HC Deb 20 March 1996 vol 274 cc429-38

Order read for resuming adjourned debate on Question [14 December].

Motion made, and Question proposed, That the Promoters of the City of Westminster Bill [Lords] may, notwithstanding anything in the Standing Orders or practice of this House, proceed with the Bill in the present Session; and the Petition for the Bill shall be deemed to have been deposited and all Standing Orders applicable thereto shall be deemed to have been complied with; That if the Bill is brought from the Lords in the present Session, the Agents for the Bill shall deposit in the Private Bill Office a declaration signed by them stating that the Bill is the same, in every respect, as the Bill which was brought from the Lords in the last Session; That, as soon as a certificate by one of the Clerks in the Private Bill Office, that such a declaration has been so deposited, has been laid upon the Table of the House, the Bill shall be read the first and second time and committed (and shall be recorded in the Journal of this House as having been so read and committed) and shall be committed to the Chairman of Ways and Means, who shall make such Amendments thereto as were made by him in the last Session, and shall report the Bill as amended to the House forthwith, and the Bill, so amended, shall be ordered to lie upon the Table; That no further Fees shall be charged in respect of any proceedings on the Bill in respect of which Fees have already been incurred during any previous Session.—[Sir Michael Shersby.]

Question again proposed.

7 pm

Sir Michael Shersby (Uxbridge)

I shall explain briefly my interest in the Bill and the history of its provisions.

My interest goes back to the days between 1964 and 1971, when I was a city councillor, and to 1967–68, when I was deputy Lord Mayor of the city. During that period, the activity of sex shops in the Soho area of the city was becoming a real problem. It is still a problem today and it needs to be addressed in the Bill.

The Bill is promoted by Westminster city council, which complied with all the statutory requirements and the Standing Order requirements for the Bill. It was deposited in November 1993 and was allocated to originate in the other place. There were no petitions in the other place, and the Bill then came into the House on 14 June 1994. There was no objection to its Second Reading and there were no petitions against it. The Bill was carried over to the 1994࠷95 Session by resolution of the House, and following an adjournment of the Unopposed Bills Committee for further written submissions to be made in support of part III. The Committee approved the Bill on 20 October 1994.

The Bill was then blocked by the hon. Member for Leyton (Mr. Cohen) and several other hon. Members at the consideration stage in the House, and amendments to the Bill were tabled.

A debate on amendments took place on 26 June 1995. A point of order was raised just before 10 pm, and it did not prove possible to move the closure motion. There was no parliamentary time available to resume the debate before the end of the parliamentary Session. Nor was it possible to obtain a carry-over motion before the end of the Session, as that was also blocked. The Bill is therefore technically dead pending this debate on the revival motion.

The Bill is divided into three parts and deals with two totally separate topics that bear no relationship to each other. Part I simply deals with the short title and interpretation. Part II proposes additional provisions to supplement those contained in the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1982, as amended by the Greater London Council (General Powers) Act 1986, to control unlicensed sex establishments.

Westminster council has a particular problem, as Soho is within its area. The Bill would give the council additional powers to close unlicensed premises. Although existing powers allow the prosecution of operators of such premises and the seizure of goods and equipment found on them, experience has shown that such premises are routinely restocked and reopened within a matter of hours. Moreover, such premises are invariably run by what I can only call front men, whose identities change from week to week. Prosecution of such persons is not therefore effective in preventing the operation of the premises.

Part II would enable the council to obtain a closure order from a magistrates court, which would stop the premises continuing to be used as unlicensed sex premises.

Part III seeks to release the city council from its statutory duty to build a county primary school on a site at Moxon street in the city of Westminster.

I understand that it is to that particular provision that the hon. Member for Leyton objects. His concerns relate to the future use of the site. Were the Bill to obtain its revival motion, the city council would consider deleting part III to allow further time to seek a resolution to the current impasse.

I can assure the House and the hon. Member for Leyton that the motion, if agreed to, as I trust it shall be, will provide an early opportunity for him to meet members and officers of the city council to discuss these matters before resumed procedures on the Bill take place.

