Commons Sitting of 24 June 1996

Preamble
The House met at half-past Two o'clock
PRAYERS
[MADAM SPEAKER in the Chair]
Oral Answers to Questions
  DUCHY OF LANCASTER

    Deregulation
    Mr. John Marshall: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what discussions he had on deregulation during his recent visit to the far east. [32603]
    The Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. Michael Heseltine): During my discussions with senior leaders in the far east, I emphasised the positive contribution of privatisation and deregulation to the competitiveness of the UK economy.
    Mr. Marshall: Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is no mere coincidence that job opportunities have grown much more rapidly in the deregulated labour markets of the far east and north America than in continental Europe? Did he give the leaders of the economies of the far east an assurance that the Government would never adopt the job destruction measures that are inherent in the social chapter and the minimum wage?
    The Deputy Prime Minister: I was able to go a little further than that because I was able to make it clear that
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    job creation is proceeding faster in Britain than in the rest of the European Union. One of the reasons for that is the combination of deregulation and privatisation.
    Mr. Derek Foster: Since returning from the far east, what discussions has the Deputy Prime Minister held about deregulation and food safety? Does he have complete confidence in the Minister of Agriculture? Does the right hon. Gentleman agree with a junior Minister in the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food that: the Minister of Agriculture will be in his job for many months to come, or does he think that the Minister is a clapped-out old milker?
    The Deputy Prime Minister: I can give the right hon. Gentleman a wholly positive answer to those questions because, unlike the shadow Cabinet, the members of the Government are on extremely good terms.
    Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: Does my right hon. Friend accept that I enormously appreciate the tremendous efforts that he has made to hack through the jungle of regulation? However, I received a communiqué from my chamber of commerce in Lancaster this morning which says that there is still too much regulation at local level. Regulations are being embroidered that should not be embroidered. Can he do something to prevent that leakage?
    The Deputy Prime Minister: My hon. Friend raises one of the most important aspects of deregulation. A great deal of the concern about regulation relates to its implementation, and the varied practices of implementation, at local level. That is why she will share my pleasure that we have introduced an appeals system to give local businesses the possibility of redress in such cases.

    Ministerial Visits
    Mr. Win Griffiths: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister how many visits he has made to Wales since becoming Deputy Prime Minister to co-ordinate the work of his Department with the Welsh Office. [32604]
    The Deputy Prime Minister: My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales and I work closely together to ensure that Wales gains full benefit from the Government's policies.
    Mr. Griffiths: I assume from that answer that the Deputy Prime Minister has not visited the Welsh Office once. Is that reluctance to visit Wales due to the Government's disastrous handling of bovine spongiform encephalopathy and its impact on the rural economy, to their pathetic response to the Sea Empress disaster or to his painful experience in Wales when he baled out of the Army to fight a by-election? Does he think that a visit would improve or worsen the fourth-party, lunatic fringe standing of his party in Wales?
    The Deputy Prime Minister: On balance, I think that a visit by me to Wales would be a wholly desirable event. To show the ignorance upon which the hon. Gentleman's question is based, I might say that I visited Cardiff Arms park on 23 February to announce on behalf of the Millennium Commission the rebuilding of the stadium. On 15 March, I was back again in Cardiff, Merthyr Tydfil and Llandrindod Wells to spread the good news of the transformation that the Government have made in the Welsh economy.

    European Union (Policy Co-ordination)
    Mr. Simon Hughes: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what are his responsibilities in respect of coordinating the policy of Her Majesty's Government with other Governments in the European Union. [32607]
    The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Mr. Roger Freeman): Co-ordination of policy with our European partners is a matter for individual Ministers within their respective areas of responsibility, and overall for my right hon. and learned Friend the Foreign Secretary.
    Mr. Hughes: Individual Ministers may be on good terms with each other, but they are clearly responsible for causing the problem. In the past months, we have seen the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food getting into a huge hole, which the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and his colleagues have had to dig him out of. What assurance can the right hon. Gentleman give the House that, in future, we shall have a sufficiently good relationship with our European colleagues that we do not become the pariahs of the European Union, to the disadvantage, not of Ministers of the Crown, but of the people of the United Kingdom?
    Mr. Freeman: My right hon. and learned Friend the Minister of Agriculture is, at this moment, participating fully in the Agriculture Council. He has done a magnificent job in defending the interests of the British farming industry and he will continue to do so. In the past four weeks of our policy of non-co-operation—which has now come to an end—we have successfully focused the minds of Ministers and Governments in the European Union. We have now reached a successful conclusion in the sense that a framework document has been agreed that
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    will lead to an early lifting of the ban. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister will be saying something further about the timetable at 3.30 pm.
    Mr. Sykes: Do not the Germans, Spanish and Italians practise the same techniques all the time? When my right hon. Friend next goes to talk to other Governments in Europe, will he bring to their attention the dangerous provision of the 48-hour week and the fact that it was introduced into this country in a deceitful way? Will he take the same attitude towards that as he has towards beef?
    Mr. Freeman: I can give my hon. Friend the assurance that, unlike the Opposition, we shall continue to fight for the national interests of the United Kingdom, which is not inconsistent with belonging to the European Union. Since the inception of the Common Market, which is now the European Union, this country has always fought for British interests, just as other countries have fought for their interests.
    Mr. Mandelson: Will the right hon. Gentleman throw away the cryptic text prepared for him over the weekend that tried to dismiss the story as rubbish and answer a simple question of fact? Is there in existence a letter from the Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office to the Prime Minister criticising the Government's handling of the beef crisis and making a threat, veiled or otherwise, to resign from the Government?
    Mr. Freeman: If ever there was an author of cryptic messages in party politics or Parliament, the hon. Gentleman must take the prize. The answer to the wholly erroneous newspaper story was, as my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has said, rubbish.

    Government Departments (Efficiency)
    Mr. Harry Greenway: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what plans he has to increase competition between Government Departments in respect of increasing efficiency; if he will institute suitable rewards for the most successful; and if he will make a statement. [32608]
    The Parliamentary Secretary, Office of Public Service (Mr. David Willetts): The Government will continue using competition to improve the efficiency of public services. The rewards, which will be for everyone to share, are better-quality and more cost-effective services for users and improved value for money for taxpayers.
    Mr. Greenway: I thank my hon. Friend for his reply, which I warmly welcome. Would it not be nice to give Departments an incentive to improve in the way that they need to, can and will? What about a few sides of good British beef for those Departments that do really well?
    Mr. Willetts: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that ingenious suggestion. Any ideas for improving the quality of public services, especially from Conservative Members, will be carefully considered.
    Mr. Gunnell: If the Government are so committed to the efficiency of their Departments and believe that efficiency exists, why are the targets that have been set

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    for many Departments for the current year below the level of efficiency reached last year? Are the Government attempting to cook their own books?
    Mr. Willetts: There is no question of cooking the books. Every year, we set targets that are credible and take account of the Department's performance in the previous year. We are always pressing for improvements on the previous year's performance.

    Deregulation
    Mr. Nigel Evans: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what recent representations he has received concerning the over-regulation of small businesses. [32609]
    Mr. Freeman: Earlier this year, I received over 500 letters from small businesses when I invited them to tell me what regulations were hampering their business. At the final "Your Business Matters" conference on 11 March, we announced a package of deregulation measures in response to the concerns raised. We are now continuing our contacts with businesses through a series of special deregulation seminars.
    Mr. Evans: Does my right hon. Friend agree that small businesses are the backbone of this country and that we ought to do as much as we possibly can to lift burdens from them, so that they can grow and employ more people? Is he therefore as concerned as I am at the possibility of the introduction of the regulations incorporating the 48-hour directive, which would undoubtedly affect some small businesses? We did not sign up to that directive; indeed, we explicitly opted out of it. Is the Minister aware that he will have the support of the vast majority of businesses, small, medium and large, in his fight to resist the imposition of the 48-hour directive?
    Mr. Freeman: My hon. Friend is absolutely right to say that small businesses would suffer greatly from the erroneous and dangerous election of a Labour Government, who would agree to qualified majority voting on the social chapter provisions of the Maastricht treaty. That would mean a great many expensive burdens on small businesses. The Opposition are by no means the friend of small businesses. It is this Government who have consistently deregulated and who will defend small and large businesses against inflexible and expensive welfare state laws.
    Mr. Olner: Does not the Minister speak with forked tongue? Will he admit that, for every deregulation order that the Government have introduced in recent years, they have brought in three new regulation orders which have crippled small businesses?
    Mr. Freeman: That is a travesty of the truth. Neither Labour Front Benchers nor Back Benchers have any genuine interest in the deregulation initiative, and Labour would sideline it if ever elected to government. In the past 12 months alone, we have lifted burdens from small companies by allowing more than 500,000 of them to pay VAT annually; and we have lifted the auditing burdens from another 500,000.
    Mr. Anthony Coombs: Does my right hon. Friend agree with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation
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    and Development, which found that the reasons why small businesses in this country produce so many new jobs arc the deregulation and privatisation effected by the Government, and the lowering of company taxation for small businesses? Was he as nauseated as I was to see the Leader of the Opposition last week in Germany attempting to glory in the transformation of the economy that those very measures have brought about—given that he voted against every single one of them?
    Mr. Freeman: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. Indeed, experience of the social market experiments in Germany and other EU countries shows how dangerous they can be, in the sense that those countries lose competitiveness. Germany's unit costs, compared with ours, have meant that time and again Germany has lost, and we have gained, inward investment. In competition with those other countries, they lose and we gain in terms of export markets.

    Ministerial Visits
    Mr. Jamieson: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister when he intends to visit Plymouth and the southwest of England to discuss the competitiveness of the region. [32610]
    The Deputy Prime Minister: I shall be visiting the south-west to discuss competitiveness in a few weeks' time.
    Mr. Jamieson: During that visit, will the Deputy Prime Minister tell us whether he agrees with the Prime Minister that there should be a grammar school in every town? Or does he agree with the Secretary of State for Education and Employment, who apparently voted to close the grammar schools in Norfolk? How will competitiveness in the south-west be enhanced by reintroducing secondary modern schools—a system that declares that 80 per cent. of children aged 11 have failed?
    The Deputy Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman has missed the point: divisions on education are not among Conservative Members; they are among Opposition Members. The Leader of the Opposition does one thing for his children and tries to stop the rest of the country doing the same for theirs.
    Sir Peter Emery: When considering competitiveness in the south-west, will my right hon. Friend acknowledge the great need of businesses in the area to have their mail delivered? Although we may not always have seen eye to eye on this, it is obvious that if strikes continue to upset businesses in the south-west or anywhere else, the Post Office's monopoly will have to be broken.
    The Deputy Prime Minister: I welcome my right hon. Friend to a cause on which I failed to persuade him a few months ago—it just goes to show that they all come around in the end. I am concerned, as are the Government—
    Mr. Lewis: Another Tory cover-up.
    The Deputy Prime Minister: I am answering the question, not the hon. Gentleman.

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    The House should be preoccupied with the customers—with the people who are waiting for letters, with the people who expect to get a decent service. It should not be preoccupied with the understandable, but regrettable, commitment of the Labour party to defend the unions whenever they take action that threatens the interests of the wider public.
    Mr. Caborn: I convey the thanks of my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott) to the Deputy Prime Minister for the witty get well message that he sent to him earlier today. My right hon. Friend wants also to convey the message that it has brought a whole new meaning to hop-along deputy.
    I am surprised at the answer that the Deputy Prime Minister has given about competitiveness in the south-west region. That region is now well below average in gross domestic product per capita terms. When will he set out a positive programme of regeneration for the regions, which clearly was not in his recent White Paper? I am sure that he acknowledges that regeneration will come through the regions. Will he take seriously the recent Confederation of British Industry report on the south-west, which posed a number of questions about competitiveness? Will he also take on board the recommendations of the Bruce Millan commission—which was set up by the Labour party—which has just reported on regeneration of the regions? When will we have a debate on the competitiveness White Paper?
    The Deputy Prime Minister: I am grateful to the hon. Member for referring to the message that I sent to the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott) when I received the news that he had fractured his foot and had been taken to a major hospital in the area. I hope that he gets well soon, and I am delighted that he is receiving excellent treatment in that hospital. As I pointed out to him, Tory government works.
    As to the specific issue of the regeneration of the south-west, I believe that the Government are taking that matter seriously. We have asked my hon. Friend the Minister for Local Government, Housing and Urban Regeneration to take a special co-ordinating role to focus Government support. I had the opportunity to lead in the creation of the urban development corporation in Plymouth which, as hon. Members will know, made available some £41 million for the regeneration of the Royal William dockyard and its environs.
    In addition, £170 million of European rural development funds have gone to Devon, Cornwall and west Somerset; £79 million has been levered in by £13.5 million of regional selective assistance; there have been £72 million-worth of projects in the south-west in the first two rounds of the single regeneration budget; and £23 million of European funds have gone to the regeneration of Plymouth. I am delighted to see the support that has been given to that by the excellent newspaper, the Western Morning News.
    Mr. Mans: Does my right hon. Friend agree that one way to destroy competitiveness in the south-west region—or in any other region—is to introduce the minimum wage, as is suggested by the Labour party? It would result in lost orders, businesses going under and jobs being lost.
    The Deputy Prime Minister: I am delighted to have another chance to refer to the right hon. Member for
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    Kingston upon Hull, East who, on the subject of the minimum wage, referred to the loss of jobs and said. "Any fool knows that." If he knows it, it proves the point.

    Parliamentary Questions
    Mrs. Clwyd: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what assessment he has made of the efficacy of parliamentary procedures relating to the answering of questions for which he has responsibility. [32611]
    Mr. Willetts: My right hon. Friend has made no such assessment. My colleagues and I always try to bear in mind the injunction in "Erskine May" that answers
    "should be confined to the points contained in the question, with such explanation only as renders the answer intelligible."
    Although "Erskine May" adds temptingly
    "a certain latitude is permitted to Ministers of the Crown",
    I am sure that you, Madam Speaker, would rein us in if we strayed too far.
    Mrs. Clwyd: Perhaps the Minister should move off "Erskine May" and on to the conclusions of Sir Richard Scott. Subsequent to his inquiry, he said that Parliament should not be fobbed off by blocking and inadequate answers from Ministers. Does he agree with another suggestion put forward by Sir Richard Scott—that there should be a parliamentary watchdog to ensure that Parliament is told the truth?
    Mr. Willetts: The crucial responsibility is that of a Minister to the House. I believe that here in the Chamber of the House, both Opposition Members and Government Members can hold Ministers to account for the answers that they give.
    Dr. Spink: May I press my hon. Friend to say how long it would take his Department to deal with questions on our economic performance including, for instance, a question about the impact of the lowest mortgage rates for 30 years?
    Mr. Willetts: I congratulate my hon. Friend on the ingenuity of that supplementary. Of course, if I were invited to regale the House with the story of the British economy since 1979, I would be able to explain that we have the lowest mortgage rates for a generation and that, in the most recent economic cycle, our output per head grew more rapidly than that of any other major economy apart from Japan.

    Scott Inquiry
    Mr. Dalyell: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what assessment he has made of the implications for the policy of open government of the evidence on parliamentary answers given by Sir Michael Quinlan to the Scott inquiry. [32612]
    Mr. Freeman: The adversarial nature of Question Time does not detract from the Government's commitment to be as open as possible with Parliament and the public.
    Mr. Dalyell: Why has the Deputy Prime Minister funked answering the question himself?
    Mr. Freeman: I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman is not content. I am the Minister responsible not only for the

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    code of conduct but for the rules that apply to all Ministers when they answer to Parliament. I am the Minister with day-to-day responsibility for the civil service and I have answered the debates on both Nolan and Scott. If the hon. Gentleman had wanted to ask a supplementary, I would have willingly replied inp—I hope—a constructive fashion.
    Mr. Dalyell: So, may I have a supplementary?
    Madam Speaker: No. The hon. Gentleman had a supplementary and I thought it was perfectly proper.

    Magistrates (Bolton)
    Mr. Thurnham: To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster what representations he has received about the recruitment and working conditions of magistrates in Bolton. [32613]
    Mr. Freeman: I approved the appointment of 18 persons to the Bolton bench earlier this year, following recommendations from my advisory committee in Bolton. The working conditions of magistrates in Bolton are a matter for my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department.
    Mr. Thurnham: Is the Chancellor aware of how strongly people in Bolton feel about the need for a new magistrates court? Will he press his colleagues in the Lord Chancellor's Department and the Treasury to give an immediate go-ahead to that important contract, which was so unfairly stopped?
    Mr. Freeman: The hon. Gentleman refers to the buildings in Bolton that house the magistrates courts, which date from the 1930s. As I understand the situation from the Lord Chancellor's Department, a private finance initiative proposal is on the table. I give my assurance to the hon. Gentleman and to the House that I will investigate the status of that proposal and convey to the Lord Chancellor and to my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary not only the hon. Gentleman's concern but my interest.

    Government Policies (Promotion)
    Mr. Winnick: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of his Department in promoting Government policies. [32615]
    Mr. Willetts: The results of the fundamental expenditure review of the Office of Public Service have been published. The effectiveness of the Department is kept under review through MINIS—the ministerial information system.
    Mr. Winnick: Can the Minister explain why the Government have the lowest opinion poll ratings of all time, are incapable of winning any by-elections and have done dismally at local elections? Would not it be wise for the Prime Minister to summon up enough courage to call an autumn election? If he is speculating about doing that, as we are told in the press, why does not he pluck up the courage, call it and let the people decide?
    Mr. Willetts: My party won two local authority by-elections last Thursday. We had a successful
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    conclusion to the European Commission's proposals on beef at the European summit and we shall publish an exciting White Paper on education tomorrow. In due course, we shall put our policies to the electorate.

    Ministerial Responsibilities
    Mr. Jacques Arnold: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what was the principal Government policy with which he was concerned in the week beginning 17 June. [32616]
    The Deputy Prime Minister: I have continued to work on a full range of those Government policies for which I am responsible.
    Mr. Arnold: In view of the callous bombing in Manchester recently, I welcome the visit that my right hon. Friend intends to make to that city. Will he ensure that every arm of Government rallies around Manchester to help it to recover fully from that outrage?
    The Deputy Prime Minister: I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend for asking that question. The Prime Minister has asked me to go to Manchester on Wednesday this week, and I shall do so. I hope to meet with civic and private sector leaders in order to ensure that the Government's resources are used effectively wherever appropriate. If those resources can be co-ordinated better in dealing with the horrendous consequences of that dastardly act, the Government will have done all that is proper in the circumstances.
    Mr. Lewis: When the right hon. Gentleman visits Manchester on Wednesday, will he meet small business people from the Corn Exchange and the Royal Exchange complexes? Small businesses have suffered huge financial losses in the past week and some business people cannot access the buildings to see what stock they have left. I am afraid that insurance companies are already ducking and diving about insurance matters. When the right hon. Gentleman visits Manchester, I ask him to meet those people and to not go empty-handed.
    The Deputy Prime Minister: I shall go with the intention of meeting as wide a representation of the community as I can during what, by definition, must be a limited visit. I expect to see representatives of small and medium companies. The first stage is to visit the city, to listen to the people and to take stock of the situation. That is obviously what my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister wants me to do before I report back to him.

    Millennium Exhibition
    Mr. Spearing: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what part he has played in the planning of a millennium exhibition. [32617]
    The Deputy Prime Minister: As a member of the Millennium Commission, I have taken part in numerous discussions about the exhibition. Over the past month, I have been working with Sir Peter Levene, who was asked by the commission to advise members oil the commercial soundness and practical feasibility of proposals. There is now significant private sector support

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    for the plans and, as the chairman of the commission announced last week, the exhibition is going ahead at Greenwich.
    Mr. Spearing: Is the Deputy Prime Minister aware that, when I asked the Secretary of State for National Heritage on Friday what recent decisions she had made about the exhibition, she replied that she would answer as soon as possible? As the Deputy Prime Minister is a member of the commission, is he aware of my suggestions of some weeks ago that we celebrate the millennium on both a regional and a national basis? Greenwich is the originator of mean time and young people should be encouraged to look towards 2051 to see how we could implement nationally and internationally the purposes and the aims of the United Nations charter. Is it too late for that sort of vision to be incorporated in the mess that now confronts the country?
    The Deputy Prime Minister: I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman should describe the millennium festival in that manner. All parties welcome the fact that the country proposes to stage what appears to be the largest event of its sort in the world. Its purpose is to show Britain at its best as it faces the new century, and I hope that that spirit will be adopted by all. It is not a party political event—a Labour party representative is a member of the Millennium Commission and I welcome the statements emanating from the Labour party in support of it. My fellow commissioners and I are working with the private sector to ensure that there is the widest possible manifestation of support from that sector. We are in the business of projecting the excellence of this country into the next century, and we all have an interest in that.
    Mr. Congdon: I welcome the efforts that have been made to secure the millennium exhibition for Greenwich, and in particular, the work of my right hon. Friend in helping to bring that about. What steps will be taken to ensure that there are long-term benefits from the regeneration of that important site in Greenwich?
    The Deputy Prime Minister: My hon. Friend asks an important question which is much in the minds of Millennium Commission members. I have visited many regeneration projects in many cities. When projects begin, it is extremely difficult to predict how the regeneration process will develop as confidence builds. It is dangerous to try to forecast some dramatic scheme that is devised by planners and politicians on the basis of wishful thinking rather than on a factual assessment. That could choke the spontaneous working of the market, which can encourage a degree of confidence and produce a range of proposals that were not envisaged by the originators of the scheme. It is difficult to strike a balance, but we shall do what we can to ensure the most imaginative use of the site in the longer term. However, the Millennium Commission is responsible for organising the festival.

    Florence Summit
    Mr. Alan W. Williams: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what contribution he has made to the promotion of Government policy in respect of the Florence summit; and if he will make a statement. [32619]
    The Deputy Prime Minister: The Prime Minister will make a statement to the House on the Florence European Council today.
    Mr. Williams: The Deputy Prime Minister will accept that farmers in my constituency are not exactly dancing with delight at the result of the Florence summit. An extra 100,000 cattle are to be slaughtered, 95 per cent. of which have no traces of bovine spongiform encephalopathy, in exchange for a framework agreement without a timetable. What part did the right hon. Gentleman play in this humiliating climbdown for Britain in Europe?
    The Deputy Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well that the Prime Minister's achievements at the Florence summit exceeded all expectations. It is not for me to anticipate my right hon. Friend's statement, but I can say that the thing most likely to prejudice the summit's successful outcome was the Leader of the Opposition telling the Germans what they wanted to hear before the summit, at the expense of British self-interest.

  OVERSEAS DEVELOPMENT

    International Debt
    Mr. Spearing: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what studies his Department has (a) commissioned and (b) evaluated of international debt as a factor in civil instability or conflict. [32634]
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Jeremy Hanley): We have no reason to believe that debt burdens have led to civil conflict, but there is a good deal of evidence to link economic problems with the breakdown of civil order. That is why we encourage Governments to implement sound policies that promote stable economic growth.
    Mr. Spearing: Does the Minister agree—indeed, do the Government agree—that, in certain circumstances, debt can be a most potent, although hidden, form of slavery? Has his attention been drawn to the report of the Debt Crisis Network, appendix 2 and 3 of which point out that the conditions imposed on Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia by the International Monetary Fund were factors in exacerbating regional and ethnic differences, which contributed to the atrocities of which we are only too well aware? Will the Minister therefore send those appendices to the IMF, request the responses of our representative at the IMF and of its president and place their report and his own observations on it in the Library?
    Mr. Hanley: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his question, but I am not aware of the appendices to which he refers. If he will send them to me, I will study them and place my reply in the Library. Debt is only one of a number of factors that force Governments to spend less on social services and cause other problems. The primary cause of problems in countries with high debt is poor budget prioritisation and long-term economic mismanagement, leading to weak or negative economic growth. I am sure that the debt problem in the countries

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    to which the hon. Gentleman referred was not one of the prime causes for the serious disasters from which they have suffered; in many countries, rapid population growth and weak public sector management are other factors. The important thing is to recover and to use debt sensibly, and I am proud of this nation's record of turning debt into aid and of forgiving debt.
    Sir Jim Lester: Is that not all the more reason why we should continue to support the British Government and particularly the Chancellor of the Exchequer in his efforts to relieve multilateral debt in negotiations with the IMF and the World bank? The president of the World bank will attend a meeting in the House next week, at which, I hope, the positive steps for which we have all worked will be taken to anticipate and ease the problems of countries where multilateral debt is a severe restriction on the future.
    Mr. Hanley: I agree very much with my hon. Friend. The British Government have written off the aid debts of 31 of the world's poorest countries: a total of £1.2 billion has been written off. All our aid to the poorest countries is now on grant terms so that their debt burden is not increased, and we have taken the lead in pressing for solutions to that burden.
    The official bilateral debt of the poorest countries is now being rescheduled on Naples terms, and 18 countries have benefited so far. Last month, creditors wrote off some $500 million, more than 50 per cent. of Guyana's official bilateral debt. My hon. Friend referred, however, specifically to multilateral debt. The British Government have also taken the lead in pressing for more action on that, and significant progress has been made on agreeing a framework for action. We hope that progress at this week's G7 summit will lead to agreed measures later this year.
    Miss Lestor: Although the recent increase in private sector investment in developing countries is welcome, it is not reaching the poorest African countries. As my hon. Friend the Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing) pointed out, those countries need urgent debt relief measures and high-quality assistance if they are to avoid some of the results and repercussions of debt. Bearing it in mind that the World bank itself has said that without debt reduction foreign investment will be discouraged, what plans has the ODA to rescue sub-Saharan Africa from its crippling debt problems? Will it discuss the matter with the IMF and the World bank?
    Whatever the Government's record may be on trying to alleviate debt, some of the poorest countries are still suffering enormously from the burden that they carry. We need action now, not in a few years' time.
    Mr. Hanley: I do not entirely agree. As the hon. Lady knows, Britain's aid programme is substantial, and is increasingly focused on the poorest countries in Africa and south Asia where the needs are greatest. We certainly do not ignore the countries of sub-Saharan Africa. In Africa, support for economic reform and social sectors remains a high priority. Our aid is concentrated on the poorest nations, and Africa benefits from that.

    Angola
    Mr. Hunter: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how much
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    (a) bilateral and (b) multilateral assistance the Government (i) gave in 1995–96 and (ii) plan to give in 1996–97 to Angola. [32635]
    Mr. Hanley: Provisional bilateral outturn for 1995–96 was some £12 million; our share of the multilateral EC figure for 1994 was approximately £5 million. The 1996–97 bilateral commitments for Angola currently total some £9 million. Angola's allocation under the seventh European development fund was 115 million ecu; the United Kingdom's share is £15 million. That for EDF 8, which is to run from 1996 to 2000, is now under discussion, but our share will be 12.7 per cent.
    Mr. Hunter: The successful implementation of the Lusaka protocol depends largely on the success of the United Nations-monitored quartering process. Does my right hon. Friend share the concern that overcrowding in the camps, deteriorating health conditions and sanitation and a decline in the quality of food supplies are undermining that process? If so, will the Government take steps to ensure that the UN and other agencies address the problems?
    Mr. Hanley: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I am grateful for his concern for Angola, and for the steps that are helping to improve confidence there.
    Progress in the peace process is frustratingly slow, but we are encouraged by recent movement. I hope that the quartering of UNITA will be completed without further delay so that work can begin on the formation of a unified army and then a Government of national unity and reconciliation. Fourteen quartering areas have been established to receive troops, but I am disappointed that the rate of quartering has not been faster. I am concerned about the quality of many of those that have been quartered, and about the quantity of weapons being handed in.
    There are concerns about the conditions in some quartering areas. Undoubtedly it is a formidable logistical task for UNAVEM—the United Nations Angola Verification Mission III—but the emphasis must be on the Government of Angola and UNITA co-operating with UNAVEM to make the operation a success, rather than exploiting the difficulties as an excuse not to fulfil their obligations.

    Turkey
    Mrs. Clwyd: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what recent assessment has been made by the United Kingdom, in conjunction with the EU and the UN Commission on Human Rights, of the human rights record of the Turkish Government in respect of their eligibility for development assistance. [32636]
    Mr. Hanley: The United Kingdom and our European Union partners regularly raise human rights issues with the Turkish Government, in the context of the EU's financial assistance programme for Turkey and in the wider political and trade relationship. In bilateral contacts and at the UN Commission on Human Rights, the EU has made it clear to Turkey that this assistance is conditional on Turkey's continuing commitment to principles of democracy and basic human rights.
    Mrs. Clwyd: If that is so, will the Minister confirm that he has read the latest Amnesty International report on

    15
    human rights in Turkey, which makes absolutely appalling reading? It shows that Kurdish prisoners are ill treated and tortured, and that Kurds are generally treated as third-rate citizens in their own country. How will this affect relations between this country and Turkey, let alone between the European Union and Turkey? I hope that the Minister will answer my question directly.
    Mr. Hanley: It is important to set concerns about human rights in Turkey in a broader context. We want Turkey to be firmly anchored to western institutions, because the closer Turkey is to western institutions the better we are able to express our concerns about human rights and the more influence we can bring to bear. Co-operation is a more effective approach than confrontation. We do not believe that linkage of human rights with, for example, bilateral aid or economic trade is productive. Moreover, the atrocities in Turkey are not on only one side. We deplore any breach of human rights, whether it is committed by the PKK or by the Turkish Government.
    Mr. Simon Hughes: Why will not the Government make it clear to Turkey that Greek Cypriot citizens in northern Cyprus will not have any human rights until Turkey withdraws its troops and allows them the democratic right to reclaim and to vote for their Government and to discover whether people who have disappeared are alive or dead? It is a very simple issue: why have the Government been so pathetic about it for 22 years?
    Mr. Hanley: It is a simple issue, and one about which I feel very strongly, but it has nothing to do with this question. The hon. Gentleman's question is a responsibility not of the Overseas Development Administration but of the Foreign Office. I hope that he will table such a question to it.

    Child Labour
    Mr. MacShane: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what financial assistance he is providing in 1996–97 to organisations working to eradicate child labour in developing countries. [32637]
    Mr. Hanley: We give considerable assistance to organisations that adopt an integrated approach to children's issues, but it is not possible to provide the exact amounts spent on the problem of child labour. However, we encourage a range of initiatives and engage in policy exchange.
    Mr. MacShane: I thank the Minister for his answer. I find it quite appalling that the British Government are the only Government who cannot put a figure on the help that they provide to eradicate child labour around the world. Is the Minister aware that child labour is increasing and that it is a major international issue? Other countries in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development want the issue to be raised at the International Labour Organisation and to be banned. Will he ask the Prime Minister—who gave a disgraceful reply to a question on this issue last Thursday—not to turn a
    16
    Nelsonian blind eye to child labour, but to instruct out officials everywhere to join the campaign to eradicate this monstrous practice?
    Mr. Hanley: The hon. Gentlemen is being extremely unfair in saying that we are the only nation that cannot identify how much we spend on the problem of child labour. He has made a wicked suggestion. He knows full well that when we give money to non-governmental organisations we do not necessarily know exactly how much they will choose to spend on the problem of child labour. Under our aid programme, we give generously to a number of organisations. What I have said is accurate: we cannot disaggregate the figures, so I cannot give him an accurate answer about the exact amount that is spent on child labour. I can tell him, however, that we deplore child labour. We deplore any form of child labour, whether the type of labour is bonded—
    Mr. Campbell-Savours: Come on.
    Mr. Hanley: The hon. Gentleman is becoming impatient to reach his question, which appears later on the Order Paper. He has been badgering me throughout this Question Time because he wants to ask his question. I hope that I may be allowed to answer the other questions; we will then reach his question.
    We urge Governments to take all necessary measures to eliminate all extreme forms of child labour, including forced and bonded labour. The UK has urged all countries to ratify the international covenant on civil and political rights, which provides that slavery and the slave trade in all their forms shall be prohibited. I am proud of what the Government are doing about this issue.
    Mr. Jacques Arnold: Far from turning a Nelsonian blind eye to the problems of child labour and of street children, did not my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, when in Rio de Janeiro for the earth summit, specifically visit a home that takes street children off the streets and educates and trains them for a constructive future? [Interruption.] If the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) did not know that, he should have done so.
    Mr. Hanley: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The Government's record on trying to eradicate child labour in its extreme forms is well known. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making that point.

    Papua New Guinea
    Mr. Dalyell: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what aid is given in respect of preserving the rain forest in Papua New Guinea. [32638]
    Mr. Hanley: Since 1993, we have provided assistance to 13 projects designed to help to preserve Papua New Guinea's rain forests. I will write to the hon. Gentleman with the details of the projects and place a copy in the Library. I should hate to read out all 13 projects because the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) might not have time to ask his question.
    Mr. Dalyell: Are those projects geared to sustainable development? Do they take account of the appalling river pollution from gold mining?
    Mr. Hanley: We certainly concentrate on sustainable development. Since 1993, we have committed £120,000 to the 13 schemes and £70,000 for NGO projects that are financed partly from the ODA's joint funding scheme. I understand the hon. Gentleman's point about the outflow from the Lihir gold mine and other industrial projects. We must balance sustainable development and timber production with industrial improvements in Papua New Guinea.

  PUBLIC ACCOUNTS COMMISSION

    National Audit Office
    Mr. John Marshall: To ask the Chairman of the Public Accounts Commission how many economists are employed by the National Audit Office. [32643]
    Sir Peter Hordern (Chairman of the Public Accounts Commission): The National Audit Office employs about 520 staff who have accountancy qualifications or are training for them. Of those, 69 staff have degrees in economics, although none is currently a full-time professional economist. When specialised advice is needed, the NAO would normally use external experts with a relevant economics background.
    Mr. Marshall: Would my right hon. Friend be willing to second some National Audit Office staff to the European Commission to tackle the problem of fraud that seems endemic in the operation of the common agricultural policy?
    Sir Peter Hordern: My hon. Friend makes an interesting point. I shall certainly convey it to the Comptroller and Auditor General, who frequently consults his counterparts in other European countries and in the European Court of Auditors. It will not be lost on my hon. Friend that one good reason for taking pleasure from the Florence summit is precisely that the Commission will be given more powers to make spot checks, to establish where fraud has been committed and to act.
    Mr. Rooker: Would not the NAO's expert staff be better deployed on investigating the Millennium Commission's scandalous decision to site the millennium exhibition at Greenwich, despite the fact that all the financial information available shows that the bid will not work and will waste public money and despite the presence of a suitable alternative in the midlands?
    Sir Peter Hordern: I cannot comment on the merits of that matter, but if the hon. Gentleman will write to me or the Comptroller and Auditor General, I am sure that it will be investigated.
    Sir Michael Shersby: Is my right hon. Friend aware that last week members of the Public Accounts Committee visited the European Court of Auditors? That was the first visit since my right hon. Friend and his colleagues, who were then members of the PAC, visited the court 15 years ago. We had extensive discussions about fraud and were informed of progress in dealing with that difficult problem. Does my right hon. Friend agree that we should not dilute the
    18
    considerable power and influence of the National Audit Office by seconding more than the eight staff who are currently at the European Court of Auditors but that we should continue our discussions with the court to crack this difficult problem?
    Sir Peter Hordern: I am quite sure that my hon. Friend is correct. The House is indebted to the PAC and its Chairman for their excellent work in producing the reports. I wish only that public accounts committees in other European countries were as assiduous in establishing where fraud is and in doing something about it.

  OVERSEAS DEVELOPMENT

    Former Soviet Union
    Mr. Campbell-Savours: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what plans he has to fund food and distribution projects in the former Soviet Union. [32639]
    Mr. Hanley: The know-how fund will continue to give high priority to projects in support of food sector reform. Last year, some 16.1 per cent., or £4.18 million, of know-how fund assistance was devoted to food sector projects. In addition, we have provided more than £1 million in bilateral food aid to countries in the former Soviet Union.
    Mr. Campbell-Savours: I hope that the Minister will forgive me for being a little impetuous earlier. Will he set up an inquiry into overcharging by Arthur Andersen for fees and accommodation in respect of the food distribution contract that it held under the know-how fund in Moscow about two years ago?
    Mr. Hanley: I am glad that the hon. Gentleman asked that question. Just in case he should ask, I have done some research, which shows that, as far as I am aware, there is no Campbell's Soups factory in the former Soviet Union. He was referring to the Moscow bread project—a large know-how fund operation. Costs were shared with a consortium of private sector companies led by Andersen Consulting. I believe that it was an excellent example of partnership between the Government and the private sector. It trained 634 retail shop managers and provided on-site support. Multiple benefits were derived from the support of the know-how fund. If the hon. Gentleman has any evidence of overcharging and of costs falling against the British taxpayer, I should be most grateful if he would give it to me chapter and verse. I assure him that the matter will be investigated.

  CHURCH COMMISSIONERS

    Clergy (Theological Studies)
    Mr. Harry Greenway: To ask the right hon. Member for Selby, representing the Church Commissioners, what plans the Church Commissioners

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    have to supplement the pay of bishops and clergy to allow them more time for theological studies; and if he will make a statement. [32602]
    Mr. Michael Alison (Second Church Estates Commissioner, representing the Church Commissioners): Stipends for bishops and the parochial clergy are based on the concept of adequacy in relation to duty. The extent of theological training before ordination and the time that clergy should spend in theological study afterwards are not matters for which the Church Commissioners are responsible.
    Mr. Greenway: Is my right hon. Friend aware of the frequency with which some bishops make deplorable political speeches, comments and sermons? Would it not be better if they stuck to theology and religion and forgot about politics? In particular, would not more satisfactory theological training and teaching discourage them from devastating the Lord's Prayer, as some have proposed?
    Mr. Alison: It would probably be a retrograde step if we once again sought to interweave theology with politics, as happened at the time of the Reformation, so I take my hon. Friend's advice with a considerable pinch of salt.

