Government Policy (Presentation)

HC Deb 29 July 1998 vol 317 cc384-428

Madam Speaker

I have selected the amendment in the name of the Prime Minister.

4.10 pm

Mr. Peter Ainsworth (East Surrey)

I beg to move, That this House notes the view of the Committee on Culture, Media and Sport in its Fifth Report (HC 742) that the Department of Culture, Media and Sport is focused on trivial matters at the expense of important industries like tourism; believes this to be symptomatic of a Government which places undue emphasis on presentational issues in order to mask policy deficiencies; and deplores the culture of cronyism which is discrediting political life. This debate is not some end-of-term tease at the expense of the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. It goes to the heart of the way in which this Government do business. This afternoon, Conservative Members will set out to expose the shallow, superficial and cynical way in which the Government approach their task.

Fifteen months into this Parliament, there is more than ample evidence that power has gone to the heads of Ministers. I exclude, of course, those Ministers who lost their heads in Monday's reshuffle. Power in that case has gone to someone else's head. I welcome the two new members of the ministerial team to what one person in the museum world has described to me as the battlefield of art. I look forward to debating with them in the months ahead.

We have a Government composed of a Prime Minister who thinks he is a president, a Chancellor of the Exchequer who thinks he is Prime Minister, a Lord Chancellor who thinks he is a cardinal, and a press secretary who thinks he is the whole lot rolled into one. But let us start with the Secretary of State, otherwise known as Mr. Cool, or, in the words of the novelist A. N. Wilson: a philistine who talks twaddle and does nothing. I know that that description is not entirely fair. The Secretary of State will probably claim that it was a misleading headline. He should know, because, with the Prime Minister and the rest of the Government, he is an expert in misleading headlines.

It is not hard to work out exactly why the Secretary of State attracts that type of adverse criticism. Consider his oeuvre "Creative Britain", produced to loud fanfares earlier this year. I will not embarrass him by referring to the critical reviews: I observe merely that it was described as a book. It looks and feels like a book and has a nice cover, but it is not a book. It is a pamphlet full of old speeches. Full marks for style; zero for substance.

What about the allegation that the Secretary of State does nothing? When the Royal Opera house gets into difficulty, what does he do? He commissions a review. When the results of the review are published, what does he do? He sets up a committee to review the review. In sport, after eight months of delay, he finally announces, in a blaze of publicity, that the United Kingdom sports institute is to be set up in Sheffield. Since then, he has almost nothing to show for his efforts. Have any contracts been announced? No. Have any been put out to tender? No.

When the BBC suddenly announces out of the blue that it wants to renegotiate the terms of its licence fee, what is the response from the Secretary of State? Nothing. His Department is keen on putting out lengthy documents about media convergence, new broadcasting technologies and digital television, but does he understand who is going to pay for all that? Who will be the driver behind it? Advertising will pay for it. Nor do we hear anything from the Secretary of State about what he is doing to prevent the tide of politically correct EU and other home-grown initiatives that are designed to restrict and impede the advertising industry.

Last December, the Secretary of State promised a much-vaunted tourism strategy by the early summer. Where is it? It is delayed until the autumn, or even the winter. Perhaps the Secretary of State is indulging in a bit of pathetic fallacy. He will know what I mean by that. He is imitating the weather, and turning summer into winter.

There has been a lot of doing nothing over the past several months, but, when one considers what the Secretary of State is doing, that is probably just as well. Last Friday, he published his Department's comprehensive spending review: "A new approach to investing in culture". He chose to make it coincide with a photo opportunity sitting on a magic carpet.

I shall return later to the bogus claims of the Secretary of State about the extra funding that he announced that day, but let us first have a quick look at the document, which is a fairly thick one. Across the board it presages a new era of meddling, interference and state control. When the Secretary of State finally got around to doing something, he chose to abolish the English tourist board, despite the fact that opinion polls in the industry suggest 97 per cent. support for the board. People wanted it to be enhanced and strengthened, not abolished. His decision comes at a time when the English and the Welsh tourist industries are going through a particularly difficult time, not just because of the bad weather, but as a consequence of the Chancellor's high pound. They also face a new tide of Government regulation. That is a particularly bad start for the Secretary of State.

Across the board we see new structures to develop new policies and spending programmes to deliver those objectives which focus on real outputs". The Government want to develop tangible indicators of performance linked to our key policy aims". It may sound like officialese, but what it points to is more state control.

There is much talk about new regional executive bodies acting as the Government's local agents. No doubt they will also be required to develop tangible indicators of performance linked to the Government's key policy aims. The dismemberment of autonomous national bodies will leave the regions exposed more directly than ever before to the Government's key policy aims. Just to make sure of that, the Secretary of State proposes a new national watchdog which would review and report to us on performance in achieving standards set, meeting aims and objectives and efficiency targets. I have been speculating about the new watchdog and wondering what it should be called. I thought that it might be called "Ofcult". Somebody else suggested "Ofart", but I am not sure that the Secretary of State will take up that suggestion. Nowhere is that idea more misguided, and nowhere will it be more resented, than in the arts.

The music critic Norman Lebrecht has taken the promise of extra funding for the arts at face value. Even so, he realises what is going on. He writes: The state has taken control of the arts for a mess of potage. The Government's approach to the arts is dirigiste, paternalistic old Labour. As if to reinforce the point, when the Association of Business Sponsorship of the Arts held a recent awards ceremony at the Globe theatre in London to celebrate a record year of business investment in the arts, not one Minister from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport bothered to turn up.

Mr. John Bercow (Buckingham)

My hon. Friend has given a fair assessment of the Secretary of State's performance to date. Has he, by any chance, seen the commentary of the distinguished parliamentary sketch writer, Quentin Letts, in yesterday's edition of The Daily Telegraph, in which he said: By any gauge of parliamentary ability Mr. Smith would be lucky to have kept his job. He has an irritating tick of saying `er' and 'um', which might go down as coquettish in some parts of Islington but is just irritating in SW1"?

Mr. Ainsworth

I did see the piece in question; and, er, we, er, look forward to hearing the Secretary of State's speech.

Mr. Gerald Bermingham (St. Helens, South)

I have listened with great care to what the hon. Gentleman has said. Now we are the Government who are to blame for everything—naturally, they always are—including the weather, will he turn his mind to the following tiny fact? Why do more and more people want to come to this country for their holidays, why do we have a developing film industry, why do we produce some of the best music, and why are our people some of the most creative in Europe if this country is ruled by a Government who are not encouraging all those fields?

Mr. Ainsworth

I am sorry to correct the hon. Gentleman, but he may have missed the fact that, in the first three months of this year, there was an overseas visitors deficit of £1.7 billion. I am afraid that the Chancellor's policies, mismanagement of the economy and the high pound have been a major deterrent to people visiting this country.

I wonder whether the arts are safe in the hands of a Secretary of State who is on record as saying that Bob Dylan is the artistic equal of John Keats.

The Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Mr. Chris Smith)

Will the hon. Gentleman tell me exactly where I said that—because I have never done so?

Mr. Ainsworth

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for putting the record straight. He had better address his comments to The Spectator. He is also quoted in The Spectator as saying: The distinctions between higher and popular arts are meaningless. If he really believes that, is it surprising that he has remained so dumb amid all the accusations that the BBC is dumbing down its programme quality? This Government are dumbing down politics altogether.

Mr. Ivor Caplin (Hove)

I assumed that the hon. Gentleman would say a little more about the arts. Will he reflect on comments on the proposals in the Evening Standard on Friday? It said that they were genuinely radical proposals, and some financial news which delight those of us who have been fighting to ensure our great arts institutions do not crumble entirely.

Mr. Ainsworth

It was not worth giving way, was it? When those at the Evening Standard consider the Secretary of State's proposals more carefully, they will realise that they are not the salvation that they think. I don't mind Radio 1 trying to be trendy, but I can do without the Labour party trying to strut its funky stuff. Those are not my words; they are the words of Ben Elton, who is hardly a well-known Conservative supporter. He went on: The present Government should be very careful: style is no substitute for substance. It's no good going on about our great designers if everything they design is made in China. Jobs are cool … I didn't vote Labour because they've heard of Oasis. The departmental Select Committee picked up a similar point. Its report on the Secretary of State's handling of his Department derided his promise that he would promote everything from Beefeaters to Britpop". It was astonished that tourism, which is far and away the largest industry for which the Department is responsible", was being subordinated in favour of more glamorous and trivial matters". That is not surprising, given that the Prime Minister lent his name to an article in the national press that contains, among a heap of other vacuous platitudes, the following immortal line: We are forging a new patriotism focused on the potential we can fulfil in the future. What on earth does it mean? It is a strange sort of patriotism which halves the British zone of the millennium exhibition and then spends £500,000 on a survey to discover what Britishness is.

The millennium dome stands like a paradigm of the Government's approach to presentation. It is a fine structure—all are agreed about that—but what is inside it? At the moment, we are told that it is a distorted human shape with two heads and a single pair of legs. There is something equally disturbing at the heart of the Government, which stands where their principles should be—a void. In order to clothe it, the Government have created a whole new industry devoted to weaving and spinning. You, Madam Speaker, have had cause in the past to comment unfavourably on the number of apparatchiks working in Government Departments.

Mr. Ian Bruce (South Dorset)

My hon. Friend appears to be leaving the subject of tourism, but I am sure that he will agree that, if the Prime Minister needed a free holiday, any one of us could have found a wonderful place in our constituencies for him and his family to stay. All he wants to do is advertise that people ought to spend their time overseas in Italy, instead of using the wonderful facilities available in south Dorset—where many Labour Members come on holiday.

Mr. Ainsworth

There are many wonderful opportunities in south Dorset for holidays, as there are in Scarborough, where I am going tomorrow. Perhaps the Secretary of State would like to come with me—on second thoughts, perhaps he might not.

The job of the apparatchiks is quite clear—it is to engage in the cynical manipulation of news, irrespective of truth, to the advantage of the Government. This is not only a Government for journalists, but government by journalists. The press machine of the Government is headed by Alastair Campbell, as we all know, the Prime Minister's press secretary—formerly of The Mirror. It includes a number of other prominent former journalists, including—in a selective list—Lance Price, formerly of the BBC, now at No. 10; David Bradshaw, formerly of The Mirror, now at No. 10; Martin Sixsmith, formerly of the BBC, now at the Department of Social Security; John Williams, formerly of The Mirror, now at the Foreign Office, where he is not doing a good job; Sherrie Dodd, formerly of The Mirror, now at the Northern Ireland Office; and Phil Bassett, formerly of The Financial Times, now running something called the strategic communications unit at No. 10. I imagine that their meetings are rather jolly; it is probably a bit like an El Vino' s reunion party. They probably get the Liberal Democrats to come round and pour the claret.

Mr. Andrew Robathan (Blaby)

Before my hon. Friend leaves the subject of Alastair Campbell, is he aware that it is not two years since a judge referred to him as a witness in whom one could not have a great deal of confidence? Does my hon. Friend think that he is therefore an appropriate man to have running the press machine from No. 10?

Mr. Ainsworth

I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. I would have no confidence in a press machine run by Alastair Campbell, or any of the other cronies with whom the Government surround themselves.

Mr. Robert Maclennan (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross)

I want to be clear—is the hon. Gentleman attacking the role of journalists, or the lack of economy in the use of journalists by the present Government? We all remember Bernard Ingham.

Mr. Ainsworth

Bernard Ingham is going back a bit, but I am certainly not attacking journalists—I am attacking the way in which the Government seek to manipulate journalists in a systematic way.

Around the media men in the Government are a host of other figures—the cronies. These include people such as Roger Liddle of the policy unit, who, together with the new Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, so memorably prefaced their book "The Blair Revolution" with the words: Both of us owe a special debt to Derek Draper, Peter Mandelson's former assistant … New Labour is fortunate indeed that it can boast a whole new generation with his quality of organisational energy, political commitment and realistic vision. O brave new world, that has such people in it.

Ben Lucas, who ran the Prime Minister's political briefing unit during the general election campaign, has now set up his own lobbying firm, where he expects clients to reshape their core corporate culture that is not trivial— in order to get in line with New Labour's vision. He neatly sums up the quality of that vision: This is a Government that likes to do deals. The Government have created a political culture that would have done credit to a late mediaeval principality, and it is spreading outwards. Tucked away in a recent edition of The Times Educational Supplement, I came across an article entitled "Councils urged to spin, not whinge". It is a report of the recent Local Government Association conference, covering a speech made by Mr. Greg Wilkinson, who was until recently at the Audit Commission and is now a Labour councillor for Hammersmith and Fulham. To the assembled delegates, he said: Learn the fine art of spin … In a world where perception is sometimes more important than reality, it is no longer enough to do well. The insidious culture of cronyism is discrediting political life. The Secretary of State is already a victim of it, and will become even more of a victim of a political culture that is moving ever further from the reality of life in Britain. No amount of media manipulation or photo calls on magic carpets will help the crisis in regional theatres; help manufacturing industry as it goes into recession—remember: jobs are cool; help people who are worried about their mortgages; or help the sportsmen and sportswomen who are waiting for the Government to fulfil their promises.

No amount of spin will undo the damage to our constitution or offer comfort to thousands of small businesses in tourism and other industries. Fashionable ideas such as cool Britannia and the rebranding of Britain have precious little meaning to the people who live in the real world of Labour's Britain. They do not need to have their own money spent on telling them who they are. They know who they are. The majority of them do not live in Islington as the Secretary of State and the Prime Minister do, along with any number of Cabinet members; it appears almost to be a qualification for getting into the Cabinet to have an address in Islington.

The majority of people do not share the Cabinet's metropolitan values. Their values are deeper; they are not glamorous, but they are strong. We saw people marching to protect the countryside, and we see them every day in suburban streets and city estates. They are increasingly bewildered by a Government who have abandoned their principles and placed style over substance. Nowhere is that more true than in the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.

