Commons Sitting of 21 June 1995

Preamble
The House met at Ten o'clock
PRAYERS
[MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER in the Chair]

Population Programmes
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Wells.]
10.4 am
Mr. Richard Ottaway: In this debate, I want to make two fundamental points. First, I acknowledge that coercive practices take place in international population programmes and I join all those who condemn those practices. No family planning programme will ever be successful unless it is run on a voluntary basis with full respect for human and reproductive rights.
Secondly, at the heart of international population programmes are two organisations: the UNFPA, which is not the United Nations Family Planning Association, but the United Nations Population Fund—why it is called the UNFPA, I have no idea—and the International Planned Parenthood Federation. While those organisations give aid to population programmes in countries where coercion takes place, they do not assist or condone coercion and we should not withdraw their funding.
I fundamentally believe that the root cause of many of the world's problems is excessive population growth. I was born at the end of the second world war and my life has coincided with Europe's post-war experience. Many things have happened and there have been many shifting patterns of history and mankind, yet as we reach the end of the 20th century, the global issue which stands out more than anything else is world population growth. Since I was born, the world's population has doubled. By 2000, it will reach 6 billion. The impact of that is huge, with environmental consequences, resource shortage and immigration tensions. Population growth affects the globe's economic prosperity and its quality of life.
Against that background, the international conference on population development, organised by the UNFPA, was set. It took place in Cairo in September. A year earlier, the G7 summit in Tokyo had recognised the increasing importance of world population growth and called on the Cairo conference to put forward a solution. At Cairo, politicians from such diverse cultures as President Mubarak of Egypt, Gro Brundtland of Norway, Benazir Bhutto of Pakistan and Al Gore, the Vice-President of America, all rose to argue that whatever one's backgrounds and beliefs, the situation could no longer be ignored.
The breakthrough at that conference was that almost every country in the world—including China—was present and almost every country in the world agreed. As a result, it produced a programme of action, with recommendations to
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the international community. The recommendations are a set of important population and development objectives for universal reproductive health rights in the next two decades in a framework of poverty reduction, women's empowerment, economic growth and changing lifestyles—obviously without the threat of coercion.
The conference received a great deal of publicity, mainly due to the Vatican's attempts to resist the inevitable. People may not have been sure of precisely what had happened in that conference and the conclusions that it had reached, but at least they knew that it had happened. The Cairo conference was not just about abortion—I regretted the singling out of that controversial issue—but much more. Its main objective was to place the individual at the centre of the population debate and to acknowledge that reproductive rights are recognised by Governments as international human rights.
That acknowledgement of the role of the individual must be set firmly in the context of the stark reality that population growth is at an all-time high: a rate of about 90 million people annually or 10,000 an hour. At that rate of growth, it will take only 11 years to add the next 1 billion individuals to our world.
It is inevitable that with such huge numbers involved. the globe's population programmes will be extensive. It is equally inevitable that when sensitive issues such as sterilisation and abortion are involved there will be abuses. Those abuses must be condemned.
As is well documented, many coercive practices take place in China. I do not seek to defend China's population programmes, but the demographic challenge for that country is undeniable. It has 21 per cent. of the world's population—1.2 billion people—but only 7 to 10 per cent. of the land suitable for cultivation. With growth at 1.5 per cent., 160 million more people will be added to its population within a decade.
In response to that challenge, the Chinese Government began the vigorous promotion of family planning in 1971. In 1979 it announced the controversial "one child" campaign, introducing rewards and penalties to induce couples to limit their families to one child. Not surprisingly that campaign was unpopular, especially in rural areas. In the early 1980s intensive family planning campaigns aimed at meeting strict demographic targets led to at least some instances of forced abortions and other abuses, although there is no consensus on how widespread those were.
By 1984 the programme had reached another turning point. Since by then party officials, perhaps recognising that the one child goal was unpopular and unrealistic, have gradually increased exceptions to it. Outside China the one child policy is widely perceived to be universally and strictly implemented, whereas in fact official regulations relative to family size vary substantially within that country. It may be more correct to say that nationally, China has something like a 1.6 child policy. However, official policy notwithstanding, on average Chinese couples have had 2.5 children, compared with the 2.1 child average required to achieve an eventual stable population.
All over the world our experience shows us that family planning programmes should be voluntary if they are to succeed. Countries that have succeeded in stabilising and lowering the rate of growth of their populations have done so almost exclusively by voluntary methods. I always hold out our own family planning programme as a model—free contraception, available on demand at a source of the client's choice.

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It follows that if a country engages on a one-child programme it is bound to cause tensions and concerns. However, that should not be grounds for picking up our bat and ball and walking away in protest at practices that we find unacceptable. Our attitude should be to try to persuade, influence and assist wherever possible.
Mrs. Ann Winterton: Can my hon. Friend give the House any evidence that in the 10 or more years that those organisations have been involved—in China and the third world, for example—they have been able to persuade or cajole, or in any way to change the policies of Governments on coercive sterilisation and abortion?
Mr. Ottaway: If my hon. Friend will allow me, that is the point that I intend to deal with next. I shall describe what the organisations have done and explain why the abuses are not grounds for picking up our bat and ball and walking away. Those organisations have influenced and assisted. Indeed, one of them has done much to stop coercive practices.
Family planning programmes in different parts of the world are run in two ways—first, through the country's own family planning association and, secondly, through non-governmental organisations that run their own population programmes. External funding for the FPAs and NGOs comes from third-party governmental bilateral and multilateral aid. It also comes from the UNFPA and the IPPF. The UNFPA is unequivocally committed to the principles of voluntarisrn in its programme of assistance throughout the world. It categorically condemns the use of coercion in any form or manner in any population programme.
The right to plan and regulate family size is widely accepted as a basic human right. The executive director of the UNFPA, Dr. Nafis Sadik, who has shown outstanding leadership on the issue, said in her speech at the preparatory committee for the Cairo conference:
"The principle of free choice is essential to the success of such programmes. Coercion whether physical or moral, has no part to play. Coercion is a breach of human rights; it is also unsuccessful from a practical point of view".
The UNFPA is supported entirely by voluntary contributions, not by the United Nations' regular budget. It directly manages a quarter of the world's population assistance to developing countries, and in 1994 provided support to 150 countries, including China.
Many countries believe that by providing assistance to China the UNFPA is uniquely positioned positively to influence China's population policies and to promote human rights. It has dialogue with China's officials at every level, and its projects require observance of human rights. It insists on approaches to service delivery grounded in informed consent, free choice and quality care, and its programme introduces China's officials to international standards through international training in foreign institutions.
Over the past 15 years the UNFPA has supported the development of 23 contraceptive production facilities, and China is now totally self-sufficient in the production of modern contraceptives and can offer a wide variety. The fund has also provided counselling that focuses on individual choice and informed consent and—this is particularly relevant to the question asked by my hon.
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Friend the Member for Congleton (Mrs. Winterton)—it has helped to establish population science curricula in 22 Chinese universities.
Working with the World Health Organisation and with UNICEF, the UNFPA has supported massive training of physicians and health care workers in 300 poor rural Chinese counties to increase their skills in the provision of quality maternal, child health and family planning care. It has also initiated projects in 11 provinces in China to promote women's status in a culture in which women are traditionally held in much lower esteem than men. Its role in China and its commitment to that country has been effective and influential.
The IPPF is a different type of organisation altogether. After the Red Cross it is the largest international voluntary organisation in the world. It has 112 member associations and 136 individual country associations. It gives technical and financial assistance to the work of national family planning associations in more than 160 countries throughout the world. Like the UNFPA, the IPPF entirely rejects coercive practices. I am proud to say that its headquarters are here in London.
The important feature of the IPPF is that it works through its member country family planning associations and has no direct involvement itself. It has many aims and objectives. In simple terms its goal is to meet the unmet demand for quality family planning services and to promote sexual and reproductive health through its strategic plan, Vision 2000.
The IPPF's involvement in China is carried on through the China Family Planning Association—the CFPA—which was founded in the 1980s as a nationwide NGO. The federation's assistance to the CFPA takes the form of technical and financial support—that amounted to about $1 million last year—the bulk of which is used for audio-visual equipment, education materials and administrative support.
The CFPA became a full member of the IPPF in 1986, confirming agreement to the IPPF's standards and responsibilities of membership, which explicitly state that family planning services must be voluntary and non-coercive. It was founded to promote the cause of voluntary family planning using information and education throughout China, and it has never been involved in any way in the distribution of contraceptives or other clinical services.
It is important to remember that China's family planning programme is run not by the CFPA but by the state. In 1991, at the request of the Chinese Government, the CFPA, whose only source of funding was the IPPF, started to observe the state of family planning programmes to identify and report on reproductive rights abuses. That supervision role is new for the association, and represents an important step in the recognition of the safeguarding role of an NGO, affording a crucial point of leverage for modifying over-zealous efforts that cause allegations of abuse. That role continues.
Personally, I would like the Chinese Government to allow couples greater choice over the number and timing of births, while continuing to advocate small families. I believe that China could start to achieve its demographic targets by promoting the two child family, with special emphasis on delaying the first birth and spacing the second.
However, the role of the UNFPA and the IPPF is genuine and sincere. Both organisations are firmly opposed to coercion and are committed to implementing

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non-coercive practices. The IPPF's main role in China is the funding of programmes preventing abuses, and I hope that I have demonstrated that its funding is closely monitored and is not used in the manner set out in early-day motion 1251.
Withdrawing funding to those organisations would be counter-productive. In the 1970s, the withdrawal of US aid to Pakistan as a protest at human rights abuses achieved nothing, and it was left to the rest of the world to pick up the pieces of Pakistan's family planning programme. We have seen the good work of the UNFPA and the great successes it has achieved, but withdrawing funding from the IPPF would be the most ridiculous. There are numerous examples where the IPPF's monitoring of abuses of state programmes have achieved success and lowered tensions. By education, it has shown that it is in the population's interests to have a small family.
What would we gain by withdrawing aid? We would lose our influence. Our view should be to offer constructive help. It is easy to be critical and condemnatory, but it is less easy to offer a positive way ahead which would take account both of a nation's cultural heritage and of the economic and social restraints. Horror stories, such as the documentary on television the other day, "The Dying Rooms", grip the headlines, but practical help is difficult to offer and is less likely to attract attention. Yes, there are abuses, but we should seek to minimise them and influence the perpetrators. We should make every effort to impose the standards for which we have become an example to the rest of the world.
10.21 am
Mr. Tony Worthington: I congratulate the hon. Member for Croydon, South (Mr. Ottaway) on his speech and on raising the topic today. It is extremely valuable that we should have an opportunity to discuss the role of the family planning programmes of the United Nations Population Fund and the International Planned Parenthood Federation, and the role of the British Government in assisting people to control their fertility.
There are oddities about the debate. No one in the House would be in favour of coercion, but, as I shall demonstrate, there are different forms of coercion. There is the coercion that we all deplore which was revealed in the television programme to which the hon. Gentleman has just referred. But there is also the coercion caused by ignorance. There are people who would deny access to modern family planning methods to millions of the poorest people in the world.
I hope that some of the Members who catch your eye during the debate, Mr. Deputy Speaker, will make it clear whether they are in favour of giving voluntary choice about methods of family planning to every woman, man and couple in the world. Or will they continue to deny human rights to people by denying them access to the facilities which we treasure in this country? That is an absolutely fundamental question.
Mr. David Alton: The hon. Gentleman said that no people in the House advocate coercion, and he must therefore assume that no people in the House oppose the voluntary principle. The hon. Gentleman must tell the House whether he supports funding programmes which have cost the British taxpayer £100 million in the past 10 years and which have allowed
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forced abortion, forced sterilisation and the forcible fitting of inter-uterine contraceptive devices to women. Those are abuses of human rights.
Mr. Worthington: I am glad that the hon. Gentleman has risen so early in my speech, as it gives us a chance to have a genuine debate. Where there is no question of coercion, does he advocate organisations such as the Overseas Development Administration, the IPPF and the UNFPA providing the means for poor people in ail parts of the world to use the pill, condoms, spermicides and the other contraceptive methods used at present in this country? Is the hon. Gentleman in favour of that voluntary principle?
Mr. Alton: These are not legislative matters, but relate to a personal code of morality. The issue is whether we should continue to fund forced abortion and sterilisation and the forcible fitting of IUCDs.
Mr. Worthington: Rarely have I heard such evasiveness. It is a simple question. Where there is no question of enforcement or coercion, is the hon. Gentleman in favour of public resources being used for such schemes? He must acknowledge that it can only be done with public resources, and that the projects cannot succeed on a wish and a prayer. Resources are needed to fund pills, condoms, spermicides and vasectomies. Is the hon. Gentleman in favour of the world's public resources being used to aid such voluntary programmes?
Mr. Alton: The hon. Gentleman knows that I am in favour of the alleviation of poverty, but not the subjection of populations. If the hon. Gentleman studied the history of Ireland, he would see how those arguments were used by British economists and politicians during the 19th century to achieve precisely the objective he is outlining today. The issue is not about voluntary decisions made by individuals, but coercion. That is the issue that he and the House must address today.
Mr. Worthington: I have struck gold there. The hon. Gentleman has not found himself able to say that resources should be made available, despite the fact that the projects cannot be operated effectively without financial resources.
In this country, in Italy and in other countries of the west, people who have been given the resources and choices have voluntarily chosen to restrict the size of their families. To do that, they had to have access to modern methods of family planning. An old saying about natural methods of family planning is "Show me natural methods of family planning, and I'll show you a parent."
It is a fundamental human right that the women of the world in particular should have access to the methods of family planning which have done more than anything else to transform the lives of women in Britain and in Europe. It is fundamental that that same technology and choice is available to people in other parts of the world. But because of their poverty, it cannot be made available to them without the intervention of the aid programmes of the western world, such as the UNFPA and the IPPF. Until the hon. Gentleman stands up and says that he is in favour—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. It is not appropriate to pillory an hon. Member when we are dealing with overseas programmes this morning.
Mr. Worthington: I accept your judgment, Mr. Deputy Speaker, but it will be interesting to see whether the hon. Gentleman and other hon. Members are willing to accept the voluntary principle. All I ask of them is to accept that choice should be provided, and that one cannot have a choice when one is ignorant. There can be no choice when there are no resources.
When abuses in human rights are occurring in China and in many other countries, it is absurd that one should deny resources to the organisations which are most likely to be able to bring a cessation of those abuses.
It is quite clear from my contacts with the UNFPA and the IPPF that their work is founded on voluntarism, choice and women's empowerment. To argue that they should stop working in China, where their programmes are a seed-corn, in order to introduce voluntary methods of family planning in that country is simply absurd. One would simply be shooting oneself in the foot.
I am sure that the debate will make it clear that those who argue for change in China are not arguing about coercion there or elsewhere. China is a bad example of what can happen, but it is just one country. Those who pick on it do so in an attempt to remove voluntary choice from other parts of the world. They are seizing upon the weaknesses in the Chinese programme to put forward a hidden agenda, as we shall see, to deny Chinese people the choice of access to the very contraceptive means that are available to us.
As the hon. Member for Croydon, South said, population control is an issue of fundamental importance to the world, because 95 per cent. of population growth is occurring in the poorest countries. It is estimated that their populations will double in 25 years. It would concentrate our minds if the population of Britain was expected to double from about 55 million to 110 million by the early years of the next century.
What gives ground for hope is that, in country after country, men, women and politicians want access to resources to enable them to control their own fertility. The request for contraception is demand-driven. They understand that the empowerment, enfranchisement and liberation of women is possible only if they can have control of their own bodies. When they are given that choice, they use it. What is sick about China is that, in the long run, there is no need for coercion. If the Chinese women were given proper choice, as must happen, they would seek to control their own fertility. In that movement, based on education and health, they would turn their backs on the repulsive aspect of their own culture which does not treasure women. Female infanticide was common long before mountain methods of family planning were followed by the Chinese. We must deplore that appalling practice.
We must aid organisations such as the IPPF and the UNFPA to introduce the voluntary principle to China. I am sure that all hon. Members would agree that that is the number one target. Once that principle is established, every child born will be equally valued whether it is male or female.
10.32 am
Mrs. Ann Winterton: When I first took my seat in the House way back. in 1983 I accepted, like many other people, almost without question the doomsday propaganda of the population control lobby. I thought of
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the IPPF and the UNFPA—to assist my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, South (Mr. Ottaway), that stands for the United Nations Fund for Population Activities—as good, altruistic organisations, interested in the betterment of the poorer peoples of the world.
I then came across papers written by a leading black American social worker, Erma Clardy Craven, who was chairman of the Minneapolis Commission of Human Rights. She reported the grim story of the Kaw indians of Oklahoma, whose tribe would be virtually extinct by the end of the century because virtually every woman full-blood had been sterilised by groups affiliated to the IPPF and, more indirectly, the UNFPA. She also produced figures to show that three times as many black, Indian and Puerto Rican women than white women were being sterilised in the United States. Far from family planning or voluntary population control, that practice was, to use a term more widely understood these days, "ethnic cleansing".
Any reference to those disconcerting activities was glibly dismissed by apologists for the UNFPA and the IPPF. They justified the statistics by observing that there was a greater statistical representation of such ethnic groups among the poorer sections of society—as though social status was any more justifiable than ethnic origin as a basis for sterilisation.
It was then, too, that I heard about the ruthless manner in which the one-child policy was being implemented in China. Although reports of that policy had been made for some considerable time, it was first given widespread publicity through the work of an American, Dr. Stephen Mosher, a China scholar. In 1979, he was one of the first western scholars to be allowed to visit the People's Republic of China. He was the only one allowed to conduct a village study, when he lived for more than a year in a country area, where he got to know the people and their way of life.
During his stay, Dr. Masher witnessed at first hand how women who were five months, six months, or even eight and nine months pregnant were rounded up if they refused to have abortions. They had their pregnancies terminated forcibly, in the most bloody conditions. Sometimes they were compulsorily sterilised as well. He was appalled by what he saw and determined that, on his return to the United States, he would expose what was happening. He found that he was subject to considerable pressure from the population control lobby to stay silent. He refused and succeeded in gaining coverage in the Washington Post and Time for what he had seen. He finally published a book exposing the brutality of the population control regime.
Although that happened in the 1980s, it is important for the House to be aware that the IPPF and the UNFPA went into China together in 1979 and were involved on the ground through their programmes throughout the time in question. There can be no doubt that both organisations were fully aware of what was happening, not least because, in 1983, the UNFPA made the head of the Chinese Family Planning Association joint winner of its population award.
I support the right of couples to plan or space their children in accordance with their wishes and beliefs. I have no ethical objection to the practice of contraception, but such voluntary activities bear no resemblance to what is happening in China, as the film, "The Dying Rooms", broadcast last week on Channel 4, has unequivocally shown. That documentary, produced by Brian Woods and

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Kate Blewett, records how they travelled throughout China amassing first-hand evidence of the brutal results of the state population control programme, which restricts families to one child. It confirmed that that programme includes compulsory abortion and sterilisation. The cultural bias has resulted in girl babies and those who are disabled being abandoned in orphanages. It highlighted the plight of children in state asylums, with their arms and legs tied to seatless chairs with potties underneath, who were left to die from absolute neglect. That is a grim indictment, as horrifying in its content as any atrocity ever captured on film. It left me in no doubt that the IPPF and the UNFPA, and indeed our Government—in the first two cases through their involvement and in the latter by turning a blind eye—must bear the responsibility for the impact of those draconian policies upon the women of China and their dead and abandoned children.
Mr. Ottaway: Does my hon. Friend have any evidence that funds from the IPPF or the UNFPA have been directly used for coercive practices, as she alleges?
Mrs. Winterton: The very fact that both organisations are involved in family planning in China props up the regime of the Chinese Government; my hon. Friend must be naive if he believes otherwise. The coercive programme will be changed only if the British Government stand up to the Chinese Government, for the simple reason that the Chinese bow only to strength. Unless we show strength, they will merely use the funding in whatever way they can, and indirectly it will prop up the coercive practices that are being used at present. My hon. Friend should remember that, and perhaps think a little more deeply about those matters before he merely offers 100 per cent. support for what is being done in China.
Mr. Worthington: Will the hon. Lady give way?
Mrs. Winterton: No. I have just given way to my hon. Friend, and I intend to continue with my speech. [Interruption.] I have given a full explanation to my hon. Friend.
Mr. Ottaway: My hon. Friend has no evidence.
Mrs. Winterton: Perhaps the evidence could be provided at a later date; I could not give it now.
The attitude of my hon. Friend and the apologists whom he represents will ensure that those coercive practices will continue for the next 10, 20 or 30 years, because the position has not improved while those programmes have been in place in China and other third world countries.
The plight of unwanted girl babies in China does not result purely from cultural bias in favour of boys, as some people have naively sought to suggest. It is not as simple as that. For thousands of years in rural China, when a girl married she left home to live with her husband's family. Even today, old couples have no state benefit in the country districts of China, with the result that, if couples are allowed to have only one child and that child is a girl or is disabled, they will be entirely alone in old age and virtually left to starve. That is the brutal truth.
Speaking as recently as last month, on 26 May 1995, my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, South, who introduced the debate, addressed, the inaugural meeting of the European Parliamentary Forum on Population in his capacity as its founding chairman. He told the meeting
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that in the year 2000 the programme of action that had been agreed at the United Nations conference in Cairo in September 1994 would cost an estimated £17 billion for the implementation of reproductive health programmes in developing countries and in countries with economies in transition. He said that, by the year 2015, that will have increased to a staggering $21.7 billion.
The conference in Cairo was supposed to be the international conference on population and development, yet the entire sum allocated was—as my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, South told his meeting in Brussels—$17 billion for population control, with not one dollar for development.
The answer to the intervention of the hon. Member for Clydebank and Milngavie (Mr. Worthington) is that we shall reduce the number of children being born by aid for economic development. That has been the result of economic development in the western world and elsewhere. Security of employment, pension arrangements and so on reduce the numbers of people who are so fearful.
Mr. Ottaway: Will my hon. Friend give way?
Mrs. Winterton: No, I will not.
My hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, South is chairman of the all-party parliamentary group on population and development, which published a report in March 1994, arguing that non-governmental organisations seeking overseas aid funding should expect such funding to be reduced unless they agreed to a commitment to population control.
Not only are poor countries to receive nothing from the programme agreed last year at the Cairo conference, but even charities that rely on help to develop their vital work are to be deprived of any assistance at all if my hon. Friend has his way.
Mr. Worthington: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I am sure that the hon. Lady has not deliberately misled the House, but I do know the hon. Member for Croydon, South (Mr. Ottaway) very well, and he is not associated with any population control—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I am the judge of whether an hon. Member has misled the House, not the hon. Gentleman or Back Benchers.
Mrs. Winterton: Some people have sought to portray the anxieties raised about Cairo as being exclusive to the Roman Catholic Church. That is not a Church to which I belong, and although the Vatican certainly has been outspoken in its condemnation of that diversion of resources from aid programmes to population control, its anxieties are widely shared by many people in the third world and by the Muslim community.
Commenting on the Cairo conference, 50 eminent Muslim scholars wrote to every Member of the House, observing that it was stage-managed by the wealthy western nations, who were seeking to manipulate the people of the third world. They urged us strongly to support the making of legal international agreements to bring to an end coercive population control programmes.
After watching "The Dying Rooms", I endorse such an opinion. We should not rest until we witness the end of any type of coercive or manipulative population control, whether it be the tying of the development of a village

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well to limits on family size, or the cutting by our Government of grants to charities that refuse to conspire with the population control lobbyists.
I invite the Minister to assure the House that, pending a full and exhaustive investigation, he will suspend the funding of the IPPF and the UNFPA and, as my early-day motion 1251 suggests, urge the United Nations to transfer from Beijing the proposed Fourth World Conference on Women and hold it instead in a country with a more civilised policy towards women and girl babies.
10.45 am
Mr. David Alton: I support the hon. Member for Congleton (Mrs. Winterton), especially her remarks about the unsuitability of Beijing, of all places, as a centre for the holding of a conference discussing women's rights. I urge right hon. and hon. Members to sign the early-day motion that the hon. Lady has tabled, which I believe describes the true position in China.
It has been extraordinary to listen to the speeches, especially those of the hon. Members for Croydon, South (Mr. Ottaway) and for Clydebank and Milngavie (Mr. Worthington), in defence of practices in China. Implicitly, whether they like it or not, they are defending those practices if they accept that the programmes that are being used in China to fund forced abortion and forced sterilisation should continue to receive resources from this country.
The hon. Members for Croydon, South and for Clydebank and Milngavie have adumbrated the voluntary principle, and they have said that they oppose coercion. Of course everyone in the House would share those opinions; they sound wonderful, but that is not the issue. The issue is what is happening on the ground. Are we financing it? Are we prepared to aid and abet it? If not, what will we do about that?
The approach of the hon. Member for Croydon, South is revealingly illustrated in his book, which is curiously titled, "Less People, Less Pollution". That is an extraordinary way of regarding the population question—fewer people equals less pollution. The issue for the House is not the pollution that people may cause but the respect that we place on the very right to life itself. It is about the respect that we place on human rights; it is about the position of women in society; it is about the voluntary principle; and it is about poverty.
I will not listen to the speeches that have been made, implying that those of us who share the opinions that will be expressed on the Floor of the House today are reactionary or oppose development. I strongly support the increase of our overseas aid programme and the principle that we should attack poverty at every possible level, but there are ways of doing that. It is never, and surely should never be, part of our approach to defend the discredited policies of a regime that uses such unacceptable methods against its own population.
Hon. Members have intervened to ask, where is the evidence? I intend to discuss that later, but I would especially draw people's attention to the congressional debate that took place on May 24 1995 and the evidence that led Congress again to decide that it did not want to fund those programmes—evidence that led the previous American Administration not to fund the programmes.
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Anyone who saw on their television screen the events in Tiananmen square hardly needs to be convinced that evidence is required about the brutality of the Chinese regime. The Human Rights Law Review provides evidence, if that is what hon. Members are looking for. I shall refer to that later in my remarks.
I have followed the issue for several years. I have been to see Ministers, presented petitions and tabled motions and questions about what I believe constitutes the most pernicious and evil abuse of women and human rights anywhere in the world today. I am utterly mystified as to how anyone could watch the programme, "The Dying Rooms", to which the hon. Member for Congleton referred, or last year's BBC programme, "Women of the Yellow Earth", and still offer a defence of the payment of £100 million of blood money over the past decade.
In 1994, the United Kingdom Government gave £8.5 million to the UNFPA and £7.5 million to the IPPF. British taxpayers have been underwriting forced abortion, forced sterilisation, the forcible fitting of IUCDs and even infanticide for more than 20 years. Successive Ministers have defended one of the greatest scandals in the use of overseas aid that I have ever come across. They have used a succession of arguments.
Mr. George Foulkes: I have one simple question. The hon. Gentleman is speaking from the Bench of the leader of the Liberal party. Will he make it clear whether he is speaking in a personal capacity or on behalf of the Liberal Democrats?
Mr. Alton: In 1992 my party had quite a divisive argument about whether abortion should be party policy. I am glad to say that, unlike the Labour party, we ultimately decided that it should be a matter for personal conscience. I speak today on my own behalf from this Bench. I should be interested to know whether, when the hon. Member for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley (Mr. Foulkes) speaks today, he will do so on behalf of the official Opposition. I should be interested to know whether he will state that the Labour party will continue that policy. The hon. Gentleman is confirming to the House on behalf of the Labour party—it is important to have it on the record—that if the Labour party forms the next Government, they will continue to fund such programmes in China.
Mr. Foulkes: I am confirming that if I have a chance to speak in today's debate, I shall be doing so on behalf of the official Opposition. As to what I shall say, the hon. Gentleman will find out then. He should not try to anticipate it.
Mr. Alton: The hon. Gentleman sought clarification from me and I am simply seeking clarification from him. I am trying to clarify whether he will be speaking on behalf of the official Opposition in such a way that we can assume that the Labour party will maintain the present Government's policies and offer the same arguments advanced by Ministers over the past two decades.
The first of those arguments was expressed by Lady Chalker: funding such programmes enables us to influence them. There is no supporting evidence to show that funding leads to influence over policies.
The second argument that has been advanced by Ministers is that there is insufficient evidence—even though, naturally, they did not approve of coercion. Ministers' next argument was the rural aberration

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argument. They argued that such policies might be pursued, but they were only the work of a few over-zealous officials in some backwoods area of China.
I have received a succession of identical replies to the parliamentary questions that I have tabled. The Government say that they are "deeply concerned". However, they are not concerned enough to do anything to stop the systematic abuse of women and children. The greatest deceit of all that they commit is to trot out the platitude that we are all opposed to the principle of coercion, while continuing to fund those who perpetuate the crimes against humanity, which is precisely what they are. The Nuremberg war trials tribunal rightly judged the forced abortion of Polish women to have been a crime against humanity. The shocking thing is that it has taken something as horrific as "The Dying Rooms" to shake us out of our complacency.
At the height of the mass sterilisation campaign in the 1970s the UNFPA gave China the first ever UN population award for its success in curbing population. The UNFPA provided training for central Government officials responsible for the policy. It provided computer systems that monitor the effectiveness of the programmes in reaching their targets. It funded the building of two facilities that have made China self-sufficient in IUD production. Some 41 per cent. of Chinese women now have IUDs, which, once inserted—often against their will—they can do little about. X-ray machines are used to ensure that women have not removed them.
The UNFPA is a United Nations agency. The UN purports to guarantee the
"right to freely found a family and decide on the number and spacing of the children".
Yet, in direct contradiction of that, the communist Chinese Minister for family planning, Qian Zinzhong, has said:
"The size of the family is far too important to be left to the couple. Births are a matter of state planning."
China's one-child policy uniquely marks it out as a country where it is illegal to have a brother or a sister; where little girls are eliminated in favour of their brothers and where eugenics laws—like those so favoured by the eugenicists who founded the IPPF—now permit the killing of disabled children.
In October 1994 the People's Republic of China passed a law on maternal and infant health care that came into force just a couple of weeks ago. It allows the Government to force newly married couples to be sterilised and unborn babies to be aborted, where there is disability, illness or "relevant mental disorders". Poor people from ethnic minorities and disabled people have always been the target of racists and eugenicists everywhere. The simple test is whether we would permit such procedures here and, if not, what in the world are we doing funding them in China?
The latest reports from Feng Jia Zhuang and Long Tian Gou reveal a combination of religious repression and political coercion. Using their slogan, "It is better to have more graves than one more child", the local authorities repeatedly raid people's homes, confiscate the family's property, round up the people and beat those who escape into nearby fields. Forced abortions have been performed on women in their last weeks of pregnancy. Several women have been forcibly sterilised against their will. Monstrous fines—bigger than an annual average income—are imposed on couples who do not comply.
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One villager had his legs so badly broken that he nearly died. When concerned relatives enquired about him they were arrested, abused and forced to pay a huge fine. Another villager unsuccessfully tried to sell his two children in an effort to have his wife freed from gaol.
People are subjected to terrible torture. Men and women have been hung upside down; some have been squeezed into tiny spaces, such as under chairs; some have been exposed to the elements during extreme weather conditions for sustained periods. Some people have had their tongues burnt with electric batons to prevent them from invoking the help of God. Through our funding, we are collaborating in those crimes against humanity.
The systematic killing of little girls is now beginning to reveal itself in the population shift in China and in slave trade in women. At least 114 boys are now born in China for every 100 girls. The plight of women beyond birth is equally harrowing. The Human Rights Law Review details instances of women being taken from bed late at night and brought to 24-hour sterilisation clinics. It records examples of women being inserted with IUDs without their knowledge or consent immediately after giving birth and newborn babies being killed while still partly in the womb. Local officials who violate women's rights are promoted for their ruthless cold-blooded efficiency.
Far from condemning such practices, the executive director of the UNFPA, Nafis Sadiq, said:
"China has every reason to feel proud and pleased with its remarkable achievements in its family planning policy and control of its population growth over the past 10 years. Now China could offer its experiences and special experts to other countries."
Britain should have no part in the programmes. We should use our overseas budget to help those 800 million people who are racked by starvation or despair and who live below any rational definition of human decency. We should not use resources to fund such evil practices.
Wilberforce said in this Chamber nearly 200 years ago that we should
"Disclaim that dangerous sophistry that out of doing evil some good may come."
I hope that it will not be long before we end the evil practice of funding forced abortions, forced sterilisation and oppression of women's rights in China.
10.58 am
Mrs. Jacqui Lait: I appreciate the opportunity to participate in the debate, but I shall not become involved in the subject of China for two reasons: first, it has already been clearly aired and, secondly, there are other issues in the world relating to population problems that we need to consider. I should prefer to look at the African continent, where poverty has increased markedly over the past 10 years.
I do not want to follow the route taken by my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Mrs. Winterton) and condemn the UNFPA, but I support her call for the conference for women not to take place in Beijing. However, I do so for a completely different reason. Apparently the non-governmental organisations—which my hon. Friend and I both support—will be located some 30 miles from Beijing and there is no way of travelling to Beijing except by bicycle. As some hon. Members may know, the eminent members of NGOs are perhaps not capable of travelling 30 miles by bicycle, so the conference may not be of great help to women.

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I turn to the issue of population problems in Africa. As in China, cultural and religious differences in Africa have led to the prevalence of large families, if only to ensure that there is someone to look after aged relatives and younger children. We in the west have solved that problem by increasing our prosperity, which is also the best way of solving the problem throughout the world.
In dealing with the population problem, we must move in two directions. First, we must alleviate poverty; and, secondly, we must work within third-world societies to help women—who, as the child bearers, are the key—to control their own fertility. The best way to control population growth is to improve medical services and to ensure that women are empowered to control their own lives. In many cases, that means that we must ensure that they have access to farm implements, water and grain so that they can produce food for their families. If their children survive infancy, they will realise that they do not need to have so many children and, with that realisation, will come the reproductive control that is so crucial to solving the problem of overpopulation.
We must also address questions such as why water is not readily available, why medical services are difficult to access and why poverty is prevalent in so many countries. Those problems are often the result of governmental mistakes. Many foreign politicians were educated as socialists in this country. They then returned to their own countries and tried to impose socialism on their culture. Those cultures were simply not ready for socialism and were often very anti-democratic.
The Overseas Development Administration can best assist population programmes by building up a belief in democracy in such countries. The people must remove from the control of the centralised state the levers of economic power which it has signally failed to use effectively. Governments must ensure that they release the energies of their people so as to produce the wealth that is crucial to the delivery of medical care and roads and farming infrastructure. That is vital if women are to feel that they do not need to produce a child every nine months and if men are to recognise that they do not need to prove their virility by fathering large families.
11.3 am
Mr. David Amess: I am very grateful that my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, South (Mr. Ottaway) has given the House the opportunity to debate coercive practices in population programmes overseas. I suspect that the debate—I shall speak directly to it—might have been triggered by the ten-minute Bill that I introduced last month. On that occasion, the House agreed that coercive practices should be condemned.
My hon. Friend used a cricketing metaphor in his speech and I also rather liked the cricketing metaphor used by the previous Prime Minister, Lady Thatcher. Earlier in the debate it was said that the House condemns coercive practices in population programmes overseas. I was very pleased to hear that and I am sure that hon. Members are united in their desire to do good—even though our approaches may differ.
Two years ago when I attempted to introduce a ten-minute Bill outlawing the practice of determining the sex of a child, the House voted in favour of that practice
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by a majority of 18 votes. One would have thought it extraordinary that the House of Commons should approve the practice of sex selection, but that is what it did. Therefore, I think that it is wonderful that today hon. Members have made their points with passion, vigour and conviction. If the House is to remain relevant, we must continue to argue about such matters in that way.
This morning I received a letter from a constituent who viewed the television programme to which hon. Members have referred this morning. Life may be cheap in China, but it is completely worthless if one is female. More than 6 million Chinese women are called Lai-Di or Zheo-Di, both of which mean "next time bring a boy". Female infanticide is rife, as is the abandonment of female children. The growing gender imbalance in the Chinese population—currently there are 60 million more men than women—has resulted in the kidnapping of village women who are often raped before being sold.
My hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, South spoke of the size of the world population.
Mr. Piers Merchant: My hon. Friend the Member for Basildon (Mr. Amess) mentioned the appalling gender discrimination in China which is smiled upon by the communist authorities. Will he refer also to the Chinese Government's racist activities in areas such as Tibet, where the Tibetan population is subjected to extreme population controls but the Han Chinese—who have been deliberately settled in Tibet in order to ensure Chinese domination of that previously free country—are allowed to reproduce much more freely?
Mr. Amess: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for drawing that situation to my attention. Last month during my speech on my ten-minute Bill I told the House that I was to visit China with two United States Congressmen. Sadly, the day before we were due to leave the visas of the two Congressmen were withdrawn. I hope that we wiil make that trip later this year when I shall explore the points that my hon. Friend has raised.
My hon. Friend the Member for Croydon, South referred to the size of the world's population. The world has become smaller with the advent of air travel and I wonder whether we should challenge the premise that the world is overpopulated. According to United Nations figures, only 40 per cent. of agricultural land in China is cultivated—and I am delighted that the Fiat tractor plant in my constituency is exporting more of its small tractors to that country to help with the more efficient production of food. Agricultural land in China is cultivated so inefficiently that, during the past 15 years, the World bank has threatened to withdraw its funds unless practices improve.
Only about 10 per cent. of the world's land area has been developed into cities, towns, roads, villages and farm land. Furthermore, in Europe and America we arc urged to set aside land because we are producing too much. In 1975, Mr. Henry Kissinger presented a 250-page document to the then US President, Gerald Ford. It warned that uncurbed population growth in less-developed countries could adversely affect US commercial interests. It stated that more people in poorer countries would mean an increase in demand and a subsequent call for greater economic control. The United States of America had to promote population control in order to safeguard its own interests.

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I am a great fan of the United States of America. It is interesting to note that the presidents who most strongly opposed recommendations of the national security study memorandum were both Republican—Ronald Reagan and George Bush. Mr. Reagan and Mr. Bush banned funding to the United Nations Fund for Population Activities and the International Planned Parenthood Federation because of the abortion policies of both those groups.
Finally, I return to my ten-minute Bill because I recognise that the whole House condemns coercive practices. I note that the Government are also concerned, as was demonstrated more than a year ago when the ODA promised action. I am most grateful for that, but we must go further. The House should be prepared to take a stand against the funding of oppression by calling upon the IPPF, the UNFPA and the ODA to withdraw from the Chinese population control programme.
My Bill proposed, in order to avoid inadvertently supporting those programmes or withdrawing funds for legitimate purposes, that we attach clear and unambiguous conditions to all future contributions and exact full accountability. At the same time, we should make it clear that any support for the practices in China that I have described from the spokesmen of any of those organisations would result in the withdrawal of future funding altogether.
11.10 am
Mr. George Foulkes: I join in congratulating the hon. Member for Croydon, South (Mr. Ottaway) on securing a debate on a subject of great concern to the developing world and one which creates great passion among hon. Members on both sides of the argument, as we have seen today. I know of the hon. Gentleman's interest in the subject—and pay tribute to it—from his chairmanship of the all-party group on population development and reproductive health, of which I am also a member.
The Minister and I participated in the first Wednesday morning debate on Pergau, which was a fiery affair. This morning, the two Front Benches are in somewhat greater agreement.
The growth in human numbers that lies ahead is the fastest in history—a growth in population widely recognised as resulting in serious economic, environmental and political problems in the developing countries and posing real problems for the developed world. As hon. Members have said, that was recognised at Cairo.
The balance of the world population over the next decade will switch dramatically. As my hon. Friend the Member for Clydebank and Milngavie (Mr. Worthington) rightly said, free access to all forms of family planning means that population growth in developed countries has slowed to less than 0.6 per cent. In Europe, it is less than half that. Within 10 years, populations in most European countries will probably start to decline.
In contrast, the population in the developing world will increase dramatically. Some 94 per cent. of the increase over the next decade will be in the developing world and the prospects for some countries are daunting. As hon. Members have said, we are not discussing only China. According to World bank demographers, the population of Nigeria will rise from 100 million at present to an eventual 382 million before stabilising towards the year
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2100. The population in Tanzania is predicted to increase five-fold from about 25 million at present to 116 million. It is a major, daunting prospect.
The Government have already been told on many occasions—I took the opportunity to do so again on Monday—that more than 1 billion people in the developing world now live in abject poverty. It is to that end that measures have been sought and many groups throughout the world are seeking, through respected and organised programmes of family planning, to reduce the number of people suffering from poverty.
Family planning, reproductive health and female education are some of the best aid investments available. That was recognised in Cairo, where a programme of action was agreed to improve access to quality reproductive health care, child health care and educational opportunities and to help reduce child and maternal mortality.
The Labour party supports the range of measures agreed at the conference. We recognise the continuing priority that the Government have given to the problems of population growth, notably in their programme
"Children by Choice and not by Chance".
We stress again that it must be considered in the light of an ever-decreasing aid budget and that action should be taken to maintain and continue that support.
It was agreed at Cairo that the implementation of the agreed programme of action
"is the sovereign right of each group consistent with national laws and development priorities with full respect for the various religious and ethical values and cultural backgrounds of its people, and in conformity with universally recognised human rights."
We are aware of the key concerns of some Catholic and Muslim countries expressed at the conference. However, the overwhelming majority of countries support the programme agreed in Cairo.
Criticisms of certain countries' human rights records and their approach to family planning is legitimate. The exposé of methods prevalent in China by the recent Channel 4 documentary was welcome. Abuse has been documented in other countries, but the removal of UN agencies and non-governmental organisations working within those countries would serve only to isolate them from world opinion and would not in any way help to solve the problems.
Since 1979, the Chinese state has recognised the problem. China has one fifth of the world's population and only 10 per cent. of its arable land. However, it has over-aggressively used birth targets to curb its population growth. People in cities are limited to one child and those in the country to two. The Opposition state quite clearly that the methods highlighted by the media are unacceptable and cannot be tolerated.
I agree with the hon. Member for Liverpool, Mossley Hill (Mr. Alton) on one point. It is a tragic irony that the conference on women is to be held in Beijing. There have been calls from hon. Members on both sides of the House for that to be reconsidered.
Any implication that people working in those countries condone or help to facilitate any such programme is completely false. Some people are using allegations of coercion in China's population programme to justify calls on the British Government to withdraw their funding from the UN Population Fund and the International Planned Parenthood Federation. My hon. Friend the Member for Clydebank and Milngavie called it a hidden agenda; it is a different agenda, and that should be made absolutely clear.

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The Opposition support the contributions to the UN population fund and to the IPPF. Both those organisations publicly affirmed their opposition to any coercive methods adopted by the countries in which they operate, with the Chinese family planning association, like all IPPF member associations subscribing to the principles agreed at Cairo.
In practice, as my hon. Friend the Member for Clydebank and Milngavie rightly said, the right of access to effective means of family planning is often denied. An estimated 350 million couples world wide do not have ready access to family planning. UNICEF figures show that the unmet need of women for family planning is nearly half in sub-Saharan Africa.
Reducing the population growth of the developing world should not be seen in isolation. There is no intrinsic benefit in a reduction of the world's population; the primary concern is the alleviation of the appalling, grinding poverty which currently exists, and to that end the consumption of scarce resources has been looked at in terms of population. It should not detract, however, from the duty of the industrialised world to the developing countries and it is incumbent on any population programme to form a wider strategy aimed at tackling poverty.
The rights to family planning and health education are basic human rights. The attitude of certain states and the use of coercive methods cannot be tolerated. The British Government should stress that fact to countries where infringements of human rights take place and I hope that the Minister will repeat it today. I hope that the Minister will also assure us that in the forthcoming UN world conference on women the Government will press for the cessation of such practices, which are clearly intolerable. Equally intolerable, however, is the suggestion from some quarters that such practices should be used as an excuse for withdrawing funding from the vital programmes carried out by non-governmental organisations and by the IPPF. We oppose such suggestions and, for once, we agree with what I hope the Government are about to say.
11.19 am
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Tony Baldry): This has been an extremely helpful debate. Contributions from hon. Members on both sides have illustrated the sensitivity of the issues. I know that several hon. Members who wished to contribute, including my hon. Friend the Member for Erewash (Mrs. Knight), have been unable to do so due to lack of time.
I have listened carefully to all the speeches. Those of us who take an interest in population and development policies are deeply concerned about reports of human rights abuses linked with family planning. Human rights are indivisible and sacred, and it is quite proper that wherever we discover abuses of human rights we should protest about them. We shall, of course, thoroughly investigate recent media reports which have understandably created considerable concern in this country about China's population policies. We shall carefully examine links between the Chinese population programme and UNFPA and the IPPF—
Mr. Alton rose—
Mr. Baldry: I have very little time in which to reply, and I hope to answer the hon. Gentleman's points in due course.
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We shall of course protest whenever we see abuses of human rights. Coercion of people in any regard is unacceptable; coercion to use particular types of contraception, or to be sterilised, or to undergo induced abortion is never and never can be acceptable.
Last September I led the United Kingdom delegation to the international conference on population and development in Cairo. Many people regard that conference as one of the achievements of the United Nations and its member states. In Cairo, we agreed on policies which take as their starting point the need to increase choices for women and men. At the conference, the international community explicitly rejected any idea of coercive population control programmes.
The Cairo programme of action introduced new and more positive concepts—most importantly, reproductive health, which embraces health associated with sexuality, conception and child bearing. The underlying principle is that we should seek to respond to people's needs. We believe that men and women have the right to enjoy good reproductive health, not just access to family planning services.
The conference stated:
"Reproductive health care programmes should provide the widest range of services without any form of coercion. All couples and individuals have the basic right to decide freely and responsibly the number and spacing of their children and to have the information, education and means to do so."
No one in the House could possibly disagree with those principles.
Since Cairo we have continued, as part of the overseas development programme, to help developing countries as well as those in eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union to move towards reproductive health care for all; and many countries in the United Nations are deeply committed to delivering on the promises that were made at Cairo.
Despite all this, there are those who argue—we heard their concerns mentioned today—that the UNFPA, the IPPF, and the British Government, in some way support population control. I want to make it clear again: we wholly and forcefully reject the concept of population control. We believe that individuals should be given good opportunities, information and health care, and the opportunity to have children by choice, not by chance.
The reproductive health programmes that we support are fully consistent with the principles agreed at Cairo. They aim to enable women and men to choose when to have children and to enjoy better reproductive health. We want to enable more women to go through pregnancy and child birth safely, and to prevent and treat sexually transmitted infections. We also want to enable more people to have access to family planning information and services.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Mrs. Lail.) reminded us, this is a worldwide debate about men and women's rights and their entitlement to better reproductive health. We believe that all people have a right to these services; they should not be denied them simply because they are poor. Of course, reproductive health for all remains a formidable challenge. That is why, through the aid programme, we continue to help countries to find new ways of responding to the unmet need—ways that make the best use of scarce resources. When we believe that they can make the best use of our funds, we channel some of our aid through the IPPF and the UNFPA.

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Anxieties have rightly been raised today about China's population policies. Neither we nor anyone else in the House would endorse China's one child per family policy, but that is not the issue. We do not sponsor family planning programmes in China, and we never have. As part of our multilateral assistance, we contribute to the general funds of the UNFPA and the IPPF, which carry out work throughout the world. We believe that both organisations have helped the Chinese to understand better how their population policies are viewed by other countries and how approaches based on voluntary choice could be introduced, in line with the principles agreed at Cairo.
We have no evidence that the UNFPA or the IPPF is siding with or abetting officials in the denial of reproductive rights in China. If the hon. Member for Liverpool, Mossley Hill (Mr. Alton) or any other hon. Member has any such evidence, I hope that they will forward it to me. I will consider it in great detail and with great care.
We consider that those respected international organisations are best placed to make judgments about the nature of their assistance to China, and we see no need to place restrictions on the use of our funds or to reduce the size of our overall contribution. If we withdrew all our support from the UNFPA and the IPPF, we would remove one of the few channels through which we can seek to influence China's population policies.
The UNFPA's spend in China is around 1 per cent. of total Chinese Government spending on population activity, so its withdrawal would not hurt the Chinese financially. Indeed, I doubt whether it would affect them at all. We believe that these organisations can be an influence for good, as demonstrated by the UNFPA's support in China, which has helped with the production of safer contraceptives. Earlier Chinese-designed and manufactured contraceptives were harming women. The
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UNFPA's support has also improved mother and child health for vulnerable groups in some of the poorest and most remote regions of the country.
Wherever it works, UNFPA's status as a neutral international voice can be as important as its actual programmes. Both the UNFPA and the IPPF continue to act as advocates of reproductive rights. I very much doubt whether any other organisations in the world can match the record, credibility and impact of those two organisations on population and development policies—seeking to ensure that men and women have choices and enjoy decent reproductive health. Having listened carefully to arguments that we should stop funding the two bodies, I would pose several questions in response.
Would a cessation of donor funding bring about the changes that its proponents claim to want? If we stopped funding those bodies, would it have any effect on the Chinese Government? I doubt it. What of the millions of poor women and men who as a result would be denied access to reproductive health services and who would lose this important means of controlling their own lives? The House must ask itself how many additional abortions and unsafe births would result; how many more women would be maimed or killed and how many people would be infected with a sexually transmitted infection or the HIV virus because they were unable to obtain condoms.
We are talking about the lives of real people. There is broad consensus in the House today that coercion is totally unacceptable, that human rights should be protected, that people should have the opportunity to have children by choice, not chance, and that wherever possible the Government should support responsible organisations which promote responsible reproductive health programmes. Where there are concerns about human rights abuses, we should use our influence—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Janet Fookes): Order. We now move on to the next topic.