  OVERSEAS DEVELOPMENT

    Former Soviet Bloc
    Mr. Llwyd: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what assistance is being offered to former Soviet bloc countries from the know-how fund in the current year; and if he will make a statement. [32641]
    Mr. Hanley: Planned assistance for central and eastern Europe and central Asia through the know-how fund in the current financial year is £82 million.
    Mr. Llwyd: I thank the Minister for that reply. Last November, I had the good fortune to visit Belarus
    20
    and the Ukraine. What assistance is being given to the Ukraine, given its worsening economic circumstances?
    Mr. Hanley: The hon. Gentleman asks a rather specific question. The know-how fund has helped to privatise retail food outlets in Kiev. It is now helping the new owners to set up a retailers association to strengthen their bargaining power. I shall give the hon. Gentleman a fuller answer in writing, including some of the figures, and place a copy of my letter in the Library.

    Burma
    Ms Glenda Jackson: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on aid to Burma. [32642]
    Mr. Hanley: Since 1992–93 we have provided about £630,000 in humanitarian aid for Burmese refugees in neighbouring countries. In December 1995, we contributed £1.1 million to a joint UNHCR/World Food Programme appeal for a voluntary repatriation programme. Like other EU countries, in 1988 we suspended non-humanitarian official aid, and that remains the position.
    Ms Jackson: I thank the Minister for that reply. Does it mean that Her Majesty's Government will pay rather closer attention to the calls emanating from Aung San Suu Kyi for no encouragement of any business interest in Burma until a more democratic form of government is returned and the harassment of her and her party is ended?
    Mr. Hanley: I assure the hon. Lady that we have very close contact with Aung San Suu Kyi. We have explained our policy to her on many occasions. It is to press for real reform—economic and political—that will bring the changes that are so desperately needed by all Burma's people. She is a remarkable lady and I assure the hon. Lady that we take careful note of whatever Aung San Suu Kyi says.

European Council, Florence
3.30 pm
The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major): With permission, Madam Speaker, I shall make a statement or the meeting of the European Council in Florence or 21 and 22 June, which I attended with my right hon. and learned Friends the Foreign Secretary and Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, my hon. Friend the Member for Boothferry (Mr. Davis). I have placed the conclusions of the Council in the Library. I shall deal first with beef. then with the other issues discussed.
In my statement on 21 May, I shared with the House the Government's frustration that, two months after an unjustified ban on our beef exports had been imposed. some member states were still unwilling to address on a rational, scientific basis a clear path to lift the ban. I accordingly announced a policy of non-co-operation until two specific objectives had been achieved: the lifting of the ban on beef derivatives and agreement on a cleat framework leading to lifting of the wider ban. In accordance with that policy, we subsequently blocked 74 decisions that required the unanimous approval of member states.
The first objective was achieved on 10 June, when the ban on beef derivatives was lifted. That was followed on 19 June by unanimous approval of our bovine spongiform encephalopathy eradication plan by the Standing Veterinary Committee. In Florence on 21 June, the second objective was achieved when the European Council unanimously accepted the framework and procedures put forward by the Commission for lifting of the wider ban, which were based closely on our proposals. Both objectives were secured in precisely one month. I have no doubt that the policy that we reluctantly adopted was the decisive factor in ensuring that result in such a short space of time.
The framework sets out steps for lifting the ban in stages. The Florence conclusions make it clear that decisions on each stage will be taken
"only and exclusively on the basis of public health and objective scientific criteria and of the judgement of the Commission".
That is what we insisted upon above all. I was therefore able to lift our non-co-operation policy once the framework had been agreed. It is now up to us to meet the conditions for lifting the ban set out in the framework. There are five stages for that.
We aim to be in a position to tell the Commission by October that we have met the necessary conditions for decisions to lift the ban on two of the five stages—that is, certified herds and animals born after a specified date and their meat. That is subject in particular to clearance of the backlog of animals awaiting slaughter in the 30-month-plus scheme, and a start to the accelerated slaughter of cattle particularly at risk of developing BSE.
Removal of the ban in those two areas would reopen to our industry an export market worth initially about £100 million a year, increasing rapidly thereafter as the certified herds scheme gains momentum. Also by October, I expect a Commission proposal on a third stage—embryos—subject to the scientists giving them a clean bill of health. I believe that we should have met the conditions necessary for a decision to lift the ban on the fourth stage—meat from all animals under 30 months—by November.
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Securing agreement on those steps would restore the position on beef exports to what it was before 27 March, except in the areas where we have prohibited sale in the UK. In other words, we would be in a position of being able to sell for export to the EU young animals and all the beef that could then be sold in the UK. That would open the way for exports worth some £530 million per year. The only remaining category is meat from animals over 30 months except, of course—as I indicated to the House a moment ago—for that from certified herds, which should be lifted in October. Meat from animals over 30 months is still banned in the UK because of the greater incidence of BSE in older animals.
The targets that we have set are ambitious. It is now up to us in this country—the farming and ancillary industries and the Government—to ensure that we meet them. 'The point is that this timetable is essentially in our hands. When we have met the conditions, the normal procedures for such decisions, involving the Standing Veterinary Committee in particular, will apply. But we have the firm commitment from all Heads of Government in Florence that those decisions will be taken only on the basis of scientific and objective criteria.
One aspect not adequately covered in the Commission framework is the early export of British beef to third countries. That was complicated in the minds of our partners by their concerns about the possibility of re-export to the EU, and by the European Court of Justice case against the Commission. We believe that our case against the ban on exports to third countries is particularly strong, and our court application for interim relief should be decided in the next few days.
We none the less secured a presidency statement—accepted, it has to be said, reluctantly by the other member states and the Commission—that the Commission will consider individual requests from third countries to buy British beef exclusively for their domestic markets. If such requests come forward soon, I hope that, either through Commission procedures or the European Court case, exports from Britain to third countries will begin to flow.
We have a lot to do in a short time to meet the conditions necessary to enable the EU and world markets to be fully open again. But I believe that we have taken a great step forward in the past few days. We shall go on doing everything possible to protect public health, restore consumer confidence and secure the interests of the British beef industry. Our overriding aim remains, as it has been from the start, the eradication of BSE from Britain.
Let me now refer briefly to the other main issues discussed in Florence—the intergovernmental conference, employment, economic and monetary union and the Europol convention.
The European Council agreed that the intergovernmental conference should now turn from analysis to negotiation. We need to move from exchanging ideas to considering texts. I was therefore happy to lead the call for an outline treaty text to be prepared in time for the Dublin European Council in December. The Government's position on the substance remains as set out in the White Paper, "A Partnership of Nations". In Florence, I set out once again our policies in key areas such as qualified majority voting, and the need for flexibility as the EU further enlarges.

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We also discussed employment. At the Essen European Council in 1994, we agreed an approach that recognised the primacy of action by member states and recommended a number of lines of action reflecting this Government's approach. In Florence, the European Council confirmed the priority attached to tackling unemployment and agreed to carry forward the Essen approach, taking account of the initiative taken by the President of the Commission on a confidence pact for employment. There are some good things in this document, but others that we cannot accept.
Unemployment in this country is now the lowest of any major European competitor. We have created more jobs over the past three years than Germany, France, Italy and Spain—indeed, we have created more than Germany, France, Italy and Spain added together. That is because we have followed policies that help job creation. That is why we will not sign the Maastricht social chapter or accept European Union measures that would damage competitiveness or inhibit our ability to pursue our own successful policies.
Florence was not a decisive stage in discussions on economic and monetary union. The European Council considered a report from Economic and Finance Ministers on work done since Madrid. That included the relationship between those inside and those outside any potential future single currency. It covered the proposal to create a new exchange rate mechanism. Most of our partners favour creating such arrangements. Let me assure the House that it has been confirmed that any new scheme of that sort will be voluntary, and I reaffirm that this country will not rejoin any new ERM.
The European Council also reached agreement on the role of the European Court of Justice in the Europol convention. I said at the Cannes European Council that the ECJ would not be the arbiter in any case relating to Europol which involved the United Kingdom Government or arose in the courts of the UK. Other member states saw a need for a role for the ECJ on questions of interpretation of the convention arising in their national courts.
The outcome allows other member states the option of providing such a role for the ECJ for themselves. The United Kingdom and our courts will not be bound by that in any way. That is a satisfactory outcome and a further example of the EU developing in flexible ways.
Finally, the European Council confirmed that enlargement negotiations with central European countries should open at the same time as with Cyprus and Malta—that is, six months after the intergovernmental conference ends. It also agreed a number of statements on external issues, the most important of which were on the middle east and Russia.
The Florence European Council marked a decisive turning point in our efforts to protect the interests of the hundreds of thousands of people working in the British beef industry. The issue will now be dealt with on a proper, rational basis, with the timetable for the lifting of the ban dependent on our own efforts. That has enabled the restoration of normal business in the European Union.
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This has been a difficult episode in this country's relationship with Europe and not one that I was seeking. We were right to stand up for our interests, but I now look forward to working with our partners on our positive vision of Europe as a strong partnership of nations.
Mr. Tony Blair: I shall confine my remarks mainly to beef. First, on dates, the Prime Minister chose his words with elaborate care. Can we be clear as to what he is saying? Is he saying that he can give dates and that the ban will finally go in total in November?
Some Conservative Members are now shaking their heads, but that was the clear impression—they are now all shaking their heads, but if one was listening to the Prime Minister, that was the impression—[HON. MEMBERS: "The right hon. Gentleman was not listening."] I was listening.
If the Prime Minister is now saying that those are definite dates, why were they not in the European Union agreement? I suspect—perhaps he will confirm this—that all that he is really saying is that he will table proposals by October and November, but the decision will be taken through the process of the veterinary committee, inspection, verification and so on.
So, can we return to the question that we have consistently asked the right hon. Gentleman? When will the ban finally be lifted, so that people in Europe can eat British beef under the same conditions as people in Britain?
Secondly, will the Prime Minister confirm that—again, contrary to the impression that he sought to give—there is no automatic link under the agreement between the steps that Britain must take and steps towards lifting the ban? We are obliged to do certain things in Britain, but other member states are simply obliged to follow certain procedures. There is no binding agreement on them, merely an agreement to consider. As for stating that he has won an undertaking that they would refuse consent only on scientific grounds, is not the committee that we have to satisfy the very same veterinary committee with which we had the problems in the first place? It has always ostensibly said that it was acting on scientific grounds; it has never said that it was acting on political grounds. The Prime Minister is no further forward on that.
If the basis is supposed now to be science, why have we agreed to a massive additional slaughter policy when we say that it is not scientifically justified? I suspect that the principal changes that the Prime Minister got were made once the British Government had submitted a programme for eradicating BSE and taken it round the European capitals—which, frankly, is something that they should have done a couple of months before.
Thirdly, as for the much vaunted concession on the third country ban, I agree that the ban is completely unjustified, but will the Prime Minister confirm: that it is only an undertaking from the Italian presidency and not an undertaking from the European Union; that it has no legal force; and that within minutes of it being given, a Commission official said:
"it didn't commit the Commission to anything"?
Foreign Ministers have said that the third country ban will remain. Is that right or not?
Fourthly, will the Prime Minister confirm that the extra compensation at Florence was for all European Union farmers and that British farmers will see only a small part

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of it? Will he confirm also that this country's bill, net of European Union payments, for the BSE crisis will be well in excess of £2 billion in the years to come? Is that not the price that the British people will pay for the utter incompetence with which the matter has been handled from the very beginning: the failure to intervene in the way necessary when BSE began; the failure to compensate and inform farmers when the crisis was under way; the failure to announce the link with Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, with proper consultation; and now the failure to secure the lifting of the ban once one was imposed?
The Whitehall farce even continued at Florence, where we had the spectacle of the Government trying to hang on to one Minister who was threatening to resign and hanging the poor Minister of Agriculture out to dry to try to get him to resign. [HON. MEMBERS: "Where is he?"] There appears to be a notable absentee from our deliberations.
This has been an object lesson in the Government's capacity to turn any crisis into a catastrophe. The truth is that whatever fig leaf the Prime Minister has today, the damage will be with this country for many years to come.
The Prime Minister: The right hon. Gentleman has just illustrated that he is not interested in what is right for this country. In this House, he claimed to support our policy of non-co-operation because he did not have the guts to criticise it. In Germany, he criticised British policy because he did not have the guts to defend it. He has spent half his time claiming that we have been too hard in our relations with Europe, and then jumped to the other side of the fence and claimed that we have been too soft. He has invented objectives that we did not set and then criticised us for not meeting them. It is my job to look after the interests of the British beef industry, and despite his obstruction and his determination to do anything or say anything, irrespective of the damage to the beef industry, in his own interests, that is precisely what I have done.
Let me reiterate the points that were clearly made in my statement, which the right hon. Gentleman then asked about again, having failed to understand them. First, there is no massive additional slaughter policy, as I have explained to him repeatedly on many occasions. I hope that he now fully understands that. On the mechanism for the future, the great new European is effectively saying that he distrusts the word given to Britain by the European Heads of Government and by the European Commission. He distrusts it, despite all that he has said. Let us be clear about what he is about.
Let me deal with some of the other points. As I explained repeatedly in my statement, we have set out what we sought at the outset: objective criteria that we can meet in order that the ban can be lifted. The dates for lifting therefore lie in the hands of the British agriculture industry and the British Government; I have set out the dates by which we think that they will be met on each and every part of the agreement over the past few minutes. It is a shame that the right hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair) failed to understand that. [Interruption.] I invite hon. Members to read the statement when it is printed in Hansard tomorrow; if they did not understand it when I made it, perhaps they will understand it when they read it.
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We sought an agreement that that matter would be dealt with objectively, without politically blocking the correct scientific judgment. That is what has happened in the past; that is the political commitment that we have achieved; that is the commitment that we expect our partners to meet.
Mr. Douglas Hurd: Given that the Government adopted a legitimate, even familiar, tactic for a specific and limited objective that they have now obtained, will my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister take no notice of the Leader of the Opposition's confused mischief making? Does my right hon. Friend accept that the best service that the House, particularly we on the Conservative Benches, can do in the difficult times that lie ahead is to take what may be the last chance in this Parliament to give united and effective support for the policy which my right hon. Friend set out last week and which is also set out in the Foreign Secretary's White Paper, published in the spring?
The Prime Minister: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend, who is certainly right about the Leader of the Opposition's capacity for mischief against the national interest. It is equally true that we have set out in our White Paper what we believe is the right way for future developments in the European Union in this country's interests. We have set out a clearer definition of that than any other country that will be negotiating in the intergovernmental conference. It is precisely so that we can get down to the details that I invited the Irish presidency to introduce detailed texts, so that we can begin to look at the details of what people specifically expect to be agreed at the intergovernmental conference rather than deal with the generalities, which have been the subject of the debate so far.
Mr. Paddy Ashdown: I am glad that the puerile policy of posturing masquerading as war on Europe is now over. When the Prime Minister announced it, I told him that it would achieve nothing that could not be achieved by other means. The damage that has been done to Britain's influence and respect will be great. The Prime Minister tells us that he had to take the action as Europe had been obstructive for eight weeks; is not the truth that the Government did nothing for eight weeks, which is why nothing happened? The Prime Minister tells us that we have set hurdles that were not originally set. Does he remember the statement made by his Downing street spokesman on 22 May, the day after he announced the policy in the House of Commons? Presumably speaking on the Prime Minister's behalf, the spokesman from No. 10 Downing street said:
"Nothing short of a full timetable for the phased lifting of the entire beef ban will be sufficient."
Is it not true that no such thing has been achieved?
The Prime Minister said that he was looking for binding commitments from our partners in Europe. Is it not true that every one of the steps must be validated through the Commission, the Scientific Veterinary Committee, the Spongiform Encephalopathy Advisory Committee"—super-SEAC"—and the Standing Veterinary Committee—the very people who, the Prime Minister claims, obstructed the actions in the first place? Far from our achieving success in lifting the third country ban, is it not true that, within minutes of the Foreign Secretary

27
announcing that success, a Commission spokesman, in whose hands the matter is supposed to be, said that any beef that we were not able to sell to Germany or France could not be sold to South Africa?
We shall judge the package, which is far heavier and more damaging to British industry than it would have been if the Government had acted earlier and postured later against three factors. The first factor is the Prime Minister's timetable: if he wants to clear the 30-month-plus backlog by October, he will have to put a lot more effort and resources into doing so. The second factor involves the level of compensation. The third factor relates to whether the binding responses, which are necessary as we pass each of the thresholds, have been achieved.
It is perfectly clear that the Prime Minister—like a previous Prime Minister—has returned from Europe claiming a victory, the cost of which we shall feel increasingly over the months ahead. This has been a policy of folly abroad and chaos at home, which has left Britain damaged both abroad and at home.
The Prime Minister: I certainly do not intend to take any lectures on posturing from the right hon. Gentleman, who approaches every issue in Europe from a kneeling position—whether this country is right or wrong. He is accurate, in that he has said before all the things that he has repeated today. He was wrong then and he is wrong in most of what he has had to say today. The statement that he has quoted is wholly inaccurate. I have seen the right hon. Gentleman's letter containing the assertion, and I have written back to him this morning telling him that he is wrong, and that no such statement was made. The right hon. Gentleman had better take that up with the Press Association.
If the right hon. Gentleman looks at what I said in the House of Commons, he will see what the policy of the Government was at the outset and what it has remained, right from the beginning of this affair through to the present time.
Both the right hon. Gentleman and the Labour leader, who says that the ban was unjustified, have failed to say what they would have done in the circumstances. They would have done absolutely nothing—except carp and criticise, the twin names by which we have come to know them.
Mr. John Redwood: I am glad that my right hon. Friend has had success in getting our EC partners to see the difficulties facing our beef industry. I trust that people in this House will think twice before jeopardising more livelihoods and businesses in the beef industry.
Does my right hon. Friend have equally persuasive ways of raising the issues of the powers of the European Court of Justice and the plight of our fishing industry, which are also on our minds?
The Prime Minister: As I have told the House, both matters will certainly be subject to negotiation during the intergovernmental conference. I mentioned quota hopping, which was certainly not what was envisaged
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when the common fisheries policy was agreed. As I said in my statement today and in our White Paper, we seek some changes in the European Court of Justice also.
Mr. Peter Shore: This is not exactly an occasion for national rejoicing; but will the Prime Minister now answer the question put to him by my right hon. Friend the Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair)? Do we not, at every stage, have to obtain not just the consent of the European Commission for relieving the ban, but the consent of the Standing Veterinary Committee, a nationally appointed body? Is it not also true that the great cost of the mass slaughter—or 80 per cent. of it—will have to be borne by the British taxpayer and the Treasury? Will the right hon. Gentleman give an estimate of the actual sums involved?
The Prime Minister: I believe that I have given the estimates over a period of three years before—but the point that the right hon. Gentleman did not address and may care to deal with now is that the principal issue is getting the ban lifted. It has never been a question of extra resources from the EU, for two good reasons.
First, we have sought to keep all spending across the EU within the guidelines approved for expenditure. There are repeated claims from other nations wanting to break those guidelines; breaking them would result in substantial extra costs to this country. So if we sought to break the guidelines by asking for extra resources, the costs for this country would increase, not diminish, over the years ahead. I do not think that a prudent policy to follow, and I have no intention of following it.
Equally, I have no intention of letting anyone take the opportunity of extra help being sought to change the agreements that we would otherwise seek to reach in the intergovernmental conference. For both those reasons, we do not propose to seek extra resources beyond those that normally apply under arrangements agreed in the past for circumstances such as these. There is also the special question of the British rebate and the arrangements that inhibit it when an extra payment needs to be made. They are the credible reasons why it is not in this country's interests to seek compensation over and above what is normally available under the usual arrangements. It is impossible to determine the cost, but we broadly anticipate that it will be approximately £2 billion over the next three years.
Mr. George Walden: Is my right hon. Friend aware that we have lost prestige, that we have lost money and that we have lost umpteen thousand more cows? If we feel big after that, we must have been feeling rather small before. Is he also aware that the Labour party did not condemn his tactic outright because it was frightened by the atmosphere of petty chauvinism in the press, which helped to push him into his mistaken policy in the first place?
The Prime Minister: I cannot answer in relation to the judgments of the Labour party, but I can answer in relation to the Government's position. We were not prepared to be in a position where objective criteria were ignored, where there was no way to seek a removal of the ban and where science was deliberately being subordinated to national prejudice in countries across

29
Europe, rather than there being an objective judgment of what ought to be done to help a member state facing a particular difficulty.
I can recall no occasion in the past when a single nation state faced a difficulty of this sort and political criteria in the other member states prevented a solution that was unanimously proposed by the Commission and supported by scientific evidence. Before my hon. Friend criticises the Government or anyone else, he should bear that in mind.
Mr. Giles Radice: Is it not the Prime Minister's duty to remind the Euro-sceptics on his Back Benches, who have rubbished the European Union throughout the crisis, that it would not have been possible to reach an agreement without the help of the European Commission, the European Council of Ministers, the European Court of Justice and European money?
The Prime Minister: If the hon. Gentleman looks at the many statements that I have made, he will see that I have made it clear that the Commission and the presidency have played a helpful role in seeking to find a way through these difficulties. However, that is not universally the case with the other member states. I have thanked the presidency and the Commission—most recently at my press conference in Florence—for the support that they have given us during this difficult period.
Sir Teddy Taylor: Is it not a clear sign of the Prime Minister's success in negotiating that only this morning the senior spokesman for the German Chancellor stated that he would have preferred to deal with the Leader of the Opposition, because he would have been more accommodating to German interests?
The Prime Minister was quite right to tell his colleagues that Britain's unemployment has been much lower than theirs since we left the ERM, but will he also make the point to them that the two European states that voted not to join the EC have even lower unemployment rates? Should they not think through the implications?
The Prime Minister: I am sure that they will make their own decisions on that and on other matters. My hon. Friend is quite right about the relative rates of unemployment. Unemployment has continued to fall in this country for almost three years, but it has remained constant or increased in other countries—all of which live in the same general economic climate. I do not think that the difference in policies is an accident in the sense that unemployment has been falling in this country. The House will have noted my hon. Friend's comments about the Leader of the Opposition with interest.
Mr. Doug Hoyle: Does the Prime Minister remember that on 21 May he said to us that he would be seeking a clear framework that would lead to the lifting of the European ban and the worldwide ban on British beef? However, he has returned with an agreement that gives us no timetable, no dates and no guarantees. He could have got that agreement without the policy of non-co-operation. He has soured relations with our European partners and he has left a bitter legacy for a long time to come. Even our closest friends, such as the Irish Taoiseach, said that the policy of non-co-operation was a mistake. Has not the Prime Minister—
Madam Speaker: Order. This is not a debate. Almost the entire House wishes to ask a question, so questions to
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the Prime Minister must be brisk and I am sure that he will oblige and give brisk answers. Will the hon. Gentleman now put a question?
Mr. Hoyle: Yes, I shall. The Prime Minister has got nothing for Britain. When will the ban be lifted by Europe and when will the worldwide ban be lifted?
The Prime Minister: On the last point, if the hon. Gentleman reads the statement, he will find out. If he thinks that I could have got that ban lifted without the non-co-operation policy, why was there no progress over an eight-week period and why was there great progress over the next four weeks? The reality is that we accelerated the agreement of a framework and ensured the lifting of the beef derivatives ban precisely because a the action we took.
Mr. John Butterfill: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Leader of the Opposition is nitpicking over the timetable and has overlooked the fundamental point, which is consumer confidence and its restoration? Having a timetable and an agreed procedure that relies entirely on scientific evidence gives us the means by which worldwide consumer confidence in British beef can be restored.
The Prime Minister: Of course, my hon. Friend is right. The Leader of the Opposition knows that as well as any Member of the House. He just has his fingers crossed behind his back in the hope that he can score a few political points, irrespective of the reality of the situation.
Mrs. Margaret Ewing: Some of us have listened carefully to the Prime Minister's statement. Does he realise that his use of language in his statement gives no hope at all to the agriculture community in areas such as mine, where thousands of jobs are dependent on that industry? The use of words such as "aim", "expect", "believe" and "hope" shows pious optimism by the Prime Minister.
The right hon. Gentleman specifically referred to certified herds. How will those certified herds be identified, and does he envisage a region-by-region lifting of the ban, which would be of substantial benefit to Northern Ireland and Scotland, because we have had quality assurance schemes?
The Prime Minister: It is not specifically region by region, but herd by herd. In Scotland, it is likely that many herds will be certified because of the way in which cattle are reared. It was precisely to provide such help for Scotland and probably other regions that we decided to seek, and obtained, a framework that will enable us to identify herds in collaboration with the agriculture industry and the European Union, so that the ban may be lifted at an earlier date than would otherwise have been possible. As I told the House earlier, I expect that we shall be able to tell the Commission by October when, on the basis of the agreement that we have reached, the objective criteria would be met and those certified herds would be removed from the ban.
Mr. Michael Jopling: Is the Prime Minister aware that the beef settlement is an important and welcome step towards the ultimate solution

31
of the crisis? Is he further aware that he should not take notice of those who speak for the two Opposition parties, who seem to have turned being wise after the event into a minor science? With regard to the accelerated slaughter process and in the event of dairy cows being slaughtered before the end of their natural time, will my right hon. Friend also give an undertaking that if we end up under-producing on the British milk quota, it will not have any long-term adverse effect on our milk quota in years to come?
The Prime Minister: My right hon. Friend makes an extremely good point about milk quotas, which we are examining at the moment. As to the accelerated slaughter, according to the fourth cohort, it must be voluntary as there is no other way in which it can be done. Farmers will of course receive compensation, the levels of which are being determined.
Mr. Dennis Skinner: Is the Prime Minister aware that, in industrial terms, he decided to take strike action without a ballot? He wanted to bang together the heads of all those in the Common Market, and it is the British people who have the headache. Will the Prime Minister now answer the questions: when will the ban be lifted and how much will his supreme folly and that of that gang over there cost every man, woman and child in Britain?
The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman manages to carry his own absurdity to further lengths this afternoon even than in the past. I thought that he would welcome a strike without a ballot, based on his reputation and his past—it is the way in which he seems to have operated for most of his life. As to his other questions, I refer him to the answers that I have already given to several of his hon. Friends, when I set out those points.
Sir Michael Spicer: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that the Government have not been diverted by the beef crisis from pursuing their general objectives in Europe as outlined in the White Paper: that is, preventing any further moves towards a federal state of Europe and, where possible, returning powers to this country and to Parliament?
The Prime Minister: I can certainly confirm that our policies remain as set out in the White Paper, and they were reiterated again in Florence at the weekend.
Mr. Tam Dalyell: The Prime Minister referred to the middle east in his original statement. Did the Greeks, the Italians or the Germans tell him that they would go ahead and trade with Libya and north Africa, despite the sanctions? Is not British industry the loser, as the recent Egyptian delegation to the House made clear, as a result of sanctions against Libya?
The Prime Minister: There was no such comment by the countries concerned during any discussions about the middle east. Those discussions tended to deal primarily with the middle east peace process.
Sir Hector Monro: May I welcome the achievements of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister
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in Florence, in securing the lifting of the ban in due course? I agree that it is important to get beef off the front pages of the newspapers and back into the high-quality food chain. To achieve that aim, will he ensure that the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food makes fair payments to farmers involving the least possible bureaucracy?
The Prime Minister: I shall ensure that that is the case.
Mr. D. N. Campbell-Savours: The Commission's position paper requires the introduction of an effective animal identification and movement recording system, with official registration. The hon. Member for Wantage (Mr. Jackson) and I called for those measures 11 weeks ago. Have those 11 weeks been lost? Is the programme under way? Will the Prime Minister provide some details?
The Prime Minister: On the contrary, the 11 weeks certainly have not been lost. It is a massive undertaking to produce a proper identification programme for all cattle across the country, but that is our intention. A programme of that sort is available in Northern Ireland, but it does not extend across the rest of the United Kingdom. It involves a massive amount of computerisation and co-operation from the agriculture industry. A great deal of progress has been made in the past 11 weeks, and as a result of that progress I was able to set out the indicative dates for the House a few moments ago.
Mr. Nigel Forman: On the basis of what has happened with the beef issue in the past few months, is it not clear that the Government's tactic of non-co-operation has proved both legitimate and effective? In order to put that in context, will my right hon. Friend tell the House how the 74 occasions on which we used our national veto during the period of non-co-operation relate to the occasions when was it not necessary to use our national veto, because matters were decided by qualified majority voting? That might show the House whether the European Union is as supra-national as some of my hon. Friends claim.
The Prime Minister: I shall certainly provide my hon. Friend with those figures. I do not carry in my head the number of occasions on which there were qualified majority voting agreements in the past month, during the period of the non-co-operation policy, but my hon. Friend makes a good point. He is also entirely right to point to the fact that the policy has been effective in securing the objectives that I set out at the Dispatch Box, and in securing them far more speedily than would have occurred in any other way.
Mr. Jeff Rooker: Will the Prime Minister take this opportunity to confirm that the other members of the European Union are our partners and friends, not our enemies? When he was explaining his proposals to them over the weekend, did he explain why, on 20 March, two of his Ministers came to the House to make statements on the same issue—one raising a health scare about the transfer of BSE to human beings, and the other saying that no cattle would have to be slaughtered as a result? Given the massive job losses in this country and in France and Germany, how did he

33
explain to our partners and friends the fiasco that was started by two Ministers not being remotely aware of the consequences beyond the statements that they made?
The Prime Minister: I seem to recall that when my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health came to the House, the Opposition congratulated him on bringing the problem to the House as speedily as he had, because it was thought that that was the right way to deal with it. The hon. Gentleman will recall that there had been a leak in the morning papers, I think, that day. In the absence of a statement, undoubtedly there would have been demands from the Opposition for one. Undoubtedly there would have been a private notice question. My right hon. Friend received praise from the Opposition for coming to the House and setting out the position. The way in which the hon. Gentleman refers to it now is a total and utter travesty of what happened.
Mr. David Howell: Can my right hon. Friend detect a strong whiff of sour grapes coming from the Opposition Benches this afternoon? Was it not quite simply a very positive deal, achieved as a result of a tough negotiating approach?
Moving away from beef, did my right hon. Friend notice at the Florence summit that, whereas previously all the pressure was supposed to be on this country to conform to EU social and labour market policies, it is now the other way round and the EU is seeking to follow our policies? Did he hear any comment on the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development forecast that, over the next two years, Britain will be the fastest-growing economy in the whole of Europe?
The Prime Minister: There was some comment by me, for I certainly mentioned that, but I did not hear a great deal of comment from our friends and partners in the discussion at Florence over the weekend. My right hon. Friend is entirely right that the new position of the Opposition on these matters seems to be, on every occasion, that everybody is right except the United Kingdom. That seems to be the case, whatever the merits of the argument.
Mr. Peter L. Pike: Will the Prime Minister say precisely when and how the scientific basis and information changed to justify the climbdown in the number of cattle to be slaughtered? Will he assure the House that the Minister of Agriculture will not be slaughtered before the last of these cattle are slaughtered?
The Prime Minister: There was no change in the scientific criteria. My right hon. and learned Friend is at the Agriculture Council in Luxembourg at the moment.
Sir Jim Spicer: Does my right hon. Friend accept that we all want to consider other members of the European Union as our partners and friends, but after the weekend in Turin, when he was so badly let down by our partners, was it not inevitable that the ban would follow? All of us in the agriculture community very much welcome the support that he has given to the farming community over the past three months. Does he accept that the farming community will take on board the
34
need for the accelerated slaughter, but only if the commonsense approach to it is coupled with fair compensation?
The Prime Minister: It is certainly true that we were promised co-operation in Turin. It is equally true that a few days later, in the Agriculture Council and elsewhere, that co-operation was noticeable only to the extent that it did not materialise. That is the background to the policy that we subsequently adopted.
Mr. Llew Smith: The Prime Minister said that employment matters were also discussed in Florence. As we know, to meet the convergence criteria for a single currency, cuts of £18,000 million in public expenditure and public services such as health and education are required. Would he care to anticipate the likely effects that those cuts will have on employment?
The Prime Minister: If the hon. Gentleman thinks that that applies to this country, he should have a look at what will be necessary in each and every country right across the European Union. I see that he does think that. He clearly does not envisage the sort of policy that is set out by his party's Front Bench. There seems to be a certain disagreement between the Labour party's Front and Back Benches. It is quite sad to see the splits in its European policy that open up daily.
Sir Wyn Roberts: I welcome the underpinning given at Florence to the policy of eradication, as well as progress towards the lifting of the ban. Does my right hon. Friend agree that, come the autumn, the British beef industry should be in a stronger position than it has been for some time, and that the grounds for increased consumer confidence—both here and elsewhere—should be stronger as well? Does it not appear that, if Opposition Members were ever to negotiate on our behalf in Europe, they would be dictators at home and appeasers over there?
The Prime Minister: My right hon. Friend is right about the impact of our policy over a period. We are seeking a complete eradication policy for BSE. As that is increasingly achieved, it will reopen not only the European markets that have recently fallen foul of the European Union ban, but the markets that were barred to British beef some years ago in the United States and elsewhere. That is why, given the scale of the present problem, it is right for us to seek a full-scale eradication policy. The incidence of BSE is falling dramatically at present, and will continue to do so as a result of the measures that we have adopted.
Mrs. Alice Mahon: Is it true that the eradication plan that the Prime Minister has now accepted is three times larger than the original proposal? In the light of what he has just said, would it not have been better, cheaper and safer to go down that route earlier?
The Prime Minister: I simply do not recognise the statistic that the hon. Lady has just produced. I have not seen it, and I have no reason to believe that it is remotely accurate. As I just told my right hon. Friend the Member for Conwy (Sir W. Roberts), what we are seeking is a comprehensive plan to eradicate BSE entirely from British

35
herds. I think that that is right in itself. It is certainly right in terms of bringing confidence back to the consumer, and ensuring that British beef—which I consider an excellent product, and which has traditionally been seen as such by the world—can once more enter world markets without let or hindrance.
Mr. William Cash: Did my right hon. Friend note that, in yesterday's The Sunday Times poll, the British people approved his tough stance by a majority of two to one? Cannot a number of useful lessons be learnt, both by the Labour party and by those who drive for a federal political union in Europe? Those who drive for political union should recognise that we will not—and the British people will not—tolerate the abolition of the veto as expressed by Mr. Dehaene, the Belgian Prime Minister, who, after all, is now governing by decree. As for the Labour party, since our adoption of a tough stance, its rating in opinion polls has dropped by nearly 10 per cent.
The Prime Minister: I certainly believe that we have been following the right policy on its own merits. My hon. Friend is entirely right about the veto. Some of our European partners would wish all matters to be dealt with by qualified majority voting—which, of course, is what the Labour party signed up to in its European socialist manifesto. The impact of that would be that there would be no veto for this country. I assure the House that, if there had been no veto at the Edinburgh financing arrangements in 1991, we would have lost the British rebate. No other country in the European Union likes the British rebate; every other country would vote to get rid of that rebate, which saves this country millions of pounds a year. The little piece of paper that the Labour party signed in its European socialist manifesto is a little piece of paper that will cost the country billions of pounds and more every single year.
Mr. Ieuan Wyn Jones: Does the Prime Minister realise that there is considerable concern among Welsh farmers at the accelerated slaughter programme, because we are taking out of production some of the most productive animals in the dairy herd? Does he realise that farmers' disappointment is coupled with the fact that there is no firm timetable for lifting the ban? Will he make it clear what type of compensation package will be
36
introduced for farmers? Will it cover the replacement costs of productive animals and the consequential loss of income? Does he realise that his policy of non-co-operation did not affect the timing or the outcome of the Florence deal, but that it might have affected relations with our European partners?
The Prime Minister: I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman feels that way, because I just think that he is wrong. I have spent six years sitting round the European table with my partners, and he has not. I can assure him that we have made more progress by following this policy than we would have done if we had followed the policy that he seems to advocate. Animals in the accelerated slaughter scheme would in due course have been slaughtered under the 30-month-plus scheme, and the overwhelming majority of them would have been slaughtered only a few months later than under the arrangements that we advocated last week.
Compensation will be offered. As I told the House earlier, we are discussing precisely what the compensation will be. I certainly understand the hon. Gentleman's point on that.
Mr. John Townend: As the Prime Minister has achieved most of the objectives that he set when he started non-co-operation, would he hesitate to use those tactics again in future if British interests were at risk? My farmers are very worried about the influence of the veterinary committee. If the committee is again subject to political influence—as it has been in the past—will it be able to stop the lifting of the ban, or does the Commission have the power to overrule it?
The Prime Minister: The answer to my hon. Friend's last question is, yes, it has the power if it were felt that the committee was not acting on the basis of objective science. That will be extremely helpful. As for his question about policy, very unusual circumstances led us to use that tactic—circumstances that I hope and expect not to see again. I cannot recall another issue on which our European partners voted against the unanimous recommendation of the Commission, when that unanimous recommendation was clearly backed by science. The position taken by our partners was clearly taken for domestic political reasons and was not objective. That caused our response. I very much hope that that type of circumstance will not occur again.

