the existing and new arrangements. I commend these to hon. Members. The tables include the improvements to the derivative benefits that I mentioned

  429
  a moment ago. I believe that the information provided in the tables is sufficiently comprehensive to enable those studying them to form a fair view of the pension position under the existing and new arrangements.
  The retirement provisions of the Bill are covered in clauses 26 and 27, with the accompanying schedules 5, 6 and 7. As with pensions, part of the aim is to introduce consistency. At present, judges and judicial officers have a variety of retirement dates. Not only are the ages different as between different judicial offices, but in addition some provisions relate to the attainment of a particular age, while others relate to the completion of the year of service following a particular birthday.
  For example, the retirement age for circuit judges in England and Wales, sheriffs in Scotland and county court judges in Northern Ireland is at present the end of the year of service in which they reach 72, whereas High Court judges in England and Wales and Northern Ireland, judges of the Court of Session in Scotland and other senior judges retire on their 75th birthday. Furthermore, for some appointments, particularly in tribunals, there is no statutory retirement age, although in general in such circumstances comparable retirement ages have been applied as a matter of administrative arrangement.
  In the light of consultations, the Government consider that a general age is desirable and that a retirement age of 70 is more appropriate to modern conditions. Clause 26 accordingly provides for a general retirement date at the age of 70. This will apply in relation to all the offices included in schedule 5.
  Mr. Patrick Nicholls: My hon. Friend says that retirement at 70 would be more appropriate in modern conditions. Does he share my view that there is a danger in accommodating fashion? We are told that a judge is too old to sit on the Bench but when that argument is used, there is no appreciation of the fact that one is looking for intellectual skill at least as much as physical ability. Does not my hon. Friend feel that in introducing a common retirement age he has been blown off course and made to succumb to the fashion of attacking the judiciary and the establishment, by depriving judges of office on the ground of age?
  Mr. Taylor: I am not unsympathetic to my hon. Friend's point, which he made in his usual reasonable and lucid way. Perhaps he will allow me to reflect on it. If I do not refer to it later in these remarks, I shall return to it later.
  The retirement age of 70 will apply only to those appointed after the legislation comes into force. Clause 26 and schedule 7 accordingly provide that persons holding judicial office when the new retirement provisions come into force will retain their pre-existing compulsory retirement date. Under the transitional provisions in the Bill, that arrangement will also apply if and when someone subsequently moves from one full-time office to another. For example, if a circuit judge is subsequently appointed to the High Court Bench, he will retain his present retirement date of the end of the year of service in which he reaches 72.
  At present, there are powers to extend service in some, but not all, judicial offices beyond the retirement date otherwise applicable. The application of those powers, where they exist, has been helpful in providing flexibility to meet the needs of the courts and in ensuring that the ability
  430
  and expertise of experienced office holders need not be lost prematurely if that is in the public interest. In making that last point, perhaps I laid the foundations for the answer that I shall give my hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls).
  Mr. Walter Sweeney: Does my hon. Friend agree that the discretion thereby reserved for the Lord Chancellor to extend the retirement age of members of the judiciary where they can serve a useful purpose and there is a need for them in our judicial system meets the criticism that might be levelled if the arbitrary age limit of 70 had been imposed? Does my hon. Friend further agree that the retention of the Lord Chancellor's discretion will allay fears of premature retirement?
  Mr. Taylor: Yes. My hon. Friend raises a point that was made in another place by Lord Ackner and was comprehensively addressed—I thought, after reading Hansard—by my noble and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor. During the course of this evening, I shall endeavour to replicate my noble and learned Friend's reply. The questions being the same, there is no reason, in this day and age, why the answer should not be the same—and my hon. Friend shall have it.
  It is considered appropriate to retain that flexibility and, with the introduction of a new retirement age of 70, to provide for the possibility of enabling service to be continued in the public interest. The Bill accordingly provides that service may be continued after the age of 70, but only if the Lord Chancellor or Secretary of State for Scotland, as the case may be, considers that desirable in the public interest, and then only for periods of no more than a year at a time up to, but not beyond, the office-holder's 75th birthday.
  It is expected that that power will be used sparingly and applied only where it is clearly in the public interest to do so, taking careful account of all the relevant considerations, including in particular such things as the health of the judicial office holder in question. Because of the particular constitutional factors which are seen to arise in their case, the power of extension will not apply in respect of High Court judges and above in England and Wales and Northern Ireland or to their Scottish equivalents.
  Under current provisions, judges who have retired from full-time service may be invited from time to time to serve in retirement on a part-time basis. We believe that it is no longer fair to expect them to be available indefinitely in that way, so the Bill provides for the overriding limit of 75 to apply in those circumstances also.
  Clause 26 also provides that certain one-off appointments, to which the concept of retirement as such is not strictly applicable, should not be made beyond the age of 70. Clause 27 provides that a person who has retired or otherwise ceased to hold a judicial office may nevertheless complete unfinished business—for instance, by giving judgment in a case which he had been dealing with.
  Any retirement age is of course a matter for judgment. Conflicting considerations must be balanced to achieve that which the person seeking to make the judgment believes to be right, both in the interests of the judges and in the public interest. On the one hand, the increasing burdens of judicial office must be acknowledged, but on the other, although the current retirement ages for the judiciary are higher than those for most other professional people, we must recognise that judges are appointed

  431
  relatively late in life. They are usually drawn from those who have already established themselves in a successful career in the law and their years of experience are part of the necessary qualifications for the position. Accordingly, they bring with them maturity of judgment, which is essential for judicial office.
  We think that three score years and 10 is an appropriate general age for judicial retirement, and that is, accordingly, the age for which the Bill provides.
  Mr. Sweeney: I do not disagree with my hon. Friend on that point, but does he accept that it is appropriate for the Government to consider ways of attracting younger people to the Bench, of making appointments at a younger age and of broadening the entry so that judges are more representative of the people with whom they deal in court?
  Mr. Taylor: I am glad to be able to respond to that question in exactly the way that my hon. Friend would like. It must be the inescapable conclusion of those who hold the judiciary in high regard and respect that it must be sensible to start considering appointing people rather younger than is the tradition. I was surprised to find—my hon. Friend, too, may be surprised—that the average age of High Court judges is lower than 60, which is not a bad thing. He may be pleased to know that the Lord Chancellor has made it clear many times that, as the reservoir of those competent and qualified for appointment to the Bench increases—this seems inevitable from the statistics—more women and more people from ethnic backgrounds will be appointed. There will be no obstacle to them: their appointment will be encouraged.
  Mr. Gary Streeter: Will my hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Taylor: I had not intended to give way so many times. My next words were to be, "I commend the Bill to the House," but I want to be fair to my hon. Friends.
  Mr. Streeter: Does my hon. Friend agree that, if a man or woman in his or her late thirties or early forties is old enough to be a member of the Cabinet, he or she is old enough to be a part of the judicial system and on the Bench?
  Mr. Taylor rose ——
  Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Janet Fookes): Before the Minister continues, may I invite him not to turn his back on me quite so much?
  Mr. Taylor: I apologise. I am not very experienced in this job, and I find it an unusual experience to be replying to people whom I cannot see. No doubt I shall have to come to terms with that, and I shall address my remarks to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, as is proper.
  My hon. Friend's thinking may be part of the future, but the thinking of the present is that it is unconventional to make appointments to the High Court Bench at any age younger than 45.
  Mr. Nick Hawkins: I do not disagree with a number of the important points that my hon. Friend has made, but what is most important is that nothing should deter the best candidates from accepting. appointments. Much concern was expressed by many
  432
  Members of the other place, including many experienced judges, about the best being deterred from doing so, in particular by concerns about pension provisions, early retirement through ill-health and about the possibility of judges becoming stale if they are required to serve for 20 years to qualify for their full pension. Those are the greatest concerns that I and a number of hon. Friends share, to which I shall return later if I am successful in catching your eye, Madam Deputy Speaker.
  Madam Deputy Speaker: It would be easier to catch it if interventions were not so long.
  Mr. Taylor: I shall try to respond briefly.
  I am anxious to tell my hon. Friend that there will be no derogation from the selection of the best candidates. It is not incompatible or inconsistent with that to say, on the one hand, that women candidates and candidates from ethnic minorities will be encouraged and, on the other, that selection will be confined to the best candidates. On the 20-year qualifications, I am sorry to have to invite my hon. Friend to come to terms with the Finance Act 1987 and Finance Act 1989, which created an anomaly in respect of judges. The Bill seeks to rectify that anomaly by putting the tax status of judges' pensions on the same footing as everybody else's. I do not think that he is pressing me to let judges have a tax-privileged pension scheme that is not available to anybody else. I remind him that judges are able to buy added years if they wish and retire earlier.
  Mr. Roger Evans: I am following the force of my hon. Friend's reasoning, but why does not the same provision apply to the Lord Chancellor's pension?
  Mr. Taylor: My hon. Friend seems to be adopting an aggressive tone. For that and other reasons I shall not oblige him. The Lord Chancellor, as he will know better than me, is in an absolutely unique position under our constitution. He is a contradiction of all the 18th-century nostrums about the separation of power. He is a Minister-judge; there is no other. The job goes back 1,360 years. It is scarcely surprising that he is treated slightly differently.
  Sir Ivan Lawrence: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Taylor: No. You, Madam Deputy Speaker, and the House will agree that I have been generous in taking interventions.
  Sir Ivan Lawrence: Before my right hon. Friend finishes his speech.
  Mr. Taylor: Very well.
  Sir Ivan Lawrence: I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend: I called him right hon., but I am sure that that is only a matter of time. What did he mean when he said that we should be encouraging women to be judges? Under the Bill, a woman practitioner who has to leave practice to raise a family will not be able to amass sufficient pension before she becomes a judge to make the pension that she gets as a judge worth while. Surely my hon. Friend is being rather optimistic in suggesting that the Bill will do anything to help women to become judges.
  Mr. Taylor: There is little evidence that people accept, or are deterred from accepting, judicial appointment because of the pension arrangements. Most people seem to

  433
  regard the decision about whether to accept appointment as a judge as being altogether more important than pension arrangements, which are considered collaterally to the main decision. My hon. and learned Friend will have to allow me to stand by my earlier position and say that the Lord Chancellor looks forward—I do not think that he is alone in this—to the time when the reservoir of those available for appointment includes more women and more people of ethnic origins. On the same criterion of choosing only the best, many of them will be appointed, and most of us think that that will be a very good thing.
  I commend the Bill to the House.
  5.49 pm
  Mr. Paul Boateng: The debate has taken on a rather churlish and acrimonious tone—largely, I fear, as a result of the interventions of the Minister's hon. Friends. That makes one look forward with a certain amount of glee to the Committee stage, should it so please the House, when one fancies that the Minister will have an even rougher ride.
  Mr. John Morris: They will not be selected.
  Mr. Boateng: Quite so. Perhaps Conservative Members who have expressed what I consider to be a welcome interest in the subject have scuppered their chances of ever serving on the Standing Committee. Places on the Committee will no doubt be the subject of much competition, as the attendance in the House this evening signifies.
  The Opposition will attempt to return a certain amount of equilibrium and proper dignity to the debate, which is timely. The judiciary are now required to preside over a system of criminal and civil justice increasingly groaning under the strain of under-resourcing and understaffing. They also, especially the higher judiciary, have imposed on them an increasing burden of duties in serving on various bodies of inquiry established from time to time to deal with the troubles that the Government have got themselves into.
  It is a good time to examine the judiciary, and I hope that in the course of the debate and, if the House wills it, in Committee, we shall take the opportunity to examine the wider issues that provide the context of the Bill, and which have already been raised by several Conservative Members. No doubt they will also be raised in due course by my hon. Friends.
  The public perception of the judiciary at times lapses into caricature. The picture is of a figure such as Mr. Justice Cocklecarrot—elderly, wearing a wig and ermine, and as narrow-minded as he is short-sighted. It is of the sort of judge who inquires, "Who is Cliff Richard?" or "What is Spitting Image?"
  Mr. Nicholls: "Who is Paul Boateng?"
  Mr. Boateng: Quite so, but I shall not succumb to the temptation of responding to that sedentary and entirely unfounded intervention.
  The caricature, the lampoon, contains within it a grain of truth in terms of the public's perception of the judiciary, which has already been referred to in at least one Conservative intervention. It is important that the House should deal with that perception, because there is nothing more important than that the judiciary and the system of justice they serve should command the respect of the whole
  434
  community, and that they should be seen as what, in the main, they are. They are a highly qualified and erudite body, a group of men and women—I shall deal with the composition of the judiciary in due course—whose intellectual ability and total incorruptibility are unmatched anywhere in the world. That must be said, and it is the background against which the debate takes place.
  However, we must not be complacent about the institution of the judiciary, any more than we should be complacent about any other of our great institutions. To some extent, the judiciary stand apart and are unique. They, alone of all our great institutions, have at no time been the subject of any comprehensive reform. The monarchy, the House of Commons and the upper House, and the civil service, have all at some time been the subject of a comprehensive body of reform, after considerable public debate, and, in the case of the monarchy and this House, after civil war. The judiciary have never been subject to such reform.
  Over the years, there has been a series of debates on the judiciary in the House, going back to the glorious revolution. They make interesting reading, and they have always tended to take place around the subject of the emoluments of the judiciary. That was for the good reason that it was important to ensure their independence—in those days, their independence from the Crown and from a variety of vested interests—and also because it was important that the ablest and most highly qualified people were drawn into the judiciary. That matter has already been addressed in interventions in the debate.
  It is interesting to examine a debate held in the Chamber in 1825 which gives some flavour of the concerns which remain with us to this day. One hon. Member, a Mr. Leycester, saw his opportunity. Others may seek to emulate him tonight—who knows? Mr. Leycester took the opportunity to raise several general issues concerning the administration of justice. The Hansard of the time tells us that he thought that the debate presented
  "a favourable opportunity for correcting many evils in the mode of administering justice in this country."
  Mr. Leycester sought to widen the debate, and was also prompted to observe that he did not think that a time when the price of corn was falling was the time to consider any increase in judges' emoluments, salaries and pensions.
  The Chancellor of the Exchequer of the day responded. He was clearly a more generous Chancellor than the one who revealed in his autumn statement this year his attitude to the legal aid fund and the criminal and civil justice systems in this country. The Chancellor in 1825 strongly argued that it was important to do nothing that would in any way remove from the office its "just dignity", or anything that would diminish the
  "respectability of the judges,and their weight and character in the eyes of those for whose benefit the laws were administered.—[Official Report, 16 May 1825; Vol. 13, c. 612.]
  Listening to what the Minister has said today, it seems to me that the reason for the Bill is similar—a concern to ensure that the independence of the judiciary is maintained, that the highest quality of persons with the requisite professional skills are drawn to judicial office at every level, and that there is a degree of uniformity in the way in which they are treated.
  Sadly, the Opposition now part company with the Government. The Government have missed a golden opportunity to promote a debate and carry out a broader consultation than that involved with the Bill, in order to

  435
  determine what we seek from our judges today, how they could best be put in a position to deliver what they are called upon to do, how we may ensure that the judiciary are best suited to preside over an institution that, increasingly, is required to deal with a complex and plural society in a state of considerable change and with a system of justice that is increasingly required to deal with a greater volume and a more complex body of law and of litigants than has ever been the case before.
  The Government had an opportunity here, although they have missed it—the Opposition regret that—to bring forward a comprehensive package of reform of the judiciary. The Opposition intend to take the opportunity of this Second Reading debate and, if the House wills it, of the Committee stage to map out a number of areas in which the time has come for comprehensive reform and change. We also intend, here and in Committee, to table a number of amendments that will improve and assist the measure.
  The public perception of the judiciary was recently revealed interestingly in an important survey conducted by the Law Society which was published in the Solicitors' Journal. It was a comprehensive survey across England and Wales, and some of the results were as follows. Some 65 per cent. of those surveyed agreed with the statement:
  "Judges are out of touch with everyday life and everyday people".
  More than 79 per cent. of people questioned said that there should be more women judges. Some 86 per cent. thought that judges should retire earlier than the present judicial retirement age of 75, which shows considerable public support for reducing the retirement age. Interestingly, and significantly for our consideration of the Bill, about 47 per cent. thought that judges should retire at 65 and 23 per cent. thought that they should retire at 60. That is an interesting statistic.
  The overwhelming conclusion about the composition of the bench was that judges were too old, too male, too white and too out of touch. Some 69 per cent. of people agreed that judges should be appointed to reflect the ethnic mix of England and Wales. That is the background against which our debate takes place.
  Mr. Nicholls: To help us to place this useful survey in context and to understand something of the knowledge of the people who answered the questions, can the hon. Gentleman tell the House whether the people surveyed were asked whether they had ever been in court, whether they knew any judges, what the average age of judges was and how many female or black judges there were? If they were not asked those questions, it might suggest that they did not know the answers. That would tend to throw a less favourable gloss on the findings.
  Mr. Boateng: That is an interesting point from an hon. Member who is a member of the Law Society and who has experience of the judiciary at every level in a number of different modes. The importance of the survey is that it deals with public perception. Whether the public are right in that perception is an entirely different case. As it traditionally has been, the House must always be concerned about maintaining public confidence in the judiciary. The House must be aware that the public have those concerns and perceptions.
  436
  It may be of assistance to the hon. Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) if I describe the public's perception of the make-up of the judiciary. An examination of the figures reveals that the public's perception of the age, gender and race of judges is broadly right. I leave aside the issue of whether judges are out of touch. The reality is that only two High Court judges are women. Only 19 circuit judges, 42 recorders, 31 assistant recorders and three deputy district judges are women. There are no women district judges. Only 18 women are in training for assistant recordership. The figures give no cause for complacency.
  I am prompted by the intervention by the hon. Member for Teignbridge to consider the position of women in the judiciary. The view expressed by the hon. Gentleman, by the Minister and by the Lord Chancellor—that in the fulness of time, women would achieve higher positions in the judiciary in greater numbers—is not borne out by the facts. Many women were called to the Bar in the 1970s. The evidence is that they are not selected as readily as their male colleagues are for the beginnings of high judicial office, but are found in the office of recordership. Men are appointed as recorders from 12 years' call. No woman has been made a recorder at less than 16 years' call. The figure for the past five years for the south-east is 18 years' call.
  Those figures come from another report conducted by the Law Society which was published last year. It should give all hon. Members and all those who want the judiciary broadly to reflect the gender mix of our society cause for concern. There is no room for complacency on that score.
  The same could be said—I do not intend to labour the point—about the ethnic breakdown of the judiciary and about the number of persons drawn to judicial office from the ethnic minority Bar. We cannot afford to be complacent in that area, any more than we can afford to be complacent about the mix of those recruited to be holders of the higher judicial offices in terms of whether they come from the solicitors' profession or from the Bar. There remains a gross under-representation of solicitors as holders of judicial office.
  Those important issues, which need to be addressed, are not addressed in the Bill. That is a missed opportunity and that is why we believe that the time has come for the creation of a judicial appointments commission which would, first and importantly, involve a lay element in the process. In a welcome recognition of the extent of the problem in relation to the public's perception, the Lord Chief Justice made it clear in the Dimbleby lecture that he now accepted the argument for lay observers in the system of judicial appointments.
  The Opposition would argue, and would hope to find allies on the Conservative Benches, that that does not go far enough. There should be an institutionalised lay element within the judicial appointments commission. That would give a clear message to the public that the judiciary provide a public service of the utmost importance, that they should be recruited in circumstances that are open and subject to public advertisement and that the circumstances of recruitment should be transparent in terms of the manner of recruitment and the qualifications required to fill those judicial offices; and, importantly, the lay element should be involved.
  The Opposition are disappointed that, in the consultations on the Bill, the Lord Chancellor did not feel it necessary to consult anyone outside the body of the judiciary. Judicial pensions and judicial appointments are