Bradford (Community Relations)
11.30 am
Mr. Max Madden: I am pleased to have this opportunity to introduce a debate on community relations in Bradford, but am very sad at the circumstances that led me to make the application for the debate.
I invited all the hon. Members who represent Bradford to participate and am pleased to see in their places my hon. Friends the Members for Bradford, North (Mr. Rooney) and for Bradford, South (Mr. Sutcliffe), the hon. Member for Keighley (Mr. Waller), and a number of other hon. Members. I am grateful for their attendance and their interest.
The events of 9, 10 and 11 June were, undoubtedly, tragic for the local community, the whole of our city and for the reputation of our district, nationally and internationally. The events of that weekend caused severe damage to race relations, to relations between communities, and between the public and the police. In Bradford, we all share some responsibility for those tragic events and for trying to find a way ahead. The vast majority of Bradfordians—Asian and non-Asian—condemn without reservation the violence and criminal damage that occurred.
The vast majority of Bradfordians do not excuse or condone riots, the throwing of petrol bombs, the looting of shops or the torching of cars. Nor do they excuse or condone the targeting of such violence or criminal damage against cars driven by white people, or against cars or businesses owned by white people. Such attacks are as racist as attacks by white people on Asian people or on Asian homes or mosques, temples, gudwaras or synagogues. Those who oppose and condemn racism cannot he selective or one-sided in their condemnation. All racism is to be condemned, from whatever source it is perpetrated.
Over that tragic weekend, according to the chief constable of West Yorkshire, Mr. Keith Hellawell, to whom I pay tribute for his responsible approach and response to the tragic events that we witnessed that weekend, there were some 115 recorded crimes. There were eight arson attacks—one costing more than £140,000 and another costing more than £500,000. The catalogue of violence and criminal damage is daunting. Some 30 cars and 50 buildings were damaged; six business premises were burgled; five cars were burnt out; there were two reports of assault and wounding; there were four reports of robbery; two cars were stolen; three homes were damaged; and one flat was burgled.
In one incident, according to Mr. Hellawell, a couple driving through the area were surrounded by up to 100 youths who smashed every window in their car before the woman was hit with a house brick. On the first night of violence, 9 June, 12 people were arrested and two officers were injured. The following night, violence erupted when up to 100 youths surrounded Toller Lane police station, and there were further clashes in other parts of the city. Eleven people were arrested and four officers were injured.
Six more people were arrested on the Sunday, and on the Monday, with police hack in normal uniforms, there were five arrests. Mr. Hellawell added:
"Events such as these reflect no credit on us as a community or as a society and I am disturbed by the amount of confrontation there has been rather than conciliation."
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Over that weekend, I met an enormous number of teenagers—some as young as 13 and 14. It is very depressing when one finds young people of that age who are more cynical than oneself. It is deeply worrying and disturbing when one finds that such young people are angry, alienated and frustrated, and who claim, "No one listens to us," "No one cares about us," and "No one helps us." Those were the grievances that were put to me forcefully by scores of youngsters over that weekend. I must add that they had not in any way participated in the violence or the criminal damage that had been undertaken.
I also urge the House and others to understand that there is nothing unique or unusual about the city of Bradford. Of course, like so many other inner cities and urban areas, we endure high-level unemployment, and have done for years; there is extremely poor housing, little open space and few community facilities. I am pleased that my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, South will comment more fully on the financial problems that we have faced year on year for decades and the difficulties that we face when the council has to make deep cuts year on year, as it has done again this year, totalling some £18 million.
The same picture can be found in many other urban and inner-city areas. Bradford featured very unhappily in the drama series, "Band of Gold". I watched all of that series. I admired its professionalism and force, but we must all question the criteria that allows such a powerful drama to be filmed and focused on a city. I cannot understand why that drama—I do not in any way oppose its showing, as it was an extremely powerful programme—was presented as everyday life in Bradford.
The consequences were predictable. A large number of people were encouraged to flood into Bradford—some to look at Manningham as a red light district, which had been portrayed so dramatically, and others to participate in prostitution, which has gone on in that area for generations. It is not a recent phenomenon. Clearly, the impact of that series and the enormous number of people who came into the area, including kerb crawlers from all over Britain—some as far away even as continental Europe!—caused considerable resentment among the local community. There has been resentment for decades, but, clearly, the drama caused a heightening of that tension and friction. We have to question the guidelines and the acceptability of such a drama series being focused on particular areas when they are dealing with important social issues.
Again, the consequences were predictable. Over recent months people in the local community who are sick and tired of the nuisance that is caused by prostitution have been forming vigilante groups. They came out on to the streets. Their message was clear: that if the police were unable to reduce the nuisance caused by prostitution, they as members of the local community would undertake the task themselves. That caused friction and tension in sections of the local community and within the police.
Prostitution is undoubtedly a considerable nuisance. Kerb crawlers accost and assault non-prostitute women of every racial origin, colour and background. That presents a real social problem. It is to be found in Bradford and in other areas throughout the country. I urge the Minister and the Home Office seriously to consider that and other issues. It is time for the law on prostitution to be examined and ways found to reduce the nuisance that is caused to many local communities. The matter is not being aired in

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the House for the first time. I have attended and participated in previous debates on prostitution. It is an issue of mounting concern in many constituencies and it must be given serious consideration by the Government.
I pay tribute to the extremely responsible coverage of the local and regional media, including the newspaper and broadcasting media within the Bradford 'area and region. The Telegraph and Argus allowed access to its pages by many different people. Some extremely interesting articles have been written since the tragic events to which I have drawn attention. Katrina Dick of the Telegraph and Argus interviewed the assistant chief constable of west Yorkshire, Mr. Norman Bettison, who played a key part in all the events of 9 to 11 June. He said:
"There are lots of things that are a matter of frustration for the community there including education, employment, and inter-racial tensions. The police are trying to find their way through that. It would be easy to say the racist police caused the disturbances but there were tensions there anyway that we have to deal with. Loose comments in the press aiming barbs at the police become received wisdom."
The article continues:
"He feared the police could be stereotyped as racist because of one incident which would be wrong. 'The search for a cause and effect relationship of what happened is too simplistic. There was obviously more to it. It's too simple to point to the arrest of two people and blame the disorder on that. The disaffection of youth generates the sort of scenes we've also seen on the streets of Northumberland and Oxford. We all have to try to find an answer, and the police are only partly responsible. We are one of the few agencies in these areas working hard to maintain control and we get caught in the crossfire when the fuse blows.'"
Lucy Ward interviewed a group of Asian girls. These were local young women ranging in age between 16 and 18 years. Rashming Ullah said:
"A lot of Asian youths feel like second-class citizens, missing out on good jobs, good education."
Nageena Altaf said:
"It is horrible and sad to see them go to such extremes. It just shows how resentful they felt."
Razia Saman said:
"Asian boys have a lot of hatred for the police, who were warned beforehand it could get as extreme as it did."
Rehana Khaliq said:
"I think half of the men were there just for the buzz of it, just because the rest were involved."
Kulbinder Kaur Ram said:
"More Asians in the police and talks at school on police careers would be a positive move."
Alam Khan of the Telegraph and Argus interviewed a group of young Asian men ranging in age from early to mid twenties. One of them, Arif Khan, said:
"For some people the rioting was the only way they could be heard. They were frustrated at being pushed back all the time."
Amjad Arshad said:
"There are lots of talented young Asian sportsmen but they are not being encouraged and accepted."
Aziz Rehman said:
"We have got many ideas on how to make Manningham a better place, but nobody listens to us."
I welcome the inquiry that is to be supervised by John Cartwright, the deputy chairman of the Police Complaints Authority. We all remember him as a most respected former Member. I trust that his report will be thorough and will he issued as soon as possible. In my view, the inquiry must deal with 10 questions.
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What happened when two trained police officers responded to a complaint about teenagers playing football in the street on the night of Friday 9 June? Why did the police take so long to give police bail to those arrested on the Friday night and charged with minor public order offences? We note that the chief constable of west Yorkshire has said that a decision on whether the charges are to be withdrawn will be taken by this Friday. We would all be grateful if the Minister could say whether that decision has yet been taken.
We need to ask whether it is in the best interests of the public or the police for police officers in riot gear, or defensive uniform as I understand the police prefer to call it, not to show clearly their police numbers? It is surely important, especially when allegations are being made, that police numbers are clearly visible and identifiable. We need to ask also whether the training that is given to police officers in West Yorkshire for dealing with complaints over football being played in the street, and in broader terms in policing a multiracial and multifaith community, is adequate.
How successful has the West Yorkshire police been in recruiting ethnic minority community officers, both men and women? How successful has it been in recruiting men and women as special constables? We need to ask whether the community relations budget of the West Yorkshire police is to be cut, and whether community relations officers who leave the force, either for retirement or other reasons, are to be replaced.
We need to ask also if the organisation of the police in Manningham is in need of urgent review. I understand that my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, North (Mr. Rooney) will be dealing with that matter when he speaks. Do the police community forums, which have operated in the area for a considerable time, need to become more representative? We need to ask how they can relate more effectively to local communities. We need the inquiry—I have referred to this before—to take up the real social problems that are caused by prostitution and to recommend whether further consideration should be given to the current law on prostitution.
Lastly, we need to ask about the brief given to the architect for the building of the expensive new police station in the Toiler division. If the brief was to build a fortress or castle to give out the wrong signals—to suggest that there is an army that is sent out from behind high walls to quell local trouble—the architect succeeded. The police station, by its design, gives out entirely the wrong signals to the local community.
There can be no excuse in a democracy for any citizen to resort to violence to be heard. In a mature and confident democracy, leaders should respond sensibly to charges that sections of any community do not feel part of that democracy.
I am extremely disappointed that on Monday the Home Secretary refused a request from an all-party group of Bradford Members of Parliament for an independent public inquiry to be established. I regret that he did not have the confidence or the vision to agree to a short, sharp inquiry to find out why the Bradford tragedy occurred and what needs to be done by all of us to try to prevent similar tragedies from happening either in Bradford or anywhere else in our country.
The Home Secretary told me that there were no precedents for the sort of inquiry that I was suggesting. Perhaps that is the most compelling argument for a

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suitable mechanism and format to be devised. I hope even now that he will reconsider our request for an independent public inquiry. Such an inquiry could be a forum for the whole community to voice their hopes and fears, their ideas and their grievances. It would be a- vital part of the healing process. It could make recommendations for action by central and local government and a whole range of local public agencies.
As it is, there are now calls for a local, community-led inquiry. If such an inquiry is to succeed, it must enjoy the total confidence of the whole community. It must be led by people who are widely respected by that community and, not least, it must be properly funded so that it can be professionally administered and conducted.
Whatever happens in relation to that matter, the Minister and the Government cannot shirk the charge that, in Bradford and elsewhere, there is a burgeoning sub-culture of people of all ages, all colours, all nationalities, all religions and no religion who feel angry, powerless and exploited, in all cases excluded and in some cases even unwelcome aliens. That alienation is reinforced by immigration laws that separate families and that even make visits from relatives and friends of people who have lived in this country for 20 and 30 years difficult. That is deeply resented.
I urge the Minister, the Home Secretary and the Government to think carefully before they embark on further legislation dealing with immigration or asylum. We all know of media speculation that such a Bill is likely to be introduced in the new Session. I counsel caution on the Government before they adopt such a course as we know that the most unlikely spark can erupt into serious violence and public disorder. In Bradford it was complaints about teenagers playing football in a side street; that was the spark that led to the catalogue of violence and criminal damage to which I have referred.
How to include and embrace all our citizens with clear rights and clear responsibilities is the greatest political challenge facing all political parties not only in this country, but throughout the world. That is the biggest political challenge facing all of us into the next century.
I end with some perceptive words that were written in The Guardian on 17 June by Tariq Modood, a senior fellow at the Policy Studies Institute in London. He said:
"Manningham is a situation that Lord Scarman warned against. An expanding and underqualified youth population, a declining labour market, racial discrimination and harassment, drug dealing, conflict with the police. With one important difference. On one side, racism and cultural contempt is mixed with Islamophobia; on the other side, an assertiveness, paralleling forms of black pride, that might be called 'Muslim pride'. An assertiveness that may at times owe as little to religion as political blackness does to the idea of Africa. 'Muslim' solidarity is often criticised, if not in straightforwardly Islamophobic terms, as divisive. But all forms of solidarity involve an 'us' and 'them'. What divides is hardly to be welcomed, but denigrated and powerless groups need to find a focus of pride and political cohesion."
Those words are particularly profound and extremely relevant to the tragic events that took place in our city a few days ago. I hope that they will be addressed seriously and urgently by the Government. I sincerely believe that an independent public inquiry, lasting not two years, but six to nine months, could do an extremely good service to all of us. The voices need to be heard, not only in this place, but throughout our country. I hope that, having
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heard the voices that will be aired here today, the Government will respond sensibly and sensitively to the voices that need to and must be heard.
11.55 am
Mr. Gary Waller: I am delighted that the hon. Member for Bradford, West (Mr. Madden) has secured this debate, which is extremely timely. I agreed with a great deal of what he said. Tribute should be paid to him for the way in which he helped to calm the position in the past fortnight. It is to his credit that he has not exerted too proprietorial an approach to those who have taken an interest in what has happened in the Manningham area. All hon. Members representing the Bradford district have a vital stake in the city.
There is an overwhelming need to look forward and to seek to find how can we can make Bradford a better place. If there is a need to consider the events of the past few days, we should look back to learn lessons for the future. There is a great danger that people who consider what has been happening in Bradford after watching their televisions or reading their newspapers may find that their prejudices and stereotypes are reinforced. It is important to remember that nothing like this has happened in Bradford before. Nothing like it happened when the National Front was driven out of the Lumb lane area in the late 1970s, at the time of the Honeyford affair or when people saw the vivid images on television and in the press of the burning of "The Satanic Verses" at the beginning of the decade.
It is a complex position. One of those who has analysed it well is Philip Lewis, adviser to the Bishop of Bradford on inter-faith issues. A warning should be given to those who want to make absolutist statements about the reasons for what happened in Bradford: the position is complicated and there were many reasons for what occurred. That will help us in the way that we look forward to the future.
What happened? Why did it happen? What do we do in the immediate aftermath? Above all, how do we ensure that these events do not recur? I am pleased that the Police Complaints Authority is to conduct an urgent inquiry and no one should prejudge its conclusions. I have confidence in John Cartwright, who will preside over it, and I look forward to a speedy and authoritative report.
I have my doubts, and have always had doubts, about a statutory public inquiry, although I have listened carefully to those who have argued for it. There is a real danger that a public inquiry, inevitably lasting for many months, would expose the bad things about Bradford to national and international coverage and that more harm than good could result.
There is also a danger that the establishment of such an inquiry could convey the wrong messages—the message, for instance, that the way in which to attract attention to an area's problems is to start a riot. Not only would a dangerous message be conveyed to other ethnic-minority communities, but there would be the danger of a backlash, especially in other deprived areas where there has hitherto been no intention to riot but where the problems may be every bit as great as those in Manningham.
Bradford is, of course, a very different community from Brixton, which featured in the Scarman inquiry, and that should be taken into account in any analysis. I hope that such an analysis will be carried out, and that a forum will be established in Bradford to enable people to discuss the problems and their possible solutions.

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As the hon. Member for Bradford, West explained, the catalyst that sparked the riot was—as in so many cases—what most would consider a relatively petty event. Like the hon. Gentleman, I hope that everyone will concur with the view expressed by Ruth Billheimer, chair of West Yorkshire police complaints committee and a local councillor, who said that
"any unacceptable behaviour by the police does not excuse the violence that took place … There is no excuse for any section of the community to take the law into their own hands."
That view was echoed by Norman Bettison, the assistant chief constable, who said that
"no incident can be a justification for the petrol bombing, wanton damage, looting and robbery which took place throughout Bradford."
The chief constable, for whom I have the same regard as the hon. Member for Bradford, West, said that the speed with which the riot broke out was surprising. From what I have been able to ascertain, there can be little doubt that the events of the Saturday night involved agitators from outside, who tried to encourage others to go on a wrecking spree; at the end of the day, however, we must condemn violence against people and property.
When I told someone who is closely involved with race relations in the area that I was not very happy with the statement that had been made, he said that the lack of condemnation of the riots must be seen as a compromise. We cannot compromise when it comes to petrol bombs and bricks thrown through car windows; if we did, there would be complaints about dual standards.
This was not a race riot in the strict sense, but the fact remains that hundreds of thousands of pounds of damage was done to businesses—mainly white businesses—along the route into the centre of Bradford. If the situation had been reversed, everyone—including the Commission for Racial Equality—would have condemned it utterly. The overwhelming majority of Asians also condemn such action; a tiny minority was responsible, including people whose attitudes are just as racist as those of members of the British National party. If we are two-faced, the latter could be the beneficiaries. If we do not express unequivocal condemnation, those with an interest in an outbreak of greater disharmony will benefit; but condemnation is not enough.
The national media, in particular, have focused on the possible link between the violence and the recent vigilante action in Lumb lane. Some of those involved in the vigilante action may have been present during the riot, but I do not think that it was a major factor.
The number of complaints about police officers in the Toiler lane division is the lowest in the force. I understand that there have been 13 this year, none with racial overtones. I believe that the police are doing a great deal of hard work to rebuild links with the community; there are many bridges to be rebuilt after the events of the weekend before last.
According to West Yorkshire Police Federation secretary, Richard Critchley, the
"underlying problems are not policing problems".
I consider his analysis too simplistic. The police are human beings, subject to the faults and weaknesses that affect other human beings, and I know from constituency experience that in some instances they have acted insensitively. They must aim for the highest standards. Overall, however, the police in the Bradford area and west Yorkshire generally—and, indeed, throughout the
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country—compare favourably with any force in the world in the way in which they deal with the public, including minorities. We should also bear in mind that, like people in other areas, many Asians want more community officers on the beat. How many times have we heard people express that wish?
We should not underestimate the valuable influence of those who, in the immediate aftermath of the violence, played their part in successfully appealing to the public to remain calm and peaceful: we owe them a great debt. That approach united the majority among all races, male and female, old and young. Several people played a particularly valuable role in ensuring that the situation was brought under control. I pay tribute to the Bishop of Bradford, who spoke to young people on Sunday and played an enormously valuable part in bringing people together, not only in the immediate aftermath but in subsequently talking to people and trying to understand. His combination of good humour, pragmatism and firmness when it is needed has been extremely valuable.
On Monday 12 June, just after the events that have been described, the Daily Express published the headline "City Waiting to Explode". I do not think that that was necessarily right; it seemed to suggest that the problems had been caused by basic faults in the people of Bradford or the system there, and that they could easily become considerably worse in the future. Many people say that it will take as long as 20 years to repair the damage that has been done to the community; that, too, need not necessarily be true, but much depends on the way in which we all act now.
Young people in the Manningham area have problems that we must understand, but they too must understand that white people—and, indeed, Asians in other areas—have much in common with them. They should not think that their problems are unique. The problem of having nowhere to go and nothing to do affects many people, not only in Manningham but in Keighley and even Ilkley, which may surprise some. Young people in those areas also want to be listened to, and to receive a positive response.
It has been suggested that part of the problem has been caused by differences between the generations in the Asian community. The issue is sensitive; perhaps it would be more correct to say that many of those young people have values that are similar to those of their parents but their attitudes are different, in that they are more likely to act defiantly to defend those values. They are members of a generation largely born in this country, and they are not prepared to put up with the setbacks that their parents, as immigrants, may have been prepared to endure. As Bradfordians, they often feel that they are being ignored.
Those whose interest is not in harmony have much to gain. We have seen the growth of gangs in the area. It has been easy to play on the fears of those who feel that they are dealing with a society that is hostile to them. There are groups who want to play on the divisions to suit their own agendas. As I have suggested, if a right-wing backlash were provoked, it would benefit only the cause of such groups and reinforce the arguments that they have used in the past.
As the hon. Member for Bradford, West said in quoting a young person from the area, very few of the people are naturally violent but many more perhaps get a buzz from being involved. There is no doubt that many people on the periphery joined in because they were bored. That was perhaps more a factor than anything to do with religion.

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There are problems to deal with. It is going to be harder to attract businesses into the area. Among the many important things that we need in the area are more businesses. We need to rebuild the image of Bradford. Restaurants' trade has certainly been drastically affected and that needs to be addressed.
However, there are encouraging aspects. Many young people in the area have a very positive approach. We regret what happened, but some good may emerge. There has been a need to talk about the problems, and the events of the past fortnight may encourage that process.
Another encouraging development has been the spontaneous multi-racial demonstration for peace by women in Manningham. The grievances to which they have drawn attention need to be heard. We need to talk about them.
Our overall message should be that while we must condemn, in this instance we must also understand a little more. We must ensure that young people have a stake in the community in which they live. It is up to us to enable them to feel that way and then we can ensure beyond peradventure that the kind of events that so appalled us during the past fortnight will not recur.
12.11 pm
Mr. Terry Rooney: I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, West (Mr. Madden) on being lucky enough to secure this debate. I have no wish to try further to describe the events of that week, which have been brilliantly portrayed already, but I should like to expand the debate slightly. I also thank the Minister for being present and apologise in advance as I may not be able to stay to the end of his winding-up speech, having already had to delay a long-standing engagement.
The community in Manningham is dominated by Lister's mill, which is well known to Bradfordians and to anyone who has visited the city. It is a magnificent building architecturally and at its peak it employed 7,000 textile workers. Today it has less than 200. That is synonymous with, and representative of, the economic decline of the area.
Over the years, there have been very welcome schemes—including the urban programme, task force, safer cities, housing action areas and housing improvement areas—which at the time were all welcome and very successful in pulling together agencies and partnerships. All, however, were time-limited, and each time schemes have ended a feeling of despair has been left behind, with people wondering how to sustain those developments.
Recently a long-running campaign to try to maintain section 11 funding for Bradford has been partly but not wholly successful, once again leaving the feeling that a community was not being fully recognised or regarded as part of the equation.
For eight years from 1983 I was a councillor for a ward which partly covered Manningham. That was a real privilege and an experience. During that time I formed lifelong friendships with people from the many different communities. The area has a long history of settlement of people from abroad. In the mid-19th century there was large-scale Irish settlement. It is interesting that in the 1860s it took three attempts to build what is now St. Patrick's Catholic church—the first Catholic church in
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Bradford—because the Protestant-dominated population kept burning it down. They did not want to have their faith so disturbed. Perhaps, in some ways, nothing is new.
In the late 19th century, east European Jewish settlements were established. After the second world war many people came to settle from eastern Europe: Poles, Ukrainians, Estonians and Latvians. There is a long and cosmopolitan history people living and working together, trying to form new communities.
Last week, we had what I thought was a well-mannered and constructive debate on the boundary commission report. One might ask what relevance that has to this debate. Until the 1980 boundary revision, the community of Manningham had been in one constituency and represented on the council as a single ward. Since 1980, the community has covered four electoral wards in two parliamentary constituencies with 12 councillors. That in itself makes representation somewhat difficult.
Manningham is covered by three separate police divisions, which means nine different shifts of police officers per day. That leads to tensions, confusion and disagreements. The three divisions have three excellent community affairs police inspectors. However, one is on the point of early retirement; one, as a cost-saving measure, has had community affairs duties taken away from him; and the other is retiring at the end of the year. As I understand it, by early next year those community affairs inspector posts will have disappeared. Between them, those three people have amassed something like 20 years experience of dealing with the community, being aware of what is going on and gaining the respect and confidence of the community. Especially in the light of recent events, we cannot afford to sacrifice such experience, commitment and ability to communicate.
Institutions, not only in Bradford but throughout Britain, should reflect and represent communities. We should not create artificial divisions that no one needs. There is a need for a rapid healing process. We must reinforce the faith of the majority in the community while not trying to silence the minority who have genuine, valid grievances. We need to hear and respond to them. That is a duty on hon. Members as representatives of the community and on those with responsibility for policy and planning future programmes.
I echo the caveat entered my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, West about any further diminution of rights under the immigration laws. Week after week, I am contacted by people whose relatives have been refused visitors' visas to come for weddings and similar family events. They now have no right of appeal, although some of those cases are heartbreaking. That, too, diminishes people's confidence in the their place in British society.
I know that other hon. Members wish to speak, so I will end there. I hope that the Minister will take those points on board.
12.18 pm
Mr. Michael Stephen: I congratulate the hon. Member for Bradford, West (Mr. Madden) on securing the debate. It would be difficult to find two constituencies more different from each other than his inner city constituency in the north of England and mine, which lies between the south downs and the sea on the south coast. However, ours is a United Kingdom and serious issues which concern him and his constituents also concern me and mine.

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The events of 16 to 18 June in Bradford have shocked us all. The message must go out from the House loud and clear that all our citizens are expected to obey the law. What we saw in Bradford was a rampage in which opportunities were taken to engage in criminal activity of the most vile and despicable kind. The hon. Member for Bradford, West rightly condemned that. Some people- might suggest, although the hon. Gentleman did not, that poverty is an excuse for such behaviour, but many of the people engaged in that criminal activity were not poor or unemployed, while many of those whose hard-earned property was smashed, destroyed or stolen were among the poorest in the community. Members of Parliament must keep faith with the poorest in our community by making it clear that criminal attacks on them will never be tolerated.
It is suggested that some sections of our society are frustrated. All of us, including Ministers, must listen to all legitimate points of view but there are two sides—at least—to every issue. Those who find themselves on the losing side will, I suspect, always feel dissatisfied and frustrated, but that is no excuse for criminal behaviour. We do not want to live in a society in which those who shout the loudest get what they want while those who go peacefully about their business are ignored.
There are perhaps fewer reasons than ever before for anyone in this country to feel alienated. All adults have the vote. We are not living in the days of the Tolpuddle martyrs or the suffragettes, and almost everyone with a legitimate point of view has access to the media and can communicate their views to millions of fellow citizens. Members of Parliament and councillors are more accessible than ever before, and we are all extremely hard-working representatives of our constituents. That applies as much to Opposition Members as to Conservatives. Many of us start work for our constituents at 7 am and do not stop until midnight. We represent all points of view and I greatly respect those expressed by Opposition Members on behalf of their constituents, although I do not often agree with them. Ministers, too, are more accessible than ever before but they cannot always do what we want, perhaps because there is not enough money available or for some other perfectly valid reason.
We must, of course, manage the economy in such a way that our people have the highest possible standard of living and the greatest opportunity to lead fulfilling lives, but I do not suppose that we shall ever reach the stage when all our people are 100 per cent. satisfied. The relentless advance of technology means that we often have to make painful adjustments in our local economies, and Bradford is no exception.
One thing about young men which must be understood—most of those participating in the criminal activity in Bradford were men—is their need for adventure. They are boisterous and energetic and need some way to release their energy. I felt the same at their age and volunteered to join the Army, in which I served for five years. I got the adventurous spirit out of my system and am now able to enjoy life as a rather sedentary Member of Parliament. Ways must he found for today's young people—especially young men—to get that adventurous spirit out of their systems. They cannot be expected to leave school, go straight into a sedate nine-to-five job and behave themselves all the time.
Another problem that we witnessed in Bradford was the cultural breakdown. For generations, the Asian communities in our country had a strong cultural defence
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mechanism against criminal and other forms of anti-social behaviour, but I fear that that mechanism is beginning to break down. One of the reasons is television, about which I wish to make a few comments.
On television, young members of the Asian community—indeed, young members of all communities—see western culture of the worst possible kind. They see sexual irresponsibility, disrespect for parents and all forms of authority, violence and bad language. Expectations are raised by television to such a degree that no Government have any possibility of living up to them. As Members of Parliament, we have a duty not to raise expectations beyond the level that Governments can reasonably he expected to fulfil. Television is a powerful instrument for moulding ideas and shaping attitudes. In the wrong hands, however—and I fear that it may be in the wrong hands—it could destroy our society.
12.24 pm
Mr. Gerry Sutcliffe: I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, West (Mr. Madden) on the excellent way in which he explained to the House the problems in his constituency. Due to the shortage of time, I shall not be able to go into as much detail as I would wish about the problems in Bradford. In any event, we have to hear what the Government have to say and what action they propose. My only sadness about today's debate is that we are discussing a tragic event in the life of a great city.
As has been said, whatever the provocation, there is no and can never be any justification for violence against people or damage to property. During the weekend in question, it was not only property that was damaged but the hearts and minds of Bradford people who were shocked and upset at what happened to our community. Let us make no mistake—Bradford suffered and will continue to suffer until we find solutions to the core problems.
We are witnessing the economics of exclusion. The recent Rowntree report made it clear that, between 1979 and 1992, the poorest 30 per cent. of the country failed to benefit from economic growth. A third of Bradford's population relies on some form of state benefit. I have lived and worked in Bradford all my life, I was educated at Bradford schools, my first job was in the city centre and my partner and I brought up our children there, so it was with genuine pain and sorrow that I became aware of what was happening in Bradford that weekend. There are many conflicting versions of the events that sparked the fury, and I am especially disappointed that the Home Secretary does not agree that an independent inquiry was appropriate. In my view, it would have helped to clear up the myth and the fictions that abound in the area at the moment.
Like my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, North (Mr. Rooney), I was a councillor for 12 years; I also had the privilege to lead the city council. I am proud of Bradford and its achievements, despite the darker moments when the actions of a few minimise the value of the contribution of the majority. There are many tales about the horrific incidents of that weekend but two particular cases were brought home to me strongly. One involved an elderly white woman who had been resident in the area for a long time. Her windows were broken and she was threatened with being forced out of her home. The second involved a young Asian youth who was

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frightened to go to work the following week because he feared the reaction of his work mates. Racism on either side is not acceptable.
Acts of criminal damage and wanton destruction have to be punished, and it is to the credit of the law-abiding people of Bradford that they want to see those responsible caught by the police. It is also to the credit of Bradford people that they recognise that there are underlying problems which need to be tackled. The police were the focus of all that was apparently wrong: there was a notion that the establishment, or society, was not performing according to the aspirations of the disfranchised.
Disfranchised youngsters have no faith in today's Britain. It offers a vision of materialism and wealth, but the reality for many Bradford youngsters, especially among the Asian community, is one of unemployment and poverty. Sadly, the disfranchised group is not confined to the Asian youth of Manningham but includes the rest of Bradford youth and, indeed, Britain's youth.
To disinterested observers, Bradford's problems relate to the breakdown of relationships between the elders of the Asian community and the young people. The Asian community is described in general terms, but that is far from the truth: the Asian community in Bradford is as complex as any other, with geographical, religious and cultural diversities, Muslims, Sikhs and Hindus. It is wrong to generalise and it is important that we do not do so. It is true that there some differences between the generations, but the same is also true of the wider community.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, North said, Bradford has a proud tradition of welcoming people from all over the world, mainly due to the fact that it was the woollen capital of the world. We therefore enjoy a diversity of communities and have benefited from that fact.
In 1984, the city council published a document entitled "District Trends" which predicted worrying trends of poverty and unemployment. At the time, we were criticised for scaremongering and talking Bradford down, but those predictions are coming true. The Government have responsibilities to Bradford. They cannot take £40 million from the council's budget, as has happened in the past few years, and expect there to be no effect. Discipline in schools is already a problem, and there are fewer classroom assistants and less resources for special needs. It has to be remembered that many of the people involved were children—still learning at school.
The Government have straitjacketed council expenditure so that 85 per cent. of the council spend is predetermined, making it unable to respond to the many needs of the community. There is frustration when a council spends money in one area but not in another which seems more of a priority. The reason is usually because the council is not able to transfer money from pot to pot. When the Government launched the single regeneration budget, Bradford lost its urban programme: £4 million a year, which was spent across the district, was gone at a stroke.
We have pockets of unemployment of more than 50 per cent. in areas such as Manningham and on our council estates; yet the budget for training and enterprise councils has been cut by £2 million this year. Bradford has lost its assisted area status, which means that private companies have lost the opportunity to make millions of pounds. The health authority, too, has had its budget cut. Such cuts
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cannot and must not continue. So far this year, the police in west Yorkshire have had to deal with more than 23 murders, compared with 17 last year; yet they have not been given any extra resources or manpower. How can they build the stronger community relations that have been called for when they suffer such restraints?
Resources are not the only answer. There needs to be a cultural change in the attitudes and policies towards the problems of young people, so that they do not turn to the extreme right or left. Attitudes need to change in policies on inner cities and long-term employment. Politicians, both locally and nationally, must make politics relevant and meaningful to the lives of ordinary people from all sectors of the British community.
A catalogue of events in Bradford has contributed to the problems that we face. We need effective local government and we need the community to work together, as it does on many occasions in Bradford. Above all, the Government must recognise that what happened in Bradford could happen everywhere in the country if people do not feel their worth in society. I shall stop at this point, but I hope that the Minister will promise that the Government will take some strong action in areas such as ours in Bradford.
12.31 pm
Mr. Simon Hughes: I shall be extremely brief. I am not a Bradfordian, although I have visited the city fairly often in the past few weeks—indeed, just before the events of a fortnight ago. I want to make two points in support of the hon. Member for Bradford, West (Mr. Madden). I pay tribute to him and his colleagues who speak for the city and the surrounding area.
First, it is not surprising that such events happen, as the hon. Member for Bradford, South (Mr. Sutcliffe) said. This year it was Bradford; in previous years it has been Oxford, Brixton, Toxteth or wherever. Such events are not an indictment of the city, place or people. Groups of young people, especially young men, can turn very quickly from being positive and constructive to being angry and aggressive. It can happen to any group and may be triggered by almost nothing. That situation is not helped when such people feel, whatever their racial background, that their prospects, stake and opportunities are being disregarded by those in authority—not by those in authority locally.
I have been on deputations with the hon. Member for Bradford, West and others to argue for more money for section 11 funding for the city of Bradford. Its youth service funding has been cut by a third in three years, the education budget has been cut, its local authority is not allowed to decide how much it needs to spend, and urban funding in Bradford, as elsewhere, has been cut. Unless the Government understand such things and unless they listen to the voices of the locals, who are the experts, they will continue to face crises in urban Britain. Such crises will occur because urban Britain does not get its share of the cake or the opportunities. When unemployment rises by a third in six years, the chances of success are minimal.
The people of Bradford are doing all that they can. The faith communities, the faith leaders and the women of the city are doing their part; they are doing the work and working together. They want to know that they are being listened to from outside. The young people are saying, if

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they are saying anything to the Government and the people in power, "Listen to us. We will have a great future if you help us to achieve it." If the Government disregard that future, people are saying that such events might occur—not because they want them to, but because it is built up and brought about by the components of social policy. If the Government listen to young people, young people will give them the answers.
12.33 pm
Dr. Kim Howells: I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, West (Mr. Madden) on his good fortune and determination in securing a debate on this very important subject. Over many years, he has been a great crusader for the cause of racial harmony and a great opponent of those who, no matter from which quarter they come, advocate or practise racial discrimination and harassment.
In his speech, my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, West reminded us that the cocktail of grievances and the sets of circumstances which led a fortnight ago to the disturbances in Bradford are by no means unique to that city. There have been previous examples of public disorder in Asian communities, most notably of course in Burnley, Blackburn and Southall. The problems that my hon. Friend described are found all too frequently in many inner-city areas. If there is something especially worrying about the Bradford disturbances, it is the fact that they occurred despite the strong sense of community and the existence of strong community institutions which the Asian population of that city have developed.
It should be remembered, for example, that three of the four local councillors who went to the police on the weekend of the troubles to negotiate a truce—if the House will excuse my shorthand—were Asian. As a number of commentators have pointed out, Bradford's circumstances were somewhat different in that respect from those which Lord Scarman identified as having contributed to the Brixton riots in 1981.
There are similarities in other respects, however, and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, West has pointed out, they require special attention. Both riots started—it seems—after minor disturbances involving the police. The early course of events involved protests against the police, but then widened to include looting, burning, and so on. The riots were not what used to be called race riots. In the aftermath, both have been the subject of much commentary about their importance, as we have heard today, to feelings of alienation, discrimination and social disadvantage.
Bradford does not have a unique cocktail of circumstances, but the citizens who live in and around Manningham most certainly suffer some acute and specific problems, as we have heard this morning. Laws governing prostitution, for example, must be addressed urgently and properly. There seems little doubt that the relationship between the police and the Asian community was not helped by the friction which seems to have been generated by the activities of certain vigilante groups of Asian males, who took it upon themselves to persuade—by all kinds of means—prostitutes to move way from Lumb lane and the respectable residential areas which are blighted by their presence.
Reports have emerged of expressions of resentment among the west Yorkshire constabulary at the existence and nature of those groups. Other reports indicate that the
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police are frustrated that they cannot lay their hands on certain Asian pimps involved in controlling the prostitution in and around Lumb lane. The police argue that evidence against the Asian community's rotten apples is very difficult to obtain and that, in such circumstances, a tight community, which feels threatened and under siege, tightens rank still further.
Similar reports have emerged about drug dealing. It is quite clear that the Government have a duty to make known their plans for tackling problems of interpretation and enforcement if any progress is to be made in the efforts to reduce the numbers of opportunities for incidents to occur and for friction to increase. The Police Complaints Authority inquiry may offer a vehicle for pursuing that question, although, as we have heard, my hon. Friends would rather have had an independent inquiry, with a much wider remit than that of the PCA.
Any inquiry which assumes that the causes of the Bradford riots are limited to the lack of training of certain police officers in their relationship with ethnic communities is bound to fail. There is no doubt that greater resources must be made available to ensure that police officers are better trained and better equipped to deal with fractious incidents. But resources should also be made available to allow us to understand how a proper application of the laws governing prostitution and drug dealing might also help to reduce the opportunities for friction.
I do not believe that a local inquiry—however well-intentioned—conducted by the concerned people of Bradford is sufficient to deal with such problems. I hope that the Minister and the Home Secretary will reconsider their decision to refuse a properly resourced and independent inquiry.
There is no doubt that all respectable elements in Bradford have understood the seriousness of the events that occurred a fortnight ago. We have heard about the welcome efforts made on all sides—by the police and the Asian community as well as by the local authorities—to construct out of those events an atmosphere of trust and reconciliation. I am sure that everyone here wishes them all well in their endeavours, for there can be no excuse for violence and criminal damage such as that witnessed on the streets of Bradford two weeks ago.
My hon. Friends and other hon. Members have condemned that violence and the mentality that perpetrated it. There is no doubt in my mind that the sense of cynicism, alienation and frustration so vividly described by my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, West will increasingly threaten race relations in this country. My hon. Friend described the dangers of applying any simplistic analysis to that difficult and complicated problem, but begin to analyse them we must, if we are to protect and improve what I believe are the best race relations of any European Union country.
In some quarters that assertion might be regarded as controversial, but I will say it again: race relations in this country generally are among the best in Europe. We must build on that record, and we must not endanger it in any way. That means that the specific issues and problems, including the policing problems highlighted by my hon. Friends, must be investigated and tackled. My hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, West suggested that a mechanism should be constructed whereby we could quickly set up a short, sharp public inquiry capable of

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examining those specific questions and, more importantly, capable of making recommendations that would help in the immediate healing process.
I shall deal briefly with one of the specific problems that has been much commented upon over the past two weeks—the alleged relationship between high unemployment and the incident in question and others like it in ethnic minority communities. I do not believe that there is a mechanistic or automatic link between high unemployment and a propensity to riot or to commit lawless acts. You, Mr. Deputy Speaker, have represented a mining community for many years—like mine, it is now an ex-mining community—and if there was a mechanistic or automatic link between high unemployment and a propensity to riot, the coalfield and dockyard communities would have been ablaze throughout the 1930s. But they were not.
However, it is foolish to think that the cynicism, alienation and frustration that we have heard about is entirely detached from the experience of high unemployment. Unemployment represents an important variable. Whether our constituencies contain ethnic minorities or not, we all know from our experience within them that there is a link. The police know that, too, and we must deal with it as a fact.
If necessary we must get rid of the sociological hogwash that, often in the name of political correctness, prevented us from talking about the link between high unemployment and lawlessness—that tendency to do all kinds of anti-social things that so dragged down our communities. It is time that we addressed that problem, in the inner cities and elsewhere.
Unemployment is an important variable, perhaps as important as any other. Of all the ethnic minorities in this country the Pakistani and Bangladeshi populations are most vulnerable to high unemployment both cyclical and long term. That problem, like prostitution and drug dealing in the inner cities, must be addressed, perhaps by re-examining the application of single regeneration budgets and the way in which the bids for that scheme are drafted.
We must think seriously about strengthening the institutions of communities such as that in and around Manningham by empowering those communities and ensuring that the ordinary people within them have a voice in shaping their lives. If we do not address those issues all of us, whether we represent inner city constituencies or not, will regret it. Our police forces cannot continue to be, in the words of the assistant chief constable of West Yorkshire,
"the anvil on which these youths"—
Asian youths—
"are beating out their frustrations and anger".
Mob rule and collective bargaining by riot can have no place in a modern democracy. It is our duty to ensure that the mechanisms are in place to convince people that there are alternative means of making their voices heard.
12.44 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Nicholas Baker): I am grateful to the hon. Member for Bradford, West (Mr. Madden) for raising the subject of the recent disturbances in Bradford, and to every Member who has contributed to the debate.
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Obviously it is essential to hear the concerns expressed by the Members who represent that great city, and I assure them that we take what they say very seriously indeed. I also thank the hon. Member for Pontypridd (Dr. Howells) for the way in which he spoke. I cannot agree with every word that he said, but some of it seemed like remarkably new material from the Opposition, if I may say so—constructive, socially responsible and right.
As the hon. Member for Pontypridd said, every decent citizen of this country, regardless of background, must have been appalled by the scenes of senseless violence that presented themselves to us. I am sure that the House will agree that, whatever the underlying causes, the fact remains that there can be no excuse for the criminal activity of those who commit acts of violence and confront the police in the way witnessed in Bradford over those three nights from 9 to 11 June.
Those involved in the disturbances may have genuine grievances and concerns that should be properly addressed. Many have been described in the debate. But violence is not the way to deal with them. I am glad that discussions are now taking place between the police and members of the Asian community in Bradford. That is a far more sensible and positive approach.
The hon. Member for Bradford, West listed 10 questions, and I can tell him that many of those are now being considered by the police and other bodies. For example, as part of the reorganisation within West Yorkshire police, emphasis is being placed on sector policing. That means that sector inspectors will take charge of community affairs matters alongside their operational duties. It does not mean that any division's community involvement will be lessened. The community involvement unit will continue its valuable work among the communities that the force serves.
The hon. Gentleman also mentioned the problems associated with prostitution. Even before the disturbances West Yorkshire police, with the approval of the local community, had agreed to prioritise the reduction of prostitution in residential areas of Bradford. That strategy is now firmly in place, with an increase in the size of the local detachment of the vice squad.
Mention was also made of a possible inquiry by the local community groups, notably the Bradford Congress. The Government will certainly take seriously any report or conclusions produced by such an inquiry. No doubt some of the questions that one would have to consider are being examined already. I say that because I think that the local community is the source of the greatest knowledge of the problems with which we are all concerned.
The police should receive our full support in dealing with public disorder, and no doubt they do. It is the responsibility of chief police officers to decide how to respond, but I have no hesitation in saying that the overall response to what happened in Bradford was justified and professional. I know that the chief constable will do all in his power to prevent any repetition of the incidents, both through constructive dialogue with the community and through a commitment to deal firmly with lawbreaking. I believe that the House should commend the police service for the enormous strides that it has made in recent years in meeting the new challenges presented by our multi-racial society.
We have been working closely with the Association of Chief Police Officers under the quality of service initiative to put into place effective policies and strategies

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that will meet the legitimate expectations of all sections of our society and, in particular, the needs of ethnic minority communities.
Naturally the community must be consulted so that the police know what local people need and want. Indeed, under section 106 of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, police authorities are required to make arrangements for public consultation. In the Toller Lane division of West Yorkshire police, for instance, I understand that police community consultative groups meet regularly. The importance of those groups has been heightened by the events we are discussing today. At the last meeting in May, the discussion included details of the force's policing plans, and the problems posed by prostitutes in the area.
West Yorkshire police, like all police forces, places great emphasis on community involvement. I understand that in the Toller Lane division, the community liaison unit is extensively concerned with local projects, working with young people and local schools. It is involved with the Manningham drugs forum—which has been mentioned in the debate—and recently participated in a youth forum run by the Boys' Brigade to consult local people. These are small local initiatives that are terribly important to the community.
The Police Complaints Authority is currently supervising the investigation of a number of complaints made about police conduct arising from the events in Bradford. The investigation is to be carried out by a chief superintendent, whose appointment has been approved. He will keep a close eye on some of the matters which have been raised in the debate.
As the hon. Member for Pontypridd said, the Police Complaints Authority can look into wider issues surrounding complaints against the police, which might include training, bailing policy or force policy. The PCA is independent of the police, and its job is to see that allegations of misconduct are thoroughly investigated and impartially considered. If the investigation now under way uncovers evidence of police misconduct, the Police Complaints Authority has the power to recommend, and ultimately to direct, that disciplinary charges are brought against the officers involved. Any evidence which suggests that a criminal offence has been committed would, of course, be sent to the Crown Prosecution Service for consideration.
I understand that about 15 complaints against the police have been recorded so far, and I encourage anyone who considers that they have been treated improperly by the police to come forward and make use of the formal complaints procedure. Parliament has laid down an effective procedure for dealing with complaints against the police, and I have every confidence that the Police Complaints Authority will carry out its statutory duty and ensure that there is a thorough and independent investigation of those allegations of police misconduct which have arisen in Bradford.
My right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary and I met the hon. Member for Bradford, West and others on 19 June to discuss many of the issues affecting community relations in Bradford as a result of the events in Manningham. We were grateful for the helpful, practical and constructive way in which hon. Members approached the discussion. It was a useful exchange of information and opinion.
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The hon. Member for Bradford, West also discussed with us his wish to see work put in hand to identify the issues that led to the disturbances, and he called for a wide-ranging public inquiry to be set up. The Government are satisfied that the inquiry by the Police Complaints Authority will investigate all the circumstances surrounding the complaints against the police over that weekend. We do not feel that any more detailed and lengthy inquiry is the best way to look at the root causes.
Many of the concerns of the community are already matters of public knowledge and are the subject of consultation and action, both locally and nationally. In fact, one of the community relations consultants from the Home Office spent many hours over that weekend talking to the police and members of the community to assess for Ministers what had led to the disturbances and how they might be resolved.
Clearly there are matters connected with these issues which lie within the responsibility of central Government and local government, but it is very important that the community in Bradford itself now be given the opportunity to get on with repairing the damage it has suffered. Experience shows that any community needs to be given a clear role and responsibility to help solve its own difficulties.
We cannot expect, nor do we, that all the responsibility lies within the community itself. But unless the people of Bradford feel that they own some part of the solution to their difficulties, the chances of coming to a conclusion which means anything and can be accepted by all is that much more difficult to achieve. As my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (Mr. Waller) said, a public inquiry will not help that process. It would concentrate on the negative aspects—such an inquiry would specialise in apportioning blame—rather than seeking to build on the very positive spirit that exists in Bradford. Despite the disturbances, hon. Members representing the city have referred to that positive spirit. I do not feel it would be productive to delay the process of reconciliation and healing until a report was prepared in a year or more's time.
Mr. Madden: Even at this late stage, I would urge the Minister not to close his mind to the suggestion of an independent public inquiry. Many people in Bradford are puzzled that the Government are prepared to give their blessing to a local public inquiry and have assured us that they will co-operate fully with such an inquiry, yet they are rejecting a wholly independent public inquiry which could be conducted speedily because they believe that it would be negative. How can the Minister reject out of hand an unprecedented inquiry which could be a positive, worthwhile and effective step in the healing process, and yet be prepared to support a local inquiry about which many of us have deep reservations?
Mr. Nicholas Baker: I understand what the hon. Gentleman says, but—for the reasons which I have elaborated—I believe that a public inquiry would not be the best way to discover the needs, concerns or solutions that the city has.
It is particularly sad to witness such unrest in a city such as Bradford which actually has a long and successful history of celebrating a rich and diverse community, and which takes the best from all of the backgrounds and cultures of its people. The history of Bradford demonstrates a commendable, effective and above all successful approach to the integration of different

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communities. Hon. Members have mentioned that, despite their sadness, in the debate today. It is not the record of a city suffering from major tensions within and between its communities. It would be a great shame if that record was to be in any way challenged by the actions of a few irresponsible and selfish individuals.
As the hon. Member for Bradford, West will know, the number of groups active in Bradford illustrate the city's record. They are working with local and national agencies to tackle issues affecting the community. Those groups include Manningham Asian Residents Association and the Pakistan community centre, and police groups such as the community consultative group in the Toller Lane division. These groups are all working locally, and the knowledge, concern and information needed to produce solutions will come from them.
Many of those groups have made considerable efforts to canvass the views of young people and to encourage them to participate. For example, the last meeting of the police community consultative group in Toller Lane was deliberately held in a venue which would be likely to attract young people to attend, and the Bradford Council of Mosques has an established youth group. The community in Bradford will no doubt wish to consider how it can build upon this good work, and how best it can provide young people with an appropriate platform for their views. Many of those issues will, no doubt, relate to local ones, for example, the relationship with the police; local authority provision; employment, education and housing. I am sure that West Yorkshire police and Bradford city council will also be looking at ways of addressing those concerns to ensure that the views of the community are properly considered.
Reference has been made to the Government's investment in Bradford, which has been remarkable in three respects, the first being the single regeneration budget—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order.

Vehicle Excise Duty
1 pm
Mr. Peter Butler: I am grateful to the president of the House of Commons Motor Club, otherwise known as Madam Speaker, for permitting me my first Adjournment debate. I should also like to thank others who have raised with me, and supported, the concerns expressed about changes to the rules on vehicle excise duty, in particular, my hon. Friend the Member for Derby, North (Mr. Knight), whom I thank not only because he is a well-known old car enthusiast but because he is the Conservative deputy Chief Whip. I therefore feel that it is tactful to mention him.
I declare a number of non-pecuniary interests as a member of the Vintage Sports Car Club; honorary legal adviser to the Bentley Drivers Club; a member of the 750 Motor Club and as one of two Members of Parliament who is eligible to hold an international race licence. I also declare a rare victory for Conservatives—the winning of something—in the London to Brighton run last year, which is not, of course, technically a race, when I was the guest of the president of the Veteran Car Club in a 1900 Stevens Dogcart. My final interest is that after 34 years of assiduous graft, I have gone from having one Austin Seven, which was given to me on my 10th birthday, to being the proud owner of two Austin Sevens. That says something for the property-owning democracy.
I am grateful for the Minister's presence. He is an honourable man, who has said:
"It is not our intention to penalise the law-abiding motorists."
He has also said:
"We are determined to produce workable proposals that will attract a wide measure of support and will not disadvantage honest motorists."
I am happy to give my hon. Friend the chance today to achieve both those objectives. I know that he is a man who does not miss many chances and I am sure that he will take the one that I am offering. In doing so, I hope that he will reassure the many hundreds of thousands in the country who have been concerned about the proposed changes. I do not exaggerate. I would like to thank first the Federation of British Historic Vehicle Clubs. One of its constituent bodies was put together to fight a previous proposal for tax on possession put forward in 1980 by my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Sir N. Fowler), but subsequently, on mature reflection, withdrawn. That federation alone has 285 affiliate clubs representing between one quarter and one third of a million members. I mention that because one sits in the Chamber sometimes and hears talk about "widespread concern", which amounts to no more than half a dozen letters.
I thank Lord Montagu, who has done a considerable amount of work with the Minister and others on the proposed changes. I also thank the more temperate of those who have written to me on the subject.
I make it clear that there is no objection to making the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency's records better. An accurate V5 confirms the identity and to some degree the history of a vehicle. It also helps to trace vehicles for defect recall, although I accept that that does not apply to many historic vehicles. It identifies the keeper of a recovered stolen vehicle and the current keeper immediately for breaches of the road traffic Acts.

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Everyone must agree with those excellent objectives. There is nothing but positive support for the improvement of the records.
It follows that of the two proposals, joint notification is not one which would be a problem, except to the extent that, in paragraphs 36 and 37 of the consultation document, a requirement is placed on the disposer of the vehicle to establish the "true identity" of the purchaser. Many might feel that that places an undue and legal obligation on someone disposing of a vehicle to act in some way as a policeman of the honesty of his purchaser. That is impracticable and I have no doubt that in due course the severity of that obligation will be reduced. The very idea of prosecuting someone for having been misled into recording the name of his purchaser incorrectly is abhorrent.
As part of the joint notification and the other proposals in the document, we look forward to the establishment of proper records to show when a vehicle has been scrapped or written off. A proper list of previous keepers should be shown, with the mileage on change of keeper visibly recorded on the document. Those improvements, to which we look forward, are greatly to be welcomed.
The difficulty comes under what is quietly called "continuous licensing". The documentation on that is headed:
"Proposals for reducing vehicle excise duty evasion."
First, one must consider how much evasion occurs and whether it is reducible. It is estimated by so-called "professional statisticians" that 4.1 per cent. of vehicles currently on the road do not display a tax disc. That represents a reduction of nearly 50 per cent. since 1980 and suggests, first, that measures against evasion have been extremely effective in the past 15 years and, secondly, that perhaps we have reached a level that cannot be reduced still further except at disproportionate cost. I must concede that both those figures—8 per cent. in 1980 and 4.1 per cent. now—are estimates.
The Government calculate a £145 million loss to the taxpayer, by which, presumably, they mean a loss of gross revenue as opposed to a loss to the taxpayer net of the cost of collection. Of that loss, £16.5 million is accounted for by vehicles over 12 tonnes, which are to be exempted in any event from the continuous licensing or continuous taxation proposals, on the interesting basis, put forward by a spokesman for the DVLA, that
"The view is that it would have a detrimental effect on business."
Hon. Members might feel that the first people who should not be running untaxed vehicles are those who are running heavy goods vehicles in the course of their business. No doubt the Minister will correct me if I have got that wrong.
One major fault that the proposals aim to tackle is the missed month—the slipped or lost month. That occurs when someone inadvertently or otherwise forgets to renew a tax disc. One must then fill out a form, which asks for the date of acquisition of a vehicle, or the date of expiry on the tax disc. It also asks for the date from which the licence is to run. If there is a gap between the two, one must sign a simple statement at the bottom of the form to confirm that the vehicle has not been used or been kept on the road between those two dates.
I respectfully suggest to the Minister two more effective, and certainly cheaper, ways of approaching that problem. When I say that a declaration must be signed,
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that simply means that a signature is put at the bottom of the form to confirm that the particulars given are correct. I believe that one signs a statement to the effect, "I understand that I might be prosecuted," but no one, of course, reads that. In certain jurisdictions a similar form requires a proper legal declaration to he witnessed. The signature must be witnessed to give it the form and substance of a proper legal declaration. I am told that that is an effective stop to evasion, because it makes people pause and think. They realise that if they sign that form falsely, they are committing a criminal offence. I commend that idea to the Minister for further consideration.
Secondly, I suggest an alteration to the law to permit the wheel-clamping of cars that are seen on the highway not displaying a current vehicle excise licence. I recommend both those suggestions as practical means of dealing with a serious problem. They are simple and effective. I appreciate that they may be too simple, but they would work.
If I intended to be fraudulent, the proposed new system would help me enormously. If I am prepared to sign a fraudulent declaration that my vehicle has not been on the road, I would equally be prepared to sign a fraudulent declaration to get an off-road licence. Whenever I was finally stopped driving it with an off-road licence, I would say, of course, that it was the first time that I had used the car with that licence—no doubt I would probably say that I was on my way to the post office to change it to an on-road licence. All of us who have been in magistrates courts professionally will know that the police always catch someone the first time that he goes out in an untaxed motor vehicle. The new system will make it easier because, instead of simply doing it for a month or two, I will get my off-road licence and use it until I am stopped.
Having made a couple of practical suggestions, I shall explain exactly what we are talking about. Who are those historic vehicle owners, what do they do, why do they do it and why is it a serious matter? What they do, first, is to maintain a living archive of British engineering and social history. For example, the original advertisements for the Austin Seven described it as being a car so simple that it could be used by one's wife or one's servant. I make no comment about that, except to say that my daughters also drive mine.
That archive is also a source from which industrial and motor vehicle historians may work. It maintains pride in the engineering achievements of some great motor manufacturing companies. It gives a continuum right through to today's Formula 1, Saloon Car championship and other racing teams. Eighty per cent. of the world leaders in those sports are based in the United Kingdom. There is a straight continuum in that—the same people having the same interest. Those sports, including rallying, are watched by outstandingly more people than the number who watch football matches. Even more people take part in them than go fishing.
The hobby also, frankly, is fun. Sometimes in the House we are suspicious of anything that is fun—the pursuit of happiness. Being British involves rights as well as responsibilities, and those include the right to enjoy a harmless hobby and not to be taxed in that enjoyment.
It is not a hobby only of the rich, as exemplified by the fact that various Members of the House own historic vehicles. I did some calculations and discovered that

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I could buy an eligible vehicle for less than the cost of a full set of fishing tackle, so it is not a hobby only of the rich, although I believe that my hon. Friend the Minister at one time indulged in it. It is also an enormous fund-earner for charities. Every weekend, almost throughout the year, charity events take place at which motor vehicles of one type or another form a major attraction.
The people who have that hobby are the ones whom Lady Thatcher described as the quiet people, who grumble a little but pay their taxes and are the backbone of England. Why are they so upset?
First, there is a suspicion that the Government have given up on tax dodgers; that the 4.1 per cent. is effectively irreducible so the Government will recoup the loss from law-abiding people who already pay tax. I mention that suspicion so that my hon. Friend the Minister may correct it.
Secondly, there is a suspicion that this is a tax on possession coming along again, 15 years after my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield first proposed it. That suspicion arises from the wording of the consultation paper, which says that for one's off-road licence there will be
"a small charge to cover administration costs (say £5)".
I challenge my hon. Friend the Minister to state publicly, first, that the £5 mentioned is indeed the full administrative cost and, secondly, that it is limited to that recovery cost by statute law, and that to recover more than the administrative cost of £5 would require primary legislation, which the Government have no intention to introduce. I look forward to the Minister's response to that.
The test of the proposals is, in my hon. Friend the Minister's words: are they simple and are they workable? The proposals are alternatives. There would be either two categories of licence instead of the present one, or three categories of licence. Under two categories of licence, one would have the present licence, plus a new one called an off-road licence, which might run for six months or 12 months.
So far, so good and so far, so simple, but the problem comes if one does not want to have one's car on the road for a whole six or 12 months or indeed off the road for the whole six or 12 months. The proposal is explained in the following way:
"Two possible ways of allowing vehicles to be brought back onto the road before the expiry of the off road licence are:

i) the keeper could be liable to pay VED hack to the beginning of the licensing period. This would mean that there would be no incentive to declare a vehicle off the road falsely, because VED would have to be paid back to the point of expiry of the previous licence; or

ii) the keeper could be required to pay a surcharge (perhaps £15)"—

perhaps a lot more—
"on top of the full rate for a six or twelve month on road licence, commencing on the first of the month in which it was applied for".
So far, so slightly less simple.
Let us assume that a vehicle is used for the London to Brighton run once a year. Under the scheme, the owner surrenders his old tax disc or allows it to expire. He then obtains a 12-month off-road licence at nominal cost, but that expires after next year's annual event so, in the
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meantime, he must apply for a six-month off-road licence. When that expires, he applies for another. To put the vehicle back on the road to go to the rally, he has to pay the back tax of five months. He buys a six-month licence, but after one month he surrenders it.
I paraphrase that because I would not wish to ridicule the proposals, which I am sure have taken much time to think out, but I give that as an example of the fact that they are not simple or, in a practical sense, workable. They require a full administrative system in the home office of every person who has one, two or more old vehicles.
However, the real problem with that in the minds of the proposers is that it is not complicated enough, so there is a second proposal. That is that there should be three categories of licence: an on-road licence, an off-road licence and a temporary off-road licence. I shall not go through that as I did the first proposal. Suffice it to say that, under the second proposal, there are at least two, and possibly three, further administrative steps. May I, slightly humorously, suggest a fourth and fifth category—that we have on-road, off-road and temporary off-road licences, coupled, from the owner's point of view, with an off-rocker and a temporary off-rocker licence, as he attempts to fill up the various forms?
What is all that to achieve? It is to achieve full and continuous registration—up to date and detailed. Joint notification will achieve that substantially, and with the good will and support of all the people involved in it. The proposal document says:
"Increased public perception of the value of the registration document"—
with all that extra information in it—
"and a growing awareness of the benefits of compliance will encourage people to participate in the new system."
When I first read that, it seemed like a new definition of optimism but, having considered the facts, I believe that it is correct. First, there should be full and continuous registration. Secondly, there should be full payment of tax on use only, not on keeping or owning, or on possession. So the full and continuous registration amounts already to an off-road record. I do not call it an off-road licence because it does not license or permit anything, but it is already, with full joint notification and the other amendments that we have supported, an off-road record.
One should then apply for a tax disc, which would amount to a declaration that the vehicle will be used on the road only for those months covered by that application, with automatic reversion, through a simple computer programme, to the off-road record status upon the expiry of the vehicle excise duty; no complex rules, no complicated applications, no off-rocker, no home office required.
Much of the problem of "on to off" and "off to on" arises from the occasional use—the charity rallies, the London to Brighton run and so on. With respect to Lord Montagu, who gave me the original idea, I make the following simple, radical and, dare I say it, workable proposal.
First, you will he aware, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that pre-1948 manufactured vehicles have a reduced vehicle excise duty, currently £70. I know that it is already in the mind of the Minister that that should be altered to pre-1960, according to the press, or pre-1970, according

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to the more optimistic press. I respectfully suggest that that definition be changed to 25 years old or more. It will then continue forward, year on year.
Those vehicles should pay 25 per cent. of whatever the current vehicle excise duty is, and that should cover any period up to a whole year. In other words, whether the vehicle is used once, for one month, six months or the whole year, the owner of a vehicle that is 25 years old or more pays 25 per cent. of the VED. We should abolish the six-month licence for that category of vehicles and abolish the bureaucracy of unused months' refunds, for that class only.
While my hon. Friend the Minister considers that, I shall make three short suggestions. First, the definition of a vehicle must be included. It is not in the regulations at the moment. Obviously, it would be a vehicle of a type which at some stage would require a MOT test. Secondly, I commend him and encourage him to continue the protection for traders and museums that he has already included. Thirdly, I ask him to assure me that whatever licence is needed will be readily available at post offices, following the closure of local vehicle licensing offices.
I thank my hon. Friend enormously for listening so carefully to the debate and to the representations that have been received. As the proposals are demonstrably neither simple nor workable and as my hon. Friend is an honourable man, I know that he will, in due course, respond with substantially different proposals. If so, will he undertake a consultation exercise on the new proposals?
1.19 pm
The Minister for Transport in London (Mr. Steve Norris): I know that when my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, North-East (Mr. Butler) used the term "honourable man", he was thinking of the parliamentary rather than the Shakespearean definition. On that assumption, I welcome the opportunity to respond to the points that he has made.
There is no doubt that our proposals to improve the quality of our vehicle records at DVLA and to reduce vehicle excise duty evasion have attracted considerable interest. We have received about 20,000 letters since our proposals for continuous licensing were first announced by my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (Mr. Key) on 20 July last year. The DVLA has issued 12,000 copies of the consultation paper and we have received 3,000 responses.
Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: Quite a lot of those responses undoubtedly came from me. I must declare an interest as the owner of nine Morris Minors. I have received an enormous amount of post on the subject. There are strong feelings about it.
Mr. Norris: One of the delights of the House is to find out something new about one's colleagues almost every day. I now know that the possession of nine Morris Minors must figure large among the many qualities that I already attribute to my hon. Friend. My hon. Friend need not apologise for writing to me on the subject; I know the strength of feeling on the subject of my hon. Friend and other owners of vehicles that are not customarily on the road for 12 months of the year. It is important to put that on the record. None of the proposals has the slightest
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impact on someone who, like me, simply taxes his car from one 12-month period to the next. Such people have nothing to be worried about.
I shall explain why we want to look at how the present arrangements work.
Mr. Paul Tyler: Will the Minister give way?
Mr. Norris: Yes, but the hon. Gentleman must be quick as we are under time constraints.
Mr. Tyler: I congratulate the hon. Member for Milton Keynes, North-East (Mr. Butler) on introducing the debate. As the Minister recognises, there is widespread concern on the subject. Will the Minister address the point of principle raised by the hon. Gentleman? If the purpose of the tax is to tax usage rather than ownership, the hon. Member for Lancaster (Dame E. Kellett-Bowman) will be saved from any cost. But those who use the roads infrequently—even if they have vehicles other than vintage vehicles—will still be penalised.
Mr. Norris: I shall refer to that point in the remaining few minutes.
There has rightly and understandably been some criticism of our proposals and there has been much speculation about what they might lead to. There has also been widespread support for the overall objectives that we set ourselves in the consultation document. About 25 per cent. of DVLA records are out of date and inaccurate at any one time simply because people who buy vehicles do not immediately inform the DVLA—some people take up to a year to do so. They often do so when they want to retax their vehicles and realise that their V5 form is not in their name but in the previous owner's name. It astonishes me that more people do not realise that, when they sell their vehicle, it is in their interest to ensure that the DVLA is aware of the change of owner. There cannot be many of us who have not received a fixed penalty or a parking ticket relating to a vehicle that has long since been disposed of. If the DVLA was informed, it is highly unlikely that such trouble would be encountered.
It is not simply a bureaucratic ambition to ensure that the DVLA database is up to date and truly relevant. There are three obvious reasons for an accurate DVLA database. First, and most importantly, we operate a system whereby, once manufacturers identify a safety fault on a vehicle, they must send a notice to everyone who has bought that particular type of vehicle. They must tell the owners that their vehicles, which may not be new but may be two or three years old, have a fault. They must tell them urgently to go to any garage, where the fault will be put right straight away and free of charge. The House will understand the need for an accurate DVLA database in order to trace those owners.
We also need an accurate DVLA database to tackle vehicle excise duty evasion—the second main pillar of the proposals. We must, from the outset, have an accurate tax database.
The third and obvious reason for an accurate database is that we are increasingly moving into a world where traffic will be regulated by technology, whether that be camera or trip technology. If we are to use such camera technology, the sine qua non—the precondition—is that when the ticket is issued for an offence, we must have an accurate database to back up the system, otherwise there will be trouble.