4.32 pm

The Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Mr. Chris Smith)

I beg to move, To leave out from "House" to the end of the Question, and to add instead thereof: `commends the Government for its progress on major matters of substance across all fields of responsibility, and in particular for its recognition of the cultural, social, educational and economic value of the areas of activity sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, and for the concrete action taken across all parts of the Department's responsibilities over the last year to maximise that value; welcomes the outcome of the Comprehensive Spending Review, which provides for a significant investment in culture, sport, heritage and tourism alongside positive steps to reduce bureaucracy and ensure the most effective use of public money; and notes that this brings to an end a damaging period of real cuts presided over by the Opposition.'. The speech of the hon. Member for East Surrey (Mr. Ainsworth) demonstrated neither style nor substance. I wanted to take notes as he was speaking, but there were absolutely no points for me to answer. Quite apart from the fact that he could not get his quotations from me right, he could not get his quotations from Shakespeare right.

Mr. Peter Ainsworth

I am stung to my feet. I may have said, "O brave new world, that has such people in it", rather than "has such people in't", but the Secretary of State is being a little pedantic.

Mr. Smith

It is important to get these things right; the hon. Gentleman did not.

Last Tuesday, the Liberal Democrats launched an important debate about the relationship between Government and Parliament, which lies at the heart of some of the things that I think the Opposition are trying to get at. Not one Tory Back Bencher was in the House to listen. This morning, we had an important debate on concessionary television licences for pensioners, which was brilliantly handled by the new Minister in my Department, my hon. Friend the Member for Rossendale and Darwen (Janet Anderson). Not one Tory was in the House. Those were matters of substance but they were clearly not interested.

Mr. Michael Fabricant (Lichfield)

It is all right to say that we had a debate this morning on a question of substance, but what have the Government decided? Are they going to give pensioners concessionary licences, yes or no?

Mr. Smith

No. Had the hon. Gentleman been here to listen, he would have heard the arguments.

The Tories cannot stand the Government's success on matters of substance across the board. All they can come up with is an obsession with the froth of whether there are six or seven journalists working at No. 10 Downing street. They are not interested in our investment in the national health service; the money that we have provided for education; how we are genuinely tackling crime across the country; how we are integrating transport; the help for pensioners with their winter heating bills; the reduction of VAT on people's fuel bills; the new deal that is taking hundreds of thousands of young people off the dole and putting them into work; signing up to the social chapter; the introduction of the national minimum wage; the use of capital receipts to allow local authorities to start building houses again; devolution for Scotland and Wales; a mayor and elected assembly for London; investment for the first time on a proper basis in science; the banning of trade in landmines; the banning of ownership of handguns; building on the work of the previous Government in the search for peace in Northern Ireland. Those are matters of substance but they are not interested in them.

Mr. Ian Bruce

Like the comprehensive spending review, the Secretary of State did not include tourism in his list. Why is the British Tourist Authority's chairman rushing down to see us in Dorset about the Secretary of State dismantling support for tourism? What are the Government going to do? This is one of our largest industries and important to my constituents. Will he give us a substantial answer?

Mr. Smith

I shall come to tourism because it is referred to specifically by the Select Committee. If the hon. Gentleman is interested in tourism, perhaps he noticed the press release on the comprehensive spending review issued on Friday by the British Hospitality Association. Its chairman welcomed our announcement that we are increasing funding for tourism. That is precisely what we are doing. He said: Chris Smith's announcement today that an additional £6 million has been allocated to tourism … is welcome news. That is the industry's response to last Friday's announcements. I shall deal with that in more detail later.

I have described real, solid achievements by the Government. They have nothing to do with style, glamour, trivia or any of the things that the Opposition go on about. They are real and they matter to people. It was breathtaking chutzpah for the hon. Member for East Surrey to accuse us of endorsing the idea of cool Britannia. He said that it had precious little meaning to people in the real world. Perhaps he would care to look at the press release issued by the right hon. Member for South-West Surrey (Mrs. Bottomley) on 6 November 1996, when she was Secretary of State for National Heritage. It was headed: Cool Britannia as Latest Tourism Figures Reveal Best August Ever". On 5 February 1997, the right hon. Lady issued a press release saying that we must ensure that more overseas and British tourists made "Cool Britannia" their first choice. On 5 March 1997, she issued a press release headed: Cool Britannia rules the way. On 9 March 1997, she claimed: 'Cool Britannia' is now an internationally recognised phenomenon. Best of all, she used the phrase twice in her press release of 4 December 1996, describing London's place as the coolest city on the planet and adding that 'cool Britannia' rules. I have them all here—the hon. Member for East Surrey can have a look at them if he wants to, but certainly he cannot criticise us for leaping on some "Cool Britannia" bandwagon.

Turning to my own Department and related matters of substance, we inherited a situation in which all the areas for which the Department is responsible had faced neglect and cuts for many years; the arts in particular had suffered for years from cuts or standstill funding. The enormous opportunity offered by the lottery had been mishandled. School playing fields were being sold as local authorities throughout the country were forced to sell them. Some of our main national museums were having to introduce entrance charges and important arts organisations were staring closure in the face. The film industry was, as Bob Hoskins described it, like flowers grown like grass through the concrete.

Mr. Robathan

The right hon. Gentleman said that local authorities were forced to sell off playing fields, but nothing could be further from the truth. At that time, I was parliamentary private secretary to the then Minister of Sport, who worked extremely hard—as I know his successor has done—to prevent local authorities from selling off playing fields. We looked into the possibility of having a register, but the truth is that we did not have a right to order local authorities not to sell off the playing fields. Nevertheless, we tried very hard to stop them so doing.

Mr. Smith

First, I am tempted to observe that the hon. Gentleman was not very successful if that was what he was trying to achieve. Secondly, he did nothing at all to ensure the withdrawal of the circular from the then Department of the Environment which insisted that local authorities throughout the country should look at the asset value of playing fields. That is the sort of thing that he ought to have done.

Even within the self-agreed spending constraints that we have rightly imposed on ourselves for the first two years of the Labour Government, we have within the field of culture, media and sport been able to make a real difference. We introduced substantial reform of the national lottery, with our White Paper which was published a year ago and is now enshrined in the National Lottery Act 1998. New sets of directions are in place for the lottery distributors. We have established the new opportunities fund to make lottery funding available for projects related to health, education and the environment. We have established the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts, or NESTA. We have ensured that lottery distributors place new emphasis on small-scale community grants and on making sure that more money goes to support people and activities, rather than to bricks and mortar. All that has been put in place in the last year.

Mr. Bermingham

My right hon. Friend knows of my interest in the lottery. Will he undertake to continue to press the lottery distribution bodies to accelerate the rate at which money is distributed? Currently, much of it sits gaining interest when there is so much to be done on the types of project that he has just described.

Mr. Smith

I will certainly do that. However, one of the issues that has to be addressed is the speed with which those organisations that have been awarded grants manage to get their projects off the ground and take up their grant.

Our other achievements include the introduction of fiscal incentives in British film making; those are to be applicable for the next five years, rather than for three years, which was the period in the measure that we introduced within weeks of coming into office. We have sorted out the Channel 4 funding issue with a requirement that Channel 4 puts more emphasis on original programme making and film making. We brokered the agreement that saved the Old Vic theatre in London for serious theatre.

We have developed the new audiences fund to make money available to theatres and orchestras around the country to bring in new audiences to enjoy our greatest arts. We have developed the schools youth music trust to make available an additional £10 million a year for instrumental tuition for young people. There has been a savage decline in that over the past 15 years, which was presided over by the Conservative party. We are taking action on that.

We are developing new technology in the public library service. We have made available £50 million for the digitisation of content and £20 million for the training of librarians. We have set up the Wolfson Challenge fund to assist with the development of infrastructure.

We have stopped the unnecessary sale of school playing fields, which was achieved by co-ordination between my Department, the Department for Education and Employment and the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions. We have established the UK Sports Institute. We took an idea that was completely unformed and off track under the previous Government and made it a reality. The institute will open in 2000, as everyone intends. We are providing backing for the 2006 world cup bid, transforming it from a gleam in the eye to a genuine possibility, which we are intent on pursuing in the coming years.

We have saved Newstead abbey, which faced the threat of being undermined by coal mining. There is the prospect of a solution to the problems of presentation at Stonehenge, which is our greatest ancient monument. We are very close to reaching agreement between all the local communities, English Heritage, the National Trust, the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions and the Ministry of Defence to ensure that the landscape of Stonehenge can be restored. That will be a major achievement, which has required painstaking, difficult and patient negotiation and government of substance, not glamour or trivia.

We have introduced a common grading scheme for hotels. There has been agreement between the English tourist board, the Automobile Association and the Royal Automobile Club. We are ensuring that the tourism and hospitality industries take advantage of the new deal so that they can train more young people and solve their labour shortages. We have established the tourism forum, which regularly draws together all representatives of the major tourism organisations to consider tourism issues seriously.

Those are all measures that we have introduced in the 14 months since we came into office, and that is a pretty good record for any Government.

Several hon. Members

rose—

Mr. Smith

I give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool, North and Fleetwood (Mrs. Humble).

Mrs. Joan Humble (Blackpool, North and Fleetwood)

Does my right hon. Friend agree that tourism initiatives, especially the industry's involvement in the new deal, will improve the quality of services that so many of our resorts, including my constituency, need to offer to their thousands of visitors, or millions, in the case of Blackpool? Greater quality in staff training and recruitment is vital to improve our tourism industry, which is why the industry welcomes Government initiatives and its involvement in the new deal.

Mr. Smith

My hon. Friend is absolutely right and I am looking forward to going to Blackpool in two months to enjoy the best that it has to offer. She is right to point out that it is quality of service that counts in the tourism industry and draws visitors back to resorts. Quality of service depends on decent remuneration, career prospects, motivation and training opportunities for staff. The tourism industry recognises that, which is why it has welcomed initiatives on the new deal, the minimum wage and the quality benchmarks that we are putting in place. That is why the Opposition, in their opposition to all those measures, are completely out of touch with modern tourism.

Mr. Peter Ainsworth

The Secretary of State has boasted a lot about the achievements that he is claiming in the arts, but he has not answered the question about the erosion of the arm's-length principle, and the extension of ministerial control into areas that had a degree of autonomy until the Government came to power. If he is so proud of his achievements in the arts, how does he account for the article written by Peter Hall as recently as a month ago, in which he says: In a hundred years' time, our new government will, I am sure, be seen as having been in the great tradition of English Puritanism—narrow-minded and joyless. They are also indifferent to what really matters in life. If they destroy the British arts, they will look fools in the eyes of history"?

Mr. Smith

Well, Peter Hall has now realised that we are not in the process of destroying the arts. On Friday last week, he said the following: I am delighted that the deprivations of the last 20 years"— for which that lot are responsible— have been stopped and that the government has at last realised that there is a serious crisis in the performing arts. Every pound put into the arts will earn its money back many times over … I hope this is the beginning of really progressive thinking about the arts by the government". Peter Hall recognises that it is, and the hon. Gentleman should get his facts up to date, not a month old.

Mr. Ainsworth

Unquestionably, we all want the arts to flourish in this country, but the public will be gravely disappointed when they discover that the money that the right hon. Gentleman is talking about is not as much as he claims, and that it will be, as never before, under the control of the Secretary of State instead of under the control of people in whom they can have confidence.

Mr. Smith

The hon. Gentleman is wrong on both counts. First, the money is exactly what it says it is. It is £30 million, in cash, next year, £40 million extra, in cash, the year after and £55 million, in cash, in the third year—each of those sums in addition to this year's figures. Over three years, it adds up to £125 million for the arts. In addition, there is £100 million for museums and galleries and £65 million for all the other activities that the Department sponsors. That adds up to the biggest enhancement ever for all the fields of cultural activity in this country. It will enable—

Mr. Bercow

rose—

Mr. Smith

I am so fond of the hon. Gentleman that I shall give way.

Mr. Bercow

I am most grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for generously giving way. Does he agree with the view expressed by his hon. Friend the Minister for Sport in the debate on 5 June 1998, at column 679, that children should receive an irreducible minimum of three hours per week of physical education? If he agrees with that view, why has he downgraded physical education as part of the curriculum?

Mr. Smith

In a debate about the creative industries, we shall take no lessons from the hon. Gentleman about designer style.

My hon. Friend the Minister for Sport was expressing an ideal aspiration that he has for children. The hon. Gentleman ignores the fact that sport and physical recreation remain part of the national curriculum. They must be taught by schools. There is flexibility in when the school decides to time them in the school week, but they must be taught. They are part of the curriculum; to try to pretend otherwise is to mislead the public and the House.

Mr. Richard Spring (West Suffolk)

Can the right hon. Gentleman confirm that the Secretary of State for Wales has rejected that view, and has insisted that physical education remains part of the core curriculum in Wales?

Mr. Smith

Sport and physical recreation never were part of the core curriculum. They have the same status in the curriculum as they have always had—they must be taught. That has been confirmed many times in the House by me, by my hon. Friend the Minister for Sport and by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Employment.

To return to the £290 million that we have made available under the comprehensive spending review over the next three years—

Mr. Ian Bruce

That is not what the right hon. Gentleman said before.

Mr. Smith

If the hon. Gentleman had been listening, he would have realised that £125 million for the arts, £100 million for museums and £65 million for other activities adds up to £290 million. I am glad that he is not an Education Minister.

The £290 million has enabled us to ensure that there will be improved access to our major national galleries and collections, with—if the trustees wish it—free entrance for all children next year, free entrance for all pensioners as well in the second year, and in the third year of the settlement, free entrance for all, universally. That development will be welcomed by many people around the country, although not, I expect, by the hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Peter Ainsworth

Will the Secretary of State deduct £912 million from £1,038 million? He said that Conservative Members could not do their arithmetic. The answer is £126 million. That is the figure in the Chancellor's Red Book, resulting from the comprehensive spending review, and that is the increase to which the Secretary of State referred—not £290 million, but £126 million. I am sorry to have to do the right hon. Gentleman's arithmetic for him.