  437
  not matters solely for the judiciary. They should be matters for the general public and for consumer and professional organisations. The process should be more open and more transparent than it is at the moment.
  The Bill misses another opportunity which has been alluded to in the debate, albeit by a side wind. That missed opportunity relates to judicial careers. There is absolutely no reason why we should not accept that it is perfectly proper and appropriate for the profession—solicitors and barristers—to consider judicial office in career terms.
  There is no reason why we should fail to grasp the opportunity of so structuring our pension arrangements as to encourage the principle that it is proper to appoint people to judicial office at a much earlier age. That should begin with and include the office of stipendiary magistrate and recorder; move through to the circuit court, whether district court or Crown court, to, where appropriate, the High Court and the higher echelons of the judiciary. There is no reason why that path should not be embarked upon at an earlier age—perhaps in one's mid-30s. The pension arrangements that we are considering should reflect that and have a degree of portability.
  Mr. John M. Taylor: As the hon. Gentleman is addressing rather constructively the possibilities of advancement within a hierarchy that permitted promotions, does he not concede that the pension arrangements that we have introduced today are homogeneous, without internal boundaries, and conducive to what he has suggested?
  Mr. Boateng: That is why we do not oppose the principle today and why we look forward to the debate on the issue in Committee. However, we would go further.
  There should be a time when those who hold judicial office should have a contributory pension. I noticed that at least one Conservative Member gasped when I said that. However, I do not see why a Conservative mouth should gasp at that concept. After all, is not the Conservative party in the forefront of encouraging contributory pensions? What is sauce for the goose should be sauce for the gander. Why should this calf be so fatted and we be incapable of appreciating another means of achieving that end and providing a means by which people might be able to contribute to their own pensions?
  Mr. Sweeney: After the hon. Gentleman's farmyard metaphors, does he accept that we are not comparing like with like? I believe that the salary of a High Court judge is about £87,000 a year. While that may sound a vast salary to the great mass of the public, in comparison to the salaries of the most senior and effective members of the Bar, it is relatively low. The fact that the pension arrangements for the judiciary are non-contributory is, in part, a reflection of that. Anyone earning a huge salary is in a far better position to fund his own pension arrangements than a member of the British judiciary.
  Mr. Boateng: Quite so. I do not for a moment call that into question. However, I dare to suggest that there is no reason why the arrangements and their generosity should be immutable and fixed. It is perfectly proper for there to be a broader consideration, within the context of an overall career structure for the judiciary, of a contributory pension and a corresponding increase in salary.
  I raise that matter as an issue for discussion and debate. I understand how the current arrangements have evolved
  438
  and I do not complain about them. However, it is important that there should be a comprehensive review of the appointment of the judiciary, their career structure and place within the overall scheme of the public service. That is a proper exercise which should be engaged upon with alacrity.
  That brings me to the retirement age. It is not automatically obvious to the general public or to many hon. Members why there should be a distinction between a senior judge in the service of the administration of justice and various other servants of the Crown in the civil service. Why should it be thought that it is automatically presumed and required that senior civil servants should retire at 60 and judges at 70?
  Mr. Roger Evans: There is no such rule in respect of hon. Members of this House. Why should we be treated differently?
  Mr. Boateng: There are one or two good reasons. Our emoluments are in no way comparable, in case the hon. Gentleman has not noticed. Our role is in no way comparable. If the hon. Gentleman, as a new Member and no doubt welcome on his own side, thinks that he is as important as a High Court judge, he has another think coming, because I can tell him, with more experience here than he has, that he is not. He will discover otherwise.
  Mr. Roger Evans: As I have more experience than the hon. Gentleman at the Bar, can he tell me why, in private practice as a lawyer, there is no requirement to retire at a particular age and why Crown servants should be shackled in this arbitrary fashion?
  Mr. Boateng: I have clearly stung the hon. Member and become the subject of the wrath that he was reserving for the Parliamentary Secretary. I should have refrained from drawing him in that way.
  The point I make is this: it is not automatically clear why this distinction should be made. I take the view of one Conservative Member that the mere fact that one is old does not mean that one is out of touch or in some way impaired in one's intellectual capacity. That simply is not true.
  It seems to us to be entirely desirable that judges should retire at 65 and that that is a reasonable proposition and one which is in keeping with the requirement. of ensuring that there is maturity and a degree of wisdom that are reflected in age on the Bench and also, importantly, is in keeping with the need to ensure that levels of judicial staffing are maintained. But having said that, 65 as a retirement age is reasonable and it ensures that public perception of the Bench is not one that conforms with caricature and lampoon. It is also important, given the number of years required to acquire a full pension under the provisions of this Bill, that it is an added incentive to earlier appointment. I stress that it is desirable that appointment to high judicial office should take place earlier than at present.
  Several Hon. Members rose ——
  Mr. Boateng: Before giving way to Conservative Members, I would say one thing that goes to the whole issue, sadly untouched in this Bill, of a career structure for judicial office. On reflection, is there any reason why consideration is not given to the appointment of High Court judges on a fixed-term basis? It would be useful to

  439
  know whether the Lord Chancellor's Department has given any thought, in the context of the present shortage of judicial manpower—and manpower it is, with the gender make-up of the judiciary—to the proposal first aired by a Conservative Lord Chancellor as long ago as 1900.
  If eminent lawyers are not prepared to make the real sacrifice of earning capacity or life style that a permanent commitment to the Bench inevitably brings, why should not consideration be given to the appointment of High Court judges for a fixed term of five or eight years so that it is possible for a High Court judge to be drawn from the solicitors' profession, the Bar or academia for that period to serve in judicial office and then to go back to their previous occupation in the law? Why is that not at least considered by the Lord Chancellor? It was considered in 1900; why not now?
  Mr. Streeter: The hon. Gentleman asks why it has not been considered since 1900, but one could ask the same thing about many Labour Governments since then. However, I rise not to question him on that point but on his earlier interesting points about an enforced retirement age of 65. Can he say a little more about the cost of his proposals in increased pensions and additional salaries for replacement judges, or is this yet another Labour proposal that has not been costed?
  Mr. Boateng: I wish that I had not given way to that intervention. That is not worthy of the contributions the hon. Member made earlier in this debate. Is it to be suggested—I can see it now—in three or four years' time, or probably sooner, given the conduct of some Conservative Members, when we have a general election, that our proposal for a judge's retirement age should be costed and thrown against us at the hustings as an indication of Labour irresponsibility? Not even Conservative Members can sink that low when we are seeking a rational discussion about the shape and role of the judiciary.
  Several Hon. Members rose——
  Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. If the hon. Member who has the Floor does not give way, other hon. Members must resume their seats.
  Mr. Boateng: The fact is that in terms of the administration of justice, Conservative Members have been all too ready to be influenced by the Treasury as opposed to the demands of the administration of justice and that is precisely why they have, time and again, ignored the pleas and criticism of successive Lords Chief Justice and other Lords of Appeal and members of the Court of Appeal for an end to the scandal of the repeated use of deputies and part-time judges in the High Court. That is entirely as a result of the sort of quite improper consideration of costing by the Chancellor of the Exchequer that is imposed on the Lord Chancellor. It is self-defeating.
  Mr. John M. Taylor: The hon. Gentleman has followed the pastoral phase of his speech with some more aggressive comments. I shall respond to his remarks on the availability of part-time judges. It is my opinion that they increase flexibility to cope with peaks and troughs in work
  440
  load, and to cover the absence of full-time appointees due to illness, or caused by the time lag which often occurs between a post becoming available and the appointment of the new post holder. Part-time sitting also builds up an experienced pool of practitioners, from which future appointments to higher judicial office are often made. Those are respectable arguments in favour of part-time officers on the Bench.
  Mr. Boateng: The respectability of that argument can be judged against the views of successive Lord Chief Justices, of the overwhelming majority of both wings of the profession, and of the City of London, the consumer organisations, the Bar Council, the Law Society and the overwhelming weight of informed opinion. They find that the continued use of part-time High Court judges and deputy High Court judges is offensive in terms of the independence of the judiciary—an important constitutional argument—and also self-defeating for the role of London and the Royal Courts of Justice as a centre of international commercial litigation, which earns this country in excess of £500 million a year in invisible earnings. I am afraid that that argument is not respectable, and that view is not shared outside the House by those most intimately concerned with the subject.
  Several Hon. Members rose ——
  Mr. Boateng: I have given way more than enough during this speech. I do not want to be drawn any further down that path, save to say that those issues are worthy of consideration and that they will be considered in Committee, during which we will inevitably seek to amend the Bill constructively so that it is in a state which will merit and warrant the support of the whole House at Third Reading.
  This is a welcome opportunity to debate the role and structure of the judiciary—an opportunity which we shall take—but it is a missed opportunity for the Government. It is an opportunity for the House to contribute to shaping a future for the judiciary, and their role within the civil and criminal justice system, that will strengthen and reinforce public support for that institution, will cause it to represent the skills and excellences which the Bar, the solicitors' profession and academia can bring to the law, and will ensure that it is broadly representative, in race and gender, of a cross-section of our society, so that it can go into the next century strengthened and ready for the challenges that lie ahead. Opposition Members will do all that we can to ensure that that happens.
  6.33 pm
  Mr. Roger Evans: In what I shall describe as the pastoral phase of this speech, I shall begin by congratulating my hon. Friend the Minister on avoiding almost completely the dreadful invitation that we have just heard for a comprehensive review of the judiciary.
  The judiciary have been the distinguishing great feature of our country since 1688, when Mr. Justice Powell was not overawed by King James at the trial of seven bishops. There have been successive serious reforms of the judiciary since then and, until the unhappy events of latter years, they have alway been thought to be of the highest quality, with the highest degree of independence and integrity. I am sorry that anything else should have been said.
  Unhappy recent events, which have undoubtedly, and very sadly, clouded the reputation of justice—faulty police

  441
  evidence, false police evidence, wrong verdicts by juries, or the quaint and eccentric statutory shackles upon the criminal appeals process—are not properly matters of complaint to be laid before the judiciary.
  I would understand the need for a comprehensive reform of the judiciary if it had been directed to a specific cause or to something more serious, and less frivolous, than an opinion poll in the Solicitors' Journal. Frankly, that was just another example of a crude tabloid public opinion poll, of the sort that has disgraced our public life. If one asked people, "Are you satisfied with, or do you think that members of the Labour Front bench are out of touch with the country?", the odds are that a great majority would say yes. The Law Society is to be deplored for the low standards of journalism employed in conducting that poll, and in publishing it.
  Let us consider the substantive arguments of the hon. Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng). A judicial appointments commission has been seen in certain professional quarters as an attractive and plausible possibility. The difficulty with it is simply this: who does the choosing and who chooses who will make the choices? At the moment, a Minister of the Crown makes appointments and, however strange they may sometimes be thought to be, he is responsible to Parliament, and not to a quango containing self-perpetuating oligarchs from the professions.
  An example of a similar amount of plausible pressure, which led to a calamitous state of affairs in another institution of state, is the removal of parliamentary responsibility for the appointment of bishops in the Church of England by the Crown Appointments Commission, which has turned the episcopal Bench into a self-perpetuating oligarchy, which is not accountable to anyone. A judicial apppointments commission is a deplorable idea, which should be rejected on the most elementary principles of parliamentary accountability.
  The second great innovation suggested by the hon. Member for Brent, South was that a judicial career should begin at a much earlier age. My hon. Friend the Minister thought that that was the basis for some friendly across-the-party-divide co-operation, and that the hon. Member for Brent, South was assisting his argument. If he considers the matter more carefully, he will appreciate that there was more danger in what was being proposed than he perhaps understood at first blush.
  Again, it sounds plausible that one should start as a baby judge and work one's way up to a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary, but that would undermine the independence of the judiciary, because the promotion depends on the Lord Chancellor and not on anyone else. The importance of the existing system is that traditionally in this country we have believed that one gets the best judges by having the best practitioners, who have learnt how to prepare and present cases, and have experience of assessing them. One takes leading practitioners from among the most able and makes them into judges. That is what has singularly distinguished our judiciary and that in certain parts of the Commonwealth, in contrast to the system in continental countries.
  Mr. Sweeney: Does my hon. Friend not accept that his view that we need experienced and able judges should not preclude young practitioners, who happen to be experienced and able? We need more of them on the Bench.
  Mr. Evans: People should be appointed to the Bench because they are distinguished by their ability and character. I regard age discrimination as immoral. One should judge people purely on their talents and abilities and not on whether they happen to be born in one year rather than another, in so far as that can properly be avoided.
  Whereas in the House one can work one's way up from the lowest form of life to the Cabinet, with a judicial career it has never been the case that the lowest judicial appointee can proceed all the way up the ladder. I think that the immigration appeals adjudicator is the lowest judicial appointment—my hon. Friend will correct me if I am wrong, but he dared to mention it—for which the minimum qualification is three years' practical experience at the Bar or as a solicitor. I do not think that an immigration appeals adjudicator has ever proceeded up the judicial ladder, let alone to the circuit Bench, let alone to the High Court Bench, let alone to a Lord of Appealship in Ordinary. The way in which the system has always operated is that certain practitioners at certain levels go into the judiciary at certain levels simply because they have experience of doing that sort of case properly. That has been the tradition and it should be defended.
  Mr. John M. Taylor: I may not, from instant resource, be able to satisfy my hon. Friend in the matter of an adjudicator achieving such instant elevation. However, we have an existing case of a district judge, whom practitioners as old as I used to call a registrar, who has become an Appeal Court judge—and she a lady, too.
  Mr. Evans: I am well aware that there have been from time to time, and I welcome them, promotions from both the district Bench and what I, too, would call district registrars, to the circuit Bench and upwards, but that is a very different thing. I expressed to my hon. Friend earlier—admittedly slightly aggressively—the sheer outrageousness of his suggestion that immigration appeals adjudicators are part of this process; that is simply nonsense.
  The third suggestion made by the hon. Member for Brent, South regarding his comprehensive reform of the judiciary was to dredge up an idea put forward by Lord Halsbury, who might be described as belonging to a rather opposite school of legal patronage thinking. The objection, again, to fixed-term High Court judge or other judicial appointments, is that they undermine the independence of the office, because in the last year either one is wondering what will have happened to one's practice when one goes back to it or one is hoping for further preferment from the state. The whole point about judges since our glorious revolution is that they are appointed for so long as they conduct themselves properly, and seldom have they had to be removed. That is the basis of our rule of law and our constitutional liberty.
  It may well be that the civil servants, in particular, who sit not so far from my hon. Friend, find it very difficult to comphrehend the traditions of the British legal profession and of the British Bench. Those traditions have been based upon sturdy independence and a total rejection of any idea that people should be beholden to the powers that be who appoint them. Judges are appointees, not creatures of any politician or any Lord Chancellor. That is the basis of our constitutional liberty that we must defend.

  443
  I turn now to my hon. Friend and, first, to part I of the Bill. He has, I respectfully submit, a very much better case in certain regards than the one that he put to us. Yes, I entirely endorse the view that arrangements whereby circuit judges get promoted to the High Court Bench and run into difficulties over their pension scheme are anomalous. There is a need to sort this out and the Bill is welcome in so far as it tries to sort it out. What my hon. Friend is really doing, however, is following the dictates—which I, as a Conservative, welcome—of the Treasury that the Bill is intended to be fiscally neutral. It is not intended to increase public expenditure and, as a good Conservative, I find that a very attractive proposition. But this means that he has to balance the books; he has to balance the benefits and the disbenefits. If that had been stated rather more clearly, it would have been, I respectfully say to him, a more attractive argument.
  The argument that was put was, first, that somehow a 15-year accrual period for a judicial pension could no longer be tolerated because the Finance Act 1987 had given certain taxation privileges to pensions of more than 20 years' accrual period. It is all very well to say that the Lord Chancellor is a noble ornament of our constitution and should still be exempt from this new arrangement, but it rather weakens his case when one reflects that the Prime Minister, former Speakers of the House and field marshals, for example, are equally privileged in this regard in respect of pensions, and the 20-year accrual period does not apply to them. It is extraordinary members of the higher judiciary should suddenly find that they are to be treated on any different basis and why that should be used as the reason to do so. By all means balance fiscally the benefits and the debenefits in this Bill, but the argument which my hon. Friend uttered was, in my submission, wholly mistaken.
  The second point that my hon. Friend made concerned the benefits of unifying all the various judicial pension arrangements. I can see the force of that in terms of practicality and justice, provided that there is no attempt to oversell it on the basis that there is a judicial career and a pattern of judicial promotion. Judicial promotion remains, and ought to remain, very much the exception. I think that it is the general professional view that individuals who are promoted are singular examples of the failure of patronage in the first place. In other words, they are singularly distinguished and able persons, who amply and quickly demonstrate that they ought to have been preferred to a higher level in the judicial hierarchy in the first place. They are examples not of the success of the present system but of the failure of the decision-making process in the first place.
  There are a number of odd points in part I which are important in principle. I note, for example, that it appears that in 1990 widowers' pensions were first introduced for judges. I ask my hon. Friend if that is indeed the case under the present Bill as it is drafted.
  The second point on which I ask for elucidation is the situation in respect of children in further education. On the Queen's Printers' copy of the Bill, in clause 7(1)(a), an "or" has been missed out which is certainly there in section 21 of the Judicial Pensions Act 1981. The effect of this would be to stop any pension to a judicial child if he or she underwent further education beyond the age of 16. I
  444
  cannot believe that that is what the Government intended; I am sure that it is a slip-up, and I should be grateful for clarification by my hon. Friend.
  The totality of part I is welcome. It is not generous compared with arrangements in Australia or Canada, for example, and I can understand why this portion of the Bill was attacked with such vigour and enthusiasm in another place. But the fact remains that we must balance the books and make sure that the fiscal effect of this is neutral.
  However, I must say this to my hon. Friend. I did not drop my jaw with such surprise as the hon. Member for Brent, South thought. What I find extraordinarily anomalous is that in 1992 we should be discussing judicial pensions, or indeed civil service pensions, at all. I believe that the whole thing should be privatised and that individual practitioners, individual judges, should be paid enough to enable them to make individual arrangements which suit their individual circumstances.
  We have got ourselves involved and enmeshed in the genius of the British civil service at thinking up complex rules which are wholly inconsistent and produce obvious anomalies. They then have to be thought through again and reworked, and the same process goes on and on. The time has surely come for an end to it. If my hon. Friend had come to the House and said that he was proposing to increase official pay by some modest amount to allow for the fact that there would be no further judicial pensions, I for one would have welcomed that.
  It is on part II, in particular, that I must part company with my hon. Friend. I do not know what modern world he lives in when he quotes the Old Testament figure of three score years and ten and says that it is in accordance with the modern climate that one should retire at 70. The hon. Member for Brent, South was at least a little bolder and said 65.
  This has two consequences. First, unnecessarily and unhappily, my hon. Friend has talked about the discretion given to his noble Friend the Lord Chancellor and the Secretary of State for Scotland to allow people, after this upper ceiling is reached, to sit from time to time—a power which, he has assured us, is to be used only sparingly. Unhappily, it is the practice, which has been commented upon adversely by several distinguished judges, that the existing powers to use deputies have been grossly over-indulged in. I would respect that argument if it were put more brutally in terms of Treasury needs to contain public expenditure, but there is something here which has given rise, unnecessarily in my submission, to public concern and criticism.
  What sticks in my gullet about this proposed piece of legislation is the idea that at age 65 or 70 a person should be stopped from working and using his talents, in an arbitrary, discriminatory and unfair fashion. It is immoral. The moral basis on which we have founded legislation against race and sex discrimination is simply that one cannot be blamed and should not be penalised for what one is born. In like fashion, one should not be discriminated against simply by the year of one's birth. That is anomalous and unfair and wrong in principle.
  That such an idea would casually emerge, no doubt without any malice, from the British civil service is eminently probable and plausible, because the civil service is the classic example of a statist system in which everything works according to age and cut-off by particular date. That is deplorable, and the Government's policies for reducing the civil service, creating next steps