Asylum Seekers (Benefits)
4.26 pm
The Secretary of State for Social Security (Mr. Peter Lilley): With permission, I should like to make a statement to the House on the Government's intentions following the Court of Appeal decision on the vires of the regulations made in February on asylum seekers.
The Government propose to restore the fundamental policy, which was upheld by healthy majorities in both Houses of Parliament. As my right hon. and noble Friend Lord Mackay of Ardbrecknish has said in another place, the Government's intention is to introduce amendments next week to the Asylum and Immigration Bill to restore Parliament's intention.
There are only three categories of people whose benefits were affected by the regulations. The first is illegal immigrants who claim asylum. I cannot believe that it is right to reward illegality. There may be a reason for someone to leave their own country illegally, but there can be no reason illegally to enter this country, which offers sanctuary to genuine refugees. That issue was not addressed in the Court of Appeal judgment.
The second group who no longer qualify for benefit are people who arrived in this country claiming to be something other than asylum seekers. It is not merely that they fail to make a claim for asylum at their port of entry, but they enter the country as business people, students or tourists. They succeed in convincing the immigration authorities that they have the means to support themselves, and they agree not to be a burden on British taxpayers.
One reason why those seeking to abuse the system do not claim asylum at their port of entry is that the process of deporting bogus immigrants is much more protracted after they enter the UK than if they make their claim at the port. I cannot believe that that group should be entitled to benefits if they subsequently change their story—but that issue was not addressed in the judgment by the Court of Appeal.
The third group affected are those whose claim for asylum is turned down after due consideration by the immigration authorities, but who then appeal. British citizens do not generally receive benefit while appealing against its refusal. Successive Governments have upheld that policy, because otherwise, every unsuccessful British benefit claimant would have an incentive to appeal against refusal of benefit. Following the judgment, asylum seekers are now entitled to retain benefit during an appeal. Until the new regulations took effect in February, the vast majority of asylum seekers appealed against rejection, yet 97 per cent. of their appeals turned out to be unfounded.
In the case of British claimants, nearly half eventually win their appeals against benefit refusal, compared to the handful of asylum claimants. It would be extraordinary to treat asylum seekers—only 3 per cent. of whom are found to be genuine refugees—more generously than British citizens, nearly half of whose claims are found to be genuine. That issue was not addressed in the judgment of the Court of Appeal.
In one respect only, British citizens appealing against refusal are treated more leniently than foreign asylum seekers. If a British claimant's appeal is upheld, benefit is backdated. That has not been the case with asylum seekers
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whose refugee status is confirmed on appeal. I propose in future that any refugee whose appeal is successful will have his entitlement to benefits backdated. That will mean that, where families, friends or voluntary groups are convinced of the validity of an individual's claim, they will be able to support the claimant in the knowledge that he will be able to reimburse them when his claim for refugee status is accepted.
By removing the incentives for bogus asylum seekers to come to this country or to lodge valueless appeals, fewer bogus claims will be clogging up the system. Genuine refugees will have their applications processed and right to stay established much more quickly. In any case, genuine refugees come here not to claim our benefits but to escape persecution. It is as much in the interests of genuine refugees as of taxpayers that action should be taken to discourage unfounded applications. The interests of genuine refugees are damaged if consideration of their applications for asylum are held up by a huge and growing number of unfounded applications from economic migrants.
The court had no difficulty accepting my objective of discouraging economic migrants. Since the regulations were introduced in February, the message has been getting across. The number of asylum claims was down 7 per cent. in March, one quarter in April and nearly one half in May, and 84 per cent. of that decline was due to a fall of in-country applications. That is good news above all for genuine refugees, as it will be easier to deal speedily with their claims.
We are determined that the judgment will not provide a blank cheque for bogus asylum seekers. We must clearly move as quickly as possible to restore the position and reinstate the message. The February regulations were debated in both Houses, and the policy was endorsed by healthy majorities. Their conformity with primary legislation has been considered by five judges. Three endorsed the Government's position. In the latest judgment, two judges ruled the regulations ultra vires. The latest judgment takes effect immediately, and is being implemented by Benefits Agency offices. It will remain in effect unless and until it is reversed by a higher court or overtaken by primary legislation.
To leave the judgment in effect would mean disbursing nearly £300 million a year—the vast majority of it on bogus claimants. That is not in line with the clearly expressed wish of Parliament, in the interests of taxpayers or in the interests of genuine refugees—who come here not to claim our benefits but to seek our liberties.
The House is determined that Britain should remain a sanctuary for people fleeing persecution. We are acting now to ensure that this country remains a safe haven, not a soft touch.
Mr. Chris Smith: Is it not profoundly telling that the Secretary of State—the latest in a straggling line of Ministers—has had to be taught the rules of natural justice by the Appeal Court? Is it not the case that, during the past two years alone, Ministers have been found to have acted unlawfully on four occasions by the Appeal Court and on seven occasions by the High Court?
Did not the Appeal Court on Friday administer a timely reminder to the Secretary of State that no Government, however long in office and however arrogant they may have grown, are above the laws of common humanity and justice?

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Does not the Secretary of State feel ashamed that his policy earned the most damning of indictments from Lord Justice Brown, who said that the measures would
"necessarily contemplate for some a life so destitute that to my mind no civilised nation can tolerate it"?
Does he understand that simply using a whipped vote to force through a further change in primary legislation in order to get around an inconvenient decision of the courts is yet another demonstration of the incompetence of the present Administration?
Does the Secretary of State not realise that his measures—even if they are subsequently implemented—will come nowhere near achieving the savings for the public purse that he has claimed? Is he not aware of the enormous extra cost that local authorities already have to incur, especially where the needs of children have to be met? Is he not simply saving money from one part of the public purse and imposing extra cost on another?
Are not the Secretary of State's claims about dramatically lower numbers claiming asylum themselves misleading? The Government's published figures show that there were 9,305 applications in the first quarter of 1996, compared with 9,905 in the first quarter of 1995 and 7,110 in the first quarter of 1994. Is not the fall in numbers that he claims simply the usual effect of the winter and spring quarters?
Is not the real answer to the problem to speed up the processing of asylum applications, rather than to remove all means of support from those seeking asylum? In that respect, are not the Government doing worse rather than better? Last September, there were 64,000 outstanding applications. By November, the figure had risen to 68,000.
The Secretary of State's argument comparing asylum seekers with British citizens applying for benefits is unsound. He is simply not comparing like with like. Can he not see the difference between someone appealing against a decision on the facts of his entitlement based on an objective criterion relating to his circumstances and someone appealing against a decision on the Home Secretary's opinion as to the genuineness of his fear and anxiety? Surely those are two completely different circumstances.
Let me welcome the right hon. Gentleman's decision to backdate eligibility if an appeal is subsequently successful, but point out that it does not address the need to stay alive while an appeal is being considered.
Does the Secretary of State not understand that his policy is forcing many of those who are legitimately seeking refuge from persecution to become completely destitute? Would he like to tell the young man from Eritrea who came to my advice surgery, who fled his country in fear of his life, who put in his asylum application three days after arriving here, and who is existing on one free meal a day from a local church, what precisely he is expected to do in the meantime?
Does the Secretary of State not realise that his measures affect the genuine and the non-genuine alike, and that all the evidence—including the facts produced by his right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary—shows that more genuine applicants apply in-country than at the port of entry?
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Will the Secretary of State now at last acknowledge that, in a supposedly civilised country, he is leaving people to starve, and has acted with both inhumanity and injustice? Will he now think again and abandon his Foolish intention to legislate his way round the problem? Common humanity demands nothing less.
Mr. Lilley: The hon. Gentleman said that I needed to be taught justice. I was then being taught in company with judges in the lower court and the most senior judge of all who have heard this case, who agreed with my position.
The hon. Gentleman says that the decision is a damning indictment of our policy. If so, it is a damning indictment of a policy, on the treatment of benefit claimants who are appealing against refusal of benefit, that was supported on both sides of the House. The distinction that he tried to draw between the treatment of appeals against refusal of benefit and appeals against refusal of asylum was a distinction without a difference, and bogus in every way.
The hon. Gentleman says that we will not achieve the savings that we set out to achieve. On the contrary, our estimates of savings were based on the assumption that the measures simply checked the rise in the number of asylum seekers. To the extent that they reduce the numbers as they have so far done, the savings will be greater than we anticipated, not less.
The hon. Gentleman claims that the figures do not show a decline, but used figures for the number of claims Largely before the measures had taken effect. The figures for the months since the measures took effect show a 7 per cent. drop in claims in March, a 27 per cent. drop in April, and nearly a 50 per cent. drop in May. He is simply factually wrong.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned a specific case of a claimant. I cannot comment on a specific case, but I can ask questions that he should have asked and answered. Did that claimant tell a different story at the port of entry? Did he come from another safe country and shop around countries before coming here? If not, why did he not make the claim at the port when he was asked his reason for entering this country?
The simple question that the hon. Gentleman did not answer is what Labour would do. Would it allow to stand, or reinstate, the court's decision and the old regulations, so that the House would be obliged to spend £300 million a year on a group of people of whom more than 90 per cent. are subsequently found to have made invalid claims? It is all very well for him to take the sanctimonious high ground but not say whether he would change things. He is like the Levite in the parable of the good Samaritan—only he does not pass by on the other side. He leans over, sees the Samaritan in the gutter, expresses great sympathy, and then says, "I shall subject your matter to a review." The hon. Gentleman is not going to say whether there will be any help from a Labour Government.
The simple fact is that fraud is wrong. The whole House recognises that it is wrong, whether it is perpetrated by a domestic claimant or a foreign claimant. Labour has always been the friend of the fraudster. It has now shown that it is the friend of bogus asylum seekers and the enemy of hard-working people in this country of all races, who simply want to ensure that we remain a safe haven but not a soft touch.
Mr. Peter Brooke: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that the

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welcome concession that he has made on backdated benefits will continue to apply if the Home Office decides to challenge the decision to reverse the original decision on appeal?
Mr. Lilley: There is a simple answer to my right hon. Friend's question: yes.
Mr. David Chidgey: Does the Secretary of State accept that the withdrawal of benefit has caused severe and intense hardship to some asylum seekers, and that changes in policies on immigration and benefits have created such fear among some of them that they are avoiding any contact with support agencies? Does he accept that those policies are standing the concept of British justice on its head? Under this regime, asylum seekers are considered guilty until they can prove their innocence.
Mr. Lilley: Before the regulations came in, the Refugee Council said that there would be terrible problems and that the streets would be full of destitute asylum claimers. After some months of operation of the regulations, it has had to admit that
"fewer asylum seekers than were expected have made contact with agencies or been visible on the streets."
To suggest that asylum seekers are so destitute that they are too afraid to go to people who can help them seems absurd. It suggests that, when asylum seekers do not need help, they go to people who can help them, but when they need it, they do not. That is not a credible explanation. The alarmist fears stirred up by groups—sometimes in very good faith, through genuine fear that the regulations would have a damaging effect—have not materialised. The claims about destitution are based largely on theory rather than practice.
Dame Angela Rumbold: Does my right hon. Friend accept that the vast majority of my constituents—I have a multicultural constituency—are absolutely fed up to the back teeth with fraud and asylum seekers' abuse of the system? They will be very pleased with his statement. All parts of the community have felt very strongly about the matter for a considerable time. Does he agree that it is monstrous hypocrisy of the Labour party to condemn his very sensible statement?
Mr. Lilley: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for her support for the measures. She is right to say that they are supported in all communities. I believe that they have a great deal of support among genuine asylum seekers—although little, of course, among bogus asylum seekers and those who try to misrepresent them.
Mr. Gerald Bermingham: Will the Secretary of State acknowledge that the Home Secretary, who is sitting next to him on the Front Bench, is partly to blame? If the system is underfunded, so that a claim's genuineness cannot be tested effectively and quickly, there will, of course, be delay.
What worries me is that, unless immigrants at the port of entry are able to see a friendly face rather than an official face, they do not often seek the advice and guidance they need, which leads to delay in registering their claim. Once they have registered their claims, they
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do not have the support of family and friends—unlike resident applicants. Unless the appeal or their application is processed quickly, they are left in a state of limbo. If, in turn, their appeal is delayed—or, as we know often from experience, wrongly decided—the situation spirals. Are they to starve until they get justice?
Mr. Lilley: The hon. Gentleman's initial question referred to the resources put into the system speedily to assess claims. My right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary has considerably increased the resources. I have transferred to his Department from my budget £37 million to increase the resources further. It is impossible, however, to keep up with an ever-growing flow of bogus asylum seekers if one positively invites them here by promising them benefits when they arrive. As a result, the system is clogged up to the detriment of genuine refugees whose claims cannot be assessed.
I should have thought that the whole House would welcome the fall in the number of claims since the measures were introduced. The fall is predominantly of in-country claims, which suggests that the hon. Gentleman's rationale for such claims is not founded. People have learnt that, if they are going to claim, they should claim at the port of entry or not at all. It would therefore be right to reinstate the policy and reaffirm it, with the improvement that I have mentioned, which so far the Opposition have failed even to welcome.
Mr. Tony Marlow: Am I right? [Interruption.] Did I understand it correctly that a member of the judiciary said that the policy of this House and this Parliament was "uncivilised"? Have I missed something? Do the judiciary now have a democratic mandate to decide which laws are acceptable, or does this House and Parliament, on the balance of views in the country, continue to decide what the laws should be, while the judiciary apply them without being informed by their personal prejudices?
Mr. Lilley: My hon. Friend raises important points about the relationship between the courts and Parliament, but it would not be right for me to pursue those general points in light of a particular judgment that it is my duty to implement, appeal against or alter by primary legislation in Parliament—and I intend to do the last.
My hon. Friend referred to civilisation. Italy provides no benefits for asylum seekers at all, and France provides no benefits for asylum seekers after 12 months. In both respects, our provision is infinitely more civilised and better targeted than anything proposed by the Opposition, or provided in most other countries.
Mr. Jeremy Corbyn: Does the Secretary of State accept that the regulations introduced this year have caused a great deal of misery and poverty? Asylum seekers have been forced to sleep in churches and to beg on the streets, and they are afraid of going to authorities of any sort. Has he not created an underclass of fear in our society? Is it not time that he met some of the organisations that are doing their best to look after asylum seekers, who are quite justly pursuing appeals, to find out what they have to say, rather than pursuing his own prejudices?
Mr. Lilley: I am rather sad that the hon. Gentleman, to whom I have previously paid tribute for his consistent

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interest in the matter, did not express gratitude for the change to which he alluded in previous debates in this House—rendering the treatment of asylum seekers more similar to that of British benefit claimants by making their successful claims backdated to the beginning of the claim. I should have thought that he would welcome that, and the change will have the effect that I mentioned in my statement.
I am constantly in touch, as are my fellow Ministers, with groups working with asylum seekers. Almost all of them report that the outcome of the regulations was much less severe than any of them feared and most had led us to believe.
Mr. Graham Riddick: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the vast majority of people in this country find it unbelievable that foreigners can come here claiming to be business men, students or tourists, and, once here, can seek asylum status and qualify for state benefits? Is it not highly revealing, and a timely reminder to the British people, that, when it comes to a choice between supporting the taxpaying British public and bogus asylum seekers, the Labour party once again supports those who would be a burden on the taxpayer?
Mr. Lilley: My hon. Friend puts it extremely well. The man or woman in the street would see the matter exactly like my hon. Friend, and would be mystified by Labour's position on this issue.
Mr. Mike Gapes: Does the Secretary of State recognise that the legal judgment gives him an opportunity to table an amendment that would allow a reasonable period—perhaps a few weeks—in which someone who had fled for their life to this country after having been tortured would have a chance to understand the procedures and would be able to make an application, rather than be left destitute? I am not talking about an indefinite period—just a few weeks. After this debate, will he think again and table a sensible amendment that might unite this House and the country behind a sensible policy?
Mr. Lilley: The simple fact is that those who are genuinely escaping persecution come here because they trust this country and do not trust the country they are leaving. They come here to seek our liberties and protections—not because they are in terror of this Government. If they were, they would go somewhere else.
There is a legal distinction between those who claim at the port and those who claim in-country, in that it is more difficult to exercise deportation rights on the latter if they are found to be bogus. That is why many are advised to wait a while and make their claim in-country. I do not believe that it is right that people who come here telling one story should get benefits when they tell another.
Mr. Toby Jessel: Is my right hon. Friend aware that many of us feel that Britain has a long and honourable history of acting compassionately towards people abroad who have been persecuted—perhaps persecuted to death? But my constituents do not expect the Government to make the taxpayer pay for unlimited numbers of bogus asylum seekers, nor do they expect the
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Court of Appeal to do other than uphold public policy as expressed through our parliamentary democracy. My constituents do not expect the Court of Appeal to make up the law as it goes along.
Mr. Lilley: I am sure that my hon. Friend is absolutely right about the attitudes of the British public, who want to give refuge to the fairly small number of genuine refugees who come to this country to escape persecution. But the public recognise that there is also a great wave of economic migration, and—although there is sympathy for economic migrants—we need sensible immigration control, which should not be undermined by abuse of the asylum system. The role of the Court of Appeal is important, although I should not respond to my hon. Friend's question in the context of a specific judgment with which I have the duty of dealing.
Mr. Alan Howarth: May I appeal to the Secretary of State and to his party, on the ground of humanity, to abandon this policy, because it is cruel? If, regrettably, he intends to pursue it, I welcome the fact that he intends to do so by means of primary legislation. Have not the Government driven increasing quantities of substantial and contentious legislation through Parliament using the procedures for secondary legislation, which are perfunctory and subject to entirely inadequate parliamentary scrutiny? Should we not be grateful that the judges at least are willing to stand up for the decencies and liberties upon which previous generations of Conservative Back Benchers would have felt it their duty to insist?
Mr. Lilley: The hon. Gentleman now finds himself in uncomfortable company, because his new party tabled a clause on pension-splitting measures during debates on the Family Law Bill the other day that gave the most draconian powers to Government, through secondary legislation by a Henry VIII clause, to alter any legislation by regulation. We have no intention of using those powers, and we shall introduce the measure through primary legislation. The Opposition wanted that clause, which gives a clue to the way in which they would govern this country if, heaven forbid, they should ever get a majority in this place.
Mrs. Elizabeth Peacock: Is my right hon. Friend aware that many of my constituents will welcome his statement, as many people in my part of the world are sick and tired of paying taxes for illegal immigrants and people seeking asylum who are not genuine? Which countries would offer similar benefits to me were Ito seek asylum?
Mr. Lilley: I think my hon. Friend can be confident that she will not have to seek asylum either now or after the general election, and she will continue to exercise a prominent role in this country. But she is right about the views of British citizens, and about the fact that our benefits and arrangements are honourable, well tailored and—in many respects—superior to those provided in many other countries.
Mr. Harry Barnes: At the start of his statement, the Secretary of State said that we

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should not reward illegality. As he has been turned over by the courts, does that principle apply to him? How will he suffer from that decision?
Mr. Lilley: The Court of Appeal was delivering a verdict on a decision of Parliament—a decision endorsed by a healthy majority in this House and by a substantial majority in the other place. If there is any criticism, it is of the Houses of Parliament, and we must collectively bear the shame that the hon. Gentleman attaches to us.
Mr. Patrick Nicholls: Anybody who wants to see whether there is a difference between new Labour and the Conservative party ought to look at the report of the exchanges in this House, as my right hon. Friend has announced today something that would strike most people as no more than ordinary common sense. Will my right hon. Friend consider—although perhaps not today—the fact that judges take it upon themselves to strike down laws passed by the Houses of Parliament? If judges now feel entitled to do this, should they not take a 70 per cent. pay cut and get some democratic authority, instead of subverting the constitution that they are in place to uphold?
Mr. Lilley: My hon. Friend makes some telling points, which I shall not follow, for the reasons that I have already given. He is right to say that I am reasserting the decision of Parliament—seeking the assent of Parliament to do so by primary, rather than secondary, legislation. The role of the courts in this is a broader matter, to which I do not want to allude at the moment.
Mr. Neil Gerrard: Rather than complaining that the Court of Appeal did not address the issues, why does the right hon. Gentleman not admit that the court found against him in the most scathing terms? Before he rushes into primary legislation, will he remember that, before he introduced the regulations, he was advised against them by the Social Security Advisory Committee and every organisation and individual that works and deals with refugees? He ought to pause and remember that before rushing into primary legislation.
On the question of applications at the port, why, if applications at the port are the only ones that can be regarded as genuine, which seems to be his view, has the Home Office given refugee status to many people who have applied in-country?
Mr. Lilley: The one thing I do recall about those who advised against introducing the regulations was that, in almost every case, the forecast they made of what would follow once they were introduced has proved erroneous. That gives me some confidence that their judgment was wrong.
Mr. Jacques Arnold: My constituents expect political judgments to be made by this, their elected House of Commons, and not by remote judges who have probably never met a bogus asylum applicant in their lives. My constituents—both Sikh and other constituents—live cheek by jowl with hundreds of bogus political asylum applicants. My constituents resent those people, who at their expense laugh all the way to the Benefits Agency.
Mr. Lilley: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. This is the place to take political decisions, and therefore this
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House has a right to know where both parties stand on the issue. We have been discussing it for the best part of an hour, and we still do not know for sure whether the Labour party proposes to go to the people, saying that: it will spend £300 million—90 per cent. of it or more on bogus asylum seekers.
Dr. Norman A. Godman: May I point out to the Secretary of State that many people in Scotland find it deeply offensive that we are detaining in Her Majesty's prison Greenock those persons awaiting deportation from Scotland? Why are the Government so hostile to the idea of a detention centre being built at Glasgow airport, as I and many others have suggested? The BAA is willing to find space for it.
I see that the Home Secretary is whispering in the right hon. Gentleman's ear. That is an important issue. Those people should not be detained in a small, overcrowded prison alongside remand prisoners. The right hon. Gentleman should practise in Scotland what he has practised in England and Wales.
Mr. Lilley: That is, of course, a matter for my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary, who will have heard and considered what the hon. Gentleman said. The ruling of the court, however, was that the practice of detaining refugees and putting them in hostels and camps was an alternative to providing benefits, should we wish to do so.
Mr. Anthony Coombs: I welcome, although I am not terribly surprised at, the effect of the regulations in reducing in-house asylum applications, the vast majority of which are totally bogus, as we all know. Does my right hon. Friend agree that the change will have two effects? It will save the taxpayer about £200 million a year, which the Opposition always seem to forget, and it will improve the climate for genuine asylum seekers, who need their cases to be properly considered.
Mr. Lilley: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Those are the two key points. I am only sorry that the Opposition have been unable to see them with the clarity with which my hon. Friend does.
Mr. Tam Dalyell: May I ask a personal, factual question? I hope that it is not offensive. Has the Secretary of State, or indeed the Home Secretary, been present at a port of entry when wretched asylum seekers are arriving? Before I became a Member of Parliament, I worked for P and O, and I did see that. The people were bewildered, and could not answer any rational questions. Have Ministers any idea what it is like to go to completely strange shores, often in desperate circumstances? At that time, the refugees came from Ghana, and doubtless from many other places. Have Ministers any idea of the sheer bewilderment? One cannot ask people to be rational at such a point.
Mr. Lilley: The hon. Gentleman misunderstands. Those who are most bewildered reveal their circumstances to the immigration authorities when they arrive. My concern is those who have concocted a convincing tale to get through, by pretending to be business men, tourists or students, and who demonstrate that they have the means to look after themselves while they are in this country—

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they probably have a return ticket, and have gone through the visa system. If they subsequently change their minds, having sussed the place out and learned how the benefit system works, it would be extraordinary for them to be entitled to benefits. Such people will have convinced the authorities that they have the means to support themselves.
Ms Glenda Jackson: From the Secretary of State's reply, it would seem that the definition of a bogus asylum seeker is failure to apply at the port of entry. As other hon. Members have said, many of the most vulnerable people do not know that that system applies and do not have the English language which would enable them to ask the relevant questions and to understand the relevant answers.
If the Secretary of State is really unaware of the hardship that the changes to the rules made by his regulations will cause, may I give him an example from my constituency? A woman from Somalia is claiming asylum status. She is seven months pregnant and has absolutely no money, nowhere to live and no friends or relatives to support her. The Secretary of State might not find that shameful, but I and many of my constituents certainly do.
Mr. Lilley: The simple fact is that people who have genuine claims can make them at the port of entry. It is not merely that they have to make the asylum claim there—they have to refrain from telling some entirely spurious and different story. If they say that they are not sure why they are here, they will probably be questioned further until it is discovered that the real reason is to seek asylum. Then they will be entitled to benefits.
If people got here with the story that they were coming for a different purpose, with evidence to that effect and proof that they had the means to support themselves and accepted that they would not be a burden on the British taxpayer, they should not be entitled to help from the taxpayer when they subsequently change their story. I am astonished that the hon. Lady thinks otherwise.
Mrs. Margaret Ewing: Does the Secretary of State realise that, with the small exception of the positive amendment produced today, his continuing policy will be roundly condemned by all those who work with refugees and asylum seekers, not least the Churches? Whatever political niche he may find in the history books, it will certainly not be as the good Samaritan.
If the hon. gentleman is going to insist that applications for asylum must be made at the port of entry by people who are repressed, downtrodden and fearful, and who have fled God knows what, will he ensure that there will be people there who speak every language, to enable them
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to understand the situation? That includes Eritrean, which might help hon. Members on the Opposition Front Bench, who referred to that matter earlier.
Mr. Lilley: I can reassure the hon. Lady that my right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary ensures that there are a wide array of interpreters covering many scores of languages to deal with the problems of people who would not otherwise be able to make themselves understood. That issue is covered, and I should have made it clear in response to the hon. Member for Hampstead and Highgate (Ms Jackson).
Mrs. Maria Fyfe: We have heard a lot from Conservative Members about what they allege their constituents think. I am sure that my constituents want a system that is just, fair and humane. They do not expect to see it while this Government are in power.
If the Secretary of State really plans to help genuine asylum seekers, will he change his mind about withdrawing the Benefits Agency freephone telephone line for ethnic minorities? If not, how does he think that its withdrawal will help people genuinely seeking asylum?
Mr. Lilley: The hon. Lady says that most of her constituents want a fair system. Of course they do; but I do not think that they will think that it is fair if British citizens who are refused benefit, appeal against the refusal and get no benefit while they are pursuing their appeal for the next six months, are treated much less fairly than those who come from abroad who are refused asylum, appeal against the decision and—under the ruling and the apparent policy of the Opposition—will be paid benefit while they do so, even though nearly half the British appellants are found to be genuine against only 3 per cent. of asylum claimers.
As for the freephone line, the objective is to encourage people to apply direct to their local offices and not via the freephone, which, in a large proportion of cases, we have found, has to refer them to their local offices. It will cut out the middleman and speed up the process.
Mr. Piara S. Khabra: What plans, if any, has the Secretary of State to give extra money to local authorities such as mine, where many asylum seekers live, that have to pick up the bill for supporting the people who will be deprived of benefits?
Mr. Lilley: The hon. Gentleman may not have heard the question of my right hon. Friend the Member for City of London and Westminster, South (Mr. Brooke), who has—naturally—campaigned for proper compensation to be given to local authorities such as his, which have large concentrations of asylum seekers. We responded to that by reaching an agreement with the local authority associations to reimburse a very significant proportion of the costs. That agreement is in place and is unaffected by the judgment.

Points of Order
5.11 pm
Mrs. Ann Clwyd: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. I seek your guidance and, I hope, your assistance, on a matter that I raised with you last week: the tabling of early-day motions.
I understood you to say that, when the judicial inquiry into child abuse in Clwyd was set up by a motion of this House, the matter would become sub judice. I understand that, but, on Thursday evening, I attempted to table a motion on child abuse that related to a period before that which is being investigated by the judicial inquiry, whose terms of reference are from 1974 onwards. The motion I attempted to table related specifically to 1971. You said that you would use your discretion in these matters. I am asking you to use it in this matter.
Madam Speaker: As the hon. Lady knows, I have not seen the early-day motion to which she refers. Without giving a commitment, if she would like to resubmit it, I shall certainly take a look at it.
Mr. David Ashby: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. My point of order relates to the Defamation Bill with which we shall deal shortly. Would you prefer me to raise it then?
Madam Speaker: The hon. Gentleman may raise his point of order now.
Mr. Ashby: I am much obliged, Madam Speaker. I raise this point because you are the person who supports Back Benchers and looks after their rights. You will recall that the Defamation Bill had its Second Reading three weeks ago in similar circumstances to those of today. The debate started at about this time, and there was a 7 o'clock vote. I believe that I was one of only two Back Benchers who spoke. I may be forgiven for having felt that I had something to offer the House on that occasion because I felt that, having been a victim, I had a knowledge of the subject. I had much information to give the House about what happens to victims and about how improvements could be made.
I was somewhat surprised—I should not have been, but I was—that I was not selected for the Committee. None the less, I tabled many amendments with the help of my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley), and he was ready to speak to them. I attended the Committee, although not a member, I was unable to participate, and had to sit in the public—
Madam Speaker: Order. What is the point of order?
Mr. Ashby: The point of order relates to my rights as a Back Bencher. I was surprised to find that most of the amendments that I had tabled were not called on that occasion. Notwithstanding that, I tabled many amendments—
Madam Speaker: Order. We have a lot of business before us. If the hon. Gentleman is asking me why I have not selected some of the amendments that he has tabled, the answer is that the Speaker never gives reasons for the non-selection of amendments. He asked about the
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Committee of Selection. That is not the Speaker's business. I hope that I have dealt with his point of order, and that we can speedily move on to the very important Bill before us.
Mr. Ashby: I should like to continue with the point that I was making.
Madam Speaker: I am a most tolerant lady. I ask the hon. Gentleman to put his point so that I can deal with it.
Mr. Ashby: What is a simple Back 13encher to do when he is ridden over roughshod by the Government and by the Speaker and not able to put his points?
Madam Speaker: Order. I very much resent the hon. Gentleman's last comment. For most of this morning, I carefully examined the amendments that he tabled. Like every Speaker before me, I will not give the reasons why I cannot select them. If he were to examine them more carefully, he would know very well why they are unacceptable.
Mr. Matthew Taylor: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. You will be aware that, over the weekend, Albert Tong was arrested for deportation, and subsequently suffered what is thought to have been a mild heart attack. The Minister of State, Home Office said that the Home Office had not been informed that he had health problems. She later accepted that, although the Home Office had been told, Ministers had not.
Today, it has been revealed that an immigration office letter specifically said that the Secretary of State had been informed and had considered that fact. In that light, should not the Minister come to the House to explain what inquiry she has undertaken and how the letters were sent? Can you do anything to help that happen?
Madam Speaker: The hon. Gentleman appears to be asking the Government to make a statement. If there was to have been such a statement, we would all have known about it, because it would have been on the annunciator by 1 o'clock today.
Sir Terence Higgins: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. I understand that you would prefer to take points of order on the Defamation Bill now rather than at the beginning of proceedings on it. You have selected new clause 9, with which are associated several other amendments, including amendment No. 21. On Report, we do not normally debate clause stand part. However, amendment No. 21 only partially amends clause 13, to which it relates.
If new clause 9 were carried, we would take amendment No. 21 as consequential. It would effectively leave a space in which the new clause could be inserted. If I understand the situation correctly, it would not be possible to vote against clause 13, which has deficiencies other than those covered by the amendment. If that is the case, when that rather innovative clause returns to the

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Lords, where it arose, perhaps they would be able to take into account the fact that we had not been able to vote on it.
Madam Speaker: I hope that I can help the right hon. Gentleman. If new clause 9 is not carried, I can accept a Division on amendment No. 21. That will clear the matter up.
Sir Terence Higgins: I understand that very well, but it may be that we come first to the amendment, which goes only part of the way that one wishes to go. It would be strange to vote against an amendment of which one is in favour when one cannot subsequently go further by voting against the clause itself.
Madam Speaker: New clause 9 comes before amendment No. 21, so the House will be voting on new clause 9 before we reach amendment No. 21.
Mrs. Ann Taylor: Further to that point of order, Madam Speaker. It may be for the benefit of the House to clarify the situation. Any vote on amendment No. 21 would come at the end of all the proceedings. As my hon. Friend the Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng) will make clear, the Opposition are not suggesting that new clause 9 is the best possible solution. It will be suggested that new clause 9 is a possible alternative, but not better than complete deletion, which will still be an option open to the House after the debate on amendment No. 40.
Sir Terence Higgins: That may be so, and I shall need to think about it. Would I be right in thinking that, if amendment No. 21 were carried, the new clause would be knocked out?
Madam Speaker: No. What is the right hon. Gentleman asking? If we carry new clause 9, what we do on amendment No. 21 will depend on what the House indicates are its wishes at the time. I am in the hands of the House. We have to deal with new clause 9 first; we shall reach amendment No. 21 much later in the proceedings, by which time the House will have made up its mind how to deal with it.
Sir Terence Higgins: I am so sorry to persist, Madam Speaker, but this is a matter of constitutional importance. If we vote for new clause 9, we then reach amendment No. 21, which knocks out virtually all of clause 13. The amendment proposed goes only part of the way towards removing deficiencies in the original clause.
Madam Speaker: My advice is that the Bill would go to the House of Lords for it to consider the position. That is all we can do—once we have made our decisions, all we can do is refer the matter to the House of Lords for it to make a decision.
Sir Terence Higgins: Madam Speaker, in that case, the position is clear and the House of Lords will need to consider it. We shall not have an opportunity to knock out clause 13 completely.
Mr. Peter Bottomley: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. We have just had a statement from the
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Secretary of State for Social Security as a consequence of a decision taken by judges. He has proposed that the House should consider primary legislation to rectify the position. There has been a development on defamation over the past few years: judges have developed the law to allow them to interfere in awards made by juries, contrary to the previous opinion of judges and common law.
We have a difficulty: although seven groups of amendments have been selected for debate this afternoon, there are also two new clauses to debate. One subject was clearly a matter of interest—on Second Reading, in Committee and, in relation to some of the proposals, on Report—but unfortunately it was not possible to table an amendment which would have had the same effect as some of the new clauses and which would have returned to the House the question whether judges should be able to overturn jury awards. That is one area of defamation in which I do not have a personal interest.
The House faces a difficulty in accepting what the judges have determined the law to be, without being able to consider the subject in detail, either in Committee or on Report. It would be helpful to the House to know how it could consider the matter while debating the Bill.
Madam Speaker: That is not a point of order for me. It is a matter that will become clear in debate across the House, but it is not a point of order for the Chair of the House.
Mr. Bottomley: I am not criticising the Chair—I fully understand the Chair's role in allowing the House to consider points made by right hon. and hon. Members. As one of the new clauses has not been selected, and as it is not possible to table an amendment, it will not be possible for the House to effect the law as developed by judges. As the previous question and answer session with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Social Security demonstrated, when the judges believe that the law is not as Parliament believes it be, the House should have an opportunity, when considering a relevant Bill, to consider the sort of amendment or clause that has been tabled, but not selected.
Madam Speaker: I can select only the new clauses and amendments that are in order and that relate to the Bill. As I said earlier, I cannot give reasons for the non-selection of some new clauses and amendments, but many of them did not relate to the Bill and were out of order. I cannot select amendments that do not directly relate to the Bill. I can take no further points of order on the subject.
Mr. Bottomley: I think I must explain—
Madam Speaker: Order. I think that the hon. Gentleman has just explained everything.
Mr. Bottomley: I am not challenging the role of the Chair; I spoke specifically in support of the role of the Speaker. How can the House consider judge-made law if it is not possible to move an amendment that is in order and if the new clause that has been tabled is out of order? That is the dilemma for the House.
Madam Speaker: The hon. Gentleman can vote on new clauses or amendments in any place, either in

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Committee—I believe that he was a member of the Standing Committee—or on the Floor of the House. It is up to the House to make its decisions. Those are not points of order that can be resolved in this way. We must move on.

Orders of the Day
  Defamation Bill [Lords]
  As amended (in the Standing Committee), considered.
  Defamation Bill [Lords]
    New clause 9

      EVIDENCE RELATING TO PROCEEDINGS IN PARLIAMENT
      '.—(1) Where proceedings in Parliament are in issue in defamation proceedings, the House of Parliament in which the proceedings in issue took place may, if such relief is sought in a petition from a plaintiff in those defamation proceedings who is or has been a Member of that House, waive for the purposes of those defamation proceedings the protection afforded to that person by any enactment or rule of law which prevents proceedings in Parliament being impeached or questioned in any court or place out of Parliament.
      (2) Where one House of Parliament waives that protection, any such enactment or rule of law shall not apply to prevent evidence being given, questions being asked or statements, submissions, comments or findings being made in or to the court about the conduct of the person in relation to whom it has been waived and no such proceedings in the court shall be regarded as infringing the privilege of that House, but—

      (a) the waiver of that protection by one House of Parliament does not affect its operation in relation to the other House;

      (b) the waiver of that protection in relation to one person does not affect its operation in relation to another; and

      (c) the waiver of that protection in relation to one cause of action does not affect its operation in relation to another cause of action.