7.4 pm

Mr. Harry Cohen (Leyton)

I have been an objector to the Bill and to this carry-over motion, appearing every Thursday at 2.30 pm to shout "Object". Indeed, when the Bill was last debated on the Floor of the House, last June, I spoke for two and a half hours, but you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and the House will be pleased to know that I do not intend to speak at length tonight. I simply want to give a summary of some of the issues and where we are from my point of view in relation to the Bill, and, indeed, to give a warning shot that if we do not made progress the House might have to have lengthy sessions on it again in future. I hope that we can make some progress and achieve a settlement that benefits the university of Westminster and addresses the concerns in relation to sex shops legislation.

Westminster city council has been slow to do either of those things. It seems to think that it can steamroller Parliament into passing the Bill without having to account for the reasons behind it or without considering the implications that would come from such a change in the law. Apart from the three-hour session in June about the university of Westminster, the Bill has not been considered by Parliament. As the hon. Member for Uxbridge (Sir M. Shersby) said, it passed virtually all its stages without discussion.

I shall say a few words about the carry-over motion. Normally, Bills that are not completed at the end of a parliamentary Session will fall, but there is an exception with private Bills, for which there is a carry-over procedure. Because of the exception for private Bills, the onus is on the promoters to resolve the differences if they want the Bill to be carried forward and get on the statute book. I know that there is a cost to the Bill's promoter, and that is why the motion says at the end: That no further Fees shall be charged in respect of any proceedings on the Bill in respect of which Fees have already been incurred during any previous Session. There are also costs to the public purse, and my time and that of other hon. Members on top of that. I think that the Government have to keep about 100 of their Members here just in case the closure was moved. That adds up to a lot of time, let alone the cost of running the House. I know that we cannot amend the motion to say that in these circumstances the promoter should pay the proper costs, but if it could be amended those costs would be considerable.

I tabled a parliamentary question to the Chairman of the Finance and Services Committee last December about the estimated cost of the House on a sitting day. The reply said: It is not practical to allocate the majority of House costs as between sitting and non-sitting days. The outturn for the financial year ended 31 March 1995 for the Works and the Administration votes, that is. excluding Members' pay and allowances, was £102,256,000. There were 158 sitting days in that year. Further information is given in the Commission's annual report."—[Official Report, 18 December 1995; Vol. 268, c. 848.]; If we divide the £102,256,000 by the 158 sitting days, we come up with a figure of £647,189.87 per day. A debate such as this, taking up three hours of parliamentary time, will cost the public purse £242,696.19—and that does not include the cost of the time of the hon. Members involved. Westminster city council will not be reimbursing that cost. As I said earlier, it is incumbent on the promoter to resolve any differences, so that parliamentary time and public money are not wasted.

I demonstrated my willingness to reach agreement on the Bill, and I think that Westminster city council was rather taken aback by that. I think that it had assumed that it would get its way automatically by using Conservative Members as Lobby fodder to bludgeon the Bill through. Perhaps it would even have preferred outright opposition from me, and from other hon. Members. I have tried to be reasonable, however. I have told the council that it can have its Bill, but that it must provide educational benefit for the university of Westminster. After all, the Moxon street land referred to in clause 9 was given to the council for educational use. I have taken a flexible attitude to the way in which educational benefit can be secured; for some time, the ball has been in the council's court.

On 18 December, I met Councillor Robert Moreland and a senior council official. I suggested that the council should come up with a package of benefits for the university, and that it should be prepared to deal with the sex shop issue. I said that I would not oppose the Bill on the basis of the sex shop legislation as long as the implications were discussed.

Since that meeting I have heard nothing from the council. On 14 March, however, Jonathan Bracken of Dyson Bell Martin, parliamentary agents for the university, wrote to me saying: So far as I am aware, no further progress has been made between the City Council and the University of Westminster concerning the Moxon Street site but should you need any further information please do not hesitate to let me know. Notwithstanding our three-hour debate in June and the meeting that I attended in December, no progress towards a settlement is being made, although we are approaching the end of March. As I think the House will agree, such a settlement is achievable.

Sir Michael Shersby

I hope that the hon. Gentleman heard me assure the House that, if the revival motion is carried, Westminster city council would like to meet him again to try to resolve the outstanding issues before further consideration of the Bill. The council has made that clear.

Mr. Cohen

I welcome that assurance. I had hoped that we would make progress at the December meeting rather than simply laying out our positions again—although that may be an unfortunate phrase, given that the Bill deals with sex shops.