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My hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, North-East suggested that there was a suspicion that we had given up on the £160 million a year that goes uncollected. The figure amounts to about 4.1 per cent.— I do not know the exact figure. Most of that figure is the result of short-term evasion. As my hon. Friend suggested, people simply try to skip paying the tax—they do so pretty regularly.
Many people are angry and say that we should do something about such evasion, which is a very visible form of tax evasion. In every constituency it is possible, when walking to the station or pushing a shopping trolley in a supermarket car park, to see vehicles with no vehicle excise duty disc or an out-of-date disc displayed in the windscreen. It has been estimated that, at any one time, there are up to one and a half million vehicles on the road without a valid disc. We must do something about that.
For all those reasons, we intended to eliminate evasion and improve the quality of the records. It is fairly clear that the joint notification proposals have received pretty unanimous support. They will deliver tangible benefits such as information on mileage and previous keepers, which we propose to show on the registration documents. In my experience, classic car owners positively welcome that because the thrill of ownership comes from the vehicle's history—it is part of the hobby's attraction. Other benefits will include a more secure registration document, which will make fraud and vehicle ringing more difficult. That, too, will be in the legitimate owner's interest.
The continuous licensing proposals have been less uniformly welcomed.
Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: That is an understatement.
Mr. Norris: That is a masterly understatement. I have never been known to exaggerate, so it is possibly appropriate to put it in that context.
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We intend to close off the options for VED evaders, particularly the month dodgers. In the couple of minutes remaining to me, I shall outline our two propositions. First, there is the two-tier option, under which the owners of occasionally used vehicles will pay more. That is a fairly simple system to operate. The other option is what we refer to as the three-tier system, which is more complex to administer. It will cause more paperwork and is arguably more bureaucratic, but it will not involve additional cost to owners. It will, however, involve owners putting an amount down as a deposit at. the first point at which they take the vehicle off the road—an amount that is subsequently recoverable.
I shall now respond specifically to the concerns of my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes, North-East. First, I know that Lord Montagu of Beaulieu has clearly said that we have adequately covered museum vehicles and vehicles undergoing restoration—there is no concern about that. Secondly, we have always made it clear that we do not wish to use the proposal simply to extend the tax base. The £5 charge to which my hon. Friend referred is a charge to recover DVLA costs. The DVLA is empowered by statute only to recover costs at the level at which they were incurred. The charge is not the thin end of the wedge, leading to £135. If there were to be any proposal to go further than recovering costs—that is, to tax rather than simply to recover costs—that would require specific legislative proposals. It is important that my hon. Friend should have that assurance and I am happy to give it to him.
We believe that the consultation has been extremely useful. Sadly, I have not had time to expand on the various arguments for and against the proposals. Suffice it to say, we have been very keen to bear in mind the fundamental objectives of improving the quality of the record and dealing with the issue of evasion. We have borne in mind the many expressions of concern about the level of additional cost or the additional paperwork. It may surprise my hon. Friend—but I hope that it will not surprise him too much—
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Geoffrey Lofthouse): Order. The time for the debate has expired.

Television Services (Wales)
1.30 pm
Mr. Llew Smith: I shall try to be brief, as I wish to share my speaking time with my hon. Friend the Member for Islwyn (Mr. Touhig), who has done a lot of work in this area over the years.
The debate is not about whether we are for or against the Welsh language: it is about freedom of choice. I was employed for 15 years as a tutor organiser with the Workers Educational Association, and much of my work involved organising classes in Welsh language and culture in community centres. Those classes were supported by the Labour-controlled Gwent county council, of which my hon. Friend was a prominent member. So I start from the position of wanting to see the Welsh language flourish.
About 12 months ago, I read an article in the Western Mail which stated that people in north Wales who cannot receive the S4C television channel had secured all-party backing for their claim that they should not be deprived of Welsh language broadcasts. The article went on to state that Welsh nationalist, Labour and Liberal Democrat politicians agreed at a meeting that it was a civil rights issue, and that people in Delyn should receive coverage of all local programmes.
One should compare that tolerant sentiment with the intolerance often expressed by some Welsh nationalists and by those people within the Welsh language movement in response to demands from communities like my own—where English is almost inevitably the first and only language—that they, in turn, should have access to English language Channel 4. I was reminded of that intolerance when I read an article in the Western Mail responding to a petition demanding that communities throughout Wales should have access to English language Channel 4. Those who made such demands were compared with Hitler and his belief in one kingdom, one people, one language.
Many of us have come to expect that sort of response from Welsh nationalists on that and other issues, but it is insulting to many people in my community who fought and died opposing Nazism and to those people who are still fighting, in a different way, whenever such prejudices are expressed. While it is a question of civil liberties when the people in north Wales cannot receive Welsh language channel S4C, similar reasoning is not applied to those communities in south Wales and in other parts of Wales who demand access to English language Channel 4.
We recognise the right of the people of north Wales to receive S4C. We do not want English language Channel 4 at the expense of S4C; we want it in addition to S4C. In other words, we want to increase freedom of choice for viewers throughout Wales.
It is somewhat ironic that Cardiff, the capital of Wales, receives English language Channel 4, while communities like those in my constituency cannot receive that service. Although only 2.2 per cent. of the people of Blaenau Gwent speak Welsh, they are forced to receive a channel which they do not understand. Unlike people in other areas, they are not given the choice of viewing all Channel 4 programmes at a reasonable hour.
In my time as a Member of the European Parliament, and in the past few years as a Member of the British Parliament, not one person has contacted me defending the present position. However, time and again people have
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voiced their opposition to it, and have demanded access to Channel 4. That view was reflected in a recent opinion poll conducted by the Gwent Gazette, which covers my constituency. The poll showed that more than 90 per cent. of my constituents demanded access to English language Channel 4. That and other opinion polls have showed the support for the position that I am arguing today. They also reflect the people's depth of feeling and anger at their exclusion from receiving that television channel.
While the opinion poll was conducted in Gwent, it must be remembered that the problem is not peculiar to Gwent, as only about 40 per cent. of Welsh people can receive Channel 4.
Mr. Ted Rowlands: My hon. Friend has referred to the Welsh people's depth of anger and frustration. As a Member of Parliament, I felt anger and frustration when Welsh language programmes were available on both BBC 1 and HTV. S4C was devised to serve two purposes: first, to allow Welsh language broadcasting to expand; and, secondly, to remove from the two major channels Welsh language programmes that were causing tremendous offence. I think that my hon. Friend should be reminded of S4C's dual purpose.
Mr. Smith: I accept my hon. Friend's point. I think that that situation was having a detrimental effect on the Welsh language. However, the present situation is having a similar effect. We have managed to contain the anti-S4C feeling, but, if the present situation continues, people will not call for Channel 4 in addition to S4C, but will demand it in place of S4C. I am certainly not of that view.
S4C has responded to my points by saying: if Channel 4 is available in Wales, should not Welsh language channel S4C be available in the rest of the United Kingdom? That is an interesting response. S4C says that it does not object to Channel 4 being provided in addition to S4C. It also states that approximately 70 per cent. of Channel 4's programmes are also broadcast on S4C. However, it is important to recognise the time of day at which those programmes are broadcast—it is very rarely during peak viewing time.
It is also interesting to note that the highest proportion of viewers who watch Welsh programmes on S4C regularly are those in managerial and technical occupations. Only 5.1 per cent. of those who are not in paid work watch S4C Welsh language programmes. Some 1.2 per cent. of those who cannot speak Welsh watch Welsh language programmes on S4C regularly, compared with 9 per cent. of the total population.
I have taken those figures from the Welsh Office social survey which was published in February this year. It is also interesting to note that only 4.6 per cent. of the population of Gwent bother to tune in to Welsh language radio. According to the Welsh Office survey, approximately 80 per cent. of the population of Gwent never watch Welsh programmes on S4C. The Broadcasting Act 1990 states that Channel 4 should be provided for
"so much of England, Scotland and Northern Ireland as from time to time be reasonably practicable".
The legislation must be changed if areas like mine are to receive Channel 4 by right. I think that that would be fairly simple to do, as one could just replace the words "England, Scotland and Northern Ireland" with "United Kingdom".

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The matter may also be resolved through the use of additional transmitters. I know that S4C would say that there is a problem with cost. I do not wish to push the point too much, but I think that it is somewhat ironic that S4C should take that position, when one considers that it is probably the most subsidised of all the television channels. We should also consider the possibility of rescheduling, so that programmes can be televised at the same time but in different areas, depending on the language of a particular community.
It is also argued that we should wait for the digital system. I am sure that will result in major advances, but the decoders will cost between £200 and £500. Many communities in Wales that cannot receive S4C or Channel 4 English language programmes are also the poorest communities. I was interested to read an article by Andrew Neil in The Independent on 16 June, stating:
"There is every chance that the digital revolution will be dominated by Sky and its leading shareholders News Corporation, which control the essential system."
So there are problems ahead.
According to recent correspondence from representatives of S4C, they would be concerned if people's failure to receive Channel 4 led to an anti-S4C feeling. I have responded to that point, but I am aware that there is such a danger unless the problem is resolved.
For some people, the only measure of Welshness is the Welsh language, so for them, the only television channel relevant to Wales is S4C. Such an argument insults the majority of people in Wales, who are English-speaking. When people talk about civil liberties, they mean civil liberties only for those who speak the Welsh language, whereas the rest of us recognise the value of both languages and the diverse cultures that make up Wales. We should build on that diversity and encourage it. Access to S4C for the people of north Wales is an issue of civil liberties and we ask them to recognise the civil liberties of those who wish to view the alternative Channel 4 in the English language.
1.41 pm
Mr. Don Touhig: I support my hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent (Mr. Smith), and I am delighted to give vent to the feelings of the people I represent. I am grateful to my hon. Friend and to the Secretary of State for agreeing to share the time and allow me to take part in the debate.
Welsh, it is said, is the language of heaven. While I have no sure knowledge of that, I have no intention in my sojourn in this life of preventing it from being spoken. The deliberate suppression of the Welsh language in the last century was one of the worst acts of our Victorian forebears. If Welsh is to survive all the pressures, and not a few prejudices, of the 20th century, it should be encouraged wherever possible. Welsh medium broadcasting has a part to play in that.
I am proud of the fact that, in the past decade or more, Gwent, through the Labour-controlled county council, has invested large sums of money in education for young children who want to be educated through the medium of Welsh, but the language will survive and flourish only if people are encouraged to use it. If they perceive it as being foisted on them against their will, they will react accordingly. Recent history is proof of that.
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I remember as a young reporter on the Free Press at Pontypool writing about public protests over Welsh language broadcasting going out at peak times in English-speaking areas.
The emergence of S4C was a progressive and positive step. It encouraged the language, while removing the antagonism to it from many television viewers, but I fear that, unless we address the legitimate demands of the English-speaking Welsh people to be given the choice whether to watch S4C or Channel 4, we risk a renewed backlash. In an attempt to avoid that, I pressed S4C to consider the possibility of rescheduling, to which my hon. Friend referred.
I asked S4C to consider rescheduling so that people in different parts of Wales could watch different programmes at different times. In that way, it would be possible for the English-speaking majority in south-east Wales to watch a programme in English, while in north and west Wales, where Welsh is often the first language, a different programme could go out in Welsh. I hope that S4C will respond positively to that suggestion, but I recognise that it is but a halfway house.
In an early-day motion last week on S4C in Wales, my hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent and I underlined our support for S4C, but in all honesty we had to state quite clearly that S4C does not cater for the vast majority of people in Wales whose only language is English.
My hon. Friend referred to a poll conducted by his local paper, which sought to obtain readers' views. The South Wales Argus, the local evening paper serving my constituency and much of Gwent, conducted a similar poll, showing that readers were overwhelmingly in favour of being able to watch Channel 4 as well as S4C. I do not consider telephone polls a wholly satisfactory method of measuring public opinion; they do little more than give the flavour.
More significantly, some 8,000 people have already been prepared to put their names to a petition in support of choice, which I understand will be presented to the Secretary of State in October.
It is not that English-speaking Welsh people in the south Wales valleys are against the language. They simply want the same facility as those who live in Cardiff, the capital city of Wales, to watch both television channels. I cannot emphasise too strongly that the debate is not about replacing S4C with Channel 4; it is about giving the people of Wales the opportunity to watch both stations.
I am fortunate that, in the part of Gwent where I live, I can already do that, but it is not the case everywhere. In the Graig area of Cwmcarn in my constituency, people are unable to receive any television, whether it is broadcast in English or Welsh. My constituents have to pay £100 a year to a cable company to pipe in the signal in addition to £100 for a television licence. As Mr. Ken James, one of my constituents, wrote to tell me, the quality of the television signal is appalling, and is affected by the strength of the wind across the local hills.
I have sought to give the Minister an idea of the feelings of people in my area on the issue. If we do not respond to public feeling, we are in danger of harming Welsh language broadcasting. My hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent has already outlined a possible solution, although not a simple or cheap one—the development of digital television broadcasting. My hon.

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Friend the Member for Nottingham, North (Mr. Allen) has secured an Adjournment debate on the issue tomorrow night, and I do not propose to stray into his territory. However, I would welcome a statement from the Minister about the early publication of a promised White Paper on digitalisation. It will help extend choice, but will not in itself solve the problem.
We also require a commitment from the Government to extending to Channel 4 the right to broadcast in Wales which is currently denied by the Broadcasting Acts 1981 and 1990. I understand that S4C may not necessarily oppose that.
Taken together, those measures will answer the legitimate complaints of my constituents, and at the same time ensure that the development of Welsh medium broadcasting continues without antagonism and rancour.
1.47 pm
The Secretary of State for National Heritage (Mr. Stephen Dorrell): I begin on a matter of some sensitivity. The reason why I have the pleasure of replying to the debate is that my hon. Friend the Minister for Sport is currently in South Africa supporting a rugby team. It is an important part of his ministerial duties to support our national teams. I am sure that I shall enlist the support of the Welsh Members present for wishing him Godspeed and improved fortunes in the remaining game for the English rugby team.
My first serious point is to say how much I agree with the basic line that the hon. Members for Blaenau Gwent (Mr. Smith) and for Islwyn (Mr. Touhig) took about the importance of the Welsh language and ensuring that there is proper support for the development of Welsh speaking and proper respect for Welsh culture in Wales.
As both hon. Gentlemen said, it is not a matter of a choice between S4C as an agency for the promotion of Welsh television and English-speaking Channel 4. They both presented the case that they wished to argue to the House in terms of extending choice and access to English-speaking Channel 4. It is not an issue of Welsh people or their representatives in the House being against S4C or Welsh-speaking television; it is a question of their English-speaking constituents not wanting to be denied the opportunity to see English-speaking Channel 4 on the same terms as are available to the rest of the United Kingdom. That is a perfectly fair argument for representatives of English-speaking Welsh constituents to make in this House.
It is worth pausing at this point to reflect on the contribution that S4C has made to the development of Welsh speaking and of proper respect for Welsh culture. As Secretary of State for National Heritage, I think it important not to seek to create an homogenised, centralised culture in Britain, but to build one that respects regional and local diversity and traditions. I regard the fact that my Department is responsible for the public contribution, in terms of finance, to S4C as part of a wider contribution to the delivery of a varied and pluralist cultural life in Britain—one that respects the differing traditions of various parts of the United Kingdom.
It is fair to record the fact that S4C achieves a significant audience share, not just among the Welsh-speaking population—its share of peak viewing is nearly 19 per cent. of them—but among the whole population of Wales: its peak viewing share amounts to
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9.5 per cent. of them. As for audience reach, 66 per cent., or two thirds, of the people of Wales look at S4C at least once a week, although the programmes in question are not necessarily Welsh language ones. So S4C is not, as it has been constituted, a minority interest channel. It is a broadcaster that performs a service right across Wales, and it is used at different times in the week by two thirds of its population.
S4C has a distinguished record of developing various aspects of the cultural life of Wales. The reputation of its children's programming and its animation department spreads far beyond the borders of the Principality. Its animation programmes and its children's programmes reach audiences not just outside Wales but outside the United Kingdom.
S4C has also been an important contributor to the development of the independent production sector in Wales. It is clearly a Welsh-oriented station, and its support for the Welsh independent production sector has been an important factor in that sector's progress.
Finally, it is important to stress again that the easy availability of Welsh language broadcasting has made an important contribution—possibly the decisive contribution—to halting the decline of Welsh speaking and to heightening perceptions of, and respect paid to, Welsh culture. I regard S4C as one of the Government's successes. We legislated for its existence in the Broadcasting Act 1980, and we continued its existence in the Broadcasting Act 1990. It has been the biggest single achievement in living memory to demonstrate real public support for Welsh culture as a living, developing entity, not just the pursuit of a tiny and shrinking minority. All in all, S4C makes a significant contribution to the life of Wales.
The problem which the hon. Members for Blaenau Gwent and for Islwyn put to the House is that, when setting aside spectrum space to allow this broadcasting to take place, a choice had to be made about access to the spectrum and about the terms on which S4C would have the chance to deliver all the benefits that I have described. As both hon. Members made clear, it is not a straight choice between English language and Welsh language broadcasting. S4C's schedules include a large element of English language Channel 4 broadcasting. The objective is to deliver roughly 75 per cent. Channel 4 English language broadcasting over the S4C element of the network—that is, 75 per cent. excluding Channel 4's news programming.
Thus, S4C is an important transmitter and broadcaster of English language Channel 4 programme material, and there is no straight choice between English, represented by Channel 4, and Welsh, represented by S4C. The latter seeks to deliver its Welsh mission by mixing English and Welsh language programming but according a higher priority to Welsh language broadcasting than has been delivered by any other means in the history of Welsh broadcasting.
More than once, the hon. Members for Blaenau Gwent and Islwyn sought to argue that the offer of a clear choice between the S4C schedule and a recognisably English Channel 4 schedule was restricted by costs—either costs incurred by S4C or costs incurred by some other, unmentioned body. In the present state of technology, the limitation on providing a clear choice between two complete schedules—one the same as Channel 4 and the rest of the United Kingdom, the other run by S4C—is

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not cost: it is technical feasibility, or the availability of spectrum, given the state of modern technology. That is the answer to the conundrum that both hon. Gentlemen described.
The world of broadcasting is on the verge of a revolution which will make broadcasting in 10 or 15 years' time unrecognisable. The introduction of digital technology, not simply to terrestrial broadcasting but to cable and satellite broadcasting, opens the door to a world in which it will no longer be correct to talk about spectrum as the limiting factor on access to audience for a broadcaster. Ever since the beginnings of broadcasting, the limiting factor has indeed been access to spectrum, but as technology has developed, so we have learned how to narrow the broadcasting signal and make more efficient use of the spectrum.
The digital revolution takes the process a dramatic stage further. We stand at the dawn of the digital age of broadcasting; and the effect, over a period, of the introduction of digital technology to radio and television broadcasting will be progressively to remove the block that has hitherto limited access to audience by broadcasters. In future we shall be able to move—rather more quickly than most politicians realise—to a world in which the limiting factor on the establishment of new choices for viewers, and the development of new broadcasting stations, will no longer be access to a bureaucratically allocated spectrum but the straightforward economics of broadcasting.
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Thus, a broadcaster who can find an audience prepared to pay for, or a sponsor prepared to support, a broadcast channel will find that spectrum is available. Then, subject to the regulatory regime for which the Government will remain responsible, a broadcaster who can design an economically sustainable station will be able to set up in business to demonstrate that his views on the viability of his station are correct.
Both hon. Members asked me what stage the Government have reached in delivering the promised White Paper on the introduction of the digital revolution. I can lift the veil concealing Ministers' diaries at least a little, and say that I shall be leaving this House to have a meeting on precisely that subject. I hope that the White Paper to which the Government are committed will be ready for publication in the next few weeks. It is quite close; it is in the final stages of preparation. It is the second stage of the changes that the Government plan to announce to the broadcasting world, following the media ownership changes that I announced at the end of May.
Mr. Rowlands: Will the Minister give way?
Mr. Dorrell: Very briefly.
Mr. Rowlands: Will the White Paper subsequently require legislation?
Mr. Dorrell: Yes.
In conclusion, hon. Members put a problem to the House. The answer to that problem lies in the recruitment of new technology to deliver greater choice to the consumer. That is an objective that the Government warmly embrace.

Job Creation
2 pm
Mr. Nigel Evans: I am grateful for the opportunity to raise this important subject for debate today. It is one of those subjects on which it is extremely difficult to get any coverage whatever when things are going well, but when things are going badly tends to lead the news bulletins. Having said that, however, this morning, on page 2 of the Daily Express is an article entitled, "Boom-time Britain" in which it talks about the British economy being
"in fine shape, with soaring exports, falling unemployment and growing output".
An influential report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development has stated that, not the Daily Express. It also states:
"Unemployment could fall by a further 300,000 over the next 18 months to just over two million".
That is excellent news.
If one looks at some of the recent statistics about unemployment, one will see that only last month it fell yet again by another 10,000 to 2.32 million—the 21st successive fall. Within the United Kingdom, the work force in employment now stands at 25.5 million, which is a superb figure. Manufacturing productivity in the three months ending April 1985 rose by 3.2 per cent. Export volumes, which are important, excluding oils and erratics, are up 11.5 per cent, in three months to March on the year earlier. Underlying inflation is at its lowest level since the 1960s. That is all good news for the economy.
My constituency has the lowest level of unemployment in the whole of the United Kingdom. Therefore, one might think it strange that I have decided to ask for this debate today. My constituency is blessed in having a very good and skilled work force. We have a good infrastructure—the motorways—in and around the Ribble Valley. The west coast main line could improve that infrastructure dramatically, and I hope to see further investments in that, which would encourage more people to travel by train, and more freight to be carried by train.
We are also blessed in having Manchester airport not too far away. It is one of the largest international airports in the world and provides great service for people in and around the region. I have a superb rural constituency, which attracts many tourists, and Blackpool is not too far away, which attracts many more tourists and conferences as well.
There is also tremendous manufacturing capacity within the Ribble Valley, and just outside as well. One leading firm, British Aerospace, is world-renowned, particularly with its carbon technology. It is a good supporter of the community, and I am extremely grateful for the work it does in supporting schools and technology, particularly the William Temple school in my constituency, which it supports with its technology courses. It has done much innovative work and has provided many jobs in schemes such as the European fighter aircraft, airbus, and, I hope, the future large aircraft and Tiger in future.
We have some superb manufacturing skills. On top of that, my constituents also travel long distances to work. If they do not find work on their doorstep, they travel to places such as Manchester, Liverpool, throughout the north-west—wherever the jobs happen to be.
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In my constituency, there are also smaller firms than BAe, which none the less are vital. Ultraframe has to be one of the success stories of my constituency. I invite my hon. Friend the Minister to come to my constituency, in the not too distant future, and visit Ultraframe, so that he can see for himself at first hand the successes that can be achieved when a firm is run by people with a belief in what they are doing, who are constantly reinvesting money back into their firm, a firm that has faith in the people who work there, and which not only ensures that they are properly trained in the work they do but encourages them to undertake national vocational qualifications.
In 1992, Ultraframe had 152 employees; in 1993, 207; in 1994, 293. It currently has 420 employees. It pays a lot of attention to exports as well, which is extremely important. Last year, its turnover was £25 million, and it is the UK market leader in conservatory roofing systems. It takes on a lot of youngsters from the schools at 16 or 18 and offers them jobs and training. It is a superb asset, not only to the Ribble Valley but to the United Kingdom as well, particularly with its exports.
We have to look at what we offer people in this country, to ensure that we have the right skills and a good work force that companies will want to employ, and at the encouragement that we give to businesses to expand. That means that we must have good schools and colleges, the right courses and relevant training. We must also ensure that the training and enterprise councils are delivering the right packages of training. There are 82 TECs. I am sure that they are not all of a superb level, but I hope that we will encourage those that are not as good to raise their standards to those of the best.
To see another reason why we are doing so well in this country one has only to look at the strike record. One can remember the 1970s, when strikes dogged this country. Businesses did not know whether they would be able to operate. Customers did not know whether they would be able to get their services. It was a blight. It was the British disease.
No longer is that the case. We now have one of the lowest strike records since records have been collected. That is important. We take that for granted, but we should not. We also have consistently low inflation. We should not take that for granted, because we can remember the 1970s, under the previous Labour Government, when inflation ravaged industry and people's savings.
We also have competitive interest rates, which are important for businesses, as they enable them to borrow with confidence to invest in their businesses, and they know that they will get returns.
We also have low taxation. We can remember what taxation rates were like under the previous Labour Government. There was hardly any incentive to take risks, because the Government, if one made any profits, were taking the lion's share. That is no longer the case. I hope that we shall continue with our tax-cutting policies in future to ensure that people who take the risks in business are able to keep the lion's share, so that they can reinvest that money in their businesses.
We also have a policy of deregulation, which is vital. I sat on the Standing Committee last year that considered deregulation, with my hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough (Mr. Sykes). I believe that it is one of the most important pieces of legislation that we have passed since I have been a Member of Parliament.

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One has only to talk to business people to know that the last thing they want is regulation after regulation heaped on them, for all sorts of reasons. Goodness knows why some of them are put into place. We have to appreciate that every rule and regulation imposed on business has a cost. Therefore, if we can lift the burdens of bureaucracy off the backs of businesses, they would be able to ensure that their businesses were more profitable, that they could expand and reinvest the money they make back into their businesses.
I am not saying that I want to scrap every rule and regulation—some of them are there for good reasons—but we have to look at each of the rules and regulations, particularly those that have been around for some time, and question their worth. There should be a cost-benefit analysis of some of those rules and regulations. We should remove as quickly as possible those that happen to be politically correct or those that are extremely expensive but show little or no reward.
Mr. John Sykes: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way. We are all pleased to hear that he has been made a privy councillor. I wonder whether he knew that Small Business News has awarded him a privy councillorship. I think that it is richly deserved.
Will my hon. Friend contrast the levying of regulations in this country with the manana attitude towards regulation by some of our so-called partners in the European Community, some of whom do not even obey their own laws, never mind directives from Brussels?
Mr. Evans: First, my hon. Friend and the bureau are somewhat premature in their congratulations to me on being made a privy councillor. Secondly, I fully appreciate that, in the United Kingdom, we have a structure in place that demands that, when we sign up to rules and regulations, we enforce them.
Many other member states of the European Union are happy to sign up to almost any rule or regulation, and they do not read the small print. They are not bothered about that, because they will not enforce the rule or regulation with the rigour of the United Kingdom. Perhaps we should approach some rules and regulations in the same way. It would be better, however, if other member states' enforcement was the same as the UK's. If that were their approach, they might think twice before signing up to more rules and regulations in future.
I am glad that we are able to gain so much inward investment. It takes place in the north-west, as it does throughout the country. We received 41 per cent. of Japanese investment in Europe. Close to 40 per cent. of the investment made by the United States in Europe comes to the UK. Why is that? Overseas companies have confidence in investing in the UK, because they know that they will not have social on-costs heaped on them, as happens in other parts of the EU. Levels of unemployment elsewhere in the EU are telling.
In Spain, unemployment is 23 per cent. Youth unemployment is a staggering 43 per cent. In France and Belgium, it is 12 per cent. and 10 per cent. respectively. The EU average is 10.8 per cent. How grateful I am that unemployment in my constituency is 2.7 per cent., and 8.3 per cent. is the average throughout the UK.
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We must ensure that we have proper training. General national vocational qualifications are vital, and superb work is being undertaken at St. Mary's college, Blackburn. We must ensure that job clubs and our various schemes provide relevant advice and proper guidance.
I hope that we can do more to encourage employers not to adopt agism within the work force. Far too many people are unable to obtain work when they are in their 40s and 50s. In fact, they have a wealth of experience. We must do more to convince employers that they should not turn their backs on older prospective employees. We have a flexible work force, which means that someone who starts work at 18 will not be in the same job until he is 65. It is more likely that employees will have several careers during their working life.
I hope that employers will stop using advertisements in newspapers that state that they are interested only in people who are under 30 or over 25. It is wrong to take that attitude. It gives no encouragement to people in their 50s and 60s, and the country suffers because a wealth of experience is not being used properly.
I was delighted when my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister fought hard within the EU to ensure that we had opt-outs from the social chapter. If we had signed up to the chapter in its entirety, companies would have looked beyond Britain when investing in the EU. Without opt-outs, the chapter would have been extremely expensive. I see no reasons or advantages in being a signatory to it without opt-outs.
Mr. Sykes: My hon. Friend does not need any additional information, but he might be interested to know that, in my constituency, a large food manufacturer that normally supplies the home market decided that it could not afford to build a factory in France, and so doubled its production line at Scarborough, much to the benefit of my constituents who work for the company, whose jobs are now guaranteed. What does that say for the social chapter?
Mr. Evans: It says everything for my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister having won opt-outs. My hon. Friend has given a constituency example. I am sure that it is one that could be replicated throughout the country. So many businesses have decided to contract within other parts of the EU and to expand in Britain. Companies outside the EU decide to come first to Britain. They take full account of the advantages of investing in Britain. I think that it was Jacques Delors who said that it would be to experience paradise to engage in inward investment in Britain. Instead of following Britain's lead, the rest of the EU decided to try to get us to follow them. That was ridiculous.
Most damaging of all policies for our future economic prosperity is the minimum wage. We all know that socialism is a creed that dare not speak its name. The minimum wage is a concept that dare not name its price. If it is such a good idea, why should its level remain a secret?
It is rather like a perverted form of the "Price is Right" approach, except that the losers in the minimum wage game will lose their jobs. It will be a case not of low pay but of no pay. Silence on the level of a minimum wage is not for the virtuous reason that there should be consultations with the unions and employers. To say that such consultations should take place is to put up a smoke screen. The present vacuum allows an unpriced product to be shown in a shop window. If anyone has to ask how much it is, he should know that he cannot afford it.

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A menu without prices means that Labour spokesmen can say to employers, "We are new Labour, not old. Don't worry about the level of the minimum wage. It will be so low that it will have no effect on the profitability of your business. We want only to catch a few cowboys who are paying poverty-level wages."
At the same time, Labour spokesmen are saying to the unions, their paymasters, "Don't worry about new Labour tosh. It is just to con the public into thinking that we have changed. We can't set a level for a minimum wage. If we do so, employers will be able to work out how much it will cost them and how many jobs they will have to shed. Obviously, we are going to look after you. After all, you look after us." The only losers in the game will be those whose jobs disappear in the black hole of socialist dogma. As many as 1.8 million jobs could be lost.
I watched the hon. Member for Peckham (Ms Harman) being interviewed on "On the Record" on Sunday. John Humphrys gently savaged the hon. Lady to pieces. It was a cruel display by Mr. Humphrys, who had the effrontery and cheek to ask the hon. Lady a few elementary, simple and straightforward questions on the minimum wage. How dare he? Whenever she was unsure of what to say, she resorted to making a dash behind the name of Winston Churchill, who was the saviour of many people. Never was his name called on so many times in such a short time as by the hon. Member for Peckham.
When the hon. Member for Peckham said, in her Mother Teresa demeanour, that she wanted to get rid of poverty, she should have started with the poverty of her argument. Winston Churchill was a great man, but not even he could have saved the hon. Lady or her feeble argument on Sunday.
Two further complications with the minimum wage are the black economy and differentials. We would be stupid to ignore the fact that the black economy exists. Indeed, it existed to a greater extent in the 1970s under the Labour Government, when taxation was so high. If we introduce a minimum wage, many cowboys will still pay poverty wages. They will do so in an underhand manner and behind the back of the Inland Revenue. Without a minimum wage, we have a transparency in the system.
No one—especially not a member of the Labour party—should be allowed to hide behind the argument that his role is to look after only the poorer sections of society, those who are earning £1 an hour or less. If a minimum wage is introduced, those who are earning £4, £5 or £6 will want to ensure that differentials continue. The unions have said as much. The result will be demands for inflationary pay increases.
It will not be only those who are earning £1 or £2 an hour who will lose their jobs. Jobs will also be lost by those who are earning £4, £6 or £8 an hour. It has been estimated that a minimum wage of about £4.15 will cause about 800,000 people to lose their jobs. That would cost £2.2 billion in additional unemployment benefit expenditure.
It is pointless to argue that the taxpayer is subsidising low pay for many people. A minimum wage will mean that the taxpayer will have to subsidise many more unemployed people. When Bill Clinton was campaigning to become President, he said that he would increase the minimum wage in the United States. He has not done so. That was even before the rise of Newt Gingrich. The President knew how many jobs an increase in the minimum wage would cost.
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The right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott) said that he was aware of the consequences of a minimum wage. He told us that any silly fool would know that there would be a shake-out. The right hon. Gentleman was speaking the truth.
Does the Labour party, which treats the country with contempt, really think that the wages of some people can be jacked up without job losses, shorter hours, loss of differentials and the fuelling of the black economy? The higher the minimum wage, the higher will be the number of job losses. The Labour party fails to tell us what price is worth paying in terms of job losses to fulfil its bargain with the trade unions.
We must continue with the successful policies that the Government have followed in the past 16 years, which are leading to more job creation, more inward investment, more job expansion and more employment generally, with unemployment coming down. We must continue with the deregulation policy and ensure that the town halls, Whitehall and the know-alls of Brussels take into account the fact that businesses are there to ensure that jobs are available and to produce goods and services; they do not need such people coming on with a tirade of bureaucracy, rules and regulations.
In Europe, 20 million people are unemployed. The rest of Europe should consider what we are doing in this country, find out why we are so successful, and start to put our policies into place. The choice is simple. We know what is happening in this country. We have the job and wealth creation; the evidence is there for all to see. The choice is either sticking with that and with something that is successful, or listening to the Labour party, which is offering something for nothing.
2.20 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Employment (Mr. Phillip Oppenheim): I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans) for choosing this subject. He is well known as an hon. Member with great knowledge and understanding of the issues involved.
My hon. Friend mentioned at length the effect of a minimum wage on jobs. He was correct to point to the unemployment level in Europe, because every one of those European Union countries with minimum wages that are set at significant levels has higher unemployment, and particularly higher youth unemployment, than Britain. The figures that are quoted are based on the International Labour Organisation international standard for compiling unemployment statistics, so the claim that Opposition spokesmen sometimes make—that those figures are fiddled—is nonsense.
Every one of us wants low-paid people to earn more, but it is unfair and deceitful to the less well-off for politicians to pretend that they can wave some magic wand and raise wages without any cost to the economy. What we can do, and have been doing since 1979, is to continue to make the economy more competitive, to improve training and education, to create the conditions for sustainable non-inflationary growth, and to give people the chance to be more productive so that they can really earn more on a sustainable basis.
As my hon. Friend rightly said, his constituency has a fine record of good quality employment. It has that record because people in that region are productive and work for

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companies that produce goods that people want to buy. That is the only honest way for us politicians to say that people will be able to earn more, and that better-quality jobs will be created on a sustainable basis.
The Labour party's minimum wage policy is doubly dishonest. It pretends to the less well-off that there is some easy, cost-free method of raising their pay, and then it will not even say what the minimum wage will be until after the next election. It gives the less well-off a menu with no prices, in the hope that they will not discover the true cost in jobs, as my hon. Friend rightly said, until after the next election.
No wonder the Opposition spokeswoman, the hon. Member for Peckham (Ms Harman) got in such a mess in "On The Record" last Sunday. I found it probably the best comedy programme of the year. I think that my hon. Friend, as a Welshman, probably thought a better comedy occurred on ITV an hour or so later, but I did not find that show quite so funny.
During the programme, the hon. Member for Peckham said that she could not set a minimum wage level until after the election, because Labour could not meet employers to achieve consensus until it was in government, but when John Humphrys said that the reason Labour was waiting until after the election was that it could never achieve consensus—as too low a rate would annoy the unions and too high a rate without regional variations would worry employers—the hon. Lady suddenly changed tack and said that Labour had been meeting employers, and that there was a great deal of consensus. If that is the case, fine, but why cannot she now tell us what the minimum wage level would be? No wonder she kept harking back to 1906. If that is new Labour's idea of progress, how far back would old Labour have gone for inspiration?
During the programme, the hon. Member for Peckham insisted on repeating several myths. She said that we are alone among European Union countries in not having a minimum wage. That is wrong; only seven EU countries have national minimum wages. She also said that pay had fallen in wages councils sectors since we abolished the wages councils. She should know the answer to that, because she asked me a written question in which the labour force survey, which both the Labour party and the unions say they find fully reliable, showed that pay for workers formerly covered by the wages council was rising at double the rate for the economy as a whole.
The Opposition say that the minimum wage would end what they term the £2 billion taxpayer subsidy for low pay in the form of in-work benefits such as family credit, but, as Andrew Dilnot of the Institute of Fiscal Studies said, even if a minimum wage were set at £8 an hour, many families would still receive family credit, so the Opposition are wrong on that point as well.
Labour—and, again, the hon. Member for Peckham during that programme—persisted in claiming that pay had fallen in Britain and that Britain competes on the basis of low pay, yet pay has risen at all levels since 1979. The real take-home pay of a single low-paid man in the bottom 10 per cent. of earnings has risen by £27 more than inflation since 1979. It actually fell by £1 under the last Labour Government.
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My hon. Friend ably made the point that our economy is much more productive and competitive compared with 1979. It is because we are so much more competitive and productive that real pay has risen significantly at all levels, in stark contrast with the period 1974–79, when productivity and pay stagnated. During the 1960s and 1970s, Britain was bottom of all the major industrialised G7 countries when it came to the increase in manufacturing productivity, whereas in the 1980s we were equal top with Japan. That productivity boom has led to a sustainable increase in real take-home pay and living standards.
Even Labour's union buddies do not find its policy credible. The Trades Union Congress, in a document published on 22 March this year, said:
"No campaign on the minimum wage issue will carry real weight … unless it clearly states who would benefit, what impact it would have on unemployment … and the impact on differentials."
Sir Gordon Borfie, chairman of Labour's Social Justice Commission, wrote in April that the key to the minimum wage was the level. He said:
"too low would not have much benefit—too high would cost jobs."
Even William Hutton, economics editor of The Guardian, wrote around the same time that the
"key to the minimum wage is the level"
at which it is set.
Therefore, why will not Labour say or give any indication of the level at which it would set the minimum wage, what it would do about differentials, and whether there would he different rates for young workers, regions and different industries? Why the deafening silence?
The answer has been given by Labour's leader and deputy leader. Three years ago, its deputy leader, who, sadly, is not here to listen to the debate—I can understand why—said:
"I knew the consequences were that there'd be some shake-out"—
in jobs—
"any silly fool knew that."
The Leader of the Opposition was a little more oblique in his comment. He said:
"Econometric models indicate a potential jobs impact."
Now we all know why the hon. Member for Peckham is keeping so quiet about the level at which she would set the minimum wage.
We now have the spectacle of an Opposition—
Mr. Peter Butler: There is no Opposition.
Mr. Oppenheim: My hon. Friend is right, but I understand why Opposition Members are afraid to turn up for this debate. We have, rather, the spectre of an Opposition whose shadow Chancellor—[Interruption.] Now that my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridgeshire, South-West (Sir. A. Grant) has apparently joined the Opposition, we have an Opposition—and a much worthier and more substantial Opposition than the one to which we are accustomed.
We may not have the spectacle of an Opposition here, but we have the spectacle of an Opposition in the country whose shadow Chancellor talks of the obscenity of directors' pay but said yesterday, in a Select Committee, that Labour would not introduce a pay maximum, and

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whose employment spokesman habitually speaks in flowery tones of putting a floor under low pay, but will not say what that floor would be.
That is the worst type of deceitful populism. Labour is cynically using the low-paid as political pawns, and it will not wash. By the time of the election, Labour will have
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to say what the level of the minimum wage will be; otherwise, the low-paid will know that they are being conned, and cruelly deceived.
It being half-past Two o'clock, the Motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, pursuant to Order [19 December].

Oral Answers to Questions
  ENVIRONMENT

    Regional Government, London
    Mr. John Marshall: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what representations he has received about the introduction of regional government in London. [28027]
    Mr. Robert Hughes: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what representations he has received about whether regional government is needed for London [28033]
    The Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. John Gummer): I have had no recent representations in favour of introducing a top-heavy new layer of regional government in London.
    Mr. Marshall: Does my right hon. Friend accept that, if London had to suffer a regional government, it would become the most over-governed capital city in western Europe? May I, as a former London borough councillor, remind him that the GLC mark 1 was an expensive irrelevance that caused confusion and cost to London's ratepayers, and that no one except the hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Banks) wants a GLC mark 2?
    Mr. Gummer: I hope that the House will remember that in the last five years of the GLC's existence its spending rose by 170 per cent. while prices were rising by 29 per cent., and that in 1986 it had 92 councillors, 20,000 staff and a budget of almost £1 billion. It is difficult to see that we are missing anything.
    Labour's plans for regional government—which, happily, have now been leaked in an official Labour party document—reveal that the London assembly that it wants would take economic development, the environment, planning, water, transport, higher education, health, community care, police and emergency services, energy and training away from everyone else.
    Mrs. Roche: A poll conducted recently by the Association of London Government showed that 79 per cent. of people supported an elected authority for London. Does the Secretary of State agree that what has been said by the hon. Member for Hendon, South (Mr. Marshall) is arrant nonsense?
    Mr. Gummer: I am afraid that the hon. Lady is wrong. We consulted 10,000 people in London, and very few of them put a strategic authority—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Mr. Dobson)—with as usual, a slight grin on his face—is trying to ask a question. The need for a strategic authority was not among the first 40 issues raised by the people whom we consulted.
    Mr. Tracey: Does my right hon. Friend accept that outer London boroughs more than 20 miles from the centre have little in common with central London, and that neither a Greater London council nor a regional structure would make sense? Will my right hon. Friend encourage the "confederation" view of the Association of London Government? Surely that, rather than the imposition of nonsensical views such as Labour's, is the sensible way of promoting subsidiarity among London boroughs.
    Mr. Gummer: My hon. Friend may have noticed that the London boroughs—even those under Labour control—do not seem very enthusiastic about yielding their perfectly proper powers, particularly those relating to education, to some regional government controlling the entire capital. He may also have reflected that the old GLC area is far too small to deal with many matters, such as transport, while in regard to others—such as tourism—central London boroughs should work together, as they do in the new cross-river partnership. The Thames covers a completely different area which extends both above and below the old GLC area. There is no doubt that regional government, as run by the GLC, is entirely unsuitable for London, and is unmourned by the majority of Londoners.
    Mr. Dobson: When will the Government recognise that the majority of people in London—ranging in polls from about two thirds to four fifths—believe that there needs to be an elected, strategic authority for London to speak up on behalf of Londoners and to replace the present regional arrangements whereby a collection of faceless men and women, at the behest of Ministers who then deny all responsibility, take decisions behind closed doors that affect the future of all Londoners?
    Mr. Gummer: The hon. Gentleman would carry more credence in the House if he had ever produced a plan for London that he had managed to keep on the table for more than two days. Every time that the Labour party produces a plan, it has to withdraw it because not everyone in the Labour party in London likes it. The hon. Gentleman has no plan for London. The reason is that the Labour party in London does not want a new GLC because it knows how unpopular it would be. The London boroughs want to go on running their own affairs. The hon. Gentleman is, on this issue like most others, utterly incredible. He has failed to produce a policy. If he thinks that he can explain to the leader of Southwark that he wants to take away education, economic and other powers, he will have a very tough time.
    Dr. Twinn: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the only evidence about the desire for a GLC came when we abolished it? Labour boroughs privately gave us every support to hurry its demise. They hated it. Power is where it should be—at the local role level with the London boroughs.
    Mr. Gummer: I agree with my hon. Friend. However, it is noticeable that the Labour party remains seated when anyone asks what it would do. It pretends to want regional government to balance what it wants to do in Scotland but when it comes to London, it says that no powers would be given to regional government. Labour really must make up its mind.

    Standard Spending Assessments
    Dr. Wright: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will make a statement on the area cost adjustment element of standard spending assessments. [28028]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Robert B. Jones): I have previously said that I wish to take a fresh look to see whether we might improve the boundaries of the zones used in the

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    calculation of the adjustment. We and the local authority associations are currently looking at the initial findings of research on this which we commissioned.
    Dr. Wright: I am grateful for that answer. Can the Minister go on to explain to my constituents in Staffordshire why each pupil in secondary education in Surrey gets an extra £310 a year compared with my constituents' pupils in schools in Staffordshire? Would he also explain why the 10 counties that have had the largest increase in standard spending assessments since 1990 are all in the south-east and have all benefited from the area cost adjustment? Finally, can he tell the House why he has not been minded to accept the new basis for the area cost adjustment suggested by the Association of County Councils which would give Staffordshire an extra £9.5 million and go some way to offset the damaging cuts to education and other services that are taking place at the moment?
    Mr. Jones: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman is as aware as anybody else that that sort of argument falls into fault lines according to those who receive it and those who do not. It is therefore all the more important that the Government should carry out research to make sure that the area cost adjustment is based on proper statistical analysis. We have carried that forward by discussions with the local authority associations. The ACC is one of those which have put forward ideas, but those ideas also have to be tested by proper and rigorous statistical analysis. So far, I am afraid, it has been unable to justify its approach. What I think is dangerous about the hon. Gentleman's argument is that he has failed entirely to recognise the additional costs that fall on local authorities, not only those such as Surrey, which he cited, but on inner London local authorities, which are controlled in virtually every case by his party.
    Sir Anthony Grant: Does my hon. Friend recall that for many years, I have drawn the attention of the Government to the crazy situation whereby if people take one step over the border from Bedfordshire or Hertfordshire into Cambridgeshire, they are suddenly deemed to be in a low-cost area? That is manifest nonsense. The result is that millions of pounds have been lost to Cambridgeshire which could have been used for education purposes. Therefore, any initiative that my hon. Friend takes is welcome. When he gets the results of the research, which I hope will suggest changes to travel-to-work areas, will he act quickly?
    Mr. Jones: Of course, we will look at the results of the research. I know that my hon. Friend has been a doughty fighter for Cambridgeshire in this and other cases for many years. Of course, he is right. We have to look at those methods of statistical analysis that match best the real pressures to spend, whether the areas involved are in the existing south-east or immediately outside.
    Mr. Illsley: The Minister will be aware that the amount of money spent on the area cost adjustment has doubled since 1990 to something like £1.6 million. He has heard from hon. Members of all parties that there are many discrepancies between adjacent areas, some of which receive the area cost adjustment and some of which do not. Will the Government consider a specific cost approach and London weighting, or other specific data, in order to achieve an immediate change rather than wait until the research is available?
    Mr. Jones: Our approach is based on specific data and research carried out by reputable organisations. London weighting is not the only additional cost borne by authorities in the south-east. Indeed, I see the hon. Members for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson) and for Greenwich (Mr. Raynsford), who are sitting on either side of the hon. Gentleman, squirming in embarrassment about the fact that he is arguing that the area cost adjustment should be reduced because that would hit their constituencies very hard. The adjustment has to be justified by rigorous statistical analysis, not by the hon. Gentleman's political prejudice.

    Regional Assemblies
    Mr. Dunn: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what representations he has received asking him to move responsibility for certain services from local councils to regional assemblies. [28029]
    Mr. Gummer: Since last October, we have had more than 30,000 letters about local government from members of the public, and we cannot trace or remember any that demanded regional assemblies.
    Mr. Simon Hughes: Regional assemblies are not local government.
    Mr. Dunn: Does my right hon. Friend accept that there is no popular demand whatsoever in England for the setting up of unnecessary, expensive and socialist regional assemblies and that the people of Kent have no desire to have their local government affairs run from Woking or Reading? They believe that local government must remain local to Kent.
    Mr. Gummer: I think that my hon. Friend received his answer from the Liberal local government spokesman, who said that regional assemblies are not local government. That is the whole point: regional assemblies are, in fact, utterly alien to Britain because they are not close enough to the people. People do not see themselves as living in regions and there are no natural boundaries to regions. The idea of the Labour party in the south-west, for example, saying that people in Cornwall should have their fire services organised in Bristol, or that people in Wiltshire should have their affairs run from Bristol, is entirely alien to the concept of local government. The idea that the counties, which fought for the independence that they have now been given since the changes, should have their powers taken away from them by a future Labour Government is anathema to most people.
    Mr. Betts: That is one of the most nonsensical answers that I have ever heard the right hon. Gentleman give in the House. Does he not accept that the important point is that the Government have transferred powers, not to regional assemblies, but to quangos and have centralised more local government functions than any other Government in history? Economic regeneration, transport, housing and other matters are currently run by faceless officials in regional offices, but it is those things for which local people want elected councillors to have responsibility at a local level so that they can have a say. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will deal with that point.
    Mr. Gummer: I can understand why a former leader of Sheffield city council would want someone else to run his city, given the disastrous position in which he left it

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    and the debts that he ran up for it. The hon. Gentleman seems to think that parents are quangos and that people who run their own affairs are quangos. In fact, schools are now run by parents, teachers and governors on behalf of pupils. It is not only such matters that would be given to a regional assembly: it would, it appears, be responsible for economic development, the environment, planning, water and transport, all of which are currently run by local government. The idea that we have taken powers away from local government, when responsibility for something such as community care—one of the most important social services—has been given to local government, reveals just how empty the hon. Gentleman's rhetoric is.
    Mr. Harris: Can my right hon. Friend confirm that the document to which he refers—Mori. MEMBERS: "Which document?"] The Labour party's document for regional government in the south-west which puts forward the concept of a regional assembly covering an area stretching from the Isles of Scilly in my constituency, right up to Swindon. As my right hon. Friend says, that would not only be anathema to the people of Cornwall, but would make absolute nonsense of the whole concept of local government and the provision of local control over those services.
    Mr. Gummer: My hon. Friend is right. The document, which has now received welcome publicity, is a recent publication by the Labour party in the south-west. My hon. Friend is right to say that the only problem with the geography of the document is that the map on the front includes Berkshire as part of the south-west. I wonder whether the hon. Member for Newbury (Mr. Rendel) would like Newbury to be run from Bristol, for example. The difficulty for the Labour party is that it is in a party political mess. It needs regional government to justify having Scots in this House to vote on English matters without English Members voting on Scots matters. That is its only reason for regional government. It has nothing to do with the people of England.
    Mr. Rendel: In relation to the powers of local government, what is the Secretary of State's reaction to the final report from the Commission for Local Democracy which was launched this morning? What is his reaction in particular to three of its recommendations that, first, there should be a single transferable vote system of elections for local government; secondly, that we should as a country ratify the European charter for local self-government; and, thirdly, that there should be a power of general competence for local government, except where prohibited by statute?
    Mr. Gummer: I note that the question is about regional government. The first thing that that body said was that regional government was not a sensible policy for England. That was one of the few important things that it said—many of the other things that it said suffered a fundamental gap. It did not talk about the connection between who gave the money and who decided on the policy. The trouble with the whole issue of local democracy is this: if the money is supplied by the national taxpayer, it is difficult to have a kind of local democracy which enables people to pre-empt the decisions of central Government and have access to taxpayers' funds, without any kind of responsibility for the way in which those funds are spent.
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    The difficulty for the Commission for Local Democracy is that it failed to address that central issue. The document does not properly address that issue because none of the people concerned with the Commission for Local Democracy has had any history of trying to make sense of the reality of having to account for the money spent.
    Mr. Thomason: Does my right hon. Friend find it in the least surprising that the majority of my electors in Bromsgrove are appalled at the prospect of their area being run by regional government in Birmingham? Does he find it ironic that Labour Members have been campaigning for the abolition of county councils for the past few years and yet, suddenly, they are arguing for the creation of super county councils in the form of regional assemblies?
    Mr. Gummer: If that were so, it would be much easier. The Labour party is really campaigning for five levels of government. It wants Britain to become the most over-governed nation in Europe. It is very deeply concerned. It wants parishes, districts, counties, regions and the national Government. It wants all that—[Interruption.] Well, some of them want that and others do not want it. Above all, the trouble is that the person who speaks on the subject occasionally is not the man who will make the decision—he cannot be trusted with it. The hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr. Straw) is entrusted with that.
    Mr. Salmond: Does the Secretary of State agree that it would be highly appropriate if a Scottish assembly had powers over oil and gasfield decommissioning? Do not the Government have a huge financial interest—up to £1 billion—in deep-water disposal as opposed to onshore dismantling? Was the Secretary of State consulted yesterday by the President of the Board of Trade before he made his sabre-rattling comments about denying—
    Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. That was a game try, but it was not relevant to the question.
    Mr. Nigel Evans: Does my right hon. Friend accept that many people in the Ribble Valley were deeply disappointed when Lancashire county council, which is controlled by the Labour party, was not scrapped, but that they totally oppose handing powers away from themselves to a body that they would regard as even more remote and out of touch than the current county council?
    Mr. Gummer: But those people would be supported in that by several members of the Labour party who are desperate to get rid of Lancashire county council. One of the problems with regionalism in the north-west is that although nobody outside the Labour party has asked for a regional assembly, many Labour party members, such as the hon. Member for Blackburn, see the prospect as a means of getting rid of the Labour leader of the county council, whom they are desperate to get rid of by one means or another.
    Mr. Trimble: Is there not already a significant amount of administration that is regionally based, and would it not be better if such administrative regional devolution from Whitehall were subject to democratic control, rather than being run by quangos, as at present? Is not the Secretary of State right to say that there is no threat to the future unity of the United Kingdom from a uniform

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    system of regional devolution, but does not the real threat lie in having devolution for one region alone, as the Government propose?
    Mr. Gummer: The hon. Gentleman may recognise that the issues raised in one part of the United Kingdom are particular and difficult, and I have no intention of being drawn on that subject here. However, one of the reasons why there now appears to be a bias towards female-only lists has been revealed. I have discovered that there is another way of getting rid of the leader of Lancashire county council. Is there no end to the Labour party's desire to attack her?