Mr. Smith

The hon. Gentleman does not understand what is being done. The figure that he cited is the year 3 figure, as compared with the current figure. That indeed represents a cash-terms increase of £126 million in the third year over the current position. There are also to be increases next year and the year after. By adding up the extra money for year 1, year 2 and year 3, we get the figure of £290 million. That is additional money for the arts, museums, culture, sport and tourism that was not in the Conservative Government's plans, which would not have been spent by them and will be spent by us. That is the difference. It is real money in cash—new money—and the Conservatives cannot accept it.

We shall ensure free access to our great national collections. I would have hoped that the hon. Gentleman would welcome that, but he has not done so, because the Conservatives were the party that presided over the introduction of entrance charges. Perhaps they could have welcomed the new money that we have allocated for the designated museums of national importance around the country. They put in place the designation system, but it was meaningless, because no money came with the act of designation. We are putting the money in place to make sure that designation means something.

We are ensuring that the performing and visual arts develop new audiences and, perhaps even more important, that they develop more education sessions so that pupils have the chance to learn at first hand from people who are involved in the theatre and in music about the delights that the arts can bring. The Arts Council will have control of the money. It will be up to the Arts Council to make decisions, and I hope that it will use some of that money to keep some of our best arts organisations alive.

We have ensured that there will be enhanced funds above inflation for the British Tourist Authority. We have also ensured that extra funds will be available for the United Kingdom Sports Council to make sure that it gets off the ground well in its new form. We are ensuring that we put right the cuts that we had to make this year in the national heritage memorial fund, and we have given a guarantee of future lottery income to the arts, sport, charities and heritage.

Of course we have not said that that will be something for nothing; of course conditions must be attached. I am accused of being meddlesome, and I plead guilty to that. Presumably the Opposition would have given something for nothing. They would not have been interested in ensuring that taxpayers' money was well, efficiently and properly spent. However, that is what we are doing; that is all that we are doing. We are not dictating what happens to that money. We are simply ensuring that it is spent in the right way, and it is absolutely right that we should do so.

Mr. Gordon Prentice (Pendle)

Was it not a disgrace that, year after year, the previous Government did nothing to ensure that people with conditionally exempt works of art opened up their houses to allow members of the public to see them, when the owners were given enormous tax breaks by that Government?

Mr. Smith

My hon. Friend is right to identify the enormous importance of making sure that we support excellence in this country—the best performances, the best companies and the best collections that are in our museums and galleries—and that ordinary people can get to see those performances, companies and collections, and enjoy them in ever greater numbers. That is the kernel of our arts policy: excellence and access going hand in hand. Conservatives, of course, do not understand any of that because they are interested only in tittle-tattle.

Mr. Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham)

Will the Secretary of State acknowledge that the effect of the Budget changes on historic asset items will be, as many hon. Members on both sides of the House have had letters to say, that people will be forced to sell historically important artefacts, which will go into foreign hands, with the result that there will be no access for anyone in this country because those artefacts will no longer be in this country?

Mr. Smith

If the hon. Gentleman had followed the debates that took place in Committee on the Finance Bill, he would know that my hon. Friend the Financial Secretary to the Treasury is at this very moment conducting discussions with the Historic Houses Association, to try to ensure that we do not lose out in terms of heritage as a result of the tax changes that have been genuinely brought in to ensure that the loophole in the tax system could not be exploited by hundreds of people with no genuine heritage reason for doing so.

The hon. Member for East Surrey mentioned tourism, as did the Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport. The Select Committee, rather interestingly, said that I was somehow not interested in tourism. In coming to that conclusion, it ignored the fact that we have ensured that tourism has a real and prominent role in the work of the regional development agencies; that we have made sure that a proper grading scheme for hotel and guest house accommodation in England can be put in place; that we have established the tourism forum, which I chair on a regular basis, to bring all representative bodies from the world of tourism together; that we have a monthly meeting of the strategic tourism working group—which again I chair—to bring leading representatives of tourism together to put our tourism strategy in place; that we have ensured that the British Tourist Authority and the British Council have developed good working relationships abroad so that we can have real synergy—

Mr. Peter Ainsworth

rose—

Mr. Smith

Wait. There is a longer list to come.

Those relationships have been developed so that we can have real synergy between the work of these important bodies. We have ensured that there will be enhanced funding for the British Tourist Authority and the important work that it does. We have gone out to proper nationwide consultation on the future of the structures of support for tourism in England, which has been a consultation exercise welcomed by many people in the industry. We have guaranteed to ring-fence the funding of tourism support in England. It is a consultation exercise about the best structures rather than anything that is driven by the need to obtain finance or cuts

Mr. Ainsworth

Will the Secretary of State now give way?

Mr. Smith

I will now.

Mr. Ainsworth

Has the right hon. Gentleman finished his list?

Will he explain why it was that on Thursday 18 December 1997, he answered a written question from my predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (Mr. Maude), stating: I aim to publish a comprehensive and detailed tourism strategy next summer, spelling out how the Government intend to create and sustain an improved framework within which tourism, hospitality and leisure can flourish."[Official Report, 18 December 1997; Vol. 303, c. 249.]? Yet nothing has happened.

Mr. Smith

The reason for that is precisely the consultation exercise that we have launched. It would have been sheer folly to publish a strategic tourism document while we were consulting on an essential aspect such as the structure of support for English tourism. We intend to publish our tourism strategy in October, once the responses to the consultation have been received.

There were some interesting responses when the Select Committee produced its report. Conservative Members thought, "This is useful; we can make some fun and have a go at the Secretary of State with bits and pieces of the report." Incidentally, those bits and pieces were inserted by Conservative Members. Let us consider what the sensible parts of the tourism industry had to say.

Mr. Fabricant

Will the Secretary of State give way?

Mr. Smith

Talking of the sensible men, I will of course give way.

Mr. Fabricant

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for giving way. He was not privy to the private discussions of the Select Committee—I was there. At that time, there were 10 members of the Committee. Is he saying that my talents are so all-embracing, and my powers of persuasion so great, that one other Tory and I dissuaded a Committee including one Liberal Democrat Member and seven Labour Members, including the Chairman, from producing a glowing report saying how brilliant the Secretary of State was? Is he saying that I single-handedly persuaded those hon. Members to change their mind? The right hon. Gentleman's Parliamentary Private Secretary, the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart), told everyone that, but is he so naive that he believes it?

Mr. Smith

I am tempted to say yes, but, given the nature of the hon. Gentleman, such a response would clearly be absurd and untrue. The records of the Select Committee proceedings and the list of amendments tabled to and included in the report clearly show that the report's final form differed substantially from that which it took when it was first considered by the Committee, but the important aspect is the difference between what the report said and what the tourism industry thinks.

Let me tell the hon. Member for Lichfield (Mr. Fabricant), who is a member of the Select Committee, what the chairman of the Tourism Society had to say. On 11 June, immediately after the Select Committee had issued its report, he wrote to me, saying: It is extremely regrettable that the Select Committee Report created such a critical impression when the reality is the opposite. In a press release, the British Hospitality Association said: The industry has never received so much interest from government and we are happy that we have built up a very fruitful relationship with both ministers and officials in government generally and at the DCMS in particular. On 12 June—[Interruption.] Conservative Members laugh, but these are important representative bodies—the lifeblood of the industry in this country, not piddling little Conservative Members who do not know what is happening in tourism.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord)

Order. I remind the House that contributions are normally made when hon. Members are on their feet. There are far too many sedentary interventions, and I should be grateful if they stopped.

Mr. Smith

I have suddenly realised, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that I perhaps got carried away and was verging on unparliamentary language. I withdraw the word "piddling" and insert the word "two-bit".

The Joint Hospitality Industry Congress wrote to me on 12 June saying: Dear Secretary of State, I feel I must write and express my fullest support to you following what I consider to be uninformed and incorrect criticisms by the Select Committee concerning your interest and that of your Department in Tourism and, by implication, Hospitality as well. Nothing could be further from reality. Your personal keen involvement, coupled with the immense input from your officials, brings a clear-sighted leadership to our deliberations. That is the reality.

This is a debate on an Opposition motion that demeans Parliament and brings discredit on those who tabled it. There are real issues and real matters of substance to be discussed, real progress to be made, real achievements to be heralded, and genuine difficulties to be tackled, some of which will not be easy.

In the past few days, we have announced the largest ever new investment in the cultural life of our country. We have set in motion a widespread consultation that could lead to a radical restructuring, for the better, of the cultural heritage, tourism and sporting fields of activities and of Government support. That is what we should concentrate on, and what the world outside has welcomed and will study. It is a pity that the Opposition cannot find the seriousness of purpose to do likewise. Perhaps that is why they are, and will remain, the Opposition.

5.10 pm

Mr. Robert Maclennan (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross)

I, at least, am glad that the official Opposition chose to have a debate that enables us to focus on the work of the Secretary of State's Department, although they seem to have done so inadvertently. They have not chosen the debate to outline any constructive views of their own, never mind focusing sharply on the criticisms that could be made of the Government's record in this area over 14 months.

Before I turn to the two matters on which I want to spend a little time in this rather short debate, I want to pay a personal tribute to the two Ministers in the Department of Culture, Media and Sport who have left office. Both were well-known enthusiasts for their subjects, particularly films and the performing arts, and both were unfailingly courteous in their dealings with me and, I believe, with all those with whom they worked. I also want to wish the new Ministers well in their very important roles.

Mr. James Gray (North Wiltshire)

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Maclennan

No, I shall not give way. Interventions have already been on the generous side, and it would be unfortunate to give way before I have even embarked on the substance of my speech. I shall give way later if the hon. Gentleman wants to intervene then.

I should like to deal with tourism, which is the big spending industry for which the Secretary of State has responsibility. I think that he would acknowledge that the perception of representatives of the industry is that his Department does not give it the priority that is given to other more glamorous matters for which it has responsibility.

It is clear from what the Secretary of State said today, and more importantly from the paper that he published on Friday, that important matters are being considered and are in the pipeline. He began his speech with a quick round-up of what he saw as the Government's general achievements, and I shall not follow him down that route, save to say that I do not entirely share his perspective on the Government's management of the economy. The reliance on the Bank of England as the sole controller of inflationary tendencies has resulted in an overvalued pound, which has made life exceedingly difficult for the tourism industry, and has almost certainly contributed both to the reduction in the number of visitors to this country and to a pretty lean summer.

On the wider policy point, it is the view of the Liberal Democrat party that if we were to seek early entry into European monetary union, it would be of particular benefit to the tourist industry. It would not only reduce the transactional costs of tourism, but stabilise our currency in relation to Europe at a lower level, and, as a result, increase our competitiveness. Those matters will be debated in extenso on other occasions, but they seem to be conditioning the difficulties that are currently faced by the tourist industry.

I want to focus on the Secretary of State's proposals for restructuring the public bodies for which he has responsibility. He has allowed a fairly short period for consultation, but, given that this matter has been considered before, it is not too short. I am happy to supply the views of my party, as we published today our own consultative document, "Tourism Tomorrow". That will be a direct and first response to some of the issues that the Secretary of State has raised.

However, I should like to supplement that by responding directly to the Secretary of State's paper setting out options and choices. I hope that some matters are not cast in stone and that he will be prepared to rethink in the light of responses. I am unclear whether the Secretary of State has fully taken into account the consequences of devolution for his departmental responsibilities, and its impact on the British Tourist Authority. The paper mentions devolution, but the main clients who should be concerned about the promotion of tourism abroad will, following the completion of the Government's decentralisation exercise, be the nations of the United Kingdom. It is more important that their representative voice be heard at national level. They should decide co-operatively how best to promote the separate and distinctive interests of the four constituent nations, rather than start from the proposition that the British Tourist Authority is the right body upon which to build.

I like much in the Government's approach, but I do not think that the proposals for the English regions are apt. My experience of the tourist industry is that it looks to a higher level than the regions of England to determine strategic issues and national policy towards tourism. For the delivery of particular services, it looks to a unit much closer to the locality in which it operates than the regions. Notwithstanding the role of regional development agencies—which I am not seeking to diminish, because they will sometimes be deployed to the benefit of tourism—the proper unit for local provision of tourist services is the locality. Lumping the Lake district together with Liverpool in a region does not greatly assist: it creates a bureaucracy at an unnecessary level.

In his paper, which covers many subjects for which he is responsible, the Secretary of State is clear that some streamlining of the bureaucracy is desirable. Perhaps that is what the right hon. Gentleman should look at with the coolest and most detached eye.

I am however aware that, even in my northern constituency, for which the right hon. Gentleman has no direct responsibility save perhaps through the British Tourist Authority, there is discontent with the establishment of a local tourist board which covers half the land mass of Scotland as a region, when it is clear that the interests of even Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross would be better looked after locally by a body that does not seek to represent such disparate interests as are contained in the wider highland region. Big does not necessarily mean better here. We should not look to a building up of the regional dimension of tourist provision.

I want to question the right hon. Gentleman a little about the tourism forum to which he referred. There is the germ of an important idea here, but I understand that, for the representatives of the industry, it is too large and in a sense, in respect of Government Departments, it is not sufficiently strong. It would be preferable to have, as suggested in the Liberal Democrats' paper, some commission to bring together under the right hon. Gentleman's chairmanship Departments that will also impact upon the development of tourism—such as the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions for planning matters, and the Department for Education and Employment for the important task of bringing quality education for management and service delivery to the forefront.

Those structural changes seem desirable not only to ensure that there is no passing of the buck from the Secretary of State's Department to other Departments, which I do not suppose he would wish to do, but to give added clout within Government to the forum as the voice of tourism: as the strategic powerhouse for the industry which is so massively important and has such enormous growth potential.