Eight of the Bill's nine clauses deal with sex shops; the ninth deals with the land at Moxon street, near Marylebone. As the hon. Member for Uxbridge pointed out, it has nothing to do with sex shops and everything to do with property speculation. The land was given to Westminster city council—free of charge—by the London residuary body following the demise of the Inner London education authority, for educational purposes. There is an argument about that. The council says—this suits its purposes—that it must build a school on the land, and I submit that it would be within its rights if it used the land for educational purposes. In any event, however, the land was handed over to the council for educational use.

The problem is that, once clause 9 becomes law and that obligation is lifted, the land will inevitably go to a property speculator. In a free market, the university could not possibly bid as much as a property speculator for prime-site land in central London. Indeed, in my three-hour speech last year, I pointed out that such a deal had already been lined up between Westminster city council and property dealers. It would mean that public education would be left out in the cold.

I have made it clear that the university of Westminster would make the best use of the land. According to its mission statement, The mission of the University of Westminster is to be the leading provider in the capital city of high quality accessible portfolio of higher education and associated strategic research". The same document tells us: The University has a unique profile with 9,000 full-time students, 12,000 part-time students and 20,000 students who attend mid-career short courses. Seventy-five per cent. of the full time student population comes from London, mainly inner London. and all the part-time and mid-career population comprise those who live and work in London. Fifty-nine per cent. of the full time and part-time student population is mature (ie aged 21+ on entry) reflecting the diversity of background the University serves. Over 40 per cent. of the students come from ethnic minorities, the highest of any University in Britain. The University provides education in all subject areas, science, engineering, humanities, business, management, languages, law, art and design, with the exception of medicine and initial teacher training. The university does an excellent job for the varied population of London, but it suffers from severe problems. It is run from 22 different addresses, and 30 per cent. of its floor space is leased. Many of the leases are now coming to an end. It suffers more than the average amount of building and estate costs, for which it is not reimbursed and for which it is often criticised by the Department for Education and Employment. Its strategy is to secure and operate from five large sites by the year 2000. It has already identified three sites in Westminster, and has had to build a further site in Harrow. Moxon street would be the ideal location for the fifth site, but Westminster's failure to come up with a suitable package is blocking progress.

Referring to the carry-over motion, the promoter says in its statement to the House: Westminster City Council is the Local Education Authority within the City. Clause 9 seeks to relieve the Council of its statutory duty to build a primary school pursuant to section 12(9) of the Education Act 1980 on a site at Moxon Street in the City. The Promoters are concerned that the considerable amount of time, effort and public money which have been expended on this Bill should not be wasted. I agree with that. That is why the promoter should have saved the time of Parliament and of hon. Members by reaching an agreement that would benefit the university of Westminster.

I should like to consider the sex shop aspects of the Bill. Four points need to be dealt with. I am sorry to do that, but I shall deal with them in summary form because, clearly, this is not the time for a full debate. That will be take place if the Bill comes back before the House.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Geoffrey Lofthouse)

Order. I appreciate what the hon. Gentleman is saying, but we are debating a revival motion and this is not the time to go into detail. That may happen if the Bill returns.

Mr. Cohen

I understand that. If we make no progress, I will have to go into the matter in considerable detail. That is why I want to summarise the issues. I hope that they will be dealt with by the Bill's promoter.

First, the Bill is meant to deal with unlicensed sex shops, but no proof has been presented to the House that there is a problem with provision on such shops. I am sure that there are unlicensed sex shops and that they are a nuisance, but where is the evidence that existing law is not sufficient to deal with them? I am not saying that there is no problem, but that evidence should have been produced by the Bill's promoter. When it wrote to me initially in October 1994, the Gay Business Association said: At present, if the local authority are of the opinion that premises require a licence then they can prosecute the premises for trading without the benefit of a licence. It would appear that the City of Westminster has not availed themselves of this power to any great extent and yet they now seek a radical extension of their powers". I wonder why existing law has not been used. Again, I shall not go into great detail, but in July I tabled a question to the Secretary of State for the Home Department asking him to list all legislation under which unauthorised sex shops and sex cinemas can be prosecuted; and how many prosecutions under each provision there have been in the last five years."—[Official Report, 13 July 1995; Vol. 263, c. 689.] I will not go through it in detail, but the Home Secretary's answer gives a great list of the various provisions.

Mr. Don Dixon (Jarrow)

There are not enough laws covering that.

