Commons Sitting of 11 April 2000

Preamble
The House met at half-past Two o'clock
PRAYERS
[MADAM SPEAKER in the Chair]
PRIVATE BUSINESS

  CITY OF NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE BILL [LORDS] (BY ORDER)
  Order for Third Reading read.
  To be read the Third time on Tuesday 18 April.

  GREENHAM AND CROOKHAM COMMONS BILL (BY ORDER)
  Order for Second Reading read.
  To be read a Second time on Tuesday 18 April.

Oral Answers to Questions
  FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS
  The Secretary of State was asked—
  FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS

    Ethical Foreign Policy
    Mr. David Amess: If he will make a statement on the implementation of the ethical dimension of his foreign policy since May 1997. [117165]
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Peter Hain): We have a proud record of pressing for torture to be banned world wide, the death penalty to be abolished, anti-personnel land mines to be banned and extreme forms of child labour to be ended. We helped to achieve an International Criminal Court. We have been lifting the stranglehold of debt off poor countries, hugely increasing our overseas aid and banning arms exports that could be used for either external aggression or internal oppression. Never before have a Government given such a priority to promoting human rights in British foreign policy.
    Mr. Amess: Given the Government's extraordinary double standards—for instance, in their dealings with China and Zimbabwe—how can the Foreign Secretary consider a visit to Iran, whose regime carries out the gouging of eyes and the amputation of its citizens' limbs? Will he defend that as an ethical act? Will he reconsider his visit? Will he at least condemn such brutal acts against the citizens of Iran?
    Mr. Hain: Of course everybody in the House, led by the Foreign Secretary, will condemn actions such as the gouging out of eyes, but is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that my right hon. Friend should not go to Tehran when
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    he has the opportunity to support the reform programme carried out by President Khatami, which has improved human rights there and made Iran freer than it has been for a long time? Should we stop trying to make the world better because we cannot make it perfect? The Government try to make it better at every opportunity.
    Mr. Tam Dalyell: The Minister rightly mentioned the banning of land mines with pride. Could that be extended to cluster bombs?
    Mr. Hain: I will happily look at that proposal. Cluster bombs are in a different position from anti-personnel land mines. Through the Ottawa convention—we led that process—we achieved a worldwide ban on anti-personnel land mines. I know that my hon. Friend welcomes that.
    Mr. Menzies Campbell: The Minister will remember that the Foreign Secretary's statement laid particular emphasis on human rights. After the treatment that has been meted out to Mary Robinson, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, and the Council of Europe's decision to begin proceedings that may lead to Russia's suspension, do the Government feel no discomfort at the notion of welcoming Mr. Putin to London next weekend? This is the man who became president after presiding over the indiscriminate and disproportionate shelling of civilians in Chechnya. Should not the visit be postponed until Russian actions match Russian words?
    Mr. Hain: We very much welcomed Mary Robinson's visit to Chechnya. It was important that she went and Britain supported her in that task. We use every opportunity to take up human rights matters with the Russians, as the Prime Minister did with President-elect Putin and as will occur when he visits Britain shortly, on the basis that our involvement is without illusions. The right hon. and learned Gentleman is perhaps asking us to boycott any contact with the Russians to leave us with clean hands, but that does not improve people's rights in Russia, which is the objective for which we have been consistently working.
    Ann Clwyd: Does my hon. Friend agree that there is both an ethical and a moral imperative for the United Kingdom to do everything possible to help the people of Ethiopia, whom we see dead and dying on our television screens every night? Is he aware that the European Union has sent only half the food aid that it promised last year? Will he do everything in his power to speed up the process of getting that food to the people? If not, it will be too late.
    Mr. Hain: I welcome the fact that my hon. Friend has raised the crisis in Ethiopia. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for International Development is leading the way in providing more food aid than any other country, apart from the United States. We are very aware that 8 million people face starvation in Ethiopia and the situation is dire. Britain has a proud record of providing food aid and of making sure that the other international institutions address the serious crisis there.
    Mrs. Cheryl Gillan: In this week's New Statesman, the Minister reveals to us all that

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    he is seen by the Foreign Secretary as his soul mate. As they are so close, perhaps the Minister can tell us whether the Foreign Secretary supports the Minister's view, expressed in the same article, that the ethical dimension of foreign policy was "the hook" on which this Labour Government found themselves, was oversold to begin with, and has now been abandoned and
    consigned to the memory hole.
    How does the Foreign Secretary feel about his ethical foreign policy now that even his deputy publicly denounces it?
    Mr. Hain: I realise that the hon. Lady has used all her considerable creative energies to try to read into the New Statesman interview numerous things that were not there. Let me say, however, that I am proud to work alongside my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary, whose soul mate I have been for many years. That is true on my side, anyway.
    My right hon. Friend has presided over a foreign policy that has given Britain a leading role in the world in the defence of human rights, with a strong ethical dimension of which we can be proud. That is recognised by countries throughout the world.
    Let me add that it is a bit rich to be lectured about ethics by the party that was happy to arm the Indonesian dictator Suharto, happy to support the repression of the East Timor people, and happy for its Ministers to mislead Parliament over the supply of arms to Iraq, as exposed in the Scott report. We take no lessons from that party about ethical foreign policy.

    Lisbon Summit
    Jane Griffiths: If he will make a statement on the follow-up plans to implement the decisions of the Lisbon EU summit on economic reform. [117166]
    The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Robin Cook): The Lisbon summit arose from a British-Spanish initiative. Its agenda reflected Britain's commitment to economic reform within Europe. The summit committed the European Union to removing barriers to e-commerce, and to ensuring that access to the internet in Europe is as competitive as any in the world.
    At Lisbon, the European Union agreed that the goal of full employment was back on the agenda. It was the first time for a decade that it has done so. We will now work with the Commission to follow up its conclusions. The commitment to hold annual summits in the spring to review progress will ensure that the Lisbon agenda remains a high priority for the European Union.
    Jane Griffiths: Does my right hon. Friend share my delight that that goal of full employment is now seriously and explicitly back on the agenda in Europe? Does he agree that what Britain must do is engage in Europe, and not seek to let down the people of this country as the Conservative party seeks to do by opting out?
    Mr. Cook: I absolutely agree. I note that the Opposition spokesman on foreign affairs put out a press
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    statement on the day of the Lisbon summit referring to the "job-destroying" working time directive and social chapter. Since the Government came to office and introduced both those measures, we have created 800,000 more jobs than were created at the time the Conservative Government were resisting them.
    Mr. Elfyn Llwyd: How does this country's continued support for Turkey's accession to the European Union square with an ethical foreign policy, given Turkey's awful human rights record?
    Madam Speaker: Order. The question is about economic reform.
    Mr. Bill Rammell: Did the Foreign Secretary read the story in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung last week which claimed that Britain was shaping the agenda within the European Union, and bemoaned the fact that Germany was no longer undertaking that role? Is that not a powerful statement that we can and do secure the best for Britain from Europe, and is it not the most powerful response possible to the xenophobic isolationism of the Conservative party, which ill serves the British national interest and would put 3 million British jobs at risk?
    Mr. Cook: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The agenda of the European Union is dominated by two initiatives taken by the British Government, to promote European security and to promote economic reform within Europe. The people of Britain are seeing real benefits from the decision to provide a legal base for our border controls for the first time during our membership of the European Union, and from the decision to give us one of the best deals in regard to structural funds among all European Union countries. That is the gain of positive engagement in Europe, all of which Conservative Members would put at risk.
    Mr. Richard Spring: May I remind the right hon. Gentleman that it was the Prime Minister himself who last year, speaking to the CBI, criticised the working time directive for being over-regulatory? That being the case, why did he not demand its reform at Lisbon? Surely what businesses actually want, instead of all the talk of an inclusive, dynamic and knowledge-based economy, is less red tape, less bureaucracy and less interference, not pointless prime ministerial technobabble.
    Mr. Cook: The hon. Gentleman obviously has not read the conclusions of the Lisbon summit. If he had done so, he would have seen that it was not techno-babble of any kind, European or British. It provides specific deadlines by which specific action must be taken: this year, a legal framework for e-commerce; next year, a fully liberalised telecommunications market; by 2001, a Community-wide patent; by 2003, electronic access to all public services. Those measures are sought and wanted by business. Thanks to the Government, they have been secured within Europe.

    BBC World Service
    Mr. David Rendel: What plans he has to increase funding for the World Service to meet the costs of the digital revolution. [117167]
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Peter Hain): The Government granted the BBC World Service an extra £44.2 million over the three-year comprehensive spending review period 1999–2002, partly to finance expansion into online and other digital services.
    Mr. Rendel: The World Service is producing record audiences for its radio services. I am sure that the Minister would join me in congratulating the World Service on that, but the expansion so far into online services has produced a full online service only for English, Chinese and Arabic. What plans does he have to enable the World Service to expand its full online services to the other main world languages?
    Mr. Hain: I agree that the expansion in the World Service's listenership throughout the world is extremely welcome. More than 150 million people listen to it weekly. That is good news. The online service is growing from strength to strength. I would like it to expand to other languages where possible and where its management decides, but it is still the best used internet service anywhere in the world—and long may it remain so.
    Mr. Piara S. Khabra: What progress has been made in the negotiations between the Foreign Office and the military Government in Pakistan on restoring democracy? Has my hon. Friend assessed the political situation in Pakistan?
    Madam Speaker: Order. I am afraid that that supplementary question is out of order on this question. If the hon. Gentleman looks at it, he will see that it deals with the World Service and the digital revolution.
    Mr. Michael Jack: Admirable as the new services that the World Service is operating are, what steps is the Minister taking to ensure that the BBC is adequately funded to continue necessary transmitter investment so as to make certain that the existing short wave radio service, which can reach some of the more obscure parts of the world, is maintained and sustained?
    Mr. Hain: I know of the right hon. Gentleman's close interest in the matter. I agree that it is important that the World Service be allowed to expand its short wave service. It is expanding its FM service massively too, which is also to be welcomed. We have provided an average yearly real-terms increase in funding of 3.9 per cent. for the World Service, which is in stark contrast with the record of the Conservative Government, who cut its funding year after year.
    Barbara Follett: Has my hon. Friend seen the reports in the press that suggest that the new director
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    general of the BBC is considering closing Bush house? Will he make representations to the BBC to let him know how important the World Service is to the House?
    Mr. Hain: I agree with my hon. Friend that the World Service is important to the House. Indeed, it is important to the Government, which is why we have increased its funding substantially. As to whether the World Service is sited in Bush house, or whether the BBC can best utilise its capital and other revenue resources on some other site, that is a matter for the BBC, its board of governors and its management.

    Hungary
    Mr. Gordon Marsden: What steps his Department is taking to strengthen political and economic links between the UK and Hungary. [117170]
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Keith Vaz): The UK has an excellent relationship with Hungary. We have a strong political dialogue. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary met Foreign Minister Janos Martonyi on 29 February. I have just hosted Zsolt Nemeth, the Deputy Foreign Minister, during a UK visit. I also met the Hungarian Speaker, Janos Ader, during the recent Inter-Parliamentary Union visit.
    British Trade International's Opportunity Hungary campaign is encouraging more UK trade and investment in Hungary. We are supporting Hungary's accession to the EU through technical and financial assistance.
    Mr. Marsden: Having recently met, as co-chairman of the Future of Europe trust, an Inter-Parliamentary Union delegation from Hungary, I was left in no doubt, first, of Hungary's keenness to join the European Union; and, secondly, of the business opportunities in that country for companies such as PowerGen, British Aerospace and Tesco. Does my hon. Friend believe that Hungary's early accession to the European Union would create a beacon of stability for south-east Europe? Does he also agree that any tampering with current European treaties, as Conservative Members advocate doing, would dangerously jeopardise the enlargement that we all should like to see?
    Mr. Vaz: I congratulate my hon. Friend on all the excellent work that he does as co-chairman of the Future of Europe Trust. He is absolutely right that it is essential that Hungary should be encouraged in its European Union membership application. Last year, bilateral trade with Hungary was worth £1 billion, and British companies invested $1 billion in Hungary. He is also right to say that the accession procedures are going well. Only yesterday, I spoke to Commissioner Verheugen in Luxembourg, and he assured me that of the 31 chapters of the various acquis that are necessary for the negotiations to be completed, 21 chapters have been opened and 10 have been closed. Progress is therefore going well. We must just ensure that we are ready for enlargement by completing the intergovernmental conference this year.
    Mr. Francis Maude: Is the Minister aware of reports, last week, in The Wall Street Journal Europe, that Hungary and Poland had been rebuked by the French

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    President and the German Foreign Minister for expressing concerns about the European security and defence identity? President Chirac is reported to have asked Mr. Geremek, Poland's Foreign Minister,
    whether Poland wished to be America's 51st state,
    and Mr. Fischer lectured him about the imperatives of being a "good European". The article goes on to state:
    Implicit in these admonitions has been the threat that the West Europeans will stall the easterners' applications for membership in the European Union.
    Will the Minister now dissociate Britain from any such threats and make it unequivocally clear that countries such as Hungary and Poland which have applied to join the European Union should not be intimidated into acquiescing in European federalist developments that they dislike?
    Mr. Vaz: I do not know which part of the internet the right hon. Gentleman has been looking at, but there is clearly something wrong with his software. There is no question but that Hungary and Poland—two NATO members—fully support the common security and defence policy of the United Kingdom and of the European Union. That was the message that was given to my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary when their representatives met him a few weeks ago, and that is the message that I received only last week from all the Visegrad Foreign Ministers. When they came to see me, they were extremely relaxed about the matter. They want a policy that will provide for the peace, stability and security of Europe. They want to be part of that.
    Mr. Maude: How does the Minister explain consistent reports that those countries are expressing real concerns about the European defence initiative not including current members of the European Union? Does he not understand that, although those countries certainly want to join the European Union, many of them have serious reservations about the slide towards a European super-state? Why does not the Foreign Secretary now exercise some leadership in Europe and start making the case for the candidate countries to be able to join the European Union without having to sign up to every aspect of the acquis? Does not the growing size of the European Union mean that the old "one size fits all" model is simply out of date?
    Mr. Vaz: I feel very sad for the right hon. Gentleman that he has to rely on second-hand information. The Foreign Secretary and I have first-hand information because we have actually met the Foreign Ministers concerned. We have had those discussions with them. They fully support our defence policy. They want to be part of the European Union, and, as members of NATO, they very much want to be part of the defence policy of Europe. I would rather take their word for it than his.

    Belize-Guatemala Border Dispute
    Maria Eagle: If he will make a statement on the on-going border dispute between Belize and Guatemala; and what steps the Government are taking to resolve it. [117171]
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. John Battle): There is an on-going border dispute between Guatemala and Belize. Recently, the tension increased with the abduction, on 24 February, of three members of the Belize defence force and a policeman. All four were released and although tensions have remained, constructive discussions have now taken place in the presence of the Secretary General of the Organisation of American States, and further talks are planned.
    Maria Eagle: Does my hon. Friend agree that what central America needs more than anything at the moment is a period of stability? Is not an essential part of that encouraging the move to democracy in Guatemala? Will he assure the House that any intervention that he makes to assist in resolving this dispute will bear those two facts in mind?
    Mr. Battle: Yes; both I and my noble Friend Baroness Scotland have spoken to the Governments of Guatemala and Belize about the need to reduce tensions and to have serious negotiations. I agree with my hon. Friend that human rights in Guatemala are important, as is its movement to democracy. The context in which the conversations take place should be amicable, and negotiations must not move down the route of violence and the hijacking of personnel.
    Mr. John Wilkinson: Does not the United Kingdom have a continued interest in that part of central America, inasmuch as Belize is a fellow Commonwealth country and a territory where the British armed forces have jungle training facilities, as well as staging rights? Since Guatemala has made welcome progress towards democracy and has ended its civil war, should not it now engage in the talks for which a direct agenda has been outlined?
    Mr. Battle: The answer generally is yes. I want to emphasise that the United Kingdom has no legal responsibilities in relation to Guatemala's border dispute with Belize, which goes back to 1859. However, we are ready to give diplomatic assistance to both sides to bring about a peaceful solution. That is our role, and we will continue to work towards it.

    Manufacturing
    Mr. Jeff Ennis: What recent meetings he has had with the German Foreign Minister to discuss manufacturing industry. [117174]
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Keith Vaz): My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary discussed the subject with the German Foreign Minister at the General Affairs Council meeting in Luxembourg yesterday.
    Mr. Ennis: Does my hon. Friend agree that Vodafone's recent takeover of Mannesmann shows that British companies can compete in Germany? Does he further

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    agree that in order for British companies to compete in the future, Britain must maintain its central role within the European Union?
    Mr. Vaz: I agree with my hon. Friend. Bilateral trade with Germany last year was worth £49 billion, and 700,000 British companies invest and create jobs in Europe. It is extremely important that we keep that relationship going.
    Mr. Nicholas Winterton: When the Foreign Secretary met his German counterpart, did they discuss the problems that Germany and, to an extent, this country are encountering with manufacturing costs? Is he aware that, for the first time in recent years, Germany has started to export its manufacturing capacity to other parts of the world—not least the far east—because of the heavy social and other costs involved with manufacturing within the EU, and within Germany in particular? Until recently, we have had some advantage—but we are giving it away.
    Mr. Vaz: I do not know whether that exact point was discussed by my right hon. Friend, but I know of the hon. Gentleman's great interest in this matter as chairman of the manufacturing group in this House. Our relationship with Germany is a good commercial one, based on the creation of jobs in both countries. We want to make sure that German firms are able to succeed in this country, and that our firms succeed in Germany. That is what being part of the EU is all about—a market of 390 million people; soon, we hope, to be enlarged by a further 120 million to create the largest single market in the world. We want the climate and conditions for our manufacturing industry to survive and prosper.
    Mr. Richard Burden: Does my hon. Friend agree that the anger and opposition felt by so many people in this country at BMW's decision to break up the Rover Group is directed against BMW as a pan-European company, rather than against German industry or the German people as a whole? Does he agree that German companies—including those that located to Britain in support of BMW's presence here—and Rover dealers in Germany stand to lose out as well? Will he ask his counterpart in the German Foreign Ministry to join us in asking BMW to consider seriously all credible alternative bids for Rover, so that German and British industry can thrive?
    Mr. Vaz: I congratulate my hon. Friend on what he has done as a west midlands Member of Parliament in promoting the need for jobs in the area following what has happened. I assure him that the Government have put their faith in the taskforce, to which £129 million has been allocated. BMW is working with Alchemy and the British Government, particularly my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, to ensure the best possible outcome. We shall do everything that we can to help that process. The record of past taskforces is good. Within nine months of the 1998 Fujitsu closure, when 580 jobs were lost, 97 per cent. of the work force were in employment again. I assure my hon. Friend that we shall do all that we can to help the process.
    Mr. Francis Maude: In his foreword to the Department's annual report, the Foreign Secretary places
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    great stress on the role to be played by his Department in what he refers to as a "joined-up organisation", with the Department of Trade and Industry to promote trade and investment. What effect does he think that it has on the efforts of those trying to attract inward investment when they read reports of the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry and the Secretary of State for Defence calling the management of BMW liars? Does he think that helps?
    Mr. Vaz: As the right hon. Gentleman knows, my right hon. Friends did not say that. He will also know that we were disappointed by BMW's decision, because a commitment was made to the company. Rather than making cheap political points, the right hon. Gentleman should work positively to ensure that those who have lost or may lose their jobs are put back in employment.

    Iraq
    Mr. Dale Campbell-Savours: When he next intends to visit the Gulf states to discuss the future of Iraq. [117175]
    The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Robin Cook): We have regular dialogue with countries in the region on Iraq. Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain were all helpful in securing agreement in the Security Council to resolution 1284, drafted by the United Kingdom. Every country in the Gulf supports the implementation of that resolution, which unilaterally removes any ceiling on oil exports by Iraq and offers the suspension of sanctions in return for progress on disarmament of weapons of mass destruction. I regret that Iraq has yet to say whether it will take up that prospect of an end to sanctions.
    Mr. Campbell-Savours: In so far as the United Nations has miserably failed to enforce its own resolutions and not stopped sanction busting by Saddam Hussein, enabling him to raise the money to fund his illegal regime, could we not consider a change in policy away from the enforcement of sanctions, which some of us have supported through thick and thin for nearly 10 years, towards a policy of indicting Saddam Hussein in the international court for war crimes, murder, genocide and crimes against humanity? Should not that be the new approach?
    Mr. Cook: No international court would be competent to pursue those charges. We could pursue them only through a United Nations Security Council resolution to establish a special tribunal on Iraq. As I have said before, I see no realistic prospect of our obtaining agreement to such a resolution. Because of that, Britain was in the lead in supporting the formation of an International Criminal Court, which would have prosecutors who could decide for themselves who should be brought before the court, and which would end the arrangement by which special UN clearance was needed for anybody to be indicted. Once we have such a court, the way will be clear to proceed against dictators such as Saddam in the way my hon. Friend wishes.
    Mr. Jonathan Sayeed: In the meantime, as the right hon. Gentleman is aware, there has been a sharp increase in the smuggling of oil by Iraq. What practical steps are being taken to stop that?
    Mr. Cook: The United States and United Kingdom navies operate in the Gulf and have carried out some successful operations, including one recently against oil smuggling. The hon. Gentleman raises an important point. There is no reason to smuggle oil out of Iraq. As a result of the recent resolution, Saddam can legitimately export all the oil that he wants. The only reason he chooses to smuggle some of it is that he does not want to be held to account for the money that he receives for that oil. He does not want to put it towards children's food, hospitals and medicines for his people. He wants to use it to support his military. That is the only reason for the smuggling.
    Ms Oona King: Does my right hon. Friend agree that, while we can and must target sanctions more effectively—I hope that he will have recourse to the report by the International Development Committee on that subject—the fact remains that it is Saddam Hussein himself who bears responsibility for the plight of the Iraqi people? If he wished to take up the opportunity to exchange oil for supplies and humanitarian relief, he could.
    Mr. Cook: At present, Iraq is exporting a volume of oil roughly equivalent to the volume exported by Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates. It has just been announced that Iraq will increase its production by another 700,000 barrels a day, which will bring its exports above those of Iran. Potentially, $10 billion is available for humanitarian purposes in Iraq. In those circumstances, I find it hard to understand why people in Iraq are going hungry and are short of medicines. The only reason for that is the priorities of Saddam Hussein, not the sanctions.

    Montenegro
    Mr. David Heath: What assessment he has made of the political situation in Montenegro. [117176]
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Keith Vaz): We continue to support the democratically elected Government of President Djukanovic, and are keen to see the democratic and economic reforms already under way in Montenegro expanded and developed. We strongly condemn the economic measures taken against Montenegro by Milosevic, including an embargo on food and medicines. I discussed the current situation with the Montenegrin Foreign Minister, Branko Lukovac, at the stability pact conference last month.
    Mr. Heath: Does the Minister agree that it is desperately important to underpin the democratic aspirations in Montenegro? When will the stability pact for south-east Europe deliver for Montenegro, Macedonia, Albania and the other states in the region? Do the serious criticisms expressed in the German press, the Bundestag
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    and the European Parliament give him any cause for concern about, or any lack of confidence in, Mr. Bodo Hombach, the co-ordinator of the stability pact?
    Mr. Vaz: I know of the hon. Gentleman's interest in those matters as the chairman of the all-party group on Kosovo. Yesterday, at the Luxembourg General Affairs Council meeting, we heard a very good report from Javier Solana and Chris Patten about the work that they have undertaken following the successful conclusions at Lisbon, where it was decided that there needed to be a much more proactive role in trying to deal with the situation in Montenegro. The hon. Gentleman, more than anyone else in the House, knows how difficult the situation is, but we need to support the Government of Montenegro and ensure that they have the capacity and the confidence to deal with the very difficult situation they are in. Montenegro has had 82.7 million euro given to it in the past two years. We want to ensure that Solana and Patten can work with Bodo Hombach—who has done an excellent job in difficult circumstances—to deliver a practical result for the people of Montenegro.