      (3) Nothing done under this section shall affect the protection which is afforded to a person from legal liability for words spoken or things done in the course of or for the purposes of or incidental to any proceedings in Parliament by any enactment or rule of law.'.—[Mr. Boateng.]
      Brought up, and read the First time.
      5.25 pm
      Mr. Paul Boateng: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
      Madam Speaker: With this, it will be convenient to discuss the following: Amendment (a) to the proposed new clause, at end add—
      '(4) This section does not apply where the cause of action arose before the section came into force.'
      Amendment No. 21, in clause 13, page 10, line 32, leave out from beginning to end of line 17 on page 11.
      Amendment No. 43, in page 11, line 17, at end insert—
      '(4) This section does not apply where the cause of action arose before the section came into force.'.
      Amendment No. 22, in clause 18, page 13, leave out line 2.
      Amendment No. 44, in page 13, leave out line 15.
      Amendment No. 23, in page 13, leave out line 31.
      Amendment No. 24, in clause 19, page 14, leave out line 6.
      Mr. Boateng: New clause 9 and the amendments grouped with it arise as a result of a widespread concern in the House, which was reflected in Committee, at the proposals in clause 13. That clause, as drafted,

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      would overturn, and change in relation to article IX of the Bill of Rights, a major plank of our constitution. It is proposed to enable an hon. Member who is suing for libel to waive a privilege that has long been enjoyed by Members of the House in order to enable him to sue more effectively. It is also proposed to enable the court to determine and to rule on matters which would otherwise be considered proceedings of the House and on which it would otherwise be unable to rule.
      In his point of order, the right hon. Member for Worthing (Sir T. Higgins) outlined the dilemma that the House faces as a result of the Government's handling of the matter. We were told, both in the other place by the Lord Chancellor and in this House by the then Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department, that the Government's stance on the subject was neutral. We were told that there would be ample opportunity to debate the matter on Report. Were it not for the fact that the Opposition tabled new clause 9 and for the action of other Opposition Members in tabling the amendments, we would not be having this debate.
      The Government have been far from neutral on the matter. What we wanted at this stage of our deliberations was a full debate that enabled the House to determine what course of action it wished to take in relation to this fundamental constitutional issue. There should have been a range of options that we as a House could freely debate—it will be a free vote for the Opposition, and, I understand, for Conservative Members. Those options would have contained each of the elements now included in new clause 9, in amendment (a) to it, and in amendments Nos. 21 and 43.
      New clause 9 enables a Member who is suing for libel to waive privilege, but only in narrowly defined circumstances and with the approval of the House. It is drafted to limit the capacity of the courts to rule on the extent of privileged proceedings of this House, and it reasserts the collective nature of parliamentary privilege as belonging to the House as a whole rather than an individual Member. That is central to our concerns—and, I hope, to those of some Conservative Members—about clause 13. Privilege is a matter for the House, not something that we would enjoy except as Members of the House. We enjoy privilege so that we can better carry out the democratic purposes of the House.
      New clause 9 asserts the collective nature of privilege in a way that recognises also that there are hard cases. The hon. Member for Tatton (Mr. Hamilton) probably feels that his is just such a case. When hard cases arise, however, it is surely right that the whole House should determine whether someone's privilege should be waived; not the individual Member.
      Amendment No. 21 deletes the whole of clause 13, which was inserted on Third Reading in the other place, leaving the law as it stands. The effect of amendment No. 43 and of amendment (a) to new clause 9 is to ensure that no change will apply retrospectively; in other words, they bring clause 13 or new clause 9—whichever the House determines to proceed with—in line with every other major provision in the Bill.
      The dilemma outlined by the right hon. Member for Worthing in his important point of order is an exact consequence of how the Government have chosen to
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      proceed. The proper course would have been to produce a range of options for the House to consider. Then we could have held a free debate on them; the right hon. Member for Worthing could have chosen, for instance, to vote to remove clause 13 altogether. Then, if it fell, we could have debated whether the House, in certain circumstances, should be able to waive privilege to allow a Member to remedy a particular injustice. Thereafter we could have determined whether clause 13 met the requirements of the House in terms of privilege.
      The Government have failed to give the House the right opportunity. Indeed, the whole issue has been mishandled from start to finish. There were absurd scenes in the other place, where Lord Hoffmann was "encouraged" to table an amendment. There had been an attempt, apparently, to table it earlier on, but it failed. So—exceptionally—the amendment was tabled on Third Reading, whereupon Lord Hoffmann proceeded not to vote for his own amendment.
      So, at a late stage in the debate and by a side wind, as it were, this important clause was added. Not only did Lord Hoffmann not vote for it, but he has since made it clear that there are arguments for and against his clause and he does not regard himself as having any brief to support it.
      That is no way to rewrite the constitution. The Government meanwhile claimed that they were neutral, but rejected attempts to refer the matter to a Joint Committee of both Houses, where it could have been considered with care, drawing on the expertise of outside disinterested constitutional lawyers. In that way, we could have benefited from their advice to the full. But the Government chose not to take this course; instead they pushed the measure through the House, and that is no way to change the constitution.
      Mr. David Ashby: Proceedings in the two cases concerning Members of the House were stayed on a procedural point. Procedural points are not points of law and they can be retrospective. Why is the hon. Gentleman supporting an amendment that would not allow the changes to be retrospective? Is that not an act of meanness by his party, aimed at our party?
      Mr. Boateng: I am sorry that I gave way. I had hoped that the hon. Gentleman would understand that both sides of the House want the matter to be regarded as separate from party politics and from the people concerned. We are worried about how it has been handled. A major constitutional change has, in effect, been brought in on the back of a couple of cases.
      When the matter was debated in the other place, several Lords and Ladies took an unprecedented and sudden interest in issues of law reform. There was a massive turnout on the Government Benches, whereas one would not have expected to find such keen interest in their Lordships' House. One suspects that that turnout was not wholly unrelated to the special and personal interests of the hon. Member for Tatton, and with their Lordships' sympathy for it. That sympathy may or may not be misplaced, but it should not in any case determine how we deal with an issue that goes to the very heart of our constitution.
      Article IX of the Bill of Rights has an important antecedent case history. It resulted from Sir John Eliot's case, from Sir William Williams's case, from Strode's

      57
      case and from the arrest of the five Members. It resulted too, from Peter Wentworth's persistent advocacy of the rights of Members of this House to freedom of speech against the great and mighty interests of the day. Is there to be added to those names the name of the hon. Member for Tatton? Is it really right that an article fashioned out of a desire to preserve and protect the privileges of this House, as a means of defending the interests of the people, should be subordinated to the special interests of the hon. Member for Tatton? Is that how we would wish to order our constitutional affairs? Of course not.
      When we consider this matter, we must do so free from the special interests represented by the hon. Member for Tattoo or the hon. Member for Torbay (Mr. Allason). Of course, understandably, they feel deeply about the injustice that they believe they have experienced. However, the privilege that they have—the privilege that they enjoy to say what they wish to say when they speak during the proceedings of the House—has its downside. The downside is that it is a privilege that may not be waived to enable them to preserve and to protect their special and personal interests.
      Sir Peter Tapsell: The hon. Gentleman has cited famous and historic cases that led to the Bill of Rights—cases in which individual Members of the House were in danger of being persecuted or bullied by the King, the sovereign or the Executive of the day. We are currently discussing an entirely new situation—it did not exist in those days. Individual Members—they could be from any side of the House at any time—can be subjected to persecution, not from the Executive or from the sovereign, but from what many people regard as an over-mighty press that is owned, for the most part, by foreigners. We have to try to bring up to date the ideas that led to the Bill of Rights. We have to protect Members of Parliament, in a modern and new situation, from the sorts of abuses that the Bill of Rights sought to protect them from in the 17th century.
      Mr. Boateng: The abuse of power—whether it be by the Crown, the Executive, an over-mighty subject or group of subjects or an overweening power outside the House—is something that the House ought to take cognisance of. However, the complaint of many Labour Members and, I suspect, of some Government Members is that clause 13, as it now stands, hands over to the judiciary the power that the House should have to preserve and to protect the privileges of the House against such over-mighty and overweening powers. That power does not belong with the judiciary; it belongs in the House. New clause 9 and our series of amendments seek to enable the House to arrive at a decision in that regard.
      When we examine the Prebble v. Television New Zealand case and the jurisprudence that lies behind it, we see that it is part and parcel of a series of cases that have addressed the issue of the extent and nature of parliamentary privilege. In the light of these cases, Hansard was opened up to the courts as an instrument by which it was possible for them to arrive at an interpretation of that which we have placed in statute. When we look at these cases, we see a greater willingness by the courts to define the extent of our privilege.
      It is ironic that we should be holding this debate in the immediate aftermath of a statement that has been brought about as a result of what some Conservative Members
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      suggested was an unjustified usurping of our powers by the judiciary. Some of those hon. Members are now about to hand over powers in relation to the House to the judiciary to enable it to determine, through the instrument of interpretation, the extent of our privilege.
      Those of us who are concerned about clause 13 believe that we ought to do that with great caution. If we allowed the courts to interpret privilege—in the way that clause 13 will do—we would be in danger of doing the House, its proceedings and the special role its Members play in a democracy a grave disservice.
      Mr. Tim Devlin: Earlier, the hon. Gentleman made a disparaging reference to my hon. Friend the Member for Tatton (Mr. Hamilton)—I hold no brief for him or for any other hon. Friend. If, for whatever reason, an individual is unpopular, what the hon. Gentleman proposes is still likely to lead to injustice. If the House decides not to support the individual Member, for whatever reason, an injustice can be perpetrated, can it not? We are seeking to protect any Member—whether we like him or not—from injustice in similar circumstances.
      5.45 pm
      Mr. Boateng: The hon. Gentleman misunderstands our purpose in new clause 9 and in the other amendments tabled in the names of my right hon. and hon. Friends. We wish to give the House a series of options. One of my concerns about clause 13 is that, although it maintains the collective nature of the privilege that the House enjoys so that it can better carry out its democratic purpose, it might lead to the House as a whole being required to look into and to determine the rights and wrongs of a particular case. In those circumstances, there is a danger that considerations other than the interests of justice—considerations of a personal nature—will intervene in the process.
      Because of my concern, my preference—there is to be a free vote and my colleagues will arrive at their own decision—is to delete clause 13. In that way, we would avoid the danger to which the hon. Member for Stockton, South (Mr. Devlin) referred. Equally important, we would avoid the danger that exists in relation to clause 13, which is dramatically illustrated not least by the very case in which the hon. Member for Tatton is involved. Under clause 13, as it is written, if one Member of the House is prepared to waive his privilege but another Member who is involved in the proceedings is not prepared to waive his privilege, what will happen?
      Sir Terence Higgins: The hon. Gentleman has moved on from the point that I wished to address. If he wishes to remove clause 13, he has the option to do so—he simply does not move new clause 9—and we would knock out clause 13.
      Mr. Boateng: We have chosen not to proceed in that way, in the hope—[Interruption.] I hear laughter from the Government Benches. This is a serious matter. It would have been preferable if the Leader of the House had delivered on what the Government promised: if all hon. Members were able to make a free choice between three options. The Labour party recognises that there may be hon. Members who accept the argument that in certain

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      cases the result of the Prebble v. Television New Zealand case, the result of article IX, is hard and creates a potential injustice for an individual.
      New clause 9 provides a halfway house in which it is possible—in certain circumstances where the House is so moved and accepts the injustice caused to one of its number by a particular action—for privilege to be waived by the whole House in relation to that hon. Member. We have tabled new clause 9 out of a desire to facilitate a debate and a free choice.
      Mr. Rupert Allason: If the motive behind new clause 9 is to pass what I readily accept is an important constitutional issue for the whole House, what is the purpose behind amendment No. 43 and amendment (a) which seek to stop those cases that are already before the courts being affected by the Bill?
      Mr. Boateng: Those amendments have a simple purpose. It must be for the whole House to determine whether anything it does should have a retrospective effect. It must be for the whole House to determine whether the cases of any individual hon. Members should be subject to new clause 9 and the amendments.
      Mr. Allason rose—
      Mr. Boateng: The hon. Gentleman will have an opportunity to make a speech in due course. The proponents of clause 13 must answer, on the issue of injustice, the question of what happens when one Member waives privilege and another does not.
      Mr. D. N. Campbell-Savours: Does my hon. Friend agree that the new clause and the position of the Lords would make huge constitutional changes that would have formidable implications for the House of Commons? Less than 5 per cent. of the membership of the Commons is here tonight. Many of my hon. Friends and many other hon. Members are perhaps unaware of what is happening. Surely the only possible way to proceed would have been for the matter to be dealt with by a Committee of the House of Commons or a Committee of both Houses. It seems utterly ludicrous that we are discussing a matter of huge constitutional importance and that a handful of Members will take a decision that we may regret—or may not regret, I do not know the answer—well into the future.
      Mr. Boateng: The timing of the debate is certainly of interest, because it inevitably will run up against the 7 o'clock deadline for private business. It can run on thereafter if the House wants it to do so, but the timing is singular and calls into question yet again—if I may say so—the Government's neutrality on the matter.
      What will be the position under clause 13 when one hon. Member waives his privilege and another does not? What would be the position in the case of the hon. Member for Tatton? Part and parcel of The Guardian's defence to his action is the position of the hon. Member for Beaconsfield (Mr. Smith). Suppose the hon. Member for Tatton were to waive his privilege but the hon. Member for Beaconsfield did not waive his. The danger
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      would be that at least one of the parties to the litigation would still, in effect, be denied justice. The Guardian, as the defendant, would not be able to pray in aid such evidence as the hon. Member for Beaconsfield might be able to give on the matter, in so far as he has admitted that he was paid money by some outside interests for the purpose of asking a question in the House. That is a real problem and it has not been addressed by those who support clause 13.
      Our view can be summarised as follows. Privilege belongs to the House, not to the individual Member. It is for the House to determine how that privilege may or may not be exercised. If privilege is to he waived, that is a matter not for the individual but for the House as a whole. Above all, our view is that when Members individually and freely arrive at their decision on this subject, they should bear in mind that any action by the House that enables the courts, not us, to determine the proceedings of the House—clause 13 may represent just such an action—and any action that puts an individual under pressure to waive privilege, is likely to undermine the privileges of the House. Those privileges were designed to enable us to uphold, maintain and develop a democratic purpose, not to enable us to uphold special rights and interests. We tamper with such a privilege at our peril.
      For many Labour Members, clause 13 represents—in the haste and the manner in which it has been introduced—an unwarranted tampering that ultimately threatens the liberty of us all. As such, we shall resist it. All hon. Members, when they make up their minds to resist clause 13—if they do—should do so on the basis that it is an unwarranted interference. All hon. Members should bear in mind the circumstances in which the matter has been brought before the House. Hon. Members should regret the way in which it has been brought before the House and they should bear in mind also their responsibility to preserve and protect the privileges of the House, not in their interests but in the interests of the people whom they serve.
      The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Tony Newton): New clause 9, as the hon. Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng) made clear—although his concluding remarks called into question what he said about neutrality—and the amendments grouped with it, have given the House what we see as a valuable opportunity to debate what is undoubtedly an important issue that has arisen about parliamentary privileges and the Bill of Rights. Apart from the contribution that the hon. Gentleman has made and those that will no doubt be made by others during the debate, it is right also to acknowledge the help that has been given to the debates in this place by the earlier proceedings and exploration of the issues during the passage of the Bill in another place.
      As the House is by now well aware, and as the hon. Member for Brent, South has explained, the matter that new clause 9 and clause 13 seek to deal with has arisen because the defamation case that my hon. Friend the Member for Tatton (Mr. Hamilton) and Mr. Ian Greer brought against The Guardian in the High Court was stayed by the judge because he decided that the case could not be tried properly without hearing evidence about my hon. Friend's conduct and motives in tabling the parliamentary questions that were the subject of the newspaper's allegations and that that evidence could not

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      be heard because of the prohibition—by virtue of article IX of the Bill of Rights—on the questioning or impeaching by the courts of proceedings in Parliament. As the hon. Member for Brent, South has already said, that case followed the earlier case of Prebble v. Television New Zealand Ltd. before the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, in which, because of the provisions of article IX, the Committee found that the defendants could not use parliamentary materials to establish the truth of allegedly defamatory allegations made by them.
      Two possible resolutions of the predicament in which my hon. Friend the Member for Tatton found himself—and which, let us be under no illusion, could face other hon. Members from any party in the future—are before the House this evening, and I will deal with each of them in turn. I make it clear—particularly in light of the hon. Gentleman's peroration which seemed at variance with his earlier stated position—that the Government have adopted the attitude of neutrality. We believe that it is a parliamentary matter and that each individual Member of Parliament should exercise his or her judgment. I was delighted to hear the hon. Gentleman's comments about the Labour party's neutral position—although I think that some of his remarks were not completely consistent with that approach.
      Against that background, clause 13—which amendment No. 21 seeks to leave out—was inserted in the Bill during its passage through another place as a result of an amendment moved by Lord Hoffmann. It would allow a Member of either House or any other person whose conduct in Parliament is an issue in defamation proceedings to waive the protection of article IX so as to enable evidence to be given in court and findings made about his conduct in Parliament. At the same time, the clause seeks to preserve the essential protection that the Bill of Rights affords—we do not dispute that such protection is necessary—to Members of both Houses and to others, such as witnesses before parliamentary Committees, from any legal liability for anything that they may say or do in the course of parliamentary proceedings.
      6 pm
      Mr. Campbell-Savours: I seek the right hon. Gentleman's interpretation on that point. Does that mean that a document that came before the Standards and Privileges Committee and that made allegations about a number of hon. Members could be used in evidence in a trial when an hon. Member seeks to waive protection? In other words, could the process of extracting information from the Committee prejudice the rights of other hon. Members or other persons who might be named in that document?
      Mr. Newton: My right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General is by my side. He says that he thinks that that would not be the case as the document would not be in the possession of the individual hon. Member. I shall give further attention to that point during the debate.
      Sir Terence Higgins: Would not such a document be part of the proceedings of the House?
      Mr. Newton: I think that the appropriate course is for me to take further advice about the matter and seek to respond to the House and to my right hon. Friend at a later stage.
      Mr. Campbell-Savours: I do not want to embarrass the right hon. Gentleman—no one knows all the
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      answers—but I ask him to seek a more sensible and informed response from his right hon. and learned Friend. I have asked a fairly elementary question that will influence the judgments of many hon. Members. I want to know whether material that is included in a document that may be owned by a Select Committee and which refers to people other than the hon. Member who is applying for that document to be made available to the court would prejudice the rights of hon. Members if it were to be freed.
      The Attorney-General (Sir Nicholas Lyell): I am happy to answer the hon. Gentleman as best I can—I have considered the matter.
      In my view, it would not be open to the other party to the action to call for such a document to be admitted. According to the hon. Gentleman's description, such a document would probably emanate from the Standards and Privileges Committee and it would be in the possession of the House. It would not be under the control of the hon. Member concerned and, as such, it would not be available to the other party upon discovery.
      We are discussing whether the motives or the actions in Parliament of the hon. Member who has brought the action and who has—if the clause is attached to the Bill and becomes law—waived his privilege may be impeached or called into question. That cannot occur at present because of article IX of the Bill of Rights. Therefore, the court has held in the Hamilton case that the matter must be stayed as the full issues cannot be tried. The court has not held that it must be stayed because every relevant document that is in Parliament's possession cannot be made available—that would be a much wider point.
      Mr. Boateng rose—
      Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Geoffrey Lofthouse): Order. The Leader of the House has the Floor.
      Mr. Newton: I shall give way to the hon. Member for Brent, South, who clearly wishes to intervene. However, first I must complete my point. My right hon. and learned Friend is present and I am sure that he will seek to assist the House at any appropriate stage in the debate if that should prove helpful.
      Mr. Boateng: The question raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) is not answered completely by the Attorney-General's intervention. What would occur if the hon. Member concerned had made a number of interventions or raised a number of points during Committee proceedings, which are obviously part of the parliamentary record? If that hon. Member subsequently waives his privilege, surely it is open to the defendant to say, "We should have access to that information which reflects his motives and conduct but which appears in a document to which other hon. Members who have not waived their privilege have contributed." As the Attorney-General said, one imagines that such a document would be owned by the Committee and by the House. It would hamper the defendant if he

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      were not given access to that document. We are opening that area to the scrutiny of the courts if we allow clause 13 to stand.
      Mr. Newton: I have already said that my right hon. and learned Friend will seek to assist the House later if that should prove helpful. Meanwhile, we must remember that the House allows the courts to refer to Hansard.
      Mr. John Morris: As the Attorney-General intends to assist the House further, I ask him to consider that we are seeking to allow the protection of Parliament to be raised as the clause would apply to parliamentary proceedings that at present cannot be impeached or questioned in any court or place outside Parliament. That is the starting point. Clause 13(2) states:
      "Where a person waives that protection—

      (a) any such enactment or rule of law shall not apply to prevent evidence being given, questions being asked or statements, submissions, comments or findings being made about his conduct".

      How will the sorts of documents to which my hon. Friend the Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) refers be ring-fenced in that regard?
      Mr. Newton: I shall not elaborate further upon the remarks of my right hon. and learned Friend, beyond saying that, according to the advice given to me, the short answer is that such a document could not be made available without a separate decision of the House. I hope that that provides the reassurance that both the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) and the hon. Member for Brent, South are seeking.
      Dr. Tony Wright: I do not wish to explore the content of the answer by the Leader of the House, but I must put several points to him. Does not that important exchange illustrate a fundamental difficulty with the clause? The House—particularly the Standards and Privileges Committee—has laboured mightily over the years to try to define what constitutes proceedings in Parliament. The clause, quite casually and without reference to any Committee or to previous deliberations, announces that there may be a waiver and that proceedings in Parliament shall be thus and thus. The first time that it is tested, we find that we do not know what the Bill says. Does that not illustrate precisely the difficulties of dealing with a major constitutional issue in a wholly casual manner?
      Mr. Newton: I am sure that if the hon. Gentleman catches your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker, he will be able to develop that point, which, in a sense, has already been developed by the hon. Members for Brent, South and for Workington. No one—certainly not me—is seeking to present the argument as though every single case was conclusive and one way. There clearly is a balance of considerations, and every hon. Member will have to make up his or her own mind at the end of the debate about where the balance lies between the risks that have been focused on in the past few minutes and the injustice that many people feel that two hon. Members have experienced as a result of what has occurred in recent times.
      Mr. Campbell-Savours: The right hon. Gentleman is Chairman of the Select Committee on Standards and
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      Privileges. I have been a member of that Committee sufficiently long to realise that the test that he sets in any debate is that we go to the very nth degree to ensure that what we are doing is absolutely correct, because we do not—especially the right hon. Gentleman as Chairman—want to be party to mistakes. Does he not feel that, on this very important issue, he should be sitting in the Chair of the Committee and that we should be taking evidence to ensure that a mistake is not made? The Committee might well approve it. I simply do not know. We may reject it. But we cannot afford to take that risk without the fullest inquiry.
      Mr. Newton: I am grateful for the complimentary nature of the hon. Gentleman's earlier remarks. There was sufficient concern in another place to consider it right to raise the issue in relation to the Bill, and in the event they decided to insert what is now clause 13. That—inescapably, it seems to me—gives me a duty to set out as fairly as I can the balance of consideration for the House to take into account when deciding whether it wishes to proceed. Clearly, the hon. Gentleman will argue that it would be a mistake for the House to proceed in this way, either because he is against it or because he feels that the implications have not been sufficiently explored. That is a point for him to argue, and if he does so with sufficient persuasion no doubt the House will reach a different decision from that currently in the Bill. That is what we are talking about tonight.
      Mr. Jeff Rooker: The other place agreed clause 13. The great distinction between clause 13 and new clause 9 is that the latter exclusively affects Members of Parliament of either House. Clause 13 gives the power to waive privilege to all witnesses before Select Committees and to any and every Officer of the House who may be called to give evidence. What are the consequences of witnesses who come before a Select Committee in the knowledge that, in future, they may want to waive their privilege if a case comes to court? Surely the place to discuss the consequences and ramifications of the possible distortion of the evidence that such a witness may give is the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges, which the right hon. Gentleman chairs with such distinction, and not on the Floor of the House, as we have not debated clause stand part and the clause was not in the Bill at the beginning.
      Mr. Newton: I am grateful for the last part of the hon. Gentleman's remarks. The rest are points of argument about what decision the House will have to take at the conclusion of the debate. I hope that it is clear by now that nobody—certainly not me—is dismissing the points that have been made, although on balance I would probably come to a different conclusion as an individual. There clearly are, as I have acknowledged, a number of factors that the House needs to take into account when considering the matter. Indeed, I had hoped to set them out relatively briefly in the course of my remarks.
      Sir Peter Tapsell: It has been more than three centuries since the Bill of Rights 1688 was put on the statute book. Am I right in thinking that the tradition of the House is that if the integrity of an hon. Member in discharging his parliamentary duties is seriously impugned by an outside body, the Privileges Committee investigates the matter,

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      that if it is found that the hon. Member has seriously misbehaved, he is punished by the House, and that if the allegations against the hon. Member are unfounded, the person or organisation bringing the allegation is seriously punished by the House? Why could not the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges have dealt with this matter?
      6.15 pm
      Mr. Newton: Perhaps others will wish to comment, because it is not for me to say why particular people took particular actions at particular times. I have to cope with the fact that the clause was added to the Bill in another place, as they felt that it was an appropriate way of tackling what everybody acknowledges is a problem. Whatever else may be realistic to suppose about the activities of the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges, it should also be acknowledged that it would not be in a position to impose an award of damages against a person who was judged to have libelled somebody. There would be widespread objection—certainly in this day and age—to some fine or award of damages being imposed by a Committee of the House in the circumstances that my hon. Friend seems to be postulating.
      Sir Peter Tapsell: With great respect, I do not think that my right hon. Friend has answered the question. I did not raise the question of damages, which arise only if the case goes to court. Why cannot the merits of the case be handled by the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges and a decision made in the terms that I mentioned in my earlier question? I thought that that was why the Committee existed.
      Mr. Newton: The Committee of Privileges—the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges, as it now is—obviously seeks to examine matters that are referred to it. On the cases that led to the debate tonight, I have already made the point that it was felt appropriate in another place to tackle the matter by a change in the law to enable Members of Parliament to pursue their cases through the courts in such circumstances in the same way as anybody else. That does not exclude the Select Committee from investigating the matter, were it to be asked to do so, but many people would feel that that alone would not be adequate where a Member of Parliament was in effect—or felt that he had been—libelled in respect of his actions within the House.
      Mr. Tam Dalyell: In making up their mind, did the Government consider the entire corpus of decision making, which goes back to the case of George Strauss v. the London Electricity Board in relation to what is and what is not a proceeding in Parliament? That case has served us quite well over the years.
      Mr. Newton: The hon. Gentleman echoes one or two points that have been made by his hon. Friends. Again, it is a point of argument. It is one of the factors that the House needs to take into account in reaching a judgment at the end of the debate.
      The case for the clause can be put simply. In essence, it would enable justice to be done in defamation cases such as that brought by my hon. Friend the Member for Tatton. As the House well knows, provided that my hon.
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      Friend—or anybody else in those circumstances—waived his protection, which the clause would allow him to do, the defendants in the case would be able to call evidence relating to the proceedings of the House to justify the allegations that they published, and the issue between them and the plaintiffs could be tried by the court. If the plaintiffs went on to win their case, they would be able to clear their names of the charges against them, a matter to which those affected would naturally attach great importance. Furthermore, they would be able to recover damages—which they could not do if they were able only to resort to the machinery that exists within Parliament for dealing with such cases by way of a complaint of privilege.
      There is a substantial case to be made for the clause. On the other hand—this echoes a point that I have acknowledged on a number of occasions—it is, of course, also the case that any interference with the Bill of Rights, which has stood the House in good stead for more than three centuries, is a matter of great importance, which both Houses are rightly anxious to assess with the utmost care.
      One line of criticism is that the clause gives unfair advantage to Members of Parliament. I do not think that the hon. Member for Brent, South made that point, but the argument is that a Member would be able to put his conduct in Parliament before the courts when it suited him if he thought that he had been defamed, but would continue to enjoy absolute protection from liability if he said something in the House about another person that would have been defamatory if he had said it outside the House.
      The House will doubtless agree that it is essential to preserve—as the clause does—the core privilege of protection from liability in respect of proceedings in Parliament, without which the exercise of free speech in Parliament cannot be upheld. Lord Hoffmann commented on that in another place, arguing that, while there was an obvious public interest in freedom of speech in Parliament, there was no public interest in allowing anyone free licence to make defamatory statements about what hon. Members do in the course of their parliamentary duties. Personally, I agree with that.
      Another concern that has been expressed—the hon. Member for Brent, South did touch on this—is that, once hon. Members were enabled to waive protection, they could be put under pressure to do so when they did not wish to. That problem does not arise in the case of my hon. Friend the Member for Tatton, but it could conceivably arise in other cases, including the case on which the hon. Member for Brent, South speculated—a case in which the conduct of one hon. Member was inextricably linked with that of another. That is yet another factor that the House must take into account in making a decision.
      Mr. Boateng: But that is precisely the point that will arise in relation to the The Guardian case, in which the conduct of the hon. Member for Beaconsfield (Mr. Smith) has a direct bearing on that of the hon. Member for Tatton (Mr. Hamilton) as far as the newspaper is concerned. 'That is the reality of the case that led to the tabling of the

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      clause. The conflict—or the danger of a conflict—between two hon. Members, one waiving protection and the other not waiving it, lies there.
      Mr. Newton: The question of any link would be a matter for the court. I certainly do not want to be drawn into discussing what is and what is not linked in respect of any particular case. Let me tell the hon. Gentleman, however, that that dilemma, or potential problem, would exist just as much—and, I believe, more in some respects—if new clause 9 were adopted. Presumably, the House would then be able to impose on one Member a waiver that was not sought by that Member, but was sought by another. I do not see how the arrangement would work in any other circumstances. Otherwise, no answer is presented to the problem; the problem would, or could, arise in any event, whether on the lines of new clause 9 or on those of clause 13.
      I accept that that line of argument leads the hon. Gentleman to the conclusion that he would prefer amendment No. 21 to new clause 9. That is what he implied towards the end of his speech. I am simply saying that I do not think that the solution that he seemed to prefer at the outset of the debate—new clause 9—is in fact a solution to the problem to which he just referred.
      Mr. Boateng: I made it clear at the outset that hon. Members should not have to face such a choice. We should be in a position to choose freely which of the three options to support: the status quo, the whole House determining whether privilege should be waived or clause 13. If, as Leader of the House, the right hon. Gentleman had taken the initiative in relation to the ordering of the House's business and given the House that free choice—as the right hon. Member for Worthing (Sir T. Higgins) pointed out—we would not be in the invidious position of having to vote on new clause 9 first. We are having to do that precisely because the Government, in their neutrality, have abdicated their responsibility to the whole House.
      Mr. Newton: Obviously, I do not accept that at all. What we are seeking to do at this very moment is to provide the House with an opportunity to make choices of the kind that the hon. Gentleman has described, and that opportunity arises because of what has been tabled.
      Mr. Devlin: Amendment (a) to new clause 9 was clearly drafted by The Guardian with the aim of preventing the current cases being brought against it. Will the Committee of Privileges be looking into the motives of the hon. Member for North Durham (Mr. Radice), who tabled the amendment?
      Mr. Newton: I am not aware of any proposal for the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges to look into that, but I am sure that, if an appropriate complaint were made to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, he would examine it in the proper way—as Madam Speaker has indicated on a number of occasions.
      Mr. Barry Sheerman: Many of us who have been following the debate carefully would have expected the Leader of the House to slap down that last intervention, which constituted a vicious attack on my hon.
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      Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr. Radice). I expect better of the right hon. Gentleman. Indeed, many of us are unhappy about the proceedings, because they do not seem to issue from a mature period of reflection. These are fundamental issues, but everything that the right hon. Gentleman has said so far persuades me—along with many of my hon. Friends—that we are involved in a short-term quick fix. This is not the way in which to debate an arrangement that has served us well for 300 years.
      Mr. Newton: I think that the hon. Gentleman will find that what I said about the proper course for referring complaints to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards was said in pretty much the same terms as those in which I have said it to hon. Members on both sides of the House who have raised possible complaints in the period since the new machinery was set up. I do not accept the hon. Gentleman's interpretation.
      Mr. Gerald Bermingham rose—
      Mrs. Gwyneth Dunwoody rose—
      Mr. Newton: I will give way to the hon. Member for St. Helens, South (Mr. Bermingham), but if I continue to give way no one else will have a chance to speak.
      Mr. Bermingham: Having sat here listening to the debate, and having watched it earlier on television, I am struck by the fact that the issue is complicated and confusing, and by the fact that the House has not been properly briefed. [Interruption.] We hear the twittering of ignorant birds again. As I was saying, the issue is complex, and most hon. Members have not been briefed in any great depth. It has slipped through from another place. If we are to change 300 years of history, perhaps we could do it with a little more decorum and be given a little more time. We need a much more wide-ranging discussion.
      Mr. Newton: Again, that is a point of argument. The hon. Gentleman is advancing reasons why he believes that it might be right to go down the path recommended by the hon. Member for Brent, South—or one of those paths. Let me reiterate my position. Clause 13 is in the Bill, and I am doing what I can to sketch some of the factors that the House ought to have in mind in reaching a conclusion, in relation to either new clause 9 or amendment No. 21.
      Mrs. Dunwoody: Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
      Mr. Newton: Yes, but this must be more or less the last time.
      Mrs. Dunwoody: As a non-lawyer, I am now totally confused. I would be grateful if the right hon. Gentleman would make the position clear to me, as an hon. Member with a vote. Is he saying that, in future, a Member of Parliament will be able to waive the privileges and protection of the House when it suits him, and will not have to when it does not? Is he also saying that, on that basis, the House will not be able to vote to maintain its existing arrangements this evening? If that is what he is

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      saying, I should be grateful if he would make it clear so that we know exactly what we are voting for in relation to the powers of the House.
      Mr. Newton: I do not think that the hon. Lady is entirely right, on the basis of the guidance that Madam Speaker gave the House earlier. I hope that I am correct. If new clause 9 were accepted, it would leave certain provisions in the Bill, albeit different from those that are in it now; but if it were rejected, there would still be amendment No. 21, which in effect removes clause 13. I think that I have that right.
      Mr. Rooker: With respect to the Leader of the House, new clause 9 does not knock out clause 13. The House could send back this Bill to the other place with both clauses in and let it clear up the mess. So voting on this matter will be rather more complicated than he explained.
      Mr. Newton: I would not seek to presume on the Chair's prerogative, but I was seeking to explain that—as I understood what Madam Speaker told the House earlier, when the point was raised by my right hon. Friend the Member for Worthing (Sir T. Higgins)—were the House to decline to accept new clause 9 and to agree amendment No. 21, the effect would be that clause 13 had disappeared from the Bill and had not been replaced.
      Mr. Campbell-Savours: Will the Leader of the House confirm that what my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) said is absolutely correct and that the Bill provides exactly for her interpretation?
      6.30 pm
      Mr. Newton: I do not think that it does, and I have just sought to explain why it does not. I understood the point made by the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody)—I do not want to misinterpret her or any other hon. Member—to be that there were no means by which the House could remove clause 13 without having new clause 9, whereas in fact it was made clear earlier today that that result could be achieved by the House voting for amendment No. 21. That is all that I am seeking to make clear, and I hope that it has been helpful to the hon. Lady.
      Mr. Max Madden: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I apologise for raising a point of order when you took the Chair only a few moments ago and also for interrupting the speech of the Leader of the House, but it is clear that there is considerable unhappiness in all parts of the House with proceeding with a very important matter and, in particular, confusion over what opportunity hon. Members will have to express their view when the Division is called. Mr. Deputy Speaker, will you consider the order of business to enable the House to vote, first, on new clause 9, and then immediately after to vote on amendment No. 21, or conversely? As I understand it—
      Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Morris): Order. I have heard the hon. Gentleman's question, but I cannot account for hon. Members' unhappiness. The answer to the hon. Gentleman's request is no, it is not possible.
      Mr. Devlin: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Is it in order for hon. Members to come into the Chamber and then to stand up and say that they are confused because they have not listened to the debate?
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: That is not a point of order for the Chair.
      Mr. Newton: I was about to come to the third point—it has already surfaced in the debate, and concern has been expressed about it—which is the relationship between Parliament and the courts.
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      As we know, in broad terms, article IX keeps the courts out of Parliament's business, and the sub judice rule that operates in the House keeps Parliament out of the courts' business. The proposal would inevitably let the courts into an area from which they are currently excluded, and it would be for the courts to decide how far to go in each case in inquiring into the proceedings of Parliament. If the clause was passed, the courts would have to decide for themselves exactly what it meant in particular circumstances, and the precise scope of the protective provisions that restate the traditional effect of the Bill of Rights.
      Some observers consider that the courts are already tending to take a more restrictive view than the House has traditionally done of the protection afforded by the Bill of Rights—such as the judgment in the case of Pepper v. Hart, for example, in which it was held that the courts could in certain circumstances use Hansard for the purpose of interpreting a statute. Again, that is one of the factors that the House will have to bear in mind in reaching a decision.
      I should like to say a few words about new clause 9, which was moved by the hon. Member for Brent, South, and to note the two differences of substance between new clause 9 and clause 13.
      Mr. Campbell-Savours: Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
      Mr. Newton: If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, he has made a number of interventions, and I think that it would be more appropriate for him to make a speech later in the debate.
      The first difference of substance is that the clause applies solely to Members or former Members of either House. A witness before a Select Committee who was defamed in respect of his evidence would have no opportunity to seek redress in the courts, whereas a member of the Select Committee who had been libelled in respect of a question he had put to that witness would have such an opportunity. The House will want to consider whether it regards that as an equitable outcome.
      The second difference of substance is more substantial. Clause 13 envisages the waiver of protection by an individual hon. Member, without the House having any say in the matter. Conversely, new clause 9 allows either House to waive protection on a petition from an hon. Member or former hon. Member who is a plaintiff in a defamation case.
      It is of course the case that parliamentary privilege belongs in the first instance to the House, and only then to its hon. Members. "Erskine May" states at page 69:
      "it is only as a means to the effective discharge of the collective functions of the House that the individual privileges are enjoyed by Members."
      In practical terms, it is very difficult to see on what basis the House could reasonably allow a waiver in one case and decline to allow a waiver in another case. In my judgment, it is much less difficult to envisage circumstances in which a decision by the House might be much influenced by factors other than the objective merit of the case—at the worst, of course, the decision might become the focus of a straightforward partisan dispute.