In some parts of the country, there is also another problem that must be recognised. Tourism must be sustainable and there are some parts of the country where setting up bodies to encourage tourism would be regarded as positively perverse. That adds to the force of my view that local tourist boards are better adapted than regional ones to tackle the particular needs of the tourist providers.

I move from tourism to the arts, which have great importance not only in relation to tourism—they are one reason why many people come to Britain—and not only in respect of the cultural industries, to which the Secretary of State has referred on a number of occasions. I welcome the steps that have been taken, particularly in relation to the film industry and, to some extent, the music industry, and I hope that that will lead to a more powerful British film industry.

I want to put into a little perspective some of the claims that have been made about the new spending directions and decisions. I read the Select Committee's report without a whole-hearted recognition of what it was talking about. It was a patchy report. However, it made a number of telling points. One of the legitimate points that it made was that there has been real underfunding of many of the Departments' dependent bodies of clients for a number of years, for which the Government cannot be wholly blamed. However, I do blame them for having accepted the budgetary settlements that were projected by the outgoing Administration. If they had a damaging effect in the health and education sectors, as I believe they did, they have also had a real and damaging effect in the arts and cultural sectors.

When the Secretary of State speaks, as he did, about this being a record settlement, we must remember that we have had some pretty lean years and that, at the end of this triennial period, we shall only be roughly back where we were in 1992.

Mr. Chris Smith

I have enormous respect for the right hon. Gentleman and I hesitate to put him right. The arts underfunding in real terms during the past five to six years, to which he refers, has been of the order of £35 million. In the first year of this new settlement we shall almost put that right. By the time we get to the third year, we will have done a lot more than put it right.

Mr. Maclennan

I concede the point that the right hon. Gentleman makes, but I think that I am correct in saying—if I am not, I am happy to give way again—that if one takes into account his Department's expenditure as a whole, it roughly restores the position to where it was in 1992–93.

Mr. Smith

The reason for the difference is that the Department' s responsibility for voluntary organizations was transferred back to the Home Office so, given the Department's responsibilities, that enhances what we are able to do.

Mr. Maclennan

On that I congratulate the Minister, although it is not a bonanza, and I do not think that he would claim that it was. Moreover, it might not be worth while. I take the point made by Sir Peter Hall, which the right hon. Gentleman quoted, about the value of investment in the cultural industries and how that money fructifies in the sector when it is invested. In considering the settlement, it is necessary to recall just how little money we are talking about in terms of Government spending as a whole. During the last financial year, the Government's cultural spend was one third of 1 per cent. of total Government spending. The new injection will increase that total by 0.03 per cent. per annum during the next three years.

Britain has the balance wrong when it spends so little. If our expenditure on the cultural industries is compared with that of other countries—that is difficult because there are different parameters for measurement—we do not seem to be doing as well as other western European countries of comparable wealth. That fact has been brought out recently in some new research which has not been challenged; that should lend support to the Secretary of State's efforts to enlarge Government spending on the arts in Britain.

Looking at the structural proposals for the arts, whose purpose is similar to those for the tourist industry, in that the Secretary of State is trying to slim them down, I must question whether the right hon. Gentleman has got it right. First, however, I strongly agree with him on a number of things. In the case of the arts, the right hon. Gentleman is entirely right to recognise that the regions are the appropriate level at which public funding should be spent, and I applaud the increased emphasis on the regional bodies. But it is not entirely satisfactory that they should be predominantly appointed, if that is his intention, by the Department or by himself. I would hope that the regional bodies would be more home grown.

A second structural change that I think would help the arts is the introduction of improved planning arrangements, along with three-year funding settlements. Uncertainty about the future has forced many arts providers to devote a disproportionate amount of time to financial planning, particularly to the justification of planning applications before a proper outturn can be seen.

I must question the Secretary of State about a number of other proposals. He said that he recognised the importance of the Arts Council as an advisory body—I think that should be its principal role—but qualified that by saying that he did not want it to have an adversarial relationship with the Government. The Secretary of State must surely acknowledge that, if advice is freely given, it may involve free criticism from time to time. I do not think that criticism from that body, or indeed from any body that is charged with giving advice, should be inhibited by the Secretary of State's talk of partnerships. I do not like the idea of a partnership between advisers and Government; I find it too cosy. I think that it would be sensible to enhance the independent aspect of the Arts Council's advisory role.

Here I enter more controversial territory. I feel that it is time to question fundamentally the arm's-length principle to which the Secretary of State has at least paid lip service. In fact, I think that he has embraced that principle. I am puzzled. Most of the elements in the package of measures proposed on Friday struck me as being designed to increase accountability—through the right hon. Gentleman's Department, ultimately—for strategies and policies set by the Department; but, at the same time, the right hon. Gentleman wants the arm's-length principle to apply to the delivery of those measures. I find that odd. Is the Secretary of State saying that his Department is not capable of making assessments of how money is being used? If he is making such a self-critical judgment, he ought to beef up his Department so that it is capable of ascertaining whether its strategies and policies are being implemented, rather than commissioning others to perform the task or seeking to fulfil its role of accountability in another way.

There is one oddity—one innovation—in the package of proposals: the proposal for a powerful watchdog. I am not sure what that means, if it does not mean another tier of bureaucracy. I hope that the intention is not to sideline the work of the National Audit Office where it is responsible for such matters, or that of the Audit Commission where it is responsible for local government activities in this context. As the Secretary of State knows, such action certainly would not take the attention of the Public Accounts Committee away from the Department's activities.

I fear that this could constitute a fifth wheel—or worse, an alibi enabling the Department to seek to avoid responsibility for the outturn of the strategies and policies that it is embracing and, indeed, requiring other bodies to have in mind when spending public money. Any such move would be a failure. It is becoming increasingly unacceptable for the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, alone among the great Departments of State—for I think of it as a great Department of State—to be able to wash its hands of the way in which its strategies and policies are being implemented, and say, "That is not for us, because of the arm's-length principle".

The arm's-length principle was dreamt up—probably by that liberal John Maynard Keynes or one of his friends—in the mid-1940s, against the background of the abuse of Government power with respect to culture by Nazi Germany, fascist Italy and, indeed, the Soviet Union in the 1920s and 1930s. There were legitimate and understandable fears about Government involvement, Government meddling, Government dictation to the arts, and about the abuse of power. Today, however, we live in a very different world. If a Government sought to meddle in decisions about which play should be staged by which company, or about which composer was acceptable, or sought to burn the vanities, there would be—given the multi-media outlets that we have in this country—howls of abuse. I think that the time has come to dispose of the mantra about the arm's-length principle, and to recognise the reality that Ministers are expected to intervene when there is a problem.

The Conservative party recognised that in government. The Conservative party saw that it was important to give English National Opera more stability by providing it with a home in the Coliseum. Mr. David Mellor did not hesitate, just before a general election, to ignore the arm's-length principle and provide ENO with the Coliseum. Similar provisions were made by the Conservative Secretary of State for Wales to help fund Welsh National Opera when it was touring England. Again, the arm's-length principle was simply forgotten—rightly, in my view.

There is now no case for distinguishing between the approach of Government to the funding of great national companies from that applying to, for instance, the British Library. There is no interposing body deciding what sort of money should go to the British Library; there is no "arm's-length" argument, although it would be possible to present such arguments. I think that the time has come to be frank, and to say that the Government are dealing with these matters and should be judged accordingly.

Responsibility for wider funding of the arts, in which the issues are not so much national as local or regional, should be delegated to other bodies—preferably elected bodies—which should be judged according to their response to the perceived needs of regions and localities. That would build up a degree of competition in provision, which would be very healthy. East Anglia, for instance, is almost the only region not to have a resident orchestra. Although I do not think that it would be sensible for central Government to tell East Anglia that it should have a resident orchestra, I do think that the regional tier of government should consider the matter. That has been done in other parts of the country.

I am not saying that, having abandoned the arm's-length principle, the Secretary of State should intervene at every level of decision-making, although what I am saying could be interpreted in that way. I believe, however, that the Secretary of State should be responsible for the future of major companies—responsible, as effectively he is, for the future of major museums and libraries. That would get rid of many illusions about what is needed, and would avoid the fantasy that, if the Royal Opera House gets into difficulties, it is all because of personal problems between its director and the chief executive of the Arts Council—or something or that sort. If tens of millions of pounds of public money are being spent, the Government must be involved.

I do not want to speak for much longer, as this is a short debate; but I want to raise a specific structural issue. I hope that the Minister will look again at his proposal to graft the Crafts Council on to the new arts body that will replace the Arts Council. The Minister acknowledges in his paper that the Crafts Council commands widespread support among its clients. Its function is somewhat different from that of the Arts Council. It is closer to the Design Council in some respects, in that it assists people who seek to create little businesses trading in the decorative arts or crafts in which they are engaged.

Scotland has experience of a unified body which the Minister might like to examine. I make no criticism of how the matter is handled in Scotland, but there has been a feeling in the Scottish crafts world that English crafts people were advantaged by a separate and separately run Crafts Council. No doubt the Crafts Council will consider the matter and make recommendations in due course.

The Secretary of State has one of the most important portfolios in the Government. There has been a long gestation period for the proposals and I hope that we shall soon reach conclusions so that the structure for dispensing public money can be settled to enable people to get on with the job. In framing that structure, it is important to bear in mind the fact that if artists and art providers have to spend too much time checking whether they are fulfilling strategies, meeting criteria and devising or contributing advice on new criteria, there will be much less time for the activity that is at the core of the arts and the work of artists. For that reason, a bloated bureaucracy is to be avoided.

5.41 pm

Mrs. Joan Humble (Blackpool, North and Fleetwood)

I agree with the right hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Mr. Maclennan) that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport has one of the most important jobs in the Government. I say that not just because of the Department's great importance to our economy but because I enjoy so many of the facilities that it covers. I am pleased to take part in a debate that highlights the Government's exciting initiatives. Such proposals are sadly lacking among Conservative Members.

I listened carefully to the speech by the hon. Member for East Surrey (Mr. Ainsworth), but there was no substance and, I fear, no style in his presentation. We should all welcome the biggest ever increase in resources for culture, and the fact that it has been placed in the context of a wide-ranging consultative document. There have been other initiatives in the past 15 months that are especially important to tourism in view of the difficulties that face many of our tourist resorts, especially seaside towns. I represent such a town, as does my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool, South (Mr. Marsden), whom I am pleased to see in his place. We are both aware of the difficulties that seaside towns faced for many years because the previous Government did not support them. At last, we are looking forward to the support that we need.

Mr. Gray

Has the hon. Lady heard from the Labour party whether it intends to return to Blackpool for the annual conferences? Her constituents must have been concerned by the recent announcement that the standard of hotels and restaurants in Blackpool did not come up to the high standards that Labour has come to expect in Islington and elsewhere.

Mrs. Humble

My colleagues and I look forward to enjoying the party conference in the autumn in Blackpool, and to enjoying the hotel accommodation and restaurants and all the other facilities that Blackpool offers. We might go to see the illuminations. Seaside resorts should not be treated with the contempt that the hon. Gentleman has displayed. They have serious problems. Those who visit Blackpool in the summer and autumn see the bright lights, the theatres and a bustling town. They do not see behind those attractions the problem of unemployment and the difficulties that have been caused by many years of underfunding.

At last, Britain has a Government who are investing not just in tourism but in housing to improve the housing stock. They are investing in health, education and new jobs. In north Blackpool, a new technology park is being built, and already there is a queue of people waiting to develop new technology and new jobs on that site. In recent years, Blackpool council and the tourism and hospitality trade have taken steps to ensure that Blackpool remains Britain's premier seaside and tourist resort. However, local support, initiatives and endeavour will not be enough. The Government must be equally committed not only to Blackpool but to other seaside towns and to tourism as a whole. That is why all those who are involved in tourism and hospitality welcome many of my right hon. Friend's initiatives.

Training and the new deal initiative are important. I was pleased to attend the higher awards ceremony at Blackpool and the Fylde college. The degree ceremony there is held in conjunction with Lancaster university, and many of the degrees are in tourism, hospitality and catering to enable people to provide for the many visitors who come not just to Blackpool but to other parts of the country. I felt proud of those students as they walked across the stage to receive their degrees. Those well-educated young people will deliver the quality service that we want, and that will encourage more overseas visitors and make life more enjoyable for those who take their holidays at home.

There have been many plaudits for the minimum wage legislation. How can we develop quality services if we do not pay the rate for the job to the people, many of whom are young, who are engaged in the direct delivery of services? Those initiatives are sponsored by many Departments which have co-operated to develop a key industry. The Department for Culture, Media and Sport has been involved in many other initiatives. I recently took part in the debates on the Bill that became the National Lottery Act 1998. I fear that my constituency is among those that have received the lowest lottery funding.

Under the new legislation, there is hope for a more equitable allocation of resources so that the many deserving causes in my constituency and in many regions that have dropped off the list will be viewed much more sympathetically. People are already approaching me to know more about the sixth good cause, the after-school clubs and the healthy living centres. They are excited by the Government's new initiatives.

I welcome the arts initiative. When my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State is considering museums and art galleries, I hope he will remember that there are many excellent examples in the regions. A museum in Fleetwood has concentrated on the history of the fishing industry there. Unfortunately, that industry has declined in recent years, but many children can visit that museum to learn more about their heritage and about the industry in which their fathers, grandfathers and uncles worked. That museum is a centre of education, as well as providing an interesting afternoon out for many families. On Friday evening, I will attend the Grundy art gallery in Blackpool, where a new exhibition is to be unveiled. It regularly has new exhibitions which highlight local as well as national talent. There are many such art galleries and museums throughout the country, so, when we look at the arts, let us remember that we are talking not just about the royal opera or metropolitan organisations, however much we all wish to support them, but about local initiatives.

