Engagements (Hansard, 8 July 1998)

§ Q1. Sir Teddy Taylor (Rochford and Southend, East)
If he will list his official engagements for Wednesday 8 July.

§ The Prime Minister (Mr. Tony Blair)
This morning, I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I will have further such meetings later today.

§ Sir Teddy Taylor
Is the Prime Minister aware that, in Southend-on-Sea, where Labour and Liberal Democrat councillors have just imposed savage increases on home help charges for the disabled and elderly, and are planning to close three old folks' homes—not because they are nasty, but because there is not enough money—there is huge anger at the fact that the Government have had no difficulty in finding an extra £1.5 million to increase the number of political advisers by 50 per cent? Does not the Prime Minister think that it would strengthen our democracy if he simply allowed civil servants—respected people—to tell people the truth, whether good or bad, rather than employ that huge and costly army of news twisters, who many of us think are an insult to democracy?

§ The Prime Minister
No, I do not know about the particular circumstances in Southend that the hon. Gentleman has raised—[Interruption.]—although I have to say to him and his colleagues who are shouting about it that, of course, as a result of keeping to tough spending limits in the first two years, we have had difficult financial decisions to make. But I hope that he realises that, as a result of what the Government have done since they came to office, we have put more money into the health service, into education and into social services. That is a huge difference between the Government whom he supported—more or less—and the Government whom I lead.

§ Mr. Robert Marshall-Andrews (Medway)
In view of the recent reports in The Observer, will the Prime Minister consider one constructive suggestion? The ministerial code should be amended to prohibit Ministers and officials from dealing with people who are lobbying on behalf of others, where those people have, within the past five years, been employed as aides or advisers to any Minister. Will he add, by way of a gloss, that the legitimate way in which to petition Parliament or the Government is either directly to Government offices, or through the agency—the legitimate and open agency—of elected Members of Parliament?

§ The Prime Minister
Of course Ministers or Members of Parliament will meet lobbying groups and organisations as part of their normal work, and there is nothing wrong with that; but I agree with my hon. and learned Friend that the concern that has been expressed—and I do take it seriously—does show, as I said yesterday, that we have to be extremely careful about any relations between 1065 lobbying firms and special advisers and those in Government. I have instructed the Cabinet Secretary, therefore, to revise the rules that we inherited that govern such contacts and to strengthen them in any way that he thinks fit. In particular, there can be no circumstances that ever justify either passing confidential or inside information to a lobbyist, or the granting of any improper preferential access to, or influence on, Government. These rules will be strengthened and they will be published. Anyone found breaching them will be out on his ear.

§ Mr. William Hague (Richmond, Yorks)
Why does not the Prime Minister tackle the culture of cronyism that he has created in his Government, instead of talking about rules that should already be observed across the Government? After the allegations in The Observer at the weekend, a national newspaper sacked one of its columnists, a lobbying company suspended one of its directors and another reprimanded one of its employees. The only organisation who have not acted against their employees or investigated their employees are the Government. When will the right hon. Gentleman act, rather than protecting the cronies with whom he has surrounded himself?

§ The Prime Minister
First, I welcome the right hon. Gentleman back. Secondly, I can tell him that we have investigated each allegation in The Observer in turn. I shall go through them for him. First, there was the supposed leak of a Select Committee report. We investigated that—no Minister was involved and no Members of Parliament were involved. A member of a lobbying firm simply took a press-embargoed copy. That should not have happened, but obviously it was not the Government's fault.
Secondly, there was the allegation of a leak of selective information in my right hon. Friend the Chancellor's Mansion House speech. There was no such leak; indeed, the information concerned was not even in the speech. Thirdly, the allegation about Mr. Liddle, as the right hon. Gentleman knows, was based on talk at a cocktail party at the Guildhall. A freelance journalist claiming to be an American business man said that he wanted to invest in Britain. He asked Mr. Liddle to help, and he perfectly properly agreed to do so. It is emphatically denied that, in doing so, he in any way offered to act on behalf of a lobbying company. The journalist claimed to have words suggesting that on tape, but it is now admitted that that claim was false and that no such tape exists.
We have investigated these matters very carefully. Instead of making general allegations, the right hon. Gentleman should make a specific allegation, provide the evidence for it and, of course, we would then investigate it.

§ Mr. Hague
I am grateful for the welcome back, but even with my sinuses I can smell the stench from these revelations. As for this so-called defence, of course some things did not involve Members of Parliament or Ministers—it is not MPs and Ministers who are running the affairs of this Government.
The central allegation about Mr. Liddle has not been disproved: it has been denied by Mr. Liddle. If it had involved an ordinary civil servant, investigations would now be under way and disciplinary action would be in prospect. Saying that people drank too much champagne 1066 on the night and could not remember what they had said would not be regarded as an adequate or convincing defence.
When will the right hon. Gentleman stop protecting the money-grabbing cronies with whom he has surrounded himself and start—[Interruption.]. They are indeed feather-bedding, pocket-lining, money-grabbing cronies. When will the right hon. Gentleman clean up the Government's act?