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      We should at least face up to that possibility, which would be very damaging to all hon. Members and would certainly be of no help to parliamentary privilege.
      Mr. Campbell-Savours: I am sorry to press the Minister, but will he answer another question for me? Could an hon. Member waive privilege and thereby enable a court to draw on an original document prior to a sidelining amendment by a Committee, which means the deletion of matters that the Committee feels should not be made available outside the Committee?
      Mr. Newton: I think that that is a variant of the hon. Gentleman's earlier question, to which my right hon. and learned Friend the Attorney-General replied. I have already said that my right hon. and learned Friend will seek to assist the House further on such points later in the debate if that is thought to be helpful.
      The House should recognise that it is the individual hon. Member who is taking the risk in waiving the protection afforded by article IX of the Bill of Rights so as to allow the court to hear evidence about his conduct, and it should be for him alone to decide whether the protection should be waived.
      A point of detail arises on amendment (a) to new clause 9, which is in the name of the hon. Member for North Durham (Mr. Radice), and on amendment No. 43 to clause 13, which is in the name of the Leader of the Opposition. As has become clear, if either of those amendments is agreed to, an hon. Member who is libelled in 1997—next year, for example—in respect of something that he has done in Parliament will be able to get justice in the courts. But my hon. Friend the Member for Tatton, who believes—and wishes to prove, as he has repeatedly made clear—that he was libelled in 1994 in respect of something he had done in Parliament, would still be denied an opportunity to clear his name.
      The hon. Member for Brent, South has given his reasons for believing that that would be an appropriate outcome, and, of course, all hon. Members would acknowledge that the House is rightly suspicious of anything that smacks of retrospective legislation. But I find it hard to understand how that can be retrospective legislation in the sense that normally causes concern. We are not making unlawful some action that was lawful at the time it was performed, but we are removing a barrier to the hearing of evidence that the parties to the case of my hon. Friend the Member for Tatton wish to call. I also remind the House that my hon Friend's case has not been struck out. It has only been stayed, and is therefore capable of being revived.
      I underline the fact that the protection of article IX could be removed from an hon. Member only if he wanted it to be removed. All hon. Members can agree that there should be no question of an hon. Member who has not sought a waiver finding what he has said or done in the House exposed to scrutiny in the courts. That applies just as much to words and actions that lie in the past as it does to words and actions in the future, after this clause—were it to be agreed to and remain in the Bill—has come into operation.
      So there need be no anxiety that words that have been spoken in this House by an hon. Member in the belief that those words would not be scrutinised by the courts may
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      now be exposed to such scrutiny against the hon. Member's will. In my view, if Parliament believes that it is right to allow hon. Members an opportunity to waive the protection of article IX in the circumstances that we have been discussing, it is right that Members of Parliament currently affected by a case that has been stayed should be allowed to benefit in the same way as hon. Members whose cases may arise in future.
      I hope that I have given fairly good reasons for believing that clause 13 is a more satisfactory solution than new clause 9. I make it clear that that is my view—but a personal view, and not one that I state on behalf of the Government. I personally prefer clause 13 to new clause 9. We return to the central question raised by the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich as to whether it is right to tackle the problem at all by legislating at this time. There are clearly differences of opinion. I have repeatedly emphasised that the issue is for the individual judgment of my right hon. and hon. Friends, but I should conclude by remarking that my personal judgment is that it is right to tackle the problem. I expect to cast my own vote—I make this clear as a matter of fact, not a point of argument—to preserve clause 13 as it stands.
      Mr. Peter Shore: I am struck by the lack of enthusiasm for both clause 13 and new clause 9. The Leader of the House and the hon. Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng) have largely succeeded in convincing me that we would do better to leave things as they are, particularly as we have not had the benefit of a study by a Joint Committee of both Houses and as clause 13 was introduced at a late stage in the other place and appears before us tonight for the first time.
      It is obvious that the privileges of the House are enormously important to the House collectively as well as to Members of Parliament individually. The one strength of new clause 9 is precisely that it recognises that the waiving of privilege is the concern not only of an individual hon. Member but of the whole House. New clause 9 requires that, before initiating defamation proceedings, an hon. Member should petition the House or the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges for consent to waive the protection accorded to us all by article IX of the Bill of Rights.
      I have more confidence than some hon. Members in the seriousness of the Standards and Privileges Committee. It can be relied on not to allow personal likes and dislikes to affect its judgment. Moreover, it will thoroughly consider all the possibilities before it consents to infringing the rights of other hon. Members or of the House.
      For three centuries, Parliament and its Members have been protected by the famous words of the Bill of Rights that our proceedings
      "ought not to he impeached or questioned in any court or place out of Parlyament."
      We all agree that that protection should not lightly be breached.
      There is a case for allowing an hon. Member to waive his or her historic privilege in pursuit of defamation proceedings and, in making it, it is helpful to have the safeguard to which I have referred—that of obtaining the prior consent of the whole House. Hon. Members inevitably have in mind the case involving the hon.

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      Member for Tatton (Mr. Hamilton). He maintains that he was libelled by The Guardian, which alleged that he had received money from Mr. al-Fayed via Ian Greer Associates for tabling questions in the House. The hon. Gentleman and Ian Greer Associates—one of whose senior executives is a constituent of mine—immediately sued for libel, but the case could not proceed after Mr. Justice May ruled in the High Court that as the evidence directly involved proceedings in Parliament it was blocked by article IX of the Bill of Rights.
      The hon. Member for Tatton maintains that that is unjust and that he has been denied a remedy available to other citizens of the United Kingdom by a provision in the Bill of Rights that was enacted not for that purpose but to ensure that we enjoy untrammelled free speech in Parliament.
      6.45 pm
      I am not entirely clear whether a parliamentary remedy remains available to the hon. Member for Tatton. The Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards is considering a document that contains allegations against the hon. Gentleman and others, and I understand that the issue is likely to be reported to the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges. Is it not possible for the hon. Member for Tatton to pursue his case before that Committee? I do not know the answer. Whatever it may be, privilege poses an additional problem to individuals whose names are associated with the alleged wrongdoing of an hon. Member. In this case, The Guardian alleged that payments were made through Ian Greer Associates. The company says that it has lost reputation and business as a consequence but has no remedy unless the Member of Parliament waives his privilege. That aspect should be considered when the House decides whether to support any of the amendments.
      Mr. Allason: Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
      Mr. Shore: I am coming to the end of my remarks.
      Although I support new clause 9—just—I am not persuaded that amendment No. 43 should be agreed as it directly excludes any case initiated before the Bill is enacted, which seems unfair to the plaintiffs.
      Sir Terence Higgins: I am struck by the fact that many aspects of the argument do not emerge at first sight. I am clear that the issue should be examined by a Joint Committee of both Houses. We have not previously considered a wide range of aspects. The House is rightly jealous of its privileges. The question is whether, by accepting clause 13 or new clause 9, we shall undermine our privileges. Over the centuries, the Bill of Rights has ensured that there is no conflict between the House and the courts, but we suddenly find that the courts are dealing with matters that affect us. That point was made by Lord Simon of Glaisdale in another place:
      "In the most recent case that reviewed this matter … it was emphasised that it would be quite intolerable if there were two inquiries going ahead simultaneously or overlapping, one by the courts of law and one by the House of Parliament. The amendment—
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      now clause 13—
      "would land us in a whole number of respects in precisely that situation."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 16 April 1996; Vol. 571, c. 31.]
      We cannot allow that, especially as the Bill did not contain such a clause when it was first introduced in the House of Lords. The clause was introduced in a strange way—in an amendment for which the proposer did not vote. Clearly, we have to consider the matter extremely carefully.
      As the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) said in an intervention a few moments ago, our procedure is not satisfactory. As I understand it—and as Madam Speaker has confirmed—initially we can vote on new clause 9. If it is carried, we shall go on to consider amendment No. 21, which effectively would create a hole into which new clause 9 would slot. If new clause 9 is defeated, we shall vote on amendment No. 21, which would delete clause 13. That creates a problem for hon. Members who feel that new clause 9 improves clause 13, but would prefer to knock out clause 13. With great respect to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, we do not have that choice, which raises a difficult question about which way to vote. I hope that many hon. Members who are not present in the Chamber are watching the debate on television as they will have to decide how to vote on new clause 9 and on amendment No. 21 should new clause 9 be defeated. It is a complicated and difficult matter.
      I have already pointed out some of the potential dangers of accepting either new clause 9 or clause 13. However, I should mention one point that had not occurred to me previously, and it is a matter of grave concern to me as a member of the Liaison Select Committee. If the House were to give an hon. Member the right to petition the House to waive parliamentary privilege, to what extent would that allow the courts to question proceedings in the House under the Bill of Rights?
      My right hon. Friend the Leader of the House was not quite right about that. We have to consider what are proceedings in the House: that is an uncertain matter. It is not simply—as was suggested a moment or two ago—a question of evidence that hitherto had not been sidelined suddenly being revealed to public gaze when the Select Committee concerned thought that it should have been sidelined. Whether or not evidence is sidelined, if it proves to be relevant to a case in which the individual concerned has waived his privilege, the other side can ask to see privileged documents and can question them in court. That is precisely what the Bill of Rights has sought to prevent for hundreds of years, and for very good reason.
      I am particularly concerned about evidence that has been give to Select Committees in confidence. We all know the difficulties involved in Select Committees taking evidence in confidence if the witness feels that it may be revealed subsequently. We have been over those arguments many times before.
      Witnesses will be more hesitant about giving evidence in confidence if they believe that it will be challenged in court and that it will not be treated in confidence by the House, even though the Select Committee and the House had promised that it would be. That had not occurred to me until this afternoon, but it is another reason why the matter should be considered in greater depth and not decided on the basis of an amendment that was carried somewhat haphazardly in another place.

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      For the reasons that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House gave, new clause 9 appears to be some improvement on clause 13. It would restrict the waiving of parliamentary privilege to hon. Members, although whether that is fair on witnesses, who would not be able to waive parliamentary privilege, is another matter. Again, there are two arguments to be considered.
      Mr. Newton: I may not have made it sufficiently clear that I prefer clause 13 to new clause 9, partly for the reason that my right hon. Friend has given.
      Sir Terence Higgins: That is the essence of the dilemma. The question is whether to vote against new clause 9 although it may be an improvement on the status quo.
      My right hon. Friend pointed out the other difference between clause 13 and new clause 9. Under clause 13, the matter is left entirely to the discretion of the individual hon. Member—I have already mentioned some of the potential hazards—but under new clause 9 an hon. Member has to petition the House, which may accept his petition. As my right hon. Friend said, that may involve party politics.
      I find myself in the position of night watchman in a cricket match, as it is clear that the debate will continue later and we cannot make an immediate decision.
      It is probably advisable to vote for new clause 9. If it is carried, with all its imperfections, it will go back to the House of Lords for a decision, where, I hope, their Lordships will decide that clause 13 should be deleted and the matter referred to a Joint Committee of both Houses. If it is defeated, we shall then have the opportunity to vote on amendment No. 21. That will be difficult as we may or may not win.
      On reflection, I believe profoundly that the matter should be considered further. It is clear from what has been said that we do not have all the facts to hand. Important issues of parliamentary privilege that affect proceedings on the Floor of the House and in Select Committees have been raised and I hope that they will be considered further.
      Mr. Menzies Campbell: In accordance with the spirit of the House, I associate myself entirely with the remarks of the right hon. Member for Worthing (Sir T. Higgins). His analysis of the consequences of voting is clear beyond question and the House would be well advised to follow his advice. I shall certainly advise my right hon. and hon. Friends to do so.
      Mr. Boateng: I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.
      Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

    New clause 11

      LIMITATION OF ACTIONS: SCOTLAND
      '(1) The Prescription and Limitation (Scotland) Act 1973 is amended as follows.
      (2) In section 18A (limitation of defamation and other actions), for subsection (1) substitute—
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      "(1) Subject to subsections (2) and (3) below and section 19A of this Act, no action for defamation shall be brought unless it is commenced within a period of one year after the date when the right of action accrued."
      (3) In section I9A (power of court to override time—limits, etc).
      (a) for subsection (1) substitute—
      "(1) Where a person would be entitled, but for any of the provisions of section 17 or section 18 and 18A of this Act, to bring an action, the court may, if it seems equitable to do so, allow him to bring the action (or to bring any specified cause of action to which the action relates) notwithstanding that provision."
      (b) after subsection (1) insert—
      "(1A) In acting under this section in respect of causes of action falling within section I8A of this Act, the court shall have regard to all the circumstances of the case and in particular to—

      (a) the degree to which the operation of section 18A of this Act prejudices the pursuer or any person whom he represents;

      (b) the degree to which any decision of the court under this section would prejudice the defender or any person whom he represents;

      (c) the length of, and the reasons for the delay on the part of the pursuer;

      (d) where the reason or one of the reasons for the delay was that all or any of the facts relevant to the cause of action did not become known to the pursuer until after the end of the period mentioned in section 18A—

      (i) the date on which any such facts did become known to him; and

      (ii) the extent to which he acted promptly and reasonably once he knew whether or not the facts in question might be capable of giving rise to an action; and

      (e) the extent to which, having regard to the delay, relevant evidence is likely—

      (i) to be unavailable, or

      (ii) to be less cogent than if the action had been brought within the period mentioned in section 18A.

      (1B) In the case of an action for malicious falsehood brought by a personal representative, the references in subsection (1A) above to the pursuer shall be construed as including the deceased person to whom the cause of action accrued and any previous personal representative of that person."
      (4) The amendments made by this section apply only to rights of action arising after the section comes into force.'.—[Mr. Brooke.]
      Brought up, and read the First time.
      Mr. Peter Brooke: I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: With this, it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 41, in clause 18, page 13, line 13, at end insert—
      'section (Limitation of actions: Scotland) (time limits for actions for defamation or malicious falsehood)'.
      No. 42, in clause 19, page 14, line 3, leave out '5 and 6' and insert
      '5, 6 and (Limitation of actions: Scotland)'.
      Mr. Brooke: It is a remarkable coincidence that I should rise to move new clause 11 when, in rather less than a minute's time, my speech will be interrupted and I shall sit down, only to be called immediately to move the Second Reading of the King's College London Bill [Lords]. I therefore must occupy this brief period with

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      niceties and allusions to the fact that my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley), in whose name the new clause also stands, spoke on the matter in Committee and who I know—
      It being Seven o'clock, and there being private business set down by direction of THE CHAIRMAN OF WAYS AND MEANS under Standing Order No. 16 (Time for taking private business), further proceedings stood postponed.

      King's College London Bill [Lords] (By Order)
      Order for Second Reading read.
      7 pm
      Mr. Peter Brooke: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time. [Interruption.]
      Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Morris): Order. I ask hon. Members to withdraw from the Chamber unless they are taking part in the debate. Further to that, I ask hon. Members who are having a dialogue on the previous Bill to do so outside the Chamber.
      Mr. Brooke: The Bill is promoted jointly by King's college London and the united medical and dental schools of Guy's and St. Thomas's hospitals. For brevity, I shall refer to the latter as UMDS. Both are part of the university of London. I should declare an interest. I am a fellow of King's college and a member of the council of the university of London. The main campus of King's college lies at the heart of my constituency.
      The Bill is designed to bring about the merger of King's college and UMDS. However, the scene is a little more complex than that. King's college already has a medical and dental school: King's college school of medicine and dentistry. Following the merger, King's college—a multi-faculty institution—will have an integrated medical and dental school made up of the present UMDS and King's college school of medicine and dentistry. I shall return to that, because the coming together of the two medical and dental schools is key to the success of the merger.
      The Bill's provisions are straightforward. In large measure, they follow those of other private Acts, merging medical schools with multi-faculty colleges. The Bill has a lengthy preamble that recites the history of the formation of King's college London and UMDS. King's was founded by charter in 1829. The histories of St. Thomas's and Guy's can be traced as far back as 1550 and 1769 respectively. The Bill is self-explanatory, but, as there is only a small number of key clauses, I shall at this juncture rehearse their rationale and relevance to the purpose of the Bill that I have just described.
      Clause 3 provides that King's college school of medicine and dentistry and UMDS may agree a day to be the effective date for the proposed merger. Clause 4 provides for the dissolution of UMDS, and subsequent clauses provide for the transfer to King's of UMDS's property, obligations and rights. Clauses 6 and 7, together with schedule 2, protect certain properties of UMDS for 10 years. During that period, the use of those properties may not be changed without the approval of a body that the Bill establishes, which is the continuing trustees of UMDS. Clauses 15 and 16 amend the statutes of King's college so that UMDS will be appropriately represented on the principal decision-making bodies of King's.
      I urge that the Bill be accepted for three main reasons. First, it is widely agreed that the integration of medical schools and multi-faculty colleges such as King's leads to improved quality in both medical education and research. Secondly, it is only by unifying two medical and dental schools of international distinction—UMDS and King's

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      college school of medicine and dentistry—that further potential for achievement in medical and dental education, the biomedical sciences and research will be released. That is particularly true of research that increasingly relies on critical mass. Current research is about complex problems and requires big research teams and expensive equipment. Thirdly, the Bill has the overwhelming support of the respective councils of governors of the merging institutions, their staff and students. It has long been accepted that there are academic benefits—not least for students—as well as good administrative financial reasons for integrating free-standing medical schools into multi-faculty colleges.
      As long ago as 1968, the royal commission on medical and dental education recommended that pre-clinical students should study in a multi-faculty environment—the London medical schools being unusual in being free-standing, independent schools. Since then, there have been a series of mergers of London medical schools with multi-faculty colleges: University College hospital medical school with University college London in 1979, St. Mary's hospital medical school with Imperial college, which are both in my constituency, in 1988, and the Middlesex hospital medical school with University college London in the same year.
      More recently, the inquiry headed by Sir Bernard Tomlinson recommended that eight of the London undergraduate medical schools be merged into four faculties of medicine in the multi-faculty colleges of the university of London that teach medicine. The Higher Education Funding Council for England has been asked by the Government to take the recommendation forward. Of the mergers recommended, in addition to the proposed merger of UMDS and King's, the merger of Bart's and the Royal London hospital medical schools with Queen Mary and Westfield college has already been authorised by an Act that was passed in November, and the Bill to merge the Royal Free hospital school of medicine with UCL is awaiting Royal Assent.
      As I said, the unification of UMDS and King's has the overwhelming support of the respective councils of governors of the merging institutions, their staff and students.
      Mr. Ted Rowlands: As a very proud former student of King's—although not of the departments with which the Bill is concerned—I should like to confirm whether every member of staff and student supports the merger. If so, I shall vote for the Bill.
      Mr. Brooke: I do not know whether I can say that support is unanimous, but there is overwhelming support in the bodies that are coming together for the scheme. I thank the hon. Gentleman for being present as a graduate of the college.
      The proposed merger has been seen as the way forward for a long time. The two institutions began discussions about coming together as early as 1989. Indeed, before the Tomlinson report was published, they had already signed a memorandum of agreement to merge. So the development was pre-Tomlinson. Practical planning for the proposed merger is well advanced, not only administratively but academically.
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      For example, from 1998, King's and UMDS will have a common curriculum for third-year study—the first year of the clinical focus of the five-year undergraduate medical programme. By 2000, King's and UMDS will offer a joint curriculum. That advanced stage of academic planning is one of the main reasons why UMDS and King's want the merger to go ahead with all speed within a unified management structure. Delay at this stage would not only frustrate the introduction of the joint curriculum to which I referred, but, more important, reduce the morale of staff who have so enthusiastically been planning a joint future. Uncertainty would also result, with consequent adverse effects on staff, students and research teams.
      UMDS and King's believe that their merger will provide unparalleled opportunities for the further development of their unified medical and dental schools as a centre of national and international distinction in teaching and research. It will improve significantly the opportunities for interdisciplinary and intradisciplinary integration in pursuit of both teaching and research excellence. Resulting economies of scale will ensure that the merged college is a cost-effective institution, both in terms of space utilisation and recurrent and capital expenditure.
      The proposed consolidation of biomedical sciences, currently taught on six sites, on the Guy's medical school and hospital site will be of great advantage not only academically but in terms of cost-effectiveness. The consolidation of biomedical sciences will require new build. That can be done at Guy's without any effect on present or future hospital services. The new build will replace Hunt's house, which the NHS planned to demolish in any case when phase III of the Guy's site development opens next year. The new build project could not be realised without the merger. King's and UMDS staff could not come together in the new building on any other basis. Moreover, the merger will enable the teaching of future doctors, dentists, nurses and other health care professionals to be undertaken together.
      The merger will facilitate the important linkage between the education of medical and dental students and the clinical work of a hospital site, thus ensuring vertical integration of the curriculum. It will have the further advantage of concentrating medically related research groups alongside medical teaching and hospital services for patients, thus increasing opportunities for effective collaboration and cross-fertilisation of ideas. The present first-class academic facilities at Guy's hospital site will secure for the future King's medical student a unique educational environment.
      The juxtaposition of academic and clinical facilities in one place will allow integrated teaching of basic science and clinical practice—the best possible educational experience, everyone agrees, for the teaching of medicine. Taken together with the first-class facilities at King's College hospital, Denmark hill, and St Thomas's hospital, that will guarantee the prospective medical student a rich and varied education.
      Concerns may be raised this evening bearing on issues of health care provision, particularly at Guy's hospital, rather more than on the proposed merger of UMDS and King's. As far as Guy's is concerned, the present proposal from the NHS is that Guy's should continue to provide hospital and health services focusing on the needs of the

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      local community. I should make it clear that UMDS is a separate legal, financial and administrative entity from the Guy's and St Thomas's hospital trust.
      UMDS and King's plans for the academic development of the Guy's site have no effect on available hospital space at Guy's and do not constrain either the national health service's present plans for the future of Guy's as a hospital, or, for that matter, any future plan for the development of that hospital. A strong academic base at Guy's will support the health services there, in providing a critical mass of patient work and a range of skills and expertise in clinical terms so as to ensure continuing high-quality treatment for patients at Guy's, as well as at the competing centres of excellence elsewhere in the capital.
      The medical school merger plans will have a beneficial effect on health care provision at all three hospitals—Guy's, King's and St Thomas's. The various projects, including the massive academic development at Guy's in biomedical sciences and the enhanced academic provision at King's College hospital and St Thomas's, will support the health services in providing a level of work, a range of skills and expertise in clinical teams and high-quality treatment to enhance patient care, as well as teaching and research.
      King's and UMDS's vision is that, by merging, they will be able to maximise the potential of two very successful university institutions. Principally, the merger will secure the academic critical mass, both to strengthen a number of areas of academic endeavour already of an international standard of excellence and to develop new initiatives. Thus the two institutions will be able to secure a place at the forefront of health education, clinical care and research, which they do not believe to be as achievable if they were separate institutions.
      Before I finally commend the Bill to the House, I allude to a happy parliamentary coincidence this evening. The hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes), who is present, will know of a previous reference that I have made in the House to the year 1808, when there were six Members of Parliament for my constituency, three representing Southwark and two for the rest of Middlesex. The debate this evening is surrounded by a major constitutional debate, redolent of the days of Wilkes, who was a Member of Parliament for Middlesex and subsequently lord mayor of London. It is a happy coincidence that this debate should be surrounded by a debate on a great constitutional development while the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey and I demonstrate the longevity of both our constituencies.
      I commend the Bill to the House.
      7.15 pm
      The Minister for Health (Mr. Gerald Malone): I am glad to have been able to catch your eye early in the debate, Mr. Deputy Speaker, to set out briefly the Government's support for the measure. I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for City of London and Westminster, South (Mr. Brooke)—as is customary when I follow him in a debate—on setting matters in their important historical context. I shall venture no suggestion that the rest of the House is somewhat relieved that the number of hon. Members has changed somewhat in the intervening 188 years. I shall leave that to the judgment of others.
      My right hon. Friend set out the history of this much needed and welcome change which those involved wish to put forward. I welcome the Bill, which will take
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      forward the agenda of all those involved. My right hon. Friend was right to point to the consensus among academics, clinicians, students and all those concerned with providing a high quality of medical education and research in this part of London, who have worked so hard to make the change possible.
      As my right hon. Friend said, the plans have been the policy of the university of London for many years. He rightly pointed out that they continue independently of any health care provision changes that may be debated at present. The move towards uniting the medical schools with multi-faculty colleges will provide a broader base for teaching and improved links with basic sciences. But although they are independent of the changes now being implemented in the health service in south-east London, there are close working partnerships between the university and the NHS, and it is important for the provision of health care that those partnerships be reinforced in a number of ways.
      It is sensible for the NHS and the medical colleges to work together constructively on all the changes, which will bring benefits to patients, and also support important teaching and research interests. It is in the interests of Londoners that they should have access to the full range of health services that they need, and it is also important that London's role as a centre of high-quality medical education and research be sustained and fostered. The latter ambition is at the root of the Bill.
      My right hon. Friend rightly referred to the three reasons for or principles behind the change—quality in research and education; the fact that research nowadays needs to be on a supportable scale; and the principle of support from the institutions involved. Those are very important and underpin the Government's welcome and support for the Bill. We are pleased to work with the university of London and the Higher Education Funding Council for England in ensuring that service, teaching and research interests are balanced and that plans proceed in parallel to achieve coherent, consistent and managed change.
      The schools and the college have close links with associated NHS hospitals, and those will be further supported with the collocation of teaching and research facilities with clinical services on the Guy's hospital site, as my right hon. Friend rightly said. Many of the new services being developed at Guy's include state-of-the-art day care and diagnostic services, and it is important that academic and research work is carried out in collocation with those.
      One of the great strengths of our NHS is that we are able to provide research in parallel with service commitments. UMDS, King's college medical school and King's college London are recognised as organisations of high reputation that are successful in their own right. Their wish to come together will reinforce that excellence and produce new opportunities for the future. The proposals are widely supported. I am pleased to add the Government's support to plans that will ensure that a long tradition of outstanding medical education and research in south-east London will continue, which will be strengthened by the Bill.
      7.19 pm
      Mr. Simon Hughes: I am privileged to be able to take part in this debate and I do so wearing my hat as the Member of Parliament for

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      Guy's hospital, which, as the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South (Mr. Brooke) introduced the Bill by saying and the Minister and other colleagues will know, is one of the sites for the united medical and dental schools—one of the partners in the proposed merger.
      I must give one word of historical reply to my neighbour across the river, the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South, who like me represents a constituency with one of the oldest pedigrees in the country. There have been Members of Parliament for Southwark since the 13th century. I believe that there have been more than 400, reflecting the fact not that they have each had a short span, but that there were two at a time for each of the constituencies until last century.
      One of the great pleasures of a constituency such as mine—which is more rightly now called Southwark and Bermondsey, reflecting the two old boroughs south of the river—is looking after and advancing the causes of those institutions that are historically part of our community. We do so conscious of our history, but also conscious of our present. It is no mistake or accident that two of the greatest issues facing the Governments of our time are the futures of our education and health systems. The Bill is a microcosm at the higher education end of that debate, as it concerns the best arrangements in one part of the country for the best conjuncture of education and health.
      The question is simple: to merge or not to merge. I will not divide the House on Second Reading. My job is to pose some questions that flow from the proposition of the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South that there should be a merger—a proposition supported by the Minister.
      The House will be relieved to know that I will not repeat the speech of the right hon. Member by tracing the history of how we come to be here. Due to a series of developments in London medical education, we have ended up with a merged medical and dental school south of the river, on two sites: the St. Thomas's site in Waterloo, just over the bridge from here in the constituency of the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Miss Hoey); and the Guy's site, at London Bridge in my constituency.
      A merger is proposed between that institution and King's college, which provides academic teaching on the north bank of the river and clinical teaching on the south bank at King's College hospital, Camberwell. Ancillary issues are involved: students live in residential institutions, which are scattered around and are mainly south of the river.
      It may surprise the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South to learn that I do not intend principally to raise issues to do with health care and Guy's, although I am concerned about the linkage. The right hon. Gentleman stated three propositions as unarguable—one touches on the intervention of the hon. Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney (Mr. Rowlands). They are perfectly credible propositions, but I want to question them in turn, because there are counter-arguments.
      The first proposition is that it is widely agreed that integration is a good thing. Although that is so, several reputable people dispute it in the case of London teaching hospitals and schools, so it is not an unarguable proposition.
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      The second proposition was that there is a critical mass for medical and dental academic institutions. I agree that there is, but I take issue with the claim that the merger is necessary for, and will produce, that critical mass. Indeed, the merger will make for a much larger institution than is normal in this country and countries of a similar size, and much larger than is recommended. It will be a very large institution, and there are arguments against it being so big.
      Thirdly, on the intervention by the hon. Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney, I will not assert that the proposal does not have considerable support—I cannot do so. I do not doubt that there is majority support. However, I am aware from approaches made to me that that support is not unanimous, or even overwhelming. The people who are probably the most troubled are the students, but others who are academically involved in UDMS and, I gather, in King's—that is not in my constituency, so I know less about it—have certain concerns.
      Given that I think that there will probably be no recorded vote on Second Reading, the hon. Member may want to make further inquiries, and I can put him in touch with some of the people who are concerned about some of the implications. I am grateful for his interest as a former graduate of King's, which is an eminent university college.
      The right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South first tackled the drafting of the Bill, which is straightforward. The proposition is that, if there is to be a merger, one needs such a Bill. I will not discuss the details of the drafting, which will be a relief to some of those involved in it, whom I have known for a long time—I would not want them to be offended, but that is a more personal matter.
      The Bill provides for an appointed day for the merger, and the date pencilled in is August next year. My collaboration will depend on whether I get assurances on and satisfactory answers to my questions—the date may have to be later.
      Two other matters arise from the Bill's drafting. First, it will be a blessed relief to those living south of the river that we will lose a name that no one understands and gain one that, in theory, everyone would understand. The united medical and dental schools could be anywhere from John o'Groats to Land's End, or certainly from Aberdeen to Plymouth. It was not a very clever title—it was a bit clinical. I would not defend such a title, in which the historic names of the two original hospitals were lost.
      However, I am not sure that the new title provided for in clause 12—
      "the Guy's, King's College and St. Thomas' Hospitals' Medical and Dental School"—
      is a wonderful solution. It will not fit with ease on a rugby shirt, a rowing vest or anything else unless one is a very large fellow indeed, or a large woman. [Interruption.] Women's rugby is all the rage nowadays, and it will be an Olympic sport before we know where we are. Some of the people to be seen at St. Thomas' hospital and Guy's would be good candidates—if they do not play rugby already.

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      It is a minor issue, but we must get the name right. We want one with which we can all associate. No matter where they were educated, all hon. Members will agree that names matter a great deal.
      Mr. Rowlands: I do not quite understand what the hon. Gentleman objects to. The Local Government (Wales) Act 1994 left us with Rhondda Cynon Taff.
      Mr. Hughes: I remember that debate. I was educated in Wales and I still follow Welsh issues. However, even Rhondda Cynon Taff is only a third as long as the name proposed in the Bill. I do not want make a big deal about that, but it is a muddle that tries to get everyone's name into the title.
      Thirdly, I should like the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South to deal with the historical concern about the trust funds that belong to the trustees of the existing institutions. As in all such cases, there is some concern that, if the trust funds are merged, control will be lost and their original historic purposes will not be fulfilled.
      I have seen the memorandum from the Charity Commissioners that says they are happy, and I know how the law on the merger of trusts works. There is, to put it mildly, nervousness that there may be a loss of control of funds that were given for particular purposes as a result of the merger. If there continues to be discontent, could the trust funds held by the trustees of the various institutions remain separate and be excluded from the Bill? That could be done under the law. If it would allay concerns, I might well argue for it.
      The section of the documentation supporting the Bill called "The rationale for the merger" sets out the merged colleges' seven strategic objectives, which the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South summarised.
      First, there is the issue of critical mass. It is argued that the merger of two successful university institutions will result in the critical mass necessary to obtain a secure, linked set of academic centres of excellence that will enable us to keep our international reputation.
      We are talking about institutions that already have a high international reputation. London medical schools dominate the top ten list of institutions that receive Medical Research Council funding. In the international lists of institutions with the highest academic standards and their research grants and successes, UMDS does extraordinarily well.
      For example, in 1989 the French newspaper Libération published a guide to the top 100 universities in Europe. London's medical schools came top of that guide, which stated:
      "The density of its network is such that this premier position is in no way a surprise: the different colleges of the university each on their own cover the full range of specialities."
      There is a strong argument that it is the nature of the current institutions that attracts interest, investment and bright students from elsewhere.
      A London university medicine administrator told my office only last week that Singapore and Malaysia will pay for their students to study in England only at Oxbridge or London university. For medicine and dentistry, they will not pay for them to go anywhere else.
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      I am sure that there is no dispute in the House that it is important that any change we make to the structures must safeguard and enhance the academic reputation and international pre-eminence of the institutions.
      If we merge the two institutions, what will the student numbers be? What is the pattern of academic institutions in Britain and elsewhere? A learned article in the British Medical Journal in 1993 entitled "Undergraduate Medical Education" appeared in a selection of articles called "London after Tomlinson". It is both recent and academically attested. I hope that it will make my argument clear. It states:
      "The Tomlinson report recommends the incorporation of all medical colleges into multifaculty institutions without giving any academic evaluation of its desirability … There are, however, few data to support the thesis that undergraduate medical education is more effective when conducted in a multifaculty environment."
      I shall return to that point.
      The article continues:
      "the resulting medical colleges within the capital would be extraordinarily large, with some medical student intakes approaching 350. The General Medical Council's proposals for undergraduate education strongly recommend a reduction in the factual overload often generated within basic science faculties."
      The article then debates integration, to which I shall return, before addressing the numbers question, about which it states:
      "If the Tomlinson proposal was grounded in the belief that such mergers would produce economies of scale there is in fact little evidence to suggest that economies of scale exist in institutions that have merged.
      Our personal prediction would be that in 10–20 years the debate will focus on how to unscramble these large schools, bringing ourselves into line with those in the United States, where intakes of 100 to 150 students are deemed desirable."
      The new college will be considerably larger than other institutions in this country or in the United States. In paragraph 195, Tomlinson predicted that an intake of more than 200 to 250 would be bad, managerially and organisationally. The merger will produce an intake of 300. Chicago and Johns Hopkins, one of the most prominent medical schools in the United States, have a maximum intake of 100; Stanford's maximum is about 65. Are we sure that such large academic intake cohorts will benefit students?
      People are seriously troubled about that. On the mainland of Europe, there are often hundreds of students doing an academic course at any one time. It may be possible to get away with that with academic teaching—a point that replicates our debates about class size. I am doubtful about that argument, and it has never been our tradition in England. In medicine, dentistry and applied sciences generally, the argument is even less strong.
      The merger will also produce a dental school much larger than all other dental schools in Britain. Apart from Glasgow, dental schools have student intakes of less than 60. The optimum size recommended by the royal colleges and others is between 65 and 75. The UMDS figure is at present 88. I am not merely advancing a layperson's argument; the Nuffield inquiry into dental education, for example, made that point.
      It has been put to me by academics and students that a dental school that takes 140 students a year would, under any foreseeable arrangements, be unmanageable. For heaven's sake, let us examine whether the critical mass

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      will not be far too big. Where is the evidence that such a big school will work? There are no parallels, and the proposition is not supported by the academic evidence.
      The second strategic objective argues that the merger will
      "improve significantly the opportunities for interdisciplinary and interdisciplinary integration in pursuit of both teaching and research excellence."
      That might be the case in parts of the country where there is not already a federal university. The parts of the university of London about which we are talking are near each other. London students are part of a larger family—if they want to mix, they mix; if they do not want to mix, they do not.
      My university experience suggests that medics, dentists and vets do not naturally spend all their time with students studying other subjects, but traditionally stay together. It may be argued that that is not a good thing socially, but the argument for such mixing seems less well made in London than in any other place in the country as the collegiate structure already provides such opportunities.
      I accept that UMDS is a free-standing university medical and dental school, and that such institutions are now in a minority. But that does not mean that its students are isolated either from those undertaking the other professional training mentioned by the Bill's promoters or from students studying other subjects. It is not as if UMDS students will be miles away from other students, whether undergraduates or postgraduates, studying something else.
      There is also the questionable argument whether it will be better to integrate in this way. I challenge that argument, not because I believe that it is definitely wrong, but because strong and valid academic arguments suggest that it is not necessarily good. The arguments are as follows: if a highly regarded, internationally successful medical and dental school already exists, the benefits of merging may well be outweighed by the disadvantages. To put the question crudely: will the merger result in a sum greater than its constituent parts?
      The recent experience of Bart's, Queen Mary and Westfield, and the London, which have done a double merger, shows that the merger may bring no short-term advantages, although it is accepted that it may have long-term advantages. Can we be sure of the long-term advantages when it looks as though there will be few, if any, short-term advantages?
      Unit costs per student in London are already less than the national average. London medical students do not cost more than other medical students. Students at UMDS cost the taxpayer not more, but less, than average. What is the advantage of merging with another institution when that does not necessarily bring better value for money?
      There are some strong arguments about the nature of the academic teaching. One argument is that there will be generic teaching—that has been going on at UDMS for some time. There is an argument that one can have too much generic teaching. There is an argument that, if someone is studying medicine or dentistry, he wants specific teaching and does not necessarily want to be entirely integrated into a course of life sciences.
      At Bristol university, the joint lectures that were set up between the dentists, medics and other life science students have been abandoned because they became too
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      general. It does not automatically follow that it is a good thing for non-clinical teaching to be carried out with other people if it is inappropriate. It would be the same as insisting on all-class teaching, when it would be more appropriate to set or stream. We must be satisfied about what we are doing; we must not blindly undertake such a policy when there is evidence that it has not worked elsewhere.
      There are already links with other institutions—UMDS has strong modular links with University college London, for example. Why should it not be better to continue with that mix-and-match form of curriculum development rather than put everyone together on one integrated course as the proposal suggests? If the proposal were adopted and life sciences, medicine and dentistry were integrated, would that work in practice?
      We must consider the fact that people studying for an ordinary life science degree such as biochemistry have a traditional academic year cycle, while people studying for a medical or dental degree have different cycles—they go on location to other hospitals, they go on electives elsewhere, they undertake six-month stints in different places, and they have shorter holidays. There are practical questions about whether the system will work. Those questions are raised both by the students and by those who teach them. They say that they are achieving perfectly good results, so why should anyone seek to integrate them when that may be contrived and unnatural?
      The third strategic objective argues that the merger will
      "provide a cost-effective institution, both in terms of space utilisation and recurrent and capital funding."
      There are some serious questions to answer. I gather that the proposal will cost about £140 million—I should be grateful for confirmation. I also gather that, of that figure, about £70 million will be for the new biomedical block that is to come to the Guy's hospital site. I should say in passing that I hope that everybody will talk about it as the Guy's hospital site, not the London Bridge site—a title that has started to creep in as a way of writing Guy's hospital out of titles. Not surprisingly, the people at Guy's do not take too kindly to that.
      Another question which arises links this debate to the one about Guy's hospital. The current proposal that the Minister of State and his colleagues are advancing about Guy's hospital will leave vacant considerable amounts of space in at least one of the tower blocks that currently form part of the Guy's hospital site.
      It is no good looking at the cost of the academic development separately from the costs of the health service development. The cost of the health service development is the cost of Philip Harris house, which has escalated from about £50 million to well over £100 million. There is the cost of new build for mothers and children at Riddell house and other sites at St. Thomas's hospital and other further capital developments—all of which are eventually meant to be recouped in lower revenue costs.
      There are serious concerns that, under the Bill, we are committing ourselves to large amounts of taxpayers' money which happens to be in the pocket marked "education" rather than "health". Under the heading of health we have committed ourselves to further money to build unnecessary buildings. They are unnecessary, because space will be available in buildings that already exist.