Mr. Cohen

I will not read out the Home Secretary's answer, but I should like to mention the different provisions in the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1982 under which prosecutions may take place. They include schedule 3, paragraphs 20(a), (b), (c) and (d), 21, 22(1), 22(2), 23, 24(6)—

Mr. Deputy Speaker

Order. I know that the last thing the hon. Gentleman wants to do is to test my patience too far, but he knows that this debate is not for detail.

Mr. Cohen

I do not want to test your patience, Mr. Deputy Speaker. We are debating a carry-over motion. For that to be justified, the purpose of the Bill must be justified and evidence should have been presented to the House that there is a need for this legislation. I am just making a brief summary. There are existing legal powers. If Westminster council needs to go beyond those, it should produce the proof of why that is necessary. Other legislation is available apart from the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act, including the Video Recordings Act 1984 and the Obscene Publications Act 1959, which Westminster city council could use.

Having said that—this leads me to the second point—I have an open mind on whether there is a problem with unlicensed sex shops. I am waiting for the evidence to find out whether there is a problem. If there is, why does the Bill apply only to Westminster? I know that Soho is a major area for the sex industry, but it is not the only one. The problem is that unlicensed sex shops have, I understand, arisen in other parts of London. If the Bill is passed, such shops in Soho could easily spread to the rest of London. With the Bill, Westminster could be exporting Soho to other boroughs. Why should Westminster have powers that other boroughs do not have? The Bill just shifts the problem elsewhere.

Sir Michael Shersby

The answer to the hon. Gentleman's question is that the problem has been identified and is growing in Westminster. It has not been identified elsewhere.

Mr. Cohen

Again, we have not received the evidence for that statement. The Member for Uxbridge is an honourable gentleman and I believe his word, but we are passing important legislation here and we should receive evidence of that statement. If we had a strategic council for the whole of London, all the London implications could be considered, instead of legislation being introduced in such a piecemeal fashion for just one borough.

The third point about sex shops is that councillors and officers have strong, excessive powers. If the Bill is enacted, they will have greater powers than the police or Customs and Excise. That should be explained. At the meeting, I asked for explanations of all those points and I did not receive them. That is why we are at the stage of the carry-over motion.

There is a danger of councillors and officers having excessive powers. They could decide what is acceptable. With a shallow standard of proof, they could close a business, which would have to stay closed until an appeal could be heard. A legitimate business could go broke in that time, even though sex material might be only a small proportion of its business—perhaps one book that was deemed to be pornographic. That is not right.

There is much potential for intimidation, perhaps even corruption—a form of official protection—if a councillor or an officer of Westminster council were unscrupulous. Under the Bill, newsagents could suffer because the magazines that they display on their top shelves might be deemed to be pornographic. Under these powers, they could be closed and they would have to stay closed until an appeal was heard.

There could be discrimination against gay cafés and bars. That brings me to the fourth and final point in relation to sex shops. The Gay Business Association wrote to me expressing concern that the legislation could be used in a homophobic way. Under the Bill, an officer or councillor of Westminster council could close gay businesses in Soho and elsewhere that they might not like.

I raised those four aspects in the December meeting, when I said that Westminster city council should come up with some answers. A hidden aspect of the legislation is that the licence fee could soar with consequent implications. Only rich pornographers might be able pay the licence fee that Westminster city council has in mind. We could be heading towards a monopoly. That implication should be considered. All those matters are worthy of Parliament's consideration, as is the Government's general attitude to the sex industry.

The Government seem to face both ways at once on the sex industry. On the one hand, they favour deregulation and liberalisation—cable television is allowed to show many sex programmes—but on the other hand, they have a knee-jerk reaction against obscenity without defining obscenity. The Bill is cashing in on that.

To conclude, there are genuine points in the Bill that need to be addressed, but I repeat: Westminster city council can have its Bill. I shall not block it completely, provided the points that I have made are addressed and taken into account in future legislation.

In particular, the university of Westminster should be properly treated. I should have thought that that would be a matter of civic pride for Westminster city council. My area has a lowly football club, Leyton Orient, and it is a matter of civic pride that I as a Member of Parliament and local councillors do our best by that club. We want it to thrive.

Westminster city council has a superb university—I have read out what it does—yet the council seems to show no civic pride in helping it to thrive. I am amazed at that. Public education should not be left to rot because of market economics whereby land goes to property speculators to use for their own purposes.