  445
  agencies and private arrangements and so on must be the future course against obsolete and increasingly odious privileges which the civil service enjoys.
  Mr. Nicholls: Perhaps my hon. Friend will also shed a tear for the civil service, given that it too suffers from the maladies he is pointing out. There is no logic in forcing a talented permanent secretary to leave his office on his 60th birthday. The idea that he was capable of doing the job the night before and that, at the witching hour of midnight, he is not, is complete nonsense. So we lose not only the talent of judges in certain cases, but of civil servants as well.
  Mr. Evans: I agree with my hon. Friend. It is wicked, irresponsible and wasteful. Why should we carry that model, which undoubtedly does no good for the civil service, into the sphere of the judiciary?
  It is easy to say that one should be compelled to cease exercising one's talents at a particular age. For my constituents who are, say, small business men or farmers, there is no simple or easy retirement age. They make their own provision and choice, depending on their ability, health and resources.
  What is being proposed is deeply deplorable, and it goes back to the tabloid opinion polls. The hon. Member for Brent, South was extremely careful—I admire and respect him for it—not actually to accuse but to say that what he was alleging was a matter of public perception. If the public are to make assessments of that degree of crudeness, then that degree of crude response is wrong, and we should say so.
  I suspect—I trust that the Minister will give a categorical assurance on this—that the whole arrangement of a fixed retirement age of 70 is some scheme to balance the judiciary's gender or racial composition so as to make it more politically acceptable and more in touch with what is supposed to be popular opinion. We are talking about judges who are 69 or 68. It is hardly surprising that they do not reflect the gender or race composition of the population a generation younger than them.
  Mr. John M. Taylor: I can provide the reassurance for which my hon. Friend just asked.
  Mr. Evans: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. Although the hon. Member for Brent, South did not actually say so, he seemed to derive some apocalyptic joy at the prospect of making judges younger, both by appointment and by their upper retirement age. Ageism as a form of immoral discrimination remains wicked, but it is worse than that. Law is not like politics. Nor is it like medicine, in the sense that where there is a scientific discipline, science moves on and one must become up to date, or, for a politician, one must become in tune with what one's electors say.
  Being a judge, particularly at the higher parts of the judiciary, is a hard matter of intellectual expertise and accumulated knowledge. That expertise and knowledge have made the judiciary in particular so much an ornament of our constitution. It would undermine standards to force able judges to retire at an earlier age.
  When I was a law student in the 1960s, Lord Denning, then the Master of the Rolls, had been appointed to the High Court Bench in the year I was born—[Interruption.] I think I heard the hon. Member for Brent, South say from a sedentary position that he was too old. That was such an ignorant, prejudiced and erroneous comment as to be most uncharitable and unfair. Every law student in the 1960s
  446
  read Lord Denning's judgments for the joy of their prose and the fact that they could be understood, unlike the judgments of certain other distinguished members of the judiciary. They could be understood very easily and appreciated for their sense and prudence. As we get older and become more conservative, I have no doubt that we sometimes think that intellectually Lord Denning cheated a little, but that is a different issue.
  The Minister should have come before us with detailed proposals to give a college of judges the power to compel members of the judiciary over a certain age to submit to a medical examination, if their condition was physically deteriorating or if their mental faculties were publicly obviously failing. In such an event, some judgment should be available to require them to retire. But to suggest that, say, a permanent secretary or a member of the high judiciary should be cut off from exercising the talents that God has given him, at an arbitrary date selected purely on grounds of political prejudice, is obviously wrong.
  Mr. Barry Porter: As my hon. Friend is speaking of God-given gifts, may I ask him to agree that God, in his wisdom, has given certain gifts to members of the solicitors' branch of the profession? Does he agree that, whatever their gender, age or race, they should be part of the new judiciary?
  Mr. Evans: Yes, I do not disagree with a word of that, though what I am saying is more fundamental. It is that from whatever part of the legal profession one may come, provided one is in good health and able to discharge one's duties to the best of one's ability, one should not arbitrarily be cut off and prevented from doing that. It cannot be right or moral to do otherwise, and I urge that the whole matter be reconsidered.
  6.56 pm
  Mr. Stephen Byers: Many members of the public watching the debate will wonder what priority the House gives to important issues of the day. We heard during the autumn statement that low-paid public sector workers would receive no more than a 1·5 per cent. increase in their pay next year. Today we are talking about the pensions—which are really just deferred pay—of judges earning in some cases more than £87,000 a year.
  The House has not yet had the opportunity of discussing the public sector pay policy that is being imposed by the Government. Nor has it had the opportunity of looking at the effects of the reduction in the availability of legal aid, which will deny justice to many citizens. Even so, tonight we are considering the pensions and retirement age of judges.
  Despite that, this is an important time to consider those issues because retirement and pensions are the framework within which the judicial structure will operate. They are the fixed points that will determine much of what goes below it, and the House must recognise—not in terms of the complacent language used by Conservative Members—that there is a crisis of confidence in our legal system today. There is prolonged delay, escalating costs and, as we know, a series of miscarriages of justices, and the judiciary has a heavy responsibility to bear in that respect.
  It is not good enough to blame the police or juries. The judges have a responsibility, and public perception generally cannot be ignored. It is arrogance in the extreme to say that the public perception of how the judges operate

  447
  can be ignored. The House has a responsibility to recognise the deep feelings that members of the public have about the way in which judges conduct themselves and their business. Judges must bear a heavy responsibility.
  Reference has already been made this evening to the occasional quirkiness of some members of the Bench. Odd comments often make for a good after-dinner speech. We have heard about the judge who does not know about Cliff Richard or a launderette. Such comments are faintly amusing, but they show how judges are often out of touch with modern living. That degree of being out of touch does not concern me as much as the way in which that being out of touch has an effect on the sentencing policy, which often occurs.
  There is a responsibility on judges to acknowledge the depth of public feeling on certain issues when they come to pass sentence. The House lays down a maximum sentence which can be imposed in many cases. There are many cases in which judges, because they are out of touch, fail to reflect the way in which the public feels about some serious crimes. Let me give a few illustrations. We all know of the many cases of men being violent towards women. We know that lenient sentences are often imposed on people who are convicted of such crimes. If the roles are reversed and the woman, who has often been subjected to many years of violent beating from a husband or partner, commits a crime, often in a moment of passion, a heavy and harsh sentence is imposed on her. Such decisions lead to a lack of confidence in the judiciary.
  The age of the judiciary is an important factor. There must be a cut-off point at which judges need to retire. They cannot sit on the Bench for ever, as the hon. Member for Monmouth (Mr. Evans) said, subject to an occasional medical check-up. There must be more to it. The Bill takes a small step towards reducing the retirement age of members of the Bench from 75 to 70 years. That small step is welcome, but I feel that it goes nowhere near far enough. I agree with the Bar Council suggestion that there should be a fixed retirement age of 65 for the Bench. That would be wholly appropriate.
  The Bill not only reduces the age of retirement from 75 to 70; it gives the Lord Chancellor a discretion to extend annually the services of members of the judiciary who are aged from 70 to 75. I do not feel that that is appropriate. There must be a clear cut-off point. We must not put ourselves in the position in which the Lord Chancellor has the power to renew annually a judge's term of office on the Bench. We have been told that that degree of power is essential to fill the gaps in the judiciary that may be caused by sickness or by a call to lead an important national inquiry.
  Retired judges will be brought back annually to fill the gaps. That is an absurd way of proceeding with an important part of public life. If Manchester United has a long injury list, the call does not go out to Bobby Charlton, Denis Law or Nobby Stiles to get their kit and turn up at Old Trafford. The same should apply to members of the judiciary. When the Prime Minister is unable to attend Question Time because of his trips around Europe, the call does not go out to Baroness Thatcher.
  Mr. John M. Taylor: Can I take it from the hon. Member's remarks about recruiting from the cadre of the promising young players rather than yesterday's men—I
  448
  followed his word picture, which was good and vivid—that he supports my earlier arguments in favour of the rationality and the sense that often lie behind part-time appointees sitting on the Bench in the higher courts? My argument is that one is training a cadre of younger people, who will be ready for promotion later, and addressing peaks and troughs in the availability of judicial officers. Does the hon. Gentleman favour that argument?
  Mr. Byers: The Minister's problem is that he does not go far enough. Many Labour Members will argue that there must be a radical reform of the way in which we treat the judiciary in the United Kingdom. Half measures simply will not be enough.
  Mr. Nicholls: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Byers: I will give way when I have finished advancing my argument. Under the present system there is a reluctance to recruit younger members to the Bench.
  Mr. Barry Porter: One hears some funny things in this place over the years. To use the images of the hon. Member for Wallsend (Mr. Byers), he might remember that, as I recall, Stanley Matthews played for Stoke City at the age of 50 and that a man called Peter Shilton both manages and keeps goal for some remote southern team at present.
  It is absolute nonsense to say that, because a man or a lady reaches a certain age, they are no longer any use. Good Lord! If that were the case, it would help the House to get rid of one or two hon. Members who I think should go. However, those hon. Members and many other people think that they can add something. The matter of age is sheer nonsense.
  The Lord Chancellor of the day can examine the age of judges who are 70, 65 or whatever and decide whether to extend their service. That appears to be correct. All this stuff about gender, age and so on is nonsense.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Morris): That was a very long intervention.
  Mr. Porter: It was meant to be.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: The hon. Gentleman might like to rephrase that.
  Mr. Porter: I apologise. I was trying to make my point.
  Mr. Byers: I had the misfortune to see Stanley Matthews play for Stoke City against Norwich when he was 50 years old. It was a sad occasion. I remember Stanley Matthews when he was much younger. He was a much better player than he was when he was 50. It was a sad sight to see. I would not want to see the same thing happen to members of the Bench.
  The scale of the use of retired judges cannot be underestimated. Let me give some illustrations. In 1990, 500 judge days in the High Court and the Court of Appeal were dealt with by retired judges aged 75 years or older. More detailed figures show that in 1991, in the Court of Appeal alone, 100 judge days were covered by judges aged 80 years or older. I do not believe that such statistics will instil confidence in the judicial system.
  Mr. Nicholls: The hon. Gentleman gives a homely metaphor about Stanley Matthews playing at the age of 50. The point is that arthritis may stop people playing football, but it does not stop them judging cases. In a civil

  449
  case of great complexity, it is possible that an 80-year-old judge will retain the expertise to understand the intellectual aspects of the case. The mere fact that he might have arthritic knees may stop him from playing football at the weekend, but it will not stop him doing a decent job. It is all about aptitude, not age.
  Mr. Byers: The Minister will certainly have an interesting time with some of his hon. Friends in Committee.
  I believe—I think that I am supported by my hon. Friends—that there must be a sensible cut-off point. Our view is that the cut-off point should be 65. The debate about where the cut-off should be will continue, although I hope that we will agree that there must be a cut-off point.
  We should not endorse the principle in the Bill that the Lord Chancellor should have the power to renew annually the services of judges aged between 70 and 75. I know that it will be argued that we need that power and should maintain the retirement age beyond 65 as there are insufficient numbers of recruits of adequate ability to come to the Bench. That says more about the current method of appointment, and a careful scrutiny of the ability of those available might be helpful.
  The chairman of the Bar Council, Lord Williams of Mostyn, has described the present system of appointing members to the Bench as "bizarre and farcical". The files may have been removed from the Kremlin, but they are still held in the Lord Chancellor's Department. Files are kept on individual barristers to determine whether they are suitable for service in the Bench. That cannot be acceptable in the 1990s, and has more to do with George Orwell's thought police of "1984". Behind the scenes consultations take place to decide whether an individual is appropriate to serve on the Bench.
  It is little wonder that such a system creates a self-perpetuating elite and potential membership of the Bench. Human nature means that people appoint those in their own image—at the Bar they are male, middle-aged and middle class. The Bill does nothing to promote women in the judiciary. In many respects, the pension arrangements will make it more difficult for women who have had a break in their career at the Bar to bring up a family to obtain the pension entitlements normally due to them.
  It is particularly disappointing that, when giving the Dimbleby lecture, the new Lord Chief Justice, Lord Taylor of Gosforth, took a complacent attitude towards the issue of appointments to the Bench. He refused to consider significant changes in the method of appointment. As my hon. Friend the Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng) said, the new Lord Chief Justice suggested that there would be an opportunity for lay involvement in the consultation process. However, that does not go nearly far enough. Such cosmetic changes—like the removal of the wig—do not address the fundamental issue that the House should be considering this evening. Such cosmetic changes are more like moving the chairs on the deck of the Titanic and do nothing to address the real problem—the lack of confidence in the judiciary and our public legal system.
  We must have a judicial appointments commission where posts are openly advertised and applicants can apply. We can learn lessons from the way in which the recent vacancy for the Director of Public Prosecutions was filled. It was advertised nationally and proper interviews were held. Applicants were invited to apply. If that process
  450
  was good enough for the Director of Public Prosecutions, why was it not good enough for appointments to the Bench?
  Mr. Hawkins: If the hon. Gentleman's proposals were carried to their logical conclusion, those considering such appointments, even were they to be advertised, would face a dilemma. He is suggesting that there could never be any confidential consultations. When making public judicial appointments, it is essential for those who know the candidates best to have some confidential consultations. For the hon. Gentleman to suggest that we should have a system of positive discrimination—which is what he is doing—will create such a dilemma.
  Mr. Byers: Many hon. Members will be aware of the way in which most appointments take place. I see nothing wrong in the normal procedure whereby confidential references are provided for applicants. There is no reason why that process, which applies to many other parts of public life, should not apply to the Bench. People involved in the world of personnel management say that the present system of appointments to the Bench is, effectively, indefensible.
  I was hoping that the comments that I have just made would be seen as constructive, not controversial. I shall now turn to the contentious part of my speech. I hope that the House will consider whether we should continue with the traditional Anglo-Saxon method of appointing judges from the pool of existing practitioners, advocates or legal advisors. We are always told that we should move closer to Europe, so perhaps we should look at the continental system, where graduates go straight into judicial training. Advocates' confrontational skills—often demonstrated in the Chamber—are not best suited to members of the Bench, who should be able to defuse emotions and listen to what is said. Often, such skills are not to be found in members of the Bar.
  Mr. Sweeney: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the best way to learn how courts work and develop the skills required to serve effectively as a member of the judiciary is through the practical experience of being an advocate, acting either for the plaintiff or the defendant—prosecuting or defending? There is no way in which simply by studying books or anything else one can develop the level of training required to preside over the British legal system.
  Mr. Byers: I understand the hon. Gentleman's argument, which is used in favour of the present method of appointing members to the Bench. However, I am not talking about a graduate studying the appropriate books and immediately taking up a place on the Bench. As I understand it, the position throughout the continent is that trainees sit with existing judges for a long period, and it is only when they have been trained effectively and properly that they sit as judges.
  Mr. Boateng: Does my hon. Friend agree that we would not necessarily have to adopt fully the continental approach in order to attract people to the judiciary from academic life? A number of recent appointments to the silk from academic life have shown only too clearly that that sector of legal life and the body of expert lawyers in this country could be a fruitful source of members of the judiciary at various levels. With appropriate judicial

  451
  training, the objections of the hon. Member for Vale of Glamorgan (Mr. Sweeney)—which I understand—could readily be overcome.
  Mr. Byers: I agree with my hon. Friend, and such a system could form part of the process of trying to broaden the way in which judges are appointed. I think that all hon. Members are genuinely concerned that judges are recruited from a narrow academic and social background, which is not helpful in promoting public confidence in the legal system—a desire shared by all hon. Members.
  The judiciary are the one remaining sector of public service that has not been reformed, at least in this century; every other sector seems to have undergone reforms of one description or another. The judicial system is based on secret appointments, and there is no monitoring of performance and no appraisal scheme for individual judges. We should welcome initiatives to correct those faults.
  The judiciary are given enormous powers. They are the guardians of our liberty; they should protect us against abuse by the state and defend the weak against the strong. In recent years a number of well-known cases have demonstrated that the judiciary have for one reason or another failed to achieve those objectives. The Bill provides an opportunity for radical reform of the judiciary. That refom is badly needed. If the House fails to seize the opportunity provided by the Bill, it will rightly stand condemned.
  7.19 pm
  Mr. Patrick Nicholls: I heard what the hon. Member for Wallsend (Mr. Byers) said. What came across clear and strong was that he spoke with great sincerity but, as someone who has practised in both the criminal and civil courts, I do not recognise the picture he paints. It is easy to say, as he did a moment ago, that the history of recent times is about the judiciary having made wrong decisons, not standing up for the rights of the weak and not protecting people against an over-mighty state, but no matter how many times one says it, it is not true.
  Any criminal practitioner can tell us what has being going on in recent years. The balance of advantage has moved so much in favour of the defendant from society, in whose name essentially we prosecute, that policemen bend the law. They should not do that. When they are caught doing it, they are rightly prosecuted and condemned, but the House has got the balance wrong.
  One of the most demeaning and unpleasant experiences is having to go down to a cell to represent an incorrigible criminal who knows his trade and knows that all he has to do is keep his mouth shut for 24 hours and he will be away scot free. When we have a system like that, the police will break the rules and there will be miscarriages of justice.
  It is a tribute to the judiciary that, very much against their basic inclinations, they have been able to see the way in which the law has been abused in certain cases, and have been prepared to step in and deal with it. One could expand on that at greater length on other occasions. The hon. Member for Wallsend believes that the present state of affairs has been caused by the fact that the judiciary are drawn from the middle classes. Of course they are. They have professional qualifications. That makes them middle class. It does not make them Conservative. They may be
  452
  barking Marxists, but they are certainly middle class. To say that there are problems because the judiciary are drawn from the middle class is not a contribution of thought but an exercise in sloganisation.
  My hon. Friend the Minister must be getting troubled because of the interjections from myself and from my hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth (Mr. Evans). I suspect he may be feeling that there is a vote around the corner, or he must be saying to himself, in the light of the contribution from my hon. Friend and the contribution that I intend to make: "How on earth can they with a clear conscience vote for the Bill?" It is inevitable in the nature of these things that one concentrates on the more controversial aspects. In many ways, this is a splendid Bill, which I will have no difficulty in supporting. Having said that, I should perhaps concentrate for a moment on some of the things which, had they been in a Bill in isolation, might have caused one to say to the Lord Commissioner, "I would like the evening off."
  I want to quote what my noble and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor said when introducing the measure, which has interesting implications:
  "It is in the interests of all of us in a free society that our judges should be men and women of the highest calibre, able and willing to carry out the heavy public duties which we expect of them. It is right, therefore, that the pension Parliament provides to our judges should be sufficiently substantial to attract, or at least not deter, those candidates best fitted to serve."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 16 June 1992; Vol. 538, c. 119.]
  He went on to set that in the context of salaries as well as pensions.
  That is an excellent principle for remunerating officers of the state in the person of judges. The Minister might feel sad because the same principle is not applied to ministerial salaries. We have got to the stage when ministerial salaries are not fixed with any relationship to what might be necessary to bring people in. We have achieved a state of affairs in which if someone is prepared to serve as a Minister, it may be because, like my hon. Friend, he is a man of vast but discreet wealth. Because the salary is so niggardly, we are fast approaching the alternative possibility that some people may get a pay rise when elevated to the position of Minister.
  That is a troubling aspect. It is a pity that my right hon. and hon. Friends on the Front Bench have not been as successful as the judiciary. Much has been said in the debate about the age at which judges should retire. There seems to have been an assumption that, at a certain point in time, one can look at a person, be he a footballer, a Minister, a permanent under-secretary or a judge, and say that on one day he is capable of performing satisfactorily and the next he is not. I do not understand that.
  Nor do I understand the references made in another place apparently in justification of an automatic cut-off date for the appointment for a judge. My noble and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor referred to three score years and ten. Like the devil, I can quote the Bible for my own purposes. I recognised the reference, but in biblical times three score years and ten was a good innings—it was over the top as an innings. These days, people of three score years and ten are capable of running the London marathon. It makes me feel ill even to contemplate them doing it. In biblical times, three score years and ten might have been a great age, but it is no great age today.
  Lord Wigoder also made an interesting contribution in another place when he said that, essentially, we should be