    Sewage Treatment Works
    Mr. Congdon: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what progress has been made in upgrading sewage treatment works which were in breach of their discharge consents at the time of privatisation of the water industry. [28030]
    The Minister for the Environment and Countryside (Mr. Robert Atkins): Of 918 sewage treatment works identified in 1989 as requiring investment, 95 per cent. are now compliant with their consents. Further investment is planned over the next 10 years.
    Mr. Congdon: May I congratulate my right hon. Friend on having become my right hon. Friend. I welcome the improvements that have taken place in the treatment of sewage since the massive investment following privatisation of the industry, but does my right hon. Friend agree that there is more to be done to ensure that no sewage is discharged into the sea in an untreated state?
    Mr. Atkins: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his remarks. The problem that he mentions has been around for a considerable time, and because of its size it is not likely simply to go away. However, since privatisation many companies involved in the disposal of sewage have spent vast sums on improvements. My hon. Friend's point is well taken, and I am sure that the water companies already spending that money will continue to do so, so that, in the not-too-distant future, the concerns that he has expressed will vanish.
    Ms Ruddock: Does the Minister agree that the improvements to which he alluded have been made as much to comply with European directives as because of privatisation? Is he also aware that the beaches at the major resorts in this country are still being contaminated by the discharge of sewage into the sea, and that the European Commission's recent annual report placed Britain third from the bottom of the league table for bathing water quality? Is it not true that this summer holidaymakers should be given the health warning, "Bathing in sea water in Britain can damage your health"?
    Mr. Atkins: The hon. Lady raises several points, although, as usual, she puts her finger on a problem that is easy to attack, but she does not understand the solutions. The fact remains that this country has spent more on cleaning up its beaches and providing sewerage facilities than any other country. That has happened as a direct result of privatisation, although the hon. Lady is right to say that the European Commission has played a part. Surely the point is that for years in this country we thought that poking a pipe into the sea off the coast to get
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    rid of sewage was acceptable, but we now reckon that it is not. It will cost a lot of money and take a lot of time to redress that, and it does not help if Opposition Members such as the hon. Lady attack tourism, the towns that depend on it and Britain as a whole by suggesting that our beaches are unsafe, when they are not.
    Mr. Hawkins: May I join in the congratulations to my right hon. Friend on his well-deserved advancement, which was particularly welcome among fellow Lancashire Members? Will he confirm that one of the best of the recent advances in sewage treatment is the splendid investment that North West Water is making to clean up the sea off Blackpool's beaches to ensure that our leading resort remains the best in the world? Is it not outrageous that the Opposition seek always to run Britain and its tourism down?
    Mr. Atkins: I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend for his kind remarks. Blackpool is arguably the most important tourist resort in Europe, and certainly the most important in the United Kingdom. My hon. Friend, and my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool, North (Mr. Elletson), speak firmly and regularly in favour of the town they represent. Anyone who attacks Blackpool and its contribution to the British economy through tourism does Lancashire and this country a grave disservice. We know who is doing that.

    Homelessness, London
    Mr. Corbyn: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what is his estimate of the total number of homeless people in London. [28031]
    The Minister for Local Government, Housing and Urban Regeneration (Mr. David Curry): Last November, a count by voluntary sector agencies found 288 people sleeping rough in central London.
    Mr. Corbyn: Does not the Minister think that it is quite disgraceful that anyone should be sleeping rough in London? Can he explain why 28,000 families have been accepted as homeless by London's local authorities, and why hardly any building by local authorities or by housing associations is going on? Why are the Government relying on hostels to solve the homeless crisis? Does not the contrast between the 20 million sq ft of empty office space in London and the enormous housing waiting lists, and the enormous number of homeless people, suggest that the Government have got it badly and totally wrong? The Government's real priority must be to build houses for affordable rent so that people can get a clean, decent and safe roof over their heads, rather than experience the misery of bed-and-breakfast or hostel accommodation.
    Mr. Curry: The hon. Gentleman has got it wrong again. He knows that the rough sleepers initiative has been a great success in the past few years. That has been due to the remarkable co-operation between the voluntary organisations—to which I freely pay tribute—and my Department. The principle of that co-operation has been to find people who have difficulties and move them through into hostels. They will then be put into permanent accommodation so that they can move into some form of settled life. That will never be available for everybody, as some people with particular problems with drink and mental illness will not be able to live autonomous lives without a great deal of assistance. The system is working

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    extremely well, and I have given an undertaking that it will be followed by a new rough sleepers initiative. I am pleased to pay tribute to all of the volunteers who have worked so hard to make the scheme succesful.
    Mr. Brooke: I congratulate my hon. Friend and the voluntary sector on the progress which the figure of 288 rough sleepers represents. But does he agree that definition in this problem is important? Would not a regular and comprehensive indexed scale of the problem—agreed with the key charities—be helpful, both in the context of policy making and informed questioning?
    Mr. Curry: My right hon. Friend is right in that regard. We have a clearing house which helps to identify people who find themselves in that position and which can find accommodation for them. It is also important that we ensure that the voluntary agencies share information more effectively with each other. We have identified the schemes which are working most effectively, and we will see how we can focus those schemes on people with particular problems—for example, mental health, alcohol or drug problems. The infrastructure is largely in place, and making sure that it works efficiently is a key priority.
    Mr. Simon Hughes: When will the Minister announce the Government's proposals to come to the rescue of long leaseholders who are contemplating the prospect of becoming homeless because they have bills of up to £27,000 for capital charges which they cannot possibly begin to pay? A working party has bounced ideas around the Department, but nothing has been said on the subject for months. Those people are desperate for some news, and they want to be rescued from a predicament which they never envisaged.
    Mr. Curry: I will send the hon. Gentleman the announcement that we made last Monday.

    Regeneration
    Mrs. Lait: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment in which main areas in England there has been significant regeneration. [28032]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Sir Paul Beresford): Our cities and towns are benefiting from more than £1 billion per annum in special regeneration initiatives, on top of national housing, training and education programmes. The special initiatives include urban development corporations, city challenge and the single regeneration budget challenge fund, and are building new partnerships throughout the country. They have stepped in where Labour authorities on their own have frequently failed abysmally.
    Mrs. Lait: I am pleased at the success of the regeneration policies, but does my hon. Friend agree that perhaps the time has come to look at other areas in need, such as Hastings? My constituents are aware that the town has high levels of unemployment, criminality, drug, solvent and alcohol abuse as well high levels of child and sex abuse, poor housing and bad roads. Does he agree that it is about time his Department started to recast its policies and moved in the direction of other areas, such as Hastings, which need help?
    Sir Paul Beresford: I think that my hon. Friend is already aware that we have moved in the right direction. In fact, Hastings has done so, because it is receiving just under half a million pounds from the round one bid for the challenge fund. My hon. Friend should persuade, if she can, her local Liberal-Labour council to work with the grain rather than against it and launch a decent bid—I hope with success—for the next round.
    Mr. Pike: Does the Minister recognise that it does no good to make an unnecessary swipe at Labour councils, as he did a few moments ago? The Burnley initiative, which comprises business, local industry and the community, is working well with the council. Their only comment to the Government would be that they should not have to get money through competition, because the Government should give out money based on need.
    Sir Paul Beresford: The hon. Gentleman misses the point. He has obviously not read the newspapers recently; otherwise, he would have noted that a small Labour authority called Monklands is in some trouble. We have in our midst the ex-leaders of Islington and of Sheffield, where there is degeneration rather than regeneration. That is why we must opt for partnerships.
    Mr. Jacques Arnold: Was not the Thames gateway one of the most fascinating recent decisions of the Government's regeneration policy together with the choice of Ebbsfleet as the station on the channel tunnel rail link? Does that not augur extremely well for jobs and many other improvements in north-west Kent?
    Sir Paul Beresford: My hon. Friend is right. He has obviously noticed that we recently launched the final strategy, which was successfully received with a positive response. Even those one would expect to be critics have joined in praising the venture.

    Private Rents
    Mrs. Anne Campbell: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what is the average rent paid by tenants of private landlords; and what was the equivalent figure for 1978–79 in actual and real terms. [28034]
    Mr. Robert B. Jones: The average weekly rent paid by tenants of private landlords in England is £60.00. The average weekly rent in 1978–79 was £6.30—equivalent to £17.00 a week at 1993–94 prices.
    Mrs. Campbell: Does the Minister accept that as a result of Government policies there has been a massive increase in private sector rents, which has caused a huge increase in the cost of housing benefit in the past five years from £1.1 billion to £4.9 billion?
    Mr. Jones: We are anxious to ensure choice in housing for the people of Britain, and that means a healthy private rented sector. It follows from not being able to get a decent return that landlords will not come forward. If Opposition Members argue for rent controls, they must bear the consequences. For example, in 1974, when rent control was extended to furnished lettings, the number of such lettings fell by 400,000 and were therefore unavailable to people.

    Rented Homes
    Mr. Miller: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many rented homes were provided through the Housing Corporation in 1993–94; and how many will be provided in 1995–96. [28035]
    Ms Hodge: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many rented homes were provided through the Housing Corporation in 1993–94; and how many will be provided in 1995–96. [28042]
    Mr. Curry: The Housing Corporation estimates that it will provide 46,000 rented homes in 1995–96, including properties freed up by tenants' incentive schemes and the do-it-yourself shared ownership scheme. In 1993–94, about 52,000 were provided.
    Mr. Miller: Those figures are somewhat misleading. Data provided by the Government in their own statistics show a massive fall in approvals from 1993–94 to the current year and a fall in completions. Add that to the difficulties faced by local authorities because of the rather ridiculous restrictions placed on them by central Government and the fact that the house building market has stagnated because of the Government's fiscal policies, and it is no wonder that we have a housing crisis. When are the Government going to do anything about it?
    Mr. Curry: What matters is that properties become available, and it makes sense to use resources to make the maximum number of properties available for whatever resources are available. It makes a great deal of sense, for example, to use tenants' incentive schemes, encouraging people to buy in the private sector and freeing up property, because of their effect on the number of properties entering the marketplace for new tenants.
    Mr. Miller: How many are available?
    Mr. Curry: The hon. Gentleman should not forget that about 250,000 local authority housing association tenancies become available each year, and that 75 per cent. of the programme to which he referred is for homes to rent. He should have the common sense to realise that the important thing is to free up the maximum number of properties so that people can take advantage of them. He should not become too hooked on the idea of new build and he certainly should not become hooked on the idea that local authorities should throw some mythical crock of gold into the gap. Even Members on his own Front Bench will not tell us how they would manage that.
    Ms Hodge: I agree that it is important to have properties available, but it is also important that properties should be available at affordable rents. Does the Minister agree that, when he allocates grants to housing associations through the Housing Corporation next year, he will have to have regard to the quality of what is produced and the existing rents of those housing associations?
    Mr. Curry: The hon. Lady, in her capacity as chairman of Circle 33 housing association, has perhaps been more successful than in her more distant capacity as leader of Islington council.
    Ms Hodge indicated dissent.
    Mr. Curry: Therefore, she speaks with some experience on that matter. We are obviously reflecting on questions of the type that the hon. Lady asked us, because
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    it is important to ensure that rent increases do not reach the point at which they start costing resources and that maximum use of resources is made. I am sure that, if the hon. Lady will bide her time, she will discover that we shall cover those in the forthcoming publication.
    Mr. Raynsford: To put the record straight, may I remind the Minister that his Department recently published a memorandum confirming the need for 60,000 to 100,000 rented homes to be built each year, and that at the same time his Department's annual report—which I assume he does not repudiate—shows that output from the Housing Corporation's approved development programme this year will generate only 18,900 rented homes, not the much larger figure to which the Minister tried to refer in his answer?
    Although I understand the Minister's wish to obfuscate and confuse the issue, will he now come clean and reveal that he is responsible for reducing the output of rented housing to the lowest point for 50 years?
    Mr. Curry: I thought the hon. Gentleman would come up with that one. He is confusing new building and new letting. Let us place the facts on the record. In 1995–96, 36,000 properties will be made available in approved development programme lettings, 7,200 properties will be released by tenants' incentive schemes and about 2,820 will be released by do-it-yourself shared ownership. That gives a figure of 46,020, to which I referred in my earlier answer.

    English Partnership
    Ms Corston: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment when he next intends to meet the chairman of English Partnership to discuss its progress. [28036]
    Mr. Curry: My right hon. Friend will meet Lord Walker on 17 July.
    Ms Corston: What steps does the Minister propose to take to ensure that local councils receive the help that they require with their plans for regeneration? Does he not realise that it is vital that the creation of a new agency should not be regarded as a substitute for Government action to help local councils with their plans for local regeneration and to help local businesses to bring prosperity to communities and cities?
    Mr. Curry: I am sure that the hon. Lady will know that I have had detailed discussions with the Bristol development corporation, of which the chairman of Bristol local authority is a member, to try to make progress on the development scheme and to bring it to a successful completion. Two schemes previously proposed by the corporation have not materialised. There is now one on which I have authorised negotiations. I hope that that will be successful, but we must ensure that, when the corporation does come to an end, an organisation exists that is able to take over the assets. I have therefore insisted that there should also be discussions with English Partnership, a body that is very experienced in the subject. I hope that the private sector development will succeed, that I shall be able to authorise it and that the third one will be the lucky one. At the same time, it is important for the protection of Government money to ensure that there is a failsafe mechanism.
    Mr. Vaz: Does the Minister accept that when the Government created English Partnership they failed to

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    make clear that organisation's role? Will he now accept the views of the private sector and others, and initiate a thorough review of the role and functions of English Partnership so that it plays an important part in our regeneration process rather than being just another Government quango, as it is at present?
    Mr. Curry: The Opposition have clearly caught review mania. It is amazing that they do not demand a review of whether today is Wednesday. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Leicester, East (Mr. Vaz) does not even know the answer to the question—not surprisingly.
    English Partnership has a clear role: to assist in development, to act as a partner in development and as a focus and help for inward investment, and to use Government resources in the most cost-effective manner. That role is played admirably by Lord Walker, who has a very good knowledge of how government and the private sector work, and of regeneration—in fact. he is almost everything that the hon. Member for Leicester, East is not.

    Construction Industry
    Mr. Luff: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what action he is taking to minimise procurement disputes in the construction industry. [28037]
    Mr. Robert B. Jones: My Department is working with the Construction Industry Board in taking forward the recommendations in Sir Michael Latham's report, "Constructing the Team". The Government are also consulting on legislative proposals arising out of Sir Michael's recommendations, which are designed to address some of the causes of disputes in the industry.
    Mr. Luff: Does my hon. Friend understand the concern of construction industry subcontractors such as Metal Constructions Ltd. in my constituency, which wants to see a construction contracts Bill in the next Session of Parliament? What reassurance can he give me to share with such companies, that the Government are committed in principle to legislate on issues identified in the Latham report?
    Mr. Jones: I share my hon. Friend's concern for the position of subcontractors as, before entering the House, I spent my working life in the construction industry. I can confirm that the Government have made it clear that, provided there is a consensus in the industry on how to move forward, we will legislate. I am sure that my hon. Friend will understand that I cannot bind the Government over the contents of the Queen's Speech. We are making steady progress, which is due to the hard work of many people in the construction industry and, of course, Sir Michael Latham himself.

    Central and Local Government
    Mr. David Nicholson: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what action he will take to improve relations between central and local government. [28038]
    Mr. Gummer: Last November, the Prime Minister and the chairmen of the local authority associations agreed written guidelines for the conduct of relations between local and national government. We are committed to seeing active and robust local government delivering quality services which their residents want and can afford.
    Mr. Nicholson: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the best way of countering the rubbish that we hear from both Opposition parties about regional assemblies is to improve further the relations between central and local government? Should that not include improving the co-ordination between the two tiers of central Government, where there are two tiers, central Government taking account of the functions that they devolve to local government, the outlawing of extremism, corruption and maladministration such as we have seen in Monklands and Hackney and, finally—building on my right hon. Friend's excellent decision last week in respect of Somerset—the relaxing of capping?
    Mr. Gummer: I hope very much that we can continue the good relationships that we have built up with local authorities. That can be achieved across the party-political divide by people who are concerned to give local authorities a proper role in the way in which the government of this country operates. It does not help to pretend that local authorities had powers taken away from them when their biggest challenge at present is the implementation of community care—a major new sphere in which they can operate in an enabling way. They have accepted the challenge gladly and with enthusiasm. It does not help to threaten local authorities, whether county, district or unitary, with yet another tier of local authority—regional government—particularly without any reference to how it would be done and knowing it to be a party-political ploy.
    Mr. Macdonald: What steps will the Secretary of State take to improve relations between the central Government and my local Western Isles council following its successful campaign to stop the dumping of the Brent Spar at sea? As the Government have been so completely wrong and so completely humiliated with regard to the Brent Spar, is it not time for an apology or perhaps a note of humility from the Dispatch Box?
    Mr. Gummer: The solution to the Brent Spar problem is now less environmentally friendly. That is the issue, and Opposition Members will have to accept that fact.
    Relations between central and local government—that is what the question is about—are for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland.
    Mr. McLoughlin: Bearing in mind the fact that central Government may have to supply some 90 per cent. of local government finance, will my right hon. Friend consider carefully whether it is time for his Department to issue to every household in the country the exact position in relation to the amount of funding going to each local authority? That will ensure that the position is readily understood, despite the misleading propaganda from local government.
    Mr. Gummer: My hon. Friend has raised this matter before and he is right to press it. I hope that the simple performance indicators that we are now publishing will help in that direction. The truth is that good local government is extremely good, but there are many examples—as we have seen from the newspapers in the past few days—of where local government has been very bad indeed. Monklands is one such example. We must try to draw a distinction not only between local authorities that are manifestly operating in an unacceptable way but

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    between those that are just badly run. I should have thought that Hackney and Haringey would be two very good ones to start with.

    Planning Policy
    Mr. Hanson: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what representations he has received regarding his review of planning policy. [28039]
    Sir Paul Beresford: The only review that my right hon. Friend proposes at the moment is to revise PPG6, on which he has received a number of representations.
    Mr. Hanson: Is the Minister aware of the continued pressure from developers for out-of-town shopping? Will he take the opportunity today to assure the House that, in any future review, he will stick closely to the Government's position of opposing out-of-town shopping and not pander to developers?
    Sir Paul Beresford: I am sorry, but the hon. Gentleman seems to have missed the various discussions and debates that have taken place. That is the reason for the revision and the rethinking of PPG6.
    Mr. Mans: When my hon. Friend reviews planning policy, will he take careful note of the more silly structure plans of various counties, such as Lancashire? It is suggesting that another 66,000 houses should be built in the county in the next 10 years, particularly around small towns such as Garstang and Preeshall, which would completely alter the character of the villages and towns. Those houses are not wanted in the county by anyone who knows what is going on there.
    Sir Paul Beresford: As my hon. Friend will know, I am abundantly aware of those points. I spent a rather enjoyable hour and a half one morning having them rammed down my throat. The only member of the Labour party present protested with a small voice, but it is his party that should get its act together on the issue.

    Rats
    Mr. Nigel Griffiths: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what representations he has received alleging failure to control rats by the water and sewerage companies. [28040]
    Mr. Atkins: It seems singularly appropriate that rats should be answering a question about rats. My Department has received no such representations.
    Mr. Griffiths: Has the Minister seen the report released in June by the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health? It shows—if the Minister had chosen to inform himself, he would know this—that the number of rat infestations has increased by more than 40 per cent., that one in seven houses is now infested with rats and that the water companies have slashed the budgets of pest control officers. Is the Minister satisfied with those cuts, which have obviously been used to fund some of the boardroom bonanzas?
    Mr. Atkins: According to the survey that was carried out, there has been an increase in the number of infestations from 4.4 per cent. to 4.8 per cent. I suggest that most of those are in Monklands.
    Mr. Fabricant: What does my right hon. Friend intend to do about an infestation in Staffordshire that we do not
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    enjoy? They moan about the standard spending assessment, they have more than £70 million held in reserves and they threaten school children with teachers losing their jobs? Should not we do something about the rats in Labour-controlled Staffordshire county council?
    Mr. Atkins: My hon. Friend has a point. However, there is a serious issue. Scare stories are being spread by the likes of the hon. Member for Edinburgh, South (Mr. Griffiths) to suggest that rats are on the increase. There has been a small increase in certain areas, but the problem must be viewed in proportion. According to the survey by the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health, the number of rats has increased by 0.4 per cent. In those circumstances, the stories from Opposition Members are little more than scaremongering and my hon. Friend has a better point than the hon. Member for Edinburgh, South.
    Mr. Banks: Since the Minister seems to know precisely the percentage increase, what is the United Kingdom population of rats?
    Mr. Atkins: It depends whether they are rattus vulgaris or whether they are black rats. My comment about Monklands would apply to the black rats.

    Regional Government
    15. Mr. Day: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what representations he has received about regional government in the north-west. [28041]
    Mr. Gummer: I have received no representations in favour of regional government in the north-west and I doubt whether anybody ever will.
    Mr. Day: My right hon. Friend will know that in my eight years as Member of Parliament for Cheadle I have received no such representations from business men in my constituency or within the region and further, and that in my eight years as a vice-president of Stockport chamber of commerce I have received no such representations from businesses in Stockport requiring regional assemblies. Does he agree that the north-west is a powerhouse for exporters, high-tech industry and aerospace and is doing great stuff for Britain? Will he ensure that that remains so and never even consider the Labour party's ridiculous proposal for regional assemblies? What would they do other than get in the way of private industry?
    Mr. Gummer: But I am sure that my hon. Friend recognises that we have had no requests from the Labour leader of Manchester council or from the Labour leadership in Lancashire for a regional assembly. Nobody wants a regional assembly, not even the Opposition, but they have to support it because it is the only way of ensuring that Scottish Members of Parliament can vote on English issues, while English Members of Parliament cannot vote on Scottish issues. We all know perfectly well why the Labour party is so silent, with the single exception of the hon. Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe (Mr. Betts), who is busy wanting regional authorities to make up for his very sad past. Labour Members are keeping quiet because they know that it has nothing to do with the governance of Britain, but concerns the Labour party's determination to fix the electorate.
    Mr. Campbell-Savours: In so as far as many decisions relating to my constituency and the constituency of the hon. Member for Cheadle (Mr. Day) are actually taken in

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    the north of England—they are taken in Preston, Manchester and, in my case, Newcastle—surely there already is a regional tier of government?
    Mr. Gummer: No. Ministers are, perfectly properly, advised by civil servants, but Ministers take the decisions and are accountable to the House. The Opposition want not only Ministers responsible to the House but five tiers of government. The hon. Gentleman would not put up with it for a moment. He would insist that he had powers in the House. He should speak out in his own party against the silly devolution plans that it is putting forward.
    Mr. Elletson: Will my right hon. Friend give the House his latest estimate of the cost to the taxpayer of an extra tier of local government in the north-west? Will he tell us how much more tax the people of Lancashire would have to pay for the privilege of being governed from Manchester?
    Mr. Gummer: Now that we have the Labour party's scheme for the south-west we are applying it to the whole country and working out what it will cost. We will then be able to give my hon. Friend a much more detailed breakdown. I hope that my hon. Friend has noticed that, at the same time as advocating an extra tier of government that would increase costs for businesses, the hon. Member for Lewisham, Deptford (Ms Ruddock) is attacking the British tourist industry and making people afraid to go on holiday in Britain—because she does not even care about putting party political profit ahead of the people of Blackpool.

    Council Homes
    Mr. Austin Mitchell: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many homes have been built by local councils in England over the past five years; and what were the figures for the period 1974 to 1979. [28043]
    Mr. Curry: Twenty-seven thousand seven hundred and 460,900 respectively.
    Mr. Mitchell: The Minister is telling us that, at a time of desperate and growing need for low-cost social rented housing, the number of starts and completions by councils is down by more than 90 per cent. Is he proud of that? Is he proud of the fact that councils will build only 1,000 new houses this year and that housing associations will build fewer than 20,000, at a time of need? Is he proud of the fact that, this year, there will be the lowest number of starts for low-cost rented housing for 50 years?
    Mr. Curry: The hon. Gentleman has been in this place long enough to know that the earlier figure referred to local authority building at a time when local authorities were the prime new builders of social housing, whereas the latter figure refers to a period when that role has been largely taken over by housing associations. Last night the hon. Member for Greenwich (Mr. Raynsford) and I were at a meeting to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the National Federation of Housing Associations, whose members are now significant builders. He might have added that 260,000 new lettings in the relevant period came from housing associations.
    The answer to the hon. Gentleman's question is therefore simple: the Government do not believe that new build should be undertaken predominantly by local
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    authorities. We believe in diversification of tenure and in choice. We believe that housing associations are better placed, more skilful and more effective at delivering new housing than local authorities.
    Mr. Dobson: Will the Minister confirm that, taking council house building and housing association building for rent together, the total this year will be the lowest for the 50 years since VE day?
    Mr. Curry: We have produced 180,000 new lettings in the past three years, and we will produce as many again in the next three years. What matters is letting, not building. It is nonsense to assume that the only house available is one built from scratch. What matters are properties coming to the marketplace for social letting. We have made significant achievements in that respect, and we shall continue to build on them.

    Local Government Finance
    Mr. Clifton-Brown: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what recent representations he has received on changes to the capping criteria for local authority budgets. [28044]
    Mr. Curry: I shall consider the capping criteria for 1996–97 in the context of decisions on next year's local government finance settlement.
    Mr. Clifton-Brown: Does my hon. Friend agree that we should relax the capping criteria on local authorities, so that profligate and wasteful expenditure decisions by councils can be well and truly exposed and local people can make their decisions known via the local ballot box?
    Mr. Curry: Any Government will seek to find ways in which people can distinguish at local level between those offering themselves for election, at the same time as making sure that Government's responsibility for overall economic policy continues. In the light of that, we shall consider the capping criteria next year.
    Mr. Denham: Will the Minister confirm that on current projections Hampshire county council will be required to cut its budget by £38 million next year? Why, then, has he absolutely refused to meet representatives of the county council, the business community and local residents in Hampshire to discuss the crisis into which he is forcing the council? Is this not a case of "those who won't listen won't learn"?
    Mr. Curry: Next year's budget for Hampshire county council has not been set; the capping criteria have not been set; decisions on the SSA have not been taken; and the budget has not been announced. When the hon. Gentleman talks about what might happen next year he is indulging in sheer fantasy.

    Cement Kilns
    Mr. Bennett: To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will make a statement about the burning of secondary liquid fuel in cement kilns. [28046]
    Mr. Atkins: I wrote to the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Mr. Bennett) on 13 June welcoming the

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    Select Committee's initiative on burning SLF in cement kilns. I said that the existing controls are sufficient to regulate cement kilns and SLF.
    I can assure the House that the trials are strictly controlled and that Her Majesty's inspectorate of pollution will stop any which endanger the environment. Permanent burning will be allowed only if HMIP is satisfied that the environment will not be adversely affected.
    Mr. Bennett: Does the Minister accept that people who live close to cement kilns have suffered for a long time from pollution from the dust and that they are now extremely worried about the possible effects of burning this new fuel? Would it not be far better to reassure them by ensuring that
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    the trials are short-lived and that no permanent permission for burning this new fuel will be given unless the same conditions apply as those for burning waste?
    Mr. Atkins: My hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans) has been particularly involved in pursuing me on a matter affecting his constituency directly, and the hon. Gentleman and the Select Committee have asked similar questions. I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his Committee's report and, as he will know, I am in full agreement with some of the things that he said. The trials that are going on are being conducted by HMIP, which is a highly regarded and internationally renowned organisation. I must await its advice before I make any decisions.

Points of Order
3.30 pm
Sir Peter Hordern: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Will you tell the House what can be done to protect the rights of right hon. and hon. Members when it is quite clear from press reports that officials in the Scott inquiry have been leaking misleading information to the press? I have in my hand an article that appeared in The Times today, which says:
"Sir Richard is understood to believe that the leaks are intended to undermine his report…and believes that some of those criticised in his report are seeking to discredit his findings before they are"—
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Morris): Order. The Scott inquiry has absolutely nothing to do with the Chair.
Mr. George Robertson: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I seek advice in relation to what the Prime Minister told the House yesterday afternoon, when he said:
"I have made it clear in 'Questions of Procedure for Ministers' that Ministers who deliberately mislead Parliament should resign, except in exceptional circumstances like a devaluation".
Only a couple of minutes later he referred to me individually, when he said:
"If the right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair) is so concerned about open government, will he say today that he will publish the earlier, secret report held by the Labour party into Monklands council, which the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. Robertson) has consistently refused to make public?"—[Official Report, 20 June 1995; Vol. 262, c. 149–150.]
That statement is untrue. The report to which the Prime Minister referred was published in March 1993, and it was made available to the press and to the public. Therefore, what he told the House yesterday, with specific reference to me, was not true. I can say only that he must have been misleading the House.
I wrote to the Prime Minister yesterday, pointing that out to him, and asked him whether in honour he would come to the House to clarify the point and apologise to me and to the House. He replied to me this morning, acknowledging that what he said was not true. He said:
"You know as well as I do that … a report may have been published as a result of your Party's internal inquiry."
Have you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, had any indication from the Prime Minister that he will now come to the House to give the apology and the clarification that, in honour and integrity, he should give us?
Mr. Deputy Speaker: I have had no communication from any hon. Member, least of all the Prime Minister.
Mr. Patrick McLoughlin: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Will you advise the House on whether there is any way in which the right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair), one of the Opposition Members who is paid extra out of the public purse, can come to the Chamber to make a statement on whether he will permit the report to be published? The evidence has remained secret. What has Labour got.to hide?
Several hon. Members rose—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. Hon. Members know full well that the Speaker has no power to demand that any hon. Member makes any statement on any matter.
Mr. Alex Salmond: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. You, as Chairman of Ways and Means, and, indeed, Madam Speaker herself, have made clear on a number of occasions the preference that the House be told first of any new developments in Government policy. All of us would have seen on our television screens yesterday evening the President of the Board of Trade, and, indeed, the Minister for Industry and Energy, make a series of belligerent statements to the effect that Shell Oil might not be given permission for onshore disposal of the Brent Spar oil rig. Those statements may have been made in a fit of pique, and they were incredible statements to make, but even if the Government are advancing such an incredible argument, do they not have a duty to come before the House and be subjected to questioning about that extraordinary behaviour?
Mr. Deputy Speaker: The hon. Gentleman knows that Ministers must respond as they feel appropriate to what they believe to be their duty.
Mr. David Shaw: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: I hope that it is a new subject.
Mr. Shaw: We have just heard the hon. Member for Hamilton (Mr. Robertson) say that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said something that was untrue yesterday—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I said that I hoped that the hon. Member's point of order would be on a new subject.
Mr. Shaw: It relates to the fact that 100 Labour Members have lied in the House about Monklands—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Member might like to rephrase that or withdraw it altogether. What he has said is not acceptable.
Mr. Shaw: I shall say exactly—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: No, a straight withdrawal.
Mr. Shaw: The fact is that 100 Labour Members—[Interruption.]
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Member deserves to be heard in silence.
Mr. Shaw: I would like to rephrase my point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker, because I think that it should be phrased in the way that hon. Member for Hamilton phrased his point about my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister. One hundred Labour Members made false statements, untrue statements, on the Order Paper about the cover-up by Labour of Monklands district council.
Mr. John McFall: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker—a new point about the progress of my private Member's Bill, the Wild Mammals (Protection) Bill, which received more support than any other private Member's Bill. Despite that, hon. Members considering the Dogs (Fouling of Land) Bill are deliberately filibustering. The public cannot understand the difference between the antiquity of the rules and procedures of the House and public opinion. Will you,

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Mr. Deputy Speaker, do something to repair the dislocation between our procedures and public opinion so that my Bill might go into Committee?
Mr. Deputy Speaker: I am confident in the Chair of that Committee and confident also that there cannot have been filibustering. In any event, what happens in a Committee has nothing to do with me today.
Mrs. Alice Mahon: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Today, the audit commissioners warned that patients' lives were being put at risk because of the chaotic state of hospital medical records. As the Government have spent millions of pounds on administrators over the past few years, has the Secretary of State for Health said whether she will come to the House to explain exactly what is going on?
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Madam Speaker has made it absolutely clear that that sort of manoeuvre to ascertain whether there will be a statement is unacceptable.
Mr. John Sykes: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I do not normally raise points of order, but I had no idea that the hon. Member for Dumbarton (Mr. McFall) would raise a point of order about his Bill. May I inform you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that last week the Committee considering the Dogs (Fouling of Land) Bill spent about an hour discussing manuscript amendments that had been tabled by the hon. Member for Burnley (Mr. Pike)?
Mr. Tony Banks rose—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Is it a point of order?
Mr. Banks: Yes, Mr. Deputy Speaker. It relates to the point of order raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Dumbarton (Mr. McFall). Surely his point about proceedings in Committee is an example of where the will of the House as expressed on the Floor is being frustrated.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: We will not go back to points of order on which I have already ruled.

prosecution Privatisation
3.38 pm
Mr. Julian Brazier: I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to allow the police to use private solicitors instead of the Crown Prosecution Service to prosecute in the magistrates' court.
The aim behind the Bill is simply to make justice for smaller crimes cheaper, faster and hence more easily pursued. Summary cases—those that have to be handled in magistrates courts—are in theory less important matters to be brought before the criminal law. For the victims, however, the theft of a vehicle, criminal damage up to £2,000 or common assault are serious enough offences.
It is interesting to note what has happened since 1985 while the Crown Prosecution Service has had a monopoly of handling summary cases. The latest figures available are for 1993, which was the peak year for crime. It rose sharply in the years until then and has fallen since. We find not only that, up to 1993, crime increased fast and that the police substantially increased the number of crimes that they cleared up, but that a number of cases had been downgraded from indictable offences handled in Crown courts to summary cases handled in magistrates courts. For all those reasons, one would have expected a substantial increase in the number of successful prosecutions in magistrates courts. Far from it. In 1993 the number of successful convictions in magistrates courts was 4 per cent. lower than 10 years before.
Costs too have spiralled. The Comptroller and Auditor-General is one of a number of authorities which have commented on the issue. It is interesting to ask how the system works. I shall furnish my argument with an example from my constituency. Canterbury police station is a few hundred yards from Canterbury magistrates court. Several excellent firms of solicitors operate in the immediate area. Every case—no matter how trivial—that is brought to court must go all the way to Crown Prosecution Service offices in Folkestone, with all the procedures involved in that. Cases that could have been dealt with before on the same day, largely on the strength of verbal briefing, must now be dealt with through that expensive and time-consuming procedure.
That is not a criticism of individual Crown Prosecution Service officials. When I visited them in Folkestone, I was impressed at how hard working and diligent they were. The truth is that the system is a grossly unwieldy one for dealing with minor offences.
I propose that we should allow each police area to appoint, if they choose to do so, one local firm of solicitors to handle a proportion of their magistrates court work. That firm would obviously have to give up any defence activities because, otherwise, there would be a conflict of interest. That proposal should be extended further to allow police officers to be used to prosecute some minor cases themselves, as used to be the case.
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The new system would have a number of advantages. First, it would obviously be much faster. Secondly, it would be far cheaper. Those two changes would enable us to tackle more cases so there should be an increase, instead of a reduction, in the number of cases successfully brought. Thirdly, it would improve the motivation of the police force. Fourthly, in relation to minor cases, it would give police officers greater experience in court work. We have reached the absurd position where officers are having to be sent on courses to be trained as witnesses.
As far as I know, only two arguments have been advanced against my proposal. One of them involves the argument from uniformity and the other from independence. Uniformity cuts no ice with me and should cut no ice at least with Conservative Members because, as a party, we believe in diversity. Crime, especially petty crime, has a local aspect to it and it is right that, in some regions, people should choose to be more vigilant in relation to a particular type of crime if it is more prevalent in their region.
On independence, we often hear cases cited, such as the Guildford Four or Birmingham Six, but surely no one would maintain to the House that the procedures that are appropriate for a major criminal trial are appropriate for a person damaging someone's front door or for careless driving. However, all such offences must go through the same basic procedure, with the same people, in the prosecution process.
The question is posed immediately: why did we ever nationalise the service? Whereas Conservative Members would believe that it was perhaps a mistake to nationalise something as important as this anyway, hon. Members on both sides of the House would surely agree that the most appropriate way to handle small cases, petty offences—the offences that local magistrates courts exist to deal with—is for local police to deal with local solicitors.
These offences matter to my constituents and, I am certain, to other hon. Members' constituents. My approach would result in faster and cheaper justice and would allow us to handle more cases. I urge the House to support my Bill.
Question put and agreed to.
Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Julian Brazier, Sir Archibald Hamilton, Sir George Gardiner, Mr. Peter Bottomley, Mr. Robert Hughes, Mr. Graham Riddick, Mr. John Sykes, Mr. David Shaw, Mr. Roger Knapman, Mr. Bernard Jenkin, Mr. Nigel Waterson and Mr. Stephen Day.

PROSECUTION PRIVATISATION
Mr. Julian Brazier accordingly presented a Bill to allow the police to use private solicitors instead of the Crown Prosecution Service to prosecute in the magistrates' court. And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time upon Friday 22 June 1995, and to be printed. [Bill 142.]
Orders of the Day

  European Union
  [Relevant documents: The White Paper on Developments in the European Union January-June 1994 (Cm 2675); the White Paper on Developments in the European Union July-December 1994 (Cm 2798); the unnumbered Explanatory Memorandum submitted by HM Treasury on 6th June 1995 on the Commission's recommendation for the broad guidelines of the economic policies of the Member States and the Community; European Community Documents Nos. COM (95) 333, the Commission's Green Paper on the practical arrangements for the introduction of the single currency, EP: A4-0102/95, a European parliament resolution on the functioning of the European Union with a view to the 1996 Intergovernmental Conference-implementation and development of the Union, and SEC (95) 731, the report of the European Commission on the operation of the Treaty of the European Union; the Report of the Council of the 'European Union on the functioning of the Treaty of the European Union (Cm 2866); the Report by the Court of Auditors to the 'Reflection Group' on the operation of the Treaty on European Union; the Report of the Court of Justice on certain aspects of the Treaty on European Union; and European Community Documents Nos. 7221/95, on the White Paper on the preparation of the associated countries of central and eastern Europe for integration into the internal market of the Union, 12269/94, relating to recognition of qualifications for academic and professional purposes, and 5715/95, relating to the implementation of directives in the social field.]
  Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Andrew Mitchell.]
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Morris): Before I call the Foreign Secretary, I must announce that I have imposed a 10-minute limit on speeches by Back Benchers.
  3.45 pm
  The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Douglas Hurd): As usual, the debate covers a number of detailed documents, but I shall follow recent custom in looking forward rather than back. I shall try to set out the Government's approach first to the summit at Cannes under the French presidency at the beginning of next week, and secondly to the intergovernmental conference next year. Ideas for that conference are already being exchanged in the reflections group on which my representative is my hon. Friend the Member for Boothferry (Mr. Davis), the Minister of State.
  I shall try to set out again the Government's philosophy and policies within the framework already established by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister's speech at Leiden last year and his speech in the House on 1 March. That philosophy and those policies may not—indeed, do not—suit either extreme of the argument, and they therefore disappoint those who prefer excitement to reason, particularly in some parts of the press; but I strongly believe that they are the right philosophy and the right policies for the national interests of Britain and, indeed, for the success of the European Union. I also believe that, unless the Governments of Europe are remarkably foolish over the years to come, that is the
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  approach that will succeed in the end. I do not believe in either the disintegration of the European Union or its conversion to a centralised state.
  Mr. Tony Marlow: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Hurd: So soon!
  Mr. Marlow: My right hon. Friend raised the spectre of a centralised European state. One issue that could be involved in that is obviously the single currency. Let us suppose that the next election took place in April 1997. I understand that, before joining a single currency, a country must have been in the exchange rate mechanism for two years. Given that our right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said that we would not join the ERM during this Parliament, would it be right to assume that the United Kingdom could not, in those circumstances, be a founder member of the single currency?
  Mr. Hurd: It might be sensible if I dealt with the single currency at the point where it arises in my speech, but I do not know that I shall add a great deal to what my hon. Friend heard from the Prime Minister on 1 March, when he dealt with the matter at some length.
  The line set out by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister in the speeches that I have mentioned has been consistently advocated and defended by the whole Cabinet, which recently reaffirmed our commitment to it. It is greatly to be preferred to the policies of the Opposition, whose spokesmen hop about from one branch of the European argument to another, uttering first one note and then—a few weeks later—another, and, as far as I can see, being consistent only in their carelessness of the national interest. I believe that our policies are also to be preferred to others based simply on fear and dislike of the European Union to which we belong. If we want a Europe of nations, we need to work positively and persuasively with our partners to achieve it.
  At Cannes and in the intergovernmental conference, we will be talking of the Europe of 1995, looking forward to the next century. Ten or 20 years ago, the mindset in Europe was different. Indeed, the general assumptions in Europe have changed since my right hon. and noble Friend Baroness Thatcher was Prime Minister. As she reminds us, she challenged the assumptions of the day with great vigour and she now summarises her stance as no, no, no. My recollection is a little bit different. I tend to remember it as no, maybe, yes. That was her approach.
  Mr. Terry Dicks: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the truth about Baroness Thatcher was that her approach was yes, yes, yes—yes to the Single European Act, yes to giving money when the Community overspent and yes to the exchange rate mechanism?
  Mr. Hurd: I think that my hon. Friend, with the best of motives, is slightly exaggerating. I would prefer to summarise it as no, maybe, yes. That was her approach to the successful negotiation of the British rebate and it was certainly her approach to the decisive extension of majority voting in the Single European Act.
  Mr. John Sykes: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Hurd: May I just finish this?

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  I think myself that it would have been Baroness Thatcher's approach also to the issues of Maastricht and I do not criticise her for that. What the noble Lady did was to argue hard and when she had the best deal available for Britain, she signed. She argued and she signed. That is the record and, in its time, it was a successful one. The style now is different but, actually, the approach of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister is much closer to that of his predecessor than she now supposes.
  Mr. Sykes: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way. I am not really interested in what my right hon. and noble Friend Baroness Thatcher did in 1986. I am far more interested in, and want to ask about, what will happen in 1997. I want to ask my right hon. Friend whether he remembers 20 years ago, when we had the referendum. I was recently looking in my attic and I found an old leaflet which at the time I busily shoved through people's letter boxes. If I could quote from this document, which I was happy to disseminate in 1975, on the question of sovereignty and ministerial responsibility it says that
  "the real guarantee of Parliamentary control over new EEC legislation is the fact that British Ministers attending the EEC Councils remain responsible to Parliament at Westminster and can, if necessary, veto decisions to introduce new EEC legislation if they believe that it would not be in the national interest."
  It goes on to say, if my right hon. Friend will listen, that
  "as long as Parliament can control its Ministers, it can control all important new laws that are made in Brussels and Luxembourg."
  How can I hold my right hon. Friend to account in the House 20 years later when we have sold so many of our interests to qualified majority voting?
  Mr. Hurd: That is precisely what my hon. Friend is doing now. He is holding me to account. He can do so frequently. It is perfectly true that in 1985 in the Single European Act, in order to gain the advantages of the single market we—and the Prime Minister of the day—accepted a substantial extension of majority voting. I think that she was entirely right.
  I do not think that we could have had a single market and rules and a proper enforcement of those rules if every anti-protectionist measure and every attempt to enforce the single market had had to be done by unanimity. That was the argument that the noble Lady accepted in 1985 and I think that she was entirely right. But we do not believe that that having been accomplished, it is necessary to go further. That is one of the differences, as I shall seek to explain, between our position and that of the Opposition.
  Going back to the mindset of 10 or 20 years ago and illustrating the change that is now occurring, it was assumed in those years that community spending was a good thing in itself and that budget discipline was an eccentricity to which only the British were attached. The prospect of enlargement in those days to include the Scandinavians and Austria was viewed with suspicion. Remember the hostile reception given to Lady Thatcher's speech at Bruges in which this was one of her main themes? It was felt that Britain was interested in enlargement only because Britain was opposed to deepening. Deepening good, widening probably wrong was the general view in those days.
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  It was supposed that the more the Community did, the better. It was an absolute. There was a steady move to enlarge the areas in which the Community was competent, that is, to draw more and more power to the centre. There are still people who hold these ideas and preach them, and when they do so their words are happily pounced on here by those who like to believe simply that Britain stands alone against the unanimous continental ambition for a centralised state. However, these voices, which were once dominant and which we still hear, are now defensive because events and opinion are moving against them, as I shall seek to show.
  Mr. Hugh Dykes: My right hon. Friend just now, quite rightly, gave the reasons why the Prime Minister is better as a successor to Baroness Thatcher, in respect not only of European matters but of other policies. Does he agree that one of the sad features of Baroness Thatcher is her repeated attacks on friendly member states in the so-called friendly European Union, not least the attack that she made on Germany yesterday? Will my right hon. Friend confirm that the Prime Minister has very good relations with the other member states?
  Mr. Hurd: I was not seeking to make the point that my hon. Friend suggests. I was not seeking to make a distinction or difference; I was simply saying that the approach of arguing and then, when one feels that one has the best deal available for Britain, signing, is one shared by the present Prime Minister and his predecessor.
  Going back to the difference between the mindset of those days and now, we now have the beginnings of budget discipline, as opposed to the time when it was thought that extra Community spending was essentially a good thing.
  Mr. Alex Salmond: Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Hurd: No, I have to get on.
  I say that we have only the beginnings of budget discipline because we are not yet satisfied, but, when my right hon. Friend discusses in Cannes next week how much money the European Union should spend on helping the countries of eastern Europe and the Mediterranean, the whole discussion will be within spending guidelines laid down under his chairmanship in Edinburgh in 1992. There will be plenty of argument—there always is plenty of argument about these matters—but it will be within the financial bounds already set, something that would have been inconceivable in the early years.
  The enlargement of the Union, which was regarded as heretical in the old days, has happened and will happen again. The argument set out in Bruges by Lady Thatcher about including the east is now orthodox. It is also now orthodox to say that the European Union should do less and do it better. That is a phrase of the present President of the Commission, Mr. Santer. It is inconceivable that his predecessor, Jacques Delors, in his heyday would have used such a phrase.
  No one in a position of authority now talks about the "United States of Europe". Indeed, the federal Chancellor of Germany, who used to use the phrase, has explicitly renounced it, saying that we are not aiming for a United States of Europe. The European Commission and the European Parliament have recently set out their ideas of

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  how the intergovernmental conference should end up, and there are many things in their papers that we would contest.
  It is notable that in neither the Commission's paper nor in the Parliament's paper is it suggested that further matters should be transferred from the competence of nations to the competence of the European Union. That, in itself, shows the change of mindset in recent years. As the chairman of the reflections group told me in Madrid this week, the dreaded F-word is nowhere to be seen.
  Mr. Peter Shore: Will the Secretary of State give way?
  Mr. Hurd: I shall give way to the right hon. Gentleman in a minute.
  No one is proposing an increase in competences. There is plenty of room for debate about what remains and about how Europe should act in the area already allocated for European action within the existing treaties, but there is no proposal on the table at the moment for an increase in that area. The accent is—
  Mr. Shore rose—
  Mr. Hurd: I shall give way in a moment if the right hon. Gentleman will let me finish the point.
  The accent is on subsidiarity and deregulation within those spheres where the Union has a role under the existing treaties, and we shall want to find ways to entrench subsidiarity and deregulation during the IGC.
  Mr. Shore: Before the Secretary of State escapes entirely into cloud cuckoo land, may I put to him one obvious point? All the European institutions—the Parliament, the Commission and the European Court of Justice—are making proposals, which are now before the reflections group and will be before the IGC, to dismantle the two pillars of foreign and security policy and home affairs and justice, which were the right hon. Gentleman's greatest claim to success in the previous negotiations. Surely he cannot overlook this major assault, which will not be confined to those three institutions but which will be backed by virtually all the Governments of the nation states.
  Mr. Hurd: There is certainly a tentative attempt by those institutions to enlarge their scope within the area covered by the treaties. The point that I was making was that, I think for the first time in the history of the European Community, or Union, there is now to be a conference at which no one will seriously suggest that areas now within the competence of the nation state should be put within the competence of the European Union.
  Several hon. Members rose—
  Mr. Hurd: I shall give way to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton (Sir I. Lawrence) and then get on.
  Sir Ivan Lawrence: What does my right hon. Friend say about the current demand that we could only have Europol as an instrument for controlling organised crime and drugs if we were prepared to accept that Europol must be judicable by the European Court of Justice, which is within the competence of the European Union, however strongly we have asserted that justice and home affairs should be the third pillar of Maastricht outside the competence of the European Union?
  Mr. Hurd: We shall resist that. Indeed, my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary is resisting it at the moment. I hope that it will be possible to reach agreement on Europol—a very important and valuable proposal—at Cannes, without accepting the jurisdiction of the ECJ in what should be an intergovernmental pillar.
  Several hon. Members rose—
  Mr. Hurd: I shall give way once more and then I really must get on.
  Mr. Iain Duncan Smith: May I press my right hon. Friend on the point about competence? Surely the real factor is not so much that extra competence is granted under the aegis of the IGC, but that the European Court of Justice, in the way that it is constructed, does not need extra competence to be granted because it will, through teleological interpretation and other devices, grant itself greater scope by reinterpreting the treaties. Is not the reality that federalism may not be spelt out literally, but is in action the whole time through the European Court of Justice?
  Mr. Hurd: If my hon. Friend looks at the recent judgments of the court, for example, on competence, and on the question of the World Trade Organisation, where the court found in favour of the member states against the Commission, he will find that the pattern is not as uniform as he and sometimes others seek to lay down. But of course one of the things that we shall need to look at during the IGC is the role of the ECJ and whether it fits our idea of how the institutions of the Community should work.
  The Opposition do not seem to have noticed the change in mindset, which I have been—I hope—proving. In the 1980s, the Labour party was wholly opposed to British membership of the European Union. It now embraces the European ideas of the 1980s, just when the debate in Europe is moving away from them, as I hope that I have proved. It seems determined to stay about 10 years behind the gang. For example, it clings obstinately to the social chapter, and it clings obstinately to the national minimum wage—presumably as the price which the unions exacted for their support on clause IV.
  The social chapter and the national minimum wage may suit the Leader of the Opposition's internal policies, but we believe that there would be a heavy price for Britain. The accent now in the European debate, which will be sounded quite clearly at Cannes, is on restoring Europe's competitiveness, not on undermining it further. The accent is on creating new jobs, not on destroying those which already exist.
  Mr. Mike Gapes rose—
  Mr. Robert N. Wareing rose—
  Mr. Hurd: I shall just finish this part of my speech and then give way to the hon. Member for Ilford, South (Mr. Gapes).
  President Chirac has rightly put the creation of jobs at the top of the agenda in Cannes next week. Our Prime Minister, representing the country with the fastest falling unemployment in the European Union, is well placed to take the lead.
  Mr. Gapes: How many member states of the enlarged European Union are in favour of ditching the social chapter?
  Mr. Hurd: With regard to the member states at Maastricht, before this concern with competitiveness really took hold, people signed up to the social chapter who would have been much wiser to follow our example and stay well away from it. They are now repenting that. On that day, I remember very clearly, the European employers were not awake to what was happening. A recent report from the European Employers Federation puts deregulation and subsidiarity at the top of its list and realises that the loss of competitors in Europe is connected with the inflexibility of the labour market. It is now moving away from the ideas which the Labour party would have this country embrace. That is what I mean by saying that the Labour party appears to be, in the most damaging way, about 10 years behind the debate.
  Mr. Wareing: Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Hurd: No, I am going to move on.
  In his speech in Chatham house and again in Bonn recently, the Leader of the Opposition offered up four whole areas of policy for qualified majority voting: industrial, regional, environmental and social. Last month many of his Members of the European Parliament, presumably taking their cue from him, voted for much wider extension, to collapse the intergovernmental pillars and to move to full co-decision between the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers.
  Mr. William Cash: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Hurd: May I finish this passage? Then I shall give way to my hon. Friend.
  To those of my right hon. and hon. Friends who want to establish clear blue water between the views of the Opposition and those of the Government on Europe I simply say this: "You have it. Read the speeches by the Leader of the Opposition and read the speeches by the Prime Minister, especially the two that I have mentioned." We do not need to retreat into a stream of negatives or a mood of sourness to establish a difference between the parties. The difference exists; it is there in the texts; the Leader of the Opposition created it. He thought that he was being fashionable about Europe, but the fashion has changed. Our policy is based not on fashion but on an analysis of the national interests of Britain. His policy is based on a set of ideas that, in our view and in the view of an increasing number of Europeans, have had their day.
  Mr. Cash: Of course Conservative Members acknowledge that the Opposition are absolutely hopeless on majority voting, but will my right hon. Friend comment on the Foreign Ministers' report adopted in April, to which he and the Government subscribed? It is now contained in a Command Paper before the House, and it says clearly:
  "On the question of efficiency the continued extension of qualified majority voting is a positive factor".
  How does my right hon. Friend square that with what he has just said about majority voting and governmental competence?
  Mr. Hurd: As I shall say in a minute, for the single market, to keep the protectionists at bay and for the sake
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  of any future reform of the common agricultural policy, qualified majority voting will be needed. But I do not believe—in fact, I strongly disbelieve, if that is the right word—that qualified majority voting should be extended into the area in which I have most experience, that of foreign policy. I shall say more about that in a minute.
  Mr. Wareing rose—
  Mr. Hurd: No, I shall get on.
  As regards the summit at Cannes, I have already mentioned the debate on employment. Everybody hopes that it will be possible to reach agreement on setting up Europol, because agreement is needed. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton (Sir I. Lawrence) asked me about that. Europol will not be a Community institution but will be established under the third pillar of intergovernmental co-operation. We hope that on the same intergovernmental basis it will be possible to reach agreement on conventions dealing with fraud and the exchange of information between customs departments.
  The summit will be asked to take some financial decisions. For example, it will be asked to settle the size of the European development fund for the countries of Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific under the Lomé convention. It will also be asked to strike a balance between spending in central and east European countries as they prepare for membership of the Community and spending in the Mediterranean, in whose stability all of us in Europe have a clear interest.
  As the House would expect, the Chancellor of the Exchequer has been on the cautious side in those discussions. No one suggests that we should breach the Edinburgh ceiling. We British are keen that there should be a sizeable reserve for external spending on which we may need to call in an emergency, but which may remain happily unspent.
  Mr. John Wilkinson: May I ask my right hon. Friend an important and topical question about spending? Why was it necessary for Her Majesty's Government yesterday to approve with the Spanish Government the assignment of £2.8 billion of European taxpayers' money to the countries of the Mediterranean? Was that done to buy off the Spanish over Gibraltar? How will it benefit living standards in this country?
  Mr. Hurd: My hon. Friend may be referring to a report in The Times, but there has been no agreement between us and the Spaniards. I have referred to the balance between eastern Europe and the Mediterranean. The Commission put forward proposals for a rapid expansion in expenditure in the Mediterranean which ourselves and others, including the Germans, thought to be excessive. We contested that and we now have a presidency proposal which does not deal with the maximum proposal, but with a baseline minimum proposal which leaves scope for reserves for emergencies which might be happily unspent. We have not yet agreed on the matter, which will have to be agreed just before Cannes. The discussion is moving in a sensible way from our point of view, and the figures lie entirely within the ceilings embodied in the legislation that the House has approved.
  There are some discussions taking place about stage III of economic and monetary union and, in particular, a single currency. There is no proposal at Cannes or anywhere else either to change the timetable in the treaty

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  or to relax the criteria which countries must meet before they can join the single currency. To return to the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Northampton, North (Mr. Marlow), the Prime Minister set out the Government's attitude on the single currency at some length in his speech on 1 March. There is really nothing that I can add to that today, and it remains the Government's policy. The House will recall that the Prime Minister explained at length and with care the reasons for his own wariness—the word he used—about the proposition so far as Britain was concerned.
  My right hon. Friend also explained why he felt it right that we should hold on to the freedom that he obtained for us at Maastricht to take a decision on this matter at the time, if and when a choice comes before us. I note the strong endorsement of his stance in the report issued by the CBI yesterday. The Prime Minister has not excluded the possibility of holding a referendum on the single currency if the Government ever felt that such a test was in the British interest.
  Mr. Nicholas Budgen: Can my right hon. Friend tell the House what the money to be spent in the Mediterranean will be used for? Is there not a slight tendency for some of the Euro-money spent in the Mediterranean to be frittered away by fraud? I am sure that my right hon. Friend would wish to reassure the House on that subject.
  Mr. Hurd: We must be able to reassure the House on that matter, and that is why—as I have mentioned—we have been particularly energetic in trying to promote measures against fraud which would give even my hon. Friend reassurance on the matter. I hope that member states will agree at Cannes on new measures against fraud and also regulations which will enable the Commission to be more active and effective against fraud.
  One of the ways in which the European Parliament can attract attention and respect is by being more energetic in using the Court of Auditors in this action against fraud. While my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South (Mr. Budgen) is right in what he says about fraud, it does not occur only in the Mediterranean. That subject concerns every member state, and it is crucial for confidence in the Union that fraud is stamped out.
  Mr. Budgen: What will the money be spent on?
  Mr. Hurd: My hon. Friend asked for guarantees against fraud. A slice of the money will be spent on Gibraltar, for example. The stability of the southern and eastern shores of the Mediterranean is a matter of huge importance to this country. I am often questioned by my hon. Friends about the middle east peace process and what help we are giving to the Palestinians in their efforts to maintain the agreement which they have signed with Israel. One answer to my hon. Friend is that part of the money for the Mediterranean will go in that direction.
  The European Union is making an entirely justified effort to do its best to create and preserve stability along the eastern and southern shores of the Mediterranean. That is something that we in Britain have always spent a certain amount of money on.
  Mr. Salmond: The Foreign Secretary has spoken about a divergence of opinion on Europe, but is not the most obvious divergence of opinion that between the one that he is putting forward at the Dispatch Box and the basic
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  anti-European Union stance which now seems to be predominant among his Back Benchers? Earlier today I inadvertently found some Conservative Members handing out question papers for the next Foreign Office Question Time in a couple of weeks' time, no doubt designed to ambush the Foreign Secretary. Does he not increasingly resemble a waggon train surrounded by indians?
  Mr. Hurd: What I am setting out is the policy that has been set out by the Prime Minister in a number of speeches and which was endorsed, unanimously, of course, by the Cabinet about a fortnight ago. It is now being worked up into detailed proposals in Whitehall, the details of which are gradually being made available to the House. That is the Government's policy. We believe that is right, in line with popular feeling in the country and in the interests of the country and of Europe.
  Sir Peter Tapsell: On the important subject of the single currency, my right hon. Friend said that there were no proposals at Cannes either to ease the economic criteria conditions or to change the timetable laid down for that. Those two statements are incompatible. Everyone now knows—it is universally recognised—that the economic criteria cannot be satisfied by a sufficient number of European Union countries in order to establish a single currency according to the Maastricht timetable. Surely that is a fact.
  Mr. Hurd: What is acknowledged and what the Finance Ministers explicitly acknowledged on Monday is that the earlier timetable as envisaged in the Maastricht treaty—1996-97—is unreal. That is something that the Prime Minister and the Chancellor have been saying here for a long time, but there were people on the continent, particularly in the Commission, who clutched at the dream that it might be possible to realise the earlier timetable envisaged in the treaty. My hon. Friend certainly knows that there is also provision in the treaty for a timetable based on 1999. People have not yet come to the conclusion that that is unreal, although they may have to do so eventually. I am not disputing my hon. Friend's basic thesis, but, so far, the earlier timetable has been abandoned as unreal.
  Mr. Barry Legg: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Hurd: No. I must get on and deal with the issues before the intergovernmental conference.
  The House is being kept fully informed of the work of the reflections group, and it will have ample opportunities to cross-examine Ministers about our negotiating stance. For example, I spent two hours with the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs this morning, to a large extent discussing that point.
  As the Prime Minister has stressed, and as the House, I think, understands, Ministers cannot be expected to give every detail of a negotiating position in advance, but he and we have already set out the principles on which we will operate. There is no massive idea dominating the discussion in the run-up to the conference in the same way as the single market and majority voting dominated the discussion before the Single European Act and the way in which economic and monetary union dominated the discussion before Maastricht.