    Iran
    Mr. Andrew Dismore: If he will make a statement on human rights in Iran. [117177]
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Peter Hain): Although there have been improvements in Iran's human rights record since the election of President Khatami in 1997, we continue to press his Government over continued persecution of the Baha'i religious minority, the lack of transparency in Iran's judicial proceedings and the trial of members of the Iranian Jewish community.
    Mr. Dismore: I remind my hon. Friend that the 13 Jews who were detained in Iran more than a year ago face the start of their trial on Thursday. I urge him to use all possible endeavours to put pressure on the Iranian Government to ensure that they receive a fair trial, with adequate legal representation and international observers, so that we can bring that travesty to an end and ensure the detainees' release from those dubious, bogus and trumped-up charges.
    Mr. Hain: I know of my hon. Friend's close interest in that trial, and I applaud him for it. It is an interest that the British Government—including my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary and myself as the Minister responsible—have consistently raised with the Iranian Government. There has been some good news: it is not clear that the trial will start this week. The judicial spokesman has said that the defendants, who do not have representation, will now have time to appoint lawyers, which is good. He has also announced that proceedings will be open to the media and media representatives, which is also good news. It is also clear that only a few of those involved will be charged with espionage and the others will face lesser offences, thus removing the prospect of the death penalty. I hope that the Iranian authorities will take account of the enormous concern across the world about the trial and act accordingly.
    Dr. Julian Lewis: While I welcome that question and the Minister's response to it, does the

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    Minister agree that all matters pertaining to middle east issues are of the greatest sensitivity? Does he agree also that someone who will be taking an increasing role in these matters is the Government's so-called special envoy, Lord Levy? In the circumstances, will the Minister confirm to the House that there is no question of Lord Levy's having been in contact with any foreign intelligence agencies?
    Mr. Hain: The hon. Gentleman started off very well, and I applaud him for that. He shares our concern and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Hendon (Mr. Dismore) about the plight of the Jewish detainees in Iran, an issue that we shall continue to address.
    As I said during the previous Foreign and Commonwealth Question Time, Lord Levy plays an important role as the personal envoy of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister. He is highly respected throughout the middle east. He meets presidents, kings, foreign ministers and others to promote the peace process. His role should be applauded and not continually sniped at. The hon. Gentleman should think of a better ending to his question next time.
    Dr. Phyllis Starkey: Will my hon. Friend confirm that although there remain considerable causes for concern about the human rights record within Iran, reports of reputable human rights organisations such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International show that there has been a slight improvement, and do not bear out the more lurid allegations that were rehearsed at the beginning of the sitting by, for example, the hon. Member for Southend, West (Mr. Amess)? The important matter in Iran, with the election of the new, reform-minded Government, is for countries such as the United Kingdom to work constructively with the new regime to try to help Iran to make the transition towards a modern Government who can play a positive role within the region?
    Mr. Hain: That question was a breath of fresh air and common sense after the previous one. My hon. Friend makes the important point that, under President Khatami and his reforming Government, there has been considerable progress on human rights and in other respects. The recent clear mandate that he received for reforms in the elections in Iran has given him the opportunity to work with the international community—Britain included, and my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary will travel to Tehran shortly. That will ensure that Iran is brought back into that community on a basis of friendship with other nations, rather than on one of hostility, as in the past. We need a process of critical but active engagement to assist that reform process, which is precisely what we are doing.
    Mr. John D. Taylor: Certainly, we must express concern for the 13 members of the Jewish community who are detainees, but is it not correct that Muslims are experiencing similar charges? If that is the case, is it not wrong to concentrate only on people of one religion? Should we not express concern for both Jews
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    and Muslims? Does the Minister agree that there has been a substantial advance in human rights in Iran over the past five years?
    Mr. Hain: Yes, I agree with the right hon. Gentleman that there has been a substantial advance in human rights in Iran. There is, however, a long way to go. I can confirm that Muslims are charged under the same procedure in the same trial, and we are equally concerned for their human rights. Given the sensitivities in the middle east, I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will understand why there is particular concern for the detainees who are of Jewish descent and who have been prosecuted.

    BBC World Service
    Mr. David Chidgey: What assessment he has made of the impact of the World Service's internet site on the target audience. [117178]
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Peter Hain): We support the World Service's aspirations to be a major internet player and I am delighted that in December there were more than 20 million page impressions and audio listeners monthly. The BBC World Service is now the most listened-to audio news online in the world.
    Mr. Chidgey: I am pleased to hear the Minister echo those sentiments. I am sure that he agrees that it is a tremendous success story for the BBC. Does he agree also that it is an opportunity for Britain to become the most successful and the best provider in the world of news services on the internet? Bearing in mind how BBC television lost out to CNN as a provider of world television news services, what plans does the hon. Gentleman have to ensure that the BBC on the internet will grasp the opportunities for Britain that are now presented to it?
    Mr. Hain: The hon. Gentleman raises a very important point. I agree with him. We are working with BBC World Service to help and encourage it to spread its online provision, which is the most listened-to online information service in the world. As was noted earlier, it is spreading into other languages. The BBC deserves praise for taking the lead in its commitment to expand and to use the full potential of the internet. We also support BBC World's activities to provide increased television coverage across the world for the BBC. There are 7 million listeners to BBC World, which is available in 500,000 hotels and other places. We welcome that as well.
    Mr. Nigel Evans: Does the Minister agree that the BBC World Service is respected throughout the world as an independent and authoritative source of news, especially for people living under repressive regimes? The number of people accessing BBC online services increased by 218 per cent. last year, but my real interest is in the repressive regimes—[HON. MEMBERS: "Rephrase."] I shall press the rewind button, Madam Speaker. It is vital that the message gets through to people living under repressive regimes, and it is therefore absolutely necessary that parallel-portal services are made available throughout the world, so that people living under

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    repressive regimes can more easily access BBC online services. What talks has the Minister had with the BBC to ensure that the extra parallel-portal services are made available, so that the people who most need an independent source of news can get it?
    Mr. Hain: I thought for a moment that the hon. Gentleman was making a bid for a Front-Bench job. However, I agree with the important point that he raises. We are in close touch with BBC management to encourage them to go down that route. It is very important that every opportunity is taken to expand the BBC's services in the fast-moving world of modern information technology. The BBC is the voice of freedom across the world. That is especially important for people living under the repressive regimes in which the hon. Gentleman is now taking a close interest.

    Poland
    Mrs. Linda Gilroy: What assessment he has made of the current state of relations between the UK and Poland; and if he will make a statement. [117179]
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Keith Vaz): Our relations with Poland are excellent. We maintain a strong political dialogue, and Poland is one of our most important trading partners in central and eastern Europe. We warmly welcomed Poland's membership of NATO in March 1999, and we continue actively to support Poland's application to join the European Union. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Minister met Poland's Foreign Minister Geremek in February. The weekend before last, in London, I met the Polish Minister for European Affairs, Andrzei Ananicz.
    Mrs. Gilroy: I thank my hon. Friend for that reply. He will no doubt be pleased but not surprised to learn that, on my visit to Poland in January—when I went to the Deblin Royal Air Force academy and later had the pleasure of attending the RAF ball in Warsaw—there was no sign whatever of the attitude alluded to earlier by the Opposition Front-Bench spokesman, the right hon. Member for Horsham (Mr. Maude).
    However, does my hon. Friend recollect Poland's chief negotiator saying that the last thing Europe needs is a pick-and-choose community? Is not it clear that the applicant countries want to join the European Union because of what the EU has achieved and because of its aspirations? Is not it equally clear that those countries will have little time for any British Government who seek to undermine those achievements?
    Mr. Vaz: I am glad that my hon. Friend was able to visit Poland in January. My first visit as Minister for Europe was to Poland, although no one invited me to the ball—perhaps my shoes did not fit.
    My hon. Friend is right to point out that Poland wants to be a first-class country in the European Union. We do not favour a two-tier EU. That is why we fully support Poland's ambition to join the EU. It is making excellent progress. When I spoke to Mr. Ananicz a fortnight ago, he said that the negotiations were going well. Of course, the most important element for Poland, the chapter on agriculture, has not yet been opened. Poland has
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    ambitious targets to join and we have made it clear that we shall support it. We support 10 twinning arrangements in Poland, and we also provide funds through the know-how fund, which we shall continue to do.
    The twinning arrangement between Gdynia and my hon. Friend's constituency is very important. We would like to see such arrangements extended to other constituencies and cities in the United Kingdom.
    Miss Anne McIntosh: Does the Minister share my concern that Poland will be on target to join the EU by 2004? He referred to extra work being needed in terms of agricultural reforms, and I draw his attention to the fact that law and environmental protection need further work. How much technical assistance are the Government prepared to provide to help Poland achieve its target date?
    Mr. Vaz: As the hon. Lady knows, Poland has set its own target date. That cannot be achieved until the intergovernmental conference is completed by the end of this year and is ratified in the various national Parliaments. We do not want to discourage Poland; we want to encourage it. It is important that the applicant countries know that they have the support of countries such as the United Kingdom.
    When I was in Poland, we launched a number of schemes. We have extended our twinning programme and, as I have said, the know-how fund provides assistance. I have said to Foreign Minister Ananicz, and my right hon. Friend has said to Foreign Minister Geremek, that if we can help in any way, we will stand ready to help. We want Poland to be part of an enlarged Europe. It will give us a single market of 500 million people. Poland is already a member of NATO, and we want it in the European Union. We are Poland's best friend in Europe.

    Brazil
    Mr. Paul Goggins: What steps he has taken to encourage Brazil to sign international labour convention 169. [117180]
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. John Battle): Ratification of the International Labour Organisation's convention 169, which refers to the rights of indigenous and tribal peoples, is one of the short-term objectives outlined in the Brazilian Government's national human rights plan, which we strongly support. The convention is currently with the Brazilian Congress for ratification.
    Mr. Goggins: May I thank my hon. Friend for that positive reply? He may be aware that 22 April marks the 500th anniversary of the arrival in Brazil of the first Europeans. Given the terrible impact that colonisation has had on its indigenous people, does my hon. Friend agree that now would be a very good time for Brazil to sign ILO convention 169, which enshrines the rights of indigenous peoples to have control over their own lives and livelihoods? Will he urge the Brazilian Government to mark this significant anniversary by taking the important step of ratifying the convention?
    Mr. Battle: My hon. Friend has an active and deep interest in Latin American affairs. The answer to his

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    question is yes. We regularly raise indigenous issues with the Brazilian authorities, and we hope that ratification can be achieved. We have raised the matter within the United Nations in the working group on the draft directive on the rights of indigenous people. At the recent sessions of the UN General Assembly and the Commission on Human Rights, we have regularly raised these matters with the Brazilian authorities and non-governmental organisations.
    We support the projects to support indigenous peoples in Brazil. We welcome the Brazilian Government's progress in demarcating Indian lands, and we shall keep up the pressure. However, my hon. Friend makes a useful suggestion: the anniversary would be an excellent opportunity for ratification, and we would welcome the Brazilian Government taking it.

    Balkans
    Mr. David Tredinnick: What progress is being made in co-ordinating the international effort in the Balkans; and if he will make a statement. [117181]
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Keith Vaz): I am happy to report three recent examples of progress. First, the European Council in Lisbon agreed that the international community needed a more coherent strategy to support Kosovo and the region. Secondly, on 28 March, the Contact Group, bringing together Russia and the leading NATO allies, met for the first time in more than a year. Thirdly, on 29 March the regional financing conference of the stability pact pledged more than 2.4 billion euro for reconstruction projects in the region. The United Kingdom has pledged to contribute £100 million in bilateral technical assistance over the next three years.
    Mr. Tredinnick: I thank the Minister for that reply. Does he not think that some lessons can be learned following the recent attack on Polish and United States troops in southern Kosovo, and that since co-operation has been resumed with KFOR, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office should look seriously at the matter.
    Is the Minister aware that at a Future of Europe Trust meeting this week in the House, representatives expressed great concern about the way in which the federal aviation authority was stopping flights into Montenegro? Will he look into that matter?
    Mr. Vaz: I was not aware of what the Future of Europe Trust discussed this week, but I am more than happy to meet the hon. Gentleman and his colleague to discuss the matter, as I have done in the past. The circumstances are difficult. KFOR, the United Nations mission in Kosovo, and all the other groups that are in the region as a result of UN resolution 1244, are there to try to rebuild Kosovo and the region. We should do our best to help that process. These are difficult and sensitive issues. The forces out there are working as well as they can. I am happy to meet the hon. Gentleman to take this discussion forward.
    Mr. Tony Lloyd: My hon. Friend will be aware that the announcement of the
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    stability pact was greeted with considerable enthusiasm by all countries in south-eastern Europe, but is he aware that some disquiet is now coming into that process as a result of the slow pace of delivery? Can he guarantee that the British Government will be at the forefront of saying that now is the time to act; that the rhetoric is excellent and the will is there, but that we need to see action on the ground to build democracy and an economic pathway for the Balkans into the mainstream of the European family?
    Mr. Vaz: I pay tribute to my hon. Friend for all the work that he did when he had ministerial responsibility for the Balkans at the Foreign Office. He gave enormous leadership to the process. The decision taken at Lisbon was important. The involvement of Javier Solana and Chris Patten, working with Bodo Hombach from the stability pact, will ensure much quicker delivery. We know that progress takes a long time and we realise that people are frustrated at the time that it takes. We are frustrated but, as my hon. Friend more than anyone else in the House knows, these are difficult circumstances. I hope that, with the new impetus given by the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary at Lisbon, the process will be quickened.

    Visa Applicants (Sub-continent)
    Dr. Brian Iddon: What arrangements he is making to assist visa applicants at British high commissions in Dhaka, Islamabad and New Delhi. [117184]
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Keith Vaz): The number of permanent entry clearance staff at Islamabad and Dhaka has been increased within the last year. All three posts receive additional temporary staff during the busy season. I have put in hand feasibility studies at each post to consider further how services to visa applicants can be improved. Decisions will be made before the summer recess.
    Dr. Iddon: Is my hon. Friend aware that the British Bengali community is funding an Immigration Advisory Service office in Sylhet to put applications in order before they are submitted to the entry clearance post in Dhaka? Will he consider funding such charitable offices not only in Sylhet but in Islamabad and New Delhi, as the Foreign Affairs Committee has recommended?
    Mr. Vaz: I am aware of what the Immigration Advisory Service proposes to do and, indeed, has started to do. We welcome the involvement of agencies in a complicated and difficult area of law. As my hon. Friend may know, I went to Sylhet to see the operation there a few weeks ago. I am confident that when the feasibility studies have reported, we shall consider how we can improve the facilities in New Delhi, Dhaka, Sylhet and Bombay. On his forthcoming trip to the sub-continent, my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary will look at the visa facilities. I cannot promise funds for the IAS, because it does not come within the remit of the Foreign Office, but I am sure that my hon. Friend will write to the Home Secretary expressing his view.

    USA National Missile Defence Project
    Mr. Eric Illsley: If he will make a statement on the Government's policy towards the USA national missile defence project. [117185]
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Keith Vaz): The United States Administration has not yet decided to proceed with the deployment of a national missile defence system. Nor will they do so before later this summer at the earliest.
    We have welcomed repeated US assurances that they will take a number of factors into account before making any such decision, including its possible impact on strategic stability and on international arms control.
    We continue to urge both the US Administration and the Russian Government to seek an agreed way forward on this issue. We have made it clear to both sides that we wish to see the anti-ballistic missile treaty preserved and further early progress made in reducing the nuclear arsenals of each country.
    Mr. Illsley: I thank my hon. Friend for that reply. During its visit to the United States three weeks ago, the Foreign Affairs Committee was left in no doubt that the American Government, their advisers and American politicians are wholly convinced of the missile threat from North Korea and of the possibility of such a threat from Iran—hence the talk about upgrading Fylingdales. Does my hon. Friend agree that the key to this issue is agreement with Russia and the United States? Have the British Government held any discussions with the new Russian Administration? If so, are further discussions planned?
    Mr. Vaz: I assure my hon. Friend that, when discussions take place between the Prime Minister and Mr. Putin, those issues will be raised—as they have been raised in the past at meetings between my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary and Mr. Ivanov. I agree with my hon. Friend that we should continue along the lines that he suggests; I look forward to reading the Select Committee's report.

    Zimbabwe
    Mr. James Gray: What representations he has received on the rule of law in Zimbabwe; and if he will make a statement. [117168]
    Mr. Nicholas Winterton: If he will make a statement on the future of the United Kingdom's relations with Zimbabwe. [117169]
    Sir Geoffrey Johnson Smith: If he will make a statement on the political situation in Zimbabwe. [117182]
    The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Robin Cook): My colleague, the Minister of State—my hon. Friend the Member for Neath (Mr. Hain)—and I have repeatedly expressed our concerns at the deterioration in the economy and stability of Zimbabwe. I met President Mugabe last week in the margins of the European
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    Union-Africa summit. I am grateful to President Obasanjo of Nigeria for helping to arrange the meeting and for having played such a positive part in it.
    I emphasised our deep concern at the present situation in Zimbabwe; in particular, at the failure of the Zimbabwean police and the Government of Zimbabwe to uphold the rule of law, by complying with the court order to clear the illegal occupation of farms, or by protecting the right of citizens to peaceful demonstration without fear of violence. I also stressed the importance that we attach to free and fair elections within the time frame set out in the constitution of Zimbabwe. President Mugabe assured President Obasanjo and me that he intended to hold elections in May. He also agreed to send a delegation to London to discuss all our concerns.
    Yesterday, I opened the discussion among European Foreign Ministers on Zimbabwe. I am pleased to report that 11 countries spoke strongly in support of our concerns and that we unanimously agreed conclusions demanding respect for the rule of law and urging free and fair elections. We agreed that the EU should provide monitors to observe that the conditions for elections are free and fair.
    This morning, I spoke to Don McKinnon, Secretary-General of the Commonwealth. I gave notice that I will want to raise our concerns about Zimbabwe at the forthcoming meeting of the Commonwealth ministerial action group.
    I agree with Lord Carrington's statement this morning that we must put as much international pressure as possible on the Government of Zimbabwe. That is what we are doing. However, the solutions to the problems of Zimbabwe must be found in Zimbabwe itself. I spoke this morning to Mr. Kenwood, president of the Farmers Union, who stressed that he and his members were citizens of Zimbabwe and wanted to seek a solution in a cool and level-headed manner.
    I very much regret that President Mugabe has not approached our dialogue in that same spirit. Indeed, he has repeatedly tried to turn the election into a confrontation between Zimbabwe and Britain.
    I have therefore sought in all my statements to demonstrate that Britain is not an enemy, but a friend of the people of Zimbabwe. It is because of that friendship that Britain is leading the international demand that the Government of Zimbabwe respect the rule of law and that the people of Zimbabwe must have the right, through free and fair elections, to decide for themselves who will govern Zimbabwe. We will continue to take every responsible and reasonable step to secure those twin demands.
    Mr. Gray: I thank the Foreign Secretary for that statement and for his commitment to cool reason. None the less, if he agrees that what President Mugabe is doing in Zimbabwe looks very much like ethnic cleansing, although, in this case, it is directed against many British passport holders, when does he intend to replace the rhetoric and the discussions that he described with some real action? For example, will he consider freezing President Mugabe's international assets? Will he speak more directly to the Commonwealth about the possibility

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    of suspending Zimbabwe? If he will not take either of those actions, when does he intend to do something to which Zimbabwe will really listen?
    Mr. Cook: We are taking every reasonable and responsible step. The hon. Gentleman asks whether we will consider freezing the assets of President Mugabe. I can predict the reaction if we were to confiscate his assets; he would then confiscate farms in Zimbabwe. One farmer to whom I spoke today said:
    We are the ones who get beaten over the head here, whenever he gets beaten over the head there.
    If we want to provoke such retaliation, that is certainly how we would go about it. I appeal to the hon. Gentleman: if those on the ground want to proceed with the matter in a cool and level-headed manner, the least that we can do is to try to make sure that we do the same in this House.
    Mr. Winterton: The right hon. Gentleman will know that my interest in Zimbabwe goes back 30 years. We both believe that it holds perhaps the greatest potential of any country in central southern Africa. Would he emphasise to the House that we have no argument whatever with the good people of Zimbabwe and that we want to play our part through aid to ensure that they do not suffer through the mismanagement and wickedness of their Government? Will he assure us that aid will continue to flow to Zimbabwe, but that it will go through non-governmental organisations and direct to projects that will help the people of that long-suffering country?
    Mr. Cook: I echo the hon. Gentleman's remarks. It is important that the message goes out from this House that we want the people of Zimbabwe to succeed. The real tragedy of that country is that it is potentially one of the richest and wealthiest in the region, but that its economy has now been reduced to the extent that it has 60 per cent. inflation and no foreign exchange reserves. I very much hope that the people of Zimbabwe will soon, as a result of the pressure on its Government, have the opportunity to take control of their own government through free and fair elections.
    On aid, we have for some time restricted any new aid to the Government of Zimbabwe. We are looking for ways in which we can channel it through non-governmental organisations and now a quarter of all our aid to Zimbabwe goes through NGOs. However, the NGO sector in Zimbabwe is still weak and it is not easy to replicate entirely all the aid that we provide through its Government.
    Sir Geoffrey Johnson Smith: The right hon. Gentleman will be very much aware that not just this but other countries have played an enormous part in helping to revive the agrarian economy of what was Rhodesia. In fact, just two years ago, 700 farms in good areas were available for black people to farm the land. Does he agree that the time has come to put more pressure on the Government of Zimbabwe and that we should not rely just on the countries of the European Union to do that?
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    Would it be more successful if we included countries of the Commonwealth in the representations that we make? After all, Zimbabwe is still a part of the Commonwealth.
    Mr. Cook: As I said earlier, I will raise this matter at the Commonwealth ministerial action group when it meets in two weeks' time. I have already discussed the issue with a number of other Commonwealth leaders and I particularly welcome the help that President Obasanjo gave us in Cairo. Indeed, the assurance that elections will be held in May was given to him and not just to Britain. Therefore, I expect him to support us and to make sure that we proceed on that point.
    I agree with the right hon. Gentleman's comments about farms. Some 100 farms held by the Government of Zimbabwe are not being allocated to anybody, and they are going to waste. Over the past three years, half the farms that have been allocated under the land reform scheme run by the Government of Zimbabwe have gone not to the rural poor, but to members of the Government and officials employed by the Government. They have tended to get leases at half the rents paid by others who received farms. In those circumstances, although we are willing to fund a programme of land reform, it must be a programme targeted at the rural poor and not an urban elite.
    Mr. Donald Anderson: The holding of free and fair elections is vital. Has there been any indication from the Government of Zimbabwe that they will be prepared to accept Commonwealth observers or monitors at those elections? Would my right hon. Friend confirm, along with the Commonwealth Secretary-General, that the only precedents for suspension from the Commonwealth have been when there has been a military coup in a Commonwealth country? Does he see any further scope for a role for an intermediary from a Commonwealth country, such as President Obasanjo or President Mbeki, because the vital interests of South Africa and the region as a whole could be threatened if there is a crisis of confidence among the white people of that area?
    Mr. Cook: Many of the countries in the region are conscious that the decay of Zimbabwe's economy is of legitimate concern to them, and it is important that we explore every possible opportunity of working with them to find a resolution. My hon. Friend refers to precedents for suspension; there is only one and that is the case of Nigeria under its military regime. Nevertheless the Commonwealth ministerial action group has been gradually pressing for a widening of the scope of its action, and I expect support for us discussing that when we meet next month.
    Mr. David Winnick: Should not the whole vexed question of land in that country be properly dealt with through the rule of law and negotiations? Is it not unfortunate that Mugabe and his cronies and thugs are using racism and xenophobia to whip up a situation so that Mugabe can hang on to power, because it seems to me that that is certainly the main motive in the present situation? Should not racism and xenophobia be

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    denounced everywhere, whether it is in the country that we are now discussing or nearer home, as we witnessed yesterday with questions about asylum seekers?
    Mr. Cook: I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend that racism has no place to play either in Zimbabwe's politics or in Britain's politics. One point that has repeatedly been stressed by the farmers whose lands are occupied is that they are not white British farmers but citizens of Zimbabwe. They are entitled to protection under the rule of law in Zimbabwe, and if any citizen of that country loses the right of the protection of the courts and the rule of law, all citizens of Zimbabwe have their rights put at risk.
    Mr. Dale Campbell-Savours: Will my right hon. Friend convey to the high commissioner for Zimbabwe in London the fact that many of us who took to the streets in the 1960s and 1970s to end colonial rule in Rhodesia, and against Mr. Smith, and who supported the black liberation movements, are deeply saddened by what is happening today, indeed, even embarrassed?
    Mr. Cook: I hope that what my hon. Friend has said in the Chamber will be heard, and we will certainly make sure that it is drawn to the attention of Zimbabwe's representative in Britain. I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend that it is important that we make sure that the people of Zimbabwe have the rights and democracy that many of us wanted them to have after independence. I have been accused in one or two quarters of having a colonial attitude in lecturing Zimbabwe on rights and democracy for its people. I totally reject the idea that that is a colonial attitude. We would have a colonial attitude if we were failing to insist on the same rights and democracy for the people of Zimbabwe that we insist on for ourselves.
    Mr. Francis Maude: The whole House will want to send a message to the people of Zimbabwe, which should be one of Africa's most prosperous and stable nations, that we are their friend, and that Britain stands by its friends when they are in trouble. They are in trouble because of the regime: the wholesale intimidation of journalists and anyone with dissident views; the way in which the Government are cynically encouraging thugs to invade property despite the Government failing to win the recent referendum; the continued prosecution of a pointless and costly war in the Congo; and the postponement of the elections. All that is condemning Zimbabwe to penury and oppression. It is a process that now has all the hallmarks of ethnic cleansing.
    Everyone in Zimbabwe that I know of agrees that land reform is needed, but, so far, the 1 million or so acres that have been acquired by the Government over the 20 years since independence have been given not to the dispossessed but to Mugabe's cronies. Apart from our concerns for Zimbabwe itself, the House must be aware that, on the Foreign Office's own assessment, around 50,000 Zimbabweans either have, or are entitled to, British passports and are therefore entitled to enter Britain, so this country cannot stand idly by.
    Will the Foreign Secretary tell the House why bilateral aid to Zimbabwe's Government is now increasing and Britain is still providing Zimbabwe with military assistance, as shown in the recent reply by the Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the hon.
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    Member for Neath (Mr. Hain)? Why is nothing being done, as far as we know, to investigate the possibility of freezing the overseas assets of Mr. Mugabe and his cronies? Those would be sanctions directed against the regime, and not the people. Why did the EU yesterday decide to continue to provide aid to the Government of Zimbabwe? Has the Foreign Secretary agreed to meet Morgan Tsvangirai, the Opposition leader, later this week when he is in Britain, as I plan to do?
    Why has it taken so long for the Foreign Secretary to get around to involving the Commonwealth? Should not that family of nations be the main vehicle for international pressure, threatening suspension if Zimbabwe fails to return to the rule of law? Why should attempts not be made now to get the recent Secretary-General of the Commonwealth, or another respected African leader, to take the lead in putting pressure on the Mugabe regime to change?
    Is it any wonder that Mark Chavunduka—one of Zimbabwe's leading newspaper editors, who was tortured by the Mugabe regime last January—said, when I met him last week:
    I was disappointed when I heard the statement by Robin Cook—basically, it was a bit wishy-washy. I would go for a far tougher course of action…?
    Last week, the Foreign Secretary had the chance to make crystal clear to Mr. Mugabe the abhorrence felt throughout the Commonwealth at his Government's behaviour. Does he understand how mortified and angry British people are when, instead of winning any concessions from Mr. Mugabe, the Foreign Secretary limply promises to muzzle his own criticisms?
    There is a serious crisis in which Britain has a direct interest. Crises call for statesmanship. The Foreign Secretary does not even get close.
    Mr. Cook: I congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on his exercise in burning the midnight oil rather than listening to exchanges in the Chamber. I am grateful to him for agreeing with—indeed repeating—many of my points.
    I am happy to confirm that, like the right hon. Gentleman, I shall meet Mr. Tsvangirai. I suspect that he is looking forward rather more to a useful discussion with the Government than to one with the Opposition of the sort that we have just heard. As for why I am raising the issue only at the next meeting of the Commonwealth ministerial action group, I cannot do it any earlier than when the next meeting happens to be. I have already told the Secretary-General that it will be on the agenda on that occasion—[Interruption.] The right hon. Gentleman has asked me a number of questions and he is entitled to hear the answer.
    On the question of military training, the training provided is not to the Government or the army of Zimbabwe, but to the whole of the southern region of Africa, and it is training in peacekeeping intervention by the Organisation of African Unity or the United Nations. The group is based in Zimbabwe, but provides services across the whole of the region and to the other countries in the region. I can think of no better way of losing us influence with neighbouring countries of the region whose support we now need than withdrawing that facility.