  453
  going along with a common retirement age for judges, because it would be in accordance with the current trend. I am fed up, sick and tired of fashion and current trends. The idea that one can justify a course of action because it is fashionable is ludicrous.
  On a more serious note, one problem with fashion and current trends is that it has obliged Her Majesty the Queen to offer something in terms of taxation which, had she been properly defended in public, would never have happened. It is dangerous to base legislation and social attitudes on what is known in our former colonies as a politically correct attitude.
  I accept that it may be politically correct to support a cut-off age for judges, but my hon. Friend the Minister, in a masterful and elegant contribution, glided around the point beautifully. To his credit, one never heard the justification for judges having to retire at a certain age.
  It may be worth while dealing for a moment with why judges have to be older before they can be recruited to the bench. One could give a competent law graduate or newly qualified solicitor or barrister a pile of papers and say, "That was the evidence. How does the law apply?" That is an ordinary, intellectual exercise that any young law student should be able to do.
  That is not where the skill is involved on the bench. A member of the judiciary needs the ability to weigh up evidence. That means knowing something about human nature. It means having spent years listening to people telling the story in the cells, hearing them give the same evidence in examination-in-chief and cross-examining them. It is all about the evaluation of evidence. Applying the law is the easy bit: that is straightforward.
  What we look for in the judiciary, be it at stipendary magistrate level or in the House of Lords, is the ability to sift, understand and weigh up. The bit at the end where the law is applied is the easiest. It is in the very nature of things that we cannot get that experience unless we have people with years behind them.
  What is the justification for saying that, even if we allow for that, there must be an age cut-off? That is an ism. It is ageism. I have been present at debates in the House when there have been howls of indignation from the Opposition about sexism and ageism. I remember the hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Banks) once accusing me of being a sizeist because some of us were urging him to stand up, and it turned out that he was standing. Isms are fashionable, but apparently ageism used to be a crime. It used not to be politically correct, but in some way it is politically correct now for judges.
  It is ridiculous to draw an analogy with sporting occasions. I have already made the point, and I will not labour it, but a person could give judgment in a complicated civil case even if he had an arthritic hip, yet he would not be much good playing for Wolves, Accrington Stanley or the local football club. It is all about aptitude.
  One of the saddest things I ever heard was when I was a Minister in the Department of Employment. I spent a lot of time going round the country, preaching to people that ageism was wrong, that it destroyed a valuable national resource—that it was inhuman and unjust. One chap came to me at a training scheme that I had launched and told me about an application that he had filled in for a job as a van driver. The age limit for the job was 35, and he had lied because his age was 37.
  At the interview, he admitted what he had done and they refused to interview him for the job. He asked why
  454
  they had an age limit and was told that he needed to be fit, and that someone as near 40 as he was could not be fit. He asked them if they knew how he had passed his time recently. He was, he told them, an internationally acclaimed fell runner. Here was a man who had the aptitude for a job and who was sufficiently fit to do it; the fact that his age told against him was completely irrelevant, and it ought to be the same with the judiciary.
  If it is felt that nevertheless one should be able to retire a judge on the ground of extreme age, then in a sense the mechanism is already in the Bill—although, on this part of the Bill, it weakens the justification for it, because it is possible for the Lord Chancellor to extend the period of service in certain circumstances if he feels that there is a particular need for a judge to perform a certain function. It would be straightforward enough—perhaps this point will emerge in Committee—to say that there should be a cut-off at the age of 70 but that the Lord Chancellor may extend that in general terms. But the presumption that, once one reaches that age, one is incapable of doing the job is not borne out by the evidence.
  We know what the problem is and where it comes from. It is very fashionable to attack judges because they are not female or black or disabled or because they are seen to come from a middle-class background. It is very easy to do that, but we should not be giving in to that sort of pressure. I must tell the hon. Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng) that I am completely underwhelmed by the fact that the Law Society has carried out a survey into people's perceptions. There is a degree to which hon. Members are supposed to lead and not merely follow. I never thought that I would hear from someone who presumably, however unrealistically, aspires to office with the great cry, "I am their leader. I must follow them."
  Yes, the public perception of members of the judiciary is that they are all ancient, creaking creatures from the upper middle class and wearing wigs, but that is because of the sustained assault made on the judiciary for a number of years in popular society, and very often it is from the Opposition Benches that we hear these comments on the judiciary. The hon. Member for Brent, South and I would have been law students at more or less the same time, in the 1960s and early 1970s. I remember the contributions of the then Member for Ebbw Vale, Michael Foot, making slashing attacks on the judiciary; he turned the whole of his considerable oratory on them. If one keeps on telling the public that, every now and again, when there is a miscarriage of justice, it must be the judge's fault because he does not come from a "right on" background, in the end they will accept it.
  How would the hon. Member for Brent, South feel if he were told at some constituency function that a tabloid newspaper had just done a study on the public's perception of the work of hon. Members? I have no doubt that such a study would ask whether people thought that Members of Parliament did not work hard and were overpaid. The people would no doubt reply in the affirmative, adding that hon. Members did not understand what it was like to live in the real world. Such a survey would be completely wrong about the way in which hon. Members on both sides of the House carry out their functions.
  Are we supposed just to accept that this is what the public think? Surely we should try to do something about informing the debate. I would have liked to hear the hon. Member, when he produced that survey, make a point of saying that such a perception of the judiciary was not

  455
  correct, that there was a great deal more to it, and that people's image of the judiciary is simply not true, but there was no element of that at all.
  Mr. Boateng: Having failed to find any party political rancour in any of the contributions from the Opposition side of the House, the hon. Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) decides, quite arbitrarily, to inject some himself, and I resent that. His tone is totally uncalled for.
  Will he respond to this? His noble and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor, who, after all, stands at the pinnacle of our common profession, has made clear time after time, and sought in a number of his appointments creditably to reflect the importance he attaches to underpinning public confidence in the judiciary, by making sure that it contains suitably qualified women and suitably qualified people drawn from ethnic minorities. He responds positively to what he rightly sees as a public perception, one that threatens to undermine the very institution that we should all be seeking to build up and support. There is absolutely nothing wrong in being concerned about how the public perceive those institutions which we should be in the business not only of protecting but of developing.
  Mr. Nicholls: The hon. Member actually makes my point for me. Obviously, people who are suitably qualified should not be barred from being elevated to the Bench because they come from an ethnic minority or because they are female. Yet the hon. Gentleman says that they should be barried barred from going to the Bench if they happen to have been born an inappropriate number of years before the cut-off date he wants. That is the point that I am making to the hon. Gentleman.
  I will say something else to him as well, and if he wants to put it down to party political rancour it is very much a question of wearing the cap if it fits: the sustained attack on the nature and composition of the judiciary has given the public a perception of the way in which our legal system works which is completely untrue. He and I, as members of the legal profession and as hon. Members, have a duty not merely to accept what the public feel but to try to inform them as well.
  I do not for one moment understand the reasoning or logic in saying that, simply because someone is born before a particular date, he is incapable of carrying out his functions.
  When one talks about the public confidence, one must bear in mind that the public are a very complex body of people—young, old, members of different classes, people of particular intelligence and of none. In this country, the population are increasingly elderly, over the state retirement age. It is profoundly unhealthy to be saying to people over the age of 65, as the hon. Gentleman would have us say, that, while they are quite capable of going to court as a defendant or as a litigant, when it comes to people in their age bracket being competent in a judicial capacity, out they must go.
  It is entirely wrong that magistrates are moved on to the reserve list at the age of 65. What we should be looking for is the best person for the job—there, I am with the hon. Member for Brent, South entirely. I do not want to see any member of society who is properly qualified to perform a judicial office being barred from doing it. Speaking personally, however, I find it disturbing that we shall now
  456
  see age as the only criterion. I hear and see no evidence for it. All I hear is this constant, carping cry from the public that they must be too old. It is time we did our job—which is to lead, not simply to follow.
  7.37 pm
  Mr. Mike O'Brien: Hearing the hon. Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls), I wondered whether I had listened to a different debate earlier. What my hon. Friend the Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng) said could in no way be regarded as a sustained attack on the judiciary. It was an attempt to address constructively public concern about the judiciary. If the hon. Member for Teignbridge will not recognise that there are those public concerns in today's society, he will not address them and he will not change things. Asserting that everything is wonderful in the judiciary is not true. It simply is the case that there are wide grounds for reform within the judiciary today.
  Let me turn to the comments of the hon. Member for Monmouth (Mr. Evans). He said that pensions for judges were not generous. Let him tell that to my constituents, especially the pensioners who have worked hard, many of them having served their country in wartime, many of them professionally qualified, for example, nurses or teachers, who are having to survive on pensions which are much lower than those being given to judges.
  Mr. Roger Evans: I did not say that the provision for judges was not generous but that it was not generous compared to the provision made for US Supreme Court judges, or for judges in Canada and Australia.
  Mr. O'Brien: I am obliged to the hon. Gentleman, but he must accept that the money offered to judges on retirement is generous when compared to the money offered to people who receive state pensions or pensions in almost any other profession.
  On retirement, each High Court judge is likely to receive from the taxpayer a full financial package that is not far off £1 million. That is not my figure but has been calculated by the international lawyers' organisation, Justice, which recently published a report on judges' payments and pensions. Part of the package is a large sum, in excess of £80,000, on retirement, and the pension received yearly after that is in excess of £40,000.
  Inquiries by Justice show that the purchase of an annuity from an insurance company to give a similar yearly pension would cost £839,000, so the value of a judge's salary plus the cost of purchasing his annuity gives him a salary package, in addition to the pension package, of more than £140,000. Given the economic hardships now facing this country, to give judges such large pension and salary packages is a very generous gift and is difficult to justify.
  The Lord Chancellor seeks to justify that high salary and pension package on the basis that those appointed are at the peak of their career and could earn larger incomes outside of the judiciary. That is arguable when it comes to High Court judges, whose average net income in 1992 was some £220,000 per annum for the three years preceding the appointment. However, according to Justice, circuit judges' average net earnings in private practice are often as little as £75,000. The package available is worth less than £1 million but not massively so. Clearly, that is a lucrative incentive for them to seek appointment. That is especially

  457
  so given the fact that advocates' earnings beyond their peak of about 55 or 60 years of age will not necessarily continue to rise.
  I note the provisions in clause 18 and the Minister's comments, but it is now time to move beyond the pension schemes being made available. As my hon. Friend the Member for Brent, South said, it is time to look at a fully contributory pension scheme possibly arranged by the judge himself and possibly privately—a privatised pension scheme, if you will.
  Those appointed as judges should be able to continue with pension schemes started, like any other professional person, in their 20s or 30s. Their appointment to the Bench should enable them to receive a salary, with an employer's contribution that is openly stated to the public, commensurate with continued payment into a pension scheme of their own. The idea that a barrister can fail to make any contributions to a scheme, then become a judge and serve 15 or 20 years, and come out of it with a package of almost £1 million is difficult to justify to any hard-working constituent who ends up with a small pension.
  Nobody at any level should be encouraged to be a judge simply to get a pension. I do not accept the Minister's argument that the pension scheme contains no incentive to become a judge. At that level, there is an incentive.
  Mr. John M. Taylor: I have been following the hon. Gentleman's remarks, which, as usual, are well thought out, although that does not mean that I agree with them all. May I clarify my earlier comments? Anyone who makes a decision about a major promotion step within his or her career will look at the pension implications. However, I sincerely believe that few decisions are made for or against a promotion on the grounds of inhibition or encouragement by the pension. The main decision on whether to accept a promotion will be made in its own right and the pension will be considered in the margin as a serious and important element, but it will not be decisive.
  Mr. O'Brien: Good judges will not come to their post by reason of seeking a pension, but I know from personal experience in practice that some lawyers believe that being a judge will provide them with a good pension. I doubt whether they will make good judges, but I have heard counsel aspire to that position and comment that the pension was very good if they reached it.
  Furthermore, a judge should not be forced to stay in post beyond his sell-by date to clock up 15 or 20 years simply to get his full pension. When the Bill was being drafted, a much more fundamental look should have been taken at how judges' pensions are dealt with. As Justice says in its report:
  "the pensions arrangements for the Judiciary predate today's sophisticated pension arrangements".
  Barristers who seek to become judges now have far more options on how to proceed.
  As Lord Wigoder said in another place, before going to the Bench many people have been in a position to make some contribution towards their own and their families' future. That should be allowed to continue on a contributory basis, not on the basis now being suggested.
  I question the claim that the Lord Chancellor made in another place that we need those pensions to attract judges. We need judges who are dedicated to the judicial process and the concept of justice, not motivated by a fat and wealthy retirement. Good judges become good judges
  458
  for better reasons than a pension, but bad judges may well become bad judges for shorter hours, status and possibly a pension.
  The Bill should put in place arrangements that allow flexibility and encourage appropriate persons to accept part-time and possibly term appointments, as my hon. Friend the Member for Brent, South suggested. Sadly, the Bill does not even attempt to do that.
  Mr. Hawkins: May I suggest that the concern is not so much as the hon. Gentleman described, but rather that some of the most able potential judges might be deterred if the pensions arrangements are not good enough? Many Conservative Members are worried not about people accepting judgeships and judicial appointments because of the pensions, but about the risk of losing the best potential judges.
  Mr. O'Brien: A full contributory pension scheme would avoid all those problems and ensure that, when a person decides whether to be a judge, the question of pensions simply does not arise because he has the option, with a salary that would allow him that option, to decide what sort of pension scheme he wants. It is not a question whether the pension scheme on offer from the state is adequate. An entirely contributory pension scheme would avoid the question of the 20-year rule and it would end any encouragement in the Bill for judges to remain until they are 70 years old. It is broadly accepted in Britain that 65 is an age beyond which retirement is appropriate. A citizen should not be judged by a person who is beyond the age commonly regarded, rightly or wrongly, as an age when the ability to work can become impaired.
  To say that a judge has special skills and knowledge in justification is to demean our constituents—engineers, teachers, civil servants and others—who do intellectual work, all of whom accept the logic of a retirement age of 65. It is arguable that at 70 a judge is more likely than a man of 60 of 65 to be out of touch with a society whose members he has to judge.
  It is also arguable that a later retiring age increases the difficulty of determining which judges are up to the exacting standards of health and mental capacity required of judges who determine serious cases involving civil liberty. At a time when we are looking at equalising retiring ages for men and women, perhaps at an age lower than 65, it cannot be right to distinguish judges as having qualities of endurance not possessed by any other group in society.
  The clause allowing the recall of judges over the age of 70 is offensive. No man should be judged by a person beyond the age at which he should have retired. Litigants are entitled to be judged by a person in whom society has confidence. Many people beyond 70 are fit and mentally agile, but not all are in that happy condition. A judge is too important a figure to allow any question of capacity to be raised.
  We need the attitudes and abilities of a younger, more in-touch judiciary. New blood prevents the judiciary from becoming stale and out of touch. If, instead of trying to encourage new blood, every time we need someone to judge a case we bring back someone who ought not to be sitting any longer, the judiciary will be much more out of touch than they are seen to be, even today.
  Attitudes of members of the public to the judiciary have been revealed in a survey. There are few other surveys of

  459
  that kind of which I am aware. It reflects what most hon. Members win find when talking to their constituents and to other members of the public—that there is in Britain today a concern about the judiciary who are perceived as being out of touch.
  Whether judges are out of touch is not the point. That it the perception and it has to be addressed. Simply asserting that the public have it wrong does not address the central question of that perception and the difficulties that have arisen. That perception has been caused by a number of past injustices that have been mentioned. The public clearly think that too many judges are too old, male, white and out of touch.
  Dr. Liam Fox: As a matter of consistency, would the hon. Gentleman advocate that the maximum age of jurors should also be reduced to 65?
  Mr. O'Brien: I see no reason why someone over 65 should sit on a jury.
  The Lord Chancellor has announced his intention to appoint more judges soon, including six new judges for the Court of Appeal, criminal division, and a number of High Court judges, because, as he said this week, we are short of judges. Yet the cost of judges is a huge drain on public funds. How can we be expected to sanction and tolerate such a large expenditure when those in receipt of public money are appointed by a system shrouded in secrecy with minimal input from the taxpayers' elected representatives? If new judges are to be appointed, the system of appointment must be changed.
  As has already been said, a judicial appointments commission has been proposed by the Law Society, the Bar and Justice in its recent report on the judiciary. They show how that can be implemented in practice. It must include lay members, people who can look beyond the legal profession and its middle-class, middle-age and middle-minded attitudes, bringing a new influence and a wider perspective from other areas of life to the appointment of people who will have such a decisive effect on many people's liberty and lives.
  That commission should set clear criteria for appointments, which should be openly advertised. It should use modern selective methods and tests and open the judiciary not only to solicitors and employed lawyers, but, as has already been said, to academic lawyers, many of whom have a valuable contribution to make. Most importantly, we need to open the judiciary to more women, members of ethnic minorities and younger people.
  The Lord Chancellor's glib observations earlier this week about the lack of women judges is challenged by the Justice report which says that women are available now for appointment, but they are not being appointed. The present system of appointment relies much too heavily on the views of serving judges. The criteria for selection are woolly and imprecise. If the private sector used such criteria to appoint managers, it would be ridiculed.
  What on earth does "having a sound temperament" mean? What does "having standing" mean in practice? It sounds good, but does it not mean to the selectors who meet in secret conclave that the candidate is of a similar style to them—a white, male advocate?
  When Lord Lane was under criticism last year, a judge was asked what made a good judge. His reply was, "He is
  460
  a jolly good chap. We were at Shrewsbury together." That sums up many of the attitudes that the public find worrying. Conservative Members may suggest that such attitudes are wrongly held by the public, but all too often judges substantiate and reinforce those attitudes by such comments.
  My experience of judges, shared by many people of my background, is that they are out of touch with the people with whom they deal. I am not suggesting that today's judges are bad judges. The quality of judges has improved under this Lord Chancellor. Better candidates have come forward and have become judges. But there is much to be done and much that is not being addressed.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Brent, South has already asked why one has to be an advocate in order to be a judge. Being a good advocate does not mean that a person has suitable judicial standards and independence.
  Mr. Streeter: Does the hon. Gentleman accept that the real skill of being an advocate is not necessarily being able to string together a fine sentence, but having clarity of thought in discerning the real issues from the peripheral issues, separating the wood from the trees—exactly the same skill that is required to be an effective judge?
  Mr. O'Brien: Exactly the same skill that is required to be an effective university law professor—to be able to put forward a clear argument and be able to say what the law and the facts of the case should lead to. Therefore, a university law professor, with proper training—no one disputes that that is necessary--could be an entirely appropriate person to become a judge. The same applies to an employed lawyer, many of whom are excluded from the judiciary.
  Many secret files contain comments by judges who are now dead and can no longer be questioned about what they said about a barrister who appeared before them many years ago. Such records should not influence decisions about persons who are to be appointed to the judiciary. That smacks of the masonic conclaves of centuries past, rather than of the functioning of a modern, democratic European state. That system also fails to produce judges in whom the public have confidence. A commission has the potential for bringing judicial appointments up to date and for making the system open and understandable. It would ensure a wider range of judges and create a more acceptable judiciary enjoying wider public support.
  There is no point in improving the judiciary's pension arrangements if access to justice is to be damaged by destroying the legal aid system. The autumn statement reduced access to justice for 10 million people. As a solicitor, I know that those affected will include women seeking injunctions in cases of domestic violence and defendants, who, as a consequence of the lack of legal aid, will be unable to prepare an effective defence.
  Mr. John M. Taylor: The hon. Gentleman claims that legal aid will be denied to a rather large number of people. Last year, only 250,000 people litigated with the assistance of legal aid. I do not know how the hon. Gentleman produces a 10 million fall-out from a quarter of a million participants. Furthermore, by the admission of Labour's spokesman in another place, Lord Williams of Mostyn, chairman of the Bar Council,

  461
  "we ought to bear in mind that the provision of legal aid and assistance at public expense is almost unique to this"—[Official Report, House of Lords, 12 November 1992, Vol. 540, c. 604.]——
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Geoffrey Lofthouse): Order. This debate has nothing to do with legal aid.
  Mr. Taylor: If I may say so in the vernacular, Mr. Deputy Speaker—he started it.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. Perhaps the hon. Member for Warwickshire, North (Mr. O'Brien) will also note my remarks.
  Mr. O'Brien: I will, Mr. Deputy Speaker. However, the Minister did not accurately report my remark. I did not make the claim that he ascribed to me but spoke of access to justice being reduced for 10 million people. I reiterate that assertion, and could defend it at great length—but in deference to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I will not do so.
  This debate could be effectively continued by the Opposition on another day, but I conclude by observing that the Bill provided an opportunity comprehensively to reform not only pensions but the judiciary. It offered a chance to create the basis of judicial stewardship into the next century, but that chance has been flunked.
  The Bill contains the whiff of a Government in trouble and unwilling to take on the real need for judicial reform—unwilling to take on the judges when they should be taken on, to bring about reform and to establish a proper judiciary for the centuries to follow. My contention and that of my right hon. and hon. Friends is that the Bill is a missed opportunity to provide the House and this country with the opportunity to create a judiciary in which the public could have confidence.
  The Bill does not go far enough in considering areas that it ought to have examined, and its provisions fail to measure up to an adequate presentation of either the pension needs of judges or of the ways of improving their overall quality.
  8.4 pm
  Sir Ivan Lawrence: In deference to the plea for ecumenicalism made by the hon. Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng) I will forebear from attacking the hon. Member for Warwickshire, North (Mr. O'Brien)—preferring to attack instead my hon. Friend the Minister. I begin by declaring my interest—although no other hon. Member has done so—as a practising barrister, a recorder, a Bencher, the chairman of the all-party barristers group, the Chairman of the Home Affairs Select Committee, which has responsibility for monitoring the Lord Chancellor's Department, and the chairman of the Conservative Back Bench home and legal committees. I apologise. Perhaps I should declare also that I have not the slightest interest in becoming a High Court judge, circuit judge, stipendiary, or anything else. If I had such a desire, probably I would not dare to speak in this debate—and certainly I would not dare to attack my hon. Friend the Minister.
  Lawyers and their complicated pension arrangements are of course of enormous interest to the House. which explains why so many hon. Members are present—although the concentration of quality rather than quantity has allowed us to have a sensible and informed debate, which I am sure will continue. So much so, the Whips actually asked me not to be as hurried with my remarks as
  462
  I am wont to be, but I will confine them to the purport of the Bill and not wander more widely over the attractive fields of legal aid.
  I agree with the hon. Member for Brent, South that this is an opportune moment to debate the judges whose judgments, speeches, eating habits and dress are daily paraded before us by the media. There has been much ill-informed criticism of judges tonight, but I understand why the public find it confusing when they see a man dressed in a wig and a crimson dress trimmed with lace and fur, and wearing silk stockings sentencing a transvestite to community service. I myself would prefer to see fewer transvestites and rather more of the judges dressed like that.
  My hon. Friend the Minister made a valiant, eloquent and loyal attempt to present the Bill as a thoroughly splendid measure that will in some way strengthen the judiciary and respect for the integrity of British justice. There was no hint in his speech of it being manifestly another socially structured measure that has the dead and deadly hand of the Treasury all over it.
  There was no hint from my hon. Friend either that nearly all judges, leading barristers, the Lord Chief Justice of England and my noble and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor's predecessor deplore the Bill's pension arrangements.
  The Bill is not all bad. It is time that pension arrangements were put on a unified basis so that the same rules apply to all judges—that is sensible. It is time that, as judges climb the ladder to higher office, their pensions have more relevance to their end income at the peak of their judicial career, than to the lower office that they have held—which is not the position with some pensions today.
  It is probably time also that judges were younger. However, we must be careful not to denude the practising Bar of all its best and most experienced middle-aged practitioners. Without them, some of the long and complicated cases that are conducted in our courts might be even greater nightmares. There is something to be said for the skill and experience of the highly practised members of the Bar who conduct cases with such professionalism.
  There is also much that is wrong with the Bill. We need more High Court judges, but how on earth does my hon. Friend the Minister expect to attract the best men and women if they are to lose not only substantial amounts of their earnings as they descend from the higher earnings of the Bar to the lower earnings of the judiciary, but the substantial amount of the money that they would have been able to leave to their families when the pressures of the job finally take their toll, had they not accepted the pensions that will be paid to them as judges when the Bill becomes law? If the retirement age is reduced from 75 to 70, which is probably a good idea, we should not extend the time served before pensions fall due from 15 to 20 years.
  Mr. John M. Taylor: I must tell my hon. and learned Friend, who is making his remarks with his usual felicity and force, that lengthening the tax privileged accrual from 15 to 20 years is an inevitable consequence of the Finance Acts of 1987 and 1989. The Lord Chancellor's Department has no option. We should need primary legislation to make judges subject to a separate tax regime from that of