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  There will be discussions, however, of a number of difficult items. Qualified majority voting has already been mentioned. We shall argue, as the House knows, for a fairer system of weighting which gives a greater say to the larger countries. As I have said, QMV is necessary in certain spheres. We must face that. It is needed to keep the protectionists at hay and to prevent them from undermining the single market. It will certainly be essential when the time comes for further reform of the common agricultural policy, but we do not accept the case for its further extension into areas now covered by unanimity.
  I feel particularly strongly about the sector which I know best, foreign policy. To spare the House a long explanation, I will put in the Library a copy of an article that I have just written for a German newspaper setting out my reasons. It is right that the countries of Europe should act together when they agree and the common foreign and security policy can be built, and is being built brick by brick in that way. I cannot think of any case, however, during my time as Foreign Secretary when we would have been more effective if it had been possible to override a member state on a foreign policy matter. There is a gap there between theoretical and practical thinking. The notion, for example, that somehow there would be peace in Bosnia, and in Croatia, today if we were able to use qualified majority voting in Brussels appears wholly unreal.
  We do want to make foreign policy work better in Europe. Where does the remedy lie? Among other things, we believe in strengthening the presidency, so that when there is action agreed by everyone it can be more visible and effective. We need to consider the idea of shared presidencies so that the assets of the bigger member states in that sphere can be used better. We need better back-up for the Council: proper analysis, planning, and discussion of policy options.
  My opinion is that the basic structure of the European Union is now about right, whether it be a Union of 15 or 20 or more members. We are on the right track as regards that. It is right that the single market should have rules and institutions which work out those rules and enforce them evenly.
  Mr. Marlow: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Hurd: May I finish this bit? Then I will give way to my hon. Friend again.
  We need a Commission and a Court to ensure, for example, that British planes are allowed to fly into Orly, as they can today—as they could not a couple of years ago—that the Italians and Spaniards are heavily fined if their milk quota figures are wrong and that the Italians have to repeal a tax on luxury cars. Since that tax was repealed, under pressure from the Commission and the Court, there has been a massive increase in the sales of Jaguar cars in Italy.
  Mr. Nigel Spearing rose—
  Mr. Marlow rose—
  Mr. Hurd: I promised one Opposition Member that I would give way to him, but he is no longer in the Chamber. I give way to my hon. Friend.
  Mr. Marlow: I am exceedingly grateful for the generosity of my right hon. Friend. Will he tell the House in what aspects of policy Her Majesty's Government will seek to regain competence to the United Kingdom from European institutions? Is it none?
  Mr. Hurd: It is not none. We are still considering whether there are ways in which we could make clearer the definitions of competence. No one suggests, as I have said, an enlargement of competence. There may well he aspects in which it would be right and we could reach agreement. It should remain absolutely clear, where there is doubt at the moment, that matters about which there is doubt remain within national jurisdiction. We have that in the existing treaty as regards school institutions, education policy and as regards harmonisation of health care. Those are excluded. Perhaps that can be carried further in the next treaty. That is the type of detailed sub-policy work that we are still carrying through in Whitehall, and no doubt other countries are doing the same.
  Mr. Spearing rose—
  Mr. Hurd: I think I will come to the end.
  I am going through some of the specific ideas that we intend to propose. We shall seek changes as regards the Commission—a leaner Commission. As the Union expands, the infinite expansion of the college of Commissioners makes, in our opinion, no sense. We are considering a further control on unnecessary legislation. We believe that it is possible—not certain, but possible—that what is called a sunset clause should be considered. If an idea has got stuck and has not advanced in three years, why not allow it to lapse, to avoid cluttering the negotiating table with unwanted paper?
  We need a European Parliament that can monitor the work of the Commission in ways that are beyond the reach of the House or national Parliaments. Fraud has been mentioned; the improvement of financial control is another example. We also seek—I mentioned that in my evidence this morning to the Foreign Affairs Select Committee—stronger ways in which national Parliaments and the European Parliament can work together, although that is something where we need co-operation with the House. It is not something that Governments themselves can decide.
  Governments need to work together, outside the institutions of the Community, on an intergovernmental basis, as the treaty provides.
  Mr. Bernard Jenkin: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Hurd: I will give way to my hon. Friend for the last time.
  Mr. Jenkin: I am extremely grateful to my right hon. Friend. May I read him a short paragraph?
  "It would be idle to pretend that"
  the United Kingdom Parliament
  "has any influence over the institutions of the European Community. It is equally unrealistic to believe that it could ever have effective control, or that other national parliaments, singly or acting together, could create an effective control mechanism."
  Those are the words written by my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade when he was on the Back Benches.

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  Should not we recognise that the only effective way to strengthen the role of national Parliaments is to repatriate competencies from the European Parliament to the national Parliaments—not, as my right hon. Friend advocates, to strengthen the European Parliament?
  Mr. Hurd: I do not agree with that at all. The energy that my hon. Friend and other right hon. and hon. Members spend on European matters in the House refutes my hon. Friend's thesis. The essential decisions—changes in the treaty, anything to do with foreign policy, defence, home and justice matters—are taken by unanimity. My hon. Friend can hold me to ransom; I am responsible to him and my voice, or that of the Prime Minister, is crucial. On other matters, for reasons that I have now explained twice in my speech, there is majority voting. We in Britain agreed that there should be majority voting in order to gain our objective, which is a single market.
  Mr. Budgen: Some of us did not.
  Mr. Hurd: Some did not, but most did.
  That deal was in our interests. I do not accept that national Parliaments do not have a role—they do. Many national Parliaments, including most people in this one, would like it to be a stronger role. It is difficult to work out the practical ways of achieving that, but we have to try to do it. Some of the ideas that I set out to the Select Committee this morning—I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester, North (Mr. Jenkin) will study the reports—are ideas which I hope that Committees and Members of the House will take up and run with.
  Mr. Dykes: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Hurd: No, I have given way to my hon. Friend already.
  The institutions that I have talked about are better suited to a Europe of nations than a united states of Europe. Yet we must acknowledge that neither in this country nor elsewhere do those institutions have a firm hold on the loyalties or even sometimes the respect of the peoples whom they exist to serve. That is not because people have suddenly developed a dislike of foreigners or suddenly turned against the idea of Europeans working together. On the contrary, market research, certainly in this country and, I think, in all the countries of Europe, shows that people want Europe to succeed. They want the Europeans to work successfully together, but they are ill at ease with the way in which things are done today.
  That unease will not be cured by speeches or declarations or tinkering with the treaties. People will have greater confidence in the institutions of Europe when they see them working clearly for the objectives which they themselves—the people—think important: the building of prosperity through the opening of markets, through free trade, through deregulation and through strong action against fraud; the extension eastward of the stability and prosperity which, with all the arguments among ourselves, we take for granted in the west of Europe; and flexibility, so that national differences can be accepted, not regarded as heretical, and national identity is preserved.
  As I hope that I have established, the record of the past few years shows much greater progress in those healthy directions than people yet perceive. Britain is well placed—better placed than others—to press for further
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  progress on all those points. The Prime Minister has set our course. It may not be dramatic enough for all tastes—it just happens to be right, and we shall follow it.
  Sir Edward Heath: In his opening remarks, my right hon. Friend—and former assistant—praised my successor for her repeated technique of saying no, no, no and then saying yes and signing up. My right hon. Friend also emphasised that both he and the present Prime Minister closely follow that technique. That has given me immense reassurance and I now have every confidence in the future of the meeting at Cannes, of the intergovernmental conference, of the Union and of this country because if that excellent example is followed, we shall achieve all the aims that my right hon. Friend has been describing in his speech. Those who have been niggling away on the Benches behind us will be defeated and we shall all benefit. I thank him very much.
  Mr. Hurd: That was not quite what I expected from my right hon. Friend. I learnt a great deal from him 20 years ago. I have forgotten some of it—whether to my benefit or not, I am not sure. I am grateful—or I think that I am grateful; it will need a little further study later—for what my right hon. Friend has said.
  In conclusion, I believe that the record of the last few years and the change in the mindset that I have tried to document because it is often disputed shows that there has been greater progress in a healthy direction than people yet perceive. I also believe that this country is well placed to press for further progress on those points because, in many cases, we originated the argument which is beginning to prevail. The Prime Minister has set our course in the speeches that I have mentioned. I entirely accept that it may not be dramatic enough for all tastes; it just happens to be right. We shall follow that course steadily, firmly and in the national interest.
  4.29 pm
  Mr. Robin Cook: For the convenience of the Foreign Secretary, I make it clear at the outset that I do not intend to utter any word of criticism of him in my speech. Having listened to his speech and watched the Back Benchers behind him, I fear that he will receive enough criticism in the course of the debate without any contribution from me.
  I found the least convincing passage in the right hon. Gentleman's speech that moment when he attempted to explain that there was clear blue water between his position and that of the Labour Front Bench. I do not suggest that the Foreign Secretary should intervene at this moment, but the reality is that he knows in his heart that, if he had the freedom of speaking from the Back Benches, he would make speeches very similar to those from which he quoted by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition. [AN HON. MEMBER: "Would you?"] Indeed, I have not the slightest hesitation in answering yes to that question. My right hon. Friend and I share each other's speeches.
  If one looks for clear blue water, one will find it within the Conservative party. That has been demonstrated and measured in the past few months by the war of the pamphlets. In February, we received an interesting pamphlet from the hon. Member for Worcestershire, South (Mr. Spicer) arguing the cause of Euro-scepticism.

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  In March, we received a pamphlet from the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr. Whitney) arguing the case for a more positive approach to Europe.
  It is interesting that both pamphlets contained forewords by the Prime Minister. He welcomed the pamphlet on Euro-scepticism as a "thought-provoking contribution", and a month later he welcomed the pamphlet that was positive to Europe as a "constructive contribution". I advise right hon. and hon. Members opposite to hold on to their Prime Minister. He seems to be the only person in the Conservative party who can possibly span the gulf that is opening up between its members over Europe.
  I was sorry to read in the past week that some doubt has been cast on the Prime Minister's continued survival because of a meeting with a number of Conservatives, some of whom I presume are in the Chamber now—although there is no published minute of that meeting. We understand that 60 Conservatives attended a meeting of the Conservative party's Fresh Start group, at which the Prime Minister was strongly urged to be tough on Europe and tough on the causes of Europe.
  I tried to warn the Prime Minister about the views of the Fresh Start group. Three weeks ago, I released the agenda of its previous meeting.
  Mr. Duncan Smith: You used to be a member.
  Mr. Cook: I do not think that I was ever a member of a Tory party group in this place; I must set the hon. Member straight on that point.
  The agenda stated:
  "Britain should veto all further discussion at the intergovernmental conference unless the points stated above were agreed, which was unlikely"—
  having read the above points, I concur with that view. It continued:
  "That overall veto would create a crisis with the other members."
  I cannot think of any more irresponsible strategy to adopt in relation to our immediate neighbours and the rest of the European Union than one that deliberately sets out to create a crisis by vetoing the proposals of everyone else.
  Mr. Cash: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Cook: Of course. I presume that the hon. Member was present at the meeting last week, and perhaps he will tell us some more about it now.
  Mr. Cash: Will the hon. Gentleman concede that, although many of us are in favour of the idea of a referendum, when the referendum was proposed in 1975 after we had signed the original treaty, it would obviously have created a crisis if the Labour party's policy with regard to a referendum had been seen in its true light?
  Mr. Cook: The Labour party gave the people of Britain the opportunity to make a choice. We understood that they were promised such an opportunity in 1970, when we were told that the country would enter the European Community only with the full-hearted consent of the British people. It was left to a subsequent Labour Government to provide the opportunity for the people to give that full-hearted consent. The hon. Gentleman keeps ignoring the fact that they gave that full-hearted consent in a referendum.
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  I am disappointed that the Foreign Secretary gave us no insight into how the Prime Minister responded when he was invited to create a crisis with the other members of the European Union. Let me remind the right hon. Gentleman and his colleagues with what organisation they will be seeking to cause that crisis. It is the continent that receives the majority of our visible exports. When I referred to that at Question Time last week, I was howled down by certain Conservative Members, who said, "No!" In case they were correct, and in a spirit of humility, as I might have been wrong, I took the opportunity of checking the figures.
  In 1994, 57.1 per cent. of Britain's industrial exports and visible exports went to the other member states of the European Union. It was fractionally more than in 1993. Those are the countries with which Conservative members want to create a crisis. What possible rationale is there in seeking to create a crisis with the people who buy the majority of our exports?
  Mr. Duncan Smith: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman would not wish to mislead the House. He will therefore want to correct his statement, as he has been carefully selective. He should be discussing the totality of British exports, including invisibles. He should therefore admit that we do no more than 43.6 per cent. of our total trade with Europe, including invisibles. Will he comment on the fact that he has been selective, and should not invisibles— which are highly profitable and employs many people—also be included?
  Mr. Cook: The hon. Gentleman has raised a genuine issue. I would have more respect for what he said had he responded to that problem by saying that we should be seeking to open up the single market in financial services and insurance services to address the under-performance of the invisibles. To return to the hon. Gentleman's point, first, he is wrong. The figures from the Library say that the figure is 48.3 per cent., including invisibles. Secondly, what an extraordinarily cavalier attitude it is to say, "Does it matter, because it is only 48.3 per cent. of total exports?"
  There is another reason why Europe is so important to us. Conservative Members are fond of quoting inward investment to Britain as a triumph for the Government. If they really want to take any credit for inward investment in Britain, or any real interest in that investment, it is about time they recognised why it comes to Britain.
  I am fortunate in representing a constituency that is still a very large manufacturing area: 40 per cent. of the work force—double the national average—work in manufacturing. My constituency has attracted major investment. Most Japanese electronic firms are represented in my constituency.
  Mr. David Martin: Under which Government?
  Mr. Cook: Under both Governments. The hon. Gentleman should think through the logic of his intervention.
  Many American companies are also there. Those companies did not come to Scotland for the Scottish or even the British market. They did not come to Livingston because of the intrinsic beauty of new town architecture or the quality of our weather. They came to Livingston

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  and to Britain because they wanted access to the market of Europe, and nothing would put in doubt that investment more than any doubt over our future in Europe.
  There was a time when the Conservative party claimed to be the party of industry. The divisions among Conservative Members and the voices being expressed from within their party are causing dismay to industrialists. The Foreign Secretary referred to this week's statement from the CBI, which urges the Government to re-establish their credibility as a negotiating partner in the European Union. This week, the author of that report says:
  "I know, through my dealings with colleagues in other member states, that the UK is losing credibility as a negotiating partner in the European Union. Political divisions over Europe and the hyperbolic statements which result have often been misguided and are deeply damaging. The splits make it harder to do business and harm our economic interests."
  If Conservative Members take a different view, they should perhaps ask themselves why four other countries have, within the period that we are debating, signed up to the EU. Those four countries understood perfectly well that their market was inside the European Union, and that, if they want to influence the terms under which they trade in the EU, they have to play a full part in it. None of them imagined that they were surrendering sovereignty when they signed up; nor do we.
  Mr. Jenkin: Is it not important to keep this in proportion? May I point out that Switzerland has increased its trade with the EU faster than Britain has during its period of membership? Switzerland has also maintained a stable currency. It is an efficient country, and it provides a good standard of living for its people. Life outside the EU need not necessarily mean death. In any case, few Conservative Members are advocating leaving the European Union. We advocate redefining our relationship with it so that it is more in our interests.
  Mr. Robin Cook: I understand from press reports that the hon. Gentleman was present at the meeting in question when creating a crisis with other EU members was discussed. Certainly that is one way of redefining a relationship.
  Of course, there will always be a place—in Europe and the world—for a small nation with a modest manufacturing base, such as Switzerland, looking for niche markets. Anyone who wants to go out to the public and say that Britain can survive on the basis of Switzerland's economy will get a loud raspberry in return from anybody who understands the facts of industry.
  Sir Peter Tapsell: The hon. Gentleman is putting up a number of amusing Aunt Sallies, only to knock them down. Having been present at the meeting, may I tell the hon. Gentleman that no one suggested to the Prime Minister that we should provoke a crisis with Europe; and that no one, to my knowledge, in the Fresh Start group wants to do anything of the kind. What we want to do, as my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester, North (Mr. Jenkin) has just said, is to maintain our access to the single European market without getting mixed up in a lot of socialist bureaucracy of the central European kind.
  Mr. Cook: I ought to let more Conservative Members intervene. The hon. Gentleman has clearly demonstrated that what they want, simply and solely, is an agenda for those at the top of business, with no agenda to help the
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  people who work in business. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that the hon. Gentleman's colleagues in the Fresh Start group may not yet have created a crisis in Europe, but they have most certainly created one in the Conservative party.
  Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: As one who was not at that meeting, may I tell the hon. Gentleman that it is no good standing at the Dispatch Box smugly pretending that all is sweetness and light in the Labour party? If he thinks it is, he has only to look at some of his right hon. and hon. Friends behind him and ask them what their views on Europe are.
  Mr. Cook rose—
  Mr. Denis MacShane: Speak for England!
  Mr. Cook: I should be in deep difficulties with my constituents if I spoke for England. I assure the hon. Gentleman that it would greatly enhance the quality of these debates if we could look at our hon. Friends behind us instead of at Conservative Members opposite us—
  Sir Teddy Taylor rose—
  Mr. Cook: I have not yet answered the previous point.
  I speak for Labour party policy—particularly, for the Labour party policy document that went through conference in 1993 without a single nem. con.
  Sir Teddy Taylor: In the course of his Library researches, did the hon. Gentleman find out—many of us would like to know—why, before we joined the EU, we had a positive balance of trade, whereas since we joined we have built up a total accumulated deficit of £100,000 million—the equivalent of £2,000 per head of the British population? Moreover, did the hon. Gentleman's researches explain to him what has happened to Sweden and Norway since their respective referendums?
  Mr. Cook: The hon. Gentleman really should do more research into the trade figures. If he did, he would discover that, until 1980, we had a surplus in manufacturing exports with the whole of the world, that we did not have a deficit with the rest of the world before then, and that, since 1980, as a result of the collapse of manufacturing industry, and this Government, there was no surplus in any year until 1994. If he would like to go up and down the country and draw that to the attention of the electorate, I would be thoroughly pleased, and so would every Labour candidate in Britain.
  I shall now address our real position.
  Mr. Duncan Smith: Answer the question.
  Mr. Cook: I have answered the hon. Gentleman's question.
  Our position is that we do not, as Conservative Members like to fantasise, support a federal Europe or any super-state in Europe. We are not in favour of joining a European Union in which we have to surrender sovereignty. We favour a European Union that is a free association of independent member states, not surrendering sovereignty but sharing our common interests.
  I must say to the Foreign Secretary that his idea—that the position that he was outlining is more central to the Europe of the 1990s—is totally at variance with the experience of

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  his own negotiator at the previous meeting, who found that he was outnumbered by 14 to 1. Some of his hon. Friends seem to prefer that isolation. The problem is that isolation is a poor place from which to negotiate the best deal for Britain. Hon. Members would know that if they read the document produced by the Department of Trade and Industry only last year, which spelt out that officials of Britain feel marginalised in negotiations within Brussels, precisely because of the negative attitude taken by Ministers.
  There is, of course, a wider issue in this debate—the world is shrinking. Trade is expanding at double the rate of output. Financial flows across the exchange markets every day now clock up 20 times the amount required to finance any one day's trade. What makes that movement irreversible is the change in the telecommunications industry, which has meant that industries around the world are interlocked. It is now possible to transmit the entire "Encyclopedia Britannica" around the world in three seconds—and the Tory manifesto in a nanosecond.
  That creates a real challenge for politicians. We have to grapple with two separate realities. On the one hand, there is a powerful, rich sense of identity with the nation of our people. It is a sense of identity that is deeply creative, which Labour Members totally respect, because that sense of national identity is one of the strong bases of the social solidarity that we hold dear. We will take no lectures on the importance of national identity from people who have done more to break up social solidarity in Britain than any previous Government this century.
  The challenge for responsible politicians is how one reconciles that powerful sense of national identity with the requirement to create international structures that regulate economic relations and resolve the opportunity for friction between nations. That is the central challenge facing us.
  Conservative Members refuse to face that challenge. They are retreating into the rhetoric and mind-set of an 18th-century nation state. I do not say the 19th century, as the 19th century would be too modern. At least in the 19th century Britain understood that it could not be isolated from the world.
  Conservative Members are failing to grasp the logic of their own position. As I understand it, Conservative Members on the Front Bench and the Back Benches are united on one item for the intergovernmental conference: enlarge the European Union and bring in other countries of central and eastern Europe. We are entirely at one with them on that. I believe that western Europe at present has a very important mission: to embrace the new democratic countries of Europe and bring them into the family of democratic nations. We would then be able to underwrite those democratic structures and firmly anchor them into a structure of human rights, so that we never again see them slip back into totalitarianism.
  If Conservative Members are sincere and genuinely want to see the European Union expanded to bring in all the countries of central and eastern Europe, they cannot continue to say that there must be no change to the EU's institutions. Those institutions were designed when there were six member states. We cannot expect those same institutions to work without change when we have a European Union with over 20 members.
  Mr. Dykes: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for allowing me to intervene, especially at such an interesting part of his speech.
  Does he agree that the Government are definitely sincere about the proposals to which he has referred, given all the evidence, but are facing increasingly dotty xenophobia and a manic dislike of socialism in Christian Democratic Germany, for instance, by some Conservative Back-Bench Members? I fear that that will become worse.
  Therefore, rather like other principal countries of the Union where there are no significant differences over European policy between the major parties, why is it not possible for the Opposition to respond more positively to the idea of free votes in future in the House, where there is a large built-in majority for European development? That would, of course, need co-operation from the Opposition. Why cannot they be more constructive in that way, especially if the Government were, interestingly, able in future to offer some abandonment of controversial legislation such as British Rail privatisation?
  Mr. Cook: My right hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Mr. Foster) might like to retire at this stage with the hon. Gentleman to tie down the deal that he was offering. If the offer were on the table—that we can halt the privatisation of British Rail in exchange for a free vote on Europe—it would be one that we would happily entertain.
  A free vote would, of course, have to cut both ways. Conservative Members would have to recognise the importance of such a free vote. If the hon. Gentleman is suggesting that, in certain circumstances, he and his colleagues might be tempted into the Opposition Lobby, we shall happily take away the suggestion and reflect upon it. We could happily do so when I and some of my hon. Friends leave the Chamber to attend a meeting in nine minutes' time.
  I shall finish the point that I was making about enlargement. The Foreign Secretary knows the truth of what I have just said. In any event, we can test him on it. The demand from the Government Back Benches, including the Fresh Start group, is that he should veto any extension of qualified majority voting. Would he do that? Would he give us an undertaking that he would veto—
  Sir Teddy Taylor: No.
  Mr. Robin Cook: I know that the hon. Gentleman aspires to be Foreign Secretary, but it is perhaps unfair for him to answer for the Foreign Secretary. However, he voices the thought that is in all our minds. The answer is no, because the Foreign Secretary is far too sensible to take such a course. He knows that it was the Conservative Government under the previous Prime Minister, who agreed to the last major expansion of QMV when she signed up to the single market.
  I watched the former Prime Minister with interest when she was being interviewed about these matters. She appeared to give the impression that she felt that she had been cheated when she signed the agreement. She thought it was an agreement with Singapore. No one had told her that the end user would be the European Commission.
  Let us turn to another area where the Foreign Secretary is under pressure. The right hon. Gentleman is being pressed to veto an extension of the European Parliament's role. I can understand why Conservative Members are anxious to avoid any extension of its role. After all, they

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  have great difficulty in getting elected to the European Parliament. I shall not ask the Foreign Secretary if he will veto any extension of that Parliament.
  I shall ask the right hon. Gentleman another question. What conceivable British interest would be served by stopping the European Parliament scrutinising the agriculture budget? At present, the European Parliament can have powers of scrutiny only over the non-compulsory section of the budget. That excludes the agriculture budget. What possible purpose is served in Britain's interests by stopping the European Parliament from being able to ask questions and to vote on that budget?
  Reference has been made to fraud. Fraud stems from the common agricultural policy. Despite the promises given before Christmas, fraud is increasing. More cases of fraud were recorded in the first nine months of last year than in the whole of 1993. Why not also make that something that is open to scrutiny, vote and judgment in the European Parliament?
  May I offer one word of warning to those on both sides of the debate? Looking ahead to the next 12 months, I can see that our debates on Europe will be dominated by the issues before the intergovernmental conference. Those issues are, of course, highly technical. They take us into orbit among remote and lonely planets of the institutions of the European Union. If we, on either side of the debate, really want to connect the debate about Europe with the public, we must debate Europe in terms that relate to the lives of the public.
  I would entirely accept the challenge that the Foreign Secretary threw down to us. One of the ways in which Europe can affect the public's lives is the way in which it can provide them with working rights at the place of work—and yes, I confirm entirely, as the Foreign Secretary said, that the Labour party is fully committed to the social chapter, and that one of our first steps will be to sign up to it. To suggest that that position makes Labour isolated in Europe is extraordinary, given that the Government are the only one who have not signed it, and that four new countries have joined it within the past six months.
  Mr. John Carlisle: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Cook: I shall give way for the last time.
  Mr. Carlisle: In the earlier part of the hon. Gentleman's speech, he proudly boasted that American companies were coming into his constituency of Livingston because they wanted access to Europe. May I remind him that an American company came into my constituency because it wanted access to Europe, and that it came to Britain rather than to another European country because we had not signed up to the social chapter? Had it gone to another European country, it would have suffered the iniquities that the chapter has brought. It came to Britain for that very reason. Should the hon. Gentleman get into power, that company may desert us, and his American investment would go away from these shores for ever.
  Mr. Cook: On that point, I shall be guided by the Labour Member of Parliament who will replace the hon. Gentleman as the representative of his constituency by the time we come to power. I regularly meet American and
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  Japanese companies in my constituency. Not one of them would have the slightest problem with living within any minimum wage that this party may propose; nor do the companies that trade internationally have the same difficulty over the social chapter that Conservative Members appear to have, which is why three companies have signed up to a works council, and all of them, at the same time, withdrew their donations to the Tory party.
  Sir Richard Body: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Cook: No. I have given way for the last time. With respect to the hon. Gentleman, I have been generous in giving way, and I said before that that would be the last time that I gave way.
  The fundamental difference between the Front-Bench teams of both parties is that we fully reject the idea that one can achieve competitiveness in the new global economy by lowering wages and lowering conditions. People in China will work for 10p an hour. Not even Conservative Members would advocate that we pay 10p an hour in Britain. [HoN. MEMBERS: "They would."] I say to my hon. Friends that Conservative Members would never agree to work for 10p an hour themselves. We will never successfully compete by doing the job cheaper. We will compete only by doing it better, and that means higher skills and higher technology.
  The reality is that Conservative Members are limbering up to fight the next election as the nationalist party of Britain. Indeed, some of them see that as the solution to their difficulties. It would be not a solution to their difficulties but the start of their problem, because a nationalist party would have difficulty relating to the new world.
  What the electorate out there want is a Government who can relate to the real world, who can build alliances in the real world, who can find common ground with their trading partners, who can give people opportunity in the global economy and the full opportunity to take the benefit of the globalisation of the economy, not a Government who will isolate Britain behind the new great wall of opt-outs and vetoes.
  If Conservative Members really want to conspire to offer that choice to the people of Britain at the next election, I warn them that I shall be happy to accept it. We shall offer them a Government prepared to face a new century, because they understand that new century and will work with it; we shall be happy to fight an election against a party that would prefer to retreat into the 18th century. I have no doubt which century the electorate will choose.
  Several hon. Members rose—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Geoffrey Lofthouse): Order. I remind hon. Members that Back-Bench speeches are limited to 10 minutes.
  4.59 pm
  Mr. David Howell: With his usual courage and integrity, my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary struggled to draw from the sea of documents listed on the Order Paper—the vast output of bumf that seems to have flowed from every European institution—an awareness of positive developments in the European Union. I agree with him that some of those developments are very

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  positive, and that we are unwise to see everything in black, negative terms: we should not conclude that all that happens in Europe is against our interests.
  I shall deal in a moment with the matters that do worry me. First, however, let us consider the European scene today, just before the Cannes summit. The French Government are changing some of their views. Their position is contradictory, of course, in that they remain deeply committed to merging their currency with the deutschmark and regaining control of their monetary destiny—or so they say; I do not think that they will—while also remaining healthily sceptical about the centralising tendency of some Community institutions.
  Like us, the French are arguing for positive measures that reassert the strength and power of the Council of Ministers over the Commission—which, notwithstanding denials, seems to be bursting with unseemly ambitions in diverse areas where its competencies do not lie, and moving in directions in which, according to treaty, it should not move. The French want the assertion of national Parliaments over the European Parliament. I assume that every good Member of this Parliament would support their aim to enable national Parliaments to call the European Union to account in regard to decisions taken in our name.
  It would be stupid of us to reject those positive developments, and to say that nothing is going our way. Of course France and Germany want to remain close; of course President Chirac went first to Bonn, because the oldest and fiercest memory in the breasts of the French tells them that never again must they be overrun by their colossal neighbour. We understand that; no British man or woman could want France and Germany to be other than friends. The French attitude is changing, however, and I think that it is changing in a healthy way—in line with some of the ideas that my right hon. Friends the Foreign Secretary and the Prime Minister, and others, have struggled to put across in recent years.
  I do not know whether it was fair of me to detect in the speech of the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) definite signs that the Labour party, too, is moving—although I do not want to raise the hopes of the right hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Stepney (Mr. Shore). I detect a change in certain pronouncements.
  It was less noticeable today: although the hon. Member for Livingston always makes an enjoyable speech, his speeches are rather like a Chinese meal in that, when we read them later, nothing much can be extracted from them. The Labour leader, however, seems to be striking a far more cautious note than was struck by the mad centralism of the past, and the dotty commitment to everything coming out of Brussels.
  Who knows? It is better that one should be saved. Labour has moved in so many other areas; indeed, listening to Labour leaders describe their policies nowadays is like reading the labels on bottles of homeopathic drugs. We note all the ingredients that the Labour party no longer contains. It is no longer in favour of nationalisation, for instance; it is no longer going to sting the rich.
  Perhaps, even, the Labour party is no longer committed to dotty centralisation in social policy, and the vast redistribution of funds proposed, with excessive zeal and
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  enthusiasm, by the Brussels Commission. We live in hope: there have been positive developments which should be built on. My right hon. Friend has done marvels, and will continue to do so; I have complete confidence in him.
  Nevertheless, when I look at some of the documents listed on the Order Paper, I feel far less confident. As we have reduced our debates to mere soundbites—I know that that is nothing to do with the Chair, but the ruling has resulted in all the action going upstairs to the Committee Rooms, so that we cannot have a proper debate in the Chamber—I shall concentrate on one issue: the Commission's Green Paper on the practical arrangements for the introduction of a single currency.
  I do not know whether hon. Members have had a chance to read that vast, verbose and almost unintelligible document. When it was published, a big press conference was held in Brussels, led by the Commissioner concerned—a Frenchman, Mr. Yves-Thibault de Silguy—and the Belgian Finance Minister, Mr. Maystadt. They had some remarkable things to say, which filled me with apprehension. I speak as much as someone who has worked for European unity as someone who wants this country's interests to be upheld and protected.
  The conference was told that a core number of countries would be committed to a single currency, and that some countries outside that number either would not be able to join because their convergence criteria were all over the place—Spain, for instance, and poor old Italy, with its vast debt-to-GNP ratio—or would refuse to join, like the impudent British, who insist on good convergence criteria and a good performing economy. Those countries would have the cheek to have competitive currencies, which would be very challenging to the core countries that had signed up for the single currency—whether they consisted only of Germany, Benelux and Austria, or included France.
  Those eminent Commissioners concluded that the answer was to raise tariffs or trade barriers against members of the European Union that were not part of the core currency. I ask my right hon. and hon. Friends to ponder that proposition. It goes like this: "We believe"— I do not believe it myself—"that a single market needs a single currency." I consider that a fallacy in itself. The argument continues: "Therefore, to create a single currency, we will destroy the single market. We will cut it up; we will divide it." That strikes me as not merely a divisive but an anti-European move. It is certainly anti the Europe for which, along with many of my hon. Friends, I have worked for two or three decades.
  I know that some Conservative Members think that a single currency must be all right, because Europe is for it and everyone says that it is necessary for a single market; but I beg them to examine the technicalities of proposals that will divide that market, and to consider the advice of skilled people in the currency markets who know that the single currency is a recipe for colossal instability, vast arbitrage and huge volatility. Above all, as learned bankers are now saying every day, it is not even necessary: it is possible to run a very good single market without a single currency.
  We are left with a feeling of slight despair. Many people in the country—and, I suspect, many members of my party—are pro-Europe. We have always wanted to part of a good single market. We want it to be enlarged

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  to bring the new democracies—and we note that that is not going too well: a good deal of rhetoric is in favour, but numerous obstacles are being put in the way.
  We want a great single market, and to trade in that market. Instead, we see Europe either being dragged in the wrong direction, towards the "great leap forward"—the lunatic ideas of centralisation and uniformity that are technologically and constitutionally out of date—or being told that the alternative is to unravel the whole thing and walk away.
  We are presented with a miserable choice. It is time, dare I say, that the—I hope—not too muddled middle had a say. Most people in the country and, I suspect, most hon. Members on both sides of the House want us to be part of a good, strong single market involving some political authority at the centre, carefully delegated and circumscribed, and underpinning a highly effective Europe of nations—or, as President Chirac says, a Europe of united nations.
  That is what we want. It is time that that was articulated and that people had the right to get away from the mad extremes with which we are being presented. I know that my right hon. Friend will continue to fight for that aim, because that is the Europe with which Britain not only can live but of which we can be at the heart.
  5.10 pm
  Mr. Denzil Davies: Those of us from the Celtic fringes like to choose a text on which to hang our speeches. The trouble with debates on the common market, as it used to be called, is that there are so many documents. There are more texts than in the Old Testament. I have found two texts. I do not know whether 10 minutes is enough for a sermon on two texts, but I shall try.
  The first text is in a communication dated 13 March 1995 from the Commission to the Council following the Essen council on employment. It says:
  "Fighting unemployment is a paramount task of the Community."
  The next text comes from paragraph 6.9 of the development document of July to December 1994, which points out that 10 out of the 12 member states still have excess deficits on their Government budgets.
  There could not be a starker contrast—a contradiction of Hegelian proportions. On the one hand, we are told that fighting unemployment is paramount but on the other we are told that all the countries, or 10 at least, are engaged in a massive deflationary exercise to reduce public expenditure and public debt to the 60 per cent. and 3 per cent. targets in the Maastricht treaty because they have to eliminate their excess deficits by 1999.
  The drive to meet those criteria is one of the major reasons for the high unemployment in western Europe today and I fear that it is going get worse. Even a committee of the European Parliament—I do not usually use its documents—has apparently concluded that perhaps 11 million jobs will be lost in western Europe as a result of the drive to reduce Government expenditure and debt to meet the Maastricht criteria. That is before member states start to lock their currencies together irrevocably in the run-up to a single currency.
  The unemployed, the poor and those on welfare will have to pay the highest price for this mad exercise to get a single currency and a centralised European state. As far
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  as I can see, the political and bureaucratic elite in Europe does not care about that and believes, as Lenin would have said, that the end justifies the means.
  The main purpose of a single currency is constitutional; obviously, there have been economic arguments one way or another but the main purpose is constitutional. It is a major plank in the creation of a centralised European state. Joining the single currency, which we have debated before so there is no need go over it again, would be a major constitutional change for Britain. We would hand power over monetary and exchange rate policy and, in effect, over public expenditure and fiscal policy from a democratically elected Government to undemocratic European institutions.
  A single currency could involve a major constitutional change within the United Kingdom. The Prime Minister was in Wales a few weeks ago. I am sure that he is very sincere about this but he apparently believes that a rather modest Welsh assembly would, with the Scottish Parliament, lead to the break-up of the United Kingdom.
  If we sign up to a single currency, many people in Wales—I can speak only for Wales but it will be even more true in Scotland—will ask why they should belong to the smaller Union when they can belong directly to a larger Union. They look across the sea to Ireland. I read in a development document that the Irish do not have an excess deficit; they have negotiated it away. They do not have to reduce their debt and Government expenditure to the Maastricht criteria, whereas we in Wales, if I can be parochial, will have to strive to cut our welfare benefits and accept higher unemployment to meet the 3 per cent. target. That is not necessary across the Irish sea because Ireland has a direct seat in the Council of Ministers and can get away with it.
  I do not share that view, but many people would. If the Prime Minister and the Conservative party are concerned about the United Kingdom, as I am sure they are, they should realise that the issue of a single currency could lead to major constitutional changes within this Union.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) did not deal with the economic aspects of a single currency. I do not criticise him for that. Some of my right hon. and hon Friends have said that we are not really going to join. They accept the Maastricht criteria and a European bank but say that we will not join until there is real convergence. When I hear the word "real", I reach for a child's guide to metaphysics because I am never sure what the purpose of the use of that word is. Let us say that it does not mean inflation, unemployment or growth rates but GDP per head.
  In parts of the south Wales valleys, GDP per head is about 60 per cent. of the European average. In Wales, it is about 70 per cent; in Northern Ireland, I suspect, about 70 per cent; in Scotland, a little higher. Is the Labour party, when it talks about real economic convergence, saying that we will not sign up to a single currency until the Rhondda and the other valleys have an average GDP per head of 100 per cent. of the European average? If that is what we are saying, fine. Let us put it in the Labour party manifesto so that we know exactly what we mean by real convergence. I suspect that the word "real" is being used in the same sense as the late Lord Joseph used it in talking about real jobs in 1979 and 1980. If we believe in real convergence, let us spell it out.

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  The final escape is saying that it will not happen anyway. All those countries are striving with might and main and have signed a treaty to reduce deficits and set up an embryo European bank but it will not happen because the Germans do not want it. The German people may not want it, but who cares about them? The business and political leadership in Germany do not care about the German people. The leadership will want it because it will be an opportunity to keep down the value of the mark.
  The hidden emphasis of German monetary policy has always been to ensure that the mark, as far as possible, was undervalued. Increasingly, the mark is becoming a sort of reserve currency. It will be in the interest of German business and industry to have a European single currency to ensure that it is undervalued and that their exports do not suffer. They will try to lock in other countries to prevent them from exercising economic sovereignty by devaluing their currencies. A clash will come between the hard core that wants go outside the treaty and impose restrictions and those who do not want to join the currency.
  The vogue word in this debate has been mind-set. Frankly, it seems to me that the mind-set of most of the pro-marketeers is still that of the world of Monnet and Schuman. Some go back to the Congress of Vienna. When I read reports of the Council of Ministers, I think that if they had powdered wigs, they would not be very different from Ministers at the Congress of Vienna.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Livingston talked of a global economy. Yes, we have a global economy with free trade, although the World Trade Organisation is having some difficulties. GATT has been around a long time. A regional economic pact is not necessary in a world with a global economy. The economic prizes will go not to large economic blocs but to the country that is able to change its economic policies quickly and has the flexibility, democratic credibility and legitimacy to change its policies quickly.
  The centralised European state is a dinosaur. The best thing for Britain is not to go down the route of a single currency but to keep well away from it.
  5.18 pm
  Sir Geoffrey Pattie: I should like to offer some thoughts on the current position before the Cannes summit, based on the regular, almost weekly, contacts that I have with other centre-right parties throughout Europe in my capacity as international vice-chairman of the Conservative party.
  When the Berlin wall came down in November 1989, few people expected it. Few people anticipated what the wave of challenges to authority in eastern Europe would produce. Equally, very few people realised that it would have a similar effect in western Europe. By the time the Maastricht treaty came to be signed, much of it was, in practical terms, dead in the water. We then witnessed the holding of two Danish referendums and a wafer-thin French majority and, as the right hon. Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies) pointed out, even the Germans discovered that European monetary union meant the end of the deutschmark, which was a great shock to them. Suddenly,
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  there was a great deal of rethinking to be done. 1 believe that there is much greater uncertainty in the European Union than appears on the surface.
  The European Community—to use its previous title—was founded to make war impossible between France and Germany, an excellent aim that has been splendidly achieved. However, we have to ask what does the Community now do for an encore, especially for the younger generation for whom the idea of war between France and Germany is unthinkable? Where is the new philosophy? I do not see it, and that is especially sad when we have the opportunity to create a Union of nation states and can for the first time be genuinely European. We are not just western European but have the possibility to include in the Union countries from central and eastern Europe.
  When Lord Tugendhat recently gave his valedictory address from Chatham house, he said:
  "In most countries, however, there has been a minimum of public debate or accountability on the details and implications of what was being constructed and planned. There has been high flown rhetoric in abundance and many grand schemes put forward by politicians anxious to demonstrate statesmanship and far-sightedness. But, for the most part the impact of what these schemes would involve for the ordinary citizen was not spelt out nor subjected to detailed scrutiny. Indeed, President Mitterrand and Chancellor Kohl, in particular, both appeared anxious to avoid in-depth public discussion."
  It had been widely accepted in Europe that the single market was fundamental—a concept that, incidentally, was very much a British one activated by British Members of the European Parliament and a British commissioner. However, Lord Tugendhat also said:
  "Yet, I believe, a major component of the wide spread disillusion stems from the legislation needed to bring the Single Market into being. That legislation has proved to be unprecedentedly intrusive. Partly, there is the question of sheer scale—282 individual items of European legislation required to bring it into effect. Partly too it is a result of so many existing national rules and regulations on technical standards, health, safety, environment and other matters being so detailed that in order to create a level playing field EU regulations had to follow suit. As a result it has been brought into what"
  my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary—
  "has described as 'the nooks and crannies' of national life all over the European Union."
  There is a genuine debate throughout Europe, not only between Governments but between parties and certainly not only in this country. In my view, which stems from numerous discussions, opinions on the continent are changing and there is, for example, a debate within the Christian Democrat party in Germany. The original paper by Mr. Schauble and Mr. Lammers has been much modified following internal debate in their country. I have not found a German Christian Democrat Member of Parliament who wants a united states of Europe or anything remotely resembling a united states of Europe.
  Interestingly, in a meeting that I attended in Vienna three weeks ago, the chairman of the Christian Democrat delegation—when were in the mode to commission new study work—asked for a paper to be written on "The Adverse Impact of the Workings of Brussels Bureaucracy on Germany". That is not the sort of thing that we think about in this country because we tend to identify the Germans as being in favour of everything that comes out of Brussels, but they are not.

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  In many spheres, it is the British who are setting the agenda. The Conservative party has produced its paper for debate in the European Democrat Union and it has been extremely well received. The paper states:
  "We support the enlargement of the European Union to the East. There are three fundamental reasons why enlargement of the EU is essential for its future development—security, prosperity and shared values The EDU believes that the further enlargement of the European Union also requires a fundamental examination of the EU, its policies and its institutional structures … The framework best suited to meeting the aspirations of EU applicants is a flexible, decentralised one, not a monolithic or centralised one … Our goal should be a Europe of nation states working more effectively with each other in pursuit of shared interests and common solutions to common problems, but not a Europe which attempts to supersede the nation state."
  Mr. Dykes: Does my right hon. Friend accept that until now all the eastern European countries without exception have, by way of pronouncements by senior leaders in the Government and in the Opposition, fully accepted the acquis communautaire and, indeed, the move towards a single currency if convergence is achieved?
  Sir Geoffrey Pattie: Yes, but they need to consider to what extent they will be able to meet the key criteria. It is one thing to talk about signing up to the generalities but the reality will be harder to achieve.
  The document goes on to say that we need a Europe that will push ahead with jobs and deal with various aspects of job creation. There is too much of a tendency in Brussels to come up with programmes and proposals that impede job creation. In my three years on the Council of Ministers, I frequently found that it was our continental friends who came up with the visionary "blue sky" ideas. They were strong on rhetoric or—as we English like to call it—guff, but it was down to the United Kingdom to examine proposals in a cautious and pragmatic but entirely practical way, which was not very popular especially when others had been so enthusiastic. In the process, however, we injected the vital ingredient of practicality into many proposals.
  I believe that, by the same token, the Government's approach to the IGC 1996 process is very close to the instincts of the British people in bringing to bear our pragmatism and experience. In this we are very different from the two Opposition parties—from the Liberal Democrats who have been over the hills and far away on this issue for a long time, and from the new Labour party which, of course, is that most dangerous of things, a party of converts on this issue.
  I find it hard to understand why some elements in this country—and, I have to say, in my own party—seem to be so lacking in confidence that they are not prepared to accept the power and strength of our arguments or the fact that they are succeeding and setting the agenda. As we embark on the IGC 1996 process, we should be confident that the healthy pragmatism that so characterises the Government's approach is the best way and the best foundation for our proposals.
  5.27 pm
  Mr. Charles Kennedy: On behalf of those who are over the hills and far away—I suppose that Ross, Cromarty and Skye is over the hills and far away in a geographical sense—I have to say to the right hon. Member for Chertsey and Walton (Sir G. Pattie) that it strikes me that, given the rather febrile state
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  of his party on these matters these days, being the international vice-chairman of the Conservative party is perhaps not too onerous a task. I am not sure how many foreigners would want to talk to him in that capacity, given the propensities of some of his colleagues and what they have said.
  The focus of the debate so far, and the matter on which I shall dwell, is the Government's position in the run-up not only to Cannes, but, in the longer term, the intergovernmental conference itself. We heard what the Foreign Secretary had to say this afternoon, but I do not think that we heard what he believes. That is the central difficulty.
  This is an Administration caught in the headlights of their own Back Benchers. Whether the Foreign Secretary went emphatically pro-European or Euro-sceptical this afternoon, he was going to distance himself from and cause difficulties within his own party. He is, therefore, left immobilised somewhere in the middle, and it is pathetic to behold. One only needed to look at the faces of his Back Benchers as he proceeded to see that he was satisfying no one. The Conservative Euro-enthusiasts, whom I applaud, did not look entirely pleased with what he was saying, and the Conservative Euro-sceptics did not look at all persuaded by his efforts either. So long as what has become the war of John's ear goes on vis-à-vis the IGC, it will severely damage British national interests.
  I speak, after all, as one who has experience of having being a member of a party that split in a rather acrimonious fashion a number of years ago—the then Social Democratic party. Frankly, it would be better to get on and have an honest and open divorce now than to persist with this farce between mainstream continental Christian Democrats and what are essentially nationalistic English Conservatives. Both have perfectly respectable views—I tend to lean more towards one than the other—but they both cannot continue to cohabit in the existing United Kingdom Conservative party. It would be better for them and for the interests of this country if they were to go their separate ways now.
  In an earlier intervention, the hon. Member for Harrow, East (Mr. Dykes) made a powerful point—perhaps slightly tongue in cheek, but none the less placing his finger on a very important point—when he referred to proceeding on European matters on the basis of free votes in the House. We would have fun if there were a free vote, for example, on the social chapter, given how many Conservative Members would quite happily go through the Lobby in favour of it because they would recognise it for what it is: much more a set of aspirations than the laying down of a whole set of legal requirements. But leaving aside that fun, the hon. Gentleman made an important point that there is an in-built cross-party majority in this House for sensible European progress and for Britain to be very much a part of it.
  There is also a perfectly honourable tradition in the House among hon. Members who do not like the fact that we went into Europe in the first place but who now argue—so they say, although the logic of their position would none the less lead us to exit from Europe—that we could have some kind of competitive single market and economic benefits without the single currency and the social and political dimensions attached to it. That is an honest set of opinions with which I do not agree. Those hon. Members are in a minority in the House. Even if there were a change of Government, which there would be

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  based on the present opinion polls if there were a general election tomorrow, that attitude would still be in the minority in the House. We need to keep that consideration very much to the fore.
  We have seen abject political leadership from the Prime Minister on matters European, especially since the last general election. There has also been third-rate party management from his point of view. That has led us to a fantasy world where the likes of Jacques Chirac and Helmut Kohl are being held up as hob-goblin, socialist figures who are seeking to impose all kinds of terms and conditions of employment in this country, which otherwise we would not want.
  The former Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Sir E. Heath), intervened during the Foreign Secretary's speech, referring, as it were, to his right hon. Friend as the sorcerer's apprentice. The Father of the House made a telling point the previous time that we visited some of these European issues. He said that the Government had said nothing positive about Europe since 1979. That is entirely true as one can see by looking at all the debates on the Maastricht treaty.
  If I wanted to sell any commercial idea to anybody in this House or outside, I would play up the benefits, the positive aspects and why I wanted them to take the idea on board. Maastricht was sold to the Conservative party, to the House and to the country on the basis that we had opted out of the social chapter and that we had a derogation from the next stage. That is a hopelessly negative basis on which to try to provide political leadership on an issue that goes beyond the party and that is as broadly based as Europe itself.
  The characteristically penetrating analysis in The Times today by Mr. Peter Riddell says it all. I appeal to the pro-Europeans in the Conservative party. In speaking about them, Mr. Riddell said:
  "They have deployed a strong case, but they are losing the political battle. The main question now is how much ground they will have to surrender, and whether any of their generals will be pushed out in the process."
  He is correct. He concludes:
  "These questions—
  the ones that he has discussed—
  "are central to Mr. Major's future. Either way, the sceptics are continuing to gain at the expense of the pro-Europeans."
  That is a very worrying state of affairs.
  Mrs. Edwina Currie: Watch.
  Mr. Kennedy: The hon. Lady says "watch". With her, the hon. Member for Hartlepool (Mr. Mandelson) and others, I am involved in an exercise on behalf of the European Movement. We are approaching all three UK party leaders, with a view to having a discussion and trying to heighten the profile of positive European arguments. The situation in the Conservative party has now got so serious—it would not matter if it were in opposition although the problem for all of us is that it is in government—and the division among their ranks so deep that it is having a positively damaging effect on Britain's capacity to contribute to the European Union and, in the run-up to the next intergovernmental conference, to win the deal for which we should be aiming.
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  That is why I say that the efforts now being made in the European Movement and elsewhere to try to build an all-party pro-European movement are so important and why it certainly has Liberal Democrat support.
  Mr. Dykes: Does the hon. Gentleman further agree that in recent months the negative situation has even had an adverse effect on sterling?
  Mr. Kennedy: Yes, the evidence has shown that. There is no doubt that the position of the Chancellor in particular, which has been open to some question given the politics of the Conservative party on the single currency and so forth, has weakened his credibility, which of course has had a knock-on effect in the currency market. That is indisputable.
  The hon. Member for Harrow, East and I had lunch with the American ambassador to the European Union only yesterday. The ambassador was pointing out the United States' general sense of agnosticism over a single currency. The most telling point that he made—when he could get a word in edgeways because his colleagues were putting their rather robust construction on things—was that a single currency without sterling is of much less concern to the United States than a single currency with sterling. That was an important signal for us.
  There is clearly a need, which goes beyond sectional party interest in this House, to build a broader pro-European movement. I am glad that hon. Members of all parties are involved in that effort. My colleagues and I will certainly be contributing to it. Such an effort is needed because of what we heard in the Foreign Secretary's speech this afternoon. If that was his swansong at the Dispatch Box, it was a very sad one. The man is reduced to the position, because of the state of his own party and the division in his Cabinet, of not being able to say anything. That is a pathetic state of affairs in which the country and the rest of the European Union has no confidence and which gains no respect whatever.
  5.36 pm
  Mr. Tim Renton: To say that the speech of my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary said nothing, as the hon. Member for Ross, Cromarty and Skye (Mr. Kennedy) has done, is very odd indeed. My right hon. Friend's speech clearly said a great deal, and much of it was somewhat unsatisfactory to those on the Conservative Benches who call themselves Euro sceptics. The Foreign Secretary sticks clearly and firmly to his line, just as the Prime Minister rightly sticks clearly and firmly to the line that he enunciated in his speech of 1 March.
  I shall, however, take up the encouragement that the hon. Member for Ross, Cromarty and Skye gave to those hon. Members who are pro-European. I include myself in that number, although I always think of myself as a Euro realist rather than a pro-European fanatic. The hon. Gentleman will have read in the Financial Times yesterday the comments of Howard Davies, the Director General of the Confederation of British Industry, on the report that it has just produced, "A Europe that Works". Mr. Davies talked about CBI membership having a
  "bias in favour in the long-term"
  of the United Kingdom joining European economic and monetary union. He said, however, that companies remained cautious about the circumstances and supported, therefore, the "wait and see" position of Her Majesty's Government.