That is my case. I have abbreviated it. I have endeavoured not to try your patience, Mr. Deputy Speaker. If the Bill comes to the Floor of the House, that will be the right time for me to go into those matters in more detail. However, I have made clear my willingness to do a deal and I hope that Westminster city council will now pick up on that and reach a deal that benefits the university of Westminster.

7.31 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Tom Sackville)

I rise briefly to show my support and that of my colleagues in the Government for the measure. Sex shops in Westminster do pose a problem. I am sorry to hear that the hon. Member for Leyton (Mr. Cohen) has an open mind on that. I do not. I know that there is a problem. I have seen some of the products that those shops sell. They cater for all kinds of perversions—coprophilia, bestiality, violent torture and all sorts of means of degrading women, a tide of filth about which we must do something.

Mr. Cohen

rose—

Mr. Sackville

No, I shall not give way.

I am sorry that on a previous occasion on another part of the Bill the hon. Gentleman felt obliged to block this important legislation.

I stress that, as a matter of public policy, we wish to control the trade in this appalling material which is getting worse all the time. Westminster city council needs the powers and I hope that the Bill will be brought back to the House and become law.

7.33 pm
Mr. Alun Michael (Cardiff, South and Penarth)

I share the Minister's hope that the Bill will return and receive rapid support. However, the Bill's promoter needs to take note of tonight's debate and the points that have been made. If it listens to what has been said, a great deal of time will be saved. The hon. Member for Uxbridge (Sir M. Shersby) acknowledged that in introducing the motion tonight and showed some recognition of the need to respond to the issues that have been raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Leyton (Mr. Cohen).

I would say, for the benefit of the promoter, that I have some experience of the extent to which a private Bill can be delayed, however valuable and positive a measure it is, by one or two hon. Members who fail to understand its virtues. It took some eight years for the Cardiff Bay Barrage Bill to become law. It would be wise if those assisting Westminster city council with the Bill—some of whom shared that experience—accepted that listening now and persuading my hon. Friend and any others who might be inclined to object that their concerns can be addressed would help us when the Bill comes before the House for a proper debate, as opposed to today's revival motion.

I understand that there are limits in the statement that can be made formally on behalf of promoters, but the statement that we received was quite lightweight. My hon. Friend the Member for Leyton is right to say that it did not make the case, which I assume is strong and which I believe is accepted on both sides of Westminster city council because the Bill has general support. It would be sensible to ensure that that case is made before the next and substantive debate.

It is wise, as I was advised on one occasion, to regard hon. Members not as remote gods to be propitiated but as individuals who seek to represent their constituents and with whom a sensible discussion can be had. My hon. Friend made the point that he had met the promoter back in December, but there was then no response to the issues that he raised with the council.

I have been given an undertaking similar to that given to the hon. Member for Uxbridge earlier, that my hon. Friend will be offered a full opportunity to discuss those issues and, if possible, for his concerns to be met. That would be greatly to the assistance of the House, enabling us to debate only the issues that are within the Bill which, in general, seem positive and helpful.

There is one issue which I hope, when we debate the Bill in substance, the promoter and, more important, the Minister will have addressed—the question whether there is a danger of displacement from Westminster to elsewhere if these powers are given to Westminster city council but not to other councils. The Minister, in his reference to the unacceptability of some of the activities that go on, is right, but there should not be the likelihood of displacement as a result of the powers. I hope that the Minister will anticipate and address that point when we debate the measure in a substantive debate.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved, That the Promoters of the City of Westminster Bill [Lords] may, notwithstanding anything in the Standing Orders or practice of this House, proceed with the Bill in the present Session; and the Petition for the Bill shall be deemed to have been deposited and all Standing Orders applicable thereto shall be deemed to have been complied with; That if the Bill is brought from the Lords in the present Session, the Agents for the Bill shall deposit in the Private Bill Office a declaration signed by them stating that the Bill is the same, in every respect, as the Bill which was brought from the Lords in the last Session; That, as soon as a certificate by one of the Clerks in the Private Bill Office, that such a declaration has been so deposited, has been laid upon the Table of the House, the Bill shall be read the first and second time and committed (and shall be recorded in the Journal of this House as having been so read and committed) and shall be committed to the Chairman of Ways and Means, who shall make such Amendments thereto as were made by him in the last Session, and shall report the Bill as amended to the House forthwith, and the Bill, so amended, shall be ordered to lie upon the Table; That no further Fees shall be charged in respect of any proceedings on the Bill in respect of which Fees have already been incurred during any previous Session.

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