  463
  the citizens over whom they exercise their wisdom. We are merely bringing judges' tax provisions into line with general law.
  Sir Ivan Lawrence: The Treasury is responsible for the financial legislation that makes the Bill necessary, yet it refuses to allow an exemption whereby judges can have a better pension than is promised in the Bill. No fair comparison can be made between those who accrue an occupational pension over 40 years, which brings them within the purview of the Income Tax Acts, and judges who have only 15 or 20 years' service in which to accrue their pensions. Neither my hon. Friend the Minister nor our noble Friend the Lord Chancellor seems fully to have grasped that distinction.
  Mr. Taylor: In his successful years in practice prior to appointment, a judge can build up substantial pension rights in private schemes, which are not derogated from when he embarks on the 20 years pensionable accrual. That remains a privilege of judges, who can add their private pension to their public pension and can buy added years when in public service. They are in a better position, even with a 20-year accrual, than their fellow citizens.
  Sir Ivan Lawrence: My hon. Friend is misleading himself. The reality of life at the Bar is different from what he supposes. I shall address that when I come to it in my orderly remarks.
  Five things will happen if this approach to the pensions of judges is allowed. First, barristers and solicitors who want to become judges in their fifties will not want to do so because they will not be able to have enough years to secure the full half-pay-on-retirement pension to which they would otherwise be entitled. Secondly, there will be more judges in their forties who may not have the experience, wisdom or gravitas necessary to command respect, which the judiciary still ought to have in our courts. Thirdly, judges may be pretty tired after 15 years sitting on the Bench, but now they will have to say to themselves, "I had better soldier on for another five years, or I will not get my full pension." From my own experience of judges who have soldiered on past the 20 years, I am not sure that that is likely to add significantly to the quality of justice.
  Fourthly, I was very interested in the confident assertion of my hon. Friend the Minister—as confident as his last assertion—that the Bill will attract more women of quality. Will it? As I understand the Government's defence to the attack on the pensions provisions of the Bill, which the Minister has just advanced again, it is that members of the Bar and the solicitors' profession will be able to augment their modest judicial pension with the pension contributions that they have been able to accrue as practitioners in the good years.
  But how many good years will there have been before the practitioner is appointed to the Bench in his or her forties? We get low earnings at the Bar in our twenties, higher earnings in our thirties, but we have to pay for our children's education at school and university, take out mortgages and look after our elderly parents. Then, just as we enter our forties and are able to save for our futures and our families' futures, my hon. Friend decides that we should be obliged, if we are so inclined, to take judicial appointment.
  464
  In practice, it does not happen. These days, there is not the wealth available in the pockets of 30-year-old solicitors and barristers that allows them to increase their pension contributions. The Bill ensures that, if they want to get a 20-year pension accrual and retire at 70, they must be a judge by the time they are 50.
  What chance has the professional woman of building up a respectable top-up capability when she has to take more time off than a man to bear, nurture and bring up children? How many more women would want to become judges if it would deliver low financial prospects for the family? My hon. Friend has it the wrong way round. The Bill will deter and therefore reduce the number of women who might otherwise go to the Bench, not increase it.
  Fifthly, at the other end of the judicial scale, there will be fewer permanent judges, and so more need to bring back in a temporary capacity those who are over 70 but not yet 75. They will be paid less, of course, which will please the Treasury. Those five reasons show why the pension provisions of the Bill will go entirely in the wrong direction.
  In his Second Reading speech in another place, my noble friend the Lord Chancellor said:
  "the pension Parliament provides to our judges should be sufficiently substantial to attract, or at least not deter, those candidates best fitted to serve."
  That was a very wise and sensible pronouncement. Let us consider what some of the leading judges and lawyers in the land had to say about the Bill.
  Sir Nicholas Fairbairn: In England.
  Sir Ivan Lawrence: I am not sure whether there are any Scotsmen, I say with deference to my hon. and learned Friend, in the list to which I am about to refer.
  Lord Hailsham, the Lord Chancellor's very eminent and distinguished predecessor, said:
  "if one is to recruit adequate judges on a sufficient scale to meet the vastly increasing demands of the courts and tribunals and is limited to a pool that was created 20 years ago, one has to be a little careful before one starts messing about with the retirement age, the employment of retired judges, and the accrual of pension."
  The former Master of the Rolls said:
  "The major vice of this Bill is the combination of a reduction in the retiring age to 70 and the increase in the full term of office to 20 years. The message must be that if you accept judicial office, you are expected to serve for 20 years. That is far too long if the judge is not promoted or given different work."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 16 June 1992; Vol. 538, cc. 119, 146–47, 149.]
  Lord Ackner, one of the great Lords of Appeal, who knows what he is talking about——
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I am sure that the hon. and learned Gentleman is aware that he is not supposed to quote from debates in another place unless he is quoting the Minister.
  Sir Ivan Lawrence: I am referring to what was said. I am not directly quoting; I am paraphrasing, or attempting to do so—perhaps not very well. Lord Ackner told us that there was
  "an element of wholly unacceptable hypocrisy"—[Official Report, House of Lords, 16 June 1992; Vol. 538, c. 157.]
  those were his words—in proposing what appeared at first to be radical and sensible legislation and then, by a species of back-door mechanism, undermining its very purpose.
  Finally, the Lord Chief Justice of England said that he was concerned that, if the 15-year period were extended to 20 years, not only would the policy of having a younger

  465
  judiciary, at which parts of the Bill are aimed and which he applauded, be undermined; there would be serious problems of recruitment, judicial staleness and injustice. He then invited the Government to reconsider that provision.
  Those are the great men who know what they are talking about. They are great men upon whom the dead hand of the Treasury does not fall, and they take issue with my hon. Friend the Minister.
  The pensions issue may be marginal, but added to the fact that judges receive lower pay than practitioners, that issue becomes crucially marginal. For many people the deciding point is the pension—that is what their Lordships are all saying, and I invite my hon. Friend to take it seriously.
  If one steps back and takes a good long look at the Bill, one realises that the combined effect of the retirement and pension proposals will achieve the opposite of what is claimed for them. Fewer of the best and most skilful practitioners will want to serve as judges. Fewer women will want to become judges. Judges will tend to be either younger when they come into the judiciary, or too old when they are called back to serve in a temporary capacity.
  If there is trouble in recruiting judges, delays in the legal system will increase. Dissatisfaction and discontent will grow among judges, and thereby public respect for the judiciary will decline. I fear that, as with so many social reforms which are Treasury led, such as the so-called reforms of legal aid and of the legal profession, and the so-called reform of the brewing industry, it will all end in tears.
  8.20 pm
  Mr. Nick Hawkins: I endorse what has just been said by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton (Sir I. Lawrence). I wish to follow up the matter that he raised at the beginning of his speech, by declaring not so much an interest as a background, as a member of the Bar Council and of the all-party barristers group chaired by my hon. and learned Friend, and as the vice-chairman for the coming year of the employed barristers organisation, the Bar Association for Commerce, Finance and Industry.
  Towards the end of his speech the hon. Member for Warwickshire, North (Mr. O'Brien) mentioned the position inter alia of the employed Bar as regards any possible appointments that might be made to the Bench in coming years, and I agree that it is important to consider the whole of the legal profession. Several hon. Members on both sides of the House have done so, and I endorse what has been said by many of them—that the most important aspect of our consideration of the Bill will be to ensure that the best candidates are available for selection for judicial appointment.
  I reject the suggestion by some Labour Members that there should be positive discrimination to ensure that a wider range of backgrounds is represented on the Bench. I argue strongly that it is essential to concentrate on one aspect alone when choosing between potential judges, and that is their ability. As someone who has shared chambers with colleagues from ethnic minorities, and with several distinguished lady members of the Bar, I am the first to recognise that there are many good judges and, I hope, potential judges among people from ethnic minority backgrounds, lady members of the Bar and solicitors, but
  466
  it is entirely wrong to suggest that such people should be appointed simply because they come from such backgrounds, rather than according to the single test of ability. I stick to that belief.
  I hope that what the hon. Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng) said in praise of the quality of the judiciary will be taken to heart by many of his hon. Friends who have not had the advantage of listening to the debate. I propose to keep a copy of the Official Report of those remarks about Her Majesty's judges. I welcomed those remarks and I shall keep them by me in order to refer to them when some of his hon. Friends indulge in what I can describe only as a knee-jerk reaction, or the reaction of Pavlovian dogs, on occasions when it suits them to criticise judges. I shall point out to them that their hon. Friend the Member for Brent, South does not agree with them.
  It is important to recognise, as the hon. Member for Brent, South does, that one of the main reasons why the British judiciary is so highly respected, and why the parties to many important commercial disputes choose this country for their cases to be tried is the record of integrity and independence so obviously shown by Her Majesty's judges. In considering the Bill, we must realise that it is crucial that nothing should be done to detract from that record.
  Many of us who have been interested in the passage of the Bill through the other place have welcomed the fact that the Government have made some concessions and brought forward several amendments there. In particular, they have made more generous provision for judges who retire early through ill health. I ask my hon. Friend the Minister to consider that question again and improve the position still further. If a judge, who may have been one of the most distinguished members of the Bar, takes a judicial appointment but, sadly, suffers ill health early in his judicial life and has to retire, he should get the full pension rather than, as has now been conceded by the Government, the lump sum and the pension being calculated on the basis of the length of actual service plus half the time remaining before he reaches the age of 65.
  Like me, my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton and others of my hon. Friends will be able to think of particular examples from the recent past. Sadly, the health of several people who gave distinguished service both as members of the Bar and, having taken judicial appointments, after serving in connection with especially important public inquiries, suffered as a result of the great public services that they had rendered in those positions. Early in their subsequent judicial appointments they found themselves unable, through no fault of their own, to carry on. I welcome the concessions made in another place, but I urge the Minister to consider that aspect again and to go further than the Government have so far gone.
  I also welcome the provision for tax-free additional voluntary contributions to be made to pensions. However, I endorse what my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton said—that it is not good enough to say, "Of course, members of the Bar will always have made provision during their early years at the Bar." As my hon. and learned Friend pointed out, many members of the junior Bar cannot do so, because of their low earnings, especially those who concentrate on legal aid work, to which many hon. Members have referred. At a time when their family obligations are heaviest, they are not in a

  467
  position to concentrate on making pension contributions, especially not with thought to a future judicial appointment.
  It is of special concern that members of the junior Bar who are concerned to do their best for their clients are frequently so busy every weekday evening preparing the next day's case, the cross-examinations and the examinations in chief that they have no time to think about their pension provision. They certainly have no time to think about the pension which may be available should they ever be lucky enough to benefit from a judicial appointment.
  Sir Ivan Lawrence: My hon. Friend's point is especially true because lawyers have to wait a long time before they are paid by the legal aid fund.
  Mr. Hawkins: I am grateful to my hon. and learned Friend for making that valuable point, which I entirely endorse.
  I agree with several of my hon. Friends that it would be wrong for a decision to be made by the Government, either on this or any other Bill, simply as a result of surveys of the public's perception of judges. I strongly believe that it is the responsibility of the Government and of all hon. Members to try to lead and to influence public opinion. Surveys of public perception are almost invariably wrong. They record prejudices, so it would be inappropriate for the Government to tailor their position as a result of surveys of public opinion, which are bound to be partial. It is crucial that the right decision, rather than the public's perception of the right decision, is made.
  I stress that the great difference between Conservative and Opposition Members is that we seek to present a judgment of what is in the country's interests. Too many Opposition Members take the view that whatever is the fashionable nostrum of the moment must influence public policy. That is wrong. I am sorry that so few Opposition Members are able to listen to the valuable points made by my hon. Friends along the same lines.
  Sir Nicholas Fairbairn: The jury opposite consists of only two hon. Members. Even in England a jury has 12 members. The remarks made by the Lord Chief Justice of England, which were broadcast to the nation, were hardly helpful to the cause he was advancing. Thank God they did not apply to Scotland.
  Mr. Hawkins: I return to the subject of the concessions made by my hon. Friend the Minister, which were welcomed in another place. I urge him to go further. The Government conceded that the benefits payable to close relatives in the event of the untimely death shortly after retirement of someone who had held a judicial appointment should be improved from one and a half times pensionable pay to five times the annual rate of pension at the time of death. I urge my hon. Friend to look again at the provisions made for judicial spouses, whether widows or widowers, and to recognise that telling points were made by many distinguished judges in another place who will not benefit from any changes that may be introduced.
  I especially urge my hon. Friend to pay heed to Lord Ackner's contribution to the debate and to the comments of Lord Donaldson in another place. I urge my hon.
  468
  Friend to consider carefully the entirely objective views, based on considerable experience, of those who no longer have a vested interest in benefiting from the changes that they advocate.
  I endorse what was said by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton about the dangers of requiring, as the Bill does, that people should have to serve a full 20 years to qualify for a full pension. Hon. Members of all parties who have practised in the criminal courts will be aware of the tendency referred to as "judgeitis". There are those who, as my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton said, soldier on when they might be wiser not to do so and who become case-hardened and out of touch.
  I strongly urge the Minister to bear in mind the fact that it would be entirely right to recognise that there is a great deal of common sense in the provision that 15 years should be the right period of accrual for a full pension. He should recognise especially that 15 years period has been the period for accrual since as long ago as 1799. There are many occasions in the House when we should recognise that our forefathers knew what they were doing and that a system that has been tried and tested for almost 200 years should not be abandoned without careful thought. It should certainly not be abandoned at the behest of the Treasury.
  The Minister argues a difficult case to sustain. He says that the judges' position was unique, but he also says that the provision for pension must be brought into line with the general pension law which applies to people who have a complete working life in another kind of job. I urge my hon. Friend to take note of the fact that the judges' position is absolutely unique because of the late stage in life at which they take judicial appointment. It is precisely because of those special considerations that my hon. Friend and his ministerial colleague the Lord Chancellor should bear in mind that unique position.
  The fact that the exception has continued ever since the pension law for other occupations was changed is a reason for continuing it and for recognising the special and unique position of the judges. Nothing that my hon. Friend does in the Bill should detract from the special and unique qualities of judicial appointment.
  I very much recognise the strength of my hon. Friend's case when he talks about the importance of preserving the discretion to recall judges past the new retirement age of 70. Opposition Members were entirely wrong to suggest that there must be a specific cut-off date. Different judges retain their mental faculties to different ages. Reference was made to especially distinguished judges who have made an enormous contribution to the development of English law well beyond their 70th birthdays. English law would have been the poorer without that contribution.
  Opposition Members should recognise that many of the decisions that they have applauded—the hon. Member for Brent, South would have regretted those decisions not being part of English law—and especially the contributions towards social legislation made by distinguished judges of the past such as Lord Reid would not have been made if the noble Lords in question had had to retire at the date that many Opposition Members suggest or at the age of 70.
  I invite the Minister to reflect on Opposition Members' comments about footballers, including Sir Stanley Matthews, the distinguished former player for Blackpool in my constituency. The suggestion that he should not have played at the age of 50 should not be a reflection on

  469
  his great contribution and the contribution of many other distinguished footballers to coaching players. It was their experience as players which enabled them to be such good coaches in various parts of the world. They especially helped young players.
  The true parallel is the opposite of the parallel drawn by Opposition Members. The important point is not that those footballers were unable to play beyond the age of 50, but that they retained their footballing experience which they were able to pass on. There is an exact parallel with members of the Bar who benefit from their experience at the Bar when they become judges. We should concentrate on that parallel and not suggest that that experience should go to waste at any particular cut-off date. A judge may be a good judge at 71 or 72, so I welcome the provision for the recall of judges.
  I recognise that the Bill has many strengths and I welcome it in many ways. I urge the Minister to consider especially some of the respects that I have mentioned in which the Bill could be further improved. The greatest flaw of the Bill is that it suggests that the accrual period should be extended from 15 to 20 years. If that provision is enacted, it will be seen to have been a grave mistake. I urge my hon. Friend to think again about that aspect.
  8.38 pm
  Mr. Gary Streeter: At the risk of being clubbed to death by my colleagues who are banisters, I welcome the Bill and, in particular, the reduction in retirement age to 70, together with the discretion for judges to remain on the Bench until a cut-off point of 75. I also welcome the long overdue reforms of the pension measures applicable to the judiciary to bring them into line with other sectors in society and to eradicate some of the anomalies between different members of the Bench. That is a much-needed rationalisation, and it is welcome.
  It is interesting that people outside the House have also welcomed the Bill. In a recent newspaper article, Gareth Williams QC, the chairman of the Bar Council, said:
  "This is a welcome step by the Lord Chancellor, and one for which the Bar has campaigned very strongly this year. I am very glad the Lord Chancellor has accepted our argument."
  I am not alone in welcoming the measure.
  I want to make three points in my contribution to this very interesting and wide-ranging debate. First, I wholeheartedly support the need for members of the Bench to have an attractive financial package, including pension rights. Secondly, as I have already said, I welcome the retirement age of 70. Thirdly, I want to express concern that the reduction in the retirement age should not be allowed to aggravate the existing iculties of access to justice through the shortage of judges. I urge the Government and my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to consider further urgent measures to speed up the judicial process by making more time available for members of the Bench, so that members of the legal profession can have access to them and members of the public are not prejudiced.
  I am disappointed that no member of the Liberal Democrat party has been present during this debate. I have no doubt that that will not prevent the Liberal Democrats from rushing off a press release tomorrow morning stating that they were largely responsible for the measure being introduced. It is worth pointing out to the
  470
  public that the measure of their concern and commitment to justice in the national is reflected in their absence from the Chamber tonight.
  It is absolutely critical that members of the Bench have an attractive remuneration package. It has already been said that, in a free society, it is in all our interests that we attract on to the Bench men and women of the highest calibre and with the finest legal minds to try the issues that come before them.
  We often take for granted in this country some of the things that are good about our society. We often take for granted the excellence of our judiciary and the fact that, while from time to time there is the occasional controversy about something that a member of the Bench may say, we rarely hear about corruption or impropriety from any member of the Bench. That is to be broadly welcomed. We would certainly miss that if it were otherwise.
  It is therefore important that a substantial financial package is available for judges. That would help to ensure that corruption and temptation do not arise and that the judges remain as fiercely independent and impartial as they are today. We can be proud of our justice system, which is envied elsewhere in the world. We should not attack it too fiercely, as some hon. Members have done this evening.
  If we are to attract the men and women of high quality on to the Bench, we must be able to compete with other sectors, notably with those who remain at the Bar—those who, like myself, indulge in the perhaps more demanding side of the legal professsion and practise as solicitors, and those who are engaged in industry. It is important to attract members from those sectors to the Bench.
  The pension scheme that the Government propose in the Bill is attractive. It has been criticised and analysed in this debate. After an accrual period of 20 years, which is common to many other sectors in society, a pension of 50 per cent. of final salary is available. That is not an ungenerous provision, but we can go further than that. In addition to the 50 per cent., there is an additional lump sum of two and a quarter times the annual rate of pension. That lump sum is not obtained by commuting part of the annual pension payment—it is in addition, and that is attractive.
  The pension is also index-linked, and is paid for the rest of the retiring judge's life. It is also non-contributory. That adds up to a very handsome package, and rightly so. As I have said, it is very important to attract the right sort of people on to the Bench. I therefore welcome the Government's proposals.
  I also welcome the fact that the 20-year accrual ruling removes an anomaly that has existed for many years between various members of the judiciary—between High Court judges and district judges, and between circuit judges and stipendiary magistrates. There was no justification for a difference in the accrual period, and I welcome the fact that the Bill addresses that issue.
  I also welcome the reduction of retirement age to 70. I want to quote from Aristotle who, as far as I know, was never a Member of Parliament, but a fine fellow none the less:
  "That judges of important causes should hold office for life is not a good thing, for the mind grows old as well as the body."
  I agree with those sentiments. We should understand that being a judge is a very demanding and onerous task. In saying that, I speak as someone who, while not a court lawyer, has been in court on several occasions sitting