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      The Minister said that next year—I will believe it when I see it—the building at Guy's hospital that was to have been called Philip Harris house—history is being rewritten, and it is now to be known only as phase III—will eventually be open. It was due to be opened about two years ago, but there have been all sorts of problems and some less well explained delays. The National Audit Office is currently investigating the matter.
      That building is meant to accommodate many of the health service facilities on the Guy's hospital site, but there will still be the two other relatively recently built buildings that are intended for health use. It will be helpful to know whether they will be used for health, or whether, as people at Guy's hospital and in the neighbouring community fear, they will be left virtually empty. In that case, they could be put to academic use. If so, why spend £140 million to put up buildings, some of which will not be needed because the necessary space will be available on part of the same hospital site at Guy's?
      That is why I say that the cost-effective use of space and recurrent and capital funding must be examined in the context not just of the Higher Education Funding Council for England budget, but of the funding budget of the Department of Health. It is no good disregarding the fact that there will be a cumulative cost to the taxpayer, so the two must be looked at together.
      The fourth rationale for the change is that it will consolidate the biomedical sciences currently taught on six sites on the Guy's medical school and hospital site at London Bridge. I understand the frustrations that have led to King's seeking to rationalise the use of its properties; working on one site instead of six would, of course, be an improvement. I will therefore not argue against the fourth rationale, but I want an assurance in writing that all the biomedical sciences will indeed be on one site. It is no good arguing for consolidation if students are moved either to the Denmark hill site in Camberwell or to the St. Thomas's site at Waterloo. We need to be sure that everything will be consolidated on the one Guy's hospital site.
      The fifth argument is that the teaching of future doctors, dentists, nurses and other health care professionals should be combined. The idea is to integrate teaching in the health service, and I agree with it. It seems a worthwhile objective, with which I would not quibble.
      The sixth proposal, however, cannot be borne out by the facts. It is that we should link the education of medical and dental students to the clinical work of a hospital site,
      "thus ensuring vertical integration of the curriculum, the key requirement of both the General Medical Council and Dental Councils in relation to future medical and dental education".
      That would be fine if, after accommodating all the medical and dental students in the new buildings at Guy's hospital, the teaching were done on the same site. But the Minister for Health and his colleagues have been busy shipping most of the in-patient beds away from Guy's hospital and off to St. Thomas's. That will defeat the object of the Bill. Academic work will be done on the Guy's hospital site, with out-patients, mental health patients and patients using the 112 elective beds, but most of the beds containing the patients on whom the students will need to learn will be at St. Thomas's, a mile or so down the road.
      That is nonsense and unnecessary. If academic work is to be consolidated on the west side of the Maze pond—the western half of the Guy's hospital site—then the
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      eastern half on the other side of the road should be used for medical health care. There is room to do that, because there is certainly room for a hospital with the number of beds needed to make the project viable on the other side of the site.
      It appears that, wittingly or unwittingly, the Government are trying to implement two contradictory policies. Consolidating teaching with clinical practice is more important than ever nowadays, because students do not do a straightforward two-year pre-clinical and then go on to clinical: they start clinical work earlier. On the other hand, the Government are so arranging things that students can do this less frequently. The students in the combined institution will spend all their lives doing their lectures on one site, occasionally talking to out-patients and those who occupy the remaining beds there, but for all other work with patients, they will have to go to another site. That is exactly what we want to avoid.
      The vertical integration of the curriculum with the clinical work of the hospital site will thus not be achieved by the Bill. The solution is to vary the proposals of the Minister for Health and his colleagues, who, over time, want to move most of the beds down the road to the St. Thomas's site. There is a good academically backed case for keeping a reasonable number of medical and surgical beds at the Guy's hospital site, where it can act as a secondary and tertiary hospital.
      That is not inconsistent with the Government's strategy—I agree with it—of rationalising specialties; but that does not necessarily mean rationalising all specialties on one site—certainly not if the money does not add up. The longer the process continues, the more Philip Harris house and the building programme will cost. It will then become less necessary to start building on other sites, such as the mother and baby site at St. Thomas's.
      When this Bill, as opposed to the merger, was first thought of, there was a proposal to have hospital services on both sites. Guy's and St. Thomas's would merge into one trust, so the reorganisation of services had not yet been fully worked out. Since then, however, cardiac, renal and neurological services have been rationalised, as had to happen because there was a need to consolidate. But there was then a failure to take into account precisely what the optimal mix of specialties and beds would be.
      There are strong academic arguments to the effect that hospitals with up to 1,400 beds—that is what the merger implies—are far too big in terms of organisation, morale and business management. The Americans, the Scandinavians and academics in the UK are, according to all I read and hear, reaching the view that great big hospital sites bringing all beds under one roof no longer offer the best hospital organisation models.
      That being so, the best logical solution is to use the space of the Guy's site and the space that King's decided it did not need in New Guy's house and Guy's tower for the original health service purposes. That will also be cheaper, because it will integrate academic and clinical work, and it will allow out-patients at the Guy's hospital site as well as other sorts of treatments there. This idea is also consistent with the fact that the most modern building in the entire health service, Philip Harris house, will just have been built.
      Finally, the last rationale is that the merged college will be able to concentrate medically related research groups alongside medical teaching and hospital services for

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      patients, thus increasing the opportunities for effective collaboration and cross-fertilisation of ideas. Hooray and amen to that. In that case, let us have the teaching and the clinical activity on the same site, so that the research, teaching and clinical activity can be together. If it is the plan for Guy's to be the academic site, let it be the academic site, but do not, at the same time, pull the rug from under us and take the medical activity away. It is not so easy to take the dental activity away.
      The logic behind this argument is fatally flawed. People are arguing for the integration of a medical and dental school with a university college, which is fine; and they are arguing to put it on one site, which is also fine. However, they have realised that the site will lose most of the clinical activity that is needed.
      I shall ask the Minister a specific question, and I am keen to get a specific answer. Will he give an undertaking that, after the proposed merger, the students will not be going to the King's college site or to the St. Thomas's site for their academic teaching? If they continue to go to the King's college site or to the St. Thomas's site, the purpose of consolidating will not be met.
      It will be nonsense if, in theory, we consolidate and bring the three sites together, but, in practice, a significant number of the students still have to be bussed to three different sites south of the river. We need to be clear about this: either we go down a put-it-all-on-one-site road or we do not. If we do not, the merger is not nearly as justified; if we do, for heaven's sake let us put the clinical activity in the same place.
      How much of the cost of the whole merger project and the creation of the whole new academic site is dependent on the private finance initiative? It is a coincidence that the debate is taking place on the day that the annual conference of the British Medical Association started. One of the BMA's great concerns—apart from the fact that it thinks that the health service is greatly underfunded, with which everyone in the health service could not but concur—is that the PFI has been dreamed up by the Government as a way of saving money, but that it has never been proven to be a good idea. There is no evidence that the PFI is delivering the goods.
      For example, it was reported in the national press at the weekend that in Scotland the flagship of the PFI still has not had its contract signed—in fact, I understand that none of the PFI contracts has been signed. Last year, the Treasury was unpersuaded that the PFI was a good thing, and the Treasury Select Committee has expressed many doubts.
      The people running the hospitals and the people in the health service are concerned that the PFI means that we will be signing up to deals that commit the provision of a set of services and facilities for 10, 20, 30, 40 or 50 years to someone else, and that the health service will not have the power to manage it. Some crucial questions in relation to this issue are: how much is dependent on PFI?; how secure is the PFI money?; will it be there?; will it be guaranteed?
      One of my concerns—it is shared more widely; in fact, my hon. Friend the Member for Bath (Mr. Foster), the Liberal Democrat spokesman on education and employment matters, has voiced this concern in the past, and may elaborate on it if he catches your eye, Mr.
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      Deputy Speaker—is that there have been many examples in the past where the promise of capital finance has never been delivered. What guarantee is there that the money is secure? What guarantee is there that it will not be cut in the years ahead? I refer to south London and to the Institute of Psychiatry, which is on the Maudsley site on Denmark Hill. It has had to face significant cuts, which has made it extremely difficult for it to carry on its work.
      If we are going to have the proposal, does the money come with it? Will the Minister or the sponsor say that it will be guaranteed, and that there will be no going back? In addition, is that logical and consistent with all the development and all the money that is being spent at the St. Thomas's site and at the King's college site? Will that expenditure militate against future expenditure to provide some similar services at Guy's, if that is the implication of the Bill?
      I have expressed the concerns of the students and the academics. I now refer to what seems to many local people to be a better solution. We may be rushing to go down a complete merger road when there may be a solution that goes in the same direction but does not have the same disadvantages. Is a gun being placed at the heads of the UMDS and King's college? How much is this an entirely cost-driven question? The Higher Education Funding Council is literally saying—because these are its instructions—"We are going to go for the cheapest option, as opposed to the one that produces the best answer for medical education in London."
      Tomlinson said in his report that changes in University Funding Council funding have led to pressures for more efficiency in teaching. These changes have increased the need to rationalise resources and to remove the duplication of posts. I subscribe to that view. However, one increasingly gets the impression that things are being so cost driven in higher education and in the health service that we will do so at the risk of academic excellence or the best arrangement of academic or medical resources.
      Would it not be possible to have a federal structure, instead of a merger, for King's college medical and dental school and UMDS? Why could there not be a closer collaboration that allows them to develop how they want to work together rather than have them forced to come together? Why can that not be pursued, particularly if it would be no more expensive than the current proposals—and, indeed, might save some of the costs? Some eminent people concerned with this debate would have no problem with such a structure.
      I understand that it is simply the funding authorities that are saying, "Even if it is cheaper or the same cost, we will not pay up unless you go down the road that we insist on." That seems to be going beyond the remit of the funding council. Its job is to provide funds for the best service; it is not its job to take away decisions from autonomous institutions. If they decide that something is better or more efficient, they should be allowed to pursue it.
      That has happened over the river. As hon. Members will remember from debates in this place over the past few years, Bart's was forced to merge in two stages—there was a federation of east London colleges in the 1980s, and it has been forced into a merger in the last few years.
      That was not a happy experience for everyone—there were certainly some very unhappy academics and students. It was argued that the merger put at risk some

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      of the things that the individual institutions had developed, such as their academic expertise and their reputation. Those of us south of the river still need to be persuaded. Are we going to have a forced marriage? It has to be done with the voluntary consent of everyone, not because they have a gun to their heads.
      Is there a danger under clause 5 that some of the money currently held by the trust funds of the two institutions will be lost to other activities at King's? I do not mean that other areas of King's should not be properly funded, but is there any risk? There must be a factual answer to the question. Can any of the money currently held by the trustees of UMDS or by the trustees of King's college medical and dental school be directed away from medicine and dentistry to elsewhere?
      If we are going to go down the merger road, what evidence is there—not from this debate, not from people in the university of London and not from people in the colleges in question, but from friends elsewhere—that a much bigger institution would do any better academically? London university has some continuing small academically excellent institutions. The London school of hygiene and tropical medicine, for example, has managed to retain its academic excellence in spite of its small size. The school of oriental and African studies proves that institutions do not have to be big to be better in academia or to punch their weight in the world's research journals. The more the Internet and university computer networks are used, the less we need to force people to be together on the same site.
      In any event, collaboration is only so good, in that many of the links are with the private sector, especially for the health service—for example, with the pharmaceutical companies and international conglomerates. Why cannot they continue to fund the organisations as they do at present?
      What about the students? My understanding is that a report in 1990—the second report of the Departments of Health and of Education's steering group on medical and dental education—proposed a set of undergraduate policies and plans for medical and dental students so that development of sites and their studies should always be enhanced by better teaching practice and circumstances. That has not been done, and the formal consultation process with the interested parties has not taken place. Why not? The interested parties should have a say through the procedures that were recommended.
      I wish to make a specific point about dentistry, and the dental hospital and dental school that is currently at Guy's. The proposal would mean that there would be about 2,200 biomedical students on the Guy's site. I am worried that, if we have 450 medical and dental students—that could be the maximum—together, the logic of merger will not be carried out. That group will be too big to be taught together, so it will be split up anyway. I understand that the physical geography of the proposed buildings means that the group will divide into two. If that is the case, the solution is not a solution. It would create a big organisation, but the students would have to be divided up after all.
      The dental school is the highest rated dental school for academic results in the country. The school, the students and many of the people associated with them have expressed reservations, for the reasons I gave earlier. We have seen the closure of three dental schools in the past
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      15 years. Given those facts, there is a real risk that, if we consolidated the dental teaching on one site, the institution would paradoxically become much more vulnerable, not much stronger.
      There are other dental schools around the country, and people who are cynical and sceptical feel that it would be easy, once the dental school was based at one institution, to say at some stage in the future—if other services were moved away—"There is no medical clinical work on the Guy's site, apart from out-patients, and there is only dental clinical work being conducted on the Guy's site, and it would be sensible to put the clinical work together with academic work, so let's consolidate the dentistry elsewhere. We don't need it here."
      Clearly that would be nonsense, and a betrayal of the tradition. I do not suggest that that is in people's minds at the moment, but it is a possible outcome if we consolidate in a way that people are unhappy about and that the students, lecturers and teachers have not been persuaded is the right way.
      Where are we? The proposal on the table appears to be led by the Higher Education Funding Council. It appears to be based on the fact that it will be cheaper, yet strong arguments suggest that it will not. It appears to be based on the fact that it is universally agreed, but significant groups of people are unhappy. The proposal appears to be based on the fact that it will consolidate teaching between life sciences and medical and dental science, but some people who have experience of doing that have thought better of it and unstitched such arrangements elsewhere.
      The proposal appears to be based on the premise that we need a big institution, but all the best practice elsewhere suggests that such a large number of dental and medical students would be too big and other institutions are smaller. It appears to be based on the premise that we will put everybody together on one site, but, as I have clearly argued, the understanding is that we would not get everybody on the same site; nor would we get medical activity in teaching terms and medical activity in clinical terms on the same site.
      There are some serious flaws in the argument. It is not surprising, therefore, that the proposal has taken so long to get so far. It is not surprising that, in recent months, in the words of somebody who spoke to me about it, there has been a lot of shadow boxing, but not everybody has been willing to sign on the bottom line. Yes, the councils have approved the proposal and, yes, eminent voices are in favour, but they are all in favour only on balance, with reservations or with concerns.
      Before the House completes its consideration of the Bill, I give notice that, if my questions are not answered—not only for my purposes, but for those who have come to see me about the issue—a whole raft of amendments will be tabled on Report. We probably should not as yet accept the proposals, no matter how tight the time deadline.
      I want some assurances. I hope that this debate will have flagged up my questions. I hope that the summer recess will allow us to get those assurances and some satisfactory answers. I hope, above all, that the conjunction of the plans of the Department of Health for health provision on the Guy's hospital site and the plans of King's and UMDS and the Department for Education and Employment for academic provision on the Guy's hospital site will result in a logical conclusion.

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      If the institutions are to merge, the site must have beds and in-patients and a secondary and tertiary hospital, and if they are not to merge, the proposal should not go through backed by arguments that are, to say the least, contradicted by some people with an academic interest. I hope that we will get some answers tonight, and all the remaining answers and some policy changes on some of the key issues in the months ahead.
      8.17 pm
      Sir Roger Sims: I cannot possibly claim to have the detailed understanding of the implications of the Bill that the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) has just so effectively demonstrated, but the House will be aware of my especial interest in Guy's hospital. I have worked with the hon. Gentleman for the past two or three years in an endeavour to retain Guy's hospital in its present form and largely on its present site.
      My right hon. Friend the Member for City of London and Westminster, South (Mr. Brooke), in explaining the proposals in the Bill, sought to emphasise that the proposals for the combined medical schools are separate from the hospital, which is administered by the local NHS hospital trust. That may be so technically, but I put it to him that they are closely linked in practical terms. The public perception is that hospitals and teaching schools are one and the same.
      I believe that the proposals to transfer a substantial number of medical services from the Guy's site to the St. Thomas's site are flawed. I said in a debate that I initiated in the House about 18 months ago that I thought that the Secretary of State's decision was based on inadequate and inaccurate information. No evidence has emerged since then to cause me to change that view. I urge my hon. Friend the Minister for Health to reconcile his opposing positions: on the one hand, he advocates the Bill and all that it implies and, on the other, he is involved in implementing the proposals to merge Guy's and St. Thomas's and to transfer services.
      In my brief contribution, I emphasise the points made by the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey. If much of the teaching is to occur on the Guy's site, it is difficult to justify moving so many of the medical facilities and the patients to the St. Thomas's site. That is not logical. If we are to develop a fine medical school on the Guy's site, patients are an essential part of the learning process. It seems extraordinary to try to develop teaching facilities on the Guy's site while transferring medical facilities and the patients to another site.
      My hon. Friend the Minister must also justify the cost of the exercise. It seems extraordinary to spend so much money on new buildings for the St. Thomas's site when the present proposals will mean empty accommodation on the Guy's site, both in Philip Harris house and in the tower blocks. I urge my hon. Friend—who wears two hats as Minister responsible for implementing this legislation and also those proposals endorsed by the House regarding Guy's and St. Thomas's—to consider whether he can justify both policies. I have made clear the sorts of changes that I think he should make. As he considers implementing the Bill before us, I hope that he will realise that my case for substantially modifying the plans for Guy's vis-à-vis St. Thomas's is now even stronger.
      8.22 pm
      Mr. Don Foster: I come to the debate with a completely open mind on the rights and wrongs of the proposed move. Having listened to the contributions by the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South (Mr. Brooke) and my hon. Friend the Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) and the brief but plangent contribution by the hon. Member for Chislehurst (Sir R. Sims), I remain fairly open-minded about our approach to the issue.
      My hon. Friend and the hon. Member for Chislehurst asked important questions which must be answered before a final decision is taken. For example, my hon. Friend referred in passing to the important issue of the private finance initiative and the role that it must play in funding some of the proposed work if the merger goes ahead. I do not know whether my hon. Friend is aware that there is considerable confusion about the role of the PFI in the education sector.
      There has been interesting correspondence between the Department for Education and Employment and the Treasury on that matter. The Department believes that the PFI should be in addition to the normal capital allocation procedures, whereas the Treasury views it as a substitute for those procedures. There is clearly a difference of opinion that will have implications for whether funds will be available to ensure that the required capital work takes place.
      I was interested in the remarks of the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South, who referred to the longevity of his constituency and to some of his predecessors. He is in the Chamber and may be interested to learn that my constituency dates back at least as long as his. I also have some interesting forebears. In the 1800s, the local Member of Parliament, Mr. A. J. Roebuck, was the first hon. Member to propose the state funding of education in this country.
      If Mr. Roebuck were here today, he would be interested to listen to our debate on the funding of medical and dental education. He would have noticed the interesting timing of today's debate. Many people who are concerned about higher education in general, and about dental and medical education in particular, will arrive at the Palace of Westminster tomorrow to express their real concerns about existing funding difficulties in those areas. We are discussing the merger of two institutions that may require additional funding of £140 million or possibly more in the context of significant cuts in higher education funding. Therefore, we must ask: will that money be available?
      This debate takes place within the context of real concern about the present funding of clinical and academic education. Mr. Deputy Speaker, I am sure that you are aware that universities' capital incomes were slashed by about 31 per cent. in last November's Budget. There was an overall funding cut of 5 per cent. and at least a suggestion that further cuts would follow. Those capital cuts came on top of a 28 per cent. real terms reduction in funding per student in the past six years.
      Those figures are clearly important to the debate, as we are told that the proposals will save money. We are told that they are driven largely by the savings that may accrue from economies of scale. However, we know that the proposals will cost a great deal of money initially and no evidence has yet been produced of any savings in the long term. Before the House passes the Bill, hon. Members

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      must receive a clear answer on whether money will be made available to fund the up-front costs of the merger. Clear evidence must be produced that economies of scale will produce savings that will not prove detrimental to the quality of future medical and dental education.
      People with those concerns may well look back to other mergers that have taken place, for example in the 1970s, when Bart's was told to merge with Queen Mary's. It was told that funds would be withheld from it if the merger did not go ahead. It went ahead, but none of the money that was promised to fund the merger was made available until about 12 or 13 years later, in 1985. We must be absolutely sure that the funding will be made available in this case. I hope that the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South will say what assurances the Government have given him that funds will be made available.
      I have also said that it is important that we are given a clear sign that there will be economies of scale to save money, but in a way that will not be harmful to dental and medical education in this country. One concern which has not so far been expressed is with the way in which cuts may be made that will have a direct effect not only on medical and dental education but on the medical and dental care of people in London.
      There was some interesting correspondence recently between the Minister of State, Department for Education and Employment—the hon. Member for Mid-Worcestershire (Mr. Forth)—senior people within the Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals and medical schools around the country. For example, in the middle of May this year, the chairman of the CVCP's medical committee wrote to the Minister expressing considerable concern that the Department for Education and Employment had been quoted as saying that there was
      "no direct link between the level of university grants and the delivery of NHS patient services".
      The chairman went on to describe what he saw as an "inextricable triad" of teaching, research and patient care. Yet, in subsequent correspondence, the Minister seemed not to accept the intricate link between the two.
      That is why it was so pleasing that the Minister for Health talked about his acknowledgment of the links between teaching, research and patient care. If the merger is to go ahead, we need an assurance that it not only will bring about improvements in the teaching and medical side of dentistry but will not in any way harm patient care for people in the capital.
      Mr. Simon Hughes: My hon. Friend will be aware, as I am, that one of the great concerns outside is that there will not be sufficient medical or dental students, as in many other professions. One important factor in establishing confidence is that students should have confidence in their choice of institution, feel keen to go there and believe that it is a place where they want to study, and that they do not go off and do something else.
      Does my hon. Friend agree—
      Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Janet Fookes): Order. The hon. Gentleman is making a very long intervention.
      Mr. Hughes: I shall shorten the last sentence, Madam Deputy Speaker.
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      Does my hon. Friend agree that the views of students, those who represent them, as well as the views of patients, are vital when we consider specific proposals, as well as general policy on health and education?
      Mr. Foster: My hon. Friend makes an important point. There appears to be a fair body of evidence that suggests that there is much support for the proposal of the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South. It is nevertheless important for, and incumbent on, all hon. Members to take careful account of those who are critical of these proposals and to ensure that, before the final version of the Bill is passed by the House—if that is to be so—we answer their questions clearly.
      My hon. Friend made another important and relevant point: whether the Government will make sufficient funds available to ensure that we meet the targets for dental and medical training that they established. I do not know whether he is aware of this, but there was an interesting exchange recently in another place, when Baroness Fisher asked Her Majesty's Government:
      "How they intend to guarantee the necessary finance to train an additional 500 doctors by the year 2000 in view of the impact upon university medical schools brought about by the 28 per cent. cut in their funding over the past six years and the further 5 per cent. cut for teacher training imposed in the last budget."
      In response, Lord Henley drew attention to the fact that the Government would take into account concerns about funding for medical and dental education. He said:
      "However, the Government have to take into account the wider considerations, such as the burden on the taxpayer and the need to control public expenditure."
      He went on to make a similar point, saying that very difficult decisions have to be made about how they allocate the sums of money that are available for higher education. He said:
      "We believe that the medical side of higher education receives its fair share."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 19 June 1996; Vol. 573, c. 316–18.]
      "Fair share" in that context has led to significant cuts. That is why we need clear assurances that additional money will be made available in the short term to fund the merger.
      We are asked to accept that the merger will lead to economies of scale. My hon. Friend has already expressed the views of a number of people who believe that there is no clear evidence that that will be the case. The medical and dentistry secretary at Queen Mary and Westfield, for example, recently said that, from its recent experience of merger, there have been no short-term advantages, but acknowledged that there might be some long-term advantages. There is little evidence to show that any economies of scale will accrue from this merger, certainly not the evidence expressed in the debate. I hope that some evidence will be provided before the end of the debate.
      As my hon. Friend the Member for Southwark and Bermondsey said, it is worth taking it into account that economies of scale are usually assumed to come from an expansion of an institution; yet, as we heard earlier, because teaching may take place on a number of different sites, there may not be evidence of the economies of scale in this case.
      There is also the point expressed in paragraph 195 of the Tomlinson report, which suggests that an intake into a medical school of more than 200 or 250 would not

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      necessarily be a very efficient way of doing things in managerial or organisational terms. It is interesting to note that the merged college will have an intake of about 300. Even within the Tomlinson report, which advocated such a merger, there is evidence to suggest that in this case it may not have managerial or organisational advantages.
      I repeat that I have an open mind on this issue, but I hope that, before the end of the debate, we will be given clear answers to the questions that other hon. Members and I have raised. I am sure that we all look forward to the winding-up speech of the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South.
      8.39 pm
      Mr. Henry McLeish: I shall try to be brief, and confine my remarks to what the Minister said earlier.
      The hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) made a number of detailed points, and the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South (Mr. Brooke) will doubtless wish to deal with some of the issues that he raised with the benefit of local knowledge and an interest in the subject.
      I welcome the Bill, which, I hope, will enable the aspirations of the promoters to be realised. There is no doubt that medical education and research in London is important not only to the capital but to the nation and, indeed, the world. The House would, I think, expect any Bill such as this to enhance rather than detract from what is already happening.
      The hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey raised the question of property, which is linked to the issue of the private finance initiative. In its response to the Tomlinson report, the British Medical Association mentioned concerns about the merger—concerns, rather than objections to what was being discussed. In paragraphs 13.4 and 13.5 of that response, entitled "London's health services education and research: response to the Tomlinson report", the BMA states:
      "There is concern, however, that the use of split sites for amalgamated schools will lead to a lack of space and facilities which will make it difficult to deliver the curriculum being proposed by the GMC … It is a matter of some concern that the Report considers that the costs of rationalisation can be self-financing through the sale of medical school assets."
      At that point, post-Tomlinson, it was feared that the merger might have an impact on not only the use of sites but the quality of education.
      An article featured in The Times Higher Education Supplement on 26 January this year raised the whole question of the private finance initiative. I do not want to inject too harsh a political note into the debate, but it is clear that the PFI has not been the remarkable success for which the Government hoped. The article suggested that
      "King's College London and the United Medical and Dental Schools"—
      which are being merged—
      "are looking to clinch the biggest deal so far"
      under an initiative worth £125 million. No one would deny that such an initiative requires investment, but it is important to set that against the performance of the Government's other PFI projects. The point is worthy of
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      concern, and I hope that the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South will address himself to it. If a significant investment is required, can we be guaranteed that it will be delivered through the PFI? It has not been delivered to provide hospital improvements, refurbishments and new building, and there have been major problems in other regards. There have been delays, and many people find the PFI a cumbersome way in which to attract capital. When a consortium is involved, it may be interested in more than just the bricks and mortar that the merger would no doubt require.
      The article in The Times Higher Education Supplement points out that a final decision would have to be made by July this year. As he is not here, the Minister cannot respond, but I hope that the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South will tell us whether the PFI is on track, and also whether a decision must indeed be made by July. I suppose that the obvious further question is, "If not, why not?" The project will clearly require investment; the Government have gone down the PFI road, and it is clearly in the promoters' interests to know the current implications.
      Mr. Simon Hughes: There is another question which neither the hon. Gentleman nor I asked, but which people outside may ask. Who are the prospective partners? When funds are required for a project involving health education and medical research, some people might not be regarded as necessarily very desirable partners in a consortium because of vested interests in the pharmaceutical industry or other industries. That is another question to which the right hon. Gentleman might usefully give us an answer.
      Mr. McLeish: I was going to touch on that. The illuminating article in The Times Higher Education Supplement tells us that
      "Six consortia have been invited to make detailed bids, out of the 30 that made initial inquiries."
      Linked to that statement, and perhaps extending the concerns expressed by hon. Members, is the statement that
      "The successful private finance consortium will have to provide additional services over and above the basic construction and financing of the new building. Lynn Carlisle, co-ordinator of the PFI project, said the colleges would be looking for proposals for campus management."
      That raises some of the issues that have surrounded other PFI projects. Is it a question of buildings? Is it a question of refurbishment? Is it a question of site acquisition and development? Or does the issue indeed extend to the provision of services? That has a material bearing on the merger, and, unfortunately, on whether the consortia can secure the adequate return that they seek.
      The article poses another question by suggesting that
      'the project was proving popular with developers partly because some valuable West London buildings belonging to King's College will be refurbished for non-educational uses."
      That is in the context of a very significant merger involving many changes in land use and building construction. Perhaps it should happen, in terms of the viability of the project, but surely these issues will interest the community in London. They are certainly important in regard to the medical and educational aspects. Given all the problems surrounding the PFI, we must be given some indication this evening that the project is

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      proceeding, that there is interest and that the nature of the deal that is ultimately struck will favour the college and schools that are being merged and not—as PFI projects suggest—the developers.
      We support the initiative, but some solid points have been made which require a response. I hope that the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South will deal with funding and, in particular, the PFI.
      8.46 pm
      Mr. Brooke: With the leave of the House, I shall reply to both the debate and the questions that have been asked. All who had the pleasure of listening to the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) will probably agree that the debate has consisted of variations on a theme, and that the hon. Gentleman provided the theme while other hon. Members provided the variations. The hon. Gentleman's speech, which lasted just under an hour, was interesting throughout, and I personally enjoyed it.
      At the beginning of his speech, the hon. Gentleman referred to the name. As I know from experience elsewhere, the name is a matter of potential difficulty. I continue to derive pleasure from the existence of a finger post in Lincolnshire that directs people to the villages of Mavis Enderby and Old Bolingbroke: under those names has been added the graffito "the gift of a son".
      The hon. Gentleman mentioned trust funds. I can assure him that there is no risk of any trust funds being inappropriately diverted. If the money cannot be spent on the purposes for which it is intended, it cannot be spent, and remains in the trust fund. The hon. Gentleman also spoke at length about critical mass. The issue here is not the critical mass for good and strong groups; it is research. Such a critical mass is necessary for research, enabling a full range of specialities alongside each other to allow synergy and cross-fertilisation. Perhaps I was at fault in not using the phrase "critical mass" in my introductory speech.
      The numbers to be taught—
      Mr. Simon Hughes: I do not wish to pre-empt the right hon. Gentleman, but—if he is not already planning to address it—can he address the point about the size of entry cohorts, which was one of the critical mass sub-definitions that I was very keen to explore?
      Mr. Brooke: That was the very next point that I was going to address. If we examine Hansard in retrospect, we will find that I had just embarked on that point.
      The numbers to be taught are of the order of 300 to 330 medical students per year, as the hon. Member for Bath (Mr. Foster) quoted. That allows the development of effective cohorts of students with different backgrounds and for the possibility of having a mature graduate entry cohort who would be capable of staying together as a cohort and of being taught as a single body.
      There are three teaching hospitals involved, so that it is possible in planning terms to assign particular teaching hospitals to particular cohorts. But that is still a matter for
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      the future, and it is a matter on which the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey may wish to remain in correspondence with interested parties.
      Mr. Hughes: Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
      Mr. Brooke: I will give way, but the hon. Gentleman must not assume that I have inexhaustible knowledge.
      Mr. Hughes: I am grateful, and I shall not intervene too often. The right hon. Gentleman's answer troubles me because he suggested as a reason why 300 or more students would not be too many the fact that they may be spread among the three hospitals. The logic of the proposal is that they will all come on to one site to work on one hospital. I therefore wonder whether he has a briefing or the knowledge to be able to explain what appears to be a discrepancy between the two arguments.
      Mr. Brooke: I cannot do that. The hon. Gentleman's preoccupation was that the numbers would be overwhelming. I am saying that, because we have the potential of teaching in different cohorts, we can make use in some respects of the multi-site background.
      As for the dental schools, there are mechanisms in hand for the clinical experience element to be taken in two large successful dental hospitals, which is perhaps an example of the point that I made a moment ago. It has not yet been decided how that should be done. The hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey was of course right about the numbers that he quoted. It may be that there will be two separate cohorts, which in that respect will be divided between the two dental hospitals. It is also possible—although this is still at the unresolved and planning stage—that that may be done on a year-by-year basis, so that one year a student will be in one hospital and in the next year in the other hospital.
      There is a potential for having separate specialisations in the two hospitals so that one hospital will concentrate on some specialisations and the other hospital on other specialisations. There is currently some degree of complementarity and overlap. One can therefore see why the matter is still in the planning stage and not yet resolved. The fact that we have that combined strength in the two hospitals provides potential protection for the future on the issue raised by the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey at the end of his speech.
      The argument for co-ordinated teaching is not about joint biomedical teaching, but to ensure that the clinical professions are able to undertake appropriate clinical classes together. I doubt that there will be integrated science teaching. That is probably a false assumption. Some joint classes may be given, but the buildings are riot being designed on a scale to take life science and medics together. The planning of the new building on the Guy's site is not envisaged so that both could be done in one place.
      The matter of costs was raised by the hon. Member for Bath and by the hon. Member for Fife, Central (Mr. McLeish). The private finance initiative process means that currently the actual costs are necessarily unknown in detail. In response to the question from the hon. Member for Fife, Central, however, I can say that the PFI process is currently on track. That is not to say that it will continue to he on track, but it is currently on track.

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      I can confirm the figure of £140 million, which the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey asked me about, of which £70 million—or approximately half—will go into the biomedical building on the Guy's site. A figure of between £40 million and £50 million will go into the refurbishment of the Cornwall house site.
      The hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey referred in his speech to this being all taxpayers' money. It is taxpayers' money if one regards the sites that King's will be selling in west London as taxpayers' money, but those sites already exist. The hon. Member for Fife, Central also referred to an article in one of the educational papers, and the potential for developing sites in those areas. Part of the equation is the money that will be realised from those sites. Moreover, the biomedical activity will be brought from six different sites, including those in west London, on to a single site.
      Mr. Simon Hugh rose—
      Mr. Brooke: The hon. Gentleman cannot restrain himself further.
      Mr. Hughes: I stand corrected on the matter of where the money will come from, and I understand the point made by the right hon. Gentleman. Can he help us with the tally at the end of that set of sums? I am grateful for confirmation of sum of £140 million in total. Does he have—if not, I shall be happy to receive it from him later—the breakdown as to how much will be PFI money from the private sector, how much will be money from the sale of current assets and how much will be properly defined taxpayers' money from the Higher Education Funding Council?
      Mr. Brooke: I cannot answer that question. I have been given a breakdown which shows that £54 million will come from the health service, £20 million from the Higher Education Funding Council, £7 million from the united medical and dental schools—of which £2 million will be from the special trustees and £5 million from UMDS itself—and then the money from property sales at King's. It is too early to give the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey the detailed answers that he sought on the PFI process earlier.
      I realise that the tower at Guy's affords an opportunity. It gives the hospital an opportunity for additional health uses—within the health service, about which the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey expressed some skepticism—as well as what I would describe as trust-focused academic-clinical research. In other words, employees of the trust as against employees of the medical school will be engaged in the research, which is of course one of the bonuses and the glories of the two systems being side by side.
      The hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey wanted an assurance on the consolidation of the biomedical activity. All candidates and all students will have a base there. If there is any academically desirable science teaching that needs to be done at a clinical site, that can and will be done. There is a degree of flexibility in the planning, but I do not think that we are yet at the
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      point of absolute definition—perhaps understandably. because until the Bill is passed we do not know that we have the commitment to progress.
      I know that the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey did not mean to be disparaging in any way when he referred to talking to out-patients, but that is one of the major advantages of the strong Guy's site, which will enable a student to follow a case. The student may now see individuals in out-patient's, but he will be able to follow the case on a local basis thereafter. That is particularly so because given more rapid discharge from a bed, the less easy vertical integration will become. That is critically true in the early years of the curriculum. If the health service decides to put the clinical service on to Guy's and St. Thomas's, there is no potential planning problem.
      I have responded to the question whether students will be bussed. The answer is not for the first years, but some science-related clinical services will be taught while students are on their clinical placements. I said that we are in the process of testing the PFI, so I could not give a more definitive answer. In reply to the hon. Member for Fife, Central, I can say that not only is that testing currently on track, but, overall, the Hunt's house site was due to be handed over to the combined medical schools, in planning terms, in December 1996. The site is now due to be available in July 1997. That is not certain, but a reasonable assumption.
      Mr. Don Foster: We understand the right hon. Gentleman's difficulty in giving categorical PFI assurances, and we accept those that he has given. However, what assurances are the Government giving as to the £54 million expected from the health service and the £20 million from the HEFC?
      Mr. Brooke: 'They are part of the existing plan. I cannot be more definitive. If the hon. Gentleman wants to enter into correspondence with the Bill's promoters, he is free to do so. I have sought, from somewhat sparse knowledge, to reply as fully as I can to the debate. The HEFC for England has approved the business case, subject to the testing of the PFI process—so we cannot answer the question, "Will it be PFI?"
      The hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey asked whether the enterprise is cost driven. Both UMDS and KCL started their dialogue by academic argument—they wanted merged departments. They needed to persuade the funding council that that was the way forward, rather than the council putting a gun to their head. The proposed physical location is the best option to achieve that end. The HEFC is not dictating the solution, but it requires proper academic and financial valuations before it gives its seal of approval.
      Mr. Simon Hughes: Although it is clearly good for students learning medicine and dentistry to see out-patients, it is as important for them to see in-patients. What is the logic of having academic teaching and students on the Guy's site and most of the in-patients on an entirely different site?
      Mr. Brooke: One disadvantage for my hon. Friend the Member for Chislehurst (Sir R. Sims) and myself is that my hon. Friend the Minister spoke early in the debate, so

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      there was not the opportunity to intervene with certain questions. The questions of my hon. Friend and of the hon. Members for Southwark and Bermondsey and for Bath are more for my hon. Friend the Minister than myself.
      The Bill's purpose is to secure a merger that would not be achieved by a federation, as was half hinted. If one expects an organisation such as King's to commit £70 million raised through the sale of its property to a new location on the Guy's site, that must be done with proper control and capacity for planning. I again commend the Bill to the House.
      Question put and agreed to.
      Bill accordingly read a Second time, and committed.