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    The right hon. Gentleman suggests that we should withdraw aid to Zimbabwe, but which aid would he have us withdraw? Does he want us to withdraw the aid that we are providing to combat HIV, when a quarter of the population of Zimbabwe suffers from AIDS? Does he want us withdraw our support for irrigation, which helps those who do not currently have land? Does he want us to stop providing assistance with sanitation, which helps to prevent the urban and rural poor being exposed to disease? Those are the projects that we are undertaking. I cannot imagine a worse way of convincing the people of Zimbabwe that we are their friend, as the right hon. Gentleman says that he wants us to appear.
    Finally, the right hon. Gentleman's statement is flatly in conflict with the statement made last Sunday by the Leader of the Opposition, who said:
    I think the Government needs to restore better relations with Zimbabwe.
    The whole House is baffled as to how the right hon. Gentleman imagines any of his prescriptions will achieve the objective of the leader of his party. Instead, he has indulged in empty gesture politics that will not help to resolve the situation in Zimbabwe. Perhaps he should adjourn, go and see the leader of his party and ask who really speaks for the Tory party on foreign policy.
    Mr. Menzies Campbell: Can the Foreign Secretary confirm that Her Majesty's Government have now suspended the export to Zimbabwe of all arms and arms-related equipment, including spare parts for Hawk aircraft?
    Is not the blunt, unpalatable truth that, if the United Kingdom acts on its own, it is likely to be far less effective than if we initiate concerted action through the Commonwealth, especially among Zimbabwe's African neighbours? What initiatives have the Government taken to persuade Zimbabwe's neighbours that the stability of Zimbabwe is as much in their interests as in anyone else's?
    Finally, if it comes to the question of refugees—we must all fervently hope that that will not be the case—will the Secretary of State confirm that the Government will accept not just their legal but their moral obligations to all and any refugees from Zimbabwe, whatever their ethnic origin?
    Mr. Cook: On the last point, it is extremely important that we do not say anything that could be misconstrued or create a sense of panic. As it is, we always have contingency plans for every country, in case we should be required to assist. I will say no more on that, if the right hon. and learned Gentleman will allow me.
    I agree that the pressure is likely to be more effective if we work with African leaders, and I can assure the right hon. and learned Gentleman that, in the course of Cairo, I discussed the position of Zimbabwe with the leader of every country neighbouring Zimbabwe.
    On the supply of arms and weapons to Zimbabwe, I can tell the House that for a long time we have not provided licences for any equipment that might be used for oppression within Zimbabwe. We recently took a decision that we would not provide any licences for new
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    equipment that might be used in the Congo. We are, of course, saddled with existing commitments from the previous regime—
    Mrs. Cheryl Gillan: No, you are not.
    Mr. Cook: The hon. Lady supports a party which as recently as 1992 sent five Hawks to Zimbabwe, and the right hon. Member for Horsham (Mr. Maude) was a Minister in the Government who agreed to do it. We will of course continue to make sure that the matter is kept under review, but at present there will be no new equipment for Zimbabwe, either for the Congo or for internal repression.
    Mr. Peter L. Pike: My right hon. Friend will remember that, at the time of the Lancaster house talks, land and cash from the United Kingdom and the United States were major issues in those discussions and the agreements. He has rightly said that, to date, the redistribution of land has been a dismal failure. He will also know that President Mugabe blames the financial position largely on the British Government. Will my right hon. Friend set the record straight and make it clear that the financial position is a result of the fact that Zimbabwe is not using the funds appropriately to achieve the objectives set out in the Lancaster house agreement?
    Mr. Cook: In fairness, it must be said that Britain has supplied £44 million to support land reform in Zimbabwe. We remain willing to help further, but it must be a programme, first, that involves the rule of law and fair price to a willing seller, and secondly, that tackles the needs of the rural poor, not those who happen to have access to, and influence in, Harare. We remain committed to taking that forward. I hope that we will have the opportunity to do so, but we need co-operation from President Mugabe to achieve that.
    I share with my hon. Friend his view that the position of the economy of Zimbabwe cannot be blamed on Britain or any other European power. President Mugabe has been in power 20 years and must accept at least some of the responsibility for the present state of Zimbabwe. The people of Zimbabwe are inclined to share that view.
    Sir Peter Tapsell: As the son of parents who stood their ground on a coffee shamba in the heart of Kikuyuland throughout the Mau Mau rebellion in Kenya, and as someone who made his maiden speech in the House on the subject of Rhodesia almost exactly 40 years ago, may I agree with the right hon. Gentleman that, in the comfort and security of the Chamber, we all need to measure our words extremely carefully? While contingency arrangements must obviously be made for any unhappy developments, threatening words from outside Zimbabwe are not likely to be well received, via the BBC World Service, on their wirelesses by European farmers who may be miles away from any other European.
    I have known Mr. Mugabe for a great many years, and my belief is that he is not a man who is incapable of being persuaded to take a reasonable course of action in certain circumstances. Has the Foreign Secretary, for instance, approached Mr. Nelson Mandela or Mr. Kenneth Kaunda, to ask whether they might be prepared to go and mediate,

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    as they demonstrated during their leadership of their two countries the great contribution that Europeans can make in an African country?
    Mr. Cook: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his support and his appeal for restraint. He speaks with real authority. Those of us who have been directly in touch with people in Zimbabwe in the past few weeks can confirm that his words are echoed by people on the ground in Zimbabwe.
    I take the hon. Gentleman's point about the importance of trying to find someone who can connect with President Mugabe and speak to him with respect and authority. I assure him that we are continuing to seek such a way of making an approach. He will understand that it will not help at this time if we start to discuss names in public.
    Mr. Malcolm Savidge: Does my right hon. Friend share my view that, although the issues are emotive, they require a delicate balance between forcefulness and diplomacy, and that the shadow Foreign Secretary's recent indulgence in juvenile partisan abuse on the radio did him no credit at home and may have damaged British interests abroad?
    Mr. Cook: I have already been obliged to express my views once on the right hon. Member for Horsham (Mr. Maude); I do not want to have to return to him.
    Mr. Michael Fabricant: Does the Foreign Secretary realise that the position is getting worse and has been deteriorating in the past two or three weeks? Does he also realise that his perceived inaction makes matters worse not only in Zimbabwe but in Kenya? We hear that some opposition Members in Nairobi are calling for similar policies in Kenya. The right hon. Gentleman cannot walk on the fence indefinitely. He must take action. For how long is he prepared simply to say that he will continue to hector President Mugabe when the latter is not in listening mode?
    Mr. Cook: I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on awaking from his slumber. I will spare the House repetition of all that I have said since we started discussing the matter at 3.30 pm. President Mugabe's strategy for the general election is clear: he will stand as a candidate who opposes Britain. It would not be wise, nor would it help the people of Zimbabwe, if we volunteered to fill the role that President Mugabe is writing for us.
    Mr. Tony Lloyd: My right hon. Friend is right to ignore the Opposition's domestic political agenda. We are in serious difficulties with President Mugabe. The message that my right hon. Friend has repeated today is important, and it should be repeated to the audience in Zimbabwe. That corrupt regime, which has squandered the money for land reform, will not improve the interests of the ordinary African, white or black. However, it is important that the ordinary Zimbabwean knows that land reform is available and that the British Government will be at the forefront of those who try to achieve that fairly and consistently.
    Mr. Cook: I am happy to repeat the message, and I hope that the BBC World Service and other outlets will carry it
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    to Zimbabwe so that the truth is known: Britain stands ready to support a programme of land reform provided that it is within the law and that it helps the poor of Zimbabwe. That remains our offer, and we await discussions with people from Zimbabwe. I want the people of Zimbabwe to know that it is not true that we do not support land reform. However, such land reform must be in the interests of the people and not only of the Government.
    Mr. Tom King: Are not the vital interests of neighbouring African countries also affected? The present circumstances, in which there is no rule of law and property is expropriated, threaten any prospect of inward investment in Zimbabwe. Some of that property belongs to banks, and its expropriation will thus undermine them. The circumstances threaten not only the economy of Zimbabwe—any suggestion of their repetition elsewhere will undermine prospects of serious inward investment in other neighbouring African countries because people will have no confidence in the security of their investment.
    Mr. Cook: The right hon. Gentleman makes a fair point, if confiscation of farms proceeds, I cannot imagine that a prospective investor will have confidence in investing in Zimbabwe in the way in which the people need. That could have a ripple effect in the region. In the areas where farms have been occupied, there have been many protests by farm workers who are now denied their livelihoods and cannot support their families.
    Dr. Nick Palmer: Despite the valid criticisms of the policy of violent expropriation, does my right hon. Friend share a slight sense of unease that the media and, indeed, the Chamber, take a keen interest in Zimbabwe only when farmers of European origin are involved? Does my right hon. Friend agree that it would be unwise to place Britain in a position whereby we actively endorse the opposition party in Zimbabwe, as the right hon. Member for Horsham (Mr. Maude), the shadow Foreign Secretary, appears to do? We should criticise policies that are wrong, but we should not attempt to decide Zimbabwean politics.
    Mr. Cook: It is not for us to decide the politics of Zimbabwe or of any other country, but we have the legitimate right to express concern about the human rights and the rule of law in Zimbabwe or elsewhere. I repeat a point that I made earlier, as it requires to be stressed: those farmers who face the prospect of confiscation are every bit as much citizens of Zimbabwe as President Mugabe, and many of their families have been there for generations. I met one at the weekend who is in great distress about what is happening to what he properly and rightly described as "his country". He regards himself as a Zimbabwean; he should be given the chance to help to build the future of Zimbabwe.
    Mr. Peter Brooke: Can the Foreign Secretary shed light on the suggestion that, despite the principle of a fixed-term Parliament, no polling date has been determined because the constituency boundaries have not yet been settled?
    Mr. Cook: As I understand the legal provision, the Parliament of Zimbabwe will require to be dissolved this month because it will come to the anniversary of its

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    election and elections for a new Parliament must be held within four months of the dissolution. I welcome the fact that President Mugabe has committed himself to elections in May and hope that he will carry that through, but the right hon. Gentleman raises a serious point. There are
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    valid concerns about Zimbabwe's preparedness for elections and one is bound to say that the only possible responsibility for that lies with the Government who have been in power for the past four years and have known that there must be elections this year.

Points of Order
4.2 pm
Mrs. Cheryl Gillan: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. You may be aware that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office published its departmental report yesterday and, yet again, hon. Members had a problem obtaining copies in the House. At 5 pm, the Vote Office was prevented from handing over a copy as the Department had insisted that the document had not yet been laid before Parliament. I understand that although the Foreign Office was preventing Members from obtaining the report through the Vote Office, it was made available on the internet, together with a press release, about two hours earlier. Would not it have been more appropriate for Members to have been the first recipients of that allegedly important document?
The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Keith Vaz): Further to that point of order, Madam Speaker. Probably for the first time, the hon. Lady has a point. Due to an administrative error, the report was not laid before the House in time. However, it was laid before the House at 5 pm. We regret that this has happened and are taking steps to make sure that it does not happen again.
Mr. Andrew Mackinlay: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. May I draw your attention to the Local Government Bill, which is the principal business of the House later today? When we passed the Human Rights Act 1998, we gave ourselves a discipline that each Bill would carry a certification from a Secretary of State that it was either compliant with human rights legislation or that he was unable to provide such certification. I understand that this is the first Bill of which a Secretary of State has said:
I am unable to make a statement that in my view the provisions of the Local Government Bill are compatible with the Convention rights…
I understand from the Clerk that that is a debatable point, but, bearing in mind the undertakings given by the Lord Chancellor when the human rights legislation was going through the other place about the gravity and seriousness
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of a Secretary of State being unable to give such an indication, should not the notes available in the Vote Office have offered some explanation?
Madam Speaker: That is why this is certainly not a matter for the Chair; it is for Ministers to explain.
Mr. Michael Fabricant: On a point of order, Madam Speaker.
Madam Speaker: Order. I have not finished; I am still speaking.
As the hon. Member for Thurrock (Mr. Mackinlay) says, the explanatory notes do not make explicit why the Bill is not fully compatible with the European convention on human rights. I suspect that he is referring to clause 91 and section 28, which relates to it.
I repeat that this is not a matter for the Chair. The hon. Gentleman is right in saying that it is a matter for argument and debate. It is for the Minister to explain the Government's position, and also to explain what appears in the Bill.
Now, Mr. Fabricant.
Mr. Fabricant: Thank you, Madam Speaker. I am sorry to have interrupted you.
I was wondering whether the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry had said that he would make a statement to the House, given this morning's news that Alchemy Partners is withdrawing from the Longbridge taskforce set up by him, because of a conflict of interests involving the selection of the chairman of the taskforce by the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry.
Madam Speaker: I am not aware that the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry is seeking to make a statement today.
Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. For the second time in a week, a Minister has come to the Dispatch Box to apologise for the unavailability of documents in the Vote Office. Would you wholly deprecate any instance of documents' not being available in the Vote Office, and ensure that Ministers pay more attention to their Departments so that this does not happen so regularly?
Madam Speaker: I have already done that quite recently. I gave the House an assurance that I would take steps to help to improve the situation; I have done so, and will continue to do so.

Organ Transplants (Presumed Consent)
4.6 pm
Dr. Nick Palmer: I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to establish a national register of people who have not given their consent to transplant of their organs after death; to lay down procedures to be followed before an organ transplant takes place; and for connected purposes.
I apologise in advance for any incoherence. I have been struck by flu, and am thinking of applying for a brain transplant. However, I shall do my best.
The position is quite straightforward. At present, about 200 people die every year owing to the lack of organs suitable for transplant. Only 11 per cent. of the population have registered with the national organ donation scheme, but more than 70 per cent. have said in response to repeated surveys that they would have no objection to the transplant of their organs. In a great many cases, because people did not carry donor cards their organs go with them into the grave or, more frequently, are cremated. As a result, people who could have lived die. A number of cases have been reported in the media recently. I believe that that should concern us all, and that we should consider seriously whether it is in our power to improve the situation.
My Bill proposes that we establish a national register for those who object to the use of their organs for transplant. The existence of the register should be made known as widely as possible. One suggestion is that there should be a box on the electoral registration form. We should ensure that people know that they have such an option, which it is easy for them to take if they do object. About 3 per cent. of the population have signed up to a comparable scheme in Belgium.
The Bill would require a surgeon considering a transplant to take two steps. We would require him or her first to consult the national register of people who object to transplants, and secondly to consult the next of kin, if they are available, to find out whether they object either on behalf of the deceased—perhaps they know that the deceased did object, but had not got around to registering—or because they say that it would greatly distress them. If either condition obtained, the transplant would not take place; but if neither the deceased nor the relatives objected, it would be assumed that consent had been given, and the transplant could take place. The effect would be to cover the middle ground of people who are sympathetic to organ transplants, or have no particular view one way or the other—many people have not given it a thought—but have not obtained a donor card.
Some exemptions are necessary. First, I propose to exempt children on the ground that we cannot reasonably expect a five-year-old to take a decision of the magnitude of whether to go on to a national register. Secondly, for similar reasons, the Bill would exempt people with a long-term mental disability that makes it impossible for them to make a rational assessment of the situation. Thirdly, it would exempt non-residents. We cannot reasonably expect, say, a tourist to be aware of the register.
Beyond that, I am aware of one or two objections. In the Royal College of Nursing debate, where the proposal for informed consent was rejected by three to one, the significant factor seems to have been taking the decision out of the hands of relatives, or the effect on children. Neither would happen under the Bill.
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A number of people feel that the Bill does not go far enough and that, if you or I, Madam Speaker, carry a donor card, our relatives should not be able to override our wishes. I believe that, in the interests of achieving a broad consensus, we should accept that relatives have the last word. The British Medical Association warmly supports the Bill in the belief that the number of relatives who will veto a transplant is very small, unless they are aware that the potential donor was opposed.
I have consulted a number of religious groups. The general tenor is that there is no religious objection on the ground that the soul is deemed to leave the body at the time of death. To quote the Board of Deputies of British Jews, it is an honour if the last act of the individual on earth is to save the life of someone else—it is not only an honour but a duty.
I ask the House to support the Bill. I am aware that it is not uncontroversial, but the purpose of ten-minute Bills is to give an opportunity to air issues that may not be entirely ripe for Government legislation. I hope that the House will allow the Bill to proceed to Second Reading, so that we can pursue the debate and prepare the ground for possible Government legislation in the next Session.
I see no reason to detain the House any longer.
4.13 pm
Dr. Julian Lewis: The hon. Member for Broxtowe (Dr. Palmer) moved the Bill in a modest and moderate way. I shall try to reply very briefly in the same spirit. He has cleverly anticipated some of the main objections that might be raised to a shift from having to opt into a transplant scheme to having to opt out of one, principally those concerning children. We are all aware of the scandal involving the removal of children's organs for research purposes at places such as Alder Hey children's hospital in Liverpool, the subject of early-day motion 139 which is open for signatures and was tabled by the hon. Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook and Small Heath (Mr. Godsiff). That case has perhaps brought to people's attention exactly what is involved when organs are taken from dead bodies.
I personally have no objection to the use of organs for transplanting. Indeed, I have held a donor card since I was old enough to do so. However, I am very concerned about the shift in emphasis from opting into a donor scheme to opting out of one.
The hon. Gentleman's argument might be stronger if we were still talking in the terms—primarily in relation to the physical carrying of a donor card—in which he almost exclusively presented his Bill. The fact is that very many people who would almost certainly have no objection to their organs being used will never get around to filling in a card or, if they do, will end up leaving it at home—as I myself have done on many occasions.
I should have more sympathy with the hon. Gentleman's view if it were the only way of securing a plentiful supply of organs for transplant, but it is not. We live in the age of the internet and of electronic communication. If it is as easy as he suggests for people to be advised of their right to opt out by ticking boxes on ballot papers, for example, why do we not first at least try to use those methods to ensure that more people opt in? There are numerous opportunities for people to be asked to opt into a scheme and to have their decision registered electronically, so that, over time, if someone really wishes

201
his or her organs to be used in that way, it could easily be arranged. They would have only to say yes once, and their consent would be placed on an internet site, electronically and permanently maintained up to date.
As I am sure that the hon. Gentleman would acknowledge—hence the concessions that he made in framing his Bill—this is not an open and shut case in which there are no arguments on one side, with all the arguments on the other. All that can be done to try to make it easy for people to register their willingness to have their organs used should be done before we fall back on the position of very last resort—that of moving to a scheme whereby consent is presumed.
Before I and many other people who have very great sympathy for what the hon. Gentleman is trying to achieve could give him our support, we would have to be convinced that ordinary people who wish their organs to be used have been contacted in a manner that makes it much easier than it is for them to register that fact. If in five years the hon. Gentleman can demonstrate that we have all been contacted and given numerous opportunities to register in a single simple action on an electronic database our willingness to have our organs used in that way, and if he can demonstrate that there has been very little uptake of that, I will listen to his proposals with more sympathy. However, to date, those modern methods have not been tried nearly hard enough. Until they are, I should feel bound to oppose his Bill.
Question put, pursuant to Standing Order No. 23 (Motions for leave to bring in Bills and nomination of Select Committees at commencement of public business):—
The House divided: Ayes 113, Noes 23.

Division No. 159]

[4.19 pm

AYES

Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)

Coaker, Vernon

Ashton, Joe

Colman, Tony

Ballard, Jackie

Connarty, Michael

Banks, Tony

Cotter, Brian

Barnes, Harry

Cummings, John

Barron, Kevin

Dalyell, Tam

Beard, Nigel

Darvill, Keith

Begg, Miss Anne

Davey, Edward (Kingston)

Best, Harold

Davidson, Ian

Borrow, David

Donohoe, Brian H

Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

Etherington, Bill

Brake, Tom

Flynn, Paul

Brand, Dr Peter

Follett, Barbara

Brinton, Mrs Helen

Forth, Rt Hon Eric

Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)

Foster, Rt Hon Derek

Butler, Mrs Christine

Foster, Don (Bath)

Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings)

Campbell-Savours, Dale

Fyfe, Maria

Chidgey, David

Gardiner, Barry

Clapham, Michael

George, Andrew (St Ives)

Clark, Rt Hon Dr David (S Shields)

Gerrard, Neil

Clarke, Rt Hon Kenneth (Rushcliffe)

Gibson, Dr Ian

Gilroy, Mrs Linda

Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

Clwyd, Ann

Harris, Dr Evan

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Humble, Mrs Joan

Roy, Frank

Iddon, Dr Brian

Russell, Bob (Colchester)

Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)

Savidge, Malcolm

Keeble, Ms Sally

Sheerman, Barry

Keen, Alan (Feltham & Heston)

Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert

Kennedy, Rt Hon Charles (Ross Skye & Inverness W)

Shipley, Ms Debra

Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

Khabra, Piara S

Skinner, Dennis

Kidney, David

Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

King, Andy (Rugby & Kenilworth)

Soames, Nicholas

Kingham, Ms Tess

Squire, Ms Rachel

Ladyman, Dr Stephen

Steinberg, Gerry

Lloyd, Tony (Manchester C)

Stunell, Andrew

Llwyd, Elfyn

Swayne, Desmond

McAllion, John

Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

McDonagh, Siobhain

Tonge, Dr Jenny

McDonnell, John

Tredinnick, David

McFall, John

Turner, Dr Desmond (Kemptown)

MacKay, Rt Hon Andrew

Turner, Neil (Wigan)

Mackinlay, Andrew

Twigg, Stephen (Enfield)

MacShane, Denis

Tyler, Paul

McWalter, Tony

Vis, Dr Rudi

Mahon, Mrs Alice

White, Brian

Marsden, Gordon (Blackpool S)

Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Swansea W)

Maxton, John

Meale, Alan

Williams, Mrs Betty (Conwy)

Michie, Bill (Shef'ld Heeley)

Willis, Phil

Morgan, Ms Julie (Cardiff N)

Wood, Mike

Naysmith, Dr Doug

Woodward, Shaun

Oaten, Mark

Wright, Dr Tony (Cannock)

Pike, Peter L

Wyatt, Derek

Pollard, Kerry

Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

Tellers for the Ayes:

Rapson, Syd

Dr. Nick Palmer and

Rendel, David

Ms Jenny Jones.

NOES

Amess, David

Öpik, Lembit

Beith, Rt Hon A J

Plaskitt, James

Bell, Martin (Tatton)

Robathan, Andrew

Bennett, Andrew F

Sanders, Adrian

Burnett, John

Smith, Sir Robert (W Ab'd'ns)

Campbell, Rt Hon Menzies (NE Fife)

Stinchcombe, Paul

Townend, John

Crausby, David

Trend, Michael

Fallon, Michael

Waterson, Nigel

Heath, David (Somerton & Frome)

Wilshire, David

Livsey, Richard

McIntosh, Miss Anne

Tellers for the Noes:

Nicholls, Patrick

Mr. Edward Leigh and

O'Hara, Eddie

Dr. Julian Lewis.