  471
  behind various eminent barristers watching them do their stuff. I was extremely impressed with the way in which judges conduct themselves and carry out their business.
  Being a judge requires concentrating for hours on end. A judge must take copious notes on what is said in court. A judge must see through the arguments from various sides to get to the heart of the matter. The judge must weigh the issues, as has already been said, to make a judgment. Being a judge involves scrutinising witnesses and discerning whether what is said in court is true. It involves deciding the honesty of witnesses and seeing the wider implications of judgments. It is a demanding job, which requires great mental agility; we should not lose sight of that.
  Mr. Oliver Heald: I am concerned about the provision for extending to 20 years, because at the moment, given the demanding nature of the job, many judges reach 65 and feel that that is the proper retirement age. Under the proposal, any judge who is appointed at 50 will have to soldier on until he is 70, perhaps against that judge's better judgment, but for purely financial reasons. Is not that a fault in the provision?
  Mr. Streeter: My hon. Friend has made a very interesting and helpful point. However, I believe that it is important that we are beginning to recruit younger judges. The perception point that was raised this evening has some validity. It is not just a matter of the perception of society, it is also my perception that some of our judges stay on too long. However, we must also recruit judges at a younger age.
  I must point out that the pension is non-contributory. Although we must take account of the salaries of other members who carry on at the Bar or the salaries that are available in industry, if a judge is concerned about the final pension, that judge can make additional voluntary contributions. There are not many professions in the country in which a pension of 50 per cent. of one's end year salary is available on a non-contributory basis.
  Taking one thing with another, it is an attractive package and should not deter anyone from becoming a member of the Bench. It has been said that 70 is an arbitrary age, but any line drawn at any age is of necessity arbitrary, and there are always anomalies. There are always people who could go on for an extra year or two but are hit by a rule.
  Of course the Bill gives discretion to the Lord Chancellor up to the age of 75. It is right to reduce the age to 70, and that will be broadly welcome, but it is also right to allow the discretion to the Lord Chancellor to allow some judges to continue until they are 75. We have heard of the example of Lord Denning who went on late into his eighties and made many excellent judgments and made a great impact on the legal affairs of this country over many years.
  I had the experience of a long-running High Court case in which a judge was brought back from retirement to sit; he was there for a number of weeks. In my opinion, he did an excellent job, not just because he found for our side wholeheartedly and awarded us costs, but because he was on top of the arguments throughout the proceedings. That gives strength to the discretion of the Lord Chancellor to
  472
  bring people back, provided that they are not over 75, to take part in the judicial process when the pressure requires it.
  I have already said that it is important to deal with public perception—an issue which we avoid at our peril. The perception of judges going on too long, being out of touch and remote, is sometimes justified. It is not just an issue of age: increasingly, as the pace of modern society changes, it is necessary for most people who go through the judicial process to feel that the wise person on the judicial bench has some idea of what life is about.
  This modest step to bring down the age of retirement will be widely welcomed. It is important to recall the expression that justice must not only be done but also be seen to be done. That is about perception. There is difficulty in how some judges are perceived, and the Bill seeks to address that in an acceptable manner.
  We have to recognise that the new rules apply only to new members of the judiciary. I look to the Minister for confirmation of that. It does not include judges who are at present on the Bench.
  Mr. John M. Taylor: Anyone who is promoted after this Bill comes into place will be bound by the new rules. Anybody first appointed after the Bill will be bound by the new rules. The only persons who will have the option to stick by their historic rights are those who are promoted within the envelope of the same pension scheme, such as from the High Court to the Court of Appeal, at present covered by the same scheme. That would be seen as promotion which did not cross the boundary, and the option would not have to be taken.
  Mr. Streeter: I am glad that that point was taken, and I now come to my final and most important point.
  I hope that the Government will not believe that they have done enough to address the difficulties facing the judicial system. There is a need to review access to justice. I welcome the courts charter introduced last week setting time limits and standards for access to justice. This is timely and right, and it is urgent that the Government should respond to that difficulty. One way do so is to recruit at an earlier age and from a wider background, and it is certainly important to recruit more women judges.
  A recent newspaper article said:
  "Legal history was made yesterday when Lord Mackay announced the appointment of Ann Marian Ebsworth as a high court judge. Judge Ebsworth, aged 54 will be the first high court woman judge not to be assigned to family law cases. She will sit in the Queen's bench division dealing with accident cases, libel and claims for money owing. Her appointment brings the number of women on the high court bench to three out of 84."
  I believe that that is intolerable in 1992. Why should a woman judge be automatically assigned to the family law division? It is a condescending attitude that we have to shake ourselves out of.
  I would therefore like to see a far broader spectrum of people becoming judges, and at an earlier age. If people are fit to run the country at 47 in the excellent way our Prime Minister does, surely one is fit to be a High Court judge. If one is ready to be a member of Her Majesty's Cabinet at the age of 40, surely one is ready to be a High Court judge. It is time we revised some of our traditional attitudes and caught up with modern thinking.
  We need to recruit from a wider background and to recruit more judges, because there is often a waiting list for people to come to trial and the only stumbling block or

  473
  sticking point—the only reason for a waiting list—is the absence of a judge to try the issue. Many lawyers often find when they get to court that there are innumerable delays and witnesses and lawyers can be standing idle, including expert witnesses called at great expense, all waiting for judges to become available. That is something that we have to address urgently.
  I welcome the Bill and I am grateful to the Minister for the way he introduced it. The sooner it becomes law the better.
  Several Hon. Members rose ——
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. There are three hon. Gentlemen wishing to catch my eye. I understand that the winding-up speeches will start at about half past 9 so if they bear that in mind, it will be possible for me to call all three.
  8.56 pm
  Dr. Liam Fox: I shall indeed try to be brief, Mr. Deputy Speaker—a task made simpler by the great common sense shown by my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton (Mr. Streeter) with whose words I agree in great measure.
  I do not have a professional interest in the debate, nor do I have a great knowledge of Stanley Matthews, which some hon. Members may be grateful to hear. As a medical man and a politician talking about the legal profession, I can at least claim to unite three of the four oldest professions. Any hon. Members who can unite all four are welcome to send me a postcard or leave it in the Members' Lobby.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Sutton was right to point out that hon. Members have not emphasised—nor do the population in general appreciate—the excellent standard of our judges, and I take that matter seriously. We take their excellent qualities too much for granted. However, it is important to recognise that there is a great deal of public disquiet about our judiciary. The public perception, which is important and which the Government would be complacent to ignore, is that there is too great a gap between natural justice and the application of law. We must take into account public disquiet about the ages of our judges.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth (Mr. Evans) mentioned crude tabloid journalism, which undoubtedly strikes a chord with the general public and echoes some public disquiet. The public are worried about inconsistencies in sentencing. Why should someone in Bath get a different sentence for the same crime, under many of the same circumstances, as someone in Bristol?
  The public worry about the failure to utilise sentences that have been made available by Parliament, and they worry about elderly judges. I have never been a lawyer, but I have been in court—as a medical witness, I hasten to add, before anyone rushes to the News of the World. I know that it can be difficult to communicate in a modern vocabulary with a judge who is a touch out of date, and that cannot be good for the public's perception of justice.
  There are too few young judges. As my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton said, if one can be a Cabinet Minister in one's thirties and a hospital consultant at 40, why can there not be more younger judges? Surely that would benefit our entire legal system and not least lawyers?
  Mr. Harold Elletson: Is my hon. Friend aware that 60 is the average age of High Court judges? The oldest High Court judge is 75, and the youngest is 47, which is the same age as the Prime Minister.
  Dr. Fox: Yes, but the Prime Minister was younger than that when he became leader of the party and Prime Minister. Even if the average age has decreased, it would be desirable for it to fall further. I notice that the hon. Gentleman has no objection to the fact that the average age of Members of Parliament has fallen far below what it was in the previous Parliament.
  There will always be difficulties with fixed retirement ages. It is interesting to note that the age of retirement was first fixed, 33 years ago, at 75 for the senior judiciary and 72 for the circuit benches. Given average life expectancy then, that would equal a retirement age of more than 80 for the senior judciary now. There has been a change in the way society views justice.
  I congratulate the Government on the fact that the Bill provides a balance between judges' experience and what one might charitably call their potential cerebral vitality. My hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth said that the provision was arbitrary and ageist, but he was unable to tell us how to define judges who are—to paraphrase him—of sound mind. He said that the law, unlike science or medicine, was only a matter of accumulated knowledge. If medicine and science are not matters of accumulated knowledge, then I do not know what they are. It worries me that my hon. Friend does not think that it is necessary for judges to have that quality.
  There must be some flexibility. I welcome the provisions in the Bill, but I caution against too much flexibility in allowing judges to return to work under exceptional circumstances. My hon. Friend the Member for Sutton also mentioned that, and I wonder whether the Minister could give us some guidelines later on how many members of the judiciary might be invited to return and what percentage he would expect to do so. If too many return, it makes the provision pointless.
  I take issue with some of the arguments of the hon. Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng). He quite rightly mentioned the demands of the administration of justice, and the use of part-time and deputy judges. He also mentioned establishing a fixed retirement age of 65. I am sorry that we got on to the subject of costing that proposal, but—more importantly—he did not tell us how that would reduce the number of available judges, as we already have long waiting lists. Will the Opposition tell us how many judges would be affected if the age were fixed at 65, and who would fill those places if not the very part-time judges that he does not wish to see in courts?
  By the same token, I ask the Minister what effect the proposals in the Bill will have—although I regard them as reasonable—on the work load of the courts, and what shortfall the Government envisage during the next two or three years as a result of the present problems.
  I shall make only a couple of comments on pensions. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton that the package is not ungenerous, and may be looked on by other professions as rather generous. It seems strange that those who administer the law should find themselves in such confusion over their pension schemes.
  I regard some aspects of the present system with scepticism, such as the inequality in treatment on pensions.

  475
  A registrar can take 20 years to reach maximum pension, as can a Scottish sheriff, but a circuit judge—his English equivalent—takes only 15 years. I am very sorry not only that there are almost no Opposition Members here, but that the very vocal Scottish lobby that we often see championing the Scottish legal system seems notable again by its absence tonight.
  There is also the question of the rigidity of the current treatment. If a judge retires on his birthday, he stands to lose a full year's pension, as it depends on fully completed years. That is too rigid a system, and it needs to be addressed.
  Then there is the problem of elevation. The Bill is to be commended for simplifying the current rules, which may be a disincentive to promotion. At present, acceptance of higher office can mean that a judicial officer may not be able to retire with immediate pension at the same age as in a lower scheme.
  All these are areas of legitimate concern. I believe that in this measure the Government are addressing the public concern and the need to reassure the public about justice. They are taking on board the fact that there are changes in society and that we do not need more women judges or more black judges, necessarily; we need more good judges. That, ultimately, is the guarantee of quality in our legal system.
  9.5 pm
  Mr. Nirj Joseph Deva: I am extremely sorry not to have been here at the beginning of this debate to hear what I suspect were some very erudite and learned comments from both sides of the House. I was otherwise occupied on a Standing Committee.
  To be one of Her Majesty's judges is to hold one of the highest offices of this land. It is an office that carries with it the highest esteem, integrity and probity. Indeed, high judicial office is a coveted appointment even among learned counsel, who frequently take a substantial reduction in earnings to be appointed to such high office. In an increasingly money-conscious world, such financial sacrifices are indeed a salutary pointer to the high esteem in which judicial office is still held in this country.
  It is therefore a bounden duty, an imperative of the public interest, that those holding high judicial office should be treated fairly and equitably and have the same opportunity as those who are employed or occupied elsewhere.
  This Bill is intended to rectify a number of anomalies in the current arrangement on judicial pensions, but it is my contention that it does not go far enough. I know that a number of my hon. Friends have mentioned this, so I will not go into it in great detail.
  Our judges come from the finest ranks of the legal profession. If we are to attract the best, their pension arrangements must also be of the best that we as a nation can afford. It is an incontestable fact that those now appointed to judicial office from the ranks of counsel or learned counsel are expected to earn as judges far less than they would otherwise have earned as counsel or learned counsel. Having made one financial sacrifice by being appointed to judicial office, they are then expected to make a second in their pension arrangements under existing provisions.
  476
  This has come about because judges are appointed in mid-life, in their 40s or early 50s; thus, their pensionable period is no more than 20 years at best. While others in different professions can look forward to pensionable careers of 40 to 45 years, in the case of the judiciary the pensionable career is reduced by one half in most cases. Since pensions are calculated on the number of years in service, judges incur a double penalty, first in the reduction of their income on appointment——
  Mr. John M. Taylor: I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way because I know that he is keeping to the tightness of the time schedule, but I want him to know that, alongside the 20 years of the judicial pension, it is entirely possible for successful practitioners at the Bar to have accumulated private pension rights beforehand in that phase of their careers, which are in no sense subsumed into the judicial pension. So they end up with two pensions.
  Mr. Deva: I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention.
  The second penalty is in the pension that they receive at the end of their careers. I welcome the steps taken in the Bill to correct a number of anomalies which have been with us for a number of years. In particular, I welcome the intention of the Bill to create a single pension scheme for all members of the judiciary throughout the United Kingdom. That will end the proliferation of schemes for different judges, some based on 15 years' accrual of service and other on 20 or more years' service. Instead, all pensions will be calculated on a 20-year accrual rate.
  I listened with interest to the remarks of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton (Sir I. Lawrence). I have also noted with some concern the Bar Council's objection to the 20-year accrual period, based on the contention that such a period would reduce the prospect of gradually reducing judicial retiring ages into the 63 to 68 band, which is what the Bar Council wants. If we say that all judicial officers must serve 20 years before being entitled to a full pension, we shall be building in problems for the future. The Bar Council would prefer a 15-year accrual period, and I have some sympathy with that point of view.
  The general thrust of the Bill is to be welcomed. Its key points are that it brings the current haphazard system into line through the introduction of a single pension scheme; by ensuring that judicial pensions comply with financial legislation, it enables pensions to attract tax relief, in common with other pension schemes; and it will enable the standardisation of retirement age, currently 75 years for most judges, to 70 years. We have heard much in the debate about whether that will be a good move.
  I welcome amendments made in another place designed to make more generous provision for judges who retire early through ill health, with provision for tax-free additional voluntary contributions. They also provide for benefits to be payable to close relatives in the event of death shortly after retirement. Those benefits will be improved from 1·5 times pensionable pay to five times the annual rate of pension at the time of death.
  The Bill will help to attract some of the best legal minds to the judiciary from the ranks of the legal profession. It will make the judiciary more in tune with contemporary life by attracting younger people. It will also go a long way to redressing the balance in the nation in favour of the judiciary.
  9.11 pm
  Mr. Walter Sweeney: I must at the outset declare an interest as yet another lawyer, albeit only a humble solicitor with no aspirations or expectations towards judicial appointment.
  My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton (Sir I. Lawrence) made a strong case for more generous pension arrangements for the judiciary, with a full pension available after 15 instead of 20 years. I appreciate the Treasury difficulty in achieving that, given the existing tax relief rules.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth (Mr. Evans) went to the other extreme and argued that judges should provide their own pensions through private pension schemes. I believe that that has much to commend it. The difficulty is that most judges are expected to accept a substantial reduction in income on their appointment to the Bench, and it would be a grave deterrent to potential appointees on realising that they would not only suffer a large decrease in salary but also be deprived of a non-contributory pension.
  I welcome the amendment in another place which ensures that, if a judge is forced to retire early through ill health, the lump sum and pension to which he would be entitled will be calculated on the basis of the length of time actually served, plus half the time remaining before the recipient reaches the age of 65.
  Hon. Members have spoken of the age limit—upper and, effectively, lower. In respect of the upper limit, I recall during my law student days the tremendous admiration I had for Lord Denning. I am reluctant to support any rigid age limit, although I accept that, if there is no limit, there is a danger that judges may fall below their original level of mental prowess. They may not be so fuddy-duddy as to fail a medical examination, but their continued presence on the Bench might become an embarrassment and a disadvantage to the judicial system.
  Therefore, I reluctantly accept that it is necessary to have an age limit, notwithstanding the fact that that may sometimes work harshly and deprive us—as it certainly would have done in the case of Lord Denning—of an outstanding judge. The reduction in the age limit to 70 is appropriate, especially given the discretion provided in the Bill for the Lord Chancellor to extend that age limit to 75 in appropriate cases to fulfil the needs of the judiciary.
  The hon. Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng) said that he wanted to see more young people, women, ethnic minorities and solicitors appointed to the Bench. I echo that view, but I do not agree that it is appropriate to widen the scope of the Bill to achieve those objectives. I prefer to rely on the Lord Chancellor's Office to bear in mind the comments that have been made this evening. I am sure that the Parliamentary Secretary will relay our comments to the Lord Chancellor. It is important to have younger people, more women and people from ethnic minorities on the Bench to reflect more accurately the community at large.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth rightly, in his typically rich, robust and even rampant manner, exploded the idea of the hon. Member for Brent, South that appointments should be made to the Bench for six or eight years. To make such short-term appointments would wreck the career development of a successful member of the Bar. Anybody who moved from the Bar to the Bench for a period of six or eight years would fully realise that his
  478
  earning capacity on his ultimate return to the Bar would be severely impaired, certainly temporarily, until he proved his worth in his previous milieu.
  I support the Bill, which has a great deal to commend it.
  9.17 pm
  Mr. Boateng: With the leave of the House, it falls to me to wind up what has been an interesting debate for Labour Members.
  In the latter stages, the debate was marked by dissension among Conservative Members which surpassed anything seen since yesterday. We are becoming increasingly accustomed to such dissension. Conservative Members could not seem to make up their minds whether they thought that the Bill was good. Powerful vested interests, which were extremely hostile to the Bill, were represented in no less a person than the Chairman of the Select Committee on Home Affairs, the hon. and learned Member for Burton (Sir I. Lawrence).
  Others who wholeheartedly embrace the Bill took strong exception to the bileful speech of the hon. Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls). I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman is not in his place for the wind-up speeches. He made it sound as though it was vaguely improper to listen to what the general public—the electorate—have to say in a crucial public debate on what the role of the judiciary should be in the 1990s.
  In a useful contribution, the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton (Mr. Streeter) took strong exception to what the hon. Member for Teignbridge said. He was not alone among Conservative Members in feeling that it was important for deliberations in the House to be guided by the public perception of the judiciary.
  It has been an interesting and worthwhile debate. The House will expect me to respond to a number of issues raised, and I want to do so. Important speeches were made by a number of my hon. Friends. My hon. Friend the Member for Warwickshire, North (Mr. O'Brien) stressed the importance of our being prepared to take a look at the root and branch reform of the pension scheme for the judiciary. He suggested that it was important that there should be provision, albeit at a future date, for a fully contributory scheme. That must be right, and he made a strong case for it.
  Interestingly, that proposal was touched on by the hon. Member for Monmouth (Mr. Evans), who called for the wholesale privatisation of the judicial pension scheme. It is important that we should consider that proposal, not simply dismiss it out of hand. No less a person than a former Lord Justice of Appeal, Sir Frederick Lawton, said in The Times in July 1992:
  "Money is not the lure of the bench."
  He was right to say that.
  It is important to recognise that it is public service that calls people to the judiciary, particularly its higher reaches. To their credit, people make considerable sacrifices in their earnings in order to serve on the Bench. That is the answer to the argument of the hon. Member for the Vale of Glamorgan (Mr. Sweeney), who denounced the Conservative proposal—albeit of 92 years ago—to introduce fixed-term appointments for the High Court. He rightly said that I floated that; it is entirely proper and healthy to have a public debate on the issues.
  The strength of the proposal is that there may well be senior barristers or solicitors, whether men or women, who