I could talk at length about the theatre and the plays that I have seen in Blackpool. Instead, let me say that I just hope that the Secretary of State, when he visits Blackpool in the autumn, will take the opportunity to visit local arts establishments, as well as entering into debates with the tourism and hospitality industries, and will see why many people enjoy coming to Blackpool and want to keep coming back.

5.50 pm

Mrs. Virginia Bottomley (South-West Surrey)

I am very happy to follow the hon. Member for Blackpool, North and Fleetwood (Mrs. Humble). Having had many discussions with the people of Blackpool about the tourism and leisure industry—having visited Blackpool pleasure beach and talked about the importance of tourism—I endorse many of her points about the industry in Blackpool. I was especially pleased to hear the hon. Lady comment on the importance of training. At the recent British Hospitality Association annual lunch, Adair Turner commended the document that was produced by the Department of National Heritage on training and manpower issues in—I think—1996. That makes the point that the industry needs to train young people. I hope that the hon. Member for Newport, East (Mr. Howarth), whom I welcome to the ministerial team, will be able to deploy some of the expertise that he has developed at the Department for Education and Employment in the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, because human resource issues are so important.

Enjoyable though it has been, the debate so far has been characterised by a degree of selective memory. I hope that the Minister for Sport will be able to inform the House on these points in his winding-up speech. Surely, the biggest single increase in funding to culture in this country has arisen from the incredible significance of the national lottery. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will inform the House precisely how many museums, galleries, theatres and orchestras have benefited from the national lottery. For all the credit that should be given to the Department for its work, and to Britain's extraordinary ability to achieve a reputation throughout the world for its excellence in arts, sports and heritage, the person who must take the most credit is my right hon. Friend the Member for Huntingdon (Mr. Major), who said, of his founding of the Department: Man cannot live by GDP alone … A country can only be strong, healthy and contented if it burnishes its heritage, encourages its citizens to pursue excellence in sport and cultivates widespread appreciation of the arts … It was in that spirit that I set up the Department of National Heritage. Its creation was a sign that Government should take such activities seriously. For millions of people, they are not optional extras, they are worth valuing in their own right. The most incredible boost in funding has resulted from the national lottery, which has enabled many more people to participate in the arts, sport, heritage, culture—the things that draw people together. A dilemma of modern life is that people's lives are more fragmented and more isolated. Now, however, they have the opportunity to build communities in a way that they never previously had.

The Secretary of State was less than generous to my right hon. Friend the former Prime Minister. Anyone who has served in a Department inevitably has a tremendous commitment and concern for the activities of that Department. The former Minister for Arts, the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Mr. Fisher), consistently and generously paid tribute to those elements of policy for which the team that was present when I last held office had been responsible.

The Secretary of State mentioned many initiatives that had a remarkably familiar ring. I seem to remember setting up a working group involving the British Council, the British Tourist Authority and the Department, and changing the lottery rules to allow lottery money to go into touring, to encourage access, participation and education. I remember many other themes. I was sorry that the right hon. Gentleman presented those in classic Labour fashion, rebranding and rebadging any good idea from the past, without any recognition of what had gone before.

The one respect in which the Secretary of State did give me recognition concerned the adoption of the phrase "cool Britannia." I was Secretary of State for National Heritage. I am a Conservative who is proud of our past and who believes that there is continuity. Therefore, I was happy to adopt and to apply a phrase that identified the creative, dynamic, forward-looking potential of Britain.

Mr. Chris Smith

Does the right hon. Lady agree with the hon. Member for East Surrey (Mr. Ainsworth), who said this afternoon that "cool Britannia" is a phrase that has precious little meaning to people in the real world?

Mrs. Bottomley

I am going to explain why the use of the phrase "cool Britannia" has been hijacked and abused by the Labour party, why it is absolutely to the point and why the Opposition motion is so appropriate.

New Labour believes in rubbishing the past. It really went for cool Britannia, the rebranding and rebadging of Britain, as if there were was no tomorrow, because it did not want to remember the past.

Mr. Smith

During her time at the Department of National Heritage, the right hon. Lady issued at least five press releases about cool Britannia. I have issued not a single one since I took over after the election last year.

Mrs. Bottomley

My purpose in speaking was not to engage in trivial exchanges with the right hon. Gentleman. I will talk about his record in a moment, but I wanted to make a more profound point about the significance of the phrase "cool Britannia" and its use by the Labour party, as opposed to its use by me in the context of tourism.

I was Secretary of State for National Heritage, a Department that took great pride in our history, architecture and cultural traditions and wanted to convey the message that we were creating a country that was innovative in film, tourism, hospitality and food. The Secretary of state rightly praises the film industry. He will know that all the filming for "The Full Monty" and "Mrs. Brown" was completed way before the last election. The reason why the phrase has been wrapped around new Labour's necks, whether or not the right hon. Gentleman used it, is that the Prime Minister has exploited that message comprehensively.

On the day when the House was cutting lone-parent benefit, the Prime Minister was entertaining another 400 celebrities, media personalities and pop stars at No. 10. This is a Prime Minister who has systematically sought to exploit the "cool Britannia" phrase, which has been spun out of No. 10. It has boomeranged into Labour's face because new Labour dislikes the past—anything that represents the flourishing economy that the Conservatives left in place and anything that represents old Labour. Each is equally unappetising to new Labour.

Mr. Loughton

Far from distancing himself from the ethos of cool Britannia, as the Secretary of State is now doing, does my right hon. Friend recall that in April, the Prime Minister interrupted his tour of the middle east—specifically, Saudi Arabia—to hold a press conference in defence of cool Britannia? Such was the importance that the right hon. Gentleman attached to the issue that he interrupted an extremely important foreign tour for it.

Mrs. Bottomley

My hon. Friend has the message precisely right. When I was Secretary of State for National Heritage, my right hon. Friend the then Prime Minister would not have uttered the words "cool Britannia" for any amount of persuasion had I tried to encourage him. It was an appropriate phrase to promote the tourism industry, but it is not the way to badge a Government. That is its significance in the context of the motion tabled by my right hon. Friend.

Mr. Nicholas Soames (Mid-Sussex)

I endorse entirely what my right hon. Friend says. We all know exactly what the Prime Minister and the Labour Government were trying to do in rebranding this country cool Britannia. Does my right hon. Friend agree that it does not matter who is in power, as these great renaissances in the arts, music, poetry and painting in capital cities go in cycles? I am now an old man of 50 and twice in my lifetime London has been deemed to be the cultural capital of the world. If the good Lord spares me, it may happen once again, but it has absolutely nothing to do with anything that Labour has done, and very little to do with what we did.

Mrs. Bottomley

I beg to disagree with my hon. Friend, as I think that it has a great deal to do with what the Conservative Government did. The fact that, under the Conservatives, Britain set an economic and cultural framework in which initiative could flourish has meant that Britain has been the place in which many mobile and creative industries have wanted to invest. The growing pressure towards regulation, the introduction of a minimum wage and Labour's municipalising tendencies threaten to stultify much of the innovation that is taking place. That leads me to other serious issues surrounding today's motion.

It is disappointing that the Secretary of State lost responsibility for voluntary organisations, volunteering and the voluntary sector, as they gave the Department a serious flavour and registered the significance of that work and that theme in community development. I endorse the approach of working with the regions. The Department is an important lever for economic and social development, and I frequently emphasised that role.

Let me return to today's motion and the Government's preoccupation with style over substance. Various hon. Members have referred to the biggest ever increase in funding. I suggest that the biggest ever increase in funding was the input of well over £1 billion a year to the sector from the national lottery. Last week's announcement may have meant £290 million more in taxpayers' money, but in the same time frame the sector has lost £1 billion in lottery money. Worse, the Secretary of State has essentially allowed the Chancellor to do what successive Chancellors will inevitably want to do—to nationalise the lottery. Not only is lottery money going into education and health but the document issued last week is full of ways in which the Secretary of State is seeking to control, nationalise or municipalise the lottery stream. That is why it is so dangerous to the arts, culture and sport.

Mr. Caplin

I realise that the announcement was on Friday, but did the right hon. Lady miss the point made by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State that lottery funding for sport, arts, heritage and charities has been reinforced for 2001 onwards? That has been widely welcomed by all those sectors as the guarantee that many Conservative Members were seeking during the passage of the Lottery Bill.

Mrs. Bottomley

I regret to disagree with the hon. Gentleman. Those sectors now receive only one sixth of the lottery stream instead of one fifth. The document is riddled with implications that there will be more interference and control over the way in which the money is spent. It suggests that there will be more influence from regional development agencies, and more control—other ways of municipal agencies getting their hands on the money.

That brings me to another profound difference between Labour and the Conservatives. Labour's preoccupation with the concept of cool Britannia—from which the Secretary of State rightly now distances himself—is all about the future, not the past. The millennium dome is a futuristic building with little interest in the past history of Britain or the naval college alongside it. It is all part of Labour's branding, its image and its much-repeated phrases.

The other true reflection of the nature of the Labour Government is their renaming of the Department as the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, by which they could not have said more. The Labour Government have a soviet approach to culture. Their controlling, municipalising instincts are always there. They also have a soviet use of language. Time and again, the Prime Minister talks about the people's decision, the people's party, the people's palace and goodness knows what else. That is really a way of saying, "We have decided and we shall railroad our policies through, come what may".

The Conservative approach is much more to recognise that culture cannot be dominated and controlled from the centre and that it requires plural sources of funding. It is interesting that no Minister went to the Association for Business Sponsorship of the Arts event. During my term of office, I do not believe that I missed a single ABSA event. If I did, I am sure that a deputy stood in for me. I recall going time and again to ABSA events because I wanted to demonstrate as a Minister the degree to which what mattered was not only central Government funding, local authority funding, the box office and the philanthropy of individuals: it was businesses and others saying, "We want to play a part in the cultural life of this country". Labour always demonstrates that centralising, controlling tendency. The gut instinct comes through, come what may.

The real truth about last week's statement is that it was an effort to get the spin through in advance. This morning, I was asked to speak on the "Today" programme about today's statement on mental health reform. I said, "I do not know anything about it. I am only a Member of Parliament. I am not a journalist who gets all the information leaked in advance." I was given the information that the programme had at its disposal and I was then able to do the interview.

Earlier this week, we had the Legg report. Again, I was telephoned by a journalist asking me to comment. I said, "I am only a humble Member of Parliament. I am not a journalist who gets all the information leaked in advance."

Similarly, last Friday, from early in the morning, we had a distorted account of what was about to be announced because the Secretary of State did not want the confiscation of £1 billion from the lottery to be highlighted; he wanted the additional £290 million in taxpayers' money to appear in flashing lights. In addition, he was concealing the most serious aspect of that announcement—the death knell of the English tourist board. His consultation paper set out four options, none of which recognised the possibility that the English tourist board—with its weakness and its strengths—would continue in the role that it has performed over many years, and with increasing authority.

It was on tourism that the Select Committee rightly condemned the Department under the leadership of the Secretary of State. Tourism was slighted by the new title of the Department, which includes almost everything else one can imagine. It is difficult enough to decide what to call a Department, but why omit tourism, which generates more new jobs, great prosperity for Britain and a vital industry throughout the country?

I return to my right hon. Friend's motion on the emphasis on spin and style over substance. The Secretary of State is shameless in his selective reading of quotations. He did it again on Monday, when he referred to the English tourist board's press release following the statement, and he has done it time and again today. If he will forgive me, I shall complete some of the quotations that he used. He referred to the English tourist board's so-called welcome. David Quarmby, chairman of the ETB, said: We believe that the tourism industry and local government want to see a national independent tourism body for England. They made this clear during last year's Agenda 2000 consultation exercise. This role cannot be fulfilled effectively by a committee or government Department, or a conglomeration of competing regional bodies with no natural national remit. That does not sound like a whole-hearted endorsement of a consultation exercise that leaves no scope for the English tourist board to continue.

There has been an outcry because the Secretary of State not only made the announcement outside Parliament but allowed only seven weeks for consultation. Does it occur to hon. Members that the following seven weeks are the busiest of the year for the tourism industry? August is also the time when local authorities tend not to meet; it is a time of year when people go on holiday. The regular cycle of such meetings often omits August.

Fiona Mactaggart (Slough)

As I recall, the former Government constantly consulted on matters relating to schools, which, as we know, are shut at the moment and do not open until September, between July and the end of September. We are doing a little better than they did.

Mrs. Bottomley

In making that comment, the hon. Lady implied that the reason for taking such an approach to consultation was somehow devious and an attempt to railroad policy through. On such an important issue, surely the Government should not be afraid of a proper, open debate. To allow seven weeks at the peak of the tourism trade's year, and when local authorities often do not meet, inevitably creates suspicion, outrage and a sense that the Government are railroading policy for their own ideological reasons.

Mr. Chris Smith

The right hon. Lady might like to know that the reason for the relatively short seven-week period for consultation on the paper is that that is precisely what representatives of the tourism industry in our strategic working group asked for. It was their recommendation that we followed when we set the consultation period.

While the right hon. Lady is on the subject of selective quotations, might I complete for her the comments of the English tourist board on the document that we issued on Friday? The English Tourist Board welcomes the DCMS' recognition of its Agenda 2000 consultation, its acknowledgement of the need for a national co-ordinating role, and its appreciation of the real value of the England mark, launched by the ETB last year. The ETB also welcomes our intention to continue to fund English tourism. That was a welcome.

Mrs. Bottomley

I shall help the right hon. Gentleman by continuing the quotation of the English tourist board's press notice. We will be making strong representation to Government for the continuation of an effective national body independent of commercial interests. On the launching of the England mark, he knows full well that the process began a little before he took office. Be that as it may, I shall return to our quotation competition.