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  That is not unlike the conclusion in the report from Andersen Consulting, part of the very large Arthur Andersen group, which will have fallen on many of our desks in the past few days. That, too, concludes that in general the contributors to the survey, who were by and large manufacturing companies in this country, felt the advantages of participation outweighed the disadvantages and said that they were concerned about the effect on British industry of the United Kingdom choosing to stay outside an economic and monetary union bloc.
  That view happens to be very close to the conclusion of the working group on the implications of monetary union for Britain, which was produced under the title of the Kingsdown inquiry, on which my hon. Friend the Member for Stamford and Spalding (Mr. Davies) and I sat. I was delighted to be asked to join the working group and I came to a personal conclusion after attending most of the detailed sessions. I say this to my right hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Mr. Howell), although he is no longer present: we were addressed by bankers, economists, those used to dealing in very large quantities of foreign exchange, and representatives of British, German and Japanese industry in this country. I reached the conclusion that if a single currency comes into being, on balance it will be in Britain's interests to join.
  I must admit that, pro-European as I am, when I started on the group I had some doubts about that. What finally convinced me was hearing the consistent majority opinion put before us that if there were an economic and monetary union and a successful and viable single currency, we were likely to have lower inflation, lower interest rates and more positive inward investment—a continuing flow, in fact—if we joined it than we would be if we stayed outside.
  Mr. Cash: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Renton: No, I shall not give way. I have only a few minutes and I am sure that my hon. Friend will make his point when he makes his own speech. I do not expect him to agree with me, but he will have his chance to speak soon. Having listened carefully and reached the opinion that I have described, so I decided that the conclusions of the Kingsdown report and those of the Andersen report, like those of the CBI, pointed in the right direction.
  As I said at the beginning, there is obviously a big "if" here. If the single currency comes into being, we would do better to join. My right hon. Friend the Member for Guildford touched on that question, and many of us must wonder whether the single currency will in fact ever happen. That is perfectly fair. The Finance Ministers of the European Union countries now say that the date will certainly be postponed from 1997 to 1999, and clearly substantial difficulties will have to be overcome if a majority are to meet the convergence criteria.
  From working on the Kingsdown report I also learnt that the transitional period—the moments between the decision to go into a single currency and the event itself—would be extremely difficult. The technicians have studied the possibilities—in the Maas committee, for example—to discover what the best approach would be. However, I am sure that if the single currency were to happen and if it looked like being successful, we ought to be in it. Indeed, we should get into it quickly rather than being, as we so often have been in other European Community developments, a Johnny-come-lately who plays no part in forming the rules and lives greatly to regret that fact.
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  Whatever the economists and the bankers say, in the end the decision will be a political one for all of us. Moreover, it will have to have public support; it cannot possibly be a purely automatic decision.
  The concern that emerges most clearly from my hon. Friends and from Opposition Members who are worried about such developments is the fear of loss of sovereignty by the House. "Loss of sovereignty" is a difficult phrase to define, and it is easy to say that in many respects we have already lost sovereignty in financial and monetary matters. The decisions taken by qualified majority vote following 1986 further reduced the influence of the House. The European Court of Justice, which was set up in 1972 by the original accession to the treaty, has also removed sovereignty from the House.
  Will we lose more sovereignty if we move into an economic and monetary union? Clearly, over monetary control and money supply, we shall. A European central bank would mean that there was only one monetary authority. Against that it must be said that the House already has little real influence and little say in controlling money supply figures. It is told what is happening; it is told the decisions of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Money supply is not debated and decided in the House. The other day, in his Mansion House speech, my right hon. and learned Friend reaffirmed his inflation targets; subsequently he told Back Benchers about them. Such matters are not regularly decided on the Floor of the Chamber.
  To me, the big question is to what degree the authority to tax and to spend—in order words, the fiscal powers—would leave the House if we joined a single currency and an economic and monetary union. That problem is well reflected in the Kingsdown report. The experts are divided, but in the course of the inquiry it was said that monetary union would not remove the fiscal powers of individual national parliaments. For instance, it would still be possible for any national parliament to have either a high-spend, high-tax posture or a low-spend, low-tax posture within the Maastricht restraints. If one had to stay within the convergence criteria, however, it would not be possible to have a high-spend, low-tax posture, but within those restraints Parliament would retain as much fiscal authority as it had before. To me, therefore, the fiscal question is still an open one and I should like it to be further examined in the debate on this key issue in the months and years ahead.
  Against that background of general approval, but a great deal of understandable worry about the detail, it seems to me that the Prime Minister is absolutely right to defend the Maastricht option—an option either to go in or to stay out. Equally, there is no need for the Government to make a decision yet. No other European leader is making a decision on the issue at this stage, so why on earth should the British Government do so, however often they are pressed by those who criticise them on European matters? "Wait and see" is not a heroic posture on such a complex issue, but there is no doubt that on this issue it is the right posture.
  There is also the difficult question of how many more decisions should he taken by qualified majority voting rather than by unanimity. Clearly, as the number of countries in the Community enlarges—the next countries likely to accede are Malta and Cyprus, whose membership will be considered immediately after the intergovernmental conference, and then the Baltic states—it is difficult to

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  continue to give a right of total veto to each country. A small state such as Malta might, for example, block the accession of Lithuania until it received some particular agricultural concession.
  I know that my time is up, Mr. Deputy Speaker, so I say to the House—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order.
  5.47 pm
  Mr. James Molyneaux: In this season of commemoration of the end of the second world war it has been claimed by several people that the achievement of the European Economic Community, as it originally was, has been to keep the peace and to preserve us from a repetition of that war. The right hon. Member for Chertsey and Walton (Sir G. Pattie) said something about that, and in view of his long experience in the Ministry of Defence and the Northern Ireland Office we should pay close attention to his opinions. If time permits I may later be able to quote something for the benefit of the right hon. Member for Mid-Sussex (Mr. Renton).
  It is now suggested that the European Union should assume the role of NATO—complete with a European army, if you please. We need say no more than that the European Union's dry run in Yugoslavia has illustrated the folly of any such ideas, including the notion that the EU could ever in any circumstances be an effective peacemaker. Equally flawed is the absurd notion that the European Union could work magic on social issues. I do not have time to quote the leader in today's edition of The Times, but it is well worth reading in that regard.
  My party has consistently supported free trade in the widest sense of the term, but we can never understand the logic of those who in 1970 and much earlier advocated membership of a free trading bloc in Europe but then proceeded to erect tariff barriers all round it. We support the concept of GATT and its removal of barriers, but we must ask whether the signatories—particularly in Europe—will honour their obligations to remove all the irksome restrictions on, for example, British companies in the service sector.
  As we move into the pre-IGC discussions, we must take account of the enormous shift in global trade in the quarter of a century since we joined the Common Market, which all of us knew very well in 1972 was only the cover name for what is now the European Union. Capital investment is flowing at an ever-increasing rate from high-cost economies in America and Europe to Asia and the Pacific rim, and the coming IGC cannot ignore that global flow. The UK in particular must accept that the assumptions of 25 years ago that British trade would be focused within the European Community are now greatly out of date—so out of date that by the end of the century the related notions of monetary and political union will also be obsolete.
  Only last week, we saw how some of the leading advocates of a common currency were lowering their targets and extending their expectations from 1997 to 1999. My party's fixed position on exchange rates has been based on something more solid than arguments about Europe. Since 1974—when we were forced by an authority not now
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  in the House to become a separate parliamentary party—we have counselled against experiments in fixing the rate. That has remained our consistent position.
  It strikes us as very odd that every time the Government—of whatever party—get a bloody nose, they eventually come back for more punishment. Plain common sense supported by experience proves that once an exchange rate is fixed, the burden of support falls on the Treasury—the taxpayer's agent.
  The younger and enlightened generation of industrialists and business men—I come here to the tradition referred to by the right hon. Member for Mid—Sussex—are now well aware of the fatal consequences of a single currency. Today we have read a contribution from the chairman of the Institute of Directors in Northern Ireland, Mr. Howard Hastings, a young man making his way in the world and particularly in the world of business and industry. He says:
  "The main cost to the UK of a single currency would be relinquishing control over monetary policies…If it is too tight, there are the costs of lost output and employment.too lax, and there would be the costs of inflation…A single currency is forever…We were able to leave the ERM, albeit in a far from dignified fashion, because we had our national currency.
  Adopt a single currency and that option is removed. Not only is the case for a single currency not proven—it doesn't have a leg to stand on."
  I need add only a few other considerations. To maintain a single currency, there has to be a single Government. If there is a single Government, it follows that there has to be a single nation. In such a single nation, democracy itself becomes impotent and obsolete. Some forget or ignore that a single currency in Europe would still have to float on the world markets, and I am afraid to leave that out of my calculations.
  5.53 pm
  Sir Peter Hordern: I wish to say a few words about the single currency. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Sussex (Mr. Renton) said, it is true that a number of commissions and business leaders such as the CBI have found in favour of closer European co-operation and, on balance—so far as I can tell—of a single currency. But it will be a matter for intense debate within this House, both in the rest of this Parliament and, I am sure, in the next Parliament.
  In an excellent speech, the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) seemed to suggest that he had the total support of his Labour colleagues, but I believe that the Labour party is far more split on this issue than my party is—difficult though that is to believe.
  When we reach 1999, it is certain that those countries within the European Union which meet the economic criteria set out in the Maastricht treaty will join the single currency. I shall leave aside for the moment the transitional arrangements, which will be extremely difficult. The House will agree that there is a real political will in Germany, France and the Benelux countries to form that single currency. The House must also consider where we, and our business and industry, would stand if there were to be a core currency—that is what I think it would be—in 1999 and thereafter. That currency would certainly be widely traded in this country, as we do 40 per cent. of our physical trade with Germany, France and the Netherlands. That being so, it is certain that

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  transactions would be settled in that currency—whatever it was called—and, increasingly, private transactions would also be settled in that currency.
  We would have at least a common currency operating within this country, and I do not believe that there is any way in which that could be prevented, even if anyone wanted to do so. A common currency would operate with sterling and because of its considerable strength due to the economic criteria the common currency would be inclined to have somewhat lower interest rates than sterling, and would consequently become over time a rather more attractive currency. One must take into account the pressure on sterling in those circumstances, as it would be in competition with a very powerful common currency in which business would increasingly be transacted.
  A future Parliament will have to consider those issues, and the right way to settle the matter is to see how the initial process goes and then decide what the impact on our economy will be as a result. That is why I am so glad that we have the opt-out. The best way to settle the arguments about sovereignty would be by a free vote in this House. I do not think that a common currency operating strongly in this country is a good subject on which to have a referendum and, because of the enormous constitutional implications of a referendum, I do not go along with my right hon. and hon. Friends who believe in a referendum.
  I wonder what will happen when the core countries form a single currency. There will be considerable pressure, because of our opt-out, either to conform or to create within the European Union some kind of mechanism which will be adverse to our trading interests. I hope that we shall resist any such suggestions.
  I am glad that we have an opt-out from the social charter, as it is bad enough to hear suggestions that we should go along with that. Labour Members today have repeated their adherence to that charter. A report in today's edition of the Financial Times referred to the impact of the OECD report on pensions within the European Union. I believe that it will be profound. One thing that it shows is rather comforting: we are by far the best provided for by pensions of any of the European Union countries. It will unquestioningly be the case—
  Mr. Salmond: What?
  Sir Peter Hordern: The hon. Gentleman does not seem to understand. I refer him to the OECD report. I am talking about total pensions, which of course include occupational ones.
  The idea that we should have to contribute to a shortfall in other countries' pension funds must be anathema to us. I am quite certain that we should remain as we are and maintain an opt-out from the social contract in that respect.
  Mrs. Currie: I remind my right hon. Friend that the United Kingdom has the largest proportion of elderly people in Europe, with the exception of Sweden. Would he feel the same way if Sweden were to contribute to our funds?
  Sir Peter Hordern: I draw my hon. Friend's attention to the OECD report, which she will find interesting and illuminating. We should not be party to making large extra contributions to countries which have not made proper provision for their elderly people.
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  I have a clear idea of how we should proceed within the European Union. We are in favour of an ever-widening single market to include the eastern European countries and to provide maximum competition. I am sure that that is the case.
  There is a costly downside to maintaining an independent currency. The Government cannot finance themselves through the bond market without having to pay a full 2 per cent. more than the Germans now pay. We even have to pay 1 per cent. more than the Belgians; despite the fact that Belgium has a huge debt compared with its gross domestic product and our own, it is clearly determined to go along with the deutschmark. There is therefore a cost attached to maintaining our currency which must be borne in mind.
  I do not think that a single currency necessarily leads to a federal state. There is no question of our losing control of the power to raise income tax. In that respect, it is important that we should always retain that power within the House. We should not yield it to a European Parliament because national parliaments most nearly represent the people—much more so, at any rate so far, than the European Parliament does or is ever likely to do. We should not promote the European institutions too far, but we should promote unity among the European peoples through free trade, competition and the removal of national barriers.
  I should like to offer one suggestion to my hon. Friend the Minister. Europe will be a matter of supreme importance in the next Parliament. Although I am not in favour of a referendum, I wonder whether it would be a good idea to appoint a commission to look at every aspect of the matter, both from our monetary and economic point of view and from our constitutional point of view. People should be invited to give evidence so that if there is to be a free vote it can be taken after a proper assessment of all the important matters involved.
  6.2 pm
  Ms Roseanna Cunningham: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for calling me so early in the debate, especially when I know that a number of other hon. Members are in the queue waiting to speak.
  I wanted to speak in this debate because the subject is of enormous importance to the Scottish National party and Scotland. Our party has a policy of independence within Europe, so we are firmly on the side of the pro-Europeans in the Chamber. My predecessor, Sir Nicholas Fairbairn, might also have wished to take part in the debate, but perhaps not for the same side of the argument.
  I had occasion, in a number of different capacities, to meet Sir Nicholas, because as well as being involved in politics, I am a member of the Scottish Bar. I recall that he contributed to a book in 1992 in which he described the creation of the city of Edinburgh as being done in a "creative, roistering spirit". I believe that that quotation, rather than describing Edinburgh, is probably a more apt description of Sir Nicholas, because his impact was such that, once one met him, one never forgot him.
  Sir Nicholas made an impact not only in politics but through his work at the Bar. As a Member of Parliament, however, he had an enormous impact. In my travels around Perth and Kinross, I have met many people who have a little story to tell about him. They spoke of some cause that he had taken up or some particular intervention

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  that he had made on their behalf, which they remembered clearly, particularly because of the way in which he made his interventions.
  Other hon. Members who are also members of the Scottish Bar—not all of them are in the Chamber—would agree that when one first arrives at the Scottish Bar, it is noticeable that one of the people about whom one hears the most stories is Sir Nicholas. I regret to say that those stories are generally not suitable for inclusion in a speech, particularly in a maiden speech. The one thing that characterised every one of them was the enormous affection with which they were told. The political views of the individual did not matter, because the affection in which Sir Nicholas was held at the Bar in Scotland and on both sides of the House came through strongly. That also came through in the constituency, because wherever I went, from Kinross to Comrie, and from Milnathort to Muthill, the affection in which Sir Nicholas was held was evident.
  That affection is also tempered with amusement, because after many years of being in total political disagreement with Sir Nicholas, I found myself in total agreement with him at the very end of his life, when he gave his opinion on the likely result of the by-election that he knew was about to be called in Scotland. The result of that subsequent by-election bore out the prophetic abilities of Sir Nicholas. It at least highlighted the fact that, in the people of Perth and Kinross, one has an electorate who prefer a Member of Parliament who is just perhaps a little different from the norm. Although I cannot promise to go on in precisely the same way as Sir Nicholas, I shall provide the people of Perth and Kinross with the same distinctive voice.
  That by-election was of enormous importance for Scotland. We in the SNP had the opportunity to put forward our entirely positive vision—an independent Scotland within Europe. I could contrast that with the vision of the Conservative party, if I could ascertain what it is. I am afraid that I cannot. Such is the Tories' disarray, their only response to Europe is to delay. We could characterise their approach as "back to Baldwin" rather than "back to basics". I am afraid that at the moment our Conservative colleagues appear to be both anti-European and anti-Scottish at the same time. I hope that they will not try to save themselves in the coming general election by displaying insularity, xenophobia and parochialism, because that would be a great shame.
  An attempt is being made to press emotional buttons harking back to an empire that no longer exists in order to combat Brussels and to deal with the awkward squad on the Celtic fringe. That approach can be contrasted with the openness and inclusive nature of my party, which we demonstrate so vigorously in our campaigns. That contrast is bound to benefit my party, as it will benefit Scotland, because Tory strategy will not work in Scotland. The by-election made that clear.
  Our policy also contrasts just a little with that pursued by our colleagues on the Labour Benches. They may not be quite as anti-European or as anti-Scottish as Conservative Members, but their rhetoric is directed to what I would describe as the soggy centre. They still want to whistle "Land of hope and glory", but they want to do it quietly and in the dark. They are equally irrelevant to Scotland's political debate.
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  Scotland is lucky because it has a real alternative, which we laid out at the by-election. We fought a hard campaign in one of the most beautiful constituencies of Scotland, where, everywhere one walks, history is all around. It is a Scottish history, not a British nor an English history. There is certainly prosperity in my constituency, but there is also poverty, in spite of the way in which it is frequently portrayed.
  There is also an enormous thirst for change and a fresh start, which my constituents have discovered that only the Scottish National party can provide. Our by-election campaign laid out detailed policies directed towards economic and social decency. They are the type of policies that ordinary, decent Scots, not only in Perth and Kinross but throughout Scotland, find energising, because Scotland does not regard proper social provision and a culture of care as in any way extreme. The real extremists and the real separatists are those who wish to separate us in Scotland from the rights and benefits that should be part of a normal working life.
  In the context of the debate, I am speaking especially about those who wish to separate Scotland from the benefits to be accrued from the social chapter. I believe that it is the Government's intransigence in continually opposing the social chapter that has led or is leading directly to a low-skill, low-wage, low working standard culture.
  We are on the verge of becoming a sweatshop in Europe. There are private fortunes for some, but for the majority there is low job security, low commitment to employers and low standards of service and of production.
  Scotland does not believe that Government policies are providing a sound future for that country. Security and prosperity can come only from full and willing participation in a Europe-wide social chapter and a commitment to the people.
  The most successful European economies are those in which the work force is motivated and supported. It is short-sighted to neglect that work force and to neglect the people. An example of that short-sightedness, if I may digress slightly, is intransigence towards a minimum wage. The Government show total resistance to that, and it was one of the principal arguments in the by-election. I found that strange because the agricultural minimum wage exists, which protects rather than destroys jobs.
  That is also the case elsewhere. Study after study has shown that the 60 years of a minimum wage in the United States have not destroyed jobs. I also find it amusing that the right-wing platform of President Chirac included a commitment to increasing the French minimum wage. Indeed, Sir Winston Churchill, I believe in this very Chamber, in 1909 called it "a serious national evil" for anyone to receive less than a living wage.
  Those are the benefits that we can accrue from the European Union—tangible benefits. The concept of a people's Europe and the social chapter helps to bring us those benefits, and it can and should be coupled with a minimum wage, set by Government. It can be introduced during a transitional period to help small businesses, and I believe that, in 1995, it should be set at not less than £4 per hour—a pity that my friends on the Labour Benches will not also fix a figure.

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  An opinion poll early this year showed that Scots were more enthusiastic about Europe than were people in any other part of the United Kingdom. The message of that by-election is that it is time for Britain to pull over, get out of the slow lane and let Scotland past.
  6.12 pm
  Sir Richard Body: I congratulate the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross (Ms Cunningham) wholeheartedly on a notable speech. I do not know whether Sir Nicholas was up there, but I believe that, if he were, he would have been grinning amiably at those reminiscences. The hon. Lady spoke with great generosity towards him and with wit, both of which the House always much appreciates.
  The hon. Lady spoke of her constituency in glowing terms, which was only right, because we all envy her that constituency and she is lucky to be there. I do not know whether her constituents are lucky to have her. So far, no doubt they are, but the hon. Lady will strive hard to hold that seat and, if she continues to make speeches like that, she may he there longer than some of us would wish.
  I am tempted to tread on the controversial element of the hon. Lady's speech, but that would be to depart from the traditions of the House. Instead I shall allude, if I may, to one industry in which morale is now very low, an industry that was once the greatest of its kind in the world—our fishing industry.
  Our fishing industry is becoming smaller day by day. That is literally so, as fishermen are becoming fewer by the day and as one boat after another is being decommissioned. The industry has two parts—inshore and deep sea.
  I shall refer to the inshore sector first. We have a leasehold on what were once our British waters, but that leasehold expires in 2002. That is seven years ahead. It is an eternity away to politicians—all of us—as we never like to think of seven years ahead, but it is tomorrow to the fishermen who are contemplating whether it will be worth their while to renew the boats that they have—and many need to be renewed now—or to advise their sons to join them in an industry that has traditionally gone from generation to generation.
  In my constituency, we now have only 40 boats—40 boats, I should say, from Boston. We have none from Fosdyke and Sutton Bridge now. There are only 40 boats left going out from Boston, when not so many years ago we had more than 100. We have only 80 fishermen left, when not so many years ago we had about 500, earning a living out of the fishing industry.
  That figure can be repeated all round the coast of the United Kingdom. That is the scale on which the industry is diminishing. We really must decide very soon whether we intend to have a fishing industry. Unless we make that decision soon, morale is so low that we shall not have the investment coming in to enable boats to be rebuilt and to recruit the younger men to come in, to enable the industry to carry on in the next century.
  I beg the Government to have regard to that, even at this stage, for the intergovernmental conference. Unless we make a decision soon, we shall simply not have more people willing to enter the fishing industry to replace those who are retiring and the others—and there are quite a number of them—who see little hope for their industry and are leaving.
  Dr. Norman A. Godman: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that a campaign for the reform of the ramshackle common fisheries policy that we have now must call for regional management and regional preferences in terms of the indigenous fishermen and communities?
  Sir Richard Body: I would go a little way along that road, but my conclusion would be more radical, as the hon. Gentleman may understand.
  May I now refer to the deep sea sector. What has happened in the past 24 hours will not be lost on deep-sea fishermen—that a little militancy on the high seas can bring its reward. Having visited many deep-sea fishermen in the past few months, I must report to the House that there is rising anger, because they feel deeply let down. They feel that their industry is being treated as expendable and that they, and those who depend on them, have little future in an industry that could be great.
  It has been calculated that our fishing industry might be worth £6,000 million a year. That could make it a major industry, as indeed it used to be. We must ask ourselves seriously whether we wish to see that go—and go it will, unless the House resolves very soon that it should not go, and that requires the repatriation of fishing policy.
  One of the arguments for the common fisheries policy is that it conserves fish. I shall give one statistic that the House will not believe. Fishermen whom I have spoken to in the past few months have calculated how many fish round our shores are tipped back, dead, into the sea once they have been caught. Nobody will believe me when I say that those fishermen tell me—it is not just one view, but the view of many, including marine biologists and others who have kept an eye on what is happening—that about 1,000 million fish are tipped back in the course of a year. I do not know how many fish one could get into the Chamber—perhaps 1 million or 2 million.
  When our fishermen go out to fish, they have to keep to a quota. If they exceed it, they know that they will almost certainly be caught and fined up to £50,000. As a result, they dare not take the risk. In my constituency, it is seldom that as many as 16 boats go out in one day, but no fewer than 16 fishery officers police the Wash ports. The chances of exceeding the quota and getting away with it are nil.
  If one is fishing in the midst of a shoal of fish such as herring, one can easily, so I am told, bring on board 20 tonnes of herring. One cannot limit the amount as the nets come in; all the fish will come on board, although the quota may perhaps be only 10 tonnes—it may be anything from 8 to 12 tonnes. One will probably have to tip back half the herring. They will be fed to seagulls, but there is no other advantage in tipping them back. That process, which is far from conservation, is happening with one species after another.
  The common fisheries policy has failed to meet its objective. It is a disgraceful and wicked waste that so many millions of tonnes of food are being thrown back into the sea. The amount of waste is far worse than anything that has so far been recorded due to the common agricultural policy—and enough food has certainly been wasted as a result of that policy.
  I hope that the House—particularly my hon. Friend the Minister, who I know is sympathetic to, and understands, the problem—will urgently consider the issue. We need some resolve to ensure that the industry does not perish.

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  It is slowly dying and it will die unless the House has the resolve to ensure that we have effective control over our waters. That will not be achieved by reform—reform is Euro-speak for more bureaucracy.
  6.22 pm
  Mr. Ken Livingstone: I should certainly like to echo the kind words of the hon. Member for Holland with Boston (Sir R. Body) on the maiden speech that we have just heard from the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross (Ms Cunningham). I particularly welcomed her speech as I thought that it had a decidedly socialist tinge to it and I suspect that we are not getting as many socialists in the House as we did in the past. I hope that being generous to the hon. Lady in that way will do her no more damage in her party than it is likely to do me in mine.
  I was struck in the debate on two or three occasions by Tory Members grasping at straws and expressing the hope that the Labour party is as deeply split on Europe as the Government. They were misguided because there has been a tendency not to examine the detail of the speeches that were made by many of us in the Maastricht debate. I consistently voted against the Maastricht treaty, largely because the Government were stupid enough to make it an issue of confidence. Therefore, irrespective of what was in it, I would have voted against it.
  I also voted against the Maastricht treaty largely because I am opposed to an independent central bank—a strong motivating force for many Labour Members who opposed it. I have not the slightest doubt that, whether we are in or out of Europe, that issue will return in the next Parliament and will have to be fought over. I did not spend so much of my life trying to get elected to this place, then to conspire to give bankers vast powers over the British people.
  The recent conflict between Eddie George and the Chancellor shows that, ultimately, one person has to be responsible to the House for interest rates. It is nonsense to have dual responsibility carried between an unelected official and an elected official. Interest rates are central to the lives of British people and accountability for those interest rates should lie in the Chamber, not with an unelected official or an independent central bank. I have no problem in voting against it.
  Mr. MacShane: I shall ask a quick question as we are limited to 10-minute speeches. Who is more powerful in determining our interest rates—Eddie George, the Chancellor of the Exchequer or Mr. George Soros?
  Mr. Livingstone: George Soros and his like around the world, who, with their ability to manipulate currency flows, largely determine such issues when one is dealing with a currency that is not as large or important as it used to be.
  I want to deal with the subject of the splits in the Labour party. Shortly before the election in 1991, my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn) came to the Campaign group as the Maastricht debate was building up and presented a paper of total opposition to the European project. He was surprised to discover that two thirds of the members of the Campaign group were in favour of the federal project. It should not be a surprise
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  to the Tory party to discover that those of us with roots in internationalism, Marxism or even Methodism are open to the idea of supranational, international and global methods of organisation and government. In a world that is becoming more and more crowded with people and in which there is more competition for resources, international organisations will become more important.
  When I was on the national executive committee of the Labour party, I attended a party conference in, I think, 1988, at which there was a vote on whether to withdraw from Europe. I noticed that the constituency Labour party delegates voted overwhelmingly against it. I do not think that Conservative Members should think that the Labour party's change of attitude on Europe is a manoeuvre or a device. That change of approach has come up through the party from the grass roots, so it is irreversible.
  The Labour party contains people, on both the left and right wings, who are genuinely opposed to the European project, but they form a small minority. I do not think that we shall face the same problems in government as the Prime Minister is having with the Conservative party. We must find a way of getting Europe right, not whinge about whether to stay in it.
  One has only to examine the aspects that the intergovernmental conference will be discussing over the next couple of years as we move towards the next stage of the European project to see that there is no role for a major nation outside Europe. We know full well that Britain has a major impact on foreign affairs only when it agrees with another major power or bloc of powers. We learnt in Suez that we can no longer strut the stage. Instead, we must co-operate with our European neighbours so that there is a European dimension to global affairs, which we can pose against the policies that often emerge from the White House or the far east. We must ensure that we have that interest. It is nonsense that we are still armed to the teeth in western Europe, as if we might one day fight a war. There are major savings to be made for European peoples if we co-ordinate and co-operate on defence issues.
  Clearly, the most important question for most hon. Members is that of a currency. I was struck by the Bruges group's 19th occasional paper, which I was kindly sent by Bill Jamieson of The Daily Telegraph. It made the case that we should not be constrained by Europe but, with our vast capital holdings around the world, we should be genuinely international. I read through the paper and it decided me in favour of the European project. The Bruges document is a restatement of Britain's traditional financial perspective: to invest abroad and to neglect home investment. It convinced me more than ever to favour a single currency. We should concentrate on investing in Britain and in our European neighbours in order to build a strong industrial base, which has been neglected so badly and to which the hon. Member for Southend, East (Sir T. Taylor) drew attention with regard to the collapse in our exporting ability.
  I have no doubt that there will be a European currency. The European project has been clear: since Messina 40 years ago the Europeans have not had the slightest doubt that they were talking about a united states of Europe. The British people have been ill served by politicians constantly trying to emphasise the economic issues. It was a much wider project. It is absolute nonsense for anyone to say that a single European currency can be created

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  without recognising that that is another step towards creating a wider European union, and eventually a united states of Europe.
  I welcome that. I remember when Harold Macmillan first applied to take Britain into Europe in 1961. I was about 17 at the time and I was excited by the project. The debate then was that, although we would not necessarily enjoy tremendous economic benefits, there were wider political and military issues to consider. We wanted to create a genuine European dimension. When Kennedy in the White House gave the Union his support, it was seen as creating twin pillars either side of the Atlantic. It was viewed not simply in economic terms, but in political and military terms.
  We should now be honest to the British people. I do not believe that we were honest in the referendum, which purported to be only about the economy and so on. There is a political dimension, and we are deceiving the British people if we try to deny that. I am proud of it and I am happy to tell the British people that Europe is moving gradually—it may take a generation—towards the creation of a federal structure. Our role, as socialists, is to ensure that it is the correct structure and that Europe is devolved, decentralised, open and democratic. It must not be centralised and undemocratic and it must not turn its back on the rest of the world. That will be the subject of future debates.
  There is no way that Britain can stand apart because the rest of Europe will go with that project. The issue is whether it will be a small core based around Germany, or whether the whole of Europe will be brought together. I do not want to see a small German core with the rest of us stuck on the periphery where we have little influence; I want to see the wider European project open out as rapidly as possible, to draw in the nations of eastern Europe.
  If the rest of Europe creates a single currency and Britain opts out of it, every minute of every day the George Soros's and the international markets will test the strength of the pound against the next European currency. Every minute of every day, British citizens will have to pay more in terms of interest rates in order to fend off those attacks. The exchange rate mechanism failed because we were stupid enough to go in at an unsustainable rate. [Interruption.] I remind those hon. Members who are dissenting that I said that in the speech that I made when they voted to go in at an unsustainable rate. I said at the time that if we entered at that rate, another million people would be thrown on to the dole. I was right. The fact that the ERM failed us is irrelevant because the Government were stupid about the rate at which they entered.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman's time has expired.
  6.32 pm
  Mrs. Edwina Currie: I add my words of congratulation to the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross (Ms Cunningham). It is particularly nice to hear that sort of speech from a new woman Member. She may know that her predecessor, Sir Nicholas Fairbairn, very kindly described some women Members in the House as "old slags". I am sure that he would be amused by the irony of his being replaced by one who is not only so capable but also so attractive—and I am allowed to say that.
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  On Monday I had the honour to be elected as the new chairman of the Conservative Group for Europe. The group came into existence 20 years ago to fight for the yes side in the referendum. It has supporters all over the country, including in both Houses of Parliament.
  For those of us who are pro-European, it has always been a great reassurance to be members of the Conservative party. The original idea for modern Europe came from Churchill in Zurich in September 1946, when he spoke of creating a
  "structure under which the European family can dwell in peace, in safety and in freedom".
  He talked about giving
  "a sense of enlarged patriotism and common citizenship to the distracted peoples of this mighty and turbulent continent".
  It was the efforts more than 30 years ago of the then Tory Prime Minister, Harold MacMillan, to take us into Europe that inspired me and many like me to join the Conservative party. Since then, Tory Prime Ministers have brought about our entry into Europe; pushed through the single market; developed the notion of subsidiarity, which is now widely accepted; and pressed for the accession of other countries, especially those which once suffered under communism. I think that Tories can be very proud of those achievements.
  Most of that was done in the teeth of bitter hostility from Labour. From Attlee onwards, through the leadership of Michael Foot and Neil Kinnock, Labour's natural tendency to trudge backwards with its head down has led the party in the wrong direction. The new Labour leader, the right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair), says that he is pro-European now. In 1983—the year that we were both elected to this place—he wanted to pull out and leave the European Community entirely. In his 1983 election address he said:
  "We'll negotiate a withdrawal from the EEC which has drained our natural resources and destroyed jobs".
  He now says in radio interviews that, privately, he was all in favour of Europe. That is very strange. In public he is now in favour of Europe, but perhaps he is against it in private. One wonders at a commitment that is so superficial. I will take some convincing before I believe that the modern Labour party is in favour of the European Union.
  The Opposition's current conversion to the cause is very welcome, but what does it signify? It signifies only their realisation that an anti-European stance, along with their other batty policies, has made them repeatedly unelectable. There's the rub and there is the lesson for Conservatives as well. No anti-European party has ever been elected to office in this country. The voters, for all their grumbles, know on which side their bread is buttered.
  The European Union is a living creature; it is like a teenager. We can no more tell it to stop and say that we shall go no further with it than we can tell a teenager to stop growing. The tight little knot of six countries 40 years ago has grown until the Union's population is now as big as that of the United States of America and Japan put together. Our combined gross domestic product is 20 per cent. larger than that of the United States. The European Union is a world player and we should be thrilled to play our part.
  Sir Teddy Taylor: What is their unemployment?
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Morris): Order. Injury time will be given. That sort of barracking from the Back Benches is not acceptable.
  Mrs. Currie: In trading terms, we should make no mistake: Europe's strength is vital to us as a trading nation. We account for a quarter of total European Union trade. When there is a recession on the continent, we suffer; when continental economies grow, we benefit. Last year's figures show that we exported more to Germany than to the USA, more to Italy than to the whole of the middle east, and more to the small Dutch economy than to all the tiger economies of Asia put together. As far as our exports are concerned, the Australian market is roughly the same size as that of Denmark.
  Of course, we should not ignore the rest of the world, but why go halfway around the world when the richest and most discerning buyers are on our doorstep and we are triumphant in their markets? That is now our home market. The belief that we would find life easier somewhere outside the European Union is simply crazy and it does not accord with the facts.
  Churchill spoke of an "enlarged patriotism". Edith Cavell told us that "patriotism is not enough". I think that that is correct. I do not believe that we can improve our nation's position by taking a narrow view. Nor is it patriots who do so: it is those unpatriotic weak willies who are terrified of the challenge of other nations and who believe that we cannot meet that challenge.
  As to the single currency, I must tell my right hon and hon Friends on the Front Bench that if patriotism is not enough, nor is pragmatism. It is always necessary to ask the shrewd question: will it work? It is unwise to wait until others have designed the whole caboodle before putting the question. To insist upon "wait and see" is not a policy; it is a postponement of a policy. Worse still, it carries with it the serious danger that we will not like what we see eventually simply because we lacked the nerve or the taste to get involved at the start.
  My right hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (Sir P. Hordern) Horsham called for free votes on the issue and he was right. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister is correct to say that we cannot take a decision on a single currency until we see what is on offer, and to insist that it must be workable before we consider joining. However, true patriotism would assume that of course we will be capable of joining when the time comes and that we are capable now of active engagement in the massive amount of detailed planning that is required. That is the view of the CBI in its paper, "A Europe that works", which was launched yesterday.
  If we stand back and let other countries take the initiative, the result will be a creation from which our experience and knowledge will be excluded. It will be worse without us. We must be involved and engaged.
  I have one or two old-fashioned views. I believe that it is the job of Government not only to govern as widely as possible, but to inspire. I should like to see the Conservative Government expound the principles on which modern Europe is founded, as Churchill and Macmillan did. I should like them vigorously to promote radical change and growth in Europe, including a flexible labour market, instead of appearing to oppose it at every step.
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  The Government have an obligation to inform the public of how we benefit from our membership of the European Union. The ignorance of ordinary voters is a major stumbling block to our playing a full role. It is up to the Government to tackle it and not leave it to others.
  I should like to hear words of hope and enthusiasm from the Government about Europe, not the nit-picking and criticisms which have become so many Ministers' stock in trade. Otherwise, we may find that the voters in some future referendum have absorbed the lukewarm attitudes of some of our leaders and Back Benchers and will vote no, whatever the question is. That would be a disaster for Britain, for our partners and, in my judgment, for the free world.
  I pray that a principled, long-sighted and positive view will prevail over policy in Europe as it has in the Conservative party up to now. We must at all times seek what is good for the nation and for our constituents. Only in that direction lie the targets we desire: the wealth and security of our country and success in the next election.
  6.41 pm
  Mr. Mike Gapes: This morning, the Foreign Secretary made it clear to the Foreign Affairs Select Committee that the Government have made no formal submission of their position to the inter-governmental conference and study group. So far, they published a paper on defence policy in March and a document on the common foreign and security policy. Both those documents would be broadly welcomed in the House as they contain what most people in Britain would consider eminently sensible proposals that take us towards greater European co-operation. However, some of us wish that the Government had provided a more explicit, clearer statement of the need for a common European approach to stand up to the stupidities from the other side of the Atlantic.
  It is significant that this morning the Foreign Secretary was not prepared to promise a White Paper before the IGC. The reason is clearly demonstrated on the Conservative Benches. The Foreign Secretary is unable to produce such a White Paper because of the divisions within the Cabinet and the Conservative party. It is clear that the Government are suffering from immobility.
  Mr. Duncan-Smith: Not Mobil, what about Shell?
  Mr. Gapes: I shall come to Shell in a moment.
  The sceptics are on the rampage and the lunatics are taking over the asylum. The Inter-Governmental Conference Study Group will be an important test of whether the Government can survive into 1997, but the outcome in 1997 will not necessarily be what is envisaged at the moment.
  The German representative on the reflections group, Werner Hoyer, said a few weeks ago that from the German viewpoint it would be preferable for discussions to continue into 1997 because of the political uncertainties in Britain. He went on:
  "but the schedule could be kept only if elections in Britain have by then strengthened the decisiveness of London."
  That can be read in two ways, but I suspect that what he had in mind was his hope that there will be a Government with a clear majority led by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition before the conclusion of the negotiations. That has consequences not just for Britain

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  and the other members of the European Union but for other potential members with the enlargement to the Visegrad countries and other central and eastern European states as well as Malta and Cyprus.
  The Select Committee recently visited Finland and Poland as part of our work in reporting to the House on the issue. We had detailed discussions with representatives of the Polish Government. There are concerns in Poland that the process of enlargement will drag on and be delayed because of the ratification process after the IGC.
  I therefore welcome what the Foreign Secretary told us this morning. His view was that within six months of the IGC, discussions with potential new members should then start and that we should not have to wait for the ratification of the new treaty, which could delay matters perhaps a year or more and make it more difficult for that enlargement to take place before the end of the century, causing growing uncertainty in Poland, Hungary and elsewhere for several years.
  It is also clear that applicant countries will join the European Union when the debate on the single currency is becoming central. If the discussions of the last few days lead to the single currency being introduced in 1999, and if the Commission's proposal for a four-year, three-phase process to bring it in is met, by about 2003 there will be a fully fledged single European currency. That will have big ramifications even for countries which have decided to opt out.
  The Commission's document envisages the single currency operating throughout the single market. That has serious implications. Hon. Members have already referred to the potential costs of staying out of such a single currency, if it were introduced.
  My constituents who travel to work in the financial institutions in central London—in banking, insurance and associated industries. The single currency will have significant consequences for a part of the country with higher than average unemployment and massive job losses in those sectors in recent years. It will be worrying if we stay out of the process and the focus of European banking, finance, insurance and information technology shifts away from London towards other European cities. It would be appear to me that, in the German sense, the matter is being driven by politics. That is clear from what Chancellor Kohl has said and from what everyone else in the Social Democratic party is saying. Indeed, I met a member of the SDP this week, and he confirmed the fact that a majority in the German Parliament is committed to establishing a single currency. German public opinion may he registering some suspicion and hostility, as expressed in the polls; but I agreed—if only on this—with my right hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies) that there will be a single currency, and the Germans will be at the core of it.
  The choice that we in this country face is: should we sit on the sidelines, believing that we can operate from outside, with all the attendant risks of speculation to which my hon. Friend the Member for Brent, East (Mr. Livingstone) referred earlier? That would pose great dangers to our economy, our interest rates and our stability. We have been here before, in the 1960s and at other times. We must not repeat the mistakes of the past.
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  I believe that the Labour Government who will be in power between 1999 and 2003— and beyond— will have to confront these issues positively. I am confident that they will do so, in the interests of the long-term future of employment, stability and living standards in this country.
  6.50 pm
  Sir Teddy Taylor: These debates are usually dull and boring; it must be even more boring for the Speaker to have to sit and listen to the same old people hurling abuse at each other and at each other's opinions.
  Today we heard a considerable speech by the hon. Member for Brent, East (Mr. Livingstone), who rightly pointed out why the Labour party has changed from the grass roots up. It was not a case of some clever leader deciding to stand on his head. What has happened—it should have happened years ago—is that the average socialist has realised that the EC is about things he cares about—subsidy, intervention, social conscience, market management, protectionism, artificial prices, and boards, councils and commissions running everything. Certainly, if I were a socialist that is the kind of society that I would support. If an industry was collapsing, we would not let it go down. We would call someone to come in, sort it out and keep it going. And there would be calls for subsidies here, there, and everywhere.
  It would seem that, for perfectly good reasons—certainly not out of nastiness—people do crazy things which always end up in mass unemployment and bankruptcy. But the Labour party has certainly changed. As for the Conservative party, we have heard today how it and the rest of society have changed dramatically. When I was coming in here this afternoon I met an hon. Member who abused me when I voted against the Maastricht Bill. He called me stupid and mad. Now he tells me that he has written an article for a newspaper called The Sun, Saturday's edition, in which he intends to argue for total withdrawal from the European Union. That is quite a big change.
  Some of my colleagues have referred to that ridiculous, highly subsidised body known as the CBI. I realised when I read the CBI report that I had never seen anything like it in my life. I do wish that the CBI would state at the front of its documents how much cash it gets from the EU. Many organisations basically do no more than a PR job for the EU—but they should say how much they get in return.
  Anyway, the CBI document is quite astonishing. It says that the CBI is very concerned about the distorted competition in the EU. It goes on to say that the European agricultural policy needs to be replaced with a completely new one. Further, it says that business shares the general concern about the huge sums being spent on fraud and financial irregularity. All this represents a dramatic change from the usual rubbish which amounts to no more than PR for the European Union.
  The European Parliament is also changing. I hope that the small minority of Euro-fanatics that we still have in the Conservative party will read the massive report due to be published by the European Parliament's employment committee next week. Based on costly and detailed advice, the committee states that convergence—the first of the three stages—will cost another 10 million unemployed people. The committee is right. Forcing all the currencies together will create unemployment, just as another 500,000 people were made unemployed while we were in the ERM. This view represents a massive change too.

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  People's attitudes to legislation from Europe are also changing. My colleagues and I get cascades of letters from industry and commerce saying that they are fed up to the teeth with the costly and nonsensical legislation from Europe. Some of it is truly unbelievable. In the past few days, we have had the infant formula regulations, bringing in for the first time official censorship, with fines to be imposed on anyone who argues that a product that does not involve breast feeding can be good—crazy but true.
  Next comes the new chocolate directive; it has almost gone through even though the Government oppose it. It will go through on majority voting, and it will change our chocolate. On 1 October the crazy regulations governing the use of the metric system will come into play. People selling products in British shops without metric labelling will be subject to fines of up to £5,000. This proposal went through a Committee of this House in 21 minutes, because there was nothing that anyone could do about it.
  Of course, a tiny minority in our party still shout about the EU. Earlier, we heard the hon. Member for Derby, South delightfully saying that we should be telling the people of Britain what the EU is doing to them. I wish to goodness that she would do that—
  Mrs. Currie rose—
  Sir Teddy Taylor: I shall certainly not give way. She should tell the people of Britain the truth instead of talking all the rubbish that we heard from her today. She should tell them the cost of VAT to poor families. VAT is a filthy tax on the poor, and there is nothing that she nor 1 can do about it. Will she tell her constituents, many of whom are poor, that we spend £1 billion on growing high tar tobacco and dumping it on the third world? There is nothing that we can do about that scandal. What about telling families about the £28 extra a week that they are paying in higher food prices and taxation because of the absurd common agricultural policy? There is nothing that she or I can do about that either.
  Mrs. Currie: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I rise merely to point out that the hon. Member for Derby, South (Mrs. Beckett) sits on the other side of the House. I am the hon. Member for Derbyshire, South—and I continue to be proud of my membership of the pro-European faction.
  Sir Teddy Taylor: Ridiculous. Everyone knew who I was talking about. What about the £5 a week that families in Derbyshire have to pay as their net contribution to the EU? What good is coming from money going to waste and fraud?
  Conservatives are beginning to wake up, and the Government must take that into account. But what the blazes are we to do? First, I ask the Government not to try to resolve the matter with silly reassurances—all that stuff about moving away from federalism and about things going our way—"No one is talking about a United States of Europe", and so on. It is all nonsense and the Government know it. We are slipping ever further into Europe and, because of the courts, we cannot stop it—unless something new happens.
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  Secondly, I must ask the Government to abandon their pretences over issues such as border controls. The Government say that they will go to the brink over them, but those of us who live near the sea and the ports of entry know that we have already agreed to uniform visas, to the principle of mutual recognition and so on. More than half our illegal immigration now comes from Europe. I could give more details from the unions about this—the hon. Member for Thurrock (Mr. Mackinlay) knows exactly what is happening.
  We cannot hold back this advance so, if we are to achieve change, we must give authority to the Prime Minister, be he Conservative or Labour. We must not try to change the leadership; we must face up to the issue. The only way in which the Prime Minister can get the necessary authority is by sorting out that small band of dissidents who are trying to pull us away from our new Conservative policy of giving the people their say. But the idea of a referendum on a single currency is the biggest joke ever. By the time we come to that, everything will have gone except the Scottish pound note. If we are to ask for people's views, it must be done before we get involved in the two years of fixed exchange rates—anything else would be a fraud. If I were to try to talk to people in a referendum about whether they are for or against keeping the Euro equivalent of a Scottish pound note they would think it an absolute irrelevance. What should we look to for the future? Europe, we should appreciate, is going down the plug hole economically and politically.
  Mrs. Currie: Rubbish.
  Sir Teddy Taylor: There is mass unemployment, as my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South should know—20 million unemployed, and more to come. It is a disastrous situation. The economic situation of European countries is appalling. As we see in France at the present time, extra seats are being provided for the fascist parties. That is worrying and appalling. We should be avoiding Euro-xenophobia. We should be looking out to the world, for relations with countries like those in the North American Free Trade Agreement, which believe in free trade and nothing else.
  I would appeal to my colleagues to appreciate that we are in danger of going down the plug hole. Britain should be seeking to disengage so that we can pursue Conservative policies once again. While a small minority of my colleagues are still here laughing and chortling at what we say, they should realise that, unless something happens soon, Britain is destined, unfortunately, to the miseries of the European Union, to the disappearance of democracy and to a future that will deprive the House of bringing in Conservatism—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. Time is up.
  7 pm
  Mr. Roy Hughes: It is rather interesting to follow the hon. Member for Southend, East (Sir T. Taylor), because I have always admired the principled stand that he has taken on this issue over many years.
  I welcome the debate on the European Union. It is accompanied by the usual shoal of documents, which I have tried to browse through. I confess that I have not participated much in European debates in recent years, although I did play a fair part in the 1960s, when all the

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  agonising took place about joining, and in the 1970s, including the referendum campaign, when, with Neil Kinnock, who is now the Transport Commissioner for the European Union, I campaigned for a "no" vote. After that, I rather felt that I was knocking my head against the wall a bit. That view was reinforced for me at the time by Viscount Tonypandy, or George Thomas as he was then. He said to me, "Drop it, Roy. There are other issues."
  For me, today is something of a look back. The first thing to note are the name changes over the years. It started off as the Coal and Steel Community, the amalgamation between Germany and France, the traditional enemies. Then Britain joined what was known as the Common Market, without, incidentally, the full-hearted consent of the people of Britain, which was promised us by the right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Sir E. Heath). Then there was the European Economic Community, the EEC. Now, of course, we have the European Union. I may have missed one or two changes in the meantime.
  There are, of course, those to whom I shall refer as the Euro-fanatics, for want of a better term, and they, it seems, will not be satisfied until it becomes federal Europe. I was therefore glad to be reassured by my hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook)—who, incidentally, I hold in the highest possible regard. He indicated today and on 30 January that Europe must be a community of free member states. Labour, he said, rejects the concept of a European super-state. I hope that I am not misquoting my hon. Friend in any way.
  Mr. Robin Cook indicated dissent.
  Mr. Hughes: I recall that our delegation to Europe was once nominated. Now it is elected. I note, too, that the name has changed from a European Assembly to a European Parliament. There is, I suppose, nothing constant but change.
  In the 1960s and 1970s, when arguments were raging about membership, one of the main bones of contention was undoubtedly the common agricultural policy, so I was rather interested to receive a few days ago, from my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, East (Dr. Strang), the shadow Minister of Agriculture, a communication that pointed out:
  "The recently released CAP fraud statistics show how badly we are being ripped off by CAP fraudsters".
  The figures, he said, are a scandal, and no fair-minded person could disagree, for the figures, far from getting better, are actually getting worse.
  In 1993, 1,284 cases were recorded, amounting to £235 million. Yet for the first nine months of 1994, the number of recorded cases had risen to 1,597, amounting to £340 million. Those figures are from official European Union sources. As my hon. Friend points out, they are merely the tip of the iceberg.
  I shall quote some of the cases involved in 1994. Italian companies claiming to be exporting tobacco were in fact shipping containers full of waste paper, plastic and mouldy tobacco waste. They received £2 million in subsidies. Criminal organisations were collecting butter export subsidies—and not exporting butter. Subsidies were paid out to export beef to Egypt, even though the beef had such high levels of bacteria that it was rejected by Egypt. Fourteen million pounds was spent in subsidies for grape must because it was going to Sweden. It was in
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  fact going to the USA and Canada, where these subsidies do not apply. Those are examples of fraud in the European Union.
  My hon. Friend said that only radical CAP reform can stop the scandal of CAP fraud. The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food should be saying that to President Chirac and Chancellor Kohl, but perhaps he is too busy defending himself over the Scott allegations.
  The fact is that the CAP swallows half the European budget. It pushes up food prices in this country for every family. The cost for the average family in Britain is currently close to £20 per week.
  Sir Teddy Taylor: Twenty-eight pounds.
  Mr. Hughes: I stand corrected.
  In addition, it is doing endless damage to the British countryside. We need to switch spending to support farmers' incomes, and stop subsidising endless production.
  The Government have been in office for 16 years. They have certainly had little success in reforming the CAP. In fact, they seem to have given up the fight, and claiming it as their own policy. The Library has provided me with figures that show that the average number of unemployed in the European Union in 1995 is some 18.5 million—11.3 per cent. of the total labour force. What figures these are. They are for ever rising.
  Twelve months ago, Sir Michael Perry, the chairman of Unilever UK, pointed out that Europe, judged by its ability to provide jobs for its people, was a palpable failure. In the 1960s, only 2.5 per cent. of Europe's work force was unemployed. Unemployment increased to 4 per cent. in the 1970s. It was nearly 10 per cent. in the 1980s. It is likely to be 11.3 per cent. in 1995. Is it any wonder that the Trades Union Congress has put unemployment back at the top of the agenda, and rightly so? We need a Britain at work, not one on benefits.
  The issue of a common currency looms on the horizon. Such a currency could turn out to be a huge disaster. Within the European Union, there are large differences in prosperity and levels of employment. Some areas have high unemployment, while others fare much better. A degree of flexibility in wages and social costs obtains. A single currency could close off the avenues of regional devaluation and run the risk of locking in—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Morris): Order.
  7.10 pm
  Mr. Peter Temple-Morris: I cannot agree with what the hon. Member for Newport, East (Mr. Hughes) said and was saying, but it is a pleasure to be able to take up his remarks. I say that sincerely, as the Conservative candidate who opposed him before he first became a Member of this place. As it was Newport on the one hand and the 1966 general election on the other, he will not be surprised, as the House will be, that I firmly lost.
  I come to the debate as a vigorous European. I think that my views are pretty well known. They have been expressed in the House from time to time. I have clashed, I hope honourably and never personally, with my hon. Friends of the more sceptical element. We have always respected one another's views.