Question accordingly agreed to.
Bill ordered to be brought in by Dr. Nick Palmer, Mr. Vernon Coaker, Dr. Evan Harris, Dr. Howard Stoate, Mr. Michael Jabez Foster, Jane Griffiths, Ms Jenny Jones and Dr. Ian Gibson.

Organ Transplants (Presumed Consent)
  ORGAN TRANSPLANTS (PRESUMED CONSENT)
  Dr. Nick Palmer accordingly presented a Bill to establish a national register of people who have not given their consent to transplant of their organs after death; to lay down procedures to be followed before an organ transplant takes place; and for connected purposes: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time on Friday 21 July, and to be printed [Bill 109].
Orders of the Day

  Local Government Bill [Lords]
  Order for Second Reading read.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Alan Haselhurst): I should inform the House that Madam Speaker has selected the amendment in the name of the Leader of the Opposition. Madam Speaker has also imposed a 15-minute restriction on Back Benchers' speeches.
  4.30 pm
  The Minister for Local Government and the Regions (Ms Hilary Armstrong): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
  My right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister and Secretary of State rang me last night sending his apologies to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. He also sent very special greetings to the hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mr. Norman). My right hon. Friend has, of course, been in Japan at a G8 meeting of Environment Ministers, and has also had a meeting with the new Japanese Prime Minister. He is currently travelling home.
  Last spring, the House debated the Government's first Local Government Bill. That legislation introduced the new duty of best value, which came into force last week. This Bill takes another firm step towards modern local government. It has already been considered in draft by a Joint Committee of both Houses last Session, and by their lordships.
  Over the past three years—in stark contrast to the ideological dogma that underpinned the Conservative party' s approach to local government—the Government have worked to develop a new partnership with local people and local councils. We have worked to give local people a bigger stake in shaping their future, and to revitalise local democracy—fostering new local democratic institutions that are appropriate for the new millennium.
  Mr. John Bercow: Will the Minister explain how, in a scripted speech, she has the brass neck to go on about ideological dogma when the principal purpose of the Bill is compulsorily to impose a system that thousands of councillors regard as less accountable, less transparent and less representative? Why does not she listen to the view of Lord Dixon-Smith, who opposes the compulsory provision? He has 28 years of experience in local government, in contrast to her meagre three years of service there.
  Ms Armstrong: I was clearly wrong to give way, so I shall continue with my speech. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will learn something from it, and realise that he has made a few mistakes.
  We have increased the level of resources available to local councils to meet local needs. We have established new partnerships, giving local councillors real influence in shaping national policies. We have abolished crude and universal capping, and we have replaced the ideological dead hand of compulsory competitive tendering with a new best value regime that has been widely welcomed by local authorities and is already delivering better value
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  local services for local people. We are putting local people at the centre of determining what works best for them in their localities.
  The new Local Government Bill builds on the foundations of that new partnership and delivers a new democratic settlement for local communities. The Bill will bring new life to local government, bringing an end to the red-tape town hall committee culture and building modern local government that puts local people at the centre of decision making and enlivens local democracy.
  Mr. Owen Paterson: How does the right hon. Lady square this extraordinary paean for her own efforts over the past three years with the brutal shift of £500 million of central Government money from the shire counties to the inner cities?
  Ms Armstrong: The hon. Gentleman cannot add up. This Government, in contrast to the previous Government, have put a further 7.8 per cent. in real terms into local government over the past three years. It is not true that £500 million less goes to shire areas now than they had at the start of this Parliament, or than they would have had if the Conservative Government had continued in office. Over the three years before the election, local government finance was cut by 4.3 per cent.
  The Government's modernising agenda for local government is a unified package: changes in local political structures are integral to effective service delivery. Modern local government is, in turn, a vital part of the fabric of the dynamic, democratic, fair and inclusive society that people want to see. It is vital to securing the quality of life that people deserve and have a right to expect.
  The Bill makes much clearer to the public the fact that local councils are there to serve, and the public will understand more clearly who is accountable for local decisions and where the buck stops when things go wrong. That is a vital component of any democratic renewal. The Bill is intended to bring new life to local democracy and to create dynamic local government that listens to what people really want.
  Mr. Andrew Robathan: The right hon. Lady refers to accountability to the public, but many people are worried that public access to council meetings and decision making will be restricted. The Darlington Labour council leader said:
  Holding meetings in public would merely create a theatrical experience for onlookers.
  Does the right hon. Lady agree that the Bill will increase secrecy, lack of openness and lack of transparency in local government?
  Ms Armstrong: As my speech continues, I shall deal with those issues. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will enjoy that part of my speech, and he can wait for it to come.
  The vast majority of local councils have already begun to modernise their working arrangements by consulting their public and devising new ways of working that empower them to tackle 21st century problems. The Bill

  205
  will create the framework so that all citizens can be assured that they are governed locally by a local authority that is fit for the purpose for the new millennium.
  Mr. James Gray: Will the Minister give way on that point?
  Ms Armstrong: Which point?
  Mr. Gray: I wished to intervene on the point that the right hon. Lady was making. She obviously did not gather that.
  Along with all the new Labour cant words that she uses, the right hon. Lady makes great play of allowing local authorities to decide how they will run themselves and modernise themselves for the new century. Why, then, has she said specifically that most councils in the land may not do what they wish, but must conform to one of the three options that she offers them? Why has she ignored the unanimous cross-party recommendation from the pre-legislative scrutiny Committee, on which I served?
  Ms Armstrong: I am coming to that point. I thought that the hon. Gentleman was challenging my saying that we are in the new millennium. Given where he is coming from, I would not have been surprised if he had.
  Local councils have a vital role in exercising community leadership. They know that if they are to carry out that role effectively, they need to modernise the way in which they work to meet new demands—for example, social inclusion, community safety and sustainable regeneration—in addition to local government's historic purposes of nurturing and educating our children and protecting the vulnerable.
  Only modern councils can carry out those vital roles—councils that are in touch with the people, with councillors scrutinising the work of executive members and thus ensuring that those who make the decisions locally are held accountable for those decisions locally. They will deliver better quality local services in a responsive way, and work within a strong, clear ethical framework that strengthens the bond of trust between the community and those who seek to serve it.
  The Government are committed to ensuring that the devolution settlement for Wales is reflected in this legislation, and we have been working with the National Assembly to achieve that. Both the Government and the Assembly agree that it is essential to get the arrangements for local government right. We are listening to views in Wales to ensure that we get the approach right for Wales, and it is up to councils in England and Wales to listen to their local communities too.
  Mr. Simon Thomas: Before the Minister leaves the subject of Wales, will she say something about community planning? I appreciate the work that has gone into the co-operation between the Government and the National Assembly, but the Welsh Local Government Association has requested that the Bill impose on local authorities a duty to undertake community planning, rather than merely giving them the power to do so.
  Ms Armstrong: I am becoming more and more convinced that I should not take interventions, because
  206
  the next point in my speech is to reaffirm that the Government have already told the House of Lords that we have agreed that point with the Welsh Assembly and other bodies.
  Part I gives local authorities a broad new power to promote or improve the economic, social or environmental well-being of their areas, or of the people who live there. It will give the initiative back to local authorities, enabling them to take new action to respond to the specific needs of their communities, and build new partnerships with other local bodies to deliver real improvements in local conditions.
  Accountable councils in this age can do more than just deliver services. They also give clear direction to their communities, and help to ensure that local action reflects local priorities and is co-ordinated effectively. Effective community leadership means generating support for change and working with others to deliver that change. It means managing and negotiating differences and co-ordinating and facilitating action by others, not just by the council itself.
  That is why community strategies are such an important part of our plans to modernise local government. With the new power to promote well-being, it will be for local authorities and their communities to determine what action should be taken. We therefore want to see strategies being prepared by "local strategic partnerships", bringing together councils, public sector agencies, local businesses, voluntary organisations and local communities. Those strategies should set out a shared vision for the community that reflects local aspirations and recognises the potential for all sections of the community to contribute ideas and resources.
  Because of the importance that we attach to that role, and the potential for effective community planning to help deliver many of the changes that are essential if local quality of life is to be improved, we will table appropriate amendments to give local authorities a duty, rather than simply a power, to undertake community planning.
  Sir Paul Beresford: Clause 3 deals with the limits that will be put on local authorities' powers, and with the prospect that that will be done through guidance. When the Bill goes into Standing Committee, will that Committee be able to see examples of that guidance, and know where the Government intend to put the limits?
  Ms Armstrong: As the hon. Gentleman knows, we have consistently sought to give the House opportunities to see guidance and regulations during the passage of legislation through the House. We certainly intend to do the same this time, and substantial draft guidance has already been issued in relation to other parts of the Bill. We have received comments on that guidance, and some of the Government amendments will reflect that process. We want to rework the proposals constantly, in the light of the ideas and views that are brought forward.
  The new powers and responsibilities for local government, in addition to the new responsibilities in connection with best value and the new freedoms arising from changes in the financial regime, present both challenges and opportunities for modern councils.
  The traditional council committee structure is not well placed to deal with the new responsibilities that modernisation brings—it simply cannot cope. Local people

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  deserve better. That is what the reforms of the political management system will provide—a more efficient, transparent and accountable system that can meet the challenges of modern governance.
  Mr. Llew Smith: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
  Ms Armstrong: If my hon. Friend does not mind, I will finish this section of my speech, because I suspect that it deals with a matter that he wants to raise.
  Amendments were carried in the other place which have contradictory effects, but which essentially could allow councils to retain the status quo. That cannot be an option. We simply do not agree that the outdated committee system can deliver. All councils will have to change to reflect the new demands on them and the expectations of local people.
  Under these provisions, councils will draw up new constitutions in which the full council, meeting in public, decides the policy framework and budget, while the executive—whatever its form—is accountable for implementing the policies and delivering the services that local people want within that policy framework. The overview and scrutiny committees will hold the executive to account for what they have done and what they are planning to do. The provisions will also ensure that councils consider how the implementation of service delivery is working for the citizen.
  Dr. Lynne Jones: Will the Minister give way?
  Ms Armstrong: I really should give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent (Mr. Smith) first.
  Mr. Smith: The Minister said that the Government were in the business of devolving power. However, the Bill centralises power, in the hands of either a mayor or a leader with a cabinet. I accept that some local authorities may want that system, but others prefer the status quo. If the Government really are in the business of devolving power, those local authorities should have the opportunity to develop a system that reflects the problems and ambitions of their local community.
  Ms Armstrong: I think that my hon. Friend has not recognised that many councils are already changing, not because we say so, but because they know that the present system simply cannot meet people's needs. If my hon. Friends will bear with me until I am further into my speech, I will develop those arguments.
  We will not force councils down one route. The options available to them are far more extensive than anything for the past 150 years. I remind the House that the current system was introduced when the only people who went into local government belonged to the squirearchy—the people who owned land. [Interruption.] Friends of Conservative Members, obviously. Committee systems were set up for people to come together every now and again to agree matters—not very many—for their area. That is the basic system, and it is the only legal system that can be used today.
  Three broad types of executive are set out in the Bill—mayor and cabinet, leader and cabinet, mayor and council manager. There is, however, considerable scope for
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  diversity within those options to meet local circumstances. Local councils will, for the first time for more than 150 years, be able to develop different structures that reflect the different local circumstances. The options allow great variation within each framework, even though many have failed to recognise that.
  Mr. Peter L. Pike: I hate to have to disagree with the conclusion to which my right hon. Friend is coming on the Bill, but is it not a fact that the Joint Committee, on which I served, expressed the view that an improved status quo should be offered within the Bill? That would not be the status quo exactly as it is now, but a fourth option—an improved status quo.
  Ms Armstrong: Amendments have been made to the Bill, and they reflect the ideas that came from the Joint Committee. I hope that my hon. Friend will have the opportunity to express those ideas in Committee. We are prepared to consider other ways of doing things. I want to be responsive to the points that my hon. Friend is making, but I also want to enable councils to ensure that they can conduct their business in ways that deal with the issues that face them today—the issues involved in being a community leader—in a way that frequently has simply not been their role in the past. That is much more important today than previously.
  Mrs. Gwyneth Dunwoody: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
  Ms Armstrong: I am trying to deal with the previous intervention.
  Hon. Members: Ooh.
  Mr. Keith Simpson: She has lost her cliché.
  Ms Armstrong: I will give way to my hon. Friend.
  Mrs. Dunwoody: I am deeply grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way so graciously. I want to ask her one simple question. All the systems that she has outlined will require tough scrutiny and, as she knows, scrutiny committees are not always met with unalloyed appreciation when they express their views. What measures in the Bill will guarantee that a scrutiny committee will be given sufficient resources to deal with the real possibility of corruption and distortion of honesty in relation to council matters, and will be independent of the people who are working for the leader and the tiny group around him or her?
  Ms Armstrong: I agree that scrutiny is ever more important—and that that is one of the problems with the status quo. There is no opportunity within the status quo legitimately to pursue scrutiny. That is one of the reasons why we say that there needs to be a change. As my hon. Friend may already know, we as a party have already made it absolutely clear that no whip will be allowed on scrutiny committees. We are discussing and working with the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives and other officers to ensure that they are content that they will have the appropriate mechanisms to support scrutiny properly.

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  They are discussing with us the nature of the guidance and so on that will go alongside the Bill to secure exactly what my hon. Friend asks for.
  Mrs. Gillian Shephard: Will the right hon. Lady give way?
  Ms Armstrong: I have to make some progress with my speech. I shall be more than happy to give way in a moment or two.
  The Bill makes it clear that local people will decide the form of the executive, but our reforms are not simply about mayors and cabinets. The executive is only one half of the new executive arrangements. The other half—overview and scrutiny—is equally important. Indeed, I have said consistently that when setting up a new constitution, councils should consider overview and scrutiny first, because without effective overview and scrutiny, any new executive arrangements simply will not work. It is also clear that the representative role of councillors will become much more important. Councillors will spend more time bringing the views of local people and stakeholders to bear on the development and implementation of the council's policy, either through the overview and scrutiny committees or in full council meetings.
  It has been said that those councillors will be second class. I reject that. The role is different, but it is no less important than that of any member of the executive. The present committee system offers no opportunity for the routine scrutiny of decisions, nor for regular and systematic examination of their implementation. No one can defend that.
  Dr. Lynne Jones: I assure my right hon. Friend that when I was a member of Birmingham city council, I took extremely seriously the scrutiny of policy—as I do in this place. As a member of the council, I was able to do so because I had access to officers.
  My right hon. Friend mentioned the need for community leaders. Surely, the real impediment to true community leadership is interference from Government.
  Ms Armstrong: That is why the Bill includes proposals to give local government far more freedom to develop matters—that is what the well-being power is all about.
  I am aware that my hon. Friend, as the chair of a council committee, made sure that she followed up policies and policy development. That was not the point that I was making. My point is that it is the responsibility of the council to do that, and to do so in public so that the public are involved and can ensure that questions are asked and that there is accountability. That is the key to these changes—many people have not yet realised that.
  It is clear that the representative role of councillors will become much more important. Councillors will spend more time bringing the views of local people and stakeholders to bear on the development and implementation of the council's policies, either through the overview and scrutiny committees or in council meetings.
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  Some people have asked why the Bill does not insist that executives meet in public. The executive is not a committee; individual members will be given the right to take decisions. Indeed, at present many decisions are delegated to officers. A formal event, such as a public meeting, does not make an arrangement transparent or accountable. If we are honest, we all know what really happens. Frequently, a political group meets to debate the options and to take decisions; often, there are not even minutes of the meeting. If minutes are taken, they are certainly not made public. The meetings are not open or accountable. The committee then formally takes a decision, often without even revealing which options were considered. That is what happens at present; it is not open and transparent.
  It is right that members of an executive should have the opportunity to think. Decisions will be published—as will reasons and background papers. In the draft guidance, we have already stated that
  significant decisions should not be a surprise to those whom they affect.
  Too many councils have rushed into interim arrangements that have not taken into account the points made in the draft guidance.
  Mr. Mark Fisher: I agree with the Minister that decisions made in caucus—whatever the political party—do not serve the public well. They are not open and transparent to the public. However, how on earth will private meetings of executives—in closed session—help the participation of the public? How are the public to know about the debate and the decisions? The executives will merely present them with a fait accompli. How will the Bill result in greater participation, transparency or openness?
  Ms Armstrong: As I have already said, the executive is not a committee. Decisions will be published, and will be published quickly; the options that have been considered will be published; and the minutes that lead to the decisions and the way in which the decisions are taken will be published. All that will be open to scrutiny. Therefore, decisions will be accountable in a way that decisions taken at the moment are simply not accountable. I urge my hon. Friends to consider how people take decisions and take time to think. If an individual takes a decision, it is very difficult to legislate for that decision to be taken in public.
  Dr. Tony Wright: I have listened carefully to my right hon. Friend. However, if people come to believe that there is more secrecy under the new arrangements than under the old arrangements, the whole intent of the Bill, which is to revitalise local democracy, will be undermined from the start. Surely the Bill's drafting must ensure that that does not happen.
  Ms Armstrong: I agree with my hon. Friend. I am trying to describe the real problems that there are with the argument that one obtains openness by formally taking decisions in public. I do not believe that that guarantees openness or accountability. We want to ensure that all the options considered are in the open and that the way in which they are considered and the advice given on them receive proper scrutiny. After all, we are well used to such a system in this Chamber, and our proposal will lead to

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  improvements in the quality of decision making in local government and to the way in which such decisions are held accountable.
  Mr. Neil Gerrard: Is not one of the key points that we should consider the ability of people who may be interested in a decision to have an influence on that decision before it is a made? If an executive meets in private, how can anyone have an influence on a decision before it is made? At present, under the system that involves party political groups, people know that decisions are being made or are being considered, so they have an opportunity to try to influence them.
  Ms Armstrong: My hon. Friend obviously did not hear or understand what I said. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] We are trying to hold a debate, but Conservative Members are not used to that.
  In the draft guidance, we say that significant decisions should not be a surprise to those whom they may affect, and there is much more in the guidance on that point. It explains how executives will consult on, and work through, options before they take a decision. Some authorities—and members of them are present today—take careful pre-scrutiny positions so that their scrutiny committees are involved before a decision is made. Some of those decisions will be taken in public. However, some emergency decisions are taken by an officer without people receiving any prior knowledge. Such decisions do not receive scrutiny and they are not accountable. In future, emergency decisions will be taken by an executive, and they may need to be taken quickly on the day that a problem arises. In those circumstances, it would be difficult and might threaten the safety of children or other people if executives were not able to take decisions without having to give the three-days' notice that is in the current arrangements. The aim is to achieve more open and accountable decision making. I hope that the ideas of colleagues and others will enable us to include a process in the Bill that people are convinced is more open and will allow proper decision making.
  Mr. Gray: Will the right hon. Lady give way?
  Ms Armstrong: No, I have already given way to the hon. Gentleman.
  I urge all councils and councillors to recognise that the new system is part of a new culture of openness, accountability and closer working relationships with the public, and I hope that they will introduce ways of working that express that culture and which are not bound up with traditional methods.
  Mr. Llew Smith: As I understand it, the Bill does not require the executive even to publish the agenda. If it does not, how can people outside the executive—other councillors and the general public—know what policies are being discussed and what options are available?
  Ms Armstrong: That is precisely why I say that there should be a new culture. On some occasions, it would be absolutely right and possible to publish an agenda, but if, for example, a child abuse case required a quick decision, there would be no opportunity to publish an agenda. Hon. Members say that we can deal with such situations now, but we are seeking to ensure that elected members make
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  those decisions, whereas in the past they have been almost exclusively delegated to officers. Such a shift requires new rules. If councils are working within that—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I know that the right hon. Lady is seeking to answer points made by her colleagues, but she should be addressing the Chair, not turning her back on me.
  Ms Armstrong: I apologise, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I usually talk only to the Chair, but sometimes I feel that I am being rude to those behind me.
  I am seeking to make sure that hon. Members know that we aim to introduce a new culture, but we are also trying to find ways to ensure that there is proper, effective decision making. It is clear that Opposition Members do not want proper, effective decision making; they are simply looking for ways to have a go at local government.
  I move now to part III, which introduces the new ethical framework. That is an integral part of our plans to bring new life to local democracy. Effective democratic government is dependent on the bond of trust between the community and those who represent them, whether in local, regional or central Government. Restoring and strengthening that bond is vital. No unethical behaviour is acceptable. In the few cases where it does occur, we need to make sure that there is a suitable framework for investigating and punishing any wrongdoing. Part III establishes such a framework.
  Sir Paul Beresford: Many hon. Members on both sides of the House are deeply concerned that the mechanism that the Minister is setting up will engender the possibility of more corruption. Part of her answer to that point is the scrutiny committee, which she says should not be whipped. If, however, she has read the evidence given to the Select Committee by the leader of Hammersmith and Fulham council, she will be aware of the pressure of patronage—cronyism. How can she answer that point?
  Ms Armstrong: Every system, as we know, is open to corruption. We intend to make sure that there are methods of dealing with wrong-doing, by making processes as open and accountable as possible, in a way that they are not at the moment. We hope that the Bill will ensure that anybody who is interested in coming into public service for corrupt means thinks that it is not worth trying to do so. I believe that the provisions in part III will help us to do that.
  Those provisions establish a framework, the principal components of which are: statutory codes of conduct to which all members of local authorities must sign up; standards committees within councils to promote and maintain high standards of conduct; and an independent mechanism for the investigation of allegations of misconduct. In England, the latter function will be the role of a new body, the Standards Board; and in Wales, the Commission for Local Administration in Wales will take on the task. There will also be a separate tribunal mechanism with the power to impose suitable penalties, ranging from censure to suspension from standing as a councillor for up to five years. Alongside those arrangements, the Bill includes provision for the repeal of surcharging. That is in line with the recommendations of the Nolan committee and, more recently, the Joint Committee that considered the draft Bill.