Ken Robinson, chairman of the Tourism Society, who was also quoted by the Secretary of State, commented: It is illogical, unjustified and a non-sequitur to all the good work that the Department is doing. The money being saved is peanuts in the context of Government spending, but the consequences of doing away with the ETB are catastrophic for the tourism industry. Will the Secretary of State keep open the option of extending the consultation? Although the industry may have wanted to get uncertainty out of the way, I doubt whether it realised that the consultation would be in its busiest time. Will he make clear that, contrary to the impression in his document, he will consider allowing the English tourist board to continue—albeit following clarification of its relationship with the regions and tourist information centres? David Quarmby—also of the British Tourist Authority—and Tim Bartlett of the ETB do a remarkably good job. Their authority needs to be enhanced, yet the process that the Secretary of State has instigated simply offers them months of skirmishing over their future. Now, as never before, there is an opportunity for the Confederation of British Industry, the Government and the nation to argue that tourism is a huge boost to the economy and an industry that should be recognised in its own right. I ask the Secretary of State to look again at that area.

I ask the Secretary of State to be more truthful about the degree to which he has raided—or allowed the Chancellor of the Exchequer to raid—the lottery. I commend him for changes in the Arts Council. Gerry Robinson and Peter Hewitt are excellent appointments. Taking a more rigorous approach to their work is vital to our interests. Finally, when the Secretary of State speaks on these matters in the future, will he give more credit to the person who deserves the greatest credit for the flourishing nature of culture and the arts: my right hon. Friend the Member for Huntingdon?

6.15 pm

Mr. Tom Levitt (High Peak)

I shall try to be brief, and to spend most of my time on matters of substance—unlike the right hon. Member for South-West Surrey (Mrs. Bottomley).

My constituency covers much of the Peak national park, which attracts 22 million visitors a year. That is the highest visiting figure for any national park in the world except Mount Fuji. Of those visitors, 2.5 million find their way to just one village—Castleton—in the heart of the constituency. It is a very small village at the foot of Winnat's pass, which will, I regret to say, be nothing more than a traffic jam for the next few weeks.

Given that the Peak park is within an hour's drive of one third of the population, and that so many of the 22 million visitors are day tippers, the area is crying out for a sustainable tourism strategy. It sends the strongest message that a tourism strategy must be integrally linked with our transport strategy. I believe that, given the Government's direction, the two will work together in coming years.

The car is causing not only congestion but chemical erosion. The very moorland that people visit is being eroded by the toxic products in car fumes. In addition, the Pennine way in parts of my constituency is being worn out—not by the use of the car but by people's feet. We must keep the needs of visitors, residents and people who work in the area very much in balance in a sustainable tourism strategy.

I welcome the initiatives taken by the Peak national park authority, which has received European funding, to put traffic management for tourism at the heart of their management of the national park. I stress that a tourism strategy must link not just transport but housing, planning and environmental strategy—the very policies at the heart of national parks.

My constituency is not just open countryside. There are several towns and villages in the area. Three of them—Buxton, New Mills and Glossop—have conservation areas in the town centre, which are funded by English Heritage. Buxton is a magnificent spa town; it makes Bath look like a tub with a leg at each corner. One only has to look at the 18th-century Georgian crescent to see its potential as a major tourism centre.

Just behind the crescent, we have the unique dome—dare I mention the word—of the Devonshire Royal hospital which, like the crescent, is very much in need of large amounts of funding to preserve, maintain and enhance its heritage value. Literally, the funding is needed to save them for the nation. They are potential beneficiaries of lottery funding, and the Pavilion gardens in Buxton is an actual beneficiary. The gardens are being restored to their Victorian splendour.

I have been delighted by the way in which the former chair of the heritage lottery board, Lord Rothschild, and his successor, Mr. Anderson, have expressed an interest in the future of Buxton and its heritage value. They would be the first to agree that a heritage strategy should be just that, and not a series of piecemeal responses to situations as they arise. A strategy is needed for conserving our heritage to make sure that we do not just conserve, but that we enhance and promote access to our heritage and celebrate it. That, too, is something that the Department will do.

There is another heritage building, if I can call it that, in Buxton—the 1902 Buxton opera house, which is a Matcham theatre. My hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool, North and Fleetwood (Mrs. Humble) has acknowledged that she has a Matcham theatre in her constituency. The two are joined by a rather slow and unreliable railway line between Buxton and Blackpool.

There is no resident company at the opera house, and it is perhaps the least subsidised theatre in the country. It has—it must be admitted—less than perfect facilities. It is the subject of bids for lottery funding from both heritage and arts sources, and it has not been easy to get the two wings working together and co-operating for the future. We are working on that, and the local borough council has been committed to getting the funds operating together.

In arts, it is not just the building, but what goes on in the building, that counts. At Buxton opera house, we have opera—as the name suggests—traditional and modern theatre, comedy, the choir of the year competition and lots of music. People my age enjoy the opportunity once a year to see Robert Plant and Jimmy Page reminding us of what Led Zeppelin were like at their best. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."] They are appreciated not only on this side of the House.

Currently, the Buxton opera house has the Buxton opera festival, and a magnificent first night a couple of weeks ago was enjoyed not only by myself and the former Minister for Arts, my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Mr. Fisher), but by the Chairman of the Select Committee, the mayor, the leader of High Peak council, the leader of Derbyshire county council and the local Member of the European Parliament—a Labour clean sweep, I hasten to add. The theatre lacks subsidy, and the festival deserves assistance to guarantee its future. It has a thriving and growing fringe, and Buxton fringe festival is now one of the premier fringe festivals in the country.

This weekend, when the opera festival ends, the Gilbert and Sullivan festival starts, and after that we have the festival of musical theatre—the arts are well and truly alive in Buxton. Again, that is an example of the need for strategy in the arts and in promoting arts. It is not just a question of people coming to see them in all their various forms, but of their becoming involved and taking part in the arts. The Department has a vital role to play in that.

A major television series may be relocating its permanent film base to High Peak, and that would be welcome. I regret that I do not have the time to go into all the ways in which the voluntary sector has benefited from lottery funding, and the sport sector is benefiting from lottery funding within my constituency. However, all that is welcome.

I am delighted to say that, over the past few days, it has been noticeable that a number of people from local and national voluntary organisations have expressed their appreciation of the fact that the £1.8 billion that they knew they would get from the current lottery contract has now been guaranteed. In addition, many of them will have the opportunity to bid for funds from the new opportunities fund as well. I was delighted by the Secretary of State's announcement that Baroness Pitkeathley will chair that fund. That is a welcome appointment.

All the issues I have raised point to the need for strategies and co-ordination, and for people to talk together to make sure that they are not going off in contrary directions. There is a need to break down barriers and to ensure that strategies for the arts, tourism, sport and the media are delivered through the various avenues that are available. This is an example of what has been called joined-up government, and represents fields in which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and his team have made an excellent start. The further £290 million in his budget will go a long way, and will have a significant effect in putting strategies further into place.

I am certain that, as a result of that further investment, things will be better, not just for the people of High Peak but for all the very welcome visitors who will continue to come to my area.

6.25 pm

Mr. Michael Fabricant (Lichfield)

The hon. Member for High Peak (Mr. Levitt) is a good advocate for High Peak, but I do not want to talk exclusively about the Department of Culture, Media and Sport. This is a question of style over substance.

We should have known long in advance that style would play the predominant role in this Government's life. Before the election, the clues were all there. I call it "The Colour Purple"—but not because of the film about racial discrimination in the deep south. That was far more subtle.

First, we saw the future Prime Minister change his tie. It was a gradual process. The tie changed from red to red with blue polka dots. Then there was a further transformation—a blue tie with red polka dots; then a blue tie; then the final transmogrification took place—the colour purple.

The backdrop at the Labour party conference—sadly, for the last time in Blackpool—changed colour from red to puce. It would have been pale blue, but that would have clashed with Tony's tie. Of course, those were the days when Labour considered Blackpool. After September, Blackpool will be no more—[Interruption.]—despite the protestations from the Minister for Sport.

It is not just about colour. The Government are about alliteration. Government policies must all begin with the same letter. We have seen welfare-to-work, but, sadly, all the predictions now are for work-to-welfare. Almost every day we hear of boom and bust—the Prime Minister used the expression twice today at Prime Minister's Question Time. Yet the Government are the product of bust before they have even boomed.

It is also a question of history. Drawing from the dustbowl of the American 1930s, there is Roosevelt's new deal. Away with YOPs—youth opportunity programmes, for those too young to remember. We have brought in the new deal. Is nothing original? Is nothing sacred?

We also have Americana. Spin-doctoring is an American expression, seized with enthusiasm here following the new Secretary of State for Trade and Industry's internship with the Clinton re-election campaign. However, I am pleased to inform the House that, thanks to the tastes of President Clinton, the prince of darkness has not had to reach an immunity deal with special prosecutor Kenneth Starr, and will not have to give evidence to a grand jury without fear of prosecution.

If you want to know how the Prime Minister and the prince of darkness work, worry not about the dome. Just watch John Travolta in the movie "Primary Colours"—on release at a cinema near you soon.

Lottery money has been plundered, as my right hon. Friend the Member for South-West Surrey (Mrs. Bottomley) said, from the Department of Culture, Media and Sport, and the additionality principle has been cast aside like an unwanted toy, as have the Labour party's principles. Money earmarked for charities, the arts, heritage, the millennium and sport—normally starved of cash—has been diverted to health and education, because the Chancellor got his sums wrong when he was in opposition. Of course we value the national health service and education, but they have always been paid for by taxation.

What is the current spin? The hapless Secretary of State has just triumphantly announced that he can maintain the current spending on charities, the arts, heritage and sport into the next decade. A big hurrah. Where will the hundreds of millions of pounds a year from the millennium fund go when that is completed at the end of 2001? Will that be robbed from the Department, too? I invite the Secretary of State, who is leaning back comfortably, to say whether the hundreds of millions of pounds currently allocated to the millennium fund will be drawn back into the arts, heritage and sport. Will he answer me now? The silence is telling.

I should have thought that the Secretary of State would thank the Select Committee for its support. By branding him nice but weak and ineffectual, we have preserved his place in the Cabinet. It is clear that the Prime Minister decided that he would not be dictated to by the press or Select Committees, as witnessed by embarrassments such as the Paymaster General and the Foreign Office Minister responsible for Sierra Leone, who have also retained their salary cheques and Government drivers.

It is nice to see that both the hon. Member for Newport, East (Mr. Howarth)—who once served as a member of my party on the National Heritage Select Committee in the previous Parliament—and the hon. Member for Rossendale and Darwen (Janet Anderson) are members of the team. The latter was also, in effect, on the same side as me, when we, alone except for Angela Rumbold, fought in Committee for Sunday trading and for ordinary people throughout the country who thought that they should not be dictated to by the nanny state.

The biggest example of style or spin, and one that I believe is an attempt to mask the Government's biggest mistake, is the so-called independence of the Bank of England. It is not truly independent. Alan Greenspan enjoys an independent Federal Reserve in Washington. "Independent" means that he can set interest rate and inflation targets; but the Bank of England has no such authority in the United Kingdom.

Eddie George has to act like a high street bank manager, obeying memos from the Chancellor saying, unreasonably, that inflation targets should stay as they are while they drift up slightly in Europe and the United States of America. The object of having low inflation is to keep our goods competitive, but they are not competitive, because the value of the pound is so high.

With brooding eyes and a dour face, Brown—I am sorry, I meant to say Brezhnev—used to write out spending and income proposals in the naive belief that, if it was written in his grand office, it would be done. It is not like that: one cannot set a three-year plan—a Gosplan. Despite all the spin, the welfare-to-work programme and all the other measures have failed to get welfare spending under control.

Every week, another statement is issued on new Government spending, as a product of the departmental commissioning of yet another focus group paid for by our—the taxpayers'—money, yet every week analysis shows that there is double counting, with the inclusion of initiatives announced only the previous week. If the Government were a company, the Serious Fraud Office would already have launched a dawn raid, and the books would have been carted off in police vans.

A Government who treat their electorate as gullible fools—with contempt—ignore the lessons of history. The Mississippi cardsharp and trickster may win in the short term, but he ends up with the bullet in the head. Democracy gives the electorate the loaded gun. The Government will be judged on what they can deliver, not on promises, style or spin.

6.34 pm

Mr. Ronnie Fearn (Southport)

I want to dwell on the serious subject of tourism, which does not feature strongly in the Government's current priorities. I thank the Secretary of State for meeting the officers of the all-party tourism group this morning. It was a good meeting, and I hope that the discussions may be a spur to his Department to concentrate more on tourism.

Tourism is a large and vital industry, worth £40 billion a year. It has grown successfully, largely unaided by Government—a fact which I applaud. My constituency is a seaside resort, and relies heavily on tourism. Tourism has grown to the point where strategic planning is essential to overcome the problems caused by fragmentation, and to protect the environment.

The Department of Culture, Media and Sport—a new spin doctor title which does not even recognise Britain's fifth biggest industry—has produced a spending review document in which an industry of such importance to the creation of new jobs appears to have been tagged on at the end as a flimsy four-page afterthought.

I join the many who applaud the increase in funding for the British Tourist Authority, which markets Britain so well abroad, but I cannot understand why England alone in the British isles should be singled out and—probably—left without a national tourist board that is independent of commercial and big business interests.

Small businesses in England have already lost out over section 4 grants, which used to be available to improve and upgrade individual premises. The previous Government abolished them in England, but not, strange as it may seem, in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, despite the fact that England plays host to 80 per cent. of the tourists who come to Britain. What will the Government do for small businesses in our resorts and tourist attractions to make up for that loss of funding?

The existing accommodation facilities in many of our seaside resorts are falling below the standards acceptable to visitors. The owners can no longer find funding to upgrade, and they are shutting down in large numbers. What will the Government do to prevent seaside areas from turning into boarded-up streets with rundown houses in multiple occupancy? The appearance of such streets at the heart of our resorts drives visitors away, and whole communities are in danger of being lost for ever.