  479
  are satisfied with their careers and unwilling to opt out of them completely, but who have a sufficient sense of public duty to say that they will, for a limited period, forswear the additional earnings that they would otherwise receive in order to make a public service contribution.
  In the various branches of the profession—solicitors, barristers and, I hope, if we win the day and extend access to higher judicial office to those in academic life and in commercial employment in industry—there is a tradition of public service. When we bear in mind the current crisis in the staffing of the higher judiciary, we should consider once again the option of fixed-term appointments.
  Sir Frederick Lawton, or Lord Justice Lawton, as he was, makes the point that not only is money not the lure of the Bench but, importantly, he says:
  "The Government cannot afford, however, to assume that barristers, and in the future solicitors, too, will continue to find the supreme court bench an attraction. The prospect of a pension on retirement is no longer as attractive as it was. Ever since the Finance Act 1956 allowed insurance premiums on pension policies to be set off against income tax, any barrister who has taken full advantage of that Act can now retire with a better pension than a judge receives. It will not, however, be index-linked as a judge's is."
  That is precisely the point. Bearing in mind what Sir Frederick has said, there is no reason why we should not consider actively the introduction at a later date of a wholly contributory pension scheme, provided that, at the same time, the remuneration of the judiciary is made sufficient to fund the contributions. By failing to provide the context in which that could be introduced later, the Bill may be seriously flawed. In Committee we will seek by amendment to make that a possibility.
  The judicial retirement age was touched on by my hon. Friend the Member for Wallsend (Mr. Byers) and other hon. Members. Again, the hon. Members for Monmouth and for Teignbridge were reactionary to the last. The hon. Member for Monmouth gives flesh to the concept of reaction; he is reaction incarnate, and it is not a pretty sight. I am sorry that he is not present to hear me say that, but he may read it tomorrow, if he has a mind to.
  Of course, the hon. Member for Monmouth dismissed any notion that we should take into account the age of judges or anyone else. He extended it even to the civil service. Someone ought to point out to him that civil servants at permanent secretary level are only too happy to retire at the age of 60. Within months, they proceed to much more lucrative fields. That may not be the case in the Lord Chancellor's Department where they have a much harder lot but certainly elsewhere I doubt whether there will be any sympathy for the views of the hon. Member for Monmouth.
  Some civil servants are only too happy to retire at 60 for the lucrative chewing fields of the city of London. In a way, the Lord Chancellor spared some thought for them and dismissed out of hand any notion——
  Mr. Heald: Is not one reason why civil servants are so happy to retire at 60 the fact that they have a full pension which is index-linked? If judges were in the same position, they might be just as happy to go at 60, too.
  Mr. Boateng: That is an interesting point and no doubt it will be heard in the Treasury, although I doubt very much whether it will act on it.
  480
  The hon. Member for Teignbridge accused us of ageism for suggesting that judges ought to retire at 65. To be accused of any "ism" by the hon. Member is a bit rich. I can think of a number of "isms" that he has embraced in his time, not all of them particularly attractive. In any event, ageism is what he flung at us. I am happy to say that there were many other, saner voices, even on the Government side, who recognised that it was perfectly reasonable for the Lord Chancellor to propose a retirement age of 70 and who went even further in agreeing with us and with the chairman of the Bar Council, who was quoted with approval by a number of Conservative Members in relation to another matter, that the retirement age should be reduced to 65.
  Dr. Liam Fox: What perplexes me a little, when we are in a time of increased life expectancy and rather better expectations for robust physical and mental health, is why Opposition Members insist on reducing the retiring age to as low as 65.
  Mr. Boateng: I will tell the hon. Member why by reference to the words of an eminent and distinguished American jurist whom he and, no doubt, other hon. Members will know, Oliver Wendell Holmes. He was the beneficiary of a constitution which protected his right to sit in the United States Supreme Court for as long as he wanted, and he sat there until he was 90, so he had some insight into the problems of an elderly jurist. He said:
  "elderly judges are more likely to hate at sight any analysis to which they are not accustomed, and which disturbs repose of mind, than to fall in love with novelties."
  That is a wonderful expression of what I believe to be a profound truth; it is a recognition by a great jurist of the desirability of having a retirement age which would avoid having a judiciary composed predominantly of senior citizens who, by definition, cannot so easily understand contemporary concerns or apply contemporary values.
  That, as the hon. Member for Woodspring ought to recognise, is the overwhelming case for a lower retirement age. It is the case to which we accede, the case which we put and the case which we intend to pursue. Judges should retire at the age of 65.
  There has also been an interesting sharing of views—and, again, there was a certain amount of cross-party support for this notion, although there was also some disagreement—about whether there should be such a thing as a judicial career, whether it should be possible to enter the judicial arena at a lower rung of the ladder and work one's way up. It is rather unfortunate that somebody who does that under the provisions of the Bill will, as the Minister says, lose the privileged position that he or she would otherwise have in being exempt from its provision as someone already sitting in the judiciary, because, again, that militates against promotion rather than encouraging it, and recognising it as being not exceptional, as one hon. Member suggested, but an ordinary part of the process of ensuring that we get the right people for the job.

  We support the notion of some form of judicial career. Although we believe that it is perfectly right and reasonable, we do not embrace the continental model. My hon. Friend the Member for Wallsend, who is a former distinguished law lecturer, made well the point that, with appropriate judicial training, not least on the issue of sentences, it is perfectly proper and eminently desirable that people should move up the ladder. The pension arrangements must assist and facilitate that process.
  Mr. Nigel Evans: Although I agree with the hon. Gentleman that people with ability should be able to rise up, irrespective of their age, why is he so keen to deny people between the ages of 60 and 70, who may have something to offer this country, the chance of doing so?
  Mr. Boateng: I am glad that the hon. Gentleman is here for this part of the debate, although he could not join us earlier, but I do not consider it necessary to repeat the overwhelming case—so ably put by my hon. Friends the Members for Warwickshire, North and for Wallsend, as well as several Conservative Members—for the retirement of judges at the age of 65. It is precisely to maintain that flexibility of mind and sense of being in touch with contemporary life, which tends to become less apparent as one grows older.
  The important point that my hon. Friends have made time and again in this debate, and which has again been echoed by several Conservative Members, is that it is vital that we draw on a pool of expertise and talent that runs wide and deep.
  No one is talking about diluting standards when we say that it is important that women and ethnic minorities should be facilitated in joining the ranks of the judiciary, particularly the higher judiciary. It is a matter of concern to those of us who know and love the law and practise in the courts that only three women are High Court judges. We remain totally unconvinced that there are only three women of sufficient ability to occupy that role. Although the steps that the current Lord Chancellor has taken to deal with that issue are welcome—he has done a great deal in that area—they do not give us the luxury of being able to afford any complacency in relation to the nature and breadth from which the higher judiciary are called.
  That is why, throughout this debate, we have made the plea for, and will continue to push for, a judicial appointments commission that would have the brief to ensure that quality, breadth and variety of legal experience and background are represented in the judiciary. I accept that it would sweep away some of the mystique, secrecy and lack of transparency that currently surround judicial appointments made by the Lord Chancellor, but that is one of the things that endear the proposal to us. We shall push it and the other matters that my hon. Friends have addressed this evening to the fullest extent as we give the measure a fair wind in Committee.
  9.39 pm
  Mr. John M. Taylor rose——
  Madam Speaker: I take it that the Minister has the leave of the House to speak again.
  Mr. Taylor: I thank the hon. Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng) for his contributions and, through him, his hon. Friends for theirs. I also particularly thank my hon. Friends for keeping me entertained and on my toes.
  The debate has been wide-ranging, so wide-ranging that many matters might, on a strict and mean interpretation, have been thought to be rather outwith the ambit of the Bill, but I make no complaints about that. I am grateful for the thoughtful comments that have been made by many hon. Members.
  I welcome the endorsement of the principle of judicial independence as an essential constitutional safeguard by
  482
  the hon. Member for Brent, South and his endorsement of the quality and integrity of our judiciary which I believe to be shared by all hon. Members.
  The Lord Chancellor's policy is to appoint to judicial office those best qualified regardless of sex, ethnic origin, political affiliation or religion. Without prejudice to that general principle, the Lord Chancellor has repeatedly stressed that he welcomes application from suitably qualified women and members of the ethnic minorities.
  A major factor has been a relative lack of such candidates in the relevant age groups. For example, some well qualified women have said that they do not wish to be considered for judicial appointment. The composition of the Bench at any one time must reflect the composition of the legal profession within the group of the relevant age and seniority.
  That position will change appreciably as the composition of the professions in those groups changes to reflect the larger number of women and ethnic minority practitioners now represented in the younger age groups at the Bar and among solicitors.
  I hope that the hon. Member for Brent, South will accept in good faith that I do not wish to split hairs with him. I have a marginal correction and no more. The hon. Gentleman's figures for women in the judiciary are a week or two out of date. Four women high court judges are currently in office, not three as the hon. Gentleman said. Two of those, Mrs. Justice Smith and Mrs. Justice Ebsworth, to whom reference was made by my hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton (Mr. Streeter), are assigned to the Queen's Bench Division.
  Our figures show that there is no difference between men and women in the length of time between call or admission and appointment as assistant recorders.
  The hon. Member for Wallsend (Mr. Byers) claimed that judges were out of touch. In making appointments, the Lord Chancellor must appoint those with the necessary ability and experience. It is not the function of the professional judiciary to be somehow representative of the community they serve, and it is inevitable that appointments will reflect the profession from which they are drawn.
  The Lord Chancellor has taken steps to broaden the field of selection through the changes in the formal qualifications for appointment made by the Courts and Legal Services Act 1990 and by other means such as encouraging solicitors to apply. A solicitor judge is now eligible for appointment to the High Court and there are many solicitors on the circuit Bench and serving as recorders and assistant recorders.
  In making or recommending appointments to the judiciary, the Lord Chancellor looks for evidence that a candidate has, apart from anything else, the necessary human qualities of understanding and tolerance. The proposal for a judicial appointments commission is nothing new, and my noble and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor has gone on record as opposing one. Judicial appointments are very much the Lord Chancellor's own responsibility, and he makes all appointments personally. If they are to continue to be made on merit alone, it is difficult to imagine how a commission could reach different decisions—but such a body could undermine the Lord Chancellor's personal and direct accountability to Parliament, increase bureaucracy and delay, and risk introducing external pressures for lobbying into the appointments process.

  483
  It is the striking that, despite the claims of those who want to change the system, the appointments made under the present arrangements are generally recognised as being of very high quality. I was interested to hear the hon. Member for Brent, South argue for a career judiciary. It is a fundamental tenet of the Lord Chancellor's policy for judicial appointments that candidates should serve first part-time, as assistant recorders and recorders or in other categories, before being appointed to full-time posts. There is also the opportunity for the advancement of circuit judges to the High Court Bench, and a number of such appointments have been made recently.
  The new pension scheme will facilitate those avenues of promotion by doing away with the severe pension penalties that such judges currently experience. There are of course statutory requirements for appointees, and that necessarily has a bearing on the age at which judges can be appointed for the first time.
  As to the Bill's choice of 70 as the retiring age for all members of the judiciary, in the course of this debate the full range of possible retirement dates has been suggested. The hon. Member for Brent, South chose 65, and some of my hon. Friends thought that any restriction would be likely to rob the Bench of vital talent. As I said in my opening remarks, that question is one of balancing conflicting considerations. As the hon. Gentleman acknowledged, there is no one age at which every single judge suddenly loses touch overnight.
  It is reasonable, however, to take account of the fact that, in general, we all diminish in our effectiveness as we grow older and the burdens of office appear heavier. It is ultimately a question of judgment, and my noble and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor and I believe that 70 is a reasonable age at which judges should retire. In the Dimbleby lecture to which the hon. Member for Brent, South referred, the Lord Chief Justice strongly endorsed that proposal.
  As to the power of extension, the Bill provides that service may continue after the age of 70 for periods of no more than one year at a time up to, but not beyond, the age of 75. That power may be exercised only in the public interest and is applicable only to judicial officers below the rank of High Court judge and the equivalent in Scotland—and it is expected to be used sparingly.
  Provision for the extension of service beyond the maximum retirement age otherwise applicable in relation to circuit judges, district judges and others has been enshrined in statute for many years, and has not attracted criticism as being in any way untoward or inappropriate.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Woodspring (Dr. Fox) asked about the likely use of that power of extension. As I said in my opening speech, it is expected that it will be used sparingly and applied only where it is clearly in the public interest, taking accout of all relevant considerations. It is not feasible to make a more precise estimate of the number of future occasions on which that power may be applied.
  On the question whether there are too many sittings by part-time judges, it is important to draw a distinction between deputy High Court judges who are part-timers and circuit judges who sit as judges of the High Court by virtue of section 9(1) of the Supreme Court Act 1981. The latter are not part-timers. Indeed, the Beeching
  484
  commission recognised the benefits of the flexible use of circuit judges to assist in the disposal of High Court business.
  My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton (Sir I. Lawrence) commented on the pensions provisions of the Bill, to which I now turn. He said that they disadvantaged women and that a longer accrual span will mean that they will be unable to earn maximum pension benefits due to family commitments. I direct his attention to clause 10, which provides for the purchase of added years and the making of additional voluntary contributions. This will benefit not only women in the circumstances that he described but any officer who would otherwise be unable to complete the full 20 years service required to obtain maximum benefits.
  I cannot let the question of my hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth (Mr. Evans) about the Lord Chancellor's pension go unanswered. In response to his intervention, I pointed out that the office of Lord Chancellor is unique. With the Speaker of the House of Commons and the Prime Minister, he has statutory arrangements governing his pension peculiar to himself. His pension is governed by the Lord Chancellor's Pension Act 1832. A day's service in the Lord Chancellor's office entitles him to a full pension under that Act. If he were to seek to make use of his service in other capacities as a judge to enhance that pension, he would be subject to the same rules that apply to the judiciary in general.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls) asked why the word "or" is missing from clause 7(1)(a) when it was included in the Judicial Pensions Act 1981. The answer is that the word "or" in clause 7(1)(b) covers paragraph (a). It is merely a matter of drafting style. The fact that the draftsmen included it in section 21(1) of the 1981 act but chose not to do so in the Bill has no bearing on the substance of the clause.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Teignbridge asked whether widowers' pensions, introduced by the Courts and Legal Services Act 1990, were covered by the Bill. The answer is yes. We have, however, recognised in the Bill that female judges are entitled to be granted a pension in respect of their husbands. The Bill adopts the neutral term, "surviving spouse". I refer my hon. Friend to clause 5.
  My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton, who is in his place, suggested that the tax privilege of retained benefits for judges, which the Lord Chancellor has succeeded in preserving in the Bill, is of little value because few manage to make pension provision for themselves and their families in the years before their appointment. That may be true in some cases. However, many of those appointed to the most senior judicial offices have made considerable private pension provision. Those at the more junior levels are also often able to make such arrangements.
  For example, the district judges, who no one would claim to be drawn from the highest earning levels of private practice, said in their response to the consultation paper:
  "we accept that continuing to leave retained benefits out of account confers an advantage on those joining a judicial pension scheme which may be of significant value to those who have actually made personal pension contributions before appointment to judicial office. We consider that any alteration in the current treatment of retained benefits could have a seriously adverse effect upon recruitment. We therefore welcome the proposal not to alter the existing position."
  Mr. Lawrence: District judges, almost by definition, do not come from the high-earning Bar. High-earning barristers become High Court or senior judges. We need to appoint more High Court judges rather than district judges.
  Mr. Taylor: I thought that my hon. and learned Friend was making a point about pensions. I am saying that a lower earning category have expressed themselves grateful for the protected position of the pensions that they build up privately before accepting public appointment.
  I have already mentioned the facility of added years and additional voluntary contributions, which will help those who, for whatever reason, have been unable to make private provision.
  It has been suggested by various hon. Members that the Bill is solely motivated by the Treasury's desire to save money. That is not correct. The Bill seeks to bring the judicial pension arrangements into line with modern tax law, which already applies to the rest of us. It is not expected that the introduction of the new pension scheme will greatly affect public expenditure on judicial pensions.
  I shall say a last word on the extension on the accrual span from 15 to 20 years. The matter has been: raised several times, but I spoke about it at some length 'in my opening speech and, with respect to the House, I need not go through the same arguments again. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton, who rightly pointed to the significant benefits that judges will derive from the new pension scheme. I agree wholeheartedly with his suggestion that the package will attract candidates for judicial office rather than discourage them.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth asked about the age of immigration appeal adjudicators. He will not have failed to note my written answer to the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Mr. Corbett) of 12 November which at column 862 of Hansard, gives precise details of the age of serving officers, among other things. My hon. Friend will find that that answer reveals that his assertions are misplaced, although I am sure that they were made in good faith.
  Mr. Roger Evans: What is the minimum period of professional qualification for a barrister or a solicitor to be appointed an immigration appeals adjudicator?
  Mr. Taylor: My hon. Friend will have to accept from me in good faith that I am not seized of that information in the middle of my closing speech, but I will find it out and convey it to him within 24 hours.
  Mr. Evans: I suggested to my hon. Friend that the period was three years.
  Mr. Taylor: I have said that I do not know the answer, and I am not ready simply to swallow a suggestion, either. Before I put my hon. Friend wise I shall find out for myself.
  It is often forgotten that the various tribunal and other judicial appointments are equally part of our judiciary. The Bill aims to cover the range of appointments of a judicial nature. It therefore extends both pension and retirement arrangements to officers such as the masters of the Queen's Bench and Chancery Divisions of the High Court, taxing masters and registrars in bankruptcy. Those judicial officers, along with others, make a vital contribution to the work of the High Court by relieving pressure on judge time. Likewise, the work of district
  486
  judges in the county courts is essential to the disposal of cases in those courts. Stipendiary magistrates ensure that the volume of work in the magistrates courts is processed speedily.
  There are far too many tribunals for me to mention them all individually and to give them the credit which they deserve. Much of the adjudications process for social security benefits generally falls not to judges but to tribunals. Social security tribunal appeals chairmen fulfil the important role of presiding over the appeals of those who are dissatisfied with the decisions on their claims for social security benefits. Similar tribunals operate in relation to medical and disability appeals. There is a further appeal in limited circumstances to a social security commissioner who is also appointed by the Lord Chancellor. Those tribunals, which come under the umbrella of the independent tribunals service, are shortly to receive the addition to their number of the new child support appeal tribunals.
  I have ranged as widely as I reasonably can over the matters mentioned this evening. I am sorry that I have not been able to mention by name and individually all the excellent contributors—not only Conservative Members, but Opposition Members. Rather surprisingly, the debate has turned, in an interesting and unpredictable week, into a rather valuable Thursday debate. I add my personal thanks for the quality of the contributions. We can look forward to a very interesting, if not long, Committee.
  I quote the leading article in The Independent. It says:
  "There is little doubt that in Lord Mackay and Lord Taylor, the legal system has its best leadership for at least a generation."
  So be it, Madam Speaker.
  Question put and agreed to.
  Bill accordingly red a Second time, and committed to a Standing Committee, pursuant to Standing Order No. 61 (Committal of Bills).

  Judicial Pensions and Retirement Bill [Lords]

    JUDICIAL PENSIONS AND RETIREMENT BILL [Lords] I Money]
    Queen's Recommendation having been signified—
    Resolved,
    That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Judicial Pensions and Retirement Bill [Lords], it is expedient to authorise—

    (a) the charging on, and payment out of, the Consolidated Fund of such pensions and other benefits (including additional benefits attributable to the payment of voluntary contributions under or by virtue of the Act) as may be specified in that behalf under or by virtue of the Act;

    (b) the payment of sums out of the Consolidated Fund for the purposes of any transfer under or by virtue of the Act of a person's rights in respect of pensions or other benefits charged on, and payable out of, that Fund, whether under or by virtue of the Act or any other enactment;

    (c) the charging on, or payment out of, the Consolidated Fund of any increase attributable to the provisions of the Act in the sums charged on, or payable out of, that Fund under or by virtue of any other enactment;

    (d) the payment out of money provided by Parliament of—

    (i) such pensions and other benefits provided under or by virtue of the Act (including additional benefits attributable to the payment of voluntary contributions under or by virtue of the Act) as are not charged on the Consolidated Fund:

    (ii) any sums required for the purposes of any transfer under or by virtue of the Act of a

    487
    person's rights in respect of pensions or other benefits payable under or by virtue of the Act or any other enactment, to the extent that those sums do not fall to be paid out of the Consolidated Fund;

    (iii) any sums required in connection with the operation or administration of any scheme for the provision of such additional benefits as are mentioned in paragraph (a) or subparagraph (i) above;

    (iv) any administrative expenses incurred under the Act by a Minister of the Crown or government department; and

    (v) any increase attributable to the Act in the sums payable out of money so provided under any other enactment; and

    (e) the payment of sums into the Consolidated Fund.—[Mr. Wood.]