§ The Prime Minister
Perhaps I could return the right hon. Gentleman to the facts. The right hon. Gentleman alleges that if Mr. Liddle had been a civil servant he would have been suspended immediately. I have checked that with the head of the civil service and it is not correct—he would not have been suspended. Secondly, all the right hon. Gentleman's other allegations have been investigated and found to be false. I understand why he wants to suggest that this Government are the same as the Government of whom he was a member—[HON. MEMBERS: "Worse."] This case is not Jonathan Aitken; it is not Neil Hamilton; it is not cash for questions; and it is not Asil Nadir. Those allegations were made and proven, whereas not a single allegation in The Observer article is true.

§ Mr. Hague
Only people in the Prime Minister's inner circle would think that a fireside chat with someone with a hangover disproves the allegations. The problem is not just the allegations but the whole culture that he has now created—in which hon. Members can be hung out to dry; Ministers, such as the one sitting next to him, can be briefed against; and members of his inner circle are the untouchables. The right hon. Gentleman has created a culture of cronyism—in which the Paymaster General hangs on to his job because he has villas in high places, and in which Ministers do not even blush when they try to make the wife of his private pollster the deputy chairman of the BBC. Let the Prime Minister tell the House whether he even recognises that there is a problem of cronyism over which he now presides.

§ The Prime Minister
If I may return the right hon. Gentleman to the facts, just a moment ago he alleged that I had put someone connected with me forward for the BBC deputy chairmanship. I have had nothing whatever to do with those who have been put forward for the BBC deputy chairmanship. If he has any evidence to the contrary, perhaps he will produce it. All the other allegations are general ones. He is making general allegations because he knows that he cannot sustain a single specific one: it is a classic smear tactic.
The one allegation that the right hon. Gentleman has not made—perhaps he is about to make it—is that we leaked the strategic defence review. Such an allegation would not surprise me. We have instituted an inquiry into how the leak happened. The BBC correspondent Robin Oakley said that, at six o'clock yesterday, he was shown a copy of the document by a Conservative Front Bencher. If I find that anyone in the Ministry of Defence, or any other Ministry, was involved in leaking that document, I will dismiss him. Would the right hon. Gentleman do the same?

§ Mr. Hague
Only a Prime Minister in desperate trouble could believe that the leak of a Government document 1067 did not somehow originate with the Government. How ridiculous! He cannot admit that there is a problem of cronyism—which all the rest of the country can see—because the problem goes to the heart of new Labour, in which cronyism has taken the place of principle. In the words of the former aide to the Chancellor—who is chuntering on—the Labour Government is always of two minds…On big issues especially, they don't know what they are thinking. Does the Prime Minister not realise that government without principle quickly becomes government for sale—which is what is beginning to happen?

§ The Prime Minister
People will again note that the right hon. Gentleman has made no specific allegation or tried to substantiate one. All we have had is the usual windy rhetoric and general allegations. Until very recently, he and the Conservative party were trying to claim that we were responsible for the leak of the strategic defence review. I notice that he has not repeated that claim today, or said that he would take action against anyone involved in the leak.
As for saying that we do not get the big issues right, we have in the past few days published our proposals on the Child Support Agency—[HON. MEMBERS: "Leaked".] We have also published our proposals on the rough sleepers initiative, on numeracy and on the defence review—[HON. MEMBERS: "Leaked."] They were certainly not leaked by us—[Interruption.]

§ Madam Speaker
Order.

§ The Prime Minister
Those are all very serious issues, and the Government's policy to deal with them is correct. The right hon. Gentleman has nothing to say about those issues, because the Opposition have no policy criticism that they can sustain against the Government. He is reduced to making wide allegations with no particularity. He does that because he wants to try to prove that we are the same as the previous Government—but we are not, and we never will be.

§ Mr. Hague
Of course these are all serious issues and they should all have been brought to the House before they were brought to the media, as should every other Government announcement. This is a serious issue in which former aides of the Prime Minister, the Chancellor and the Minister without Portfolio—wherever he happens to be skulking at the moment—appear to have offered access to Government and Government information in return for a fee, and the Government have not been able to disprove it. That is an extremely serious matter and it is taken seriously by the people of this country. Will not the Prime Minister come to see in time that it was a defining moment in the record of the Government when people were able to see the Government for what they are—too many cronies and too few principles?