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  I have been a pro-European all my political life. I see the Union now, as I always have, as both political and economic. I put those words in that order deliberately. I accept the notion of shared—I am tempted to use the word of the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook)—interest, but I prefer to take terminology by the scruff of the neck and declare that I support the notion of shared sovereignty within the institutions of Europe. I take that view because that is exactly what we are sharing now. The debate will focus increasingly on the amount of that sharing and the areas in which it takes place.
  I want Britain to play a world role. We have much to contribute. The only way in which we can make our contribution now is within Europe. We waste far too much time clashing with one another about whether we shall be actively within Europe when we should actively be leading Europe. The tragedy of the entire debate, which transcends the adversarial nature of the Chamber, is that we are losing the opportunity to lead. Our position within Europe with our potential allies is diminishing almost as I speak.
  I want a single currency. Some of my hon. Friends have already said that that is what they want. They think, with various degrees of balance, that we should get into it. In a difficult world and a difficult Europe, it would mean increasing security for our country. It would mean also security for individuals, in everything from their private finance to mortgages and everything else. A feature of a strong currency is not having to worry about every international breeze, let alone wind, that might cause the pound to rock. That is something that has been going on for most of my adult life.
  I very much agree with what my right hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (Sir P. Hordern) said about the development of a core currency. I think that it is coming, as surely as night follows day. If we are not part of it, we shall have to conform with it. Increasingly, our trade will be done within it in any event. If the pound is away from it, it will most certainly have to follow it.
  When we argue about a single currency and everything else, Europe tends to go into cores, tiers or concentric circles. There are so many buzz words. I want Britain in the top tier. We do not belong lower down. I was amazed when my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester, North (Mr. Jenkin) mentioned Switzerland. I like to think that I am in a country that likes Switzerland. Indeed, I enjoy Switzerland. The hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) talked about niche markets. I do not think that we are a nation of chocolate or watch makers, and we are certainly not neutral. We like to be in there, as it were, pursuing our policy and influencing others.
  That leads me to investment and the City. It is my firm belief—I know that there are disagreements about this—that in the longer term the future of the City will increasingly come under challenge if we are not actively part of a financial and economic Europe, and that means most certainly a single currency. At present, the City is pre-eminent. It is one of the finest things that we have to contribute to the rest of Europe and the wider world.
  It is all very well for many in the City to say, "If we are outside developments, it will not make any difference. We are just like Hong Kong or Switzerland, for example. We shall manage." With that attitude, I believe that City
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  business will move away from us. 'That will happen in the medium to longer term, unless, as I have said, we are in there.
  I move on to foreign and defence policies, and, I hope, the increasingly common nature of them. I welcome co-operation in procurement—for example, the closer relationship that the Government are seeking and securing with France. We need, however, to develop efficient decision making. I do not mind how we proceed in that direction, whether it is nation to nation, intergovernmental or within the EU. There must, however, be increasingly an efficient decision-making process. That brings me to the United States.
  There has been only one reference to the United States before mine thus far in the debate. We cannot rely indefinitely on Uncle Sam to dig us out of trouble and to pay the bill. He is becoming increasingly unpredictable. The imbalance of power between the United States and the other elements of the world is becoming positively frightening, given the burdens on the US. It is the only nation that is executing foreign policy by means of measures that require a strong defence policy—in other words, military capability. It is the only nation that can act as a world power. Europe must rapidly provide some balance, for the sake of a strong twin pillar and a more equal alliance with the US.
  We are in an international world. It stares us in the face that the powers of the nation state are increasingly being challenged. Indeed, it is becoming increasingly a dated concept. We must co-operate, whether we are in or out, financially, commercially, militarily and environmentally. The European Union is a reality. The Franco-German axis will remain. There is no point in conning and kidding ourselves that, because of a change here or there, the fundamental nature of that axis will change meaningfully for us.
  A single currency will become a reality, as will enlargement. Enlargement equals institutional reform. That must be faced. We are inextricably tied by geographical and trading interests. If we are not part of the rest of Europe, we shall have to follow it.
  I regret the internal disputes that we insist on having. They are damaging, and confusing to the British people. Our people are receiving inadequate leadership and guidance. They have been in that position for many years, under, dare I say it, successive Governments. If it ever comes to it, I shall welcome a referendum. I would accept it and fight it, on the basis of a single currency or anything else.
  I believe that the pro-Europeans would win the debate and the referendum. It is all very well talking about there being only a few pro-Europeans left. There are many of them outside the House. The concept of a free vote, which has been raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow, East (Mr. Dykes), my right hon. Friend the Member for Horsham and my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South (Mrs. Currie), proves that. It is almost embarrassing that I have been able to agree with some Opposition Members' speeches. Equally embarrassing is the fact that I have disagreed with some of my hon. Friends' speeches.
  I support Government policy wholeheartedly. I recognise reality, however, and when it is a matter of wait and see, we encourage a continuing argument and debate about what we are waiting to see and the course that

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  should be taken at the end of the day. I think that my Euro-sceptical hon. Friends would agree with that. It is vital that there is no further slippage. It is vital that the United Kingdom preserves, protects and furthers its options within Europe. There must be no slippage, only preservation of options.
  7.20 pm
  Dr. Tony Wright: It would be easy for us Labour Members simply to sit back and take pleasure in watching the antics of Conservative Members. Watching the visceral hatreds that have appeared even in the debate today could simply cause us pleasure, but we would be most misguided if we were to settle for that. The tragedy is that the debate on Europe that takes place here on occasions such as this bears ever less resemblance to the feelings about Europe outside.
  We may like to pretend that it is simply a Conservative problem, that the issue about Europe interests us only because it divides the Conservative party, and therefore makes it easier for us to get elected, but that is not so. It is a Conservative problem, but it is wider than that.
  The way in which the issue is discussed and reported suggests always that there are simply two sides. That has been replayed in the arguments today: there are pros and antis, there are Euro-fans and Europhobes, and there shall be nothing in between. The reality is that most British people and most of the House are precisely in between. The tragedy of the way in which the argument is conducted is that the majority position—the critical, friendly European position, if I may put it like that—is never heard.
  We are approaching a moment of truth, not only for Europe, but absolutely for this country in its relationship with Europe. This is the moment that will test us. It will decide what sort of society we will be, certainly what sort of England we will be.
  It is interesting that Europe comes as a solution to all sorts of other people's problems. As we have heard, it comes as a solution to the Scottish problem. In a way, it comes as a solution to the French problem, the Belgium problem and the German problem, but it does not come as a solution to our problem. It compounds our problem, or so we believe. Unless we can resolve that, we shall make no progress.
  Mr. Wilkinson: What did the hon. Gentleman mean by the German problem? Germany's problems were essentially solved with reunification. I recognise that the reconstruction of the east's economy has proved difficult, but what is the German problem? To what is he alluding?
  Dr. Wright: Would that I had more than 10 minutes. That is a most extraordinarily interesting intervention. Here we are at the end of the 20th century, and a Europhobe says, "By the way, what is the German problem?" The German problem is the history of Europe in the 20th century; it is the foundation of the European Union; and it is at the heart of every discussion that we should be having about the European Union. Any hon. Member who suggests, knowing all that, that we can detach ourselves from the European project and leave a unified Germany at the heart of that project simply has not understood the history of this century.
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  Options are opening up. One option, which the hon. Gentleman's intervention reminds me of, is the "out" option—the disengagement option. Let us hear it clearly. We are beginning to do so, but people must accept the answer that I have tried to give to the question. That option means accepting the Europe that I have described, of which we shall not be part. That disengagement carries with it the most momentous and dangerous implications for us, but let us at least be clear and honest about it.
  A second option would be the "old European project, business as usual" option. One might even call it the pure integrationist model. Problems are also associated with it. Given everything that has happened, including enlargement and the end of the cold war, to think that that project is on course in the old way is profoundly misguided.
  The "out" model and the old, pure integrationist model do not work. What else are we being offered? The Government offer the "let's muddle through as best we can" model, whereby we try to avoid taking any strategic view on these matters and live day to day, week to week. Labour Members watch the agonies of that policy. It is not a pleasant sight. We may take some perverse pleasure in it, but it does not help this country or the cause of Europe. None of those positions is adequate.
  We are at a moment when Europe needs a new foundation that takes on board the environment in which we live. Real issues exist in relation to the balance between regulation and deregulation, social costs and social solidarity, and the virtues and the stability that a single currency would give and the worries about its deflationary consequences.
  There are big questions, which have surfaced once or twice in the debate, about whether the old route, and political integration proceeding by means of economic integration, were right. The time may be coming when we must return finally to the original project—the political one, involving the German and European problems—and go for it directly, but we should not do so in ever more circuitous and different ways.
  In that process, we may finish up with a project that is more confederal than federal, or certainly with a softer rather than harder federalism. All manner of questions are being discussed about the shape of a possible European constitution: is it possible to define competences in a new way, to involve the judges of national states in defining competences in a new way—which we can do—and to involve national Parliaments in European institutions in a new way? Again, around Europe interesting ideas are emerging on those questions. We shall divorce ourselves from the argument if we simply go for disengagement or make it up as we go along.
  A Europe is opening up that enables us to do things at a European level that we cannot do at a national level. To achieve a Europe of many tiers, we want more power to go not only upwards, but downwards. I say to people who are most ferocious in their defence of national sovereignty that they were not ferocious in defending the rights of the House and of Parliament against an overweening Executive; nor have they been alert and attentive as power has departed from the House to all manner of unelected bodies.
  If we accept that the world is not divided between those who are for and those who are against, but that people are somewhere in between, we need a new vision for Europe. Those arguments are being heard throughout Europe, not

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  just here. The question is: will we be part of those arguments? We need a new sort of politics to enable us to contribute to the shaping of that new vision.
  In Denmark, where many of the arguments in which we are currently engaging also feature, the parties—in preparation for the IGC—are preparing what they call a consensus position to articulate and defend Danish national interests in the context of Europe. That approach to the IGC is a million miles away from its antithesis—the unreasoning and unsensible approach adopted here.
  We must conclude by asking what Europe is for, and providing an intelligent answer. The Government seem to think that dressing up in union jack boxer shorts will somehow get them through the next general election; but I am afraid that it will fall to new Labour to provide a new vision for a new Europe.
  7.30 pm
  Mr. William Cash: We have heard the articulated claptrap of Labour at its best: a new Labour, and a new vision for a new Europe. What the hon. Member for Cannock and Burntwood (Dr. Wright) does not understand, and what the Labour party—including its leader—does not understand, is that the prescription at which the party has connived will produce massive unemployment among the very people whom it purports to represent. Worse, if a single currency were ever introduced it would be just as vulnerable to one simple solution as the dollar or the yen.
  Labour wants the borders removed. It wants a single currency and—like Germany—it wants a single state. We can tell that from the enthusiasm of the hon. Member for Cannock and Burntwood for the German position; I shall return to that shortly. The combination of those factors, and the movement of other currencies against a single currency, with the highest unemployment that we have seen for 30 years, would inevitably produce bad results. As my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Sir T. Taylor) pointed out, the European Parliament has just considered unemployment. It will know that further movement towards currency links will lead to a further increase in unemployment—an increase of as much as 10 million.
  That is Labour's prescription. It is about time that Labour voters knew that it is Labour Members who will create havoc followed by disorder. In the welter of chaos that will accompany the absence of national Parliaments that is advocated by Labour, we may well face a new form of incipient fascism owing to the removal of the safety valves provided by such Parliaments. [Interruption.]
  Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Janet Fookes): Order. I do not expect to hear seated conversations between members of different parties, or even between members of the same party.
  Mr. Cash: I am grateful for your ruling, Madam Deputy Speaker, but when Opposition Members try to interfere by chuntering among themselves I always know that it is because they do not want to hear what is being said. They are guilty men: they have connived in this project. The evidence is there for all to see. We need only look back to the exchange rate mechanism. We know perfectly well that that caused a massive loss of
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  businesses, produced a public sector borrowing requirement of £50 billion and, regrettably, led to an increase in social security and other domestic costs that then had to be repaid by the breaking of our own tax promises. That is why we are electorally unpopular. Not for one minute can Opposition Members be seen as other than guilty of having agreed to the arrangement—and. furthermore, of not having repudiated that agreement subsequently.
  Mr. MacShane: Does the hon. Gentleman recall that the biggest surge in unemployment over the past 16 years occurred early in the 1980s, when we were not in the exchange rate mechanism, thanks to this national Government's policies?
  Mr. Cash: The hon. Gentleman is not really considering what is actually happening under the current European project. He is trying to look into the distant past without focusing on the high interest rates incurred by the ERM.
  Only today, Mr. Theo Waigel made it clear that the Germans are fed up with paying money into the cohesion and structural funds. Indeed, a leaked internal paper from the Dutch Finance Ministry that came into my hands the other day suggested the same. The net contributors are fed up with making the payments, and all the promises made to countries in the south Mediterranean and elsewhere will come home to roost. People will discover that all the promises that they were given will disintegrate; a web of deceit and dishonesty is being woven on a scale that has not been seen for generations.
  The plain fact is that, if I know that such things are going on, other hon. Members must as well. None of us has that amount of knowledge; we all have access to the same information. Why are we not told openly what is really happening, and what the consequences of monetary union would actually be?
  Furthermore, under article 10 of the own resources decision, the Fontainebleau rebate, to which my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary referred, is on the table for consideration, having being put there by our Government. It is intended that the Fontainebleau question, as well as proposals for a fixed uniform rate of VAT and for a new own resources decision, should be discussed and decided by 1999.
  Some of my hon. Friends are looking at me with a certain amount of interest, because they know that what I am saying is true. I beg them to take account of this: I am not trying to be difficult, but merely trying to bring some of the information into the public arena. Why should the people of this country not be told the truth about what is happening? We sold the pass at Maastricht, and Labour and the Liberal Democrats were party to that.
  During the debate on the Maastricht confidence motion, I told the Prime Minister, "You have presented the British people with the unnecessary question of whether, in 1996 and 1999, we may have to leave the European Community." That has not been said only in the past week or so; I said it to the Prime Minister when he entered the Chamber during my speech on that motion. The analysis leads us inexorably in that direction. As one who voted yes in 1975 and—with some criticism—voted in favour of the Single European Act in 1986, and would do so again, I think it deplorable that we should be put in this position.

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  Time after time, we are presented with the covert passing of more and more powers to the European Union. A German paper published only a few days ago specifically states that, over the next decade, the development of integration in "constitutional" matters must progress, within the Union, "step by step" from the state of community of law to that of what is described as "constitutional community". What the Germans are actually saying is that they want a written constitution for Europe. We are up against it. With the tremendous power that Germany is acquiring as a result of the economic dependency of other member states upon her, the majority voting that goes with it is going get worse and worse.
  I challenged my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary on majority voting this afternoon. I did so not only with good reason but accurately because I quoted from a paper to which he is a signatory on behalf of the British Government. The paper was adopted by Foreign Ministers and by the British Government. It includes a proposal that increased majority voting is to be regarded as a positive factor in terms of efficiency.
  We are not talking about efficiency; we are talking about democracy. That is the point. We are selling out. We are not being told enough and only as a result of the tremendous efforts of a number of Conservative Members do we manage to discover things from time to time. We are not being given the full picture—
  Madam Deputy Speaker: Order.
  7.41 pm
  Mr. Nigel Spearing: The hon. Member for Stafford (Mr. Cash) has certainly discovered things. I pay tribute to him for having made it clear that he voted for the Single European Act treaty, because a treaty is what it was. It further intensified and expanded the treaties that are, in fact, already a written constitution of the European Union. He has been humble and frank enough to make that absolutely clear.
  The right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Sir E. Heath) said that he would negotiate, no more and no less. He did not; he went the whole way. He talked of the wholehearted consent of Parliament and people, which he did not get. It is clear that from that time as we have gone down that road, more and more people have begun to understand the fundamental nature of the original common market, the European Community and the European Union. The public are uneasy.
  One of the interesting features of the debate has been the use of the word "Europe". Europe is a geographical continent. If hon. Members meant the European Union, that is another matter but they have not been saying "European Union". If someone asked me, "Nigel, what is the European Union?", I would have to say that it is the treaties.
  The European Union was sold, especially to younger people—my hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Mr. Miller) has gone—as having being formed to create prosperity and peace for Europe after the war. Let people read the treaty that was made at the start and they will see that it was nothing of the sort. It was first an attempt at a rapprochement on iron and steel between Germany and France and then an economic union. I will return to the constitution that was adopted because it was
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  that of the European Coal and Steel Community, which had the high authority and decision-making powers necessary to run such an organisation.
  As one who went through the war as a boy and pupil, I give three cheers for the rapprochement and three cheers for a European view. I am very pro-European but very strongly anti-treaty. Extension and intensification of its authoritarian structure will further disintegrate not only Parliament but societies and the Union that has so far been established.
  It has been a failure of hon. Members on both Front Benches that they try to pretend that that is not so. Perhaps they do not read the treaties. They should come and listen to the Select Committee on European Legislation and try to understand the stuff that is thrown at us and the powers that already exist.
  The Foreign Secretary said that it was a good thing when we can all agree—we will do things better if we can. However article J.I of the treaty states:
  "The Union…shall define and implement a common foreign and security policy".
  It does not say that we should agree where we can and act together where possible. No, there must be an authority. It may be done in future, some say, by qualified majority voting.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) tried to take it as logical that because there is enlargement, there must be a change in the institutions. I do not follow that logic at all, if the European Union is that free association of free member states in an international sphere to which we all looked.
  Many hon. Members, including the hon. Member for Leominster (Mr. Temple-Morris), talked about internationalism. It is because there should be internationalism that the treaties are no good. Why change the institutions just because of enlargement? There is no logic in that principle.
  People have often said that it is a bankers' Europe and it is. For those who regard a single currency as the culmination of European Union, it must be. Some people do not appear to be concerned about keeping the bankers' criteria under public control. What is good for bankers is not necessarily good for us or for industry and the leaders of industry. It is not necessarily good for people at all and nor is competition good for people all the time. Economically, competition is imprinted into that treaty.
  I shall close quickly with two points. The first concerns federalism. There is no separation of powers in this Union and talk about subsidiarity is a mirage. It operates in the treaty only where the exclusive powers of the Union do not run and those powers run pretty well everywhere. Where it does operate, I would claim that, as article 3(b) of the treaty says, we should judge subsidiarity on the basis of a complex of multiple balances, probabilities, predictions, hypotheses and value judgments incapable of resolution by judicial procedure. I think therefore that we misunderstand the nature of the EC.
  I close on this point. I mentioned iron and steel earlier. If we consider the history of the Community, we see that at the meeting after Messina, a group in Rome was asked to produce a constitution. That group adopted almost without question the constitutional structures of the European Coal and Steel Community for the coming common market. That has been expanded treaty by treaty.

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  It may have been good—and I would have probably agreed, as I said at the start of the my speech—to create a common market for iron and steel. The treaty is not for the people and, in the end, the treaty will break itself if it is enlarged. Even if it stays as it is, it is unworkable.
  7.47 pm
  Mr. Ray Whitney: Those of us who participate regularly in these Euro-debates seem to have adopted set-piece roles for ourselves. Certainly, the hon. Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing) adopted the role of the voice of old Labour and he reminded us that the differences on the vital issue of Europe go across the party Benches. By doing that, if in no other matter, he does the House a service.
  We in Britain take a pride in a propensity to ask questions and challenge everything. We think it right and honourable to adopt an attitude of healthy scepticism. However, there are occasions when scepticism can be carried too far and is no longer healthy, but negative, destructive and corrosive. I believe that, sadly, those who adopt what they choose to call a Euro-sceptic attitude—many of my hon. Friends and, as I have observed, many Labour Members and all too many in the media—have got to the point where their scepticism, far from being healthy, is destructive and damaging to Britain's national interest. It is useful to analyse the divisions within their ranks, such as they are. They are greatly exaggerated by my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Sir T. Taylor).
  The thinned ranks of Euro-sceptics contain several categories of animal, if I may use that word. First, many are not sceptical at all. Their mind is completely made up. They have decided that Britain's future is not in Europe and that they cannot find a modus vivendi with the 14 other nations and the 10, 11 or 12 others that may join later. They want us out. Most of them do not have the courage to say so, although one or two are approaching it.
  Secondly, those who lack the courage to say what they think tend to set out a number of conditions which, they are quite aware, are completely outdated, unacceptable not only to our European partners but to most people in this country, and incompatible with any policy pursued by the Conservative party for a generation.
  The third category claim that they thought that the Community was a free trade area and that, when we voted in 1975 or whenever it was, we thought that that was what we were entering. That is clearly an untenable position. My hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough (Mr. Sykes) referred to the leaflets that he was distributing at the time of the 1975 referendum. They made it clear that it was not a free trade area but something with a political dimension.
  Indeed, this country tried a free trade area, discovered that it did not suit our national interests and applied to join the Common Market. That discovery has subsequently been made by the other European Free Trade Association countries—our erstwhile partners—and they, too, concluded that membership of the European Union served their interests.
  Lest there should be any doubt about whether the Common Market was simply a free trade area or whether anyone could sensibly have had any illusions, I refer the
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  House to a memorandum that Baroness Thatcher, as Prime Minister, addressed to her fellow Heads of Government in August 1984. She called on them for
  "a series of new policies to promote the economic, social and political growth"
  of the then European Community. She went on to say that it must be our objective
  "to aim beyond the Common Commercial Policy through Political Co-operation towards common approaches to external affairs."
  We seem to have forgotten what she said. She also said that the Commission was central to the functioning of the Community and Europe needed to advance its internal development. One of the objectives that she enunciated was to
  "heighten the consciousness among our citizens of what unites us."
  I wish that people would remind themselves that that is crucial in our attitude to Europe.
  The Euro-sceptics genuinely believe that it is they who stand up for Britain and that they are the true patriots but, in reality, it is they who are selling Britain short. They lack confidence in Britain being able to carve out for itself in the European Union a role that is and will continue to be of huge advantage to the people of this country. Underlying that attitude is a complete lack of national self-confidence.
  The Euro-sceptics believe that the British economy can never stand up to or live with the German economy and that the pound can never look the deutschmark in the face. That is why they run away from the idea that they should give up the right to devalue or increase interest rates. Fundamentally and instinctively, they seem to believe that we cannot live with the German economy. I reject that notion.
  Some also seem to believe that the wily continentals will always run rings round British politicians and bureaucrats negotiating at Brussels. The reality is otherwise. For example, the Maastricht negotiations were a triumph for the Prime Minister and recognised as such by all our European partners. However, they were certainly not recognised as such in this country or by the Euro-sceptics.
  The Euro-sceptics should have much more confidence, the sort of confidence that the French have. I do not know any Frenchman who believes that an active and positive membership of the European Union will somehow rob him of his national identity. I am enough of a patriot to believe that the British national identity does not need to be and will not be jeopardised or threatened by a sensible relationship with our European partners.
  At the 1GC and afterwards, we must continue to develop that positive relationship, and we have many allies. As was proved recently, we need the self-confidence to go into the negotiations with the fundamental belief that, as the Prime Minister said, Britain should be at the heart of Europe. It is not fair to expect him, my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary or any other Minister to go in to bat in what are inevitably very difficult negotiations when, behind their backs, doubt is constantly being expressed about whether we shall be in Europe the next day or the next month.
  The difficulty was highlighted in yesterday's report by the Confederation of British Industry, which said that the United Kingdom is committed to Europe, but that

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  "to be fully effective it needs to work from within and participate in full in the EU's political and economic decision-making, creating a positive agenda and support for it amongst all member states. This will be possible only if the UK re-establishes its credibility as a constructive force committed to the European Union."
  We can do that.
  A good example of the possibilities open to us was provided when my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister met President Chirac the other day. President Chirac said:
  "Europe being what it is, the quality of the Franco-German relationship is essential … We shall not build Europe without England. It is therefore essential to understand England's specific problems and France may play a role in finding the synergy indispensable for European construction between the countries of Europe, and notably between Germany, England and France".
  With the new France and the new entrants from Scandinavia, Britain has a great opportunity to play a constructive role. We must not allow that opportunity to be missed because of negativism or the destructive attitudes of Euro-scepticism.
  7.57 pm
  Mr. Harry Barnes: In debates on the European Union, two positions are inevitably adopted, which never engage with one another: the position of the Euro-sceptics and that of the Euro-fanatics. They were to some extent reflected in the clash between the hon. Members for Southend, East (Sir T. Taylor) and for Derbyshire, South (Mrs. Currie). I think that we should seek a new and superior position.
  The Euro-sceptics' position has weaknesses and strengths. It clearly depends on who is putting the case and from what point of view they are arguing, hut, if it is insular, based on chauvinism and causes us not to mix but to worry excessively about, for example, immigration, it is a cause for concern, as are the values that flow from it. However, when the Euro-sceptics point out the massive shortcomings in the European Union, they do us a great service, for example, when they highlight its economic shortcomings and its inability to tackle unemployment or to develop policies for economic regeneration. When they point to the anti-social nature of the operation of the common agricultural policy and when they point out, as has been said in the debate, that VAT is a regressive form of taxation, which is foisted on us by being a member state, it is of value.
  Fraud in the European Union has been stressed considerably. The work of the Court of Auditors, in illustrating the nature of that fraud, is very important. The Court of Auditors is one of the underfunded institutions in the European Union. It should be doing a fuller job and we should be basing many activities on the work that it produces.
  It is important when the shortcomings of this country in failing to engage in social provisions and our opt-out are pointed out, although the importance of social chapters is sometimes exaggerated. Social chapters provide channels through which we can later introduce regulations and directives. They do not produce an alternative social agenda that comes to the fore automatically. Much work needs to be done to produce that.
  Above all, these debates are valuable when democratic shortcomings are highlighted. It has been pointed out that the Commission is a bureaucratic organisation and that the Council of Ministers is a secretive body, even though
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  it is really the parliament of the European Union, making decisions on directives, regulations and legislation, which impact all across Europe.
  The Council of Ministers does not operate according to the norms and values of an official decision-making body such as a parliament, with the openness that goes with it. The final vote taken at meetings of the Council of Ministers and the position of our country have begun to be reported only recently. But there was a very long battle before that minor advance was achieved. We are still not given details on amendments and how debates in the Council of Ministers are developed.
  The Euro-sceptic view is strong when it points out those many shortcomings: the great lack of openness, the problem—often expressed—over qualified majority voting and doubt over who has the say in decisions. We have a weak Parliament, and some have tried to turn the nonsense of a notion of subsidiarity—a philosophical and social doctrine—into a constitutional and legal provision, yet there are no grounds for doing so.
  The question, therefore, that the Euro-sceptics ask us is, with all those weaknesses, what should we do? Should we, as some Euro-sceptics have said, come out in such circumstances if that is necessary just to stop further development, or should we go in to seek democratic change, to overcome those great difficulties?
  The position of the Euro-fanatics has its weaknesses and strengths as well. When they encourage us down a bureaucratic, centralised road, with creeping competences that cannot be clawed back because power is passed to the Commission and to the Council of Ministers, they are seriously wrong. They look for central banks that will not be democratically controlled and they stress subsidiarity as some way of clawing back authority when, as has been suggested, subsidiarity is meaningless. If subsidiarity was to be given meaning at future intergovernmental conferences and if it enabled distinctions to be drawn between European Union and national matters, it would become a form of federalism. Subsidiarity is a type of federalism that is frightened to speak its name. We should be prepared to speak in the name of federalism on occasion.
  The strength of the Euro-fanatic lies in talk about integration, mutual self-dependence and a political framework in which peoples can be drawn together to make decisions and be allowed to extend and mix. In such divided circumstances, we should look for the best in the Euro-sceptic argument and the best in the Euro-fanatic argument and build a different position—not a compromise. I am frightened that my party is assuming some sort of compromise between the two views.
  What would the synthesis be? The strength of the Euro-sceptic argument would overcome the economic, social and democratic shortcomings, but from a Euro-fanatic viewpoint, it could be done in the framework of an economic European Union. I grant that, in doing that, the points that have been made about the treaty—read what is in the treaty—add to the Euro-sceptic argument and must be taken on board. If we talk in that way, we are talking about a new treaty and a new constitution for the European Union. People should be prepared to grasp the high ground and argue for it.
  I am reminded of Britain in the 19th century, when it lacked many democratic controls. Chartism argued for extension of the franchise for social and economic

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  reasons, so that betterment would come for working people. In the late 20th century, the argument for developing Europe should be based on arguing for democratic extensions—not by requiring the vote, because it is usually available, but so that the vote does something and it elects parliaments with power in different areas. Parliaments should have all the power in formal decision making. Matters for the European Union should be decided by the European Parliament. National matters—many more matters could be determined nationally—should be decided by national parliaments.
  We could be establishing democratic principles as part of a programme towards full social democratic federalism in the House in the meantime. For instance, the Select Committee on European Legislation, of which I am a member, is attempting to scrutinise what takes place in Europe, but there are problems about the avenues of authority that it has. In deciding and debating European matters, nobody is able to concentrate on Europe and conduct investigations such as those carried out by other Select Committees, because the responsibility is spread between agriculture, transport, foreign affairs and so on. The House should give the European Legislation Select Committee authority to carry out such functions.
  European Standing Committees A and B check material out. The House should learn some of the lessons of those Committees and take some of their work on board, and enable the questioning sessions in those Committee sittings to take place on the Floor of the House before debates such as this.
  8.7 pm
  Mr. John Wilkinson: I hope that the House will forgive me and will understand if I do not follow the remarks of the hon. Member for Derbyshire, North-East (Mr. Barnes). I turn my attention to the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross (Ms Cunningham), who is now absent, whose speech added distinction to the debate. The hon. Lady made a maiden speech of rare quality. In particular, I admired her generosity of spirit in paying tribute to the late Sir Nicky Fairbairn. How much we have missed one of his interventions on this occasion in the bland remarks of my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary.
  There were moments of real insight in the comments of the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross. She accused the Conservative party of harking back. In matters of European affairs, I fear that may be true of the mainstream of the Conservative party and of our Government. It was well exemplified in the extraordinary speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South (Mrs. Currie), whose mind-set—the term repeatedly used by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State—was fixed in the era of Churchill, Schuman, Monnet, de Gasperi and Adenauer—the founding fathers of what is now the European Union. The world has moved on since then, and when my hon. Friend went on to criticise patriotism I could only imagine that she must he very remote from the electorate, who are bemused and wonder how a party, our own party, can seem to care more about European matters than about the everyday preoccupations of earning a living, securing and keeping a job, maintaining a house, making mortgage payments and sending a child to
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  school—activities totally remote from the abstract themes of high European policy to which we devote so much attention.
  There was another moment of insight in the speech of the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross when she emphasised the paradox of a Conservative party whose rhetoric professes unionist credentials but the effect of whose policies in favour of closer European integration inexorably militates against the unity of our own kingdom.
  I was somewhat amused to see the large number of official papers held to be relevant to the debate. Such a plethora of paper is a feature of all matters relating to the European Union. I feel that our people are being bored into submission. There is a feeling that they are powerless against the process of ever closer European union. The sense of powerlessness and frustration is building up and will eventually become a dangerous feature of our democratic politics unless we adapt our policies to accommodate our people's apprehensions.
  It is not as though the issues were complicated; they are perfectly plain. One does not need to be an economic wizard, or even to have the intellectual gifts of the right hon. Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies), who spoke so well on the subject, to realise that if we were to give up our own pound sterling and through membership of an economic and monetary union participate in a single currency, our country would no longer be an independent sovereign state. We would not set our own interest rates. We would not have our own reserves. Inevitably, we would be forced into much closer integration of indirect taxation, and we would have lost the features that make us a nation and make us distinctive.
  If that is what people wish, if that is the majority will, I will go along with it, but until that will is democratically expressed I shall fight the prospect with all the strength of my being. I do not believe that we have the right to take away our people's birthright: it is for them to decide—that is why my hon. Friends and I have campaigned so vigorously for a referendum. My hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South was rather scathing about the electorate and their opinions, but our duty is to serve the electorate. It is as simple as that. It is because we appear not to serve them well that we lose by-elections and are so poorly placed in the polls.
  If there were a fundamental choice between liberty and the hypothetical greater prosperity that it is claimed that membership of EMU and participation in a single currency would bring, the risk to our democratic liberties would be such that, even if that prosperity were certain, it would not necessarily be worth gaining. If there were a choice between liberty and prosperity I would always choose freedom—every time—and so would our people, as they have done ever since the Norman conquest.
  There probably will be an inner core of countries which will create a single currency around the deutschmark. They could call it a shilling or whatever they liked, but to me it would be all the more reason for our country to stand aside. Whenever there has been a predominant power on the continent we have sought to create a balance. We have looked to the wider world and tried to create coalitions of power and influence to offset that dominant power. There have been times when it must have been tempting to join the predominant power, and

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  when we could have done so—1940 might have been one of those times—but at great cost we have always thought that our liberty was more important.
  I do not think that the issues are complicated—far from it. Our Government should declare now where they stand in principle on the question of a single currency. In my judgment this is not an issue on which there can be equivocation: it is a matter of principle. Our people long for our party to display principle, to demonstrate decision and not to imply that procrastination is a political virtue. I do not believe that by putting off awkward decisions our party will gain electoral credibility and be better placed to win a general election. But if our party said that we would always put Britain first, that we would seek to regain powers and competencies that we ought never to have lost, that we would make British law supreme again rather than being inferior to European law, and that we would regain control over fishing and agriculture, we should again become a party that was authentically Conservative and, I believe, worthy of re-election. Above all, it would become worthy of the aspirations and traditional aims and objectives of the British people.
  8.16 pm
  Mr. Denis MacShane: It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Ruislip-Northwood (Mr. Wilkinson), and I join in his praise for the maiden speech of the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross (Ms Cunningham). In a calm, rational and courteous way, the hon. Gentleman put the Europhobe position without the ranting that we heard earlier. None the less, his argument is pernicious and dangerous and it would be a disaster if this country were to follow him.
  I am pro-European because I want to reclaim sovereignty for our people. In political philosophy, it is the people who are sovereign—not the House of Commons. We have heard much today about the importance of the House of Commons, about the centrality of its representative nature and about its debates. Yet look at us: out of 650 Members of Parliament, fewer than 20 are here to debate the issue. I want to see sovereignty reclaimed for the British people, and I believe that that is best done by working in co-operation with our partners both in Europe and in a wider world.
  I strongly oppose the new and rising tide of isolationism which the Europhobes so perfectly represent. I was horrified at the humiliation suffered by the Prime Minister yesterday. I suppose that I might have taken some political pleasure in that humiliation, but never in the 20th century has a multinational company shown such contempt and disregard for a British Prime Minister. I support the idea of dismantling the Brent Spar on land rather than sinking it, but it is a strange state of affairs when a handful of Trotskyist ecologists in Germany can so frighten Shell that it dictates a change to what a British Prime Minister has decided to do. The Prime Minister defended Shell's original decision here on Monday, and defended it even more strongly at 3.15 yesterday afternoon; yet by 4.30 he was the most humiliated Prime Minister this country has had this century. As a British citizen, I find that deplorable.
  Mr. Austin Mitchell: The Prime Minister was wrong.
  Mr. MacShane: It is not a question of the Prime Minister being wrong, although his decision was wrong. The plain fact is that our Government are so isolated and so wrong in much of their approach to Europe that they have no understanding of the new forces and powers that are sweeping Europe.
  We must look, for example, at France where 20 per cent. of the vote in the recent presidential elections went to the extreme right led by Jean-Marie Le Pen's National Front, and to Philippe de Villiers' party. What unites the extreme right is an absolute hatred of and hostility to Europe. And whom do we see as Philippe de Villiers' companion in the recent European parliamentary elections but Sir James Goldsmith, who is bankrolling the Europhobe isolationist right in our country?
  A rising tide of anti-European isolationist filth is poisoning European politics and someone must provide the leadership to lift the debate out of the swamp into which it has sunk. The hon. Member for Harlow (Mr. Hayes) talked yesterday about the dogs barking while the caravan moves on; I only wish that it was indeed moving on, but it is stuck still in the sand. To paraphrase Chesterton, the European ideal has not been tried and found wanting—it has been found difficult and left untried.
  In Conservative Members' comments about Switzerland I detected an invitation to make a little specialist contribution, but I resisted it. I have to say that I have no sense at all of Germany, France, Italy or Sweden becoming any less German, French, Italian or Swedish as a result of their membership and active participation in the European Union.
  I would like the debate to be widened and taken into the country. I have said in this House that I am not opposed to a referendum on the basic question of our membership of the European Union. I draw hon. Members' attention to the very interesting survey contained in a report in the Sunday Times last Sunday which showed that if we give people the chance to discuss the issues free from the poisonous filth that we see now in the Murdoch press and in the Daily Mail, for example, they will take a rational—not united, but rational—decision in favour of Europe.
  To the pro-Europeans on the Conservative Benches, I would say that the Government—through the opt-outs obtained at Maastricht—have excluded the working people of this country from any sense of a stake in Europe. The Prime Minister took a fateful turn when he put the interests of his party before the interests of the nation. And not much good it did him, as we have seen from speeches from Conservative Members this evening.
  If we do not put economic and social issues at the forefront of the debate and policy of Europe, we may well be lost, and we shall not claim any more sovereignty back for this country. I am glad to see that business in the shape of the recent CBI report at least is taking the lead. The Prime Minister believes that he obtained an opt-out from the social charter, but every day the Financial Times reports that more British companies are agreeing to European works councils.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) made it clear in his speech that the Labour party's position on European monetary union is that it must be based on the economic convergence criteria. The failure of the Kingsdown report and other important contributions to the debate is that they do not mention the central problem of

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  unemployment. The hon. Member for Stafford (Mr. Cash) thought that I was alluding to past history in my earlier remarks on this subject, but it is in the history of the Conservative Government since 1979 that our unemployment shot way above European averages before we joined the ERM, and certainly before there was any question of the single European currency.
  The question of the single European currency has now been put back to 1999, and I fear that it may be soon entering the Greek calends because the massive social ill of unemployment is now dominating all policy-making minds in France, Germany and other countries—except, alas, in this country. I was attracted by those who talked about the possibility of free voting on this issue. I put it to my right hon. and hon. Friends on the Opposition Front Bench that when we take power we should look at how we consult Members of Parliament and also the country at large on Europe.
  If we wish to reclaim our sovereignty, we must share power. If we want to be effective again and to rise up in the ranks of world powers instead of declining on every available index, we must do so in partnership and co-operation and through shared sovereignty with our friends and democratic allies in the rest of Europe.
  8.26 pm
  Mr. David Lidington: I share the views of the hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr. Macshane) in one respect only—the priority he rightly attached to the importance throughout western Europe of tackling the stubbornly high levels of unemployment. For that reason, I rather regret the fact that so much ministerial and official time and energy is having to be spent in preparing for the IGC in 1996—which I believe is premature—rather than in concentrating on the priorities of tackling unemployment on the one hand and dealing with the urgent necessity of enlarging the European Union into eastern and central Europe in a way that accommodates greater diversity on the other.
  When we look at the patterns of employment in western Europe, we see more than the straightforward results of an economic cycle and a deep world recession. We are seeing much more fundamental shifts in the global economy. I believe that there is a risk that western Europe today is behaving like 18th century Venice—still trading, but trading off a reputation and wealth built up by former generations while ignoring at our own peril developments in economic organisations in other parts of the world. In the case of the serene city, those developments quickly overwhelmed both its wealth and reputation.
  Listening to Opposition Members, I find myself not surprised, but startled by their insistence on the importance of the issue of unemployment in Europe which is contrasted with their stubborn advocacy of measures which seem purpose-built to add to, rather than reduce, those levels of unemployment. Labour spokesmen advocate the sort of labour market regulations through the European social chapter which damaged the British economy in the 1960s and 1970s. Those regulations are damaging western European economies today. I sometimes wish that the Opposition Members who rightly remind us of the misery and degradation that unemployment causes the men and women who
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  experience it would also look at the experience of countries such as France and Germany. Their Governments not only advocated but implemented enthusiastically the social and economic policies that Opposition Members now wish to see imposed upon the British people, whether at a national or European level.
  Mr. MacShane: Will the hon. Member give way on that point?
  Mr. Lidington: I will not give way, because time is short and other colleagues wish to speak.
  Opposition Members say that they want the unemployment rate to be reduced, but that is belied by their uncritical acceptance of a European single currency. Whatever the advantages that may be argued by the most ardent advocates of a single currency, it is surely inevitable that acceding to membership of a European currency system would involve giving up national control of both fiscal and monetary policies. That would make it virtually impossible for a British or other national Government in that system to balance economic policy at a time when national economic circumstances diverged from those of other European national economies.
  I would like to see the Governments of the member states, the European Commission and the European Parliament devote the energies that are being expended on the IGC towards the completion of the single market. It is clear from the steel and aviation industries that there are still many gaps in that market. I should like to see them devote time and energy to continuing to resist the dangerous trend towards global protectionism, because in that way Governments and the Commission would offer the best possible service to the peoples whom they exist to represent.
  I have already argued that the second priority for the European Union is to provide for enlargement to the east in such a way as to accommodate the greater diversity which such enlargement would bring. I listened carefully to the attack of the hon. Member for Rotherham (Mr. MacShane) on examples of isolationist political trends in various western European countries. I certainly agreed with some of his analysis and criticisms of those trends, but I fear that the great federal leap forward which he and some of his colleagues have advocated would almost certainly have the reverse effect from that intended. It would tend to heighten the trend towards isolation and extreme nationalism. If Europe is to develop further, it must do so in a way that goes with the grain of national loyalty and national affection. It should not try to pretend that those loyalties and feelings are no longer of any account.
  The hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) offered a false antithesis when he implied that the choice for the United Kingdom was either to roll over in the face of whatever was argued by our partners, or else to get out. The purpose of British membership of the European Union is to sustain and advance the national interests of the United Kingdom. That is what our Government have done at meetings of the Council and what they are trying to do in the reflections group, and at the forthcoming IGC.
  We need enlargement to the east. It is vital to strengthen the free markets and democratic institutions of those east European countries in order to ease local political and economic strains, which, otherwise, would have a serious impact on us in western Europe. That enlargement will work only if it is accompanied by a

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  reform of the common agricultural policy, the European Community budget and the decision-taking structure of the community.
  Although there is some coherence and logic in the arguments of those who say that the decision-taking arrangements should be set in a more federal direction, that would definitely be harmful. The French and Danish referendum results and German concerns over the deutschmark reveal a widening gap between the vision of the self-styled political elite of the Community and the wishes of the peoples they represent. If we want greater understanding and co-operation, Europe must evolve in a way that respects national political realities.
  My hon. Friend, and neighbour, the Member for Wycombe (Mr. Whitney) talked about the political dimension of the European Union. I agree with him about that dimension, but it should be primarily intergovernmental and not supranational in character. It would lose none of its worth if it developed along those lines.
  When we consider the gap between the so-called political elite and European public opinion, we find that Labour Members of the European Parliament, without exception, are voting at Strasbourg to abolish the intergovernmental arrangements governing home affairs and foreign policy. They have instead placed those areas of policy within a supranational legal and institutional framework. I can think of no better recipe for future tension and division.
  Whether we call the Europe that we want a Europe of variable geometry, a Europe á la carte, or a multi-speed Europe, the term is less relevant than the reality of a Europe that develops in line with the diverse wishes of the diverse nations that make it up. I believe that my hon. Friend the Minister, through the reflections group, is seeking to shift the European Union towards that end, and in doing so, he will have my support.
  8.35 pm
  Mr. Austin Mitchell: I join those other hon. Members who have complimented the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross (Ms Cunningham) on the quality of her maiden speech, which was outstanding.
  I should now like to turn my attention immediately to the issue of the single currency, because so much of the rest of the argument about Europe invokes history, theology, high idealism or total nonsense—all evident in the debate. We have gone over all those other arguments many times, but the single currency is now the single dominant central issue. It has been the central subject of most of the documents that have been published in the past year, as Europe has been squeezed to meet convergence criteria, which have prolonged deflation in most of the European economies. It is the central issue in all those documents that have flooded in, containing recommendations for the IGC next year. I thought that the IGC would be a kind of 3,000 mile service, but it has turned out to be a total reconstruction of the car. People are sending in huge manuals on how to do just that. The single currency is central to that.
  The single currency is also central to the Maastricht treaty, because it attempts to use the exchange rate—the single currency—as a means of political union. That is the other way round from the way in which everyone else has developed; people have achieved political union first and a single currency has followed. In Europe, we propose
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  to build unity through a single currency. The idea is to establish that single currency, then the institutions. That is supposed to build unity, but it will be a disastrous way of doing so.
  The single currency is also the central issue in the outpouring of documents on monetary union. In the past few weeks, we have had the Commission's report and the Kingsdown report on that subject. I am frankly horrified that someone who was Governor of the Bank of England could write a report that reveals so little knowledge of the role of the exchange rate. What do they know of economics who only banking know? People who come to review that report in the future will say that Lord Kingsdown's contribution to monetary union is much the same as his former deputy, Mr. Pennant-Rea's, to banking. Such is the quality of his report. The CBI has also published a report on monetary union.
  The common thread throughout all those reports is the argument that the wonderful people who gave us the ERM and recommended it to us, are now recommending monetary union. The authors of those reports seem to have forgotten the disastrous consequences of the ERM. They seem to believe that if a proposal comes from Europe it must automatically be a good thing. All those reports are characterised by a well-developed lemming mentality—if everyone else rushes over the cliff, we must join them. It is essential that we all go over that cliff together. That is the economics and politics of lemmings.
  There has been no consideration. No one has done any research on, or developed any economic analysis of the effects of a single currency. That is a huge gap in our knowledge because, as far as I can see, the economic consequences will be disastrous.
  First, one obviously cannot put two economies at different levels of productivity, investment, economic growth, training, skills and strength, together in a single currency without ripping the weaker economy apart. That is the inevitable consequence. The introduction of a single currency, in a Europe as diverse as this, will produce disaster for the weaker economies, one of which is ours.
  Secondly, one cannot have monetary union without a massive machinery of redistribution because, if a country cannot take changes on the exchange rate, it must have direct subsidy to condition the consequences in unemployment and industrial distress. No one is proposing a machinery for redistribution to cushion those consequences.
  The McDougall report, in the 1970s, recommended that between 7.5 per cent. and 10 per cent. of Europe's gross national product would have to be used in redistribution if we were going to have a single currency. That was before Spain, Portugal and Greece joined the European Union. It would now have to be much bigger. There would have to be redistribution of a proportion similar to the amount that West Germany redistributed to East Germany to cushion the consequences of their monetary union. One can do that within a nation state, as they did in Germany. In Europe, who will pay for it? The Germans certainly will not. Where will the money come from? So what redistribution is there?
  Thirdly, obviously we must reconstruct the exchange rate mechanism bridge—put our head back into the furnace—to get to monetary union in the first place. There is no other way there. The Commission's document speaks of an approach known as "the immediate big

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  bang". Well, merger of currencies immediately would certainly be a big bang, and a horrible, crashing, grinding of gears.
  The only way to do it is to reconstitute the ERM. That means that every country, especially us—it is more crucial for us because we do more trade outside Europe—would have to have its economic policy dominated by the need to keep the exchange rate at an externally determined level. In other words, interest rates and everything else would have to be sacrificed to that, whatever the damage to the economy.
  These are the arguments against a single currency. A single market does not need it—it is not necessary in the North American Free Trade Area, for instance—but, if there is a single currency unit, it follows automatically that those who are outside it would have to be forced into some type of ERM straitjacket to prevent what the others will then call "competitive devaluations". So it will apply to everyone, in or out, and one cannot devise a structure as powerful as that.
  All that springs from the folly of trying to use the exchange rate for political purposes. It cannot be said often enough that the exchange rate is simply a market-clearing mechanism. In an ever-changing world, the exchange rate needs to change too. One cannot fix it in that fashion without damage to the economy.
  It is nonsense to say, as the Commission does, that we cannot control our own destinies. Of course we can. We can control our own destinies by managing the exchange rate through interest rates, by taking shocks on the exchange rate rather than in terms of unemployment and industrial closure.
  The exchange rate is what connects us to the rate of inflation or deflation of other economies. It is therefore a crucial instrument of management. We cannot give it up, and especially the Labour party cannot give it up, if we are going to reduce the level of unemployment and regenerate the economy.
  The exchange rate sets the terms of our competitiveness with other countries. British industry needs a sustained competitive exchange rate, so demand can be channelled to production in this country instead of to exports. It gives industry the prospect of long-term growth in which it will invest, to grow. British industry needs to be profitable. For that, it needs a competitive exchange rate. We shall not achieve expansion without that. We cannot rebuild the British economy without that.
  In conclusion, it is obvious that monetary union "ain't gonna happen"—certainly not Europe-wide. If a single currency does happen, it can only happen in Germany plus a few acolytes such as Austria, and perhaps the Netherlands; a small group of currencies.
  The question is, will France go in? Obviously, President Chirac cannot have it both ways; he cannot have the franc fort and reduce unemployment. The question that the French must confront is, can Chirac continue to maintain the crucifying effect on the economy of the franc fort or will the French electorate rebel, turn to the right and produce the growth of fascism that we have witnessed in the past few years?
  I doubt that France can make it. If France does not make it, the adventure never gets off the ground. If it does get off the ground, our position is obviously to stay
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  outside and profit from their disadvantage. We shall benefit from the self-produced, do-it-yourself disaster that those countries will inflict on themselves if the single currency does go ahead, because the consequences will he disastrous. That is the sensible strategy for this country to maintain.
  8.44 pm
  Mr. Nigel Forman: I am glad to have the opportunity to take part in an interesting debate, which has demonstrated, among other things, the way in which both main political parties are now acting on the European issue as though it were more of a straitjacket than a creator of opportunities. That merely emphasises something that I have known for a long time, as someone who has been involved in the European issue at least since the late 1960s—that the two main political parties no longer adequately mobilise or reflect the main currents of argument on these issues, and in the later 1990s that may well have its effect on the cleavages in British politics.
  The main argument that I wish to make tonight, which is more short-term, is to emphasise the growing extent of common ground between this country and our key partners in the European Union. To give a few examples, we agree with the French about the need for an effective common defence and security policy, which is based on an international, not a supranational, method of operation.
  We also join the French in emphasising the paramount importance of the Council of Ministers and a relatively restricted role for the European Parliament, so there is a good deal of common ground with the French in those facts alone.
  We agree with the Germans about the importance of the subsidiarity principle and between us and them we were largely responsible for getting article 3(b) into the Maastricht treaty. One has only to read annex II of the report of the Council of Ministers on the functioning of the treaty on European Union, Cm. 2866, which was mentioned earlier, to be aware of the way in which competences are already rightly being repatriated to the national authorities and away from the supranational level where it is not appropriate, according to the subsidiarity principle that they should he exercised.
  Equally, we agree with the Germans about the importance of observing all the convergence criteria attached to progress towards economic and monetary union, and about the attractions of enlarging the European Union to include the new democracies of central and eastern Europe, whose cultural and historical antecedents qualify them every bit as much as London, Paris or Berlin to belong firmly in the European family.
  Indeed, we have a common interest, with all the other large member states of the European Union, in ensuring that the process of institutional reform, which is hound to accompany the forthcoming intergovernmental conference, gives relatively greater weight to the wishes of the larger member states, with the larger economies and the larger populations, compared with the smaller member states, which have so often formed effective, and to some extent unrepresentative, alliances with the Commission and the European Parliament against the interests of countries such as Britain, France and Germany.

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  The same principle applies with regard to the European Court of Justice, which I happen to believe, as a firm European, has got slightly out of hand and now finds itself in a position in which, relatively speaking, it is unchecked, whether by political or popular factors. Unless this issue is tackled as well, we shall find ourselves being taken towards further and deeper integration of a type that our peoples perhaps would not support and without the political consent that is a necessary prerequisite for all these developments.
  I believe that the intergovernmental conference, due to start in spring 1996, should be an occasion for consolidation in the European Union—something closer to the 3,000 mile service than the general overhaul to which the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Mitchell) referred.
  I believe that, in the run-up to that conference, all the member states should concentrate on how best to implement the new hybrid institutional structure, which is what the European Union now is, and what has emerged from the Maastricht treaty. This means that we should urge our partners to redouble their efforts to reform the common agricultural policy so that it can be afforded within an enlarged European Union. We must make no mistake about it: it could not be afforded on the present basis were the European Union to be enlarged to 18 or 20 members.
  It is also important to tackle the issues of Euro-fraud and non-compliance with European legislation because they undermine consent and trust in the arrangements, and, if allowed to continue, breed cynicism. We must also take forward the intergovernmental policies, which form the new pillars of common security policy and common approaches to law and order, migration and terrorism. On those points I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Mr. Lidington).
  Above all, we should try to improve our own performance and the policy outcomes in the European Union decision-making process. We must defend the use of the national veto when vital national interests are involved in those areas of European Union policy not covered by qualified majority voting. At the same time, we must learn how to achieve more European solutions in the areas which are covered by qualified majority voting and which also coincide with our own national interests.
  One of the Library research papers, which is relevant background to the debate, shows that over the brief period covered in the paper—October 1993 to March 1994—Britain and Germany were each outvoted on eight occasions on issues of qualified majority voting, whereas France was outvoted on only three occasions and Italy on only two. There is a moral in that tale: we need to work even harder and more effectively to ensure that the European Union interests and outcomes coincide with our national interests and objectives. To do that, we must practise a deliberate policy of placing our best people in European institutions—a point that has not been made this evening. We must also try to have a disproportionate influence on the first draft of vital documents. This is exactly the lesson that the Italians and French—involved in the two examples that I have given—have learnt very effectively.
  When we approach such matters, we must understand the Community method. As my hon. Friend the Minister will know, that method involves essentially saying, "Yes,
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  but" rather than "No, unless". We would not have to adopt the latter approach—the "No, unless" approach—so often were we more successful in practising the former approach, which is the essence of the Community method.
  The two propositions are linked. We must understand that the successful operators within the Community—I speak with some experience as I went to the College of Europe years ago and have lived with Europe ever since—are those who know almost instinctively how to operate the politics of coalition-building case by case and issue by issue. That is painstaking and necessary, and it is the best way forward.
  One sphere in which the pay-off for greater success in the Community method would soon become apparent would be that of the preparations for European monetary union, which have been at the heart of much of our debate today. Our sensible influence has been diminished by our image in the eyes of our partners as a potential free rider or a semi-detached participant. As a result, our sound reservations and policy principles are too easily dismissed or ignored by our partners. Examples of that attitude include the wisdom of a lengthy stage 3(a)—irrevocably locked exchange rates. Such a policy is completely daft—anyone who has studied it knows that it would be a recipe for disaster. Another such example is the credibility of the no-bail-out rule in article 104(b), which is critical to the success of the venture.
  Another example involves the supervisory implications of monetary union for the financial services sector across Europe—the extent to which we can leave the central bank in charge of supervision as well as the control of inflation. Another such example is the practical improbability of any European central bank being able simultaneously to achieve lower inflation for the European Union as a whole, external stability for the European currency vis-a-vis the dollar and the yen, and monetary conditions appropriate for the whole of the single monetary area.
  All those points are too easily dismissed or ignored by our partners. They are more likely to be dismissed or ignored if we do not build our European credentials in the way that I have suggested.
  Her Majesty's Government's policy in the run-up to the next intergovernmental conference is broadly on the right lines. We want to sustain our pressure for a more globally competitive European economy. We must continue to strive for sensible institutional reform. We must ensure that we understand the value and effectiveness of following a genuine Community method.
  8.55 pm
  Mr. Andrew Mackinlay: I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Mr. Forman), and I was interested to hear what he said in his thoughtful contribution. Before the hon. Member for Wycombe Wanderers leaves the Chamber, I want to refer to something that he said earlier—I shall come to that in a moment.
  An awful lot of claptrap is talked about the European Union in this place. The suggestion that Labour's policy is for federalism is tommy-rot. Nobody in the mainstream of our political parties would suggest that we could move to a federal state of Europe. That needs to be stated, despite what people might say for electioneering purposes.