      Defamation Bill [Lords]
      As amended (in the Standing Committee), again considered.
    New clause 11

      LIMITATION OF ACTIONS: SCOTLAND
      '(1) The Prescription and Limitation (Scotland) Act 1973 is amended as follows.
      (2) In section 18A (limitation of defamation and other actions), for subsection (1) substitute—
      "(1) Subject to subsections (2) and (3) below and section 19A of this Act, no action for defamation shall be brought unless it is commenced within a period of one year after the date when the right of action accrued."
      (3) In section 19A (power of court to override time-limits, etc).
      (a) for subsection (1) substitute—
      "(1) Where a person would be entitled, but for any of the provisions of section 17 or section 18 and 18A of this Act, to bring an action, the court may, if it seems equitable to do so, allow him to bring the action (or to bring any specified cause of action to which the action relates) notwithstanding that provision."
      after subsection (1) insert—
      "(1A) In acting under this section in respect of causes of action falling within section 18A of this Act, the court shall have regard to all the circumstances of the case and in particular to—

      (a) the degree to which the operation of section 18A of this Act prejudices the pursuer or any person whom he represents;

      (b) the degree to which any decision of the court under this section would prejudice the defender or any person whom he represents;

      (c) the length of, and the reasons for the delay on the part of the pursuer;

      (d) where the reason or one of the reasons for the delay was that all or any of the facts relevant to the cause of action did not become known to the pursuer until after the end of the period mentioned in section 18A—

      (i) the date on which any such facts did become known to him; and

      (ii) the extent to which he acted promptly and reasonably once he knew whether or not the facts in question might be capable of giving rise to an action; and

      (e) the extent to which, having regard to the delay, relevant evidence is likely—

      (i) to be unavailable, or

      (ii) to be less cogent than if the action had been brought within the period mentioned in section 18A.

      (1B) In the case of an action for malicious falsehood brought by a personal representative, the references in subsection (1A) above to the pursuer shall be construed as including the deceased person to whom the cause of action accrued and any previous personal representative of that person."
      (4) The amendments made by this section apply only to rights of fiction arising after the section comes into force.'.—[Mr. Brooke.]
      Question again proposed, That the clause be read a Second time.
      Madam Speaker:I remind the House that with this we are considering amendment Nos. 41 and 42.
      9.5 pm
      Mr. Brooke: I shall resume where I was interrupted by a most worthwhile Bill, which I am happy to say has now been carried.
      At the moment of interruption, I was saying that I am conjoined in the new clause and the consequential amendments with my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley). He raised the same matters in Committee, where he was unable to move what is now new clause 11 but stated his intention to pursue the matter further on Report.
      My hon. Friend warned me that the intercalated nature of the debate could prevent his being present in the Chamber, but he is with me in spirit. As the heart of the new clause lies in harmonising the law in Scotland with that provided for elsewhere in the Bill—notably in reducing the three years in Scotland to the single year provided in the Bill—I should make it clear that I do not have a single drop of Scottish blood and that, if I trample in any way on Scottish sensibilities, I hope that it will be attributed to the insensitivities of a Sassenach, albeit laced with Welsh and Ulster blood.
      I tabled the new clause because media constituents asked me to do so at the last possible moment in the passage of the Bill. I acted immediately, without undertaking any research, to enable a debate to take place. As the matter was debated in Committee, I do not propose to rehearse all the arguments deployed there, but I want to give the Minister—who is a graduate of King's college and was most welcome in the previous debate—the chance to expand his arguments against the propositions of my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham, which were deployed in a necessarily helter-skelter manner in Committee.
      On 6 June, my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham asked whether the Scottish Law Commission, which my hon. Friend the Minister prayed in aid in his remarks, could show why six years was needed in Scotland. My hon. Friend the Minister said that the Scottish Law Commission did not see the merit of reducing the period to one year, but he did not explain why. As the debate was to be revisited in a week's time, my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham asked the Minister to invite the Scottish Law Commission to send him the justification for leaving the period as it was. The Minister did not make such a commitment; instead he explained the problem of changing the law applying to Scotland without a Scottish Minister present in Committee and promised to consult Scottish Ministers the following week before the Committee returned to the subject, which satisfied my hon. Friend.
      The following week, the Minister stated that the new clause would change Scottish law on the discretionary power of the courts to override the time limit. He said that the Government saw no reason to change that provision. He said that he had consulted Scottish Ministers, as he had promised, and had been assured that it had been fully considered and added that, in the light of comments received during consultation on the Bill in Scotland, there was no evidence that change was required in Scotland. He alluded to the Scottish Law Commission as part of the consultative process, but yet again he did not rehearse its views, as my hon. Friend had requested a week earlier.
      My hon. Friend the Member for Eltham concluded the debate by reminding the Committee that it had not heard why three years were better for Scotland and it is my purpose—as it was my hon. Friend's intent—to return to
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      the issue in order to get a clear answer from the Government. As I implied at the beginning of my speech, the issue has exercised a number of media organisations in my constituency.
      Mr. Boateng: The right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South (Mr. Brooke) does the House a service by enabling us to return to this topic. Circumstances required us not to spend as much time on it as perhaps some of our number would have liked in Committee.
      There are no doubt good reasons why many people in Scotland are more than content that there should be a distinction between the law in Scotland and that in England and Wales on the limitation period, not least because many in England and Wales—we shall no doubt hear them when we debate another amendment—are concerned about the reduction of the limitation period from three years to one, do not believe that the case has been made out and see no reason why Scotland should be obliged to share in England and Wales's new misfortune. On Second Reading and in the other place, scant attention was paid to the distinction between Scotland and England and to the lack of any apparent justification for it.
      Since the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South has introduced the issue of blood lines into the debate, I should say that I have some Scottish blood. I have a grandfather who delighted in the name of Robert Wallace Burns McCombie. Anyone who has a grandfather with that name is entitled to lay some claim to Scottish blood, and I do so with pride. I have no particular interest to declare concerning the media north of the border, but I am aware of a conflicting picture emerging there on the issue.
      Mr. Bill Walker: As one whose blood is all Scottish, may I ask whether the hon. Gentleman recognises the convention on handling Scottish business in the House? The matter is very sensitive. Scottish law is different and we do not as a matter of practice change the laws affecting Scotland without Scottish Members—either in the Scottish Grand Committee or in Committee—having the opportunity to debate and discuss the merits of doing so.
      Mr. Boateng: Quite so. The absence of Scottish Members was a very good reason why members of the Committee did not dwell too long on the subject. We are blessed tonight with the presence of a number of Scottish Members and are therefore able to range more widely over Scottish matters than we otherwise would.
      We are also fortunate to have received representations from a number of Scottish organisations that have asked specifically for the matter to be raised. I know, for instance, that the Scottish Media Lawyers Society has contacted my hon. Friend the Member for Cunninghame, North (Mr. Wilson), who was present earlier. He has asked me to raise that contact on his behalf and to express his view that the case does not seem to be made out for a distinction between England and Wales and Scotland on the limitation period. I am bound to say that the Scottish media lawyers share the view expressed in "Bringing Harmony into the Law of Defamation", an article by Alistair Bonnington, who may be known to a number of hon. Members. The society took the view—a view with

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      which I disagree—that it should be one year, and it was anxious to harmonise the position in Scotland with that in England and Wales.
      Another, perhaps more authoritative, body—in the sense that it has a wider overview and a specific general interest in the matter—is the Law Society of Scotland. It was very much of the view that it would be quite wrong to change the Scottish position and to bring it into line with English law, as the Bill proposes. The society took the view—which accords with my own as regards the law in England and Wales—that three years is the right time, not least because of the problems outlined by Mr. Clancy of the society. He said that
      "legal aid is not available for defamation actions and it would unduly favour potential defenders (who may be substantial organisations) if the potential pursuer's rights are limited to their exercise within one year of the delict (or civil wrong) having been committed."
      There is a great deal of sense in that.
      9.15 pm
      It seems clear that the notion that there should be a change from three years to one year—or from six years to one year—has not found favour with the Scottish Law Commission. But has the commission been consulted? It certainly should have been. If so, what is its view? Is it—as one suspects—that there are no valid arguments that would justify reducing the period in Scotland during which an action for defamation can be brought to 12 months? We want to be sure that the commission has been consulted and we would like to know its view.
      What about the Scottish Courts Administration? Is it correct that it too opposes a reduction? We would like the Minister to answer those questions within the general context of hon. Members' concerns, not least about the series of amendments that we discussed earlier to clause 13. Have those promulgating the Bill adequately considered the position in Scotland? I have heard nothing during the debates on Second Reading or in the other place about the impact of clause 13 on the Claim of Right Act 1689 as opposed to the Bill of Rights 1688.
      Mr. Dalyell: If, as I suspect, the answer is no and those bodies have not been consulted, is there not a case for a statement to be made by the Lord Advocate at the Scottish Grand Committee during its peripatetic round? Scottish Ministers should be questioned on this complex but important subject.
      Mr. Boateng: Ministers may feel that the matter should be brought to the attention of Scottish Law Officers. It is not for me to trespass on this matter now, but those interested in Scottish constitutional matters sometimes believe that these matters are not always treated with the seriousness that they deserve. I hope that the Minister will take time to consider the matters that I have raised in this short speech and satisfy the House that my concerns have indeed been met.
      Mr. Menzies Campbell: I hope that it will not be seen as a reflection on the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South (Mr. Brooke), who introduced the new clause, if I say that, in this matter, I thought that his competence exceeded his enthusiasm for the measure by some considerable distance.
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      The House would do well to reject the amendment. Not only was no Scottish Minister on the Standing Committee, but there was no Scottish Member either and, this evening, we do not have a Scottish Minister with us. If the House passed such a measure without proper consideration of the sensitivities, and perhaps the realities, of Scottish law, it might act as an effective recruiting sergeant for those of us who believe that domestic Scottish law should be dealt with in a domestic Scottish Parliament, based in Edinburgh. Perhaps to that extent I should encourage the right hon. Member for City of London and Westminster, South, but for the purpose of this evening it is right to oppose the new clause that he moved.
      The hon. Member for North Tayside (Mr. Walker) said in an intervention that it was a convention in such circumstances that the law of Scotland was not changed. Would that he was always correct about that. I can think of a number of recent criminal justice measures that, towards the end of their passage, dealt with Scotland, but never had a proper airing in Committee or on the Floor of the House from a Scottish point of view.
      The position is this: in Scotland, the law of prescription and limitation, which is essentially what the new clause is about, is one corpus of law. It is to be found in the Prescription and Limitation (Scotland) Act 1973. It is wholly inappropriate to change that corpus of law on a case-by-case basis in a series of statutes.
      One of the advantages of having the provisions in a single Act of Parliament is that it makes for ease of reference for practitioners and public alike and that any proposed change to the principal Act can be assessed against the effectiveness of other statutory provisions relating to prescription and limitation. It is wholly inappropriate to change the law in that regard in a piecemeal fashion.
      I 'too' had the brief from the Scottish media lawyers. I have spoken to Mr. Bonnington and explained that I do not share his point of view on the matter. I understand the arguments that lie behind his views, but it would be inappropriate to interfere—I appreciate that that is a pejorative word, but I use it advisedly—in that way with the law of prescription and limitation in Scotland.
      The Law Society of Scotland has evidenced its opposition. I should be interested to know what Scottish Ministers have to say, particularly the Lord Advocate. As I am engaged in an exercise that is as much one of education as of advocacy, I can tell the hon. Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng), who spoke for the Labour party, that the Scottish Courts Administration concerns itself with the numbers of courts, sheriffs, witness rooms and things of that kind. Policy has not yet fallen within its responsibility.
      Policy is a matter for Government, and policy in these matters is the responsibility of Scottish Law Officers and Scottish Ministers. Policy is a matter on which those who practise the law in Scotland are entitled to have their voice heard. The clear view of the Law Society of Scotland and of the Law Commission, I understand, is that no change should be made. On that basis, I suggest that the amendment should not detain the House too long. I hope that the new clause is not pushed to a vote. If it is, I certainly urge anyone who has an interest in the integrity of Scottish law to vote against it.
      Mr. Bill Walker: I am worried about the precedent that would be created if new clause 11 were accepted.

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      Despite what the hon. and learned Member for Fife, North-East (Mr. Campbell) said about possible changes, those of us who care deeply—and I know that he includes himself in that—about the integrity of Scottish law and the legal system try always to ensure adequate debate on Scottish matters. We monitor the situation carefully. I came to the Chamber because I noticed that the new clause had been tabled by two English Members. In the circumstances, I would find it difficult to argue, as I always do, that our unitary Parliament looks after Scottish matters extremely well.
      I am delighted that this is not a Government proposal. The Government would not allow such a proposal without Scottish Ministers being present or without the Scots being given the opportunity fully and adequately to debate the matter. Whatever its merits, in the interests of maintaining the integrity of our unitary Parliament and that of the Union, we should have no truck with new clause 11, as proposed by two English Members.
      The Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department (Mr. Gary Streeter): I am grateful to the hon. Member for Braveheart, South for sharing his Celtic antecedents with the House and to my right hon. Friend the Member for City of London and Westminster, South (Mr. Brooke) for tabling the new clause, which allows us to have this important debate. It would mean that the limitation period of one year that we propose for defamation proceedings in England and Wales would also be introduced for Scotland. I hope that in a brief but forceful argument I shall persuade him that it is misguided.
      My right hon. Friend knows that the Neill committee did not consider the law in Scotland. Scottish Ministers consulted last year on whether the limitation period in Scots law should be reduced to one year, in line with that proposed for the rest of the United Kingdom. Ministers attached particular weight—and this answers one of questions of the hon. Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng)—to the views of the Scottish Law Commission, which strongly opposed any change, as did the Law Society of Scotland. Accordingly, it is not the Government's intention to make that reduction at this time.
      I can reassure the hon. and learned Member for Fife, North-East (Mr. Campbell), who spoke so eloquently, that my speech has been approved personally by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland. The jokes are mine, but he has approved the speech. I am glad of the support of my hon. Friend the Member for North Tayside (Mr. Walker), who made a valuable and important point.
      It is worth briefly setting out the background. There are several important respects in which Scots law is very different from English law. My right hon. Friend the Member for City of London and Westminster, South knows that Scots law is based on Roman law, whereas the law in England and Wales has a common law base, with each tradition having evolved separately over many centuries. The two legal systems have many striking differences. A prime example is that, under the law of England and Wales, consideration is required to establish a contract, whereas, bizarrely, in Scotland a unilateral promise with no consideration moving to the promisor—I speak as a law student of many years ago—can constitute an enforceable obligation.
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      The law on the purchase and sale of land is different, as is the system of land tenure generally. There are significant differences in family law and in the law of succession. Even in the law and procedure for plaintiffs and defendants in defamation proceedings, there are several differences apart from the limitation period. For example, the assessment of damages is different in Scotland and is more likely to influence the potential plaintiff's choice of forum than is the limitation period. Punitive and exemplary damages are permitted in England but not in Scotland. Newspapers, broadcasters and their advisers already have to deal with those differences and do so with little difficulty.
      Section 19(a) of the Prescription and Limitation (Scotland) Act 1973 already gives a Scottish court an unfettered discretion to override time limits where it considers it equitable to do so. That power of discretion applies to all time limits in personal injury actions and wrongful death actions as well as to defamation actions. It is not considered necessary or desirable to restrict the wide discretionary powers that Scottish courts already have to override time limits.
      If it is therefore my right hon. Friend's intention to harmonise the law between Scotland and England—a brave thing for any Englishman to undertake—a far more extensive review of the differences between English and Scots law, even in relation to defamation proceedings, would be necessary rather than the simple introduction of an identical limitation period.
      In Committee, we heard the concerns of my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley) about forum shopping. As I have explained, there are reasons other than the limitation period itself why people might seek to sue in England rather than Scotland, or vice versa.
      9.30 pm
      Mr. Menzies Campbell: In the seminar that the Minister had with the Secretary of State for Scotland, was his attention drawn to the fact that in a defamation action in Scotland the assessment of damages is almost invariably carried out by a judge, not a jury? That inevitably means that the awards in Scotland are substantially lower than those in the Strand. That, in itself, could easily be a disincentive to anyone who felt that he should go north of the Tweed to try to effect a remedy.
      Mr. Streeter: The hon. and learned Gentleman, who speaks with authority on the matter, makes a valuable point about the Government's position on the new clause.
      I have explained that the operation of rules of private international law should also prevent differences from being unfairly exploited. The plea of forum non-conveniens, with which we are all familiar, is available to ensure that cases that should be more suitably heard in England and Wales are not heard in Scotland.
      Even if a pursuer—the Scottish term for plaintiff—could establish jurisdiction in Scotland over a defamation that occurred in England and Wales, the Scottish court would still have to consider whether that defamation was actionable under the law of the place where it had occurred, and the English laws of limitation would be a relevant consideration. Section 23(a) of the 1973 Act specifically provides that if a foreign law applies to a dispute, that law's limitation rules must also be applied.
      Mr. Peter Bottomley: I apologise for not being present during the earlier part of the debate on the

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      new clause. Will my hon. Friend advise the House about what would happen in the case of the BBC? It has transmitters in Scotland, so it would be clear that the alleged libel was propagated in Scotland. Would the BBC be exposed to a three-year limitation in Scotland, but to only a one-year limitation in England and Wales?
      Mr. Streeter: My hon. Friend raises a theoretical case. He will know that almost every defamation action is started well within the 12-month period. As I have explained, the answer to his question would lie outwith the working of private international rules in a court of law. It would be for the court in which an action was brought to decide whether it had jurisdiction.
      For all those reasons, we do not see that having a separate limitation period of one year in England and Wales, while retaining the limitation period of three years in Scotland, could or would cause confusion or difficulty. We have already made it clear that, following significant consultation in Scotland, there is no widespread desire for a change in the prescription period in Scotland. If my right hon. Friend the Member for City of London and Westminster, South wished to be consistent with his amendments, he would also have to seek to harmonise the assessment of damages north and south of the border. He would also have to harmonise the procedures in bringing any such action. That would be a mammoth and unenviable task. For all those reasons, it is not the Government's intention to harmonise the limitation period in England and Scotland and I ask my right hon. Friend to withdraw the new clause.
      This debate is perhaps a modest foretaste of the folly of Labour's plans to introduce a system under which a Scottish Member could come to Westminster to make English law, but English Members could not go to Edinburgh to decide Scots law. Frankly, it does not and cannot work: the West Lothian question remains alive and kicking.
      Mr. Peter Bottomley: I repeat my apology to you, Madam Speaker, and to the House for not being here for the resumption of the debate on the new clause.
      I shall delay this Report stage for a moment by returning to the beginning. It is wrong to believe that an extension of time in Scotland balances the generally lower damages—the two issues are separate. There is not an argument for saying that, because people in Scotland have not asked for a reduction from three years to one year, we should continue with the unusual system of leaving more time for a potential pursuer or plaintiff in Scotland than for those in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
      I do not believe that we should harmonise everything, but as we have national publishers—broadcasters fall into that category to an even greater extent than newspapers, which may have separate titles north of the border—we should pay attention to them. When they suggest that it would be helpful to them to have more certainty, we should have a reason to say no to them. If the reason is that, when consulted, the people of Scotland did not ask for the period to be lowered from three years to one, and if most of the people who were consulted were lawyers, that is not of much help to those whose duty is to give the public information day after day.
      Mr. Bill Walker: If my hon. Friend had been here when I spoke he might have been a little more careful.
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      He would have realised that some of us are deeply concerned that two English Members should table a new clause on a matter affecting Scots law; whereas we believe that if this unitary Parliament is to operate effectively it must ensure that Scottish Members serve on Committees examining Bills of this magnitude.
      Mr. Bottomley: My hon. Friend's point might have gone down better if my hon. Friend the Member for North-West Leicestershire (Mr. Ashby) and my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Harborough (Mr. Garnier) had been selected to serve on the Committee. There are others besides my hon. Friend who feel that they have just as important a reason to be sorry that they were riot chosen to serve on it. I believe in a United Kingdom. If my hon. Friend is saying that I cannot raise the anomaly of the three years in Scotland as opposed to one in England, he and I have a dispute that I hope will turn out to be an argument, not a quarrel.
      Mr. Allason: Does my hon. Friend accept that the solution is to harmonise on three years across the United Kingdom? Quite often the Press Complaints Commission can take up to two years to investigate a complaint, whereupon the complainant can go to law—but only in Scotland now, not in England. He will have to go to Scotland to bring an action against a national newspaper published in England, but which is also distributed in Scotland—hence my solution of getting rid of the anomaly by imposing a universal three-year limit.
      Mr. Bottomley: That crossed my mind last week, which is why I tabled alternative amendments proposing three years. My personal preference is for three years in each jurisdiction. If a defamation is sufficiently serious to be the cause of an action—subject to the leave of the court where a person may not have been aware of what is published—it is far better if people issue writs very early on. The point about a libel is the damage it has done; the point of a writ is to put others on notice that what has been said is untrue, damaging, unprivileged and actionable. So the sooner the writ is issued, asking for retraction and reward, the better.
      The point at issue here is why Scotland should be left with three years. The fact that no Scottish Minister is present suggests that last week's early-day motion has been ignored. It is said that the people of Scotland have not asked for a reduction. We should be able to do better than that in this House. We have a responsibility to the United Kingdom to try to make it possible for people to bring us news, views and comment—as long as it is riot untrue or, in a legal sense, unfair comment.
      When people say things that are seriously damaging and actionable we should expect them to be open to action for a reasonable period. I believe that more than a year is unreasonable nowadays; the Minister has backed that up by telling us how few cases begin after a year.
      Madam Speaker: Mr. Brooke.
      Mr. Jeremy Corbyn: I support amendments Nos. 16 and 17, which are grouped with the new clause—
      Madam Speaker: Order. We are not there yet. We are on new clause 11, which is why I have called Mr. Brooke.
      Mr. Brooke: Thank you, Madam Speaker, for allowing me the opportunity to respond. The hon. and learned

      115
      Member for Fife, North-East (Mr. Campbell) referred to a seminar held between my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland and my hon. Friend the Minister. I felt that I had been privileged to attend a similar seminar this evening. I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for North Tayside (Mr. Walker) will agree that the fact that I have attended such a seminar is one of the bonuses of these proceedings.
      The Minister gave me a very full reply. He did not tell us precisely what advice he has received from the Scottish Law Commission. Had he told us that in Committee, we would not have returned to it tonight.
      I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.
      Motion and clause, by leave, withdrawn.

    Clause 1

      RESPONSIBILITY FOR PUBLICATION
      Mr. Peter Bottomley: I beg to move amendment No. 26, in page 2, line 27, leave out 'nature or'.
      Madam Speaker: With this, it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 16, in page 2, line 28, at end insert—
      '(5A) In determining for the purposes of this section whether a person took reasonable care, or had reason to believe that what he did caused or contributed to the publication of a defamatory statement, where a statement published in an edition of a serial publication is in issue in defamation proceedings, the court shall not have regard to—

      (a) court finding of libel against a previous edition in the same serial publication which was published more than two years before the edition in question; or

      (b) proceedings for defamation against a previous edition in the same serial publication which have not resulted in a court finding of libel.'.

      No. 17, in clause 8, page 8, line 6, at end insert—
      '(2A) The court may dismiss the plaintiff's claim where the defendant relies on the defence available under section 1(1) of this Act, unless the plaintiff can show that the facts of the case are such as to be unlikely to allow such a defence to be established, and the court is so satisfied.
      (2B) The court may dismiss the plaintiffs claim where the defendant is a retailer, distributor or library and relies on the defence that he did not stock or hold the publication in which the alleged defamatory statement was published, unless the plaintiff can show that the facts of the case are such as to be unlikely to allow that defence to be established, and the court is so satisfied.
      (2C) Where the defendant informs the court of his intention to rely on a defence provided for under subsection (2A) or (2B) above, the court shall be required to consider whether it should dismiss the plaintiff's claim; and in any such proceedings a body corporate shall not be bound to employ a solicitor to be on record with the court as acting for it, and in any such proceedings a limited company may be represented by one of its directors.'.
      Mr. Bottomley: I preface my remarks by saying that I have been involved in a number of libel actions, none of which is relevant to the new clauses or amendments. I believe that the hon. Member for Islington, North (Mr. Corbyn) plans to speak to this group of amendments on behalf of the sellers. I was alerted to the issue by the periodical publishers, and I hope that hon. Members will forgive me if refer extensively to their briefing.
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      One of the intentions of the Bill is to create a new statutory defence that will be available to distributors, printers and others who do not have primary responsibility for a defamatory publication, provided that they neither knew nor had reason to believe that their acts contributed to the publication of defamatory material. That defence is set out in clause I, and it was debated in Committee. The terms of the clause are such that some practitioners in law believe that the defence will seldom be available for use.
      Clause 1(3) states that those who rely on the defence should not be considered the author, editor or publisher. I am advised that further conditions have to be satisfied and, in considering them, it should be borne in mind that the person for whose benefit the defence has been devised will have had no practical opportunity to see the material before it is published.
      Clause 1(1)(b) states that reasonable care must have been taken, as defined in clause 1(5), and clause 1(1)(c) states that the persons concerned must show that they did not know and had no reason to believe that what they did caused or contributed to the publication of a defamatory statement. Again, that is defined in clause 1(5). Clause 1(5) lays down three criteria that determine whether a person took reasonable care:

      "(a) the extent of his responsibility for the content of the statement or the decision to publish it,

      (b) the nature or circumstances of the publication, and

      (c) the previous conduct or character of the author, editor or publisher."

      As I said in Committee, this is not the Scallywag defence. If a distributor continues to publish a magazine that is defamatory and actionable every time it is released, the fact that the publishers are people of straw should not provide protection for the people who are retailing it.
      Given the fact that there is hardly a publication in the United Kingdom that has not published a defamatory statement at some time, it is difficult to see how any of the persons intended to benefit can do so. In addition, every defamatory statement is not actionable—it may be protected by privilege, or the person who has been defamed may not have a reputation that is worth bothering about.
      The problem starts because the defendant must show that he did not contribute to the publication of a defamatory statement. When we talk about "a" defamatory statement, it means "any" defamatory statement. Therefore, an amendment to change "a" to "the alleged" would make the defence more available—it would then become the alleged defamatory statement. I suspect that the draftsmen will be prepared to accept that alteration. If they are not, perhaps the Minister can share with the House precisely why that which the practitioners think would be useful and make the defence effective cannot be brought into the Bill.
      This point has come up rather late in a Bill that has had a reasonable amount of bipartisan agreement on the main clauses. When there is partisan dispute about a Bill, the process takes longer and it is possible for those with practitioners' experience to share their views with the Government, the civil service, the Opposition and the media. Therefore, more attention is given to the issues that could be incorporated in the Bill in a non-partisan way. The approach to the Bill has been reasonably non-partisan in most of its passage through Parliament, which is one of the reasons why some of the practitioners are, rather late in the day, trying to amend it.

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      Under subsection (5), difficulties would also abound because the intended beneficiaries for libel purposes are publishers and do not do their job if they do not publish. The decision to publish is automatic. Paragraph (b) would appear to be a great help if we could be certain that it refers to the mode of publication rather than, for example, the type of publication. An amendment that limited paragraph (b) to "the circumstances of publication" would be helpful, because the court could then take into account the lack of opportunity for the publisher, distributor or others to avoid or to delete the offending material.
      9.45 pm
      Paragraph (c) would create a difficulty. The Periodical Publishers Association recognises that distributors and others should not have carte blanche to carry publications of any nature without any risk to themselves. The trouble is that because the paragraph refers to the conduct of the publishers, the distributors of a children's comic would not be able to use the new defence. I tabled an amendment that substituted the word "publication" for "publisher". Unfortunately it was not selected, but it is relevant because it would avoid the difficulty and relieve the plaintiff and the defendant of the need to compile a dossier of claims to try to determine "previous conduct".
      I tabled all my suggestions as amendments, and two have been selected for debate. They would not harm the Bill and they would be useful. If, by any chance, not all of them can be accepted by the Government tonight, I hope that they will have discussions with the Periodical Publishers Association and others so that the amendments might be incorporated in another place. The amendments are not a criticism of the drafting of the Bill: they are an attempt to improve it.
      Mr. Corbyn: I was slightly ahead of myself in my previous attempt to intervene. I tabled amendments Nos. 16 and 17 on Report to try to deal with the dangers of libel proceedings for booksellers. It is a serious matter, because the selective libel actions that are being taken against a number of small and independent booksellers threaten their existence. Libel actions can be used selectively to practise censorship on other people's opinions. I look forward to what the Government have to say on the matter and, even if they are not prepared to accept the amendments, I hope that the Minister will be prepared to accept that there is a serious problem with the way in which libel actions have been taken against individual booksellers.
      Amendments Nos. 16 and 17 would make it difficult for any potentially litigious person who takes a libel action against an individual who has written a defamatory article about him to extend that action beyond the writer of the article and the publisher. Under the present law, if someone writes a libellous article that is published in a newspaper, he clearly exposes himself to a libel action from the person he has libelled, as does the publisher. The printer is held to be liable to a lesser extent. These days, there is so much direct inputting to printing works that it is almost impossible to expect a printer to be able to read everything that he is printing. Likewise, it is not credible to expect someone running a bookshop, a newsagent or a vendor to have read every single magazine or book on the shelves. If they did, they would never be open, because the staff would be detained the whole day reading newspapers and magazines to ensure that they contained nothing that could be damaging to the bookshop.
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      The purpose of the amendments is not to stop people taking libel actions to protect their interests if anything outrageous was published about them. They are designed to protect innocent booksellers, lenders of books, newsagents and magazine vendors against litigation.
      Some hon. Members may have seen the interesting article in last Saturday's edition of The Independent, entitled "Anti-fascist articles prove rich pickings". It described how two ultra right-wing activists in this country have taken a series of actions against Searchlight newspaper. They have enjoined in that action a small number of people whom they deem to be stockists of that magazine and have threatened them with libel action. As there is no access to legal aid in libel actions, a number of bookshops have been forced to settle out of court at considerable cost to them.
      The two individuals concerned threaten that the bookshops either stop stocking an anti-fascist magazine such as Searchlight or face the prospect of libel action. They produced a magazine that was deeply critical of the bookshop Centreprise in Hackney and wrote on the front page of the publication, "Produced by courtesy of Housemans bookshop". That bookshop had been forced to settle out of court on a libel action and those people used the proceeds from that action to publish a pamphlet attacking another radical bookshop.
      I have tabled the two amendments because I believe that the time has come to deal with the issue. Bookmarks bookshop in my constituency and the nearby Housemans bookshop in King's Cross have been subject to terrorism by far-right groups that seek to prevent them from stocking certain types of journals. I hope that the House will recognise the importance of my comments. When the individuals concerned were challenged about their activities, they said that they intended to continue, as the liability rests only with the recipients of that litigation. It seems grossly unfair that those people should be allowed to target a number of radical bookshops around the country and ignore larger bookshops that would be in a better position to defend themselves.
      My amendments go a long way towards defending the diversity of bookshops and booksellers. I think that all hon. Members will agree that that is important. They also defend innocent booksellers, newsagents and purveyors of news from libel action involving material of which they could have no knowledge. The amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley) and myself would go some way towards protecting their position. I look forward to the Minister's accepting the burden of our argument about the defence of individuals in that situation.
      Mr. Streeter: I am glad that the amendments have been tabled. We have had a useful debate about the important new defence that has been introduced in clause 1.
      However, I believe that amendment No. 26, in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley), is misguided as it seeks to remove the words "nature or" from the description of a relevant publication in clause 1(5). The nature of the publication is a relevant issue that must be considered when ascertaining the responsibilities of printers, distributors or wholesalers and whether they can offer that defence to a defamation action. My hon. Friend mentioned the magazine Scallywag—which I think is now defunct—and

      119
      it was in the nature of that publication to libel people. We must put distributors, printers, wholesalers and retailers on notice that they should have regard to the nature of a publication if they seek to rely on that defence. Therefore, I cannot accept my hon. Friend's amendment No. 26. Of course, I am prevented from considering amendments that have not been selected.
      I understand the thrust of the remarks by the hon. Member for Islington, North (Mr. Corbyn), about amendments Nos. 41 and 42. However, they would introduce unnecessary fetters on courts when considering precisely what they can take into account in determining whether the defence that is set out in clause 1 applies. I encourage the hon. Gentleman to rely on the new defence that is set out in clause 1, which—having listened carefully to his remarks—I think offers a strong and complete defence to the people with whom he is concerned. However, I cannot accept the amendments. I am sorry, but when I referred to amendments Nos. 41 and 42, I meant amendments Nos. 16 and 17.
      Madam Speaker: Is the Minister back on his correct brief?
      Mr. Streeter: Absolutely, Madam Speaker. Thank you very much for keeping me in order.
      The hon. Gentleman is wrong, as a court must take into account whether a retailer, bookseller or library has stocked a particular publication. Of course, if no such publication has been stocked, that is a complete defence in any action for defamation.
      Mr. Corbyn: A number of bookshops throughout the country stock Searchlight, a respected anti-fascist magazine.
      Mr. David Winnick: An excellent magazine.
      Mr. Corbyn: I agree.
      People who do not like the message contained in Searchlight have selected a number of bookshops, the burden of their threat to any other bookshop being, "If you stock this magazine, you will get the same treatment." It is selective terrorism against radical bookshops, in the knowledge that they have little resources with which to fight a libel case, so many of them have been forced to settle out of court, paying money that they can ill afford to keep these people happy.
      Mr. Streeter: I am concerned to learn that, and I shall be happy to see the hon. Gentleman to discuss that case. I have no time whatever for the bullying tactics that he described. I shall be delighted to receive a delegation from him and to explore more fully what the law can do to protect his constituents.
      This has been a useful, albeit brief, debate. I understand the reasons why the amendments have been tabled, but I cannot recommend that the House accept them.
      Mr. Peter Bottomley: On the understanding that my hon. Friend will meet the delegation led by the hon. Member for Islington, North (Mr. Corbyn); if my hon.
      120
      Friend and his officials will meet the fear of the publishers, who can explain to him at more length than time allows this evening the problems of a publisher who owns a major newspaper which may, rightly or wrongly, at times be involved in libel actions as part of its general search for news; and given that the word "publisher" is in the Bill, rather than "publication", and any children's magazine can be subject to an attack because a retailer is also selling, say, The Sun or any of the mainstream periodicals; it would be inappropriate to press the amendment to a vote.
      I believe that the Bill is defective, and I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his acknowledgment of at least one of the points that was raised, and I hope of mine as well. If my hon. Friend is open to meet people, I shall not press the amendment to a vote, so I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
      Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

    Clause 2

      OFFER TO MAKE AMENDS
      Mr. Ashby: I beg to move amendment No. 15, in page 3, line 1, leave out from 'in' to second 'and' in line 2 and insert
      'an article of the same size and type and of the same prominence as the defamatory article'.
      Madam Speaker: With this, it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 1, in clause 3, page 3, line 18, after first 'offer', insert
      'save and except in the case of a qualified offer'.
      No. 2, in page 3, line 19, at end insert—
      '(2A) Where there is a qualified offer in respect of one part of a defamation, a plaintiff accepting a qualified offer to make amends shall be free to pursue an action for defamation in respect of other parts of the defamation for which no offer of amends has been made.'.
      No. 4, in clause 4, page 4, line 20, leave out from beginning to end of line 40.
      No. 5, in page 4, leave out lines 33 and 34.
      No. 6, in page 4, line 40, after 'defence', insert
      'only in so far as it applies to the meaning to which the offer related.'.
      Mr. Ashby: I find it difficult to get up at the moment, as I was gardening on Sunday and now have a bad back.
      As the law stands, a publisher who has published a defamation and admits that he has done so can publish a correction and apology in mitigation of damages and pay money into court. That seems to me to be quite sufficient. If that is not accepted by the victim—I stress again that I always use the word "victim" rather than "plaintiff"—they can go before a jury and the jury can assess the damages.
      The clause seems to be a means by which a publisher, without a leg to stand on, can avoid damages being assessed by a jury. I find it odd and quite wrong that if a victim is unhappy about an apology that has been offered and therefore proceeds with his case, he can lose all rights to recover damages, even when it is admitted that a serious libel has been published. That is the effect of the clause, and we should understand what we are doing.