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  The welfare services provisions in clauses 86 and 87 are only a small part of the Bill, but they are vital to many people in Great Britain. They are designed to improve the quality and diversity of support services by introducing a new holistic planning and grant-making system at local level. That means that vulnerable people will be able to receive the support they need to live independently in the community, and it gives local authorities an important community leadership role in the planning and provision of services in partnership with others.
  We shall table an amendment in Committee to facilitate joint working through a one-off transfer of data at the point of change to the new system. That will ensure that vulnerable people continue to receive the vital services they need during the changeover period, and beyond.
  Mr. Bercow: Will the Minister give way?
  Ms Armstrong: On this point?
  Mr. Bercow: Yes—it is a most important point. The right hon. Lady rightly refers to standards committees, and I am sure that she is familiar with the provisions of clause 49. Will the regulations governing the size and composition of those committees be subject to the negative or the affirmative procedure?
  Ms Armstrong: That is not the point to which I was speaking, but never mind. I am sure that that will be an issue of debate in Committee—
  Mr. Bernard Jenkin: She does not know!
  Ms Armstrong: We have not yet finished the Bill. As the hon. Gentleman knows, we worked co-operatively on the previous legislation; on many occasions when pressure was exerted in Committee to change provisions in the Bill, we agreed to do so. I do not want to preclude the possibility of doing that with this Bill. Perhaps he likes to work in a confrontational way, but I prefer to work, as far as possible, in a co-operative way—as he knows from his experience on previous legislation.
  The Government also intend to introduce an amendment to the Bill that will enable local authorities to respond better to the needs of the national child care strategy. The Under-Secretary of State for Education and Employment, my hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Ms Hodge), submitted an outline of the amendment in a parliamentary answer given today. Local authorities cannot pass on any of the costs of the child care that they provide to parents who receive the working families tax credit. We will continue to provide free child care where children are in need, but we want the child care tax credit within the WFTC to help families with their child care costs. Therefore, the amendment will allow local authorities to charge other parents receiving WFTC a proportion of their child care costs.
  Clause 91 amends section 2A of the Local Government Act 1986—more infamously known as section 28. The Government are committed to its repeal and will table amendments to achieve that. It would be fair to say that the debate so far on this issue has generated more heat
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  than light, so before Opposition Members attempt to raise the temperature again, let me set out clearly the limits and deficiencies of the legislation.
  Contrary to popular belief, section 2A does not apply to schools and, therefore, has no effect on what is taught in the classroom. That was clearly recognised by the previous Government and was spelled out in guidance that they issued in 1994. It does, however, inhibit local authorities from addressing the legitimate needs of a particular section of their communities. The Government believe that there is no place for such discriminatory legislation on the statute book.
  Local authorities should be free to address the needs of the gay community in exactly the same way as they address the needs of other groups, and it should be for authorities—properly accountable to local people—to decide what action they need to take to improve the quality of life of all sections of their community. That simple principle is at the heart of the Bill. I make no apologies for it, and none for telling the House that we will table amendments to the Bill to repeal section 2A of the 1986 Act.
  In response to an earlier intervention, I can say that there are considerable doubts whether section 2A is compatible with the European convention on human rights. Clause 91, inserted in the other place, amends but also reaffirms the provisions of section 2A. By extension, the amendment makes it doubtful that the Bill is compatible with the European convention on human rights.
  Mr. Robathan: I am grateful to the right hon. Lady. She said that the measure did not affect schools, but section 28 of the Local Government Act 1988 states that a local authority shall not
  promote the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship.
  Does the right hon. Lady want local authorities to spend money on that?
  Ms Armstrong: That Act was overtaken by a subsequent Education Act, which put the teaching of sex education in the hands of governors, in consultation with parents. The previous Government issued guidance which made that clear. The guidance stated that section 28 could not apply in schools.
  Mr. Andrew Mackinlay: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way. I have no hesitation in supporting the amendments that the Government are to introduce on the matter. On the issue of law making, however, my right hon. Friend should publish the advice that she was given. I find the Bill neutral. The previous Act may be contrary to human rights, but the Bill is not. When the Human Rights Bill went through another place, the Lord Chancellor said that there would be a burden on Government to explain why it was not possible, unusually, to make a statement of human rights compliance.
  It should also be borne in mind that, since the case of Pepper v. Hart, what is said in the Chamber can be considered by the Law Lords. Unless the fact of human rights compliance is explicitly stated on the Floor of the House or in the explanatory memorandum, which is silent

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  on the matter, there could be confusion rather than clarity. Will my right hon. Friend therefore publish the advice that she received?
  Ms Armstrong: I have made it clear that we believe that there are considerable doubts whether section 2A is compatible. It is our responsibility to say that we are certain that a Bill is compatible. We are not certain; there are considerable doubts. I believe that the comments on the Bill have been published, as the advice was given by lawyers to the organisation known as Justice. My hon. Friend says that the Bill may be compatible, but because it amends section 2A that may bring its compatibility into doubt.
  As we move into the 21st century, we also move towards a new era of local government and local partnership, with councils working together—
  Mr. Gerald Howarth: The Minister claimed that the Local Government Act 1988, which includes section 28, was superseded by another Act. However, I believed that we were considering section 2A of the Local Government Act 1986, which was superseded by the 1988 Act. The 1988 Act should therefore prevail. However, is the Minister suggesting that the European convention on human rights will render the House powerless to protect children and to uphold the protection that parents want enshrined in law?
  Ms Armstrong: Section 28 is not about protecting children. The Government have made their position clear on the responsibilities of sex and relationship education. The Education Act 1994 places the responsibility for that clearly in the hands of governors in consultation with parents. We affirm that.
  My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Employment said that he would publish guidance, which clearly outlines the way in which governors should deal with sex and relationship education. Teaching and work with children have nothing to do with section 28. Conservative Members should bear that in mind when they vehemently oppose abolishing section 28. They are not trying to protect children. I wonder what they are trying to do if not to promote prejudice and bigotry in this country.
  Mr. Mackinlay: If it is not possible to get the Bill through Parliament in the form that my right hon. Friend and I would like, perhaps because of decisions in the other place, we will face the dilemma of whether to enact a Bill that does not comply with the European convention on human rights. That would be misunderstood around the world, because the Bill also covers mayors, elections and so on. It would be perverse if, to correct stupid law making under previous Governments and poor advice from the Lord Chancellor, we ultimately produced an Act which stated that it contravened human rights legislation. That is bonkers.
  Ms Armstrong: That is not a matter for me. I am not in charge of the House's decisions. I believe that the House will make the Bill compatible with the European convention on human rights. I hope that Opposition Members and Members in another place will take note.
  As we move into the 21st century, we are also moving towards a new era of local government and local partnership, with councils working together with other organisations and local people to improve the quality of
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  life in their local communities. Many local authorities already have a vision of their future; the Bill should give them the means to realise it.
  As I explained earlier, the version of the Bill that has been brought to this House from another place is not yet in the form that the Government would like. We shall propose changes when we progress to the next stage. I repeat that we want the Bill to be compatible with human rights legislation.
  The Bill is far from being a centralising measure. We intend it to return local government to the heart of local communities. It grants new powers and their attendant responsibilities to councils and the local people whom they serve. The Bill should receive a Second Reading.
  5.24 pm
  Mr. Archie Norman: I beg to move, To leave out from "That" to the end of the Question, and to add instead thereof:
  "this House declines to give a Second Reading to the Local Government Bill [Lords] because it is a centralising measure which will have the effect of undermining local democracy, because it will put pressure on local councils to introduce structures which may not suit local needs and circumstances, which will tend to encourage and facilitate a culture of secrecy and lack of consultation, engender corruption, diminish the role of ordinary councillors, encourage the growth of a class of professional local politicians with large salaries, pensions and other fringe benefits, and place officers in a position of potential conflict of interest, because the arrangements in the Bill for the conduct of local referenda in respect of elected mayors are inadequate, because the new power to promote economic, social and environmental well-being, while welcome in principle, is insufficiently defined and overly subject to ministerial interference, because the powers being taken relating to the frequency of elections are too centralising in their nature, and because, although containing welcome provisions relating to the protection of school children from the promotion of homosexuality in schools and from bullying, and the conduct of local councillors and officers, it fails to provide for open, accountable and empowered local government with councils adopting structures that best suit local needs, including modernised and streamlined versions of the committee system".
  I regret the Deputy Prime Minister's absence, although, having heard the genuine concerns expressed from both sides of the House, I can understand why he chose today to be absent. I understand that he is on important business, but I trust that the Minister will pass on my greetings and say that we have missed his inimitable contribution to the debate on Second Reading of another significant Bill.
  The Minister made a torrent of extravagant claims. I have never heard so much jargon on a single issue. She said that the Bill will revitalise local democracy, put local people at the centre and bring a new democratic settlement for local communities and talked of a democratic, dynamic and fair solution, of empowering people to tackle 21st century problems and so on. Those aspirations are universally shared, but largely irrelevant to the subject at hand and most unlikely to be delivered by the Bill.
  We welcome aspects such as the introduction of standards committees, the abolition of surcharging and the extension of councils' responsibilities, but we regret that the Minister appeared to rule out the Lords amendment to allow councils to keep the fourth option—the status quo. The Bill is a hotch-potch and the consideration of it has been a shambles throughout. We have seen more of that today. Proposals aimed at setting in concrete the shape and form of local government for decades should be thought through in minute detail, experimented with, piloted properly in the real world and tempered to reflect the views

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  of practitioners, but these have been cobbled together to such an extent that the Lords passed 438 amendments—one for every five and a half lines. It is no good her saying that we have not finished the Bill because, as it will play a role in shaping democracy in this country, it should have been thought through and experimented with in the first place.
  Mr. John McDonnell: The last major reform of the structure of local government was the abolition of the Greater London council. Can the hon. Gentleman describe the temperate way in which pilot schemes were introduced by the Conservatives when that was suggested?
  Mr. Norman: The whole House had sufficient experience of the GLC in operation, so there was no need to experiment with abolition.
  Maria Eagle: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Norman: No. I want to make progress, but I shall take interventions later.
  In short, the Bill is another ill-thought-through collection of proposals that are widely seen as unsatisfactory on both sides of the House. That is apparent today. At its heart, it reflects a fundamentally flawed thought: the Government's belief that imposing detailed structures and processes from on high will solve the problems of local government. It will not, because the problem is not one of process and structure, but one of substance—what local councils are free to do, what controls and restrictions central Government impose on them and how they are financed.
  Instead of addressing those issues, the Bill represents more centralisation. Worse than that, it will reinforce the dominance of political parties and narrow cliques, encourage secrecy and deter the participation of the able volunteer councillor. Conservative Members recognise that local government has become over-centralised, but when Labour came to power many councillors on all sides looked forward to a different approach. The Deputy Prime Minister himself said that local authorities
  should be liberated from the fetters of Whitehall and the stupid restrictions of the Treasury that inhibit growth and destroy jobs…
  No doubt he still hopes to be released from the stupid restrictions of the Treasury, as seen in the Budget.
  Today, those same councillors are bitterly disappointed because the Government are the most centralising ever. Far from liberating local government, Labour is imposing an ever tightening straitjacket on local democracy. Jeremy Beecham, the Labour chairman of the Local Government Association, summed that up when he warned of
  the strange death of local democracy…
  Dr. Lynne Jones: The hon. Gentleman implies that he agrees with my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister. If so, which Treasury restrictions do the Conservatives propose to remove?
  Mr. Norman: I rarely find an opportunity to agree with the Deputy Prime Minister. Again, I am sorry that he is absent, and cannot hear me do so. The Conservatives have already said that we would like capping to be removed from local authorities: that is shared ground.
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  The Bill compounds the problem that we already have. It is a straitjacket that centralises power not just within the state, but within councils. Councils will be denied the right to choose alternative, more open ways of working.
  Mr. Llew Smith: Although it is fairly obvious that I disagree with substantial parts of the Bill, I am somewhat confused by the statement that previous Governments wanted—and, indeed, the present Opposition want—to liberate local authorities, and return more powers to them. Can the hon. Gentleman tell me how many of the 200 Acts that altered the powers of local authorities during those previous 18 years gave more powers to authorities or liberated them?
  Mr. Norman: I have made clear our belief that local government has become too centralised. We have a substantial agenda for decentralisation; it is not a matter for today's debate, but I am very willing to take the hon. Gentleman through it on another occasion. No doubt the opportunity will arise.
  Sir Paul Beresford: Perhaps my hon. Friend should ask the hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent (Mr. Smith) to have a look at the best value legislation that has been passed. It is the most centralising and forceful legislation that has ever been imposed on local government in any field.
  Mr. Norman: My hon. Friend has great experience of these matters, and makes his point powerfully.
  The effect of cabinet government will be to vest power in local political parties, especially when one party is dominant. More than ever, a narrow clique of party politicians in caucus will be able to make all the major executive decisions. No longer will the committee structure provide a role for individual councillors and minority parties, and safeguard the participation of all councillors.
  It is not only Conservative Members who believe that there is already a problem to be solved.
  Some of our Councils are quite frankly very badly run…The Party is usually controlled by a small clique and they have very poor relationships with the community which they serve.
  Those are the words of the Minister of State, Cabinet Office, the right hon. Member for Makerfield (Mr. McCartney).
  That brings me to the question of secrecy.
  Dr. Alan Whitehead: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Norman: I want to make some progress.
  It is one of the great achievements of the last 40 years that local government in the United Kingdom has been open government. It was Margaret Thatcher who, in 1960, forced councils to open all meetings to the press and the public, and it was a Conservative Government who passed the Local Government (Access to Information) Act 1985, which enables the public to obtain local council papers three days before meetings. It is a Labour Government who are now bringing back secrecy, and closing the doors to the public.
  Andrew Ecclestone, of the Campaign for Freedom of Information, has said:
  we are now finding a Labour Government removing the rights Mrs. Thatcher gave us.

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  It was the Prime Minister who said:
  The first right of a citizen in a mature democracy should be the right of information. It is time to sweep away the cobwebs of secrecy which hang over far too much Government activity.
  Instead, cabinet government as prescribed in the Bill will mean that executive decisions are made in private and that leading councillors will no longer be accountable for their views. There will be no pre-scrutiny and ordinary citizens will not be able to lobby councillors ahead of time because they will not know what is coming up on the agenda. Both points were well made by Labour Members.
  The Bill will mean that full minutes will no longer be available for scrutiny and that papers and agendas will no longer be available in advance. Several Labour Members have made that point. It is not just a question of introducing a new culture, as the Minister said. Such waffle is risible in response to the genuine concerns of experienced Members on both sides of the House. Proper safeguards should be in place, not just in the guidance, but in the Bill, otherwise, for many councils, standards of openness will step back 40 years.
  Dr. Whitehead: Has not the hon. Gentleman read the Bill where it states that the council meeting continues to be the supreme body in relation to policy decisions in local authorities? Does he not understand that the scrutiny extends to decisions that may be taken, as opposed to decisions that have been taken? His points about it being impossible to scrutinise a decision before it is passed appear to have no substance.
  Mr. Norman: I have to wonder whether it is the hon. Gentleman who has not read the Bill. It contains no provision for proper pre-scrutiny or for ordinary citizens to know what is coming up in council meetings and discuss things with councillors ahead of time. There is no provision to ensure that people are held properly accountable and that minutes are fully published.
  Mr. Ronnie Campbell: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Norman: I want to make some progress.
  Without improved safeguards, cabinet government conducted in secrecy will reduce accountability, concentrate power and increase the scope for corruption.
  If the Minister will not listen to us, why does she not listen to the concerns of Labour councillors and the local press throughout the country? Why does she not listen to the Birmingham Labour councillor who said:
  decisions made behind locked doors…is exactly how Hitler started and it is a very dangerous precedent for a modern city like Birmingham?
  Why does the Minister not listen to the Hull Daily Mail? Again, it is a pity that the Deputy Prime Minister is not here, but doubtless she will let him know. It said:
  A cloak of secrecy could descend on important council decision making in Hull.
  There are many other such instances. Far from revitalising local government and decreasing secrecy and concentration of power, the Bill will achieve the opposite. It will encourage high salaries, professional politicians and party apparatchiks but discourage the apolitical volunteer. It will create two classes of councillor: the executive and the rest;
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  the political insider and the volunteer outsider. In short, it is a Bill that centralises. It vests power in local parties, encourages secrecy and deters participation.
  Mr. Campbell: May I give the hon. Gentleman an example? Labour-dominated Blyth council in my constituency operates the cabinet system. All the minutes are free for the public, councillors who are not sitting on the cabinet and the press. Cabinet meetings are totally open to anyone who wants to sit there and listen; so are the council and all the scrutiny committees. If that is not openness, what is?
  Mr. Norman: The hon. Gentleman makes my point for me. With proper safeguards on openness, publication of agendas and pre-scrutiny, the system can be made to work.
  Sir Paul Beresford: Perhaps we should use the example of Hammersmith and Fulham council, where the leader made it clear that the Labour group had decisions given to it by leaders of the group. Decisions were made in the Labour group. They were put through on the executive and rammed through the scrutiny committee. That is not openness.
  Mr. Norman: I thank my hon. Friend for making that point. Such safeguards are not adequately built into the Bill. It centralises, does nothing to address the real problems of decentralisation in local government and vests powers in local parties and political cliques.
  Mrs. Louise Ellman: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Norman: I will not.
  The Bill encourages secrecy and deters participation. Then, tacked on to its end, there is the abolition of section 28.
  Let me be clear: Conservative Members recognise the need to maintain an attitude of tolerance in our local councils and schools and to maintain a culture of respect for all, no matter what their background, life style or sexual preference. However, section 28 has to be seen against the background of a widespread desire to promote family values and the need to educate all our children on the importance of good parenting in our society. The debate in another place highlighted the fact that those concerns are shared across the whole political spectrum. Church leaders—from the Archbishop of Canterbury to Cardinal Winning and the Chief Rabbi—business men and politicians of all parties have expressed those concerns.
  The Government's dogged determination to persevere reflects a dog in the manger attitude and a determination not to listen but to put political correctness over the fears of parents and community leaders. It matters not whether governors of schools have the ultimate right to determine what is taught, concerned parents and council tax payers simply fail to see why taxpayers' money and resources should be used to promote any particular minority life style. That is the issue, and that is what section 28 is about. We regret that the Minister has said that the Government are yet again simply not prepared to listen.

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  The strength of British local government has been its flexibility, openness, ability to adapt to the requirements of different communities, and encouragement of voluntary participation by men and women of ability. I therefore hope that, in her reply, the Minister will answer very fully the questions that were not answered in the opening speech.
  How will the Bill, in practice, protect against the concentration of power in the hands of narrow cliques of party-selected politicians? How will it prevent a cloud of secrecy descending on local council decisions? How will it help accountability? Why does it not provide for pre-scrutiny before decisions are taken?
  How will the Bill's provisions be paid for, given that the Local Government Association has already estimated that they will cost £150 million? What will it do to bring back to participation in local government ordinary people seeking to dedicate their spare time to local communities? When will the Government start to live up to their promise of less centralisation and reverse the tide of red tape and regulation on house building, planning and how councils spend their money? What can be done to give communities once again a real sense of ownership of their neighbourhoods and the power to shape and determine their future?
  The Government have failed to live up to their promises. That is why I urge hon. Members to vote for the reasoned amendment.
  5.43 pm
  Mr. Mark Fisher: I think that every Labour Member—and, I hope, every Opposition Member—recognises that the Government's aims to provide more efficient and better local government and particularly to promote greater understanding of what local government is doing among people, and more intelligent participation and involvement in it, are laudable and something to which everyone can subscribe.
  The Minister very generously gave way in her speech. I can seldom remember a Minister speaking on Second Reading who has been so prepared to engage in debate and to take on board hon. Members' concerns. She and her Department deserve great credit for that generosity, which indicates the openness with which she will approach the overall subject. However, her generosity allowed grave concern on one matter to be revealed very clearly on both sides of the House.
  Under the Bill's provisions, people will have less knowledge about what is going on in local government, less access to information and less involvement in local government. That cannot be, and quite clearly is not, what the Government want. I hope that, during scrutiny in the House, the Government will recognise that the Bill works against the grain of what they are seeking to achieve. The Minister knows the Bill only too well, so there is no need to rehearse all the areas that reinforce that point.
  Although the full council will be in public—as has been said—cabinet and cabinet bodies will not be required under clause 21 to meet in public, and will have to publish decisions only after they are made. Mayors also will be outside the scope of the Local Government (Access to
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  Information) Act 1985. Similarly, executives will not have to meet in public and cannot be required to do so by the full council—an extraordinary provision. Also, they will have to publish only after decisions have been made.
  As my hon. Friend the Member for Blyth Valley (Mr. Campbell) said in a good intervention, those provisions do not prevent good practice by individual councils. However, the point of legislation is that it sets a benchmark for what has to be done. Many councils will not follow the lead of his council's good, open practice. Many will follow the lead of the Bill, and say that they can operate in private. In many ways, that makes for easier and faster decision making and the avoidance of problems for councillors. The temptation will be enormous, and the Bill—as it is drafted at the moment—will give full rein to those seeking secrecy.
  Executives will be able to decide for themselves, which means that the present duties on councils to take decisions in public may change. The duties were introduced in the Public Bodies (Admission to Meetings) Act 1960—proposed, amazingly, by Baroness Thatcher when she was a Member of Parliament—which gave a great deal of openness to local government. It is a great pity that when she became Prime Minister, she forgot the democratic and open instinct that led her to introduce, as a private Member's Bill, a good piece of legislation. All credit to her as a Back-Bench Member; I wish that she had continued in that way when she was Prime Minister.
  The public will lose their right to involvement and participation in decisions before they are made. That very popular former Member of this House, Robin Squire, introduced a Bill which became the Local Government (Access to Information) Act 1985. It is important to remember that those are rights that the public have enjoyed to call bodies to account and to get access to information. The Bill will bypass those rights, which will not exist unless we can amend it, as we ought to.
  The Freedom of Information Bill—which we debated at great length and not entirely happily last week—applies to local authorities, but sadly does not help much in this respect. Under the Bill, information can be withheld if, in the authority's reasonable opinion, disclosure would prejudice the effective conduct of public affairs. That is a powerful inhibition to open government and the right of people to know what is going on. The implication is that the Freedom of Information Bill gives legal weight to an authority's opinion in a way that is remarkable and extremely regrettable. It will create a new cloak of secrecy, as my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock Chase (Dr. Wright) has said.
  The Bill in its present form is deficient and will lead to more closed, less well-informed and less informative local government, but all is not lost. It is up to this House to make changes. Cabinets and executives can meet in public, and should be made to do so by amendments to the Bill; that is, unless there is confidential or exempt material that cannot be disclosed. That has always been the case. That provision should be put in the Bill. I hope that the Minister and the Secretary of State will listen to the debate and recognise that there is great concern inside and outside this House. We want open local government, and if the Bill said that cabinets and executives had to meet in public, that would be a big step. Similarly, reports,

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  the factual information on which decisions are based, options and recommendations should be made public before information is exempt.
  Ms Armstrong: It is in the Bill.
  Mr. Fisher: I suspect that the Minister knows the Bill better than I do, but I cannot see any strengthening of openness provisions.
  What I am asking for can and must be achieved. We cannot let the Bill pass from this Chamber in its closed state. If we can include provisions for the open local government that we need for the next generation, we shall have done something good.
  5.50 pm
  Mr. Don Foster: I am delighted to follow the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Mr. Fisher), who has made a valuable contribution to our deliberations in the past few weeks, not least in his valiant efforts on freedom of information. I am pleased that he continued that theme in his speech on this Bill. I agree with every word that he uttered.
  We are in a unique and, I suspect, somewhat bizarre situation. The hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mr. Norman) has made it clear that he is deeply concerned about many aspects of the Bill. Judging from the interventions from several of his hon. Friends, I suspect that he was speaking on behalf of all of them. The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central—and every Labour Back Bencher who has intervened—highlighted concerns about various aspects of the Bill. Like all my Liberal Democrat colleagues, I have many reservations about the Bill. [HON. MEMBERS: "Where are they?"] So keen are my hon. Friends on the importance of local government that they are out campaigning. Every hon. Member who has spoken, including the Minister, voiced deep concerns about various aspects of the Bill. She said—I think that I quote her correctly—that the Bill is not in the form that the Government wish to see it in.
  We are in a difficult position, because we have to decide whether we want to give the Bill a Second Reading. I should make it clear at the outset that, while I have deep concerns about a number of aspects of the Bill, I shall vote for a Second Reading in the hope—I suspect that many others share this hope—that we shall be able to make several amendments during the Bill's later stages.
  Above all, I hope that the amended Bill will help to bridge the growing gulf between politicians and the people whom they represent. Sadly, people often no longer trust politicians. They certainly do not join political parties. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds has more members than all three major political parties put together. Although there are some notable exceptions, that gulf is as true in local government as in other tiers of government. The turnout for local government elections is testimony to that problem. People value the services provided by local government, but they do not believe that councillors have enough power to do much about them. I very much hope that the Bill will play a part in reconnecting the people to the politicians who seek to represent them.
  We have considerable sympathy with various provisions in the Bill and support them fully. The proposed new powers of well-being, the proposed ethical arrangements and the replacement of surcharging—the hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells acknowledged that
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  point—are sensible moves in the right direction. The hon. Gentleman and I disagree on the plans, held up by a decision in another place, to repeal section 28, because the Liberal Democrats support those plans. We also support the arrangements to enable the giving of powers to area committees.
  However, like every hon. Member who has spoken, we have several areas of considerable concern, not least the number of new powers being given to the Secretary of State, particularly his ability to limit significantly the scope of the new well-being powers. We are particularly concerned about the excessive prescription of matters that are best left to local determination. If the proposals for new structures of local government are not amended, they will concentrate too much power in the hands of a few individuals. Despite what the Minister says, they will create divisions between two ranks of councillor and, as the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central has said, will reverse the recent huge strides in opening up local government decision-making processes.
  When the Bill hit the headlines, all the talk was about mayors and cabinets. The Government were embarrassed by some old Labour councils such as Doncaster and began to find that other Labour heartland councils, such as Liverpool, Sheffield and Islington, were being taken over by the Liberal Democrats. They were desperately keen to find a new, streamlined look for some of their councils.
  The public want local councils with the power to make decisions about issues of concern to local people. They are not interested in the fancy wrapping of the council, they just want to know that it is able to get on and make the necessary decisions and has the cash to back them up. People know that, at the moment, their local council has neither the power nor the cash to make a real difference. The bulk of cash for local government comes from Whitehall. Central Government are calling the shots.
  I welcome the last-minute conversion of the hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells to a belief in freeing up local government, but I hope that he acknowledges that the previous Conservative Government stripped away many local government powers. The sad truth is that the Labour Government have continued that trend. Councillors no longer have room for manoeuvre, because ever more decisions are pre-empted by diktat from Whitehall. Ever more local government funding comes as specific grants. Councils get the cash only if they agree to spend it in the way that the Government tell them. We have also seen the massive introduction of a bidding process for specific grants, which takes up a great deal of officers' time. More often than not, they are disappointed. Research figures show that only one third of all bids made for specific funds are successful. That means that two thirds of the bids are unsuccessful. All that officer and member time is wasted.
  The target-setting process is a further example of that centralisation by a Labour Government. Target after target is being imposed on local government. Target-setting can have value and improve the management process, but it is getting ludicrously out of hand. The ultimate in the ludicrous situation that we have reached is that, having imposed targets on local government, central Government throw them in the dustbin. Anyone wanting evidence of that need only look at the written answer that I received from the Under-Secretary, the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Ms Hughes), on 2 December last year to a question about targets. She said:

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  Details of any targets agreed with local government are not held centrally—[Official Report, 2 December 1999; Vol. 340, c. 273W.]
  The implication is that the Government do not even know what targets they have set for local government. If Whitehall is known to pull all the strings, people will not bother to vote for the puppets. We must free local government if people are to regain an interest and involvement in local government.
  Maria Eagle: Is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that his party's policy is to raise more finance locally instead of the Government handing over money to local government from the centre? Is he suggesting that that should be done through the council tax?
  Mr. Foster: The answer to the hon. Lady's question is yes. It is Liberal Democrat policy to rearrange local government finance so that a greater proportion of the money spent locally is raised locally. At the moment, some 80 per cent. of the money spent locally comes from Government funds. That is wrong and we need to reduce the amount of money raised through income tax and increase the amount raised through local taxation. That is a clearly stated party policy—[Interruption.] If the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) is excited by it, I will happily ensure that he receives a copy.
  Mr. Dale Campbell-Savours: For the sake of clarity, will the hon. Gentleman tell the House whether it is Liberal Democrat policy to put a penny on income tax and a penny on local government taxes?
  Mr. Foster: I do not wish to delay the House for too long, but the hon. Gentleman confuses two separate issues. The Liberal Democrats believed that the Chancellor was wrong to reduce the level of income tax, because that money would have been better spent on improving public services such as education, health and support for pensions. The hon. Gentleman disagreed with us and voted with the Chancellor. The issue of the funding of local government is separate. Local government funding should be arranged so that more of the money that is spent locally is raised locally. The quid pro quo is a reduction in the amount of money raised through central taxation.
  Dr. Whitehead: Is there not a contradiction between the Liberal Democrats' demand that the Government do not cut taxes but increase public spending, which mostly goes through local government, and his idea that local government should be responsible for raising its funds and should not receive grants from the Government?
  Mr. Foster: I suspect that we are straying a long way from the Bill, but if the hon. Gentleman wants the full text of our policy, I would be happy to send it to him. We make it easy for the hon. Gentleman because we suggest that money should be collected locally through a form of local income tax, not through the council tax arrangements.
  The most important part of the Bill is not part II, which has been the subject of most controversy, but part I, which gives additional powers to local government in respect of the so-called powers of well-being. We have long thought that local government should be given a power of general competence. In other words, local councils would be able
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  to do all those things that they felt were in the interests of local people, except for some things that were specifically prohibited. In part I, the Government have gone a long way in that direction and we welcome that. However, we are concerned that the Bill will still give the Secretary of State significant ability to limit those arrangements. We are also concerned that the Bill contains no mechanism to allow local councils to raise funds to pay for those activities that they develop within the new power. I hope that we will debate those issues further in Committee.
  I also hope that the Minister will acknowledge that arising from that power is the ability to produce community strategies and plans, which is also contained in part I. She will be aware that local government has to produce many different plans. In some cases, local authorities have to produce as many as 40 different plans, including economic development plans, civil defence plans, air quality management plans, youth justice plans, community safety plans—the list goes on. We hope that, in Committee, it will be possible to table amendments to ensure that, when a local council develops a community plan under part I, it will be able to integrate within that plan many of the other plans. The Minister is aware that, to achieve that, we would need to change the power to a duty, and I am delighted that she acknowledged that the Government intend to table amendments to that effect.
  I hope also that the Minister will be willing to accept amendments that deal with the thorny issue of quangos. As we try to achieve joined-up government at local and regional level, it is vital that we find more effective ways to get local government and the various quangos to work together. That is missing in the current arrangements and is not referred to in the Bill.
  Part II has been the most controversial. It is true that many councils need to streamline their decision making. Many councils have already made radical changes without legislation forcing them to do so, but the Government now want to force on all councils one of only three models. We recognise that those three models are more flexible than many people have given them credit for, but—despite the Minister's protestations—any one of the models could lead to the creation of two ranks of councillor. They could also concentrate power in the hands of too few people. All councillors should be able to represent the views of their communities equally, and we do not want to see standard-class councillors and first-class councillors.
  Pilots of the models have been carried out, and the evidence in some cases shows disillusionment among the back-bench councillors. It is therefore important to recognise the pressure for a fourth option or a locally determined option. With good will on both sides, it would be possible to develop such an option in Committee, based on Baroness Hamwee's amendment in the other place. That amendment sought to provide a locally determined option that is nevertheless based on several key principles, including the vital importance of scrutiny, accountability, openness, transparency and efficiency. I hope that we will have the opportunity to develop that issue in Committee.
  Mr. Simon Thomas: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that, in Wales, we have the ideal method of developing local options, because the National Assembly could develop a set of options that took into account the unique circumstances of Welsh local government?
  Mr. Foster: I agree entirely, and several amendments will be needed in respect of the arrangements for Wales.