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  The importance of the social chapter is also exaggerated on both sides of the argument. Some of my colleagues in the Labour party, in this place and outside, think that it is the greatest thing since sliced bread and will be a wonderful breakthrough for working people. I think that it is important, but its importance can be exaggerated.
  Some people, including the present Prime Minister, say that we shall not sign up to the social chapter, and that he has secured a cast-iron guarantee that we shall never do so. That is rubbish—as we know, such matters are being pursued through the courts and the European courts and, gradually, much of the social chapter is entering our statute book by stealth. In the long term, the so-called opt-out is not worth the paper it is written on. With these two examples, I wanted to show that things are sometimes grossly exaggerated in this place, and must be put into perspective.
  I hinted that the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr. Whitney) should return. I was interested to hear what he had to say about Lady Thatcher—it is amazing how people rewrite history. Madam Thatcher signed the Single European Act, which, in my reckoning, was an important benchmark—a threshold. Once it was signed, much was surrendered.
  I am not too uncomfortable about the Single European Act, but to suggest that it was anything other than a major move in terms of European integration is to deny history. For Lady Thatcher to try to pretend otherwise is disappointing from somebody who held high office. Those who complain about European integration must tell Lady Thatcher that she is to blame. Margaret Thatcher has played a part in European integration.
  I notice that the hon. Member for Wycombe used to be a Minister at the Foreign Office. The problem is that Foreign Office Ministers do not properly acquaint this place or the British people with the ramifications of what is happening. I have recently come to learn that the endemic problem within the Foreign Office is one of appeasement towards British interests. The Foreign Office does not dish out the cards from the top of the pack. That has happened over Europe and over many other policies.
  That is happening now in relation to one part of the European Community that is under the stewardship of the Minister of State, the hon. Member for Boothferry (Mr. Davis). I refer to Gibraltar. It is claptrap to suggest that there is total free mobility within the European Union. Freedom of movement does not exist with regard to Gibraltar, and the Minister is not doing anything about that.
  People from Wycombe, Thurrock, Huntingdon, Livingston and elsewhere are being frustrated from travelling through Spain to Gibraltar, and I want to know what is happening about that situation. Those difficulties are symbolic of the nonsense that is put about regarding free movement within the European Union and the suggestion that somehow we have a robust Foreign Minister. We do not. The Government are not protecting and promoting British interests.
  I turn now to our current position within the European Union, and look ahead to 1996 and the intergovernmental conference. I think that the British people are broadly content with where we are in terms of European
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  integration. They do not share the nightmare view that somehow we are about to lose our 1,000 years of sovereignty, but they do want to see some consolidation.
  I think that the electorates of western Europe also want to see that consolidation. They have had about as much integration as they can digest: to that extent, I agree with the thrust of the speech by the hon. Member for Aylesbury (Mr. Lidington).
  The IGC must reassure British and other electorates—many of which agreed, in referendums, to sign the Maastricht treaty only by some very narrow majorities—that there will be a bedding down and a period of consolidation for a decade or 20 years. I agree with the hon. Member for Aylesbury that the IGC should also allow the states of central Europe—particularly the Visegrad countries—the opportunity of early admission into the European Union.
  I had the privilege of visiting Poland recently, and I was profoundly moved by the importance that the Polish people attach to joining the European Union. As an aside, I think it is wicked that, for nearly half a century, the west told the countries of eastern Europe, "Look over the wall and see how wonderful capitalism and democracy is." If one had believed the propaganda, one would have thought that in the west the sun always shone and the rain never fell. What happened? Communism collapsed, the wall came down, and when the central and eastern European countries asked to join the clubs, we said no.
  The other club to which I shall refer quickly is the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation—although it is not the subject of this debate. Membership of NATO is vital for Poland and the other Visegrad countries. It is an important symbol, along with EU membership, of their emerging and developing democracies, of which they are justifiably very proud. The IGC must find a way of granting political membership of the European Union to the Visegrad countries as soon as possible. If the price we pay for that is that issues such as monetary union will be kicked into touch, then so be it—in fact, that might be a helpful spin-off; although I do not suggest that that should be the primary intention.
  It is vital that those countries are given the opportunity of political membership of the European Union, even if there is a long transitional period. After all, the United Kingdom and Spain had transitional periods. Given the circumstances of the countries of central Europe, I do not see why they cannot be given a transitional period, albeit of some length—perhaps a decade or more—with built-in stages. When each of those stages was achieved, they could then participate in certain defined areas of decision-making. The shibboleth of membership of the European Union is very important to those countries.
  It is also a moral issue. In this place some 54 years ago, Winston Churchill said:
  "The gratitude of every home in our island, in the empire and indeed throughout the world—except in the abodes of the guilty—goes out to the Airmen who, undaunted by the odds, unwearied in their constant challenge of mortal danger, are changing the tide of the war by their prowess and devotion. Never before in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few".
  Some 17 per cent. of the "few" were Polish pilots and many others were Czechs. It may sound old-fashioned, but I think that is rather important. They fought for their freedom, their democracy and their membership of western Europe, and that is yet to be realised.

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  The aggressor state—I mean no disrespect to Germany—is a member of the European Union. The then German Democratic Republic was allowed to enter the European Union because it joined the then Federal Republic of Germany. The fact is that the GDR was allowed to join the Union in special circumstances. Surely the Polish state has at least an equal right to be allowed early admission, as well as some buttressing and funding to assist its integration with western Europe. I think that that is extremely important.
  I make no apologies for appealing to those fairly basic, but I think important, instincts of fairness. I ask the Government to be much more robust in protecting and promoting our interests—particularly in respect of Gibraltar and access to that country, which is being treated abysmally.
  In a few weeks' time, the Island games will be held. It is an international athletic competition that is very important to places such as the Scilly Isles, the Western Isles, the Isle of Man and so on. The Princess Royal is the patron of those games, but it might surprise you, Madam Deputy Speaker, to learn that she will not be attending this year, although she was invited to attend two years ago. That is the fault not of the Princess Royal, but of the craven Foreign Office, which is frightened of causing any consternation in our relations with Spain, and of any knock-on effects in the European Union.
  How pathetic that is. What a weak, shambolic Foreign Ministry we have. It is time we had a change. My hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) will be much more robust in protecting and promoting British interests.
  9.4 pm
  Mr. Barry Legg: We have had an interesting debate and as the evening progressed, the speeches became more interesting. My hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Mr. Lidington) made a valuable contribution to the debate, and his comments about the national interest have been well made. My hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Mr. Forman) also made an interesting speech.
  The debate started rather curiously with speeches from two highly intelligent men—one trying to avoid the obvious and the other trying to bury his head in the sand. In respect of the highly intelligent man trying to avoid the obvious, it is unlikely that we can make progress with our European partners unless we accept the European Union and its institutions for what they are. Unless we do that, phrases such as "net retrieval" will mean nothing. First, we have to recognise that currently the institutions have a momentum which is driving the European Union towards further integration.
  We also have to accept that we are not pooling sovereignty through the Council of Ministers, since the ultimate political authority in the European Union is the European Court. We know from previous debates that the European Court is a highly political body with a vested interest in extending its authority.
  Once we accept those basic propositions about the nature of the Community and its institutions, the British Government can put forward an agenda that is credible and advances British interests.
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  Some of my hon. Friends want to drive ahead with economic and monetary union regardless. I found the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South (Mrs. Currie) quite breathtaking for a Tory. She was totally committed to the concept of the single currency, come what may. She wanted politicians to fix exchange rates irrevocably. That would be a tremendous gamble and I would not expect such reasoning from a Tory, since Tory attitudes are pragmatic and Tories do not believe that politicians have a monopoly on wisdom.
  Many hon. Members do not go as far as the hon. Lady in supporting a single currency come what may. They tend to say, "I like currency stability. I think that it is a good thing.". It is a good thing; it is rather like motherhood and apple pie, but if we make currency stability the focus of our economic policy, if we peg our currency or fix it, that has to be the number one economic priority and all the other economic variables have to adjust around it. Interest rates, unemployment and the level of nominal wages have to adjust around it. Although it is a worthy objective, currency stability cannot be the priority.
  Although currency instability can cause problems for businesses, at least businesses can insure against currency instability. Products are available to provide security. I would be interested if any hon. Member could tell me of one other variable in the real economy for which business men can get a form of insurance. I do not believe that there is one.
  Pursuing currency stability for its own sake is a great mistake: as we learned from our membership of the exchange rate mechanism, it can damage an economy. Neither politicians nor central bankers can guess the right exchange rate for a currency.
  We are also missing a point by failing to realise how diverse the British economy now is. Many medium-sized businesses in my constituency trade with 30 or 40 countries across the world: they are global players. That is what is so good about the British economy; we have businesses going out and selling throughout the world. If we tell these businesses that we want a fixed exchange rate with Germany, or that we want to abolish sterling in favour of a single currency with Germany, trading relationships with Germany may or may not be made easier, but the businesses will have been put at risk vis-à-vis the rest of the world's markets.
  There is no clearer example of this than the dollar-sterling rate. If we could have stayed in the ERM at DM2.95, the sterling-dollar rate would now be $2.12, and the competitiveness of British businesses operating around the world would be badly disadvantaged. That is my message to hon. Members who seek to put currency stability at the forefront of our economic policies.
  My right hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Sussex (Mr. Renton) referred to his membership of the Kingsdown committee which drafted the report of the same name. I suggest that every hon. Member read it, because it offers an interesting insight into economic and monetary union. The most interesting phrase in the whole report comes on page 30:
  "To start with, very few monetary unions have ever been formed anywhere and there is probably no precedent for a monetary union with a single currency being formed by sovereign states which nevertheless retain independent political, economic and fiscal systems."

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  Thus the Kingsdown report spells it out: there are no examples of independent sovereign states joining currency unions and irrevocably fixing their exchange rates. Taking such an action would mean that a state was no longer independent or self-governing. That goes to the heart of the contradictions in the Tory—
  Mr. Whitney: Will my hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Legg: I cannot; time is short. My hon. Friend has had ample opportunity to make his points.
  I come next to the core of one of the contradictions in the Government's policy on Europe. The Government tell us that they want a Europe of nation states but that they want to keep open the option of entering into a single currency and abolishing the pound sterling. Those two propositions are contradictory. If we give up our national currency and other states give up theirs, they will no longer be sovereign states. Until the Government wrestle with that contradiction, recognise that it is one and come up with a clear policy on monetary union, they will have difficulty presenting a coherent European policy to the British people.
  The time cannot be far off when we must make a clear statement on monetary union and the British attitude to it. I do not believe that the Tory party can become the advocate of a policy that would abolish the pound sterling and would enter into a single European currency.
  9.14 pm
  Mr. Iain Duncan Smith: I am fully aware that we have limited time, so I shall keep my comments short.
  I am intrigued because, as ever in these European debates, we seem to spend one half of the time abusing each other with a certain amount of name calling, which always strikes me as not getting to the heart of anything, and the other half claiming territory that we think will persuade others that we are somehow better than we are. I am also intrigued by my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr. Whitney), who used his speech to claim massive patriotism, as though that was territory that nobody else could claim.
  I say to the House generally that I wish that we would get past all this nonsense about patriotism or massive self-interest, and try to deal with the honest problems that exist, and understand the argument. I feel that, if we dealt with the subject honestly, with a desire to get to the truth of the problems—for example, of the single currency and what exactly the corpus of law that exists in Europe is all about—we would begin to understand it far better.
  I am aware that we have recently been discussing the economics of the single currency. It seems to me that those who are desperate to go to the single currency have now accepted, not only through the Kingsdown report, but through a number of other reports, that the best that can be said for it is that it "might" be okay.
  On the basis of an economic "might be", we are now expected to launch into the great experiment as though we could gamble away all our constituents' livelihoods on the basis that, economically, it might be all right. That really gets to the heart of the problem, because the truth is that it is not really about economics. It is a political matter. It is a political decision. Even the Kingsdown report said
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  that. So let us stop the nonsense that, somehow, big business says that it is okay, because the IOD says that it is not. We should accept that the jury is out.
  We must understand the nature of the beast with which we are engaged. Europe. European Union. What is it about? The most important feature of that, surely, is European federal law. I use the word "federal" most definitely, as that is precisely what European law is. Let us not play around and pretend that it is not. It is about a federal concept of law. European federal law, as it currently exists, is precisely that. It is structured in such a way that it will develop of its own will, guided by the European Court of Justice and the other institutions, so that Europe attains an identity that is wholly federal.
  If we can accept that process, at least we know either that we are in favour of it, and the eventual destiny that that takes us to, or that we are not. If we are not, it is no good pretending that things are not changing. If the body of European law has a clear focus and direction, mere words and the odd change in policy here and there will not stop the essential ratchet from moving in that direction, because the nature of the European Court of Justice is always to interpret in that direction. Therefore, the only way in which one should deal with it, if one does not believe that we should eventually have a federal destiny, is to define what it is we want.
  If we want a Europe of nation states, in which I firmly believe—I am very positive and pro-Europe, and that is not something that others can claim for themselves—I say, let us now engage in the argument about what makes a Europe of nation states. We must define what it is about European law that moves against the concept of a nation state; the powers that a nation state should have unto itself; and powers that should be ceded for, perhaps, in this case, the working of a marketplace.
  We must discuss that and arrive at a conclusion. It is important, before we go to the IGC, that we work out a template for the nation state. We then talk to our colleagues in other countries, at the discussions, in the reflections group, and say to them, "There are whole areas here which, frankly, run counter to the concept."
  Let us take the concept briefly, before I conclude, on social policy. The whole principle of the social chapter is, to some degree, nonsense, because the real body of social policy comes through what we already have in the treaty of Rome. It is all there. All the articles will do it for us.
  Therefore, I say to my colleagues and to my hon. Friends on the Front Bench, we should not accept that social policy is a general across-the-board policy for all of Europe. Individual states, depending on what their electorates want—if they choose, for example, the Labour party, it is presented to them in the manifesto—must decide whether that is the policy they want. Whether it increases or decreases the productivity of companies is in the balance.
  The marketplace must be about the competitiveness of goods and services. We cannot add to it the concept that everyone must take away one of the areas of competition—social policy—because of the costs it adds. In other words, that is a power and an area that the nation state must hold to itself.
  We must engage in the debate properly. We must say to the other states in Europe that we cannot continue endlessly pretending one thing or another. Acceptance of the present, an ever-present ratchet under European

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  federal law, would be to say, "Yes, that is the destiny we want." If we were to say no, we would have to ensure that we had an alternative policy. What we have at present is not, I believe, such a policy.
  9.20 pm
  Ms Joyce Quin: This has been a lively debate and many hon. Members have contributed to it. Despite the varied comments and contributions that have been made, I am sure that we can all agree that the European Union affects many aspects of our lives. The breadth of the issues that so affect us has been raised during the debate and illustrates my point. Such issues include the effects of the EU on our economy, on social matters, on agriculture and on fishing. Other issues concern us for the future of our continent, such as enlargement of the EU. All these matters have been mentioned many times during the debate.
  We were pleased to hear the maiden speech of the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross (Ms Cunningham). She entertained us with references to her predecessor and spoke about her political convictions. I shared her feeling of confusion when she tried to analyse the Government's European policies. I shared her views on the social chapter. Many of us in England agree with her comments, which were much in line with official Labour party policy.
  A variety of views have been expressed about and towards the European Union on both sides of the House. We have seen on the Government Benches especially how much internal damage the issue of Europe is doing. It has been described as the San Andreas fault of the Conservative party, and it seemed much that way today. The Foreign Secretary seemed beleaguered during the competition to make hostile interventions on him that was raging on the Government Back Benches. It was made clear during those interventions that both he and the Minister of State will have a bumpy ride in seeking to put the Government's views in the run-up to the intergovernmental conference.
  I had sympathy with the Foreign Secretary during some parts of his speech. He referred to the recent interview of Baroness Thatcher and her description of her Government's policy on Europe as being, "No, no, no", and that of the present Government as being, "Yes, yes". As the right hon. Gentleman said, it was the then Mrs. Thatcher and her Government who were responsible for the large increase in qualified majority voting that took place under the Single European Act. I remember, shortly after becoming a Member, that she was saying, "No, no, no" to the proposition that the European structural funds should be doubled. In the end, the funds were increased by over 90 per cent. The "No, no, no" did not seem to be very effective in practice.
  Conservative divisions have been reinforced by events in recent days and weeks. It seemed sad that, after he returned from Halifax, the Prime Minister had to appeal once again for unity in his own party. Once again, however, he sounded very much like the boy who cried wolf. We have heard it all before and it does not seem to have any effect. Whatever tactic is used—begging, cajoling, threatening—it is ineffective. I know nothing about rugby, but trying to stop Euro-rifts and divisions in the Tory party is like trying to stop the All Black, Jonah Lomu, in a match.
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  There has been a balance in Conservative Members' speeches. Those of the hon. Members for Stafford (Mr. Cash), for Southend, East (Sir T. Taylor) and for Ruislip-Northwood (Mr. Wilkinson) have been balanced by those of the hon. Members for Leominster (Mr. Temple-Morris), for Derbyshire, South (Mrs. Currie) and for Wycombe (Mr. Whitney), among others.
  We have had some analysis of the rifts. The hon. Member for Wycombe spoke of the nature of Euro-scepticism in his party and highlighted its divisions. Among some Conservative Members, there was a hidden agenda, perhaps not so hidden on occasions, of withdrawal from the European Union; among others, that was not on the agenda. Obviously, that is yet a further factor for division in Conservative ranks.
  Understandably, the intergovernmental conference dominated many speeches. Many Conservative Members sought to tie the Government's hands in advance of the negotiations, which will not help British interests. I note that the chairman of the Tory Members of the European Parliament said a couple of days ago that
  "To get a successful negotiation"—
  in the IGC—
  "the government should not be ruling out too many options under pressure from Bill Cash."
  The difficulty for the Government, however, is that it is not that simple. They have to worry not only about the hon. Member for Stafford, but about several members of the Cabinet, who have also sought to tie the Government's hands in advance of the negotiations. Last year, the Secretary of State for Employment stated that he did not want any changes in the veto and in the weighting of qualified majority voting and no new powers to the European Parliament—comments that have not been reinforced by the Foreign Secretary or by the Minister.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) rightly talked about the danger of Britain's isolation because of the Government's attitude. It is hard to see who the Government's allies will be for their views on the intergovernmental conference process. The Minister has already begun to represent Britain in the IGC reflections group, but we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Livingston about the Minister's isolation there and the fact that his proposal, whereby he was hoping to scrap a body of European legislation, had
  "a reaction which was said to be lukewarm amid suspicions that the UK is seeking to roll back Brussels in favour of a looser, more flexible European Union."
  That is not a very convincing start if the Government are really serious about building up allies.
  It does not seem likely that the Government will receive much support from the European Commission—they will certainly not receive it from the head of the Commission, Jacques Santer, whose appointment was a particularly spectacular pyrrhic victory by the Government.
  As for France, although it is true that President Chirac instinctively shares some Conservative ideas on Europe, the reality is that, within 48 hours of taking office, he was taking part in a Franco-German summit. It seems that the logic of the position in France is to reinforce the Franco-German alliance.
  On social issues, which one or two of my hon. Friends have mentioned, it is true that, during the election campaign and after, President Chirac talked in terms a

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  strong social policy, a high minimum wage and issues that do not seem to have much in common with Tory views on the social chapter.
  Other important themes have surfaced in the debate. Transparency and democracy, for instance, give rise to a concern that straddles both sides of the House. My hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, North-East (Mr. Barnes), in particular, has campaigned vigorously for a more open European Union, and has frequently drawn attention to the secretive way in which the Council of Ministers operates.
  I urge the Government to do much more than they have so far to encourage debate and give information to hon. Members on both sides of the House. I note that the European scrutiny Committee, for example, has asked many times over the past year for debates on European affairs to be taken on the Floor of the House; certain wide-ranging matters are beyond the remit of either of the European Standing Committees. On most occasions, however, the Government have rejected those representations—presumably because they want to minimise the number of embarrassing European debates on the Floor of the House. Opposition Members are concerned about that.
  I understand that the Minister for the Environment and Countryside had difficulties today with the scrutiny Committee, which feels that it was not adequately consulted in advance about important matters that will be considered by the Environment Council this week. The Government must ensure that we see the proposals in good time, and can scrutinise them effectively.
  In what ways will the Minister promote greater openness in the Council of Ministers? We should like the Government to support the Dutch, Danish and Swedish Governments' efforts to open up proceedings in the Council. Although we want the pillar structure to continue under the Maastricht treaty and want it to apply to the justice and home affairs section, we are concerned about the secrecy and lack of openness in that sector. The Government should give urgent consideration to ways of ensuring that we are involved and informed.
  Not surprisingly, the principle of subsidiarity featured in the debate. There remains a clear distinction between Government and Opposition views. Opposition Members believe that subsidiarity must mean making decisions at the lowest appropriate level, which will have consequences for decision-making within the United Kingdom as well as at European level. It was heartening to learn that, in another place, Lord Cockfield had the courage to criticise the Government's policy on subsidiarity, saying that they ignored decentralisation and subsidiarity within Britain at their peril.
  We want the Government to give much more recognition to the work of the Committee of the Regions. During the Maastricht debates in the House, the Government made it clear that they wanted to nominate members to the committee rather than having any local authority or direct representation from the regions. We still consider that an important issue: we want the committee to play a useful and representational role in the workings of the European Union.
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  Many hon. Members mentioned the single currency and general economic issues. I was glad that my hon. Friend the Member for Livingston stressed the importance of trade and the future of inward investment, and I echo all that he said about the motives of inward investors in the United Kingdom. What he said has been very much reflected in my part of the country, the north-east. We have seen inward investment, but as far as I am aware—I have had contact with the firms in question—none of it has involved any concern about the social chapter. Certainly, firms have not come to our part of the country because Britain did not subscribe to the social chapter; they have come for all kinds of other reasons. The English language is one obvious factor in American and Japanese investment; the Japanese are used to working in English.
  One matter that perhaps was not mentioned as much as I would have liked was environmental co-operation in Europe. We feel strongly about such co-operation. We think that Europe can be an environmental trendsetter and we deplore the Government's efforts to try to get out of various environmental commitments that they have made at European level. The environment is a European and international issue and certain decisions about it need to be taken at those levels.
  Mr. Spearing: I endorse entirely the importance of the environment, but can my hon. Friend confirm my impression that most of the articles that relate to the environment are already subject to qualified majority voting and therefore subject to an international dimension?
  Ms Quin: My hon. Friend is right that most of the articles are subject to qualified majority voting, but we are concerned about the fact that, simply to avoid meeting European standards, the Government have been, in their words, trying to repatriate some of the legislation. Many of the directives were agreed a number of years ago. It is important that if we make such commitments we are prepared to fulfil them. Many people in my part of the world and elsewhere are concerned that our environmental standards will drop behind some other European countries. In some cases, they already have.
  Agriculture was mentioned by many hon. Members, including my hon. Friend the Member for Newport, East (Mr. Hughes) and the hon. Member for Holland with Boston (Sir R. Body). I agreed very much with their criticisms. Agricultural reform needs to be a good deal higher up the agenda. As the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Mr. Forman) said, that is imperative if we are serious, as I hope we are, about enlarging to the countries of central and eastern Europe.
  I endorse some of the comments on enlargement made by my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock (Mr. Mackinlay), who spoke very much from the heart, especially about the situation in Poland. Of course he is right. It would be quite tragic if, having encouraged changes in such countries, we seemed to turn our backs on them economically, politically or in any other way. That is a very important aspect that we must all understand and on which there is fairly wide agreement across the House.
  I make no apology for saying to the Minister, as he has heard me say in Committee, that it is terribly important for the United Kingdom to get involved economically with the countries of central and eastern Europe. I feel

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  that we are lagging way behind Germany, Italy, France and even the Netherlands in the volume of our trade with those countries.
  I was extremely disappointed, having tabled a question about direct investment by Britain and certain other European Union countries into central and eastern Europe, to receive the tired old answer that the information was not available and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost. Surely it is extremely important for us to know how much direct investment other countries are making in the countries of central and eastern Europe.
  In a very short space of time, by ringing up the Library, I obtained the information that in the past two years investment by Germany into the countries that I was asking about has been 10 times higher than British direct investment. I urge the Government very strongly to examine the pattern of trade between us and the countries of central and eastern Europe and to direct investment because it is terribly important if we are to make our relationship with those countries a success.
  Various comments were made about Labour policies: most were the usual misrepresentation of them. The comments about the social chapter were certainly wholly unjustified. I was at a meeting the other day that was also attended by a Conservative Member. I was listening to the Prime Minister of Malta, whom the Conservative Member asked about the social chapter—would not it cause Malta all kinds of difficulties if Malta joined the European Union? The answer was that it would not and, in any case, Malta had a good minimum wage system, although almost everyone in Malta earns at least twice as much.
  Mrs. Currie: Will the hon. Lady give way?
  Ms Quin: I apologise to the hon. Lady for not giving way but I have only one minute left; I should have been happy to give way otherwise.
  As I said, there were misrepresentations of the Opposition's policy, especially by the hon. Member for Aylesbury (Mr. Lidington) about our position on the veto. He described our policy as a choice between rolling over and agreeing to everything that Europe said or coming out of Europe. That is an absurd distortion, and I hope that it will carry no weight as it is a complete misrepresentation of our position.
  We contend that Government policies have weakened Britain in Europe. They have marginalised and isolated us, which has been bad for the country. It is no wonder that the hon. Member for Derbyshire, South accused some of her colleagues of not being patriotic. The British people as individuals have lost out, too, because of the Government's attitude to European social and environmental policies and to economic and employment initiatives in Europe.
  Labour wants to give the British people a good deal from their membership of the European Union by adopting a different approach, with different ideas and policies for co-operation and reform. It is clear that the British people have not won that good deal under the Conservatives; they will do so under Labour.
  9.41 pm
  The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. David Davis): Before I deal with the substantive debate, I must congratulate the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross (Ms Cunningham) on an
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  impressively confident maiden speech. She was extremely generous about Sir Nicholas Fairbairn, for which his many friends will be grateful. I hope that she will take it in the spirit in which it is intended if I say that, were he here today, he would, with his usual pungent wit, have quoted Winston Churchill and said, "Maiden speech? That was no maiden speech; that was a brazen hussy of a speech." It was exceptional. If she continues to make such speeches, I suggest that the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (Mr. Salmond) should look to his position—and we shall support her.
  The preparations and negotiations for the 1996 intergovernmental conference are a major challenge for this country, and the Conservatives had a vigourous debate about them. A number of my right hon. and hon. Friends made powerful and insightful speeches. The shopping list is so long that I am almost bound to miss out someone, but it includes my right hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Mr. Howell), my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr. Whitney), my right hon. Friend the Member for Chertsey and Walton (Sir G. Pattie), and my hon. Friends the Members for Chingford (Mr. Duncan Smith), for Carshalton and Wallington (Mr. Forman), for Holland with Boston (Sir R. Body) and for Milton Keynes, South-West (Mr. Legg), who all made excellent speeches. In their very different ways, my hon. Friends the Members for Derbyshire, South (Mrs. Currie) and for Southend, East (Sir T. Taylor) gave different perspectives on the outcome. Of course, I must also mention my hon. Friends the Members for Stafford (Mr. Cash) and for Ruislip-Northwood (Mr. Wilkinson).
  The Government's goal is simply stated: to move the European Union in the direction that serves British interests. Some have argued today that we have no choice but to concede the further integration that some of our partners desire. Others have argued, today and previously, that we cannot achieve our goals and should instead prepare to leave the Union altogether. I believe that both groups are profoundly wrong.
  One of the lessons of our involvement with the European Community is that, if we fight hard enough for what we want, we can achieve success. We have done so with the British rebate, enlargement, the single market and many other matters. I understand some of the doubts expressed about the European Union today, but I do not believe that we should throw in the towel.
  We want a Europe that is committed to free trade, a Europe that seeks to bring the countries of eastern and central Europe within its boundaries and a Europe that respects nation states and does not attempt to supersede them. Some have suggested that it is time to leave the European Union and that membership is no longer compatible with our national interests. That approach is a counsel of despair.
  We have never been starry-eyed about the Community. There are costs associated with membership: the waste of the common agricultural policy, as my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East commented, frustration at the continued protectionism of some member states and the tendency of the Commission to expand its reach far beyond its grasp. But the balance of interests weighs heavily in favour of our membership: the peace, prosperity and democracy that the Community has helped so to foster, the progress towards free trade and a single market, with the massive boost that inward investment has brought this country.

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  In recent weeks, some have suggested that we could leave the Community and join the European Economic Area instead. I do not believe that that would be in the interests of this country. Members of the EEA are subject to all the rules of the single market, but have no say in their development. What would they say to the aerospace or engineering companies desperate to liberalise public purchasing in the Community? What about the commercial television companies worried that restrictions on advertising will take away their revenues? What about the next time that we have to face down a works council directive, a parental leave directive, or a part-time workers directive that will burden business and cripple companies?
  Those companies want a British Minister at the table fighting for Britain. I and my right hon. and hon. Friends intend to fight that fight and to continue fighting it until we get the Europe that we want, that the British people want and that the peoples of all Europe want.
  The challenges facing Europe do not require a rush to further political union. That is what we should be saying at the IGC over and over and over again. As the Prime Minister has explained many times, it is time for Europe's leaders to put away the utopian dreams about a united states of Europe and to concentrate on Europe that works. We should look at the countries of Europe today. There is sluggish growth, high unemployment and instability in the east following the break-up of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw pact.
  Those are the principal problems facing Europe. They will not be solved by blueprints for a federal Europe. Indeed, nothing can be more damaging to the peace and security of Europe or more harmful to the health and welfare of its citizens than an ill-judged and unpopular lurch towards a federal Europe. It would fly in the face of what the people in this and other countries want. It would lead to bitterness and resentment. It would end in collapse and failure. That is why this Government will never support it.
  As some of my hon. Friends have pointed out, some Governments in other member states do not share that analysis. There is no point whatever in trying to brush away that fact and pretending that differences do not exist—they do. That makes the task of the Government in negotiating on Britain's behalf all the more important. It means that we must be prepared to stand up and say no to centralising proposals put forward in the negotiations and it means that, even if we find that few around the table agree with us, we must go on saying no.
  The task for the next IGC should be to make the Union work better. It should not be a great leap forward. Those who think that it should be have learned little from the Maastricht process. They seem to think that if Europe does not head somewhere, it will go nowhere; if it does not integrate, it will disintegrate. That is why we hear endlessly about catching buses, riding trains and missing boats. Unless we like the destination, we shall not buy the ticket.
  A senior business man participating in the BBC's recent debate about the future of Europe said that the Union was like a business: unless it was heading rapidly in a particular direction, it would falter and fail. I could not agree less. Many of the most successful businesses
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  flourish because they stick to their core activities and avoid launching into the unknown. The European Union should do the same.
  Mr. Mackinlay: Hands up everyone who agrees with him.
  Mr. Davis: We would not notice the hon. Gentleman, that is for sure. It means that we should reinforce subsidiarity and make sure that Brussels does not attempt to do what should properly be done by the nation state.
  The democratic legitimacy of the European Union rests first and foremost on the national Parliaments and national Governments of member states. Those who talk about the democratic deficit have got it wrong. They assume that the Commission should be the executive and the European Parliament the legislature, but they are wrong on both counts. It is the Council of Ministers that should take the lead in Europe, and national Parliaments that should call it to account. That is why we have reinforced the authority of the Council of Ministers over that of the Commission, and why we shall oppose attempts to give the European Parliament massive new powers.
  A Community operating along those lines is not a negative vision but a practical one—tackling crime and drug trafficking on an intergovernmental basis, co-operating over foreign policy on the basis not of majority voting but of unanimity, and co-operating on defence in a way that reinforces rather than undermines the transatlantic links embodied in NATO.
  As my hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington pointed out in an especially cogent speech, there is much that we can achieve by working together. But we shall achieve nothing by forcing countries to act against their will. More centralisation is not inevitable, it is not acceptable and it is not in the interests of the British people.
  The idea of European monetary union and a single currency has dominated much of the debate. We heard wise and thoughtful speeches by my right hon. Friends the Members for Guildford, for Mid-Sussex (Mr. Renton) and for Horsham (Sir P. Hordern), by my hon. Friends the Members for Leominster (Mr. Temple-Morris), for Derbyshire, South and for Milton Keynes, South-West and even—I shall exercise my characteristic charity here—by my right hon. namesake the Member for Llanelli (Mr. Davies) —[HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] It got through.
  Our position remains clear—no decisions now or in the lifetime of this Parliament. Our protocol negotiated at Maastricht by the Prime Minister ensures that we shall never be forced to join a single currency. I must tell my hon. Friends that that would not be the case had Labour negotiated the Maastricht treaty.
  My right hon. Friend the Member for Guildford, with his usual perspicacity, identified the key problems that would arise if a small group went ahead with a single currency in the wrong circumstances. I reject the implication in the Commission's recent Green Paper that countries outside such a small group would have to tie their national currencies to the single currency so that, in the Commission's definition, the single market could continue to work properly. I reject that idea because it would mean bucking the markets, and because it would

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  be artificial and ineffective. Our warnings about the divisiveness of a single currency introduced in the wrong circumstances are beginning to hit home.
  The Labour party's approach to all that is markedly different.
  Mr. Duncan Smith: Stop there.
  Mr. Davis: Yes, I could stop there.
  The Labour leader said recently that he would never allow this country to be isolated in Europe. What a good time he would have had at Messina. Give up the veto in important areas of national interest? Fine. Give away our rights to make our own decisions on joining a single currency? Certainly. Collapse the pillars of the Maastricht treaty and the treaty of Rome? Absolutely. The meeting would have been a short one. He could have sold the country down the river in the morning and sat on the beach in the afternoon.
  I must tell the right hon. Gentleman that being willing to stand alone is often necessary to defend Britain's interests. This is not the first time that Britain has stood alone. In the past decade and a half, every negotiating success has been marked in the early stages by Britain's standing alone, or in a small minority, for its principles. It was Britain that fought for the single market; it was Britain that fought for enlargement and for subsidiarity. We stood alone, we fought our corner and we won our argument.
  Mr. Charles Kennedy: And then we ditched our leader.
  Mr. Davis: It is interesting to hear from the hon. Member for Ross, Cromarty and Skye (Mr. Kennedy). I was touched by his earlier concern for our party, since he is now a member of the wholly owned subsidiary of the Labour party.
  Jacques Santer said a few weeks ago:
  "It is British initiatives that end up being mainstream Community policy".
  We are still at least seven months away from the beginning of the 1GC, and negotiations have not even begun. Yet what has the leader of the Labour party done? For no conceivable reason, other than to conform with his Euro-socialist friends, he has said that he is willing to give up the veto in four areas: social policy, environmental policy, industrial policy and regional policy. There is no trade-off and no negotiation—just capitulation. So much for the man who would be Prime Minister. Charting the right course for the European Union, and our relationship with it, is one of the great questions.
  Mr. David Harris (St. Ives): I hope that my hon. Friend will go on to tell the House about the declared position of the leader of the Liberal Democrats, who would give up the veto in all areas.
  Mr. Davis: My hon. Friend is right. It is not clear whether subsidiarity applies between the Labour party and the Liberal Democrat party, and we may not know what the right hon. Gentleman's policy will be in the future. At the moment, however, it is to give up everything.
  We have heard a lot from Opposition Front-Bench Members about the splits and debates that take place on Conservative Benches. Yet they know full well that the
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  same divisions exist among Opposition Members. There was a brave attempt by the hon. Member for Brent, East (Mr. Livingstone) to explain away the 59 votes against the Labour Whip on Maastricht. He might have been more persuasive if we could not have seen the faces of his hon. Friends during his subsequent federalist rant. The right hon. Member for Llanelli and the hon. Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing) made a pretty picture during that speech.
  Those hon. Members have at least been consistent in their views. That is more than anyone can say about the leader of the Labour party. If his policy, as clearly stated in his 1983 election address, had been carried out and Britain had left the Community, we would have been having a very different debate today. In the future, the right hon. Gentleman should start every speech in Europe with an apology.
  The Labour leadership has been wrong about Europe at every turn. When it was in Britain's interests to join, it voted to stay out. When tough negotiations to fight for reform were needed, it wanted to pull out. Now, when the people of Europe are saying no to a European super-state, Labour's policy would bring one closer. It has swapped outright hostility to the Community for blind acceptance of whatever comes out of Brussels. Companies across Europe are groaning under the weight of regulation, bureaucracy and social costs, yet Labour wants the United Kingdom to sign the social chapter and to give up our veto rights. The party that wanted out now cannot wait to sign up to any piece of Euro-nonsense on offer.
  Why does the Labour party do it? Because, after four defeats, it has nothing left to believe in. All that brought Labour Members into politics has been ditched, shelved and thrown overboard. The message about the Labour party that the British people should take away from this debate is that those who stand for nothing will fall for anything.
  When the historians look back in 30, 40 or 50 years' time at what we are doing today, I am sure that they will see this time as a critical juncture in the history of Europe. Their judgement will be driven by whether what we do in the next few years creates a Europe that achieves a number of things. First, we must succeed in bringing to the Community of western, liberal and capitalist democracies the massive free states of central and eastern Europe and in doing so, create a stable and peaceful community in the centre of Europe. That, above all, will be the key defining issue of the decade. What we do in dealing with the common agricultural policy, structural funds and the other key institutional issues in the next few years will be crucial to that.
  Secondly, that judgment will be based on whether the European structure that we have created delivers prosperity, security and freedom to the people of Europe. That, of course, will depend on whether we are cemented together by the shackles of a federalist logic or held together by the joint belief of the peoples of Europe that it is in their mutual interest to remain in a co-operative and coherent Community. That will be achieved only if the European Union works with the grain of the nation state and not against it.
  It being Ten o'clock, the motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put.

  STATUTORY INSTRUMENTS, &c.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Morris): With permission, I shall put together the motions relating to statutory instruments.
  Motion made, and Question put forthwith pursuant to Standing Order No. 101(5) (Standing Committees on Statutory Instruments, &c.),

  EMPLOYMENT
  That the draft Code of Practice on Industrial Action Ballots and Notice to Employers, which was laid before this House on 1lth May, be approved.

  PUBLIC HEALTH
  That the Food Protection (Emergency Prohibitions) (Paralytic Shellfish Poisoning) Order 1995 (S.I., 1995, No. 1388), dated 25th May 1995, a copy of which was laid before this House on 31st May, be approved.
  That the Food Protection (Emergency Prohibitions) (Paralytic Shellfish Poisoning) (No. 2) Order 1995 (S.I., 1995, No. 1422), dated 1st June 1995, a copy of which was laid before this House on 5th June, be approved.
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  That the Food Protection (Emergency Prohibitions) (Paralytic Shellfish Poisoning) (No. 3) Order 1995 (S.I., 1995, No. 1560), dated 19th June 1995, a copy of which was laid before this House on 19th June, be approved.—[Mr. Wood.]
  Question agreed to.

LOCAL GOVERNMENT FINANCE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT (SCOTLAND)
Ordered,
That the provisions of paragraph (2) of Standing Order No. 84 (Constitution of standing committees), paragraph (1) of Standing Order No. 86 (Nomination of standing committees) and Standing Order No. 101 (Standing Committees on Statutory Instruments, &c.) shall apply to the Special Grant Report (No. 14) (Grants to Surrey Police Authority and Receiver of the Metropolitan Police District) (HC 474) and the Local Government Finance (Scotland) Special Grant Report No. 1 (HC 517) as if they were statutory instruments; and that the said Special Grant Reports be referred to Standing Committees on Statutory Instruments, &c.—[Mr. Wood.]

Petitions
10 pm
Mr. Jim Dowd: Just a few short weeks before the 50th anniversary of VJ day, and the final end of hostilities in 1945, it is not just opportune, but essential that Parliament should remember the greatest unrelieved injustice that remains to be settled from the conflict of the second world war.
It is my great privilege to present a petition of more than 200,000 signatures from members of the Japanese Labour Camp Survivors Association and many other citizens of the United Kingdom. That petition states:
That we the undersigned, hereby:
acknowledge the terrible suffering of those former servicemen and Civilian Internees who were taken prisoner by the Japanese during the course of the Second World War;
express our deep concern that, despite the fifty years that have elapsed since the end of the War, the Japanese Government has failed to formally apologise for their actions and compensate the former Prisoners of War and Civilian Internees for their suffering;
Wherefore your Petitioners pray that your Honourable House do call on Her Majesty's Government to take whatever steps it can to support the former prisoners including refusing to agree to Japan being given a permanent seat on the UN Security Council until this matter is resolved and by calling on the Japanese Government to fully apologise to the former Prisoners of War and Civilian Internees and compensate them to the sum of £14,000 each.
And your Petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray, etc.
To lie upon the Table.
Mr. Hugh Bayley: I wish to present a petition on behalf of almost 2,000 of my constituents, who are seeking an end to the mahogany trade because of the damage it is causing to the rain forests of South America. The petition reads:
"The Petition of York Friends of the Earth and Residents of York
Declares that we wish to express our deep dismay at the damage and destruction caused to the Amazon rainforests by the mahogany trade.
As the world's second largest importer of mahogany from Brazil, the UK is a major contributor to the loss of these forests and the terrible consequences faced by the people who live there.
The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urge the government to announce a moratorium on mahogany imports until it can be established that the trade operates on an environmentally sound, socially beneficial and legal basis.
The petition is signed by Guy Wallbanks of York and 1,993 of my constituents.
To lie upon the Table.

Supermarket Development (Northern Ireland)
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Wood.]
10.3 pm
Rev. Ian Paisley: I wish to raise the subject of planning policy in relation to supermarket retail development in Northern Ireland. I will speak for 15 minutes and my colleague, the right hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Mr. Molyneaux), will speak for five minutes, and then we will let the Minister have the rest of the time. We will be gracious to him.
I want to make it crystal clear, at the outset of this Adjournment debate, that I do not oppose inward investment, new development, freedom of choice, private enterprise and healthy competition. It is, however, essential that all those things are operated in a context of fairness, and on an even playing field with no advantage to any section of the community.
As a public representative, I must be worried about fairness. When that concept of fairness is challenged, not by a mere suggestion, but by some secret agreement, or by some private understanding, then it comes into the public domain and I have a responsibility to comment on it.
Yesterday in Belfast, Mr. David Sainsbury announced plans to open seven supermarkets throughout Northern Ireland and said that his company was confident that a further five proposals would follow in due course.
It must be stated that, in the case of at least half those proposed sites, planning policy hitherto has been to refuse all planning permission for retail development on those sites. That planning policy was rigorously implemented in the case of various applications from local stores and developers who had sought to provide for their clients retailing facilities on the very sites now marked down for Sainsbury developments.
In some cases, applications were refused and in other cases, the applicants were discouraged from even daring to pursue their disclosed intention by a statement from the planning authorities that their proposals would not be considered with any favour whatsoever under the existing planning policy. The exception made at Sprucefield for Marks and Spencer was signalled as a "one-off" development, never to be repeated, and was not to be taken as a breach of the existing policy. There was to be no let-up in that policy.
In that very context, and in directing his attention to some of those very sites, Mr. David Sainsbury finds himself able to state with total assurance that he proposes to develop the seven sites with the prospect of five more. To add, as he does, the token formula "subject to planning approval" is simply to pay lip-service to statutory requirements and to suggest, disingenuously, that there is some element of uncertainty in the achievement of his proposals.
Any other person who had dared hitherto to say that they were going to develop those sites was shot down immediately and was not permitted even to suggest that they were going ahead to seek full planning permission on those sites.
In fact the proposals of Mr. Sainsbury go against the present planning policy in the rest of the United Kingdom about "edge of town" and "out of town" developments.

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The reason for that is the imperative necessity to bring life back to the city and town centres to make them vibrant; hence the discouragement by the planners, because similar developments have already damaged the centre of other urban areas.
Yesterday, on Radio Ulster, Mr. Sainsbury was questioned by one Mr. James Kerr for the BBC. Mr. Kerr said:
"With 12 stores right across the province, it has been suggested that what you are doing is take the heart out of the town centres in Northern Ireland."
Mr. Sainsbury replied:
"Well, I don't think that's the case at all. In England that has not been the pattern. We only go to sites outside the town centres where that is the only way we can provide the kind of service we want in terms of car parks and size of store. By and large, that doesn't have an effect on town centres if they are healthy, vital centres anyway."
But Northern Ireland has had something which has told against the health and vibrancy of its town centres which generally has not applied to the rest of the United Kingdom—a campaign of barbaric IRA terrorist violence aimed at destroying the economic heart of Northern Ireland.
Mr. Sainsbury maintains that his plans will have no adverse effect on a healthy town centre or city centre provided it is already vibrant. But how can our town centres fall into that category after the mauling destruction that they have received? Surely, if there is one undertaking to which everyone should be dedicated it is that of the reinvigoration and re-establishment of the heart of urban Ulster. Anything that tells against that may give a cosmetic and short-term benefit, but it will be dearly paid for by long-term city decline.
I ask the Minister: has a Province-wide study of retail shopping impact been made? Is there a margin within the present retail shopping enterprises that must be met? If there is no margin, it is correct to conclude that existing businesses will go to the wall—ruthlessly crushed by the juggernauts of huge shopping centres set in motion by this breach of existing planning policy. But if, after such a study has been made, margins have been proved, the requirement makes developments such as Sainsbury inevitable. No matter what the finding of such a study or what margins may be discovered, we must establish the principle that a Johnny-come-lately developer must not be given special privileges or advantages—we must have an even playing field.
I have stood. both as a Member of the House and as a Member of the European Parliament, in the destroyed business premises of many of my constituents. Their premises were blasted by the bombs of those who are now in dialogue with the present Government. Today, in the House, I want to salute the moral resolution, the personal bravery and commercial courage of those business people, both men and women, who extinguished the flames, swept up the ashes, erected signs stating "business as usual" and carried on. Not one of those businesses received from the Government full reinstatement payments and, because of that, some of those involved were forced to see their family businesses brought to an end. I invite the Minister to come with me, when he has time, to the centre of Coleraine to talk to some people there. Perhaps that would be a good place to start.
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Surely those who have borne the burden and heat of the day must not, by a sudden change in Government policy, be forced out of business now. The sort of development that is being envisaged with the evident lifting of what seemed impregnable planning restrictions will destroy some businesses as surely as did the IRA bombers. Furthermore, there are larger businesses which have sought, by development proposals amidst all the bombings, to give opportunities to the consumer. Those developers should not be discriminated against because a newcomer has arrived on the scene.
The question must be asked: why have others been refused planning permission on some of those sites while Sainsbury is in a position to make the announcement that it made yesterday? What about the constitutional rights of individuals under planning laws? I note that Mr. Sainsbury made no mention of public inquiries into any of his proposals. Does he have information that, even if such inquiries are held, the Minister concerned—who has the final word—will see to it that his objectives will be achieved? Tonight I am asking the Minister to give a solemn undertaking that, wherever there is resistance to any of those sites according to their locality, the people will have the opportunity of a full public inquiry.
I must tell the people of Northern Ireland, using the House as a sounding board, that the present Minister has set aside the findings of at least one public inquiry and that his immediate predecessor set aside the findings of another. Those inquiries have now become no better than a charade, with no credibility at all. To win at a public inquiry is now no guarantee that the battle has been successful. All gain can be taken away by a stroke of the Minister's pen. The very suspicion that the nod and wink has been given before an inquiry puts a question mark over the whole exercise.
I end in the way that I commenced: I fully support inward investment, new development, private choice, healthy competition and free enterprise, but only if the playing field is level. Otherwise it is not freedom, but dictatorship and slavery. Those who compete in the marketplace with Sainsbury require no favours. They are not asking for any advantages; they are simply demanding the inalienable right to justice and fair play. Looking at the record of their endurance, enterprise and investment, they have a right doubly to demand just that.
10.18 pm
Mr. James Molyneaux: The hon. Member for Antrim, North (Rev. I. Paisley) should be congratulated on securing the Adjournment debate on planning. This time next year we shall not be able to raise such matters on the Floor of the House if the Minister goes ahead with his plans to transfer responsibility for planning from his Department to some weird agency.
The hon. Gentleman made it very clear that we are not seeking to promote or to disadvantage any particular company in the debate; we are simply concerned to ensure that Department of the Environment planning authorities adopt an even-handed approach. The hon. Gentleman referred to the need for a level playing field, and I do not criticise him for doing so. Unfortunately, that phrase was used several times earlier today in a short debate about fisheries. It was never made clear whether the fish were rising on the level playing field.
Mr. John D. Taylor: Fisheries brings me straight to Portavogie in my constituency, where I hope that we have a level playing field.
I represent a constituency which, thankfully, Sainsbury has selected for one of its locations. We welcome the arrival of Sainsbury in Northern Ireland. Not only is it building stores that will bring lower prices for our constituents, but it will purchase something like £80 million worth of goods per year from producers in Northern Ireland.
In respect of planning decisions in my constituency, Supermac already had planning permission for the development of that location. Apparently, it has now been acquired by Sainsbury. The good news is that Sainsbury will incorporate the road reconstruction at Forster Green junction. Does my right hon. Friend agree that as several hundred people will be made redundant in the changeover from Supermac to Sainsbury every effort should be made by Sainsbury to re-employ those who will lose their jobs in the process?
Mr. Molyneaux: I am glad that my right hon. Friend has obtained firm assurances that the vital road scheme for that intersection, for which he battled so long, will be safeguarded. I hope that my right hon. Friend and I can depend on the Minister to ensure that that promise is kept in all respects and that there is no slippage. I know that it is not the Minister's responsibility, but I would ask any successor company on that site to support my right hon. Friend's plea that the 700 employees of the present supermarket will be given some priority—never mind Mr. Bob Cooper—in applying for jobs in which they are well experienced.
In any community, perceptions are everything, and they are often produced by banner headlines that a company is to develop a site in a certain location. I should not say it in the presence of one, but editors have a horror of small print, so they tend to give the impression that a decision has been made and endorsed by the planning authorities. Unfortunately, such banner headlines imply that a dramatic statement of intent will be sufficient to bulldoze the planning authorities into granting the planning application.
I hope that the Minister will take the opportunity to dispel any such perceptions or impressions, not just in regard to the applications to which the hon. Member for Antrim, North has referred today, but for all such proposals which may come before his Department in one form or another before he cedes control of all such matters to the agency. I desperately hope that the Minister will change his mind about that, and that despite all their faults he and his Department retain answerability in the House for all planning matters in Northern Ireland.
10.24 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Malcolm Moss): I congratulate the hon. Member for Antrim, North (Rev. Ian Paisley) on his success in obtaining a debate on this important issue. I recognise that the Ulster town has traditionally been the centre of trade and commerce for its population and its rural hinterland. In towns such as Ballymena and Ballymoney, the commercial town centre provides many important services for both town and country.
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I also acknowledge and pay tribute to the many local businesses to which the hon. Member for Antrim, North drew our attention today when he talked about moral resolution. They have maintained their services and provided important facilities for shoppers during the last 25 years, often in very difficult circumstances.
The right hon. Member for Lagan Valley (Mr. Molyneaux) spoke of transferring my Department to some "weird agency". I offer him every assurance that the agency will not be weird. It will be fully under my control. I shall still be accountable to the House for all planning issues—
Mr. Molyneaux: A quango?
Mr. Moss: Not in the absolute sense of the word. We shall debate that further. Furthermore, the director of the agency will be accountable to the Public Accounts Committee in a way that his predecessor never has been.
While the Government welcome the general growth of interest in economic and commercial investment in Northern Ireland, I appreciate local concern that incoming investment might threaten or destroy long-established local businesses. I can assure the hon. Member for Antrim, North that my Department is committed to protecting the vitality and viability of existing town centres.
I recognise that an attractive and flourishing town centre can enhance the quality of life of its citizens, stimulate economic investment and support and encourage a whole range of cultural, social and commercial activity. It is for this reason that my Department has been encouraging regeneration initiatives where they are needed in many town centres across Northern Ireland. In broad terms the Department's planning policy is to ensure an adequate provision of retailing and related facilities, accessible to the whole community. This includes support for and enhancement of established town centres as well as recognising the need for local food stores and specialist retailing facilities.
Retailing is an important sector in the Northern Ireland economy, providing some 57,000 jobs and around 10 per cent. of total employment. As in the rest of the UK, the retail industry in Northern Ireland is subject to dynamic change, as consumers expect a wide range of choice and competitive pricing and as retailers adapt and change their marketing methods to respond to consumer demand. Indeed, in the past five years Northern Ireland has seen a continuation of the upsurge in retail development witnessed in the late 1980s, with more than 300,000 sq m of retail floor space approved in major schemes since 1988.
In recent years shopping patterns have changed, with trends in consumer behaviour in Northern Ireland following a similar pattern to those in Great Britain. There is a growing tendency towards one-stop food shopping and greater use of the car for shopping trips.
I come now to the planning policies which relate to the recent announcement by Sainsbury. All proposals for new shopping development will be tested against the planning policies for shopping set out in the planning strategy for rural Northern Ireland and in the Belfast urban area plan. The planning strategy emphasises the Department's commitment to protecting the vitality and viability of existing town centres as a whole and contains detailed planning policies for the control of shopping development.

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The main thrust of these policies is to favour development which would make a positive contribution to existing centres. My Department also recognises that out-of-town shopping development has a role to play in accommodating types of retailing which are unsuited to a town centre location, and in satisfying local deficiencies in retail provision. It can also contribute towards urban regeneration. However, such developments may seriously prejudice the vitality and viability of existing town, district or neighbourhood shopping centres.
Additional significant retail developments on sites outside existing town centres will therefore be carefully examined against a well established set of planning tests including the following: contribution to deficiencies in the overall shopping provision; impact on existing shopping centres; impact on amenity, traffic movements or road safety; accessibility to both public and private transport.
Mr. Peter Robinson: Does it follow from what the Minister has said that if Stewarts or Wellworths have been refused permission for a site in Northern Ireland, Sainsbury's will be refused permission as well?
Mr. Moss: I can give an assurance to the hon. Gentleman that when we receive the planning applications which, I have to say, we have not as yet received, they will be carefully examined. If there is any objection from any quarter, the applications will go to public inquiry. It has been pointed out by the right hon. Member for Strangford (Mr. Taylor) that two of the seven sites that were mentioned already have existing retail land use planning permission, notably the one at Supermac at Forster Green junction in Belfast. I will give the assurance that if objections are raised the normal planning procedures will be followed and the matters will go to public inquiry.
Within the food retailing sector, the trend towards car-borne, one-stop shopping has led to the development of large, food-based superstores. Such developments rely on the close proximity of adequate car parking, and for that reason locations within existing town centres may be inappropriate. The Department will carefully examine each food store proposal received for edge-of-town locations and will grant approval only where they comply with published planning policies.
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In the case of retail warehouse developments, I recognise that trading in bulky goods and do-it-yourself products is difficult to accommodate in town centres, given the parking and servicing requirements. The siting of such developments in out-of-town locations can have a beneficial influence on town centres through the provision of an alternative location for the sale of bulky goods, thus reducing traffic congestion, and through the attraction of additional retail custom to the town. It is said, for instance, that the development at Sprucefield has enhanced the viability of the town centre retailing in Lisburn town centre itself. I use that as an example of what historically has occurred in Northern Ireland.
Proposals for retail warehouse development within urban areas will normally be directed to sites in or adjacent to existing town or shopping centres, thereby complementing and reinforcing the role of the centre. Planning permission for retail warehouses may be subject to conditions setting a minimum floor space and restricting the range and type of goods to be sold.
With regard to transportation, I expect all types of proposals for major shopping developments in Northern Ireland to be assessed within the guiding principles for transportation policy that I announced in January of this year—the primary concerns of which are to reduce, where possible, the need for travel, to encourage the use of alternatives to the private car and to provide an efficient, safe and accessible transportation system offering better choice and availability to all its users.
I know that there have been recent announcements by a major United Kingdom retail chain of its interest in developing in Northern Ireland and I am aware of the speculation in the press about other prospective developers. It would not be appropriate for me to make any comment in relation to confirmed intent or speculation, but in answer to the main thrust of the speech of the hon. Member for Antrim, North when he talked about fairness, an even playing field, and no special privileges or advantages to any group or organisation, I am prepared to give him, from the Dispatch Box, a categorical assurance that what he is asking for will be delivered—
The motion having been made after Ten o'clock, and the debate having continued for half an hour, MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.
Adjourned accordingly at twenty-seven minutes to Eleven o'clock.