I am talking not about old-style manufacturing industries for which there is no longer a market, but about viable communities that are relevant in the service industry age, and they require only modest funding to upgrade. Will the funding from regional development agencies pay only for grand projects, or can funds be directed to smaller businesses?

Those agencies could become quangos—I hope not—and regional tourist boards are private companies, of which only 20 per cent. of the industry are members. The remaining 80 per cent. are small businesses. They are often excluded from regional tourist boards' information services, and almost always seek the advice and information that at present is provided free by the English tourist board. Who will provide that direct service for our severely pressed small businesses—a private company, the mandarins in the Department or the most sensible body: the English tourist board?

In the Secretary of State's own words, the tourist industry is "byzantine and complex", which I am sure refers to the severely fragmented nature of the industry. He appears to want to pass strategic control to so many businesses in so many fields of the industry. Private companies compete—it is the nature of the market economy—rather than co-ordinate with one another. The English tourist board, as an independent organisation free from commercial interest, works hard to co-ordinate with local authorities, which have long been the greatest investors in tourism. Many private organisations still regard local authorities as an obstruction rather than a resource.

The English tourist board, as a publicly funded organisation, is concerned with the 30 or 40 per cent. of the population who do not take any holidays at all. Many of those people are socially excluded: people with disabilities, carers, and the poor. The English tourist board has worked strenuously to promote such aspects as access at visitor attractions, accommodation, and other tourist facilities. It is not only the income-producing side of tourism that is of value; the cultural, educational and leisure side provided to the consumer indirectly benefits us all. The private sector is most unlikely to promote greater accessibility without a clear profit motive.

The English tourist board has recently helped introduce, and is actively promoting, a new nationwide hotel accommodation rating system, as mentioned by the Secretary of State. We are finally starting to move away from the quaint and quirky stars and crowns that confuse many people, especially overseas visitors. The new system is simple, and facilities-based. It is being introduced across England, and the consumer is finally getting some clarity. Would competing regional tourist boards and development agencies introduce such a system, or would they hold out for one that favoured their providers, as has occurred in other areas of the UK? We would then end up with no progress being made.

Much of the work of the Department of Culture, Media and Sport has been concerned with image, but important issues such as the strength of the pound and the second highest level of VAT in Europe being levied on our accommodation providers are brushed under the carpet. An extensive report by Deloitte and Touche commissioned by the British Tourist Authority into the likely effects on the industry, and revenue to the Treasury, of cutting VAT on accommodation to average European levels has brought little response, positive or negative, from the Department or the Treasury, despite having being on the table for five months. Are its findings to be rejected outright, investigated further or ignored entirely?

After 15 months, everything still appears to be under review. The enduring strength of the pound is a great concern to all tourism service providers, yet the Treasury appears not to recognise that the issue is crucial to businesses that seek to attract overseas visitors, who are increasingly discouraged from travelling to Britain, and to the small businesses of our resorts which are suffering from the loss in trade as customers take advantage of the cheapness of travelling abroad. Tourism is crying out for direction, but I do not think that the Government are giving it.

6.42 pm

Mr. Richard Spring (West Suffolk)

I thank all right hon. and hon. Members who have participated. As Opposition spokesman, I pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Coatbridge and Chryston (Mr. Clarke) and the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Mr. Fisher), who were unfailingly polite and helpful. I wish them well in future.

On Friday morning, the Secretary of State made an announcement about his departmental budget. Characteristically, he did not make it on the Floor. He said that it was the biggest increase in cultural funding and talked of a sum of some £290 million, which he used again today. I am afraid that he is arithmetically challenged. On his birthday recently, he turned 47. God willing, in a year's time, he will turn 48. Using the methodology employed in his departmental totals, he will not turn 48 but 95. Analysis of his figures shows that that is what has happened.

The spin on the figure of £290 million is symptomatic of the media hype and distortion characteristic of the Government. If the right hon. Gentleman disbelieves me, he can check with the Library. He could send his parliamentary private secretary to the Members' Lobby to check the letter board, where there is a detailed explanation of how the figure is so entirely wrong. It is not £290 million or even half that. In real terms, allowing for 2.5 per cent. inflation, the figure is £52 million. So much for his fantasy figure.

If one thing in the lifetime of this Government sums up everything that my hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Mr. Ainsworth) talked about, it is tobacco sponsorship of sport. The Minister for Sport knows that angling is 85 per cent. supported by tobacco manufacturers, darts 95 per cent., and pool 75 per cent. It is the same for billiards, snooker, greyhound racing, show jumping and so on. All those sports are dependent on this form of sponsorship, yet, out of the blue, the Secretary of State for Health announced that the situation would change. No one was consulted and no sports governing body was forewarned.

In the following autumn, Bernie Ecclestone got an audience with the Prime Minister at No. 10 Downing street. The great principle that we had heard about vanished overnight, and formula one got an exemption. The only thing lacking was lavender writing paper. The explanation given by the new Secretary of State for Trade and Industry about this fiasco and the betrayal of sporting bodies and interests was: The Government behaved out of character. We acted against our own principles—that honesty is the first principle of good communications. Early in the year, representatives of the sports facing decimation met the Prime Minister to discuss the exemption. They were told that help would be forthcoming. In May, the Minister for Sport said that there was an adequate possibility of adequate substitutes being found. It is disgraceful that, again, the decision was made without consultation, or any knowledge of the level of sponsorship or the impact on individual sports. However, an exemption was given for a rich and powerful person, who was able to go to No. 10 having given a large amount of money to the Labour party. That is the truth because the task force has never met. Sporting bodies up and down the country are horrified about their treatment by the Government.

The Government and the Labour party are controlled by a magic circle. We have heard about Derek Draper's 17 most powerful individuals, and the lobbyists and spin doctors with the ear, and influence, of politicians. They meet over endless quantities of champagne and canapés. In July, the magazine Tatler, which is widely read in Labour clubs, produced a list of the most sought-after guests in the best circles—the top party people.

On 7 July, the Daily Mail printed the list of people described as the top 50 "Hot Guests". I am sorry to say that the Secretary of State was not among them—he was only No. 68—but, lo and behold, even ahead of Sarah, Duchess of York was the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry. We read that these: Party-goers from the worlds of modelling, showbusiness, the arts and politics are among the most wanted guests. It must be a great pleasure to the members of the Hartlepool Labour Association to know that, when they sent their man to the House of Commons, not only did he come to have such great influence, but he came to mix in the extraordinary world that has been brought to our attention so dramatically in the past few weeks. How proud they must be of his achievements. The article starts: Gilt-edged invitations spill from the mantlepiece and their champagne glasses run over. Seen at the best gatherings and sometimes known to host their own, their presence guarantees a party to remember". That is what the Labour party has come to: if one is rich and powerful, one gets favours from the Prime Minister, and influence is derived through a charmed magic circle of people who drink champagne and eat canapés together. I am sorry that the Minister for Sport is not a part of all that.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Mr. Tony Banks)

I do not get invited.

Mr. Spring

The Minister will just have to try harder.

The one thing that has brought to light the whole spinning fiasco of the Government is the handling of the millennium dome—£758 million of public money has been allocated to the dome project, along with yet more spinning, more misinformation and more interference. On 22 February on "Breakfast with Frost", the new Secretary of State for Trade and Industry spoke about the birth of a baby dome. I had been to the dome a matter of days previously and did not recall having seen anything like that. Nevertheless, the remark achieved the desired effect—the right hon. Gentleman got his headlines—but it was, of course, utter rubbish and no such thing as a baby dome existed.

Other announcements that have brought the whole dome project into disrepute include the original proposals for a recumbent, androgynous figure. The figure was to have a baby in a nappy, but there was something wrong with the nappy and a case of infanticide ensued. Gradually, the recumbent, androgynous figure turned into a figure that was sitting up. Now, finally, the British people are being treated to the sight in their newspapers of Siamese twins—a combination of chest and breasts, seated, with only one pair of legs. The point is that that is no way to deal with an important project in the life of our country; it has been spun out of control and has turned the project into an utter laughing stock.

Incidentally, we heard from the same right hon. Gentleman that the great millennial sport was to be something called surfball. However, we discovered that no such game existed—it was purely illustrative—and that, throughout, the right hon. Gentleman had been talking complete and utter surfballs himself.

The Labour Government inherited what the International Monetary Fund called the finest economy anywhere in western Europe, but even Der Spiegel this week talks about the culture of cronyism, the atmosphere that surrounds the Government, the sense of decay and the setting in of recession. When the British people come to judge the Government, as they surely will, the issues of spin over substance and the appalling way in which major national projects and the economy have been treated will come home to roost. The part played by the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport and those like him will be central in making the people turn on the Government for leading them up the garden path.

6.52 pm

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Mr. Tony Banks)

I have little time in which to respond to some of the points that have been raised. I have to say that the Opposition's contribution to the debate has not been a triumph of style over substance; as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said, there has been no style and no substance. It is amazing that the hon. Member for West Suffolk (Mr. Spring) should come along here, and moan and whinge about my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, when it seems that his main complaint is that he does not get invited to all the parties to which my right hon. Friend receives invitations.

I did note that, when the hon. Gentleman mentioned the amount of champagne that apparently gets drunk at those parties, the hon. Member for Mid-Sussex (Mr. Soames) squeaked into life. When champagne is mentioned, his interest is aroused. A little while ago, he ambled in from his club like some gargantuan summer pudding; he stayed for 15 minutes, made a wholly irrelevant point and then wobbled off back to his club. That is the sort of attitude displayed by Conservative Members that we have to deal with.

The fact is that style is not a substitute for substance—of course one understands that point. However, style is important and the Labour Government are committed to a style of government that is open—a modern style of state in respect of constitutional change, and a greater democratic style through devolution. The idea that there is no substance behind the style of the Government is arrant nonsense, and the Opposition should understand that. After all, it was not the leader of the Labour party who went around wearing a baseball hat with his name on the front. I do not know whether the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague) was trying to remind others who he was, or trying to remind himself. Do not talk to us about style.

As for the hon. Member for Lichfield (Mr. Fabricant), I thought at one point that he had taken leave of his senses and that Madam Speaker was contemplating using her powers under the Mental Health Acts to certify him. He spoke about purple ties and I do not know what he was going on about, but I should greatly prefer a purple tie worn by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister to the abortion that the hon. Gentleman is currently wearing around his neck. He was doing his impersonation of the boy standing on the burning deck, but let me tell him why the boy was standing there alone: everyone else had had the good sense to get off when they smelt burning. The hon. Gentleman still does not know when to get out of one of his own speeches.

The speeches with which I should have liked to deal in some depth were the thoughtful ones made by the right hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Mr. Maclennan) and the hon. Member for Southport (Mr. Fearn), who both made some very good points. I join Opposition Members in paying tribute to my right hon. Friend the Member for Coatbridge and Chryston (Mr. Clarke) and my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Mr. Fisher). Both worked hard and assiduously, and did a lot of excellent work. We all know that, at times, politics is a rough trade, and that we might share their experience in future.

The comments of the right hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross about the arm's-length principle were extremely significant. He knows my personal feelings on that point—I feel that it is something that belongs to the past. We should be able to trust ourselves as politicians and as Ministers in terms of what we do because if we cannot, how can we expect others to trust us? The subject is worthy of being returned to and given careful consideration.

It is not that we want to intervene daily in the arts or in sport. The right hon. Gentleman understands that. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State wants to set out a broad strategy for arts, sport and culture in this country, while leaving the detailed working to those bodies that we have set up—the arts councils and the sports councils. In many ways, my right hon. Friend sees his relationship to those bodies as being like the Home Secretary's relationship to the police authorities: the Home Secretary sets out a broad strategy, but does not interfere in the day-to-day operations of the police. The House should return to that subject, because it belongs to the days of Keynes. He said, in effect, "When circumstances change, I change my mind—what do you do?" That is a perfectly reasonable approach for us to adopt.

On the question of the tourist boards, let me tell the right hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross that the chairmen of the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Ireland tourist boards attend the British Tourist Authority board meetings. The BTA co-operates closely with them and that will continue. A consultation period is currently under way, and we shall listen carefully to representations and take them into account. However, it is a fact that we have to look at the adequacy of the existing structures for supporting the tourism industry and it is right that we should do so.

I have to tell the right hon. Member for South-West Surrey (Mrs. Bottomley) that it was she who coined the phrase "Cool Britannia". I wish that she had not done it, because nothing appears so silly as politicians using phrases that they think are cool in an attempt to seem in touch with popular culture. Of course we want to be popular, but not by trying to hijack other people's language.

I pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Huntingdon (Mr. Major), whom we supported in setting up the lottery. The right hon. Lady was right to say that it has brought enormous benefits to sport, arts and culture. We warmly supported the lottery when we were in opposition, so we need no lessons about how it benefits people.

There are many other points that I should like to make. On Blackpool—[Interruption.] I simply do not have enough time because so many Opposition Members used it up. We shall go back to Blackpool. We are taking the Labour party conference around the country to another good seaside town—Bournemouth—but I assure the House that I will again be seen walking down the front at Blackpool with my kiss-me-quick hat and a little stick of Blackpool rock in my hand. It is a great town and we love going there. I can assure the House that the Labour party will always return to Blackpool, knowing that there is no fear of contradiction from anyone.

Question put, That the original words stand part of the Question:—

The House divided: Ayes 135, Noes 355.