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  The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central rightly raised another concern about the executive models in part II. Liberal Democrats and others have worked hard in local authorities throughout the country to move them out of the dark ages. We have fought for meetings to be held in public, for the public's right to speak or to present petitions and for papers to be available to all councillors and the public in advance of meetings. The Bill's provision to allow executives the option—I accept that some will choose not to take advantage of it—to meet in secret would take us back to those dark ages and is a recipe for concealment and corruption.
  Open access to all papers in advance of meetings is crucial. How will other councillors, the public and partner organisations know that they need to lobby executive members if they do not know in advance what will be discussed and when? Publishing decisions after the event is not adequate.
  Parts III, IV and V are much less controversial than parts I and II. We would like to see changes to those parts and we shall introduce amendments in Committee. Part V involves the vital issue of section 28. I wish to make it absolutely clear on behalf of my right hon. and hon. Friends that we are opposed to the section. We welcome the new guidance that is being proposed by the Secretary of State for Education and Employment, but we believe that section 28 must be repealed. We shall give our support to any measures that the Government feel should be taken to ensure that that is done.
  Much in the Bill needs to be amended to give real powers, including fund-raising powers, to local government. Local government should be given real choices and be subject to less prescription to ensure that there is no return to the dark ages of decisions being taken in secret. We must ensure that the work of all councillors is equally valued. Above all, we must set local councils free so that they can truly serve and meet the needs of local people. As I have said, it is with some difficulty, but in the hope that, with amendments, the Bill can move us in that direction, that we shall support Second Reading.
  Several hon. Members rose—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I remind the House that there is a 15-minute limit on Back-Bench Members' speeches.
  6.11 pm
  Ms Julie Morgan: I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this important debate. I think that we all recognise the huge contribution that local authorities have made to the community, and the proud tradition of many authorities. In recognising the need for change and revitalisation, it is important also to recognise the tremendous good work that the authorities have done in their present form.
  The Cardiff local authority started street lighting services. At one time, it had its own electricity company. It introduced a trolley service and bus services. All those vital services are an important part of our lives. Local authorities have provided community leadership, and I welcome the extended powers in the Bill that will enable them to continue to do so.
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  As my right hon. Friend Minister for Local Government and the Regions said when opening the debate, the Bill applies to England and Wales. There are separate clauses for Wales that specify that the National Assembly for Wales has the powers of the Secretary of State in England.
  Mr. Nigel Waterson: Does the hon. Lady think that the council tax payers of Cardiff are getting the best possible value in paying £58,500 to the leader of that council?
  Ms Morgan: Probably not. The Assembly has considered the issue and has given the leader of the local authority a deadline to reduce the allowances. I agree with its recommendations.
  The relationship between the Assembly and local government in Wales is unique, as the hon. Member for Ceredigion (Mr. Thomas) mentioned earlier in an intervention. During the devolution campaign, the referendum and the vote last May, one of the big fears expressed by local authorities, councillors and supporters of local authority government was that devolution would take powers up from local authorities rather than bringing them down from Westminster. It was therefore built into the devolution settlement that the Assembly would work with local government and would not take work from it. The Government of Wales Act 1998 specified that a partnership council should be established. That council has been set up and it is meeting regularly. Local government in Wales is already working with the Assembly through the partnership council to develop Assembly statutory guidance on part II.
  There is a unique situation in Wales because of the creation of the Assembly and the fact that local government is bound to be closer to people's lives on a day-to-day basis than the Assembly and central Government. We have an opportunity to show our confidence in local government and to work as much as possible via local authorities. The function of central Government in Wales is not to take over the functions of local government. It is significant that a substantial amount of the extra education money in Wales has gone to local authorities and not direct to schools. Direct provision is not seen as feasible in Wales and it is not being attempted. The situation is different in Wales, and we must accept that, with devolution, there will be different solutions in different parts of the country.
  In principle, the Welsh Local Government Association accepts the case for a separation of powers with the creation of an executive that will be separate from the council. As my right hon. Friend the Minister said, councils are experimenting, and 12 councils are doing so in Wales. Another seven have plans to do so. There seems to be no interest among the councils in having directly elected mayors. I do not know whether that feeling is reflected by the public. Most authorities are thinking of a cabinet model. The Cardiff local authority has a cabinet of seven and an executive of 20. I do not know whether that is unique.
  Cabinet and executive models throw up problems over the role of non-executive councillors. There is a danger that a divide will be created, which might be made worse by the payment proposals of some authorities. It is difficult to see how back-bench councillors will take part in policy making. Scrutiny is vital and that process gives

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  a tremendous role to councillors, but it is important for every councillor to have an opportunity to participate in policy making. That may be possible via the scrutiny role, and it needs to be spelt out to local councillors that that might happen.
  Ms Armstrong: The overall policy of the council is the responsibility of the whole council and not of the executive. The executive's role is to implement, and to take decisions that are required to implement the overall policy.
  Ms Morgan: I thank my right hon. Friend for that information.
  There has been much criticism about the plethora of committees and sub-committees that have characterised local government. I served as a councillor for 12 years and I spent a lot of time on various sub-committees, committees and working groups. I suppose that many of the individuals and groups involved spent an inordinate amount of time sitting in committee. However, many of them made important decisions. They co-opted people who had experience of receiving the council's services. I initiated a child care strategy and a local authority nursery via those committees, which may not feature in the future structure. At a recent women's conference that I attended in Wales, representatives of all four political parties regretted the loss of those committees and groups. They felt that they provided an opportunity to learn, and opportunities, particularly for women, to become involved in local government on first becoming councillors.
  There is a lack of women's representation. Women are not very well represented in this place, but in local government there is a huge problem. Local government will never really be credible until it is more representative of the public that it serves, and that relates particularly to women. I hope that, in the consultation period and the processes that may arise as a result of the Bill, there will be opportunities to address this issue.
  My right hon. Friend the Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman) has recently produced a report entitled "Democratic Deficit 2000", which highlights the under-representation of women in local government. It asked whether there would be any women mayors and how many women would be in the cabinets. In my own local authority of Cardiff, three of the seven cabinet members are women. There are 17 men and one woman in the executive, and four men and one woman chair the five scrutiny committees. Although 32 per cent. of Cardiff's councillors are women, most are not in positions of power. Women account for only 24 per cent. of councillors in Wales. It is important that the Bill does not reinforce women's absence from decision-making positions.
  I hope that the consultation process, and the Bill itself, will encourage councillors to ask themselves why so few women are involved. Will the models adopted by the Bill make it easier for women to participate? What will councils do to make participation easier? I welcome the Bill's recommendation for carers' allowances, as there is no doubt that the lack of arrangements for people with caring responsibilities is one of the reasons why women have not been fully involved in local politics.
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  Clearly, the ultimate power of scrutiny and control of councils and councillors resides with the electorate. I hope that some of the changes in the Bill to make elections more frequent will help make local government more relevant to people's lives. There is no doubt that the abysmal turnout in local elections shows that something must be done about local government.
  I hope that the Bill will revitalise local government. Ultimately, the electorate will let us know how they feel about the standard of councils.
  6.22 pm
  Mrs. Gillian Shephard: I am pleased to have the opportunity to take part in the debate. It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Cardiff, North (Ms Morgan), whose enthusiasm for, and experience in, local government shone through her contribution. It was interesting to hear her description of the links that have been made between the Welsh Assembly and existing local government in Wales.
  As always, it was good to hear the hon. Member for Bath (Mr. Foster), who was mercifully brief, unlike some of his colleagues—but they are not present this afternoon. It was especially interesting to hear the thoughtful contribution from the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Mr. Fisher). I hope that the Minister took careful note of the points that he made.
  We heard a great deal from the Minister about the Government's enthusiasm for local government and its autonomy. However, the contributions made by hon. Members of all parties show that not everyone is certain that the Bill is the best illustration of that enthusiasm. As my hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mr. Norman) said, local government is important to people and communities. It is important to communities because it is a vital strand of the democratic process, because its decisions are closest to the people whom they affect, and because it delivers services that are important to everyone—literally, from cradle to grave.
  Local government is also important because when it is efficient, accountable, transparent and truly autonomous, it can play a role in limiting big, central Government. However, despite its importance, electoral turnouts show that people are apathetic towards local government, as the hon. Member for Cardiff, North noted.
  Like their predecessors over many decades, the Government want to counter that apathy, and the Bill and other measures are the means that they have chosen to achieve that. In the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions press notice of 26 November last year, Ministers stated that the Bill was part of the Government's agenda to
  revitalise local democracy and modernise public services.
  The Minister used a similar phrase earlier this afternoon. The press notice also advanced the hope that the provisions in the Bill would make
  councils more efficient, transparent and accountable.
  There is some way to go before that is achieved. Keith Lucas and Richards point to part of the reason for that in their "History of Local Government in the Twentieth Century", when they state:
  At no stage of English history has any Government held a consistent and logical policy on the range of limits of municipal services. Local government was not evolved to provide a

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  co-ordinated system of administration for a logically defined range of services; it emerged, piecemeal, in answer to a succession of separate needs and demands.
  Everyone interested in local government would agree with that analysis. It has been the task of successive Governments to try to put the deficiency right, but they have all had to start with an unsatisfactory patchwork. There has been no Napoleonic tendency in this country.
  However, people value the services provided by local government. A MORI poll conducted for the Local Government Association in spring 1999 found that although people believe that local government services are important to their lives, they are unclear about who is responsible for which services, and who should be held accountable for what.
  For example, the survey showed that people understood that street sweeping, refuse collection and—interestingly enough—the library service were provided at local level, but that they were vague about other provision such as education and social services. That is partly because a succession of central Governments—not just this one and their predecessor—have regarded local government as the vehicle for their own initiatives. Circular 10/65, the Housing Finance Act 1972 and the Rates Act 1984 come to mind in that regard.
  This Government came to power full of the good intentions expressed in their 1997 election manifesto, which stated:
  Local decision making should be less constrained by central government and also more accountable to local people.
  From the contributions that we have heard so far from hon. Members of all parties, I think that we would all agree with that.
  However, what is the reality, as opposed to what some people might call the Bill's pious intentions? Does the Bill tackle the real reasons for public apathy towards local government and all its works? Does it grasp the opportunity of its own existence?
  The Bill's proposals must first be set against the context created by the Government. The hon. Member for Bath mentioned some of the relevant points. For example, in 1999–2000, local councils must produce no fewer than 26 "Plans"—with a capital "P"—outlining their response to Government-set priorities. They are to produce 124 Audit Commission performance indicators, and 43 quality protects indicators for children's social services. In addition, the Department of Health has produced 48 performance indicators, covering the whole range of public services.
  The time taken by local authorities on such work can be imagined, but the use to which all the information would be put is less easily grasped—although the hon. Member for Bath has told us that it is often destined for the dustbin. I hope that he is not right, but it is hard to see how a Government elected on the promise that local decision making
  should be less constrained by central government
  can justify the degree of central control that the Bill will impose.
  Mrs. Ellman: Am I correct in believing that the right hon. Lady at one time advocated the total removal of responsibility for education from local authorities? Is she still of that opinion? Would she like the Bill to include provision to achieve that removal?
  Mrs. Shephard: I believe, as the Chancellor of the Exchequer apparently does, that money is well handled at
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  local level by schools. I do not remember the hon. Lady challenging the right hon. Gentleman on that point when he made his Budget statement.
  As the hon. Member for Bath said, the work of local government has been overlapped, if not undermined, by the sheer number of quangos and executive agencies. At present, there are 6,500 quangos—the number is rising—and 238 executive agencies. There are also 708 executive non-departmental bodies.
  Moreover, the Government's rush to constitutional reform has further blurred the accountability of local government. The plans for the governance of London illustrate the point. London has 32 boroughs and the Corporation of London. The mayor and the Greater London Authority will be superimposed on the local government system. Some of its members will represent constituencies of 500,000; others will have Londonwide responsibilities. In addition, the people of London will of course continue to vote for Westminster Members of Parliament and Members of the European Parliament. They will also have the services of the London regional development agency, the Government office for London, the police authority, a fire and emergency planning authority and a culture and arts commission.
  However, what the people of London will not know—the Bill will not help them—is where to turn when there is a hole in the road. That is the simple test of accountability, without which local government will continue to be regarded with scepticism and apathy. No amount of electoral gimmicks or quick fixes will deal with the basic problems of local government, not all of which are of this Government's making. The legacy is of long standing. However, the Government undertook to solve problems that the Bill not only does not solve, but exacerbates.
  I wish to deal briefly with the proposals for the new management structures. Do they address the problem of accountability? Do they make for greater transparency? Will they create more interest in local government? Do they demonstrate the Government's stated intention in their manifesto to make local government more accountable to local people? The Bill fails those important tests. It is a mockery that a Bill claiming to make local government more accountable to local people denies local people the choice of retaining the management structures they already have if that is what they prefer. How can Ministers, aware of their manifesto commitment, maintain that the only acceptable executive arrangements are those which they have devised in Whitehall, rather than those devised by local people? Why will they not have real confidence, and allow accountable elected local people to propose their own executive arrangements which, in their view and in the view of those whom they represent, are workable in their areas?
  I have listened very carefully to what the Minister has said on this point. She seems to think that a committee system is, by definition, outdated. "Outdated" is her stock epithet. How sure is she that in a county council with a cabinet and executive system all the skills, knowledge and expertise of, say, 80 members are used to the full? I accept that in a smaller council, it may be easier to ensure the involvement of everybody, because everybody will have great knowledge of a small area. However, to exclude a large number of councillors in a large county is a waste of human potential.
  The Government view, as stated in their press notice of 26 November, is clear. They want

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  to create dynamic local government that listens to what people really want—how they want to be governed and how they want their services to be delivered.
  However, people will not be empowered by the Bill to say how they want to be governed unless their view happens to coincide with what the Government decree.
  The Minister said in support of her cause that many local authorities have introduced the new arrangements ahead of legislation. She must know, but perhaps will not say, that as local authorities know that they will be obliged to do so, they might as well get on with it. Compliance under the cosh is not a cause for self-congratulation on the part of those holding the cosh. Although some cabinet and leader arrangements are working well and democratically, there are some awkward contrasts regarding transparency and fairness.
  I was pleased to hear the hon. Member for Blyth Valley (Mr. Campbell), who is no longer in his place, cite the good example of his local council. In Norfolk, the Conservative-controlled Breckland district council, with its balanced cabinet of four Conservative, three Labour and two Independent members, makes an interesting contrast with the Lib-Lab-controlled Norfolk county council. Seven of its nine cabinet members are Labour and two are Liberal, and eight members represent urban wards. The Conservative opposition, of course, was not invited to take part.
  Sadly, Norfolk is not exceptional. According to the House of Commons Library figures, taken from an article in The Independent, in more than 60 per cent. of councils with a cabinet system, only the ruling political party is represented, and more decisions are taken in private. Such points have been raised by hon. Members on both sides of the House and I hope that the Minister will take careful note of them. She has clarified the Government's position on these matters, and I expect them to be further explored in Committee.
  I cannot believe that the Minister intends to leave openness in large areas of decision making to the discretion of the new executives and remove the duties on local authorities to take decisions in public. Notwithstanding the Minister's clarification, the Bill produces the curious anomaly that local councils cannot choose the mechanisms by which they take decisions, but can choose to take them in secret. That seems a curious set of priorities and is difficult to square with the Government's avowed intention to create effective, democratic government which, as the DETR press notice says:
  relies on the bond of trust between the people and those who represent them…
  Let us see the Bill demonstrate that intent.
  The Minister will have noted the misgivings expressed by hon. Members on both sides of the House. Of course there is agreement on other aspects of the Bill, but the problems of local government are fundamental and of long standing. Sadly, unless the Bill is greatly amended, it represents a wasted opportunity.
  6.36 pm
  Maria Eagle: I am grateful to have an opportunity to speak in the debate and to follow the right hon. Member for South-West Norfolk (Mrs. Shephard). I am glad that so many women are speaking in the debate. Those of us who have been
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  excluded in one way or another from central Government over the years—not for too much longer, I hope—have often found a place in local authorities. I do not speak of myself in this instance—I have never been a councillor.
  I should like to concentrate on part II on governance arrangements, as many right hon. and hon. Members have also done. The city of Liverpool, a part of which I have the honour to represent, has had a long-standing problem of inadequate civic leadership. That is why I am interested in part II. Like many fellow citizens, I have had a long-standing interest in trying to put this right. My memory of politics in Liverpool goes back about 30 years, and I do not recall having any other opportunity to try to get things right. It is very important that local authorities, cities and other administrative areas with problems now get this right.
  Liverpool has had 30 years of missed opportunities and poor civic leadership—my remarks are not aimed at any one political party, as they have all had a go in that time—but the result is that Liverpool, one of our greatest cities, has been unable to fulfil its potential. I hope that the Bill will assist in enabling Liverpool, which is moving into the 21st century with hope and ambition, to fulfil its potential at last, and to become what it should be—a great modern city.
  The ideas in the Bill have been seized on in Liverpool. Many right hon. and hon. Members may think of Liverpool as a backward-looking place, but in fact it is very forward looking. There has been a major debate in Liverpool for the past two years about how to improve and modernise local government to ensure that the city can fulfil its potential.
  The document "Local Leadership, Local Choice" was published in March last year. Since then, a debate has raged about how the ideas that it contains can be adopted to make Liverpool a better place. The Liverpool democracy commission, which was established in March 1999, finished its work in July 1999. It is a unique commission. I do not know of any other city or local authority area setting up an independent commission to consider how to improve governance. It was chaired by a well-respected local business man, James Ross of Littlewoods, and its membership included local parliamentarians of all parties, academics, business people, Church leaders and media figures.
  The commission took oral and written evidence from anyone who cared to present it, including local organisations, individuals and those who had been involved in governance, local and national. It held meetings and consultations. Debates were held across various branches of the media—radio and local television—and it also commissioned polling; so I can safely say that we know very well what people in Liverpool think about what they have.
  The commission made some recommendations, but in a sense they are not the important thing. What was revealing was the generalised will among all political parties, all types of business people and all organisations to see change. The conclusions were interesting. Only 2 per cent. of people polled thought that the council was doing a good job. Some of us who have been in Liverpool and represented it in various ways for many years thought that 2 per cent. was quite a high figure. Sixty-nine per cent. were willing to say that they were dissatisfied.

