§ Mr. Peter Lilley (Hitchin and Harpenden)(by private notice): To ask the President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons if she will move to set up a Select Committee to investigate advance disclosure of the Chancellor of the Exchequer's Budget statement. [Interruption.]
§ Madam SpeakerOrder. I will take no points of order until after the private notice question. I want to hear what the right hon. Gentleman has to say at the Dispatch Box. The House will come to order and hear exchanges. Mr. Lilley.
§ Mr. Lilleyindicated dissent.
§ Madam SpeakerIn that case, we will have silence for Mrs. Taylor.
§ The President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mrs. Ann Taylor)No, we do not intend to establish such a Committee. There is always speculation at the time of the Budget about its contents, as the right hon. Gentleman, a former junior Treasury Minister, should know. I have seen no evidence that details of the Budget statement have been leaked. If the complaints are that we are sticking to manifesto commitments and election pledges, then, as the Prime Minister made clear, we are happy to confirm that this is the case.
§ Mr. LilleyI had rather hoped that the right hon. Lady, recognising that she acts for the whole House rather than for the Government, would take this matter more seriously—certainly more seriously than her right hon. Friend the Prime Minister—act on precedent and set up an inquiry. Does she not recognise that these are matters of the highest importance to the authority of the House and to the integrity of financial markets? That is why a previous Labour Chancellor, who himself disclosed contents of his own Budget before that Budget, was required to resign and the same has happened to other Treasury Ministers.
The right hon. Lady says that this relates to matters that were in the Labour party's manifesto. Neither of the issues disclosed before the Budget today was in the Labour party's manifesto. They are not a matter of speculation, but of disclosure of specific matters which will be in the Budget. If she says that it was a matter of which we all should be aware, why was it that, when the Treasury revealed the details of the plans to abolish in this Budget the tax relief for medical insurance for the elderly, the BBC thought that was news, Ceefax thought that was news and the journalists who phoned me thought that was news? They did not think that it was established policy and, unlike the Treasury which said that it was in the manifesto, they knew that it was not in the Labour party manifesto. It had never been declared as policy and a possible content of this Budget in the House, and I would submit to the right hon. Lady that it should not have been revealed to journalists before it was disclosed in the Budget statement in the House.
298 Whatever the right hon. Lady may say about that issue, she will surely agree that the second disclosure, on the front page of the Financial Times today, written by its respected political correspondent, states:
A senior member of the government said"—about the plans to abolish dividend tax credits and take billions of pounds out of pension funds—the markets are bonkers … we are pressing aheadwith these plans. That is a clear disclosure of a very price-sensitive matter. Will the right hon. Lady agree that it is necessary to inquire into the fact that there have been share price movements following both disclosures?Does the right hon. Lady recall that when an official, without authorisation, leaked the contents of the Budget last year, the then shadow Chancellor—now the Chancellor—said:
I condemn this leak and I think nobody can condone the leak of sensitive Budget matters the day before the Budget. I am sure that a full inquiry is going to be mounted"?Why is no inquiry to be mounted on this occasion? Why is no Select Committee to be set up, even though one was in the Hugh Dalton case? Does the right hon. Lady agree with the former Labour Prime Minister, Attlee, who said:The principle of the inviolability of the Budget is of the highest importance, and the discretion of the Chancellor of the Exchequer must he beyond question"?Does she agree with Hugh Dalton's reaction when he was urged not to admit that he was the Minister responsible? Does she accept that whichever Treasury Minister briefed The Times and was quoted by the Financial Times must own up and say that he did it? Finally, does she agree that there must be an inquiry to clear up these matters before we can proceed?
§ Mrs. TaylorI think that the right hon. Gentleman has confirmed our fears that this is nothing more than a pathetic attempt to disrupt the Budget, because the Opposition are so afraid of the popularity of our manifesto commitments. The right hon. Gentleman really ought to learn the difference between speculation and disclosure. As my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has said, speculation of the type that appears in the Financial Times today has preceded every other Budget, too.
As for the abolition of tax relief on medical insurance, which the right hon. Gentleman claims has been revealed to the world for the first time today, I remind him and his colleagues that on 25 February 1997 the Conservative party published an attack on Labour's plans which included the words:
Labour are committed to cutting VAT on fuel to 5 per cent. Labour have said that they will pay for this by abolishing tax relief on medical insurance for pensioners.I can confirm to the House that the purpose of Budget secrecy is to prevent sensitive material from being leaked, not to prevent manifesto commitments from being kept.
§ Mr. Robert Sheldon (Ashton-under-Lyne)Budget day would not be—
§ Madam SpeakerOrder. A right hon. Gentleman is on his feet.
§ Mr. SheldonBudget day would not be the same if there were not rumours and guesses about the contents of 299 the Budget. The only quotation in the Financial Times states that a senior Minister has said, "We are pressing ahead." That is what we are doing—pressing ahead.
§ Mrs. TaylorI think that my right hon. Friend will shortly find out that that is the case.