Division No. 351]	[7 pm
AYES
Ainsworth, Peter (E Surrey)	Chapman, Sir Sydney (Chipping Barnet)
Amess, David
Ancram, Rt Hon Michael	Clappison, James
Arbuthnot, James	Clark, Rt Hon Alan (Kensington)
Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)	Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey
Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)	Collins, Tim
Bercow, John	Cormack, Sir Patrick
Beresford, Sir Paul	Cran, James
Body, Sir Richard	Davies, Quentin (Grantham)
Boswell, Tim	Davis, Rt Hon David (Haltemprice)
Bottomley, Rt Hon Mrs Virginia	Donaldson, Jeffrey
Brady, Graham	Dorrell, Rt Hon Stephen
Brazier, Julian	Duncan, Alan
Brooke, Rt Hon Peter	Duncan Smith, Iain
Browning, Mrs Angela	Evans, Nigel
Bruce, Ian (S Dorset)	Faber, David
Burns, Simon	Fabricant, Michael
Cash, William	Fallon, Michael

Flight, Howard	Maude, Rt Hon Francis
Forth, Rt Hon Eric	Mawhinney, Rt Hon Sir Brian
Fox, Dr Liam	May, Mrs Theresa
Fraser, Christopher	Moss, Malcolm
Gale, Roger	Ottaway, Richard
Garnier, Edward	Paice, James
Gibb, Nick	Paterson, Owen
Gill, Christopher	Pickles, Eric
Gillan, Mrs Cheryl	Prior, David
Gorman, Mrs Teresa	Randall, John
Gray, James	Redwood, Rt Hon John
Green, Damian	Robathan, Andrew
Grieve, Dominic	Robertson, Laurence (Tewk'b'ry)
Hague, Rt Hon William	Robinson, Peter (Belfast E)
Hamilton, Rt Hon Sir Archie	Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)
Hammond, Philip	Ruffley, David
Hawkins, Nick	Sayeed, Jonathan
Hayes, John	Shephard, Rt Hon Mrs Gillian
Heald, Oliver	Shepherd, Richard
Heathcoat-Amory, Rt Hon David	Simpson, Keith (Mid-Norfolk)
Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas	Soames, Nicholas
Horam, John	Spelman, Mrs Caroline
Howarth, Gerald (Aldershot)	Spicer, Sir Michael
Hunter, Andrew	Spring, Richard
Jack, Rt Hon Michael	Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John
Jackson, Robert (Wantage)	Steen, Anthony
Jenkin, Bernard	Streeter, Gary
Johnson Smith, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey	Swayne, Desmond
	Syms, Robert
Key, Robert	Tapsell, Sir Peter
King, Rt Hon Tom (Bridgwater)	Taylor, Ian (Esher & Walton)
	Taylor, John M (Solihull)
Kirkbride, Miss Julie	Taylor, Sir Teddy
Laing, Mrs Eleanor	Tredinnick, David
Lait, Mrs Jacqui	Trend, Michael
Lansley, Andrew	Tyrie, Andrew
Leigh, Edward	Viggers, Peter
Letwin, Oliver	Wardle, Charles
Lidington, David	Wells, Bowen
Lilley, Rt Hon Peter	Whitney, Sir Raymond
Lloyd, Rt Hon Sir Peter (Fareham)	Whittingdale, John
Loughton, Tim	Widdecombe, Rt Hon Miss Ann
Luff, Peter	Wilkinson, John
Lyell, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas	Willetts, David
McIntosh, Miss Anne	Wilshire, David
MacKay, Andrew	Winterton, Nicholas (Macclesfield)
Maclean, Rt Hon David	Woodward, Shaun
McLoughlin, Patrick	Yeo, Tim
Madel, Sir David	Young, Rt Hon Sir George
Major, Rt Hon John
Malins, Humfrey	Tellers for the Ayes:
Maples, John	Mr. Nigel Waterson and Mr. Stephen Day.
Mates, Michael

NOES
Abbott, Ms Diane	Beith, Rt Hon A J
Adams, Mrs Irene (Paisley N)	Bell, Stuart (Middlesbrough)
Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)	Benn, Rt Hon Tony
Alexander, Douglas	Bennett, Andrew F
Allan, Richard	Benton, Joe
Allen, Graham	Bermingham, Gerald
Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)	Berry, Roger
Anderson, Janet (Rossendale)	Best, Harold
Armstrong, Ms Hilary	Betts, Clive
Ashdown, Rt Hon Paddy	Blackman, Liz
Atherton, Ms Candy	Blair, Rt Hon Tony
Atkins, Charlotte	Blears, Ms Hazel
Austin, John	Blizzard, Bob
Baker, Norman	Boateng, Paul
Ballard, Jackie	Borrow, David
Banks, Tony	Bradley, Keith (Withington)
Barron, Kevin	Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)
Battle, John	Bradshaw, Ben
Bayley, Hugh	Brake, Tom
Beard, Nigel	Brand, Dr Peter
Beckett, Rt Hon Mrs Margaret	Brinton, Mrs Helen

Brown, Rt Hon Gordon(Dunfermline E)	Fearn, Ronnie
	Field, Rt Hon Frank
Brown, Rt Hon Nick (Newcastle E)	Fisher, Mark
Brown, Russell (Dumfries)	Fitzpatrick, Jim
Browne, Desmond	Foster, Rt Hon Derek
Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)	Foster, Don (Bath)
Buck, Ms Karen	Foster, Michael J (Worcester)
Burden, Richard	Foulkes, George
Burgon, Colin	Fyfe, Maria
Burnett, John	Gapes, Mike
Butler, Mrs Christine	George, Andrew (St Ives)
Byers, Stephen	Gerrard, Neil
Caborn, Richard	Gilroy, Mrs Linda
Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)	Godman, Dr Norman A
Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)	Godsiff, Roger
Campbell, Menzies (NE Fife)	Goggins, Paul
Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)	Golding, Mrs Llin
Canavan, Dennis	Gorrie, Donald
Cann, Jamie	Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)
Caplin, Ivor	Grocott, Bruce
Caton, Martin	Hain, Peter
Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)	Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)
Chaytor, David	Hall, Patrick (Bedford)
Chidgey, David	Hamilton, Fabian (Leeds NE)
Chisholm, Malcolm	Hancock, Mike
Clapham, Michael	Hanson, David
Clark, Dr Lynda(Edinburgh Pentlands)	Harris, Dr Evan
	Harvey, Nick
Clarke, Charles (Norwich S)	Heal, Mrs Sylvia
Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)	Healey, John
Clelland, David	Heath, David (Somerton & Frome)
Coaker, Vernon	Henderson, Doug (Newcastle N)
Coffey, Ms Ann	Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)
Cohen, Harry	Hepburn, Stephen
Coleman, Iain	Heppell, John
Colman, Tony	Hesford, Stephen
Connarty, Michael	Hill, Keith
Cook, Frank (Stockton N)	Hinchliffe, David
Cooper, Yvette	Hodge, Ms Margaret
Corbett, Robin	Hoey, Kate
Corbyn, Jeremy	Hood, Jimmy
Corston, Ms Jean	Hoon, Geoffrey
Cotter, Brian	Hope, Phil
Cousins, Jim	Hopkins, Kelvin
Cox, Tom	Howarth, Alan (Newport E)
Cranston, Ross	Howarth, George (Knowsley N)
Crausby, David	Hoyle, Lindsay
Cryer, Mrs Ann (Keighley)	Hughes, Ms Beverley (Stretford)
Cryer, John (Hornchurch)	Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)
Cummings, John	Hughes, Simon (Southwark N)
Cunliffe, Lawrence	Humble, Mrs Joan
Cunningham, Jim (Cov'try S)	Hutton, John
Curtis-Thomas, Mrs Claire	Iddon, Dr Brian
Dalyell, Tam	Illsley, Eric
Darling, Rt Hon Alistair	Ingram, Adam
Darvill, Keith	Jackson, Ms Glenda (Hampstead)
Davey, Edward (Kingston)	Jackson, Helen (Hillsborough)
Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)	Jenkins, Brian
Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)	Johnson, Alan (Hull W & Hessle)
Davies, Geraint (Croydon C)	Jones, Barry (Alyn & Deeside)
Davies, Rt Hon Ron (Caerphilly)	Jones, Helen (Warrington N)
Dean, Mrs Janet	Jones, Ms Jenny (Wolverh'ton SW)
Denham, John
Dismore, Andrew	Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)
Dobbin, Jim	Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S)
Dobson, Rt Hon Frank	Jowell, Ms Tessa
Doran, Frank	Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald
Dowd, Jim	Keen, Alan (Feltham & Heston)
Drew, David	Keen, Ann (Brentford & Isleworth)
Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth	Keetch, Paul
Eagle, Angela (Wallasey)	Kemp, Fraser
Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)	Kennedy, Charles (Ross Skye)
Efford, Clive	Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)
Ellman, Mrs Louise	Kidney, David
Ennis, Jeff	Kilfoyle, Peter
Etherington, Bill	King, Andy (Rugby & Kenilworth)

Kingham, Ms Tess	Morley, Elliot
Kirkwood, Archy	Morris, Ms Estelle (B'ham Yardley)
Kumar, Dr Ashok	Mowlam, Rt Hon Marjorie
Ladyman, Dr Stephen	Mudie, George
Lawrence, Ms Jackie	Mullin, Chris
Laxton, Bob	Murphy, Denis (Wansbeck)
Levitt, Tom	Murphy, Jim (Eastwood)
Lewis, Terry (Worsley)	Murphy, Paul (Torfaen)
Linton, Martin	Naysmith, Dr Doug
Livingstone, Ken	Norris, Dan
Livsey, Richard	Oaten, Mark
Love, Andrew	O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)
McAllion, John	O'Brien, Mike (N Warks)
McAvoy, Thomas	O'Hara, Eddie
McCabe, Steve	Olner, Bill
McCafferty, Ms Chris	Öpik, Lembit
McCartney, Ian (Makerfield)	Pendry, Tom
McDonagh, Siobhain	Perham, Ms Linda
Macdonald, Calum	Pickthall, Colin
McDonnell, John	Pike, Peter L
McGuire, Mrs Anne	Plaskitt, James
Mclsaac, Shona	Pollard, Kerry
McKenna, Mrs Rosemary	Pound, Stephen
Mackinlay, Andrew	Powell, Sir Raymond
McLeish, Henry	Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham E)
Maclennan, Rt Hon Robert	Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)
McNamara, Kevin	Primarolo, Dawn
McNulty, Tony	Prosser, Gwyn
Mactaggart, Fiona	Purchase, Ken
McWalter, Tony	Quin, Ms Joyce
McWilliam, John	Raynsford, Nick
Mahon, Mrs Alice	Reed, Andrew (Loughborough)
Mallaber, Judy	Rendel, David
Mandelson, Peter	Rogers, Allan
Marsden, Gordon (Blackpool S)	Rooker, Jeff
Marsden, Paul (Shrewsbury)	Rooney, Terry
Marshall, David (Shettleston)	Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)
Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)	Rowlands, Ted
Marshall-Andrews, Robert	Roy, Frank
Martlew, Eric	Ruddock, Ms Joan
Maxton, John	Russell, Bob (Colchester)
Meacher, Rt Hon Michael	Russell, Ms Christine (Chester)
Merron, Gillian	Salter, Martin
Michael, Alun	Sanders, Adrian
Michie, Bill (Shef'ld Heeley)	Sarwar, Mohammad
Michie, Mrs Ray (Argyll & Bute)	Savidge, Malcolm
Milburn, Alan	Sawford, Phil
Miller, Andrew	Sedgemore, Brian
Mitchell, Austin	Shaw, Jonathan
Moffatt, Laura	Sheerman, Barry
Moore, Michael	Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert
Moran, Ms Margaret	Shipley, Ms Debra
Morgan, Ms Julie (Cardiff N)	Short, Rt Hon Clare
Morgan, Rhodri (Cardiff W)	Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

Singh, Marsha	Truswell, Paul
Skinner, Dennis	Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)
Smith, Rt Hon Andrew (Oxford E)	Turner, Dr Desmond (Kemptown)
Smith, Angela (Basildon)	Twigg, Derek (Halton)
Smith, Rt Hon Chris (Islington S)	Twigg, Stephen (Enfield)
Smith, John (Glamorgan)	Tyler, Paul
Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)	Vaz, Keith
Smith, Sir Robert (W Ab'd'ns)	Vis, Dr Rudi
Soley, Clive	Wallace, James
Spellar, John	Ward, Ms Claire
Squire, Ms Rachel	Wareing, Robert N
Steinberg, Gerry	Webb, Steve
Stevenson, George	White, Brian
Stewart, David (Inverness E)	Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Swansea W)
Stewart, Ian (Eccles)
Stinchcombe, Paul	Williams, Alan W (E Carmarthen)
Straw, Rt Hon Jack	Willis, Phil
Stunell, Andrew	Wills, Michael
Sutcliffe, Gerry	Winnick, David
Taylor, Rt Hon Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)	Winterton, Ms Rosie (Doncaster C)
	Wise, Audrey
Taylor, Ms Dari (Stockton S)	Wood, Mike
Taylor, David (NW Leics)	Woolas, Phil
Taylor, Matthew (Truro)	Worthington, Tony
Temple-Morris, Peter	Wright, Anthony D (Gt Yarmouth)
Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)	Wright, Dr Tony (Cannock)
Timms, Stephen	Wyatt, Derek
Tipping, Paddy
Todd, Mark	Tellers for the Noes:
Tonge, Dr Jenny	Mr. David Jamieson and Mr. Greg Pope.
Touhig, Don

Question accordingly negatived.

Question, That the proposed words be there added, put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 31 (Questions on amendments), and agreed to.

MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER forthwith declared the main Question, as amended, to be agreed to.

Resolved, That this House commends the Government for its progress on major matters of substance across all fields of responsibility, and in particular for its recognition of the cultural, social, educational and economic value of the areas of activity sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, and for the concrete action taken across all parts of the Department's responsibilities over the last year to maximise that value; welcomes the outcome of the Comprehensive Spending Review, which provides for a significant investment in culture, sport, heritage and tourism alongside positive steps to reduce bureaucracy and ensure the most effective use of public money; and notes that this brings to an end a damaging period of real cuts presided over by the Opposition.