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  It was also apparent that the council was unable to represent the city to the outside world. In the modern era, that is increasingly necessary to improve the city and to bring inward investment and new people and jobs to the city. Local and civic governors need to be able to represent themselves to the outside world. Only 15 per cent. of people asked thought that the city council was either good or excellent at doing that; 75 per cent. thought that it was not.
  One of the other major issues about which people are concerned is value for money in local government. Only 8 per cent. of people thought that the council gave value for money. Again, some of us were surprised at how high that figure was—certainly judging by my surgeries. I accept that the 8 per cent. probably never come to see me. Also, 90 per cent. of those asked could not identify even one of their local councillors. That is a damning indictment of the existing system. If those councillors had a defined role and were able to carry it out, in a way that local people could understand or tap into, more people would certainly be able to identify them.
  The system is not good for councillors either. Evidence was given to the commission that many felt excluded, bewildered, unable to do a good job or not sure what the job that they were supposed to be doing was. One, Councillor Bostock, said:
  I did four years on the council and it did my head in.
  Mercifully for him, he is no longer a councillor, but when someone voluntarily puts in four years of their time and effort and that is the outcome, it reflects something wrong with the system. So perhaps it is no wonder that the average turnout in Liverpool wards is now below 25 per cent. in local elections. It is no wonder that in some wards in the city the turnout is as low as 10 per cent. It is no wonder that in the north end of the city in the Melrose by-election within the past two years, the turnout fell to 6 per cent. That cannot be good for local democracy. It requires a change.
  Something needs to be done—perhaps a mayor is the answer. That debate was raging two years ago in Liverpool and it still rages. There is already speculation about who the candidates might be. I shall not add to that speculation except to say that the Liverpool Labour party, for one, will have an excellent local candidate.
  The poll conducted by the Liverpool democracy commission also asked people whether they would like to have a mayor, and 63 per cent. of those asked said that they would. Only 20 per cent. were unsure and 16 per cent. were against. There is a great will to change what we have. All types of people and stakeholders in Liverpool are dissatisfied with the present arrangements.
  However, we must make sure that the new arrangements are better. That has come through in the debate this afternoon. There has to be a hard separation between the executive and scrutiny functions. Any of the models in the Bill can provide that, but the Government need to make very sure that that is what happens when the new structures are adopted.
  I want to use the example of Liverpool to show what can go wrong. While the Liverpool democracy commission was doing its work between March and July 1999, the city council, now controlled by the Liberal Democrats, sprang into action and decided that it would pre-empt the commission's findings and move straight to some new structures. They had just taken control and they
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  wanted to make a mark, which is fair enough. They established a cabinet with a leader, all the members of which were from one party. They established scrutiny committees led by back benchers and area committees based more or less on a ward or a small cluster of wards, which theoretically enabled local people to deal with local issues and become more involved.
  However, even though a massive debate was going on in Liverpool at the time, the county council consulted no one about precisely what arrangements it intended to establish. The result is a mess. Whether it is a deliberately contrived mess or has become a mess because the flaws of the system adopted have been exploited by the ruling group, I shall leave the electorate to decide on 4 May.
  I shall use one illustration from my constituency of the consequences of the new system. The Liberal Democrat-run council has just announced the closure of Alderwood primary school in Speke. There were undoubtedly problems of poor teaching and a lack of grip by the governors and the local education authority, which meant that there were justifiable concerns about standards, but the council announced the closure to a local newspaper before it even told parents, governors or children. The story was telephoned through to the reporter by the Liberal Democrat chairman of the lifelong learning committee—the scrutiny committee. In other words, the chair of the scrutiny committee announced the council's policy to the local newspaper. What confidence can parents have that that scrutiny committee will organise proper scrutiny of a decision that he has announced?
  That thought occurred to colleagues in the Labour group so they put that question to the leader of the council. They asked:
  Will the Leader of the Council state how the Chair of the Lifelong Learning Select Committee is meant to have any credibility in performing scrutiny of the Executive when he is quoted as announcing the administration's policies to the press?
  Good question; and the answer was:
  He has obviously taken lessons from the Labour Party. Oh Dear!
  That was not an adequate answer from the leader of the council.
  The closure was then designated by the executive as a ward issue, which in the new structure means that, despite the fact that a citywide review of surplus primary places is being conducted—of which the closure should surely be a part because there are surplus places in Speke—the decision can be called in to be scrutinised only by the local ward councillors, who all happen to be Liberal Democrat. They are certainly not Labour. A manipulation has taken place that prevented the Labour opposition from calling in the decision for scrutiny, even though the scrutiny would have been led by the man who announced the decision. The decision to close the school has been ratified through the council's rubber-stamp procedure within a week of its being announced, using a process designed to deal with non-controversial issues. The closure of a school is never non-controversial, certainly not for children, parents and governors.
  The parents are extremely angry but it is not until tomorrow, after the decision has effectively been made, that the first consultation meeting will take place with those parents. Now, I am not a cynical person, but I think that the decision has already been made—so do the parents. That is not effective local democracy but an abuse of local democracy. I hope that the Government, in taking

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  powers to regulate, as they propose in the Bill, will take steps to prevent such Liberal Democrat manipulation in Liverpool and make sure that the executive and scrutiny functions of local councils are well and truly separated. Unless they do that, local people will not have confidence in the new arrangements.
  The Bill offers a way forward, but I urge the Government to ensure that the arrangements that are established satisfy its principles, rather than the ambitions of local groups.
  6.50 pm
  Mr. David Curry: May I make a suggestion to the Minister for Local Government and the Regions, who has just left the Chamber? Too often, she makes herself the worst advocate of a reasonable case. Instead of using simple English to explain her intentions, she uses an Orwellian jargon that replaces meaning with slogans. That does not work; it would be better for all of us if she stated directly what she was trying to achieve. We could then understand the good points and disagree with the bad points.
  The Minister tried to make a case for change. However, she failed to demonstrate that a new structure was necessary to remedy problems in local government. The new structure will stand as much chance of success or failure as the old one. Structures are not always at the heart of a problem—it is the way people make them work. She failed to show that the existing structures—in the hands of people of efficiency and good will—could not deliver her results just as well as new structures. People who were not efficient, or who did not have good will, would make just as much of a mess under the new structures as they would have done under the old ones.
  How should we judge the Bill? We need sensible criteria. Does it promote competent, accountable, accessible local government, with a sustainable and reasonable balance between what central Government require and the independence of local councillors? Such a balance must he achieved. We all know that the Government have requirements and that local government aspires to greater independence. Sensible government will find a way in which those two forces can come to an arrangement.
  It would be helpful if we had a clear idea of the Government's view of that relationship. However, their view is disguised by their curious placatory rhetoric and the use of words such as "modernisation". Modernisation is described as though it were a nirvana that we could achieve. It has become a Government mantra, but the word is devoid of any intrinsic meaning.
  Will the Bill help in meeting those criteria? The straws in the wind are not good. In the Budget, the number of specific grants increased again. The Secretary of State for Education and Employment told local councils that they had to use that money for the purposes that he specified—irrespective of the principles of hypothecation. However, now there is a review of local government finance. Perhaps that will tell us a little bit about which way the Government are going.
  From one of the new Labour think tanks—the new Labour forum, I think—we hear that there is a flirtation with the idea of abolishing local education authorities. That is all part of the front line first project.
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  In The Guardian, Sir Jeremy Beecham—who seems to have been under-rewarded in comparison with some of local government's lesser Labour luminaries—stated that the danger of front line first was that
  it masks a real shift of power away from local government and back to control by Whitehall. We could, unless we are careful, be witnessing the strange death of local democracy…the fact is that "frontline first" and the general move toward more ring-fencing of resources are pushing relentlessly in the direction of greater central control.
  The latest edition of Local Government Chronicle—I am paid to write a column for it, so I declare an interest—states:
  Downing Street, the Department for Education and Employment and the Department of Health are all expressing interest in radical options to channel funds directly to services without the involvement of local government—so-called "frontline first" funding.
  Ideas include giving funds directly to the country's 25,000 schools, and handing care of the elderly to health authorities.
  Prime Minister Tony Blair and his advisers believe attacking councils is a vote winner. There is strong and persistent spin coming from Downing Street that Mr Blair wants results and sees local government as bureaucracy standing in the way.
  It is not difficult to see why a case will have to be made to convince local government that the Bill is supposed to be for, rather than against, it.
  The central problem is that of prescription by central Government. All parties are to blame for that. If it helps hon. Members, I shall say "mea culpa"—as a Local Government Minister, I played my part in that process. We have seen prescription of the means of service delivery and of methods of assessment and testing—with an emphasis on outcomes. There has been a move from compulsory competitive tendering to best value. Those are not opposites, but a continuum—the use of different methods to achieve the same outcome. The prescription is the same.
  There has been a move from universal and crude capping to the use of specific and much more severe forms—if the Government choose to exercise the powers that they have taken. There has been widespread creation of inspectors—the new commissars of local government. Many local councillors are now more preoccupied with passing the test with the inspectors than the test with the electors. Under the prescription that is so prevalent, perhaps the inspectorate is in danger of taking over from the electorate.
  The Bill has contradictory aspects. There is a credit side. The general power—used sensibly, in the hands of reasonable people—will be of benefit to the community and will enable people to enlarge the partnership that is at the heart of local regeneration. Obviously, the attempt to bring order to ethical standards is important. If we can sort out and clarify the allowances system so that it is transparent and there is common agreement as to what is reasonable, we shall have done local government a service.
  However, there is a debit side. The first element of that is the prescription of structures, and the wholesale condemnation of the existing arrangements. It was interesting that the Minister said that she was not an ideologue, but that the present system was insupportable. If that is not an ideological statement, what is? The present system is dismissed, without finding out whether it can be changed or reformed.
  An amendment to make that reform possible was tabled in the other place. We hear that moves are afoot to introduce a famous fourth way—I suppose that will be better than the third way. It will be interesting to see

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  whether a way can be found to give the present system an internal rejuvenation, and whether the Government will be receptive to that. It would be a pity if there were only three choices on the menu.
  Another element on the debit side is the curious methodology for referendums. I do not like referendums, especially those with a 5 per cent. threshold and no floor for the number of participants. A 5 per cent. threshold is pretty dismal. However, if the electorate are not sufficiently responsive to the need for change, if that need does not well up in their breast, the Government will take power to cause it to well up by requiring a local referendum. However, at that level a referendum would be a tool of coercion—as the Government are well aware.
  The Bill contains ambiguities—for example, on the possibility of more frequent elections. In the original Green Paper, the Government referred to the imposition of annual elections—presumably, they did not want councillors to sleep easy in their beds at night, because they would have to keep looking over their shoulders at the electors. The Government retain the power to impose elections by order, although the method is not specified in the Bill.
  If the Government really do not want councillors to sleep easy—if they really want to introduce an instrument that, they hope, will threaten the monolithic majorities in certain areas—there is an obvious answer. They should introduce proportional representation in local government. That would do the trick—whether we like it or not. That would deliver the result far more effectively than the Government's clumsy proposals.
  There could be ambiguity in the relationship between directly elected mayors—if we take that route—and directly elected service chiefs. That is possible under the Bill. I cannot imagine a greater recipe for incoherence than to have people with separate mandates pursuing an allegedly common policy. I cannot understand how that would deliver joined-up government—one of the preoccupations of the Labour Administration.
  As others have said, it is difficult to imagine the role of councillors in scrutiny mode. All parties have problems attracting candidates to local government. If we are honest, we must admit that we all scratch around to find candidates for certain wards. We all win seats in uncontested wards where we have difficulty in putting up candidates. If I tried to persuade someone to stand as a councillor by saying, "Come on Fred, stand for the council—you'll enjoy being a scrutineer", rather than by saying, "You're going to run the council", I should not be greeted with the spontaneous enthusiasm that I normally expect when I ask people to do something on behalf of the party. If we divide the process up between the deciders—those on the inside track, backed up by the officers—and the scrutineers, who will service the scrutineers? There would be a real difficulty.
  There is one aspect of the Bill that I am inclined to support even though I realise that I may not be wholly on-message. I am sympathetic to the idea of directly elected mayors. London was a damn silly place to start; having an elected mayor in London who will enjoy fewer powers than any directly elected mayor elsewhere was a pretty silly way to test the concept. I do not think that I will feel a great deal better governed when I wake up on 5 May, whoever has won the election and however I have resolved my personal difficulty about whom to vote for
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  as my second option. I rejoice only in knowing that the Prime Minister probably faces a greater difficulty deciding whom he will vote for as his second choice.
  Perhaps, at last, we have a chance to reverse the tide of centralisation that is symbolised by the number of leaders of councils who are now in this place. I can see several sitting on the Labour Benches, and there are no doubt some on the Opposition Benches, too; they have migrated to this place. However, the day that people migrate from this place to local government because they think that that is where real power lies, we will know that we have at last brought about a mechanism that can challenge the complacency and centralising tendencies of Government. On the whole, that would be a good thing, and I am anxious that we should achieve it.
  However, the political parties will all receive a nasty shock. People who stand for the post of mayor will not just seek a party mandate; they will want a much wider appeal that goes beyond their party. They will all be off-message, as has been demonstrated by events recently in London. Because they will be held responsible for all services, even the ones that they do not control closely, their necessary tendency will be to seek more power so as to bring reality into line with perception. That will involve interesting chemistry. They could seek more power over education. Policing is another obvious example. The man or the lady seeking to be a tough mayor will want to be able to control the police.
  The process might be inconvenient, but it is a lot more persuasive than the Government's regional agenda, which is dying on its feet. Its pale ghost—a Banquo's ghost—will appear tonight in the form of the proposal for the Standing Committee on Regional Affairs. Elected mayors could turn out to be the sorcerer's apprentice for that legislation. Once they are unleashed, the Government will find it awfully difficult to put them back in their box. That is why they are a rather good idea.
  There will be many unanswered questions. How will an elected mayor relate to elected councillors, and what will their relative powers be? Are we moving towards a gubernatorial system in relation to service inspectors and the role of the mayor? For once, this is an experiment that is worth carrying out.
  The Bill offers some possibilities. We can improve it in Committee, and I hope that the Minister does not approach that with the attitude that a light is behind her and that she can stonewall all the questions that are asked. With the majority at her disposal, she will be perfectly able to do that. Instead, I hope that she realises that we all want local government to work, and that in the past, all parties have not delivered to local government the conditions in which it can thrive as it should if we are true believers in representative democracy. As we are in the House, we should at least believe in that.
  7.3 pm
  Mr. Neil Gerrard: I enjoyed the speech of the right hon. Member for Skipton and Ripon (Mr. Curry) rather more than I did that of the hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mr. Norman), who opened the debate for the Opposition. He spent 20 minutes trying to tell us that the Tory party was the defender of local government democracy, but it gave us the poll tax, rate capping and, for those of us who were in local government in the 1980s, year after year of cuts in powers

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  and spending. When we consider the disillusionment in local government, we must remember that a key issue is that of powers. If people do not believe that local government is capable of delivering anything or if those in local government are not able to deliver what they want, that will be a source of much disillusionment.
  I want to concentrate my comments on those parts of the Bill that deal with structures. However, much in it is welcome. In particular, I welcome the changes on functions and the ability to promote economic, social and environmental well-being that appear in part I. I am glad that my right hon. Friend the Minister said that that will be a duty and not just an enabling power. The abolition of the surcharge is long overdue and I was glad to hear her show in her opening remarks the same strong commitment that she has shown on many occasions in debates on the subject of the repeal of section 28. I welcome the fact that she insisted that that would happen.
  I have no difficulty with the idea that we should consider the possibility of structural change in local government. The key questions are what form that change will take and who will decide how it is carried out. To what degree will decisions be made at a national, as opposed to a local, level?
  Irrespective of whether there have been experiments in some local authorities, the Bill proposes something very new and different. It proposes the complete separation of the executive function from the scrutiny function. Councillors will have executive powers that they will exercise personally, and that is a completely new concept. If I have understood clause 11(7) correctly, it appears that a range of people with executive powers might be appointed, rather than elected, to the new positions. We are moving to something that is untried and untested in our political system. We must recognise that in the proposals for the executive functions.
  Some of the proposals are based on arguments about the failings of the committee system in local government. Sometimes, I have felt that that has been turned into the argument that local government has failed consistently for years. I have seen many of the faults of the committee system and I have spent many unhappy hours with sub-committees of sub-committees and gone through all the processes and time that it takes to do something that appears to be relatively simple. However, let us consider what local government achieved 20 years ago. Innovations for equal opportunities took place in local government, not central Government, and the Greater London council introduced a policing committee. That idea was attacked then on the ground that local authorities in London should have nothing to do with the police, but it is now being implemented.
  Local authorities did much innovative work on economic redevelopment and on the relationship between the regeneration of estates and economic development. That all happened in local government, and it involved much more innovation than many central Government Departments can claim to have introduced over the past 20 years. I wonder why we need to be so prescriptive in the proposals. Why must we insist on a separate executive and why is it not possible to consider alternative models? I do not argue that change should not be made or that we should not adapt to changing circumstances.
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  Many questions have been asked about the mechanisms involved in decision making and the role of the scrutiny committees. In many local authorities—it is not true in all; it depends on their political composition—the system is likely to be based on a one-party cabinet and a scrutiny committee that is subject to the rules on political balance. Therefore the scrutiny committee will be made up of a majority of members from the majority party on the council and the cabinet will be made up entirely of members of the majority party. How will the scrutiny functions operate and what will be the role of an opposition councillor on such a committee? I suspect that the scrutiny function might involve rather more political polarisation than often happens at the moment in the committee structures of local government.
  Some hon. Members have discussed the possibility of there being two types of councillor. I have no illusions about all councillors having equal influence over events, because anybody who has been on a council knows that that is not true. I spent 17 years on a local authority, as a back bencher, as a committee chairman, in opposition and as leader of the council, so I have seen it from all aspects, and I have no illusions about the different influences of those positions and the power relationships between them. At the end of the day, however, in each position I, like any other member of the council, had one vote in any of the council's significant policy decisions.
  If we are to have councillors whose primary role is as a member of a scrutiny committee, there is an important question about the resources for those committees, which was raised earlier by my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody). Resources are not mentioned in the Bill. We know that the effectiveness of a Select Committee in the House depends on its members and, in particular, on their personalities. Those of us who have served on Select Committees recognise that they are seriously hampered by a lack of resources to do their work and the small number of people who work directly for them.
  What will be the situation of local authority scrutiny committees when we move away from the experimental arrangements that have been set up in some places and completely separate the executive function from the scrutiny function? Who will service the scrutiny committees? Will a council officer be able to give advice to the executive and then go to the scrutiny committee and suggest how it might question the executive? That is not realistic.
  Will working for the scrutiny committee be an attractive job for a local government officer? Will a junior officer go to the committee and say, "By the way, you really ought to question what the housing department has been doing and what it has suggested to the executive"? We need to examine how we can provide scrutiny committees with independent resources and people to work directly for them, rather than being dependent on others for their jobs and careers so that they will not want to upset someone when doing their work for the committee.
  Dr. Lynne Jones: I very much agree with my hon. Friend, and there are many dilemmas to face in how we go about making changes without increasing costs. We need closely to consider the scrutiny role and, in particular, the committees' powers to call witnesses and demand that they answer questions correctly. We need to be clear about those responsibilities.
  Mr. Gerrard: My hon. Friend makes the critical point that the powers of the scrutiny committees need to be spelt out. Why will they not be able to initiate or propose policies in certain circumstances? The support that they receive will be critical to their effectiveness.
  There has been much discussion about how members of scrutiny committees will function, but little discussion about the effect of the structural changes on local government officers and how they will work in relation to the executive and the scrutiny committees. We need to give that some thought because if we are to make these changes, we want to make them work. We want the scrutiny committees to have teeth and to be able to operate sensibly and efficiently; otherwise, they will become second-class structures and be seen as repositories for people who are not considered fit to be in the executive. If that happens, the system will start to fail.
  The other issue that was raised earlier, on which I want briefly to comment, is secrecy and private meetings of the executive. That is a recipe for creating suspicion. We do not expect Cabinet meetings in Downing street to take place in public, but I should think that during several Governments' time in office, many decisions taken in private in the Cabinet have been regretted when the public reaction has become apparent.
  We must tell councils to have executive meetings in public and to make agenda papers available in advance. It is not good enough to put that in guidance, because some people will totally ignore it. If we do not do that, we will contribute to poorer decision making. People should know in advance what will be discussed, and members of the executive will be alerted to matters that are likely to create a problem. It will also make it easier for the executive to change its mind. It is easier for us all to change our minds before we have announced our decision and put it into practice than to do so afterwards. I therefore hope that we will consider transparency and openness, and recognise that there is a significant difference between providing transparency after a decision has been made and providing it before it has been made.
  We have discussed the problems that might arise and what would happen if there were an emergency. Most councils have provisions in their standing orders to make decisions in an emergency; that is not an insoluble problem. We all recognise that certain issues on the agenda, particularly to do with individuals, must be dealt with in private. Transparency is even more important when individuals, rather than groups, hold executive power.
  Although I have concentrated on concerns about the Bill, the number and scale of amendments needed to make it work, to make the system open and to ensure that the scrutiny committees have the power and support that they need are not that great. I hope that we will consider those details, because I am sure that we can improve the Bill so that it will deliver what we all want—a better and more efficient system of local government.
  7.18 pm
  Mr. Andrew Robathan: I am grateful for the opportunity to speak, and I commend the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Mr. Gerrard), whose 17 years of experience in local government shone through in his speech. I disagree with him about many matters, and I am
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  sure that I shall continue to do so, but he made sensible points. I particularly liked his remarks about secrecy in the cabinet system being a recipe for suspicion because that is one of the points that I shall address.
  My experience of local government is a great deal more limited than that of the hon. Gentleman. I was an opposition councillor in Hammersmith and Fulham, and so I am conscious of the need for change. Many decisions were made in closed caucus by the Labour leadership; nevertheless, I had the opportunity in committees to hold those leaders to account, which was valuable.
  This is a large Bill, and in the limited time that I have I shall concentrate on two issues: cabinet secrecy and section 28, which has attracted so many headlines. The first problem about the secrecy of local government cabinets is that they will not be subject to the Local Government (Access to Information) Act 1985, so statutory openness has been lost, with all that it brings with it. The second is that cabinets will inevitably tend to be single-party bodies, so the openness of cross-party discussion will be lost. Openness will be retrospective under new arrangements, so there will be scrutiny of decisions that have already been made, as has been said. In the present system, information must be made available three days before meetings.
  Councillors who are not cabinet members—especially, and mostly, councillors who are members of opposition parties—will be excluded from the decision-making process. Allegedly, back-bench councillors will be able to spend
  more time representing their communities—
  as the explanatory notes put it; however, the Conservative leader of Blaby district council pours scorn on the idea that they will have anything to do.
  As the House knows, under the current committee system, all important council decisions have to be taken at meetings of the full council or its committees, and they are subject to the 1985 Act. Therefore, meetings are open to the public and the media, although, of course, exempt information can be discussed and decided in private session. Under the Bill, cabinets will not be required to meet in public, but must publish decisions after they have been taken. Furthermore, under clause 21,
  Regulations…may make provision for or in connection with preventing the whole or part of any record or document containing prescribed information from being made available to members of the public.
  In other words, the Bill explicitly leaves open the possibility of blanket restrictions being imposed on access to information. Decisions of directly elected mayors or individual cabinet members will not be subject to the provisions of the 1985 Act, even though a record of decisions made must be published after they have been taken. My local district council, Blaby, is actively taking steps to avoid problems.
  All that sits ill with comments made previously by the Prime Minister and other Labour Ministers. My hon. Friend the Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mr. Norman) mentioned that, in 1996, the Prime Minister said:
  The first right of a citizen in any mature democracy should be the right to information.
  In March 1996, he said:
  We want to end the obsessive and unnecessary secrecy which surrounds government activity and make government information available to the public, unless there are good reasons not to do so.

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  That rings hollow after last week's debate on the Freedom of Information Bill and sits ill with the arrangements on local government cabinet secrecy.
  I shall give a few examples of how secretive cabinet meetings are already creeping into the processes of local government. In Sedgefield district council, which, the House will not be surprised to learn, is Labour-controlled, independent councillor Tony Moore remarked:
  without the press or public allowed in to listen to the debate of councillors, these secret meetings will leave us open to…abuse of power.
  That is a reasonable comment, quoted in The Northern Echo. In Labour-controlled Lambeth borough council, the chairman of an organisation called Streatham Forward says that
  To the present leadership of Lambeth council
  openness "is an alien concept." That valuable newspaper, the Highbury and Islington Express, attacked the secret council meeting held in Liberal Democrat-controlled Islington borough council, lambasting
  eight politicians wanting to decide our future in secret.
  A report about Labour-controlled Newcastle upon Tyne metropolitan borough council in The Independent stated:
  Ten councillors sit in single-party Cabinet meetings closed to the public. Afterwards the council issues a list of recommendations to a further committee, which although held in public, has been accused of "rubber-stamping" Cabinet decisions.
  Those comments, many made by members of the Labour party, express a legitimate concern. We, too, should voice that concern, because local government should be transparent.
  Blaby district council is Conservative-controlled. In a six-month experiment, it has already moved halfway to a cabinet system. However, the seven cabinet members make recommendations to the policy and resources committee—they do not make policy. The biggest concern is about the extra cost: the independent committee that recommends allowance rates has increased allowances by £100,000, which is a lot for a relatively small district council. It has also recommended that every councillor should have a laptop, which might be sensible, but it will certainly be expensive. In Leicestershire county council, the cost of allowances has now more than doubled.
  The big problem in Blaby is that councillors who are not part of the cabinet are left out of decision making, even though attempts are being made to keep them informed through a members' information system. Under the Bill, the only committee work done will be that of scrutiny committees, which will only consider decisions after they have been made. Among all councillors of all parties in Blaby, there is no desire for the change set out in the Bill.
  Mr. Waterson: Given his experience in Hammersmith and Fulham, is my hon. Friend aware that, under the new cabinet system there, more than 600 decisions have been made, only one of which has so far been reversed by the scrutiny process? Does he care to comment?
  Mr. Robathan: I was not privy to those details, but I did know that there has been much criticism expressed in the area of the secrecy surrounding the new cabinet system. All members of good intent would regret that.
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  The section 28 debate is bizarre—it strikes me as strange that anyone should believe that public money should be spent promoting homosexuality as an alternative life style. I should like to correct what was stated earlier by the Minister for Local Government and the Regions, who has now left the Chamber. The right hon. Lady said that the issue has nothing to do with schools. Section 28 is an amendment made by the Local Government Act 1988 to the Local Government Act 1986, It states that "A local authority"—not a school or a teacher—
  shall not…intentionally promote homosexuality or publish material with the intention of promoting homosexuality;
  nor shall it
  promote the teaching in any maintained school of the acceptability of homosexuality as a pretended family relationship.
  Like the majority of people in this country, I find it strange that anyone should think that public money should be spent on such purposes.
  Dr. Lynne Jones: First, will the hon. Gentleman explain how it is possible to promote homosexuality—is that not a contradiction in terms? Secondly…secondly—I have forgotten what my second point is. [Laughter.]
  Mr. Robathan: Knowing the hon. Lady, I am sure that it was an important point. However, she made one sensible point, and I, too, would have thought that it is difficult to promote homosexuality. However, a report in The Times today, states that Berkshire health authority has issued a pamphlet called "Connect"—a gay newsletter aimed at children and young people of 11 years and older that teaches them how to cruise for sex. The hon. Lady might recall from the time when we were young that, sometimes, being told about such things makes them interesting and encourages one to go out and see what is what. I do not suggest that either she or I ever did so, but I believe that that is how homosexuality might be promoted.
  Mr. Desmond Swayne: Has my hon. Friend noticed the way in which the argument has changed over the past few months? A few months ago, we were told that section 28 had to be repealed because it stood in the way of teachers legitimately and properly dealing with homophobic bullying. Now, we are told that it does not apply in schools. The Government cannot have it both ways.
  Mr. Robathan: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Hearing the Prime Minister last Wednesday was astonishing. The debate is not about tolerance; it is about whether or not public money should be spent promoting homosexuality in schools and elsewhere.
  Dr. Jones: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Robathan: I am sorry, but no—I have given way twice and, as the hon. Lady knows, we are subject to a time limit.
  Some say that section 28 has been quite ineffective, citing in evidence the absence of prosecutions under the provision. However, I suggest that its effect has been achieved through the message—the statement—encapsulated in it and the consequent deterrent effect that that has had. Local authorities have not felt minded to