§ Mr. Paul Tyler (North Cornwall)May I add to the quotation that has been read? It also said:
A senior member of the government said: 'The markets are bonkers"'.Is that not true, Madam Speaker?May I make a constructive suggestion? I wonder whether the Leader of the House heard her colleague, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, responding to a point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Mr. Maclennan) about the advantages of open government in relation to the budgetary process.
If, among Government steps to improve the position, we had more public discussion, before the Budget, of the fiscal options, so that such speculation as took place took account of that discussion and had that as background, and if, as part of the plans for open government, the Government would now give us an undertaking that those strategic options and fiscal opportunities would be discussed in the open, without the Chancellor disappearing into purdah for so many weeks, we would have a much healthier democratic discussion than we do at the moment.
§ Mrs. TaylorI really think that we cannot have it both ways. We cannot have complaints that there has not been enough secrecy and, at the same time, complaints that there has been too much.
§ Mr. Gerald Kaufman (Manchester, Gorton)Madam Speaker, this morning you rebuked one of the minority parties for playing childish games. Will you now rebuke another of the minority parties for playing childish games, and point out that that type of childish game, which the electorate are sick of, explains why that party is on the Opposition Benches and why, after the next general election, it will be on the Opposition Benches below the Gangway?
§ Mr. William Cash (Stone)As the Leader of the House has said that this is a matter for speculation, as has the Prime Minister, does she accept that there are strong grounds, as there were in 1947, for a stock exchange investigation to establish whether there is a connection between the soaring market prices yesterday and the allegations that have been made? Will she say whether she thinks that there should be a stock exchange investigation, and would she object if there were one?
§ Mrs. TaylorNo. I see no reason for one.
§ Mr. Dale Campbell-Savours (Workington)May I say to my right hon. Friend that I have a copy of the Financial Times article, and it is clear that not one single word in that article could be construed as a Budget leak, not even in the wildest possible circumstances of 300 imagination? Is not the reality that all we have here is a publicity stunt by the Tories, and that the country will not be fooled?
§ Mrs. TaylorMy hon. Friend is right. The country will not be fooled, and I think that the country is looking forward to hearing the Chancellor of the Exchequer's Budget statement.
§ Mr. Bernard Jenkin (North Essex)Will the right hon. Lady, in the interests of her manifesto commitments in favour of open government and the highest standards in public life, therefore be happy to name the senior member of the Government who is mentioned in the article? Why will she not tell us—or is she ashamed of it?
§ Mrs. TaylorThe hon. Gentleman is talking about speculation in the newspapers, which takes place on every occasion.
§ Audrey Wise (Preston)Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is by no means unusual for share prices to move on the basis of unfounded rumour? Will she, therefore, agree that this exposes the thinness of the Opposition's likely response to our right hon. Friend's Budget statement when he is finally allowed to make it? Does she share my impatience for us to get on with it?
§ Mrs. TaylorYes.
§ Mr. Alex Salmond (Banff and Buchan)As I remember it, the Conservatives got quite upset when their Budget statements were delayed in one year or another. Given that many other countries have much fuller discussion and debate in the run-up to the Budget, is there not a case for far more discussion, not less? Should we not demystify the rigmarole and flummery of the Budget, and would that not be more important than the Chancellor's changing his jacket or his Budget box?
§ Mrs. TaylorMy right hon. Friend the Chancellor has made his priorities clear, which is why he is anxious to make his statement to the House.
§ Mr. Dennis Skinner (Bolsover)Does my right hon. Friend recall that, only last year, a Budget leak was sent to the Daily Mirror? For some obscure reason that I shall never understand, the Daily Mirror decided not to print it. But The Sun took the story and printed it. I did not hear a single word or a squeak from any Tory Member in support of a Select Committee and, what is more, we did not get a statement about it either.
§ Mrs. TaylorMy hon. Friend is right. Opposition Members have slipped into opposition mode very easily.
§ Mr. Douglas Hogg (Sleaford and North Hykeham)Does the Leader of the House—[Interruption.]
§ Madam SpeakerOrder.
§ Madam SpeakerOrder. The House will come to order and hear the right hon. and learned Gentleman.
§ Mr. HoggDoes the Leader of the House accept that the House has a right to know the Government's position? 301 Is she saying that there was no leak or that there was a leak, but it does not matter? We are entitled to know. Moreover, does she accept that, in view of the lamentable way in which last week's inquiry into the allegations against the Secretary of State for Wales was conducted, the proper way, in accordance with precedent, is to set up an inquiry under the Tribunals and Inquiries Act 1971?
§ Mrs. TaylorThe right hon. and learned Gentleman should have been listening to what I said earlier. I said 302 that I have seen no evidence that any details of the Budget statement have been leaked. He says that he wants to know what we stand for. We went through the election campaign saying what would be in our first Budget. We shall find out soon to what extent we have kept our word.
§ Madam SpeakerOrder. We shall now move on to the Budget.