      121
      Libel actions rarely involve one specific allegation, and more often consist of a number of defamatory statements, all of which can have various defamatory meanings. As the law stands, a publisher can make a qualified offer of amends in respect of one defamatory meaning. Under the clause, a publisher can offer to apologise, make a correction and pay damages over one allegation, but seek to justify the rest of the article, and the victim, who may reject the offer, may end up losing even the damages to which he was entitled.
      I have said throughout that this is a publishers' Bill. Not surprisingly, in previous arguments we have heard all about the leader lawyers' point of view. It came out of Lord Justice Neill's inquiry. As I have said in the Chamber before, he sought only the advice and evidence of the leader lawyers. The victims' lawyers did not hear about the matter until a couple of days before the inquiry ended, when they hurriedly summoned and managed to submit some evidence.
      The Government swallowed that hook, line and sinker. There was an offer to make amends, which was a disgrace. I have tried to improve the position in the amendments, suggesting that, rather than a correction and apology being published
      "in a manner that is reasonable and practicable",
      an article of the same size as the defamatory article should be published.
      It being Ten o'clock, further consideration of the Bill stood adjourned.
      Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 14 (Exempted business),
      That, at this day's sitting, the Defamation Bill [Lords] may be proceeded with, though opposed, until any hour.—[Mr. Wells.]
      Question agreed to.
      As amended (in the Standing Committee), again considered.
      Question again proposed, That the amendment be made.
      Mr. Ashby: That seems to accord with much that has been said in the House. We have always said that we should have some sort of right of reply. Disgraceful defamations are made, and then we see a tiny apology on the back page, an inch high, covering nothing like the spread that was on the first or second page. At the very least, we should be demanding such coverage for the correction.
      My amendments also deal with cases involving a qualified offer. As I have said, the current position is one-sided, leaving the poor defendant absolutely open to what may happen to him. He may reject the offer and end up losing even the damages to which he is entitled. Amendment No. 1 deals with that, but makes the proviso:
      "save and except in the case of a qualified offer".
      Amendments Nos. 1 and 2 deal with clause 3. The other amendments deal with clause 4, which is entitled
      "Failure to accept offer to make amends".
      If the poor chap has not accepted such an offer, he is done for: he is hammered into the ground, and does not have a leg to stand on. That, of course, is exactly what the newspapers want. The Bill is a charter for newspapers. It has been proposed by publishers who themselves have not
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      a leg to stand on, so that they can avoid having damages assessed by a jury. That is what clause 4 is about, and that is why I have tabled my amendments.
      Mr. Peter Bottomley: As my hon. Friend the Member for North-West Leicestershire (Mr. Ashby) knows, I support all but his first amendment. I do not think that, under that amendment or under clause 9, the courts should be able to force a publisher or a broadcaster to produce an apology in a particular position, especially one taking up the same space as the original comment. I understand, nearly as much as my hon. Friend, the pain and anguish that are caused when something highly damaging is published, but I believe that the House has the role of protecting the freedom of those who bring us the news. [Interruption.] I wish that the hon. Member for Brent, South (Mr. Boateng) would stop laughing. This is a serious point for a number of people, both members of the press and victims.
      Even given that, however, what most victims—to use my hon. Friend's language—want is first a cessation of publication of what has been said, so that it is not picked up and repeated by the same publication or others; secondly, a retraction and apology; and thirdly—especially if there is not an almost immediate apology for anything factually incorrect—a sum in damages that shows the world that what was said was seriously wrong.
      I feel that clause 9, and my hon. Friend's amendment in particular, are the wrong way of approaching the problem. I do not think that the House spends nearly enough time trying to understand the difficulties of the busy media who feature news and current affairs, whether in print or in broadcast programmes. Newspapers and broadcasters can maintain high standards; they ought to be more self-critical. In general, however, one of the penalties of a free press is the existence of victims. To require the same space and the same prominence after a court has reached a conclusion or the parties have reached an agreement is probably a step towards Parliament and politicians determining what is broadcast and what is printed.
      I support the rest of my hon. Friend's amendments. I am sorry that under the rules of the House it is not possible to debate my amendment to clause 9, which faces this issue more directly than does my hon. Friend's amendment No. 15.
      Mr. Streeter: It is in the wise tradition of the House to listen carefully to those who draw on personal experience. Amendment No. 15 seeks to force a newspaper to print an apology in an article of the same size, type and prominence as the defamatory article. The truth is that editors would simply not use that new fast-track procedure of making amends if they had to suffer a total surrender of editorial independence in such a manner. The Bill already provides that an apology or correction should be published in a manner that is reasonable and practicable in all the circumstances.
      The amendments also suggest that when a plaintiff accepts an offer to make amends, he may none the less sue on some part of the alleged defamatory statement. Such a provision would undermine the entire purpose of making a qualified offer. Again, no defendant would make such an offer, leaving the plaintiff free to take the offer and still go to court. It would be to have one's cake and to eat it.

      123
      The amendments would also allow all parties to elect to have a jury involved—virtually a jury trial—contrary to other provisions in the clause. That is not appropriate in this new fast-track procedure, as part of its attractiveness is that the hearing is before a judge and not a jury. If the plaintiff wants a full-blown jury trial, obviously he will not accept an offer to make amends and will press on with his litigation under the normal rules of procedure, with all the attendant risk.
      I have listened carefully to my hon. Friend the Member for North-West Leicestershire (Mr. Ashby), but the amendments would undermine the whole purpose of a streamlined fast-track procedure. I cannot advise the House to accept them.
      Mr. Ashby: I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
      Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
      Mr. Peter Bottomley: Amendment No. 40 relates to convictions, but I sense that the House does not want a serious lecture. If this does me any good later with those individuals who might be the party managers, I shall not move amendment No. 40.

    Clause 13

      EVIDENCE CONCERNING PROCEEDINGS IN PARLIAMENT
      Amendment proposed: No 21, in page 10, line 32, leave out from beginning to end of line 17 on page 11.—[Mr. Boateng.]
      Question put, That the amendment be made:—
      The House divided: Ayes 201, Noes 264.

      Division No. 154]

      [10.07 pm

      AYES

      Adams, Mrs Irene

      Cann, Jamie

      Ainger, Nick

      Chidgey, David

      Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)

      Chisholm, Malcolm

      Allen, Graham

      Church, Judith

      Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)

      Clapham, Michael

      Armstrong, Hilary

      Clark, Dr David (South Shields)

      Ashton, Joe

      Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)

      Barnes, Harry

      Clarke, Tom (Monklands W)

      Barron, Kevin

      Clelland, David

      Battle, John

      Clwyd, Mrs Ann

      Bayley, Hugh

      Coffey, Ann

      Beckett, Rt Hon Margaret

      Connarty, Michael

      Bell, Stuart

      Cook, Robin (Livingston)

      Benn, Rt Hon Tony

      Corbett, Robin

      Benton, Joe

      Corbyn, Jeremy

      Bermingham, Gerald

      Corston, Jean

      Berry, Roger

      Cousins, Jim

      Betts, Clive

      Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)

      Blunkett, David

      Dalyell, Tam

      Boateng, Paul

      Darling, Alistair

      Bradley, Keith

      Davies, Bryan (Oldham C'tral)

      Bray, Dr Jeremy

      Davies, Chris (L'Boro & S'worth,

      Brown, N (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)

      Denham, John

      Burden, Richard

      Dewar, Donald

      Byers, Stephen

      Dixon, Don

      Callaghan, Jim

      Dobson, Frank

      Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

      Donohoe, Brian H

      Campbell, Menzies (Fife NE)

      Dowd, Jim

      Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

      Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth

      Campbell-Savours, D N

      Eagle, Ms Angela

      124

      Eastham, Ken

      Martin, Michael J (Springburn)

      Etherington, Bill

      Martlew, Eric

      Evans, John (St Helens N)

      Maxton, John

      Fatchett, Derek

      Meale, Alan

      Flynn, Paul

      Michael, Alun

      Foster, Rt Hon Derek

      Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)

      Foster, Don (Bath)

      Milburn, Alan

      Foulkes, George

      Miller, Andrew

      Fraser, John

      Mitchell, Austin (Gt Grimsby)

      Fyfe, Maria

      Morley, Elliot

      Galbraith, Sam

      Morris, Rt Hon John (Aberavon)

      Gapes, Mike

      Mudie, George

      Garrett, John

      Mullin, Chris

      George, Bruce

      Murphy, Paul

      Gerrard, Neil

      O'Brien, Mike (N W'kshire)

      Godman, Dr Norman A

      O'Brien, William (Normanton)

      Godsiff, Roger

      O'Hara, Edward

      Golding, Mrs Llin

      Olner, Bill

      Gordon, Mildred

      Orme, Rt Hon Stanley

      Grant, Bernie (Tottenham)

      Pearson, Ian

      Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)

      Pickthall, Colin

      Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

      Pike, Peter L

      Grocott, Bruce

      Pope, Greg

      Gunnell, John

      Prentice, Bridget (Lew'm E)

      Hain, Peter

      Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

      Hall, Mike

      Primarolo, Dawn

      Harman, Ms Harriet

      Purchase, Ken

      Harvey, Nick

      Randall, Stuart

      Henderson, Doug

      Raynsford, Nick

      Heppell, John

      Reid, Dr John

      Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence

      Robertson, George (Hamilton)

      Hill, Keith (Streatham)

      Rooker, Jeff

      Hinchliffe, David

      Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

      Hoon, Geoffrey

      Rowlands, Ted

      Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)

      Sedgemore, Brian

      Sheerman, Barry

      Howells, Dr Kim (Pontypridd)

      Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert

      Hoyle, Doug

      Shore, Rt Hon Peter

      Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

      Short, Clare

      Hughes, Simon (Southwark)

      Simpson, Alan

      Hutton, John

      Skinner, Dennis

      Illsley, Eric

      Smith, Andrew (Oxford E)

      Ingram, Adam

      Smith, Chris (Isl'ton S & F'sbury)

      Jackson, Helen (Shef'ld, H)

      Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

      Jamieson, David

      Spearing, Nigel

      Janner, Greville

      Spellar, John

      Jenkins, Brian (SE Staff)

      Squire, Rachel (Dunfermline W)

      Jones, Barry (Alyn and D'side)

      Steinberg, Gerry

      Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)

      Stevenson, George

      Jones, Lynne (B'ham S O)

      Strang, Dr. Gavin

      Jones, Martyn (Clwyd, SW)

      Straw, Jack

      Jowell, Tessa

      Sutcliffe, Gerry

      Keen, Alan

      Tapsell, Sir Peter

      Kennedy, Jane (L'pool Br"dg'n)

      Taylor, Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)

      Khabra, Piara S

      Timms, Stephen.

      Kilfoyle, Peter

      Tipping, Paddy

      Lester, Sir James (Broxtowe)

      Trickett, Jon

      Lewis, Terry

      Turner, Dennis

      Liddell, Mrs Helen

      Vaz, Keith

      Livingstone, Ken

      Walley, Joan

      Loyden, Eddie

      Wardell, Gareth (Gower)

      McAvoy, Thomas

      Wareing, Robert N

      McCartney, Ian

      Wicks, Malcolm

      Macdonald, Calum

      Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Sw'n W)

      McFall, John

      Williams, Alan W (Carmarthen)

      McLeish, Henry

      Winnick, David

      Maclennan, Robert

      Wise, Audrey

      Madden, Max

      Worthington, Tony

      Maddock, Diana

      Wright, Dr Tony

      Mahon, Alice

      Mandelson, Peter

      Tellers for the Ayes:

      Marek, Dr John

      Mr. Andrew F. Bennett and Mr. Clive Soley.

      Marshall, David (Shettleston)

      125

      NOES

      Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)

      Duncan Smith, Iain

      Aitken, Rt Hon Jonathan

      Dunn, Bob

      Alison, Rt Hon Michael (Selby)

      Eggar, Rt Hon Tim

      Allason, Rupert (Torbay)

      Elletson, Harold

      Amess, David

      Evans, David (Welwyn Hatfield)

      Arbuthnot, James

      Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)

      Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)

      Evans, Nigel (Ribble Valley)

      Arnold, Sir Thomas (Hazel Grv)

      Evans, Roger (Monmouth)

      Ashby, David

      Faber, David

      Atkins, Rt Hon Robert

      Fabricant, Michael

      Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)

      Field, Barry (Isle of Wight)

      Baker, Rt Hon Kenneth (Mole V)

      Forman, Nigel

      Baker, Nicholas (North Dorset)

      Forsyth, Rt Hon Michael (Stirling)

      Baldry, Tony

      Forth, Eric

      Banks, Matthew (Southport)

      Fowler, Rt Hon Sir Norman

      Banks, Robert (Harrogate)

      Fox, Dr Liam (Woodspring)

      Bates, Michael

      Fox, Rt Hon Sir Marcus (Shipley)

      Batiste, Spencer

      Freeman, Rt Hon Roger

      Bellingham, Henry

      French, Douglas

      Bendall, Vivian

      Fry, Sir Peter

      Beresford, Sir Paul

      Gale, Roger

      Biffen, Rt Hon John

      Gallie, Phil

      Body, Sir Richard

      Gardiner, Sir George

      Bonsor, Sir Nicholas

      Gill, Christopher

      Booth, Hartley

      Gillan, Cheryl

      Boswell, Tim

      Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair

      Bottomley, Peter (Eltham)

      Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles

      Bottomley, Rt Hon Virginia

      Gorman, Mrs Teresa

      Bowis, John

      Gorst, Sir John

      Boyson, Rt Hon Sir Rhodes

      Grant, Sir A (SW Cambs)

      Brandreth, Gyles

      Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)

      Brazier, Julian

      Greenway, John (Ryedale)

      Bright, Sir Graham

      Griffiths, Peter (Portsmouth, N)

      Brooke, Rt Hon Peter

      Grylls, Sir Michael

      Browning, Mrs Angela

      Gummer, Rt Hon John Selwyn

      Bruce, Ian (South Dorset)

      Hamilton, Neil (Tatton)

      Budgen, Nicholas

      Hampson, Dr Keith

      Burns, Simon

      Hanley, Rt Hon Jeremy

      Burt, Alistair

      Hannam, Sir John

      Butcher, John

      Hargreaves, Andrew

      Butler, Peter

      Haselhurst, Sir Alan

      Butterfill, John

      Hawkins, Nick

      Carlisle, John (Luton North)

      Hawksley, Warren

      Carlisle, Sir Kenneth (Lincoln)

      Hayes, Jerry

      Carrington, Matthew

      Heald, Oliver

      Carttiss, Michael

      Heathcoat-Amory, Rt Hon David

      Cash, William

      Hendry, Charles

      Channon, Rt Hon Paul

      Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael

      Chapman, Sir Sydney

      Hicks, Sir Robert

      Churchill, Mr

      Horam, John

      Clappison, James

      Howard, Rt Hon Michael

      Clark, Dr Michael (Rochford)

      Howell, Sir Ralph (N Norfolk)

      Coe, Sebastian

      Hughes, Robert G (Harrow W)

      Colvin, Michael

      Hunter, Andrew

      Congdon, David

      Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas

      Conway, Derek

      Jack, Michael

      Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)

      Jackson, Robert (Wantage)

      Coombs, Simon (Swindon)

      Jenkin, Bernard

      Cran, James

      Jessel, Toby

      Curry, David (Skipton & Ripon)

      Johnson Smith, Sir Geoffrey

      Davies, Quentin (Stamford)

      Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)

      Day, Stephen

      Jones, Robert B (W Hertfdshr)

      Deva, Nirj Joseph

      Kellett-Bowman, Dame Elaine

      Devlin, Tim

      Key, Robert

      Dorrell, Rt Hon Stephen

      Kirkhope, Timothy

      Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James

      Knapman, Roger

      Dover, Den

      Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)

      Duncan, Alan

      Knight, Rt Hon Greg (Derby N)

      126

      Knight, Dame Jill (Bir'm E'st'n)

      Sackville, Tom

      Knox, Sir David

      Sainsbury, Rt Hon Sir Timothy

      Lait, Mrs Jacqui

      Scott, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas

      Lang, Rt Hon Ian

      Shaw, David (Dover)

      Lawrence, Sir Ivan

      Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)

      Legg, Barry

      Shephard, Rt Hon Gillian

      Lennox-Boyd, Sir Mark

      Shepherd, Richard (Aldridge)

      Lidington, David

      Shersby, Sir Michael

      Lilley, Rt Hon Peter

      Sims, Sir Roger

      Lloyd, Rt Hon Sir Peter (Fareham)

      Skeet, Sir Trevor

      Lord, Michael

      Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)

      Luff, Peter

      Soames, Nicholas

      Lyell, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas

      Spencer, Sir Derek

      McCrea, The Reverend William

      Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)

      MacGregor, Rt Hon John

      Spicer, Sir Michael (S Worcs)

      MacKay, Andrew

      Spink, Dr Robert

      Maclean, Rt Hon David

      Spring, Richard

      McLoughlin, Patrick

      Sproat, Iain

      McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick

      Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)

      Madel, Sir David

      Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John

      Maginnis, Ken

      Steen, Anthony

      Maitland, Lady Olga

      Stephen, Michael

      Major, Rt Hon John

      Stern, Michael

      Malone, Gerald

      Streeter, Gary

      Mans, Keith

      Sumberg, David

      Marland, Paul

      Sweeney, Walter

      Marlow, Tony

      Sykes, John

      Marshall, John (Hendon S)

      Taylor, Ian (Esher)

      Marshall, Sir Michael (Arundel)

      Taylor, John M (Solihull)

      Martin, David (Portsmouth S)

      Taylor, Sir Teddy (Southend, E)

      Mawhinney, Rt Hon Dr Brian

      Temple-Morris, Peter

      Mellor, Rt Hon David

      Thomason, Roy

      Merchant, Piers

      Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)

      Mitchell, Andrew (Gedling)

      Thornton, Sir Malcolm

      Moate, Sir Roger

      Thurnham, Peter

      Monro, Rt Hon Sir Hector

      Townend, John (Bridlington)

      Montgomery, Sir Fergus

      Townsend, Cyril D (Bexl'yh'th)

      Needham, Rt Hon Richard

      Tracey, Richard

      Nelson, Anthony

      Tredinnick, David

      Neubert, Sir Michael

      Trend, Michael

      Trotter, Neville

      Newton, Rt Hon Tony

      Twinn, Dr Ian

      Nichdls, Patrick

      Viggers, Peter

      Norris, Steve

      Walden, George

      Oppenheim, Phillip

      Walker, Bill (N Tayside)

      Ottaway, Richard

      Waller, Gary

      Page, Richard

      Ward, John

      Paice, James

      Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)

      Patten, Rt Hon John

      Waterson, Nigel

      Pawsey, James

      Watts, John

      Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth

      Wells, Bowen

      Pickles, Eric

      Whitney, Ray

      Porter, Barry (Wirral S)

      Whittingdale, John

      Porter, David (Waveney)

      Widdecombe, Ann

      Redwood, Rt Hon John

      Wiggin, Sir Jerry

      Renton, Rt Hon Tim

      Willetts, David

      Richards, Rod

      Wilshire, David

      Riddick, Graham

      Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)

      Rifkind, Rt Hon Malcolm

      Winterton, Nicholas (Macc'f'ld)

      Robathan, Andrew

      Wood, Timothy

      Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn

      Yeo, Tim

      Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)

      Young, Rt Hon Sir George

      Robinson, Mark (Somerton)

      Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)

      Tellers for the Noes:

      Ross, William (E Londonderry)

      Mr. Edward Leigh and Mr. Michael Brown.

      Rumbold, Rt Hon Dame Angela

      Question accordingly negatived.
      Bill read the Third time, and passed with amendments.

      Children's Hospices
      Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Burns.]
      10.21 pm
      Dr. Robert Spink: Britain is truly great. We lead the world in many areas, but in hospice care, we are—[Interruption.]
      Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Geoffrey Lofthouse): Order. Will hon. Members who are leaving the Chamber please do so quietly?
      Dr. Spink: In hospice care, Britain is entirely unchallenged. Our hospice movement is held in unequivocally high esteem abroad as well as in the House. There is no—[Interruption.]
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I am having great difficulty in hearing the hon. Gentleman. Will hon. Members please have their conversations outside the Chamber?
      Dr. Spink: There is no political edge to this debate. All parties value and cherish the superb hospice movement. I welcome to this debate colleagues and friends from the three main parties and thank them for their thoughtful and kind support. The only Labour Member who represents an Essex constituency, the hon. Member for Thurrock (Mr. Mackinlay), has sent his apologies for his absence. He is genuinely supportive and genuinely otherwise engaged.
      Our children are everything. Early on a cold December morning, a small child was born and was obviously very unwell. The doctors and nurses did all they could, but the negative prognosis seemed inescapable. I looked into the eyes of the father and began to understand the depth of human despair. I was looking in a mirror, and by the grace of God, my son survived. In part, that is why I am opposed to euthanasia and why I sincerely believe that it would be very dangerous were it ever legalised. However, I do not want to get into that debate—important though it is.
      I am wearing the badge of the hospice movement's national sunflower campaign. On Saturday, I attended many local events, including the splendid Methodist Church garden party at the home of Richard and Jill Reeves in Benfleet. At those events, many sunflowers were worn. The sunflower campaign, like the Little Haven project in Essex, has caught the public's imagination and enthusiasm. The public know the strength and importance of our hospice movement and cherish it deeply. I have enormous admiration for those who contribute to the movement by volunteering, fund raising or working within the movement, and I especially thank all those involved in palliative care in the community, particularly the Macmillan nurses—they are wonderful people.
      Last Sunday, I attended my constituency's annual show, which was generously sponsored by Mobil. I was deeply moved to see Robin Reed, on behalf of all the staff of Mobil, present a cheque for more than £30,000 to the Eastern area hospice. The Mobil staff raised that massive amount by exercising their skill and professionalism in further driving up safety standards for major plant
      128
      overhauls—a worthy achievement for Mobil and a wonderful boost for the hospice movement. I congratulate Mobil and I sincerely thank its staff.
      The focus of the debate is the special nature and character of our wonderful children's hospices. They are uniquely different from adult hospices and I hope to show how they augment what is a very important part of our health and social care services. I must first acknowledge the detailed briefings that I have been given by Robin Fanshawe of Little Haven and Graham Collins of the Quidenham children's hospice in Norfolk. I draw heavily on those briefings tonight.
      Perhaps it will help if I start with a local anecdote. Fair Havens hospice in Southend has done marvellous work as an adult hospice, but came under great pressure from time to time to take a child with terminal illness. On one occasion, this was agreed. There was certainly some benefit for the family and perhaps also for the child, but she was too ill for the carers to be sure. However, her crying caused distress to adult patients in the hospice. It was therefore decided that future child referrals would have to be refused as, apart from that aspect, there are many other differences between adult and children's hospice care.
      Let me start at the beginning of children's hospices, which was an initiative of Sister Frances Dominique in 1982 in Oxford to set up the first children's hospice in the world. You see, Mr. Deputy Speaker, we are genuinely leading the world in this area. The hospice was named Helen house after a little girl who had a brain tumour. This beautiful and once lively little child was left totally helpless, unable to communicate and requiring constant care. Sister Frances was moved by the plight of Helen and her family. Being a trained nurse, she gave Helen's parents much needed respite.
      It was clear to Sister Frances that many families would be in the same position, and that was the start of the children's hospice movement. From that genesis evolved the original model that the world was to accept and follow. Fourteen years on, there are 11 children's hospices fully operational in the UK and several more at various stages of development. These help families in the UK who have a child suffering from a life-threatening or life-limiting condition.
      A life-threatening condition is defined as one in which medical intervention may prove succesful but which carries a substantial possibility of premature death, or one which makes a child especially vulnerable to opportunistic infections which may prove fatal; heart disease or cancer are examples. A life-limiting condition is defined as a progressive degenerative condition that is likely to lead to premature death; for instance, cystic fibrosis or muscular dystrophy. It is important to note that children's hospices differ from adult hospices in that fewer than 15 per cent. of our children suffer from cancer in any form. Most children in hospices are suffering from long-term progressive disorders.
      The aim of the children's hospice movement is to enable families to care for their children at home most of the time. In that way, the children can continue to attend school, see their friends and generally continue a normal routine as far as possible. Clearly, that is very important to the child.
      Hospices offer practical, emotional and spiritual support and friendship to the children and their families and recognise the child's home as the centre of the care

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      and the family as the experts in that care. The hospice team likes to be involved with the family before the child's illness reaches a terminal stage, if that is what is to be. Early relationships will be invaluable at the time of death. The needs of each member of the family are equally important and the hospice movement is committed to all family members.
      Stays booked for respite typically last from one day to two weeks, but at times of emergency—social or medical—or for terminal care, they can be extended over a longer period. That is why it is so important that the ethos, mood and even the architecture and furnishings of the hospices all create a cheerful and homely, happy atmosphere. Hospices offer accompanied or unaccompanied respite care, as well as terminal care and long-term bereavement care.
      Hospices try to be flexible in response to the individual needs of the children and families, working in full co-operation with all the other services, and, of course, all hon. Members will realise that no charge is made to the families for the care offered. Parents receive immense relief from an uninterrupted night's sleep, or just having time to talk together or walk together without the children. Hospices have kept families together and saved marriages.
      A hospice is not a facility, or a collection of equipment, buildings and people with skills and knowledge—it is much more than that. It is a philosophy—a Christian philosophy. If hon. Members visit a children's hospice, as many do, they will be amazed at what they find. A hospice is not a sad place, even though many children have a poor prognosis. Whole families are usually staying at hospices—well children and pets are often running around and the sick children all enjoy being a part of that loving, happy, joyful and sometimes even noisy environment. In addition, members of the care team maintain contact and support for the families at home and, where necessary, provide practical help there.
      In 1992, the Government provided £1 million per year for five years to pilot new services in England for children with life-threatening conditions and their families. The Department of Health called for applications and received hundreds from throughout the country. That clearly demonstrated the need. Thirty-two projects were selected, covering hospital-based services, community home nursing services, voluntary respite and sitting services, counselling and psychological support. None of the money went towards the running costs of existing children's hospices.
      Also in 1992, Professor Alison While of King's college commenced research designed to examine the needs and provision of hospice care for children. Professor While's study might well be able to substantiate the figure of 20,000 children with life-threatening illnesses in this country.
      It is estimated that there is a need for about 20 to 25 children's hospices in the foreseeable future and that that need will remain static. The hospices are mostly planned and should be—as they are—spread across the country, to fulfil the special hospice philosophy.
      The Little Haven children's hospice is being built in my constituency on a 120-acre site at Daws Heath. It is a delightful, wooded site in the green belt and I congratulate the local council and particularly Mr. Ian Burchill, the director of planning. on their foresight in assisting that unique development.
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      Twenty acres of the site will be used for hospice grounds and the remaining 100 acres will become a nature reserve under the care of the excellent Essex wildlife trust. Little Haven is easily accessible from the Al27 from all over Essex and beyond, including outer London and north Kent. I am delighted that my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Mr. Burns) is sitting on the Treasury Bench and listening to the debate, as it will benefit many of his constituents. I know that it has his full support.
      Lord Braybrooke, the Lord Lieutenant of Essex, has generously agreed to cut the ceremonial first turf in early September. I also understand that Sister Frances Dominique will join us for the ceremony, which will be a great honour for my constituency. Building and commissioning will take about a year. It is hoped that the first families will be in residence in the hospice in autumn 1997.
      Little Haven is uniquely well situated for access as well as for its serenity and the peaceful nature of its setting in the green belt of my constituency. The groundswell of support from the people of Essex and beyond has been nothing short of phenomenal. So far, £1.35 million has been raised towards the £3 million needed for building and the first year's running costs. It will be the first hospice, and possibly the only one in the south-east, to care for terminally ill children below the age of 18.
      I am tempted to mention the wonderful efforts of specific companies, schools, individuals and even local Conservative clubs who are fund raising for Little Haven, but it would be invidious to mention any one since so many have made magnificent efforts and are still doing so. With Lord and Lady Braybrooke and others, I am a patron of the Little Haven children's hospice appeal. I note that my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, East (Sir T. Taylor), who is also a patron, is here. With your permission, Mr. Deputy Speaker, perhaps he will be able to speak briefly.
      My small efforts for the hospice pale into insignificance compared with the wonderful support that the project is receiving from many of my constituents. My hon. Friend the Member for Basildon (Mr. Amess), who is also here, is one of the best friends of the hospice movement in the House. He and I will be promoting a fund-raising dinner for the hospice movement in the Palace of Westminster this autumn. We hope that it will be supported by the spouses of many Essex Members. We are doing that because it is important that the momentum of fund raising is maintained to secure the hospice's long-term future.
      God forbid that any of our families will ever need to call upon the hospices, but God knows, if we do, they will be there. Little Haven brings great credit to my constituency. I am honoured to host it. I had thought that I might mention one or two members of staff at Little Haven and at Fair Havens hospice, Westcliff, who are so closely involved. Many of them have a dual role in both hospices. However, that would be wrong, because the essence of the project is team work. All the staff have an essential part to play. They all work together for the ultimate benefit of the children and families whom they support.
      I shall briefly deal with funding for hospices generally. Everyone in the movement understands the importance of the voluntary charitable basis of the initial establishment of hospices and of their long-term running costs. That predominantly voluntary source of funding is one of the

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      great and uniquely British strengths of our hospice movement and should not in any way be underestimated or undermined. That is not to say that there should be no input from public funds. Some hospices receive a significant proportion of their funding from various public sources; others receive little or nothing.
      The Government must develop a policy for the funding of hospices, including children's hospices. I suspect that a balance of between a quarter and a half drawn from public funding would be appropriate in the medium term as an average across the hospice movement. That money would be well spent, because it would reduce the burden on the national health service in the long run. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will acknowledge that the funding debate is open and that the question should be addressed.
      Sadly, Hope house, a new children's hospice in Oswestry, is struggling to utilise all its beds, because of a funding shortfall. I congratulate the Daily Post in Liverpool on its campaign to raise funds for Hope house. If all the county council social services departments that are served by Hope house gave £25,000 from their multi-million pound community care budgets, it would be able to give the care that is so much needed, which would relieve the burden on the state in the longer run.
      Finally, the national lottery has been a tremendous success and has raised about £2 billion of additional funds for good causes in this country, which I welcome. There could be few more deserving or more popular good causes than the wonderful hospice movement, particularly children's hospices. I do not want to end on a controversial note, but some lottery giving to the arts, sports and some politically correct charities does not sit comfortably with the views of those who buy the lottery tickets. But that is another debate.
      Sir Teddy Taylor rose
      Mr. David Amess rose
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. Is it the wish of the Minister that the two hon. Gentlemen participate in the 11 minutes left to him to answer?
      The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Mr. John Horam)indicated assent.
      10.40 pm
      Sir Teddy Taylor: I welcome what my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Dr. Spink) has said about the children's hospice in his constituency. He will know that the action was initiated in the Fair Havens hospice, with which I have had the pleasure of being associated as its president for many years.
      The crucial factor that I hope that hon. Members will bear in mind is that the hospice movement is a costly organisation to run. I was sometimes appalled at management meetings at the way in which others looked forward to the expansion of the hospice movement because the resources are based simply on faith and optimism. However, the other committee members have always been right and I have been wrong—the money has always been made available.
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      As my hon. Friend has rightly said, the hospice movement in Southend has been safeguarded and developed because of astonishing generosity on the part of the community. Only last week I had the pleasure of being on the Southend seafront when a gentleman whose relative had been in the hospice said that he wanted to show his gratitude by cycling all the way from Glasgow to Southend-on-Sea. I know that it will be quite a journey as it is one that I have undertaken in other ways on many occasions.
      The only thing that worries me is that, while I have the optimism and faith because of my contact with Fair Havens hospice in Southend, it has been developing and expanding at a furious pace. We provide a wonderful home-care service and aftercare; we have developed the service in many ways and we find that the costs are substantially increasing. The hospice has been kept going owing to the generosity of the people of Southend.
      There are many problems in any such movement. There is a huge strain on the staff who have a very special job to do. While I am not asking the Minister to do anything specific, I hope that he will ensure that the Government will keep in touch with the hospice movement and that Ministers will pay regular visits to the hospices to give them the encouragement that they richly deserve. Like my hon. Friend, I should like to congratulate the hospice movement on a fantastic job that has been done thoroughly, with great integrity and devotion. I hope that it will go from strength to strength, and I hope that the children's hospice in my hon. Friend's constituency will provide the same level of service, care and Christian service that Fair Havens has for so many people over the years.
      10.43 pm
      Mr. David Amess: I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Dr. Spink) on securing this debate tonight. It is particularly appropriate because I am advised that my hon. Friend's son George was today awarded a distinction in surgery and MBBS honours at King's, London—and that in addition to a host of other educational qualifications that he has. I only hope that some of my children do as well as my hon. Friend's son.
      In Basildon we have St Luke's; Fair Havens is in the constituency of my right hon. Friend the Member for Southend, West (Mr. Channon). We all pray that eventually cancer is eradicated. For a long time there has been a gap in our area in terms of the care for children. All of us with children can well appreciate the terrible consequences when a child becomes ill. In Basildon, a member of the general public has founded a support group known as Cushions, which tries to give some support to the parents of children with cancer. The Little Haven project is also doing magnificent work.
      My hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point touched on the fact that the partners of Essex Members will endeavour to raise funds over the course of the coming year.
      I conclude with a quotation from the team at the Little Haven hospice:
      "As a team we are very conscious of our own inadequacies. We feel that we are one group of people offering simply to be alongside another group of people sharing something of their immense pain and brokenness and knowing that we receive as much, probably more, than we can give. We do not have clever answers. but we are willing to share ourselves and our vulnerability."
      It is very difficult to add to that.
      10.45 pm
      The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Mr. John Horam): I too congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Dr. Spink) on raising this very important matter. I congratulate him on a fluent and warm-hearted speech. Children's hospices have come a long way since the first purpose-built hospice in Britain—or anywhere in the world—was opened in Oxford in 1982.
      Increasingly, we are recognising the important role that children's hospices play in the care of children suffering from life-threatening or life-limiting illnesses, for whom there is no hope of cure. Children have needs that are very different from adults', and different skills are required to care for them. Perhaps more meaningful for many is the important part that hospices can play in bringing support to the families of those children. More and more it is being seen that the hospices go beyond the care of a terminally ill child and provide support for the whole family.
      Many, if not all, hospices now include family rooms and accommodation for brothers and sisters. That gives all the family, especially the parents, the chance of respite and a break from constant attendance to their child. They get a chance to relax in a homely, non-hospital environment with others of similar experiences. My hon. Friend talked of the joy and happiness that can be found in these circumstances, and I am sure that he was right.
      In the case of some of the rarer conditions, many parents build up a unique knowledge of their child and of the management of that child's condition. The sharing of these experiences with other parents can be a source of great strength and comfort; especially when, as often happens with the rarer genetic disorders, parents have responsibility for more than one sick child.
      This leads to the recommendation that if a child is to attend a hospice, it should be one that is child-oriented and properly dedicated to the care of children and their special requirements, not part of an adult facility. Adult hospices that want to include children should develop separate facilities especially equipped to cater for their special needs.
      It is now generally accepted that most families want to care for their sick child at home for as long as they can, and that many parents want their child to die at home. Their wishes need to be respected, and children with life-threatening illnesses should receive care based on their home. However, in meeting these wishes parents will need help and support. There are many ways to support those families, depending on their precise needs and on what contribution children's hospices can make to meeting the needs of the child and family. As new services are introduced, their effectiveness must be looked at.
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      So in 1992 we launched a programme to run for five years, with the overall aim of forming a better appreciation of the services that are most beneficial to seriously ill children and their families. One million pounds a year has been provided to fund this programme. By the time it ends, in March 1997, support will have been given to about 40 projects, ranging in size from under £1,000 to some over £200,000. They are spread evenly across England, and include initiatives in both statutory and voluntary sectors. All break new ground, and range from pioneering community home nursing services to support for voluntary respite care within a hospice dedicated to children.
      Various projects aim to explore the contribution that community paediatric teams, especially paediatric nurses, can make to help those families. Other developments have been supported by the programme, including the concept of the hospice at home—this can be either an outreach facility from an existing hospice or a domiciliary nursing service provided by a voluntary or statutory organisation that seeks to help with the management of the sick child's symptoms in the home.
      Little Haven hospice at Southend-on-Sea, of which my hon. Friend is the patron, has been awarded a modest grant from programme funds in support of a local survey that it is mounting to validate the information that is available on the children in its immediate area who may require its services.
      The importance of children's hospices is being increasingly recognised by the health service. Children's hospices now have access to health service funding on the same basis as adult hospices. Since 1994, funds have been included in health authority allocations for the purchase of palliative care services. Health authorities can now commission palliative care services for all their populations, including children. They are no longer restricted, as they were at one time, to supporting adult hospices—they can include children with life-threatening illnesses. They have been given the power to decide for themselves the appropriate amount of funding to meet the needs of their local populations in this regard.
      While domiciliary services may be the first line of support for families, when the services of a children's hospice are seen to have an important role to play, contracts can be arranged and funds can be provided. I understand that some hospices now receive a significant part of their funds through service contracts.
      I value highly the dedication and commitment of all those involved in the children's hospice movement. Many people put in many thousands of hours of their own time to raise money and to run events in support of the hospices, including my hon. Friend and his friends. Without their effort, the lives of many children and their families would be definitely a good deal poorer.
      Question put and agreed to.
      Adjourned accordingly at nine minutes to Eleven o 'clock.