HC Deb 14 June 1995 vol 261 cc788-9
11. Mr. Jenkin

To ask the President of the Board of Trade who in his Department is responsible for the Government's fundamental review of public expenditure; and if he will make a statement. [26813]

Mr. Heseltine

I am. All aspects of the Department's expenditure are reviewed annually.

Mr. Jenkin

I am grateful to hear that my right hon. Friend is in charge of the fundamental review of public expenditure in his Department. That is not the case in some Departments, which have left officials in charge of this important task. Does he agree that the recovery in the economy and the export boom that we are enjoying are the results of our firm control of public expenditure? That is in contrast to the Labour party, whose every word shows that it would increase public expenditure and taxation and put the recovery at risk.

Mr. Heseltine

My hon. Friend is right. I am amazed that he did not add the social chapter and the minimum wage to the catalogue of disasters that a Labour Government would herald for this country.

Dr. John Cunningham

On the matter of public expenditure, what are the President's relations these days with the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, who is responsible for scrutinising public expenditure? Yesterday, the President effectively announced two inquiries—neither of them independent, I regret to say. The first is to be carried out by Customs and Excise. He encouraged the Select Committee on Trade and Industry to embark on the other, by saying that his Department would co-operate in any such inquiry. As those inquiries will implicate his right hon. Friend in the shambles and fiasco over BMARC, how can the President maintain a sensible working relationship with him?

Mr. Heseltine

I deeply regret that the right hon. Gentleman made that intervention. If he looks carefully at the words that he has used, he will find that he has no grounds on which to base what he has just said. My relationship with my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary to the Treasury is as good and as excellent now as it has always been.

Mr. Congdon

Given that the most successful economies are low-tax economies, will my right hon. Friend do everything that he can to reduce public expenditure?

Mr. Heseltine

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that question. Maintenance of the continued improvement in the economic fortunes of our country is certainly high on the Government's list of priorities, and that requires tight control of public expenditure.