§ The Prime Minister
The right hon. Gentleman gets no better with repetition. He keeps making great allegations of cronyism and corruption. He bandies around the words, but he will not make a specific charge and sustain it because every allegation made in The Observer has been investigated and found to be untrue. The reason that he carries on with all this rhetoric about 1068 the Government is that he and his party—as is noticed more in the country than anywhere else—have nothing whatever to say about the big policy issues of the day.

§ Mr. Mike Hall (Weaver Vale)
Given the Leader of the Opposition's sinuses, I will not ask him how he thinks Westminster city council smells. A report by Alan Langlands, chief executive of the National Health Service Executive, states that under the previous Administration, health authorities and emergency care services in the north-west were facing collapse. Since we have been in government, we have spent an extra £19 million on the South Cheshire health authority and an extra £9 million on North Cheshire to improve care in cancer treatment, to reduce waiting lists, to improve intensive care treatment for young people and to attack the winter crisis. How will my right hon. Friend ensure that under our Administration the health service in the north-west will never again face collapse?

§ The Prime Minister
By giving it the investment and the reform that it needs. Of course my hon. Friend is right. Since the election, we have put substantial extra sums of money into the health service over and above Conservative spending plans. Of course there was a defining moment a few days ago when the shadow Chancellor said that the Government were spending too much. That is the position of the Conservatives. Their attack on us in respect of public services is that we are spending too much, so let us never hear anything more from them about waiting lists or any other public service matter.

§ Mr. Paddy Ashdown (Yeovil)
Whatever problems the Government have over the events of the past couple of days—they have some and I hope that they will tackle them—I know of no sight more stomach-churning than the Conservative party accusing others of sleaze. [Interruption.]

§ Madam Speaker
Order. The House will come to order to hear the right hon. Gentleman.

§ Mr. Ashdown
Surely the issue that should worry us today is not so much the job prospects of a couple of cadet new Labour insiders, but the jobs of tens of thousands of people across the country that are now placed in jeopardy as a result of the rising pound and rising interest rates. Does the Prime Minister not realise that he could take a decision today that would relieve the pain immediately: he could come off the fence on the single currency, set a target date—subject to a referendum—and give the economy, the country and industry the lead that they so desperately need?

§ The Prime Minister
As I think I have told the right hon. Gentleman before, the worst reason for making a decision to join the single currency would be some short-term advantage in the currency markets. That would not be sensible at all. The economic policy that the Government are pursuing is to make sure that we have monetary stability, which is why we gave the Bank of England independence to set interest rates, which have had to go up—they should have gone up before the election and they have had to go up since in order to squeeze out inflation. We will also ensure financial 1069 stability through curing the Budget deficit. That is the right long-term policy for the country. I have no doubt about that; and I have no doubt, either, that it is ultimately in the best interests of industry, although I understand the concern about the short-term problems that have resulted from the rising pound.

§ Mr. Ashdown
The Prime Minister has given that answer before. It did not wash then, and it does not wash now. If he took the decision that I have suggested, the pound would come down tomorrow, interest rates would come down next week, investment would keep coming into this country over the next decade, and Britain would have more influence in Europe right through into the next century. Why does he not realise that, on this occasion, long-term interest and short-term advantage coincide? He will have to take such action soon; why not take it now?

§ The Prime Minister
It is because I do not believe that short-term advantage and the long-term position coincide. If the pound were to be brought down artificially tomorrow, and if we, say, cut interest rates when the monetary conditions were not right to do so, the result would be inflation—the very problem that we had under the Conservative Government. If we do not take the action necessary to root out inflation, put the economy on a stable footing and ensure that the public finances are in order, we will be back to the days of 15 per cent. interest rates and the record repossessions and bankruptcies that occurred under the Conservatives. The policy mechanisms in place are precisely designed to avoid that.
A decision on the single currency must be taken in the national economic interest. Given the national economic interest, and as our economy has not converged with the economies of continental Europe, it would not be sensible at the moment to say that we would join.

§ Mr. John Home Robertson (East Lothian)
What do students with A-levels from Eton, Charterhouse, Wellington and Westminster schools do during their first year at St Andrews and Edinburgh universities? Does my right hon. Friend share my suspicions about the motivation of some of their parents, who happen to be members of another—hereditary—House and who keep on voting for public subsidies for that, no doubt, very interesting first year?

§ The Prime Minister
If I may deal with tuition fees, I suggest that people who have doubts read the speech of Lord Dearing—who, after all, chaired the committee that was set up by the Conservatives when in government—in which he backs the Government's case to maintain our position on Scottish tuition fees. He does so for the very sensible reason that, if we were to do what the Opposition are suggesting—although I believe them to be completely opportunist in so doing—we would end up having to find another £27 million. It would be far better to spend that money on improving university education.