PETITION

  Fleet Maintenance and Repair Organisation
  9.59 pm
  Mr. David Martin: I present a petition on behalf of Portsmouth city council concerning the fleet maintenance and repair organisation in Portsmouth dockyard. It is a significant local employer, which is vital to the economic well-being of many of my constituents. The petition reads:
  Wherefore your humble Petitioners pray that your Honourable House will urge Her Majesty's Government to sustain the Fleet Maintenance and Repair Organisation at an operationally cost-effective level and review the need for job losses, phase any unavoidable job losses, support the bid for the area to become an Assisted Area and recognise the need for a programme of economic adjustment to support the changeover from defence to other industries in a planned way, co-ordinate counselling and redeployment measures and assist in the rapid release of unused Ministry of Defence land to make this available for redevelopment.
  And your petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray &c.
  To lie upon the Table.

  Rolls-Royce, Leavesden
  10 pm
  Mr. Richard Page: I present a petition on behalf of the workers of Rolls-Royce at Leavesden. In essence, it asks the House whether it considers that those workers, who are responsible and technically skilled, and who have provided support for the Ministry of Defence in servicing helicopter engines year after year, should be allowed to quote for that business. It asks the House not to allow the work to be handed to a French company on a plate without competition. It is the subject of an Adjournment debate which I shall have the privilege to present tomorrow afternoon. The petition reads:
  Wherefore the Petitioners pray that your Honourable House urge the Prime Minister and the Ministers of Defence, Trade and Industry in the light of forthcoming committed industrial participation to retain the job skills and workforce to support the Aerospace industry within the United Kingdom.
  To lie upon the Table.

  Urban Programme Funding
  Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Wood.]
  10.2 pm
  Mr. Clive Betts: I wish the House to consider the urban programme and its termination by the Government for reasons that are so far unexplained to the House. The urban programme began in its present form with the Inner Urban Areas Act 1978. That was preceded by a White Paper which is the only in-depth review of the needs of inner urban areas for the past 20 years.
  Under this Government in the 1980s, there was a shift in emphasis from social and revenue-based programmes to economic and capital schemes. There was stricter monitoring of the schemes and programmes introduced in the 1980s. Detailed guidelines were introduced in 1985, and further management controls were introduced in 1990.
  I take Sheffield, my city, as an example of what has been achieved under the urban programme, although I know that my remarks will be applicable to many other urban programme authorities. Sheffield happens to be the largest recipient this year, with £5·894 million under the urban programme. The programme is an important source of Government funding, especially in view of the reductions that local authorities have suffered.
  The Government, when reviewing urban programme spending in Sheffield, found high-quality schemes which were precisely targeted, well developed formal assessment and appraisal arrangements, clearly defined and precisely stated objectives and an outturn performance that was delivered significantly well against allocations. That is not the normal picture of Sheffield city council which the Government like to paint.
  In particular, I want to deal with the schemes that address and assist the problems of the unemployed and which come within the economic category of the programme. There has been a switch of emphasis during the 1980s, and I want to deal with the issue on the Government's terms. However, the social, housing and environmental aspects of the scheme are also important. The purpose of the Inner Urban Areas Act 1978 and the White Paper that preceded it was to highlight the issue of multiple deprivation in our inner cities and to produce new initiatives to tackle that problem.
  The problems of unemployment have worsened since the urban programme began. While the programme has done much to assist the fight against unemployment, because of the wider economic difficulties we can see the horror of unemployment becoming worse in our urban areas.
  The essential question must be: if the programme was designed to remove deprivation in inner cities; if unemployment is a key part of that deprivation—no one would challenge that—if, despite some successes, because of the wider issues, the problem of unemployment has grown worse, why should the urban programme be abandoned at this stage? If anything, the case is more obvious for an expansion of the urban programme to deal with those growing problems.
  In the 1970s in Sheffield, unemployment varied between 10,000 and 15,000. By 1986, it had risen to more than
  490
  45,000. It had increased threefold. There was a slight recovery in 1990, but in the past two years it has risen by 44 per cent.
  In Darnall in my constituency, one third of the people are out of work. Job losses have been greatest among the less skilled, the ethnic minorities and manual workers. They are the very groups that comprise large parts of the population in inner urban areas. In Sheffield in 1992, it is interesting to note that the unemployment levels in the most prosperous parts of the city have almost returned to the levels of the 1970s.
  However, unemployment in the inner city is three times as high as it was in the 1970s. In other words, relative deprivation has grown. There must therefore be a need for more targeted resources. The logical view is that we need more schemes like the urban programme, not fewer.
  No doubt the Government will respond by saying that other schemes have been introduced. Sheffield has no city challenge, despite an obvious need and despite, in our view,'the quality of the bid. The Minister will probably say that the rejection letters become more pleasant each year, but that still does not give us the money.
  We have an urban development corporation; we did not necessarily want it in the form given, but we accepted it. We asked for certain assurances, one of which was that there would not be a reduction in the urban programme to reflect the increased money through the urban development corporation. That assurance was given by the then Minister of State. To take a wider view of the problems of inner-city Sheffield, the people who live in the area have a life expectancy six to eight years less than those who live in the outer parts of the city.
  I want now to consider some of the schemes that we have undertaken. Some £2 million from the urban development programme in addition to funding from the European regional development fund was devoted to a technology park. Some £4 million was spent on improving the appalling environment after the collapse of the steel industry in the lower Don valley to make it attractive for inward investment.
  In addition, £1·5 million was devoted to the cultural industries quarter, which helped to create 300 to 400 jobs. There is on-going funding in relation to the black economic development fund and improvement grants to firms in improvement areas. There are business support schemes and a wide variety of schemes concentrating on the economy, regeneration, training and development. Partnership between the private and voluntary sectors is very much a feature of Sheffield life.
  In Tinsley, schemes involving housing action money and transport supplementary grants have been used with urban programme funding to improve the environment of an area which had been neglected. That area has been improved and assisted by urban programme funding.
  I will not quote from the city council or its officers to prove the scheme's success. However, particular credit should be paid to Phil Nuttall, the urban programme co-ordinator in Sheffield. Much of the success is due to him. Instead, I will quote from the audit review:
  "The Council's allocation for 1990–91 was £6 million. About 55 per cent. of the programme is for economic development. Officers from the DoE's regional office in Leeds were very positive about the Council's approach. Their opinions were that the Council's programmes are of excellent quality, are submitted promptly and are monitored well by the Council. Also, the Council has more projects planned than

  491
  resources are available from the DoE. Hence, more resources can be taken easily by the Council at short notice, which DoE officers thought to be very good practice."
  Looking forward to next year, officers and councillors were planning as usual. In February 1992 came 44 pages of DoE guidance for the 1993–94 programme. In June 1992, a letter came inviting bids, with seven further pages of guidance. There were 51 pages of guidance in all for a programme which was to become non-existent.
  Following this, the council produced an action statement for 1993–94, which was submitted to the Department of Environment in August and approved formally by that Department in September. The only information that the council had was that funding was likely to be 7 per cent. lower because of top-slicing of city challenge.
  The implication was clear that the schemes would continue next year, including new schemes which had been submitted. In October, the submission was made with the scheduling of projects with regional officers of the DoE.
  More important than all the work of the councillors and the council officers is the fact that the people of Sheffield in the urban areas have been actively involved in consultation about the projects and have had their hopes and expectations raised.
  Then came the autumn statement, with the Government's emphasis on unemployment. Apparently it was no longer to be the price worth paying to ensure lower inflation. Capital investment was top of the agenda for spending. Some of us might have questioned whether that was just talk, or whether the Government were about positive action.
  Some of us even welcomed some of the initiatives on private investment alongside public investment but also recognised that, in inner urban areas, it is much more difficult, because of their nature, to attract private sector funding unless public sector pump priming is there as well, but to us the urban programme criteria seemed to fit exactly with Government objectives: targeted spending on Government priorities; Government monitoring of performance; partnership with the private and voluntary sectors, Government and local authorities; increasingly economy-related, dealing with training and jobs; assistance to the poorest areas; new initiatives and innovations; successful projects approved by the Government's own monitoring; and infrastructure development. They were all key issues.
  Shortly after the autumn statement, however, a letter arrived on the doorsteps of leaders of local authorities. It began by saying:
  "we have been able to maintain the Urban Programme at £176 million for 1993/4".
  In itself, that was a misleading statement, as maintaining it would have meant £250 million, not £176 million.
  "This will allow some £20 million for new projects which we have decided will form the urban element of Capital Partnership."
  That is a minuscule and inadequate response to the real needs of urban areas.
  "These arrangements will therefore supersede the Urban programme guidance issued in February, although we will continue to meet UP commitments arising from approvals in. this and previous financial years."
  492
  The urban programme has been terminated by the back door without reference to this House in mealy-mouthed words. They did not even have the honesty to admit what they meant.
  To say it was an unexpected letter would be an understatement: it was received with amazement and incredulity. In my view, it was contrary to the autumn statement. It is a disaster for the poorest communities—a hidden cut which the Government was trying to sneak through the back door in an effort to keep within the public spending total, while allowing high-profile projects like the Jubilee line to proceed. This means that the poorest of my constituents are being asked to pay for a train ride to docklands which they do not want to take. The Government make no attempt at explanation.
  To say that existing projects will be honoured is not true. Capital schemes which are committed to spend beyond March 1995, councillors and council officers have been told, will not be supported or funded after that date. Even commitments which have already been entered into will not be funded after March next year, even though commitments. I look to the Minister for a response on those important points. There has been no explanation for this fundamental change of policy.
  In the meantime, the problems of our inner-city areas remain. Local authorities will be left to pick up the pieces. The same local authorities which have just been rigidly capped by the Government, and which will have to make cuts in their expenditure because of that capping regime, will have to curtail expenditure in areas that need it most. Councils cannot possibly redirect the main thrust of their mainstream programmes when they are under attack because of Government actions. It is impossible for councils and councillors to cope with the situation, and those same councillors are continually denigrated by Ministers for failing to cope with the impossible task that the Government have set them.
  The other day, someone asked me the difference between being an Opposition Member in Westminster and the leader of a city council in the current climate. I replied that it was essentially the difference between throwing the hand grenades and having to catch them. Many councillors feel that way, given the present situation.
  The need still exists, and people in inner-city areas should be our main interest and our main commitment in terms of assistance. There is still bad housing, a poor environment, poverty, unemployment and the multiple deprivation which the Inner Urban Areas Act 1978 was meant to help remove.
  The urban programme has had some successes. It has not solved all the problems of inner-city areas, but it has improved on a desperate situation for many people. Are the Government serious about tackling unemployment? If they are, they have to be serious about tackling it where it is greatest—or is it still a price worth paying for those who live in our inner cities?
  The urban programme will not remove the tragedy, waste and hopelessness of unemployment in the inner urban areas, but its removal will only make unemployment that much worse. I hope that the Government will accept their mistake in abolishing the programme, will accept that they have got it wrong, and—for the sake of £80 million in the next financial year—will restore it immediately and commit themselves to a major review of the needs of such areas. That review would prove the need for a significant expansion of schemes like the urban programme.

  493
  Yesterday evening, Sheffield city council unanimously, with all-party support, expressed its concern over the termination of the urban programme. It considered the action unacceptable and called on the Secretary of State to review the situation and to meet a delegation from the city. I hope that he will meet that delegation, to give it the good news that the programme is to continue.
  10.16 pm
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Robin Squire): The hon. Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe (Mr. Betts) has raised a subject which I know is of concern and interest to many. I want to get to the issues of policy eventually, but I must respond to his account of the way in which we introduced changes to the urban programme and introduced the urban partnership fund.
  My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment announced the new capital partnership initiative on Friday 13 November—there is no significance in that date—and on the same day I wrote to all 57 urban programme authority leaders, to tell them about the implications of my right hon. Friend's announcement for the programme and our proposals for the urban partnership fund. That letter was copied to each and every local Member of Parliament. We followed that up with further guidance from Department of the Environment regional directors on 20 November, and my officials met about 50 local authority representatives including someone from Sheffield council, at the Association of Metropolitan Authorities headquarters on 26 November.
  I hope that, on reflection, the hon. Gentleman will agree that that was a rather public way of "sliding an announcement out through the back door", to quote his earlier comments. I am also very aware of the work which local authorities and their partners have put into working up their urban programmes. The timing of the autumn statement and the decisions on relaxing the rules on useable capital receipts inevitably meant that work on urban programmes for 1993–94 was well advanced before we announced changes. I repeat that we took the first opportunity to let local authorities know the position.
  Outside this Chamber, I was criticised by the hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr. Straw), the Opposition spokesman on local government matters, because the letters were not signed by me. I was in a provincial town at the time and was anxious for the information to go to all the councils affected as quickly as possible.
  I would also like to scotch the rumour that all urban programme expenditure is ceasing as of now. I know that some voluntary organisations have been uncertain about this and I am grateful to the hon. Member for giving me the opportunity to clarify the position. I must make it quite clear that we have made provision to meet in 1993–94 and 1994–95 urban programme commitments which have already been entered into in 1992–93 or earlier.
  With regard to the point which the hon. Member made about years after 1995–96, there is certainly provision to meet revenue commitments for that year. Individual projects commitments should be discussed with regional offices. I know that there has already been some discussion between council officers and my regional office officials on this point, and I would expect that to continue.
  Where projects have already been given a three-year approval, or four-year approval in the case of some
  494
  voluntary sector projects, provision has been made for these commitments to be met. There is no question of our having cut off funding to existing approved projects. Indeed, some projects, because of the nature of their approvals, will continue to receive funding into 1995–96.
  The hon. Gentleman naturally concentrated his remarks on the urban programme. The UP was for a long time the mainstay of urban policy. Originally conceived as a social programme in 1968, it has been steadily adapted and developed over the years. It assumed roughly its current shape after the 1977 inner cities White Paper. It has therefore had a very long run, and over its life tens of thousands of projects have been supported in urban areas. I fully recognise the contribution which the programme has made to urban regeneration over the years.
  It would be unrealistic, however, to think that the urban programme is the sole answer to urban problems. Since 1979, we have developed a range of instruments alongside the UP to improve the competitiveness of our cities and the lives of local people. Urban development corporations, including the very active one in Sheffield, have attracted some £12 billion in private sector investment and created or attracted over 69,000 jobs. City grant and direct land grant have also levered in substantial private investment, and their approaches will be incorporated and carried forward in the Urban Regeneration Agency. On the housing side, initiatives such as estate action have made a tremendous impact on inner city and peripheral areas of problem housing.
  I therefore think that the hon. Gentleman took a rather selective view of the resources which we are putting into urban areas. He did not mention, for instance, that we have secured an extra £93 million for the urban block as a whole for 1993–94 over the previously published plan. Taken together, total urban programme and city challenge resources will increase from £319 million in 1992–93 to £408 million in 1993–94. I would have thought this maintained commitment to urban areas in a tough economic climate would receive at least a flicker of acknowledgement from the hon. Gentleman.
  On top of this, local authorities will have extra spending power in 1993–94 as a result of the changes in the capital receipts rules that I have mentioned. If authorities continue to realise capital receipts at the same level as they are forecasting for 1992–93, we estimate that the 57 urban authorities will have extra spending power of around £500 million as a result of the change in the capital receipts rule.
  It is, of course, for each authority to decide how and when to use this extra spending power, but the urban partnership fund will help make these receipts go even further and directly support urban regeneration. The urban partnership fund will use uncommitted urban programme resources of up to £20 million. As the hon. Gentleman said, details of how the fund will operate have been placed in the Library of the House.
  There is one change to our earlier advice to local authorities which I should mention to the House. In response to representations from the AMA, we have extended the deadline for bids to be submitted from 31 December 1992 to 15 January 1993. This will give authorities more time to prepare bids and to weigh up the use to which they intend to put their capital receipts.
  The point of the urban partnership fund is to work alongside and complement other initiatives in urban areas. Anyone who is involved in the inner cities knows that each city has a different spectrum of problems and

  495
  characteristics which call for a range of measures to tackle them. Hon. Members will be familiar with the combination of problems which come together in many urban areas such as the decline of traditional industries, unemployment, which the hon. Gentleman rightly highlighted, low skill base and educational achievement, crime, poor housing. That is why the drive to regenerate our cities calls for an effort across Government Departments and agencies and closely involving the private sector and local communities.
  The hon. Gentleman mentioned city challenge. I was closely involved in looking at city challenge bids. What struck me above all else was the diversity of the problems that faced the different areas, matched by an equal diversity in the solutions and initiatives which were developed to address them. There is some force in the argument that we could do more to simplify and streamline urban policy, but the fact remains that we need a flexible and responsive set of instruments to tackle urban needs.
  Even more important than getting the instruments and structure right is engaging the commitment and enthusiasm of local people and local businesses. Here, we have learnt from the urban programme and other initiatives. Partnership was built into city challenge from the word go, not grafted on as an afterthought. Ted Cantle, chief executive of Nottingham, wrote in the Local Government Chronicle of 4 September this year:
  "No other regeneration project has, in my experience, ever created the same spirit of partnership and concentrated determination."
  Ted Cantle also said:
  "attempts by local authorities to involve others in the process of change and to actually devolve power can strengthen, rather than weaken, local government."
  That was a key message. Public money goes a great deal further if it is backed by local effort. Even old urban hands have told me that they have been astonished by the enthusiasm which has been unleashed by city challenge. In many ways, city challenge draws out and applies best practice from the urban programme.
  Of the 57 urban programme authorities, 32 currently benefit from city challenge, and as the hon. Gentleman pointed out, his city is not yet among them. We are fully committed to the approach embodied by city challenge of a locally devised and applied strategy, partnership with the private sector and the local community and effective management.
  Even in areas which have not yet been successful with their city challenge bids, the whole process of bidding and putting together partnerships has yielded some valuable results. In Plymouth, for example, the local partnership responsible for the bid will, as "Plymouth 2000", seek to take forward major investment proposals. Burnley is exploring with my Department and other partners how major development projects contained in its bid can be supported. Through the city action teams and the Department's regional offices, we will do all we can to support and encourage such initiatives.
  We shall be looking closely at the performance of the first two rounds of city challenge in deciding if and when to have a third round. The early results are encouraging.
  496
  We shall also be looking at the outcome of the 1991 census in deciding the shape of urban policy for the next few years.
  The hon. Gentleman drew attention particularly to the problems of unemployment and deprivation in Sheffield. I assure him that the review that I have in mind for early next year will be a thorough review of urban needs, drawing on the results of the 1991 census. It will cover multiple deprivation and will inform policy decisions for 1993–94 onwards. Among other things, it will cover unemployment, housing and dereliction. The results of the 1991 census should be available in January or February 1993. Only then shall we have a clear picture of how urban needs have shifted since 1981.
  There are some measures we can take which do not depend on the census results. We need to simplify further the administration of support for urban areas. That is why, for areas of derelict and vacant land, the Urban Regeneration Agency will, at a stroke, bring together three existing instruments: derelict land grant, city grant and English Estates. We have already simplified procedures for city challenge and are looking at the potential for further rationalisation. The aim must be to make our programmes accessible to local people and local businesses while maintaining a proper regard for value for money.
  The hon. Gentleman invited me to receive a deputation from Sheffield. I assure him, and other hon. Members, that my door is always open to authorities which want to discuss constructive ways to promote urban regeneration.
  As the hon. Gentleman may know, I paid an early visit to Sheffield after the city challenge announcement, specifically to meet the partners behind the unsuccessful bid. I remain available to discuss with other authorities how we take forward the many exciting initiatives that are now available.
  Mr. Betts: I have listened to the Minister with great interest. I understand that he is undertaking a review and examining many new initiatives. However, I have not yet heard an explanation why, while the review is taking place, the urban programme, with its proven success, has been effectively terminated and replaced by new schemes. Why was the urban programme not continued until the review had been completed and we had examined other schemes to see whether they were more suitable to achieve the success that we wanted?
  Mr. Squire: The hon. Gentleman will be aware of the background to the autumn statement, in which my right hon. Friend the Chancellor said that, against tight controls on public expenditure, we would emphasise capital projects. As I made clear, the total urban block has been not merely preserved, but marginally increased. Within that block, we have emphasised capital projects, which is why the urban programme has been reduced.
  I did not come here to be controversial. I hesitate even to mention the subject, but I find it a bit rich that the Government are blamed for the revenue problems that Sheffield city council faces at present. Any problems that the council faces—I have considerable sympathy with it—did not arise primarily from any Government actions. They arose from past leadership of the council and decisions taken by it. I have much sympathy with the people of Sheffield, who must now pay the price. It is not

  497
  fair or reasonable, but untrue, to suggest that the problems resulted from Government decisions. It is important to put that on record.
  Question put and agreed to.
  Adjourned accordingly at twenty-nine minutes to Eleven o'clock.