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  push "Jenny lives with Eric and Martin", but, apparently, the publisher of that book promises to reprint it if section 28 is repealed. I have seen the book: it was pretty shocking in the 1980s, but, regrettably, it is less shocking now, because we are inured to such stuff. Nevertheless, I am quite certain that, if the provision is repealed, many publications that promote homosexuality will be produced.
  The issue has become the star turn of the Bill, even though it is only one small part of it, so it is curious how out of touch with popular feeling the Government are. As a parent of two young children, I am against the repeal of section 28. A Gallup poll showed that a large majority of the British public are in favour of maintaining section 28. The Prime Minister should spend more time listening to his constituents in Sedgefield, where 71 per cent. of those polled stated that they want to keep the law as it is.
  I am not a Roman Catholic, but I shall quote Cardinal Winning, because his words are reasonable and measured. He said:
  The current debate is not about homophobia, or discrimination, or intolerance. It is about education. It is perfectly natural that parents should be concerned that their children will be exposed to material that they do not consider either appropriate or advisable. Our politicians are imposing a values-free policy of political correctness on children, parents and society in general.
  I well remember Cardinal Winning criticising the previous Conservative Government. Labour politicians should listen carefully to what he says, whether they are practising Catholics or not. He makes a good point.
  The Bishop of Liverpool, James Jones, stated:
  Section 28 is the logical outworking of putting the family at the heart of a stable society. It is, of course, discriminatory. Yet the setting of all values is a form of choice and discrimination in favour of certain moral principles.
  Muslims, Sikhs and others have all criticised the Government's moves to repeal section 28. Dr. Jonathan Sacks, the Chief Rabbi, who speaks a lot of sense, put it well when he said that repealing section 28 threatens to undermine a moral code shared by the world's great religions. Perhaps he overstates the case, but it is an important marker, which Labour Members should consider carefully.
  The Government have given the matter such priority because they have bought a wider gay agenda. They have bought the aggressive single-issue pressure group lobbying to which we have all been subjected. Indeed, I am sure that the hon. Member for Witney (Mr. Woodward) is about to jump up and tell us about all the lobbying to which he has been subjected.
  The Government apparently intend to publish a code of practice for employers to discourage discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation, which will mean that gay partners get the same rights to health care, travel benefits and relocation allowances as married couples. There is also, apparently, a case for the law to be changed to allow gay partners to register as next of kin and thereby to qualify for inheritance tax relief.
  To most people in the country, outside the Westminster village, that is nonsense. It is not intolerant of them to say that. I am not intolerant of all homosexuals. I do not think that homosexuality is an equivalent life style, but I am not intolerant of homosexuals. What people do in the privacy of their own bedrooms is largely up to them.
  However, the proposal is an unwise move by the Government, which I shall certainly oppose. To most voters, especially Labour voters who are concerned about
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  the real issues that face them in areas which may not be as prosperous as the area that I represent—this was well expressed by the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Kilfoyle)—it is extraordinary that the Government should give such priority to this one politically correct issue. I believe that that is because it is being driven by the single-issue aggressive campaigning homosexual lobby. I wonder what Labour Members' voters will think, in the local elections and come the general election, as well.
  7.33 pm
  Mr. Shaun Woodward: I look forward to the Government introducing their proposals to repeal section 28 in Committee, and I look forward to the removal of the amendments that were introduced in another place. I hope that that will happen soon.
  No one should be in any doubt about the purpose of section 28. It was introduced not to protect, but to discriminate and to hurt. Its presence on the statute book directly or indirectly creates a climate of confusion, fear, intolerance and hatred. That climate still pervades the classroom, despite changes to the legislation in the 1990s—not directly, because of the Education Act 1994, but indirectly.
  Let there be no doubt that the purpose of keeping section 28 is to maintain discrimination, to continue hurting, and to inflame prejudice. We heard some of that prejudice from the hon. Member for Blaby (Mr. Robathan).
  If there has been a consistent theme justifying the actions of those who oppose the repeal of section 28, it is the claim that there is no evidence to support its abolition. I shall focus on evidence.
  The House knows that I was sacked from the Conservative Front Bench because I opposed the party's decision to force its Members through the Lobby to keep section 28. I shall say more about those events in a moment. In the weeks that followed, I received an enormous quantity of letters, more than 95 per cent. of which supported my stand.
  As so much of the debate has focused on family values, let me begin by quoting from a family—a mother—[Interruption.] I am sorry that the hon. Member for Blaby finds a letter from a mother funny. I think that it is rather important. She writes:
  My son is gay and has lived his life being bullied at school. His life has been an absolute misery.
  I, like most of the nation, cringed at the very thought of homosexuality (not knowing my son was gay.) I have recently found out and am so ashamed that I have been so ignorant of all the facts, believing that this was a life choice and not understanding that there is no choice in this matter—that it is purely a fact of nature.
  I now have to live with the fact that my ignorance has been a factor in how my son now feels about himself. He spends most of his time in a depressed and suicidal state.
  And yes, I do blame myself for this because he has been conditioned by myself to believe there is only one way to live and that is to marry someone of the opposite sex.
  The letter continues:
  If children could go to their teachers and tell them why they are being bullied and it could be discussed in an open way, I'm sure that by the time they reach adulthood they would not feel ashamed and disgusted about themselves.
  This matter has touched me in a way I couldn't have imagined. I can't do much to help my son. I can't change the way people think. I can't educate people or make them understand what it can do to a young person—how society can make them want to commit suicide.
  But you and people like you can.

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  [Interruption.] It is a great shame that four of the greater exponents of keeping section 28 on the statute book are not even interested in listening to that lady's letter—the mother who has had the responsibility of bringing up that child.
  We have a choice today. The House will have to decide how we respond to that mother's letter. Do we listen or do we ignore her, her son and their family? If we ignore them, what does that say about our so-called family values? After all, families are not just about structures. They are about relationships and they are about love.
  I regret the fact that so much of the debate has degenerated into an almost warlike atmosphere. It is presented as some kind of cultural war. Efforts to persuade people to adopt greater tolerance and understanding of those who are gay have been caricatured as a battle to defend family values. Somehow we have arrived at the ludicrous position in which arguing the case to end discrimination is seen as attacking the role of the family and family values in our society.
  Nothing could be further from the truth. That caricature is misleading and grossly misrepresents the real argument. Somehow, being against discrimination is equated with being against the family. That is utter nonsense, utterly wrong and utterly misleading.
  I find it difficult to understand why anyone should not logically want equal treatment for all our citizens. There is something very unpleasant about the way in which the argument about section 28 has evolved. Of course, discrimination has too long played a role in the history of our society. Likewise, we have long debated the meaning of equality.
  Today, the rhetorical equation of civil rights with special rights—or as the hon. Member for Blaby called it, a special agenda—has dominated much of the debate. The tension between equality and individual freedom to discriminate fuels much of the discussion of section 28.
  Regrettably, we live in a society that still fosters a system of sexual apartheid. Just as apartheid in pre-1994 South Africa denied black people full citizenship, so our laws deny that same full citizenship to those who are gay. As the mother's letter that I read earlier said so poignantly, it is all to easy to fail our children because of our bigotry, to think that it does not matter, or even to justify the discrimination because we think that it is about special rights, not civil rights.
  In Britain we still have an age of consent that is not equal. We expect those of our citizens who are gay to fight in our wars, to defend our country and perhaps even to sacrifice their lives, yet only recently have we begun to realise that they, too, should have rights in the armed forces which may ask them to lay down their lives.
  Much has been distorted in the argument about so-called pretend families. It is claimed that lesbians and gay men do not have families, only pretend families. We tell them that they are second best, if that.
  However, we tend to consider the matter only from the perspective of adults. What about the children? As a trustee of Childline, which has counselled nearly 1 million children in 12 years, I have listened to children for a long time. I shall quote a letter from a mother, whom we shall call Kate. She said:
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  My son David is 7-years old and already he is bullied at school for having gay parents. When he started school at 5 he thought there was no difference between having gay parents and straight parents. Not any more.

  We have been staggered at the levels of homophobia in schools.

  Hug a friend of the same gender and you are gay.

  Use a smaller girl's knife at lunchtime and you are gay.

  It's not all aimed at him.

  It is just a term of abuse. Like nigger used to be when society sanctioned racial prejudice, like Section 28 sanctions homophobia.

  The school knows about this kind of abuse, but feels unable to challenge it because of Section 28.

  Kate says that David is all right because he has the support of loving parents and they have had the support of others, but what about the children in David's class who might be gay? The letter continues:
  How do you think these children are going to feel about their sexuality when it has been an officially sanctioned term of abuse throughout their childhood?
  Section 28 contributes to a climate that sets some people apart from the rest of society. Yet Conservative Members present arguments that all too easily blame lesbian and gay people for setting themselves apart. However, the House is beginning to realise, as we realised with race apartheid, that sexual apartheid is wrong. It is just as cruel, and it arouses the same feeling of injustice, and the same pain and suffering. It is divisive.
  Much of the debate has been about misunderstanding. The climate in which misunderstanding operates easily becomes one of fear, prejudice, intolerance and even hate. It would be wrong to suggest that all those who oppose the repeal of section 28 wilfully wish to mislead the public. However, some do. They distort the facts and present misleading arguments. Their conclusions are underpinned by appalling prejudice.
  Let us consider a Conservative party press release, which was issued by the shadow Secretary of State for Education and Employment. It states:
  The Conservative party is quite clear. We believe that no public money should be spent promoting homosexuality. Public money should be used to raise educational standards.
  Of course money should be spent on raising educational standards. However, resources need to be used to tackle bullying. Homophobic bullying is a serious problem in our schools. The Conservative party press release continues:
  Bullying is wrong. We do not believe that section 28 provides any legal impediment to teachers to tackle bullying.
  The Tories claim that bullying must be stopped, but would not provide money to tackle that problem in schools.
  The row over section 28 led to my sacking from the Conservative Front Bench. I had no idea that the Government intended to repeal section 28 until the Queen's Speech last November. As soon as I knew, I consulted every headteacher in every school in my constituency. Every secondary school headteacher wanted the law repealed. They gave example after example of homophobia. They said that, despite the fact that the law had changed, the climate meant that section 28 hung like a sword of Damocles over teachers' heads.
  I tried to explain that to the Conservative Chief Whip. He was not very interested. I said that a party that wanted to listen to Britain should listen. However, he said that, when it came to section 28, the Conservative party was not listening. In three minutes, a meeting of members of

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  the shadow Cabinet decided, after taking no evidence from any interested party—social workers, teachers, the British Medical Association or children's charities—that section 28 constituted a good opportunity to promote their so-called family values. They ignored the sort of letters that they received from people whose families genuinely suffer.
  The university of London produced some evidence. It polled teachers in 307 schools. The research concluded:
  Although the direct legal effect of Section 28 on school policies is minimal, the existence of the legislation sends a clear signal that there may be something dangerous or wrong about addressing the needs of gay pupils.
  This is an unnecessary, damaging and confusing message for teachers which adversely affects the lives of the young people with whom they work.
  We must all regret that none of that is reflected in Conservative party propaganda, statements or briefings.
  A briefing note that the Tories prepared on 27 March this year stated:
  Key point. Parents want the comfort of knowing that homosexuality cannot be promoted in schools at public expense, and that their children are protected.
  How misleading—the Tories know that section 28 does not apply directly in schools. Their legislation provided for that. School governors have the responsibility for sex education. Yet the attempt to mislead the public continued, even by the Leader of the Opposition. In Prime Minister's questions, he challenged the Prime Minister to back down and asked him what people had to do to get him to back off politically correct nonsense.
  The Prime Minister will not back off because the Labour party will do what is right, not what is expedient to exploit people's fears and prejudices. A teacher wrote a letter, which stated:
  I was asked to interview a young 15-year old boy who had not attended formal education for two years. It soon transpired that his failure to attend school had been due to vicious homophobic bullying.
  This resulted in a severe breakdown and admission to a psychiatric unit.
  He also told me that had been self-abusing and showed me his scars. Both his arms are covered by a huge series of scars from knife cutting.
  Another teacher wrote about an appalling case. He said:
  When I was at school, there was a swing park next to Airdrie hospital, and next to this there was a set of public toilets.
  The one painful memory I have is that a young man was beaten to death in those toilets late one night.
  His face had been kicked and booted so badly that his face was no longer recognisable as a face.
  I do remember how everyone at school was laughing about it because the general idea was that he was gay and therefore his death was a good thing.
  The fact that he suffered an inhumane death…was irrelevant.
  I know of young kids who have been beaten up at school because they were perceived to be gay, and the school did nothing about it.
  A young man called Darren committed suicide last year because he could no longer go on suffering the beatings and the abuse.
  His teachers knew all about it, but because of Section 28 felt obliged to ignore it.
  Section 28 drove him to suicide.
  How many other young children has it driven to suicide, or suffered brutally…?
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  We will never know, but it cannot be denied that such a situation is immoral and unfair.
  A few years ago, Neil Kinnock, the former leader of this party said:
  Section 28 is crude in its concept. Slanderous in its drafting. Vicious in its purpose.
  It is vicious. It should go.
  7.48 pm
  Mr. David Amess: The Bill is bad and dishonest. Anyone who had any doubts should have been here this afternoon to listen to the Minister of State's introduction. It was appalling. She convinced no one, least of all members of her party. I do not wish to be unkind to her but she has had a bad week. I listened to her on the radio when she talked about what she described as "best value". After her big build up, the interviewer asked what was new about the idea. She had no answer. The interviewer described value for money in local government as simple common sense.
  At the weekend, the right hon. Lady described the dome as a remarkable building. It is remarkable that it was ever built—I suppose that my party had a hand in that. However, it is a different matter to go on radio and claim that it constitutes a remarkable example of fine British architecture.
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions (Ms Beverley Hughes): It is.
  Mr. Amess: I am sorry to disagree with the Under-Secretary, but I do not believe that the dome is a remarkable building, and the majority of British people are not proud of it.
  The Bill is a bad measure. The Government tabled more than 300 amendments to it in another place. Most of them did not tackle the substantive points. This afternoon, the Minister showed that she had not mastered the arguments.
  The Bill is dishonest. The 1997 Labour party general election manifesto states:
  Local decision-making should be less constrained by central government…
  Well, yes. Also, it should be
  more accountable to local people.
  Yes. The manifesto goes on:
  We will place on councils a new duty to promote the economic, social and environmental well-being of their area.
  However, there was no rider to say that there would be no money for any of that, as the way in which Lord Dixon-Smith tried to amend the Bill shows. It also says:
  They should work in partnership with local people, local business and local voluntary organisations.
  I want to share with the House the fact that none of that has happened in my town, Southend, where this dreadful experiment went ahead. Under no circumstances have the local people been consulted about the nonsense that has gone on. It adds:
  They will have the powers necessary to develop these partnerships. To ensure greater accountability, a proportion of councillors in each locality will be elected annually.
  The Minister of State kept firing her guns at Her Majesty's loyal Opposition, who were saying nothing, and completely ignored Labour Back Benchers, although she knew only too well that they were deeply unhappy with

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  the Bill. Hardly any Labour Member has supported this shambles of a Bill this afternoon—everyone seems to oppose it—or perhaps they are terribly busy. The Government have had months to sort it out, yet we again find shabby legislation before the House.
  I pay tribute to Friends of the Earth, Charter 88 and the Campaign for Freedom of Information. Under normal circumstances, they would be close to the Labour party but, judging by the brief that has been sent to me, they are very unhappy with the Bill. Although one or two hon. Members smiled earlier, it was Baroness Thatcher who in 1960 introduced a private Member's Bill to allow council meetings to be open to the press and the public. The Conservative party should be proud of that. When we were in office for our 18 years, we also passed legislation to allow the public access to key council papers three days before meetings.
  Everything in the Bill is dishonest and rubbish is talked about it. The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions seemed to disagree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Skipton and Ripon (Mr. Curry) when he talked about modernisation. What the devil is this modernisation about? I shall tell the House. It is about the Labour party stifling any debate, just as it wants to stifle its own Back Benchers. The Bill is not about openness and transparency—that is an absolute travesty of what has happened in Southend.
  The hon. Member for Liverpool, Garston (Maria Eagle) talked about her Liberal council. I shall talk about my Labour and Liberal council and we shall see how open and transparent it is. What the Bill suggests is nonsense. The public will not know what is being discussed at local authority cabinet meetings, apart from seeing a brief summary of decisions made after the meeting. Time after time, Labour Back Benchers tried to intervene on the Minister of State to make that point. Whether she could not be moved from her brief or did not understand the point I do not know, but I thought that she would have had a tangible argument to meet it.
  The Bill will strip the British people and local newspapers of their right to observe how councils make decisions and how individual councillors vote. A year ago in Southend, for whatever reason, it was decided to opt for cabinet-style government. It has been a total disaster. What has gone on in Southend is a disgrace and I want to touch on many issues. I asked for a report on what the new system has meant in Southend and most councillors of all parties think that it is
  undemocratic that a small Cabinet of 8 make all the decisions and…the other 31…
  are turned scrutineer. That is what my right hon. Friend the Member for Skipton and Ripon referred to earlier. It is a waste of time being a scrutineer councillor. They have no power whatever.
  What have the daft Government done in Southend? We all nodded and said that it is difficult to get people to stand for the council so we are to have another 13 scrutineers. We shall have more councillors, but fewer people will be involved in the democratic process. What a complete waste of their time. Although the Southend cabinet meets in public, the decisions are taken at its private briefing with officers. Like many hon. Members,
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  I have been a councillor, though to be honest I did not much enjoy being a councillor in Redbridge. I prefer being a Member of Parliament. However, I got a feel for the way things work. The hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Dr. Jones) or the hon. Member for Walthamstow (Mr. Gerrard) said that parties met in private under the old committee system and the press did not get to hear what went on. That is not the case. Councillors could be whipped to any end in a private meeting on a three-line Whip, many things were leaked to the media and there was close scrutiny of decisions before they reached the committee stage.
  I am also advised by the Southend councillors that morale is low among those on all sides who are not in the cabinet. They are very bitter about being excluded and people will become totally disenchanted in the long term, but that is what this rotten Labour party is all about: fewer and fewer people voting and fewer and fewer people getting involved in the democratic process, but Ministers have the nerve to come to the Dispatch Box to pretend that they are propagating openness and transparency. There is nothing open and transparent about this dreadful Government.
  The cabinet system encourages decisions to be taken first and public debate to take place afterwards, which is odd.
  Ms Sally Keeble: Rubbish.
  Mr. Amess: The hon. Lady should come to Southend to talk to Labour councillors. Let them try to convince her that it is no good taking decisions privately and arguing about them afterwards, when it is too late. The scrutiny committee has few powers and must refer matters back for reconsideration.
  I have always been against officer-led local authorities, but the proposal plays into officers' hands as it is all about taking control away from democratically elected representatives. That is part of a hidden agenda for the long run to drive potential councillors out of local government and to shift their powers to regional assemblies, which we shall discuss later.
  I also want to refer to the payment of councillors. In our local newspaper, the Evening Echo, I read:
  Southend's council leader could be set for a 100 per cent increase in allowances under new recommendations revealed today.
  That has gone down like a lead balloon locally. Executive councillors could be paid £10,000 to £12,000, but I cannot see too many people giving up full-time jobs for such a salary. If the Bill becomes law, I shall be very worried about the way in which local government is going.
  I want to share another matter with the House. Local people have been kept in the dark about important issues such as assisted area status because of this ridiculous cabinet system. What has gone on is a disgrace. At one point, Southend applied for objective 2 status under the fisheries strand arrangements. There was no consultation. Two wards in my area, Leigh and Chalkwell, were moved to the urban strand. There was no openness and no transparency. The one ward that I represent, Westborough, was taken out rather than being switched to the urban strand. Therefore no ward in my constituency qualifies, as a direct result of a lack of openness. On Friday, I shall raise on the Floor of the House a variety of disgraceful developments in connection with social services which I believe have been kept secret.

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  Then there is the nonsense involving our roads. Our poor businesses are struggling to make a living; now we find that, to try to get the traffic flowing, the barking mad council has arranged for us to have bus lanes all along the A13, and gridlock along the Al27. Because of the secrecy of the cabinet system, local traders knew nothing of what was happening. Unfortunately, the Liberal-Labour-controlled Essex county council dropped a scheme that would have given us a decent road to the north of the town. At present, that is costing Southend dear.
  Owing to the secrecy, the planning system is a disgrace. We never hear about houses in multiple occupation until it is too late. There have been many instances of masts being put on top of buildings; a number of my constituents are worried about the health hazards, but because of this secrecy, we hear nothing.
  I am proud to represent a very Christian society in Southend, but what has gone on in regard to asylum seekers is an absolute disgrace. There are now more than 2,000 in the area that I represent. Given the strength of feeling, it is disgraceful that the matter has been handled in complete secrecy. Now that it is out of control, however, the council is taking legal action against the boroughs of Hackney, Redbridge and other areas.
  This is a bad Bill. It is a dishonest Bill, and, unfortunately, it is a Bill that is absolutely typical of this dreadful Government.
  8.2 pm
  Mrs. Louise Ellman: The Bill is about reviving local government and local democracy after a Tory onslaught that continued for 18 years. It is difficult to take seriously any comments made by the Opposition, given that they were part of that onslaught, and given that we heard again this evening—in reply to a question from me to the right hon. Member for South-West Norfolk (Mrs. Shephard)—that they still intended to abolish local education authorities. The Tory track record in local government is about destruction, and the Tory promise for the future is about further destruction and running down.
  The Bill is about revitalising local government, but it is also about preparing local government for change—change that will be very important if local government and local democracy are to lead developments in the new century by ensuring that local authorities work as effectively as possible, and by leading local communities.
  The Government have already recognised the importance of local authorities as providers of local services, either directly or indirectly. The replacement of compulsory competitive tendering by best value is a welcome indication of that. But the Government have also recognised the importance of leadership and innovation at local level. I welcome the new powers giving local authorities a duty to promote social, economic and environmental well-being.
  Nevertheless, I ask my hon. Friends to recognise that local government also has a proud record of innovation and creativity. During the 1980s, it was local government that pioneered major changes for the benefit of the community, against a background of Tory Government hostility to local government, both generally and specifically.
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  In the early 1980s, when I was leader of Lancashire county council, I was involved with not just my local authority but county councils in areas such as the west midlands, West Yorkshire and Merseyside. Despairing of the Tory Government's inaction and their uncaring attitude to rising unemployment and the destruction of our local economies, the local authority sector worked with private enterprise to set up local enterprise boards, the precursors of regional development agencies.
  The most spectacular achievement of Lancashire Enterprises was the saving of Leyland Trucks when it collapsed in the early 1990s. Lancashire Enterprises, the Labour authority-controlled local economic development company, worked with the private sector to preserve truck making in Lancashire, which continues to this day. We did that through judicious investment, rather than grant or subsidy. Moreover, we preserved thousands of jobs—the jobs of workers at Leyland Trucks, and of workers in the hundreds of feeder companies operating not just in Lancashire but throughout the north-west. That is an example of what could be done by the local government initiatives set up in the early 1980s. They showed that manufacturing could be saved by local authorities working with the private sector, although the Government of the time opposed what was happening.
  I can give other examples of my experiences in Lancashire local government during those years, showing what local authority initiative can do. Lancashire country council, working with Greenpeace, pressed for a public inquiry into the proposed nuclear reprocessing at Sellafield, because we did not accept the statistics given to us by British Nuclear Fuels. We were not successful in that regard, but we were successful in securing new legislation: from that day on, European environmental law became United Kingdom environmental law. I believe that the sad events of recent months fully vindicate the stand that we took in calling for an inquiry into Sellafield all those years ago.
  I could give many more instances of Lancashire's innovation against the background of a Government who did not care, did not listen and tried to impede. I am sure that many other Members can give examples from their own experience. I emphasise that all those initiatives, and many more, were taken under a Government who wanted to impede us. I welcome the powers in the Bill to encourage local authorities to take a leadership role, to work with the private and voluntary sectors, and to show the way forward for the community. However, I ask my hon. Friend the Minister to consider whether those powers are sufficient to give the new leadership role the strength that it deserves.
  Although the Bill gives wider powers to local authorities, there appear to be no proposals to look again at the legislation imposed by the Conservatives restricting local authorities' interests in companies. That is an extremely important issue. If local authorities are to play a full part in regeneration and if there is to be accountability for public money that is spent, it is essential for legislation relating to authorities' interests in companies to be revisited, and for authorities to be given stronger powers.
  I ask for that in general terms, and also specifically. We should consider how local authorities can play their part in urban regeneration and, in particular, in the activities of the urban regeneration companies proposed in the Rogers report on urban renaissance. One such company already

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  operates in Liverpool. I want that project to be fully supported, but I also want the local authority to have sufficient powers in regard to that company, and other regeneration companies, to ensure public responsibility and accountability for the money that is spent.
  I ask the Minister to consider whether local authorities will, through the Bill, be properly equipped to take on that leadership role and to tackle financial issues. If they are to take on real leadership, show the way forward and innovate, they will need access to funding that is flexible. Although I accept that there are cases where specific grants to local authorities are justified, it is wrong for the vast majority of central Government funding to local government to be prescribed.
  In the past, local government has innovated against the odds. This Government want local government to innovate, but, to do that, it must have legal powers and the financial flexibility to be able to identify the funds to allow it to pioneer a new way forward.
  During the debate, much has been said about the new structures. It is much easier to say what is wrong with existing structures than to find new ones that will solve all problems. I share many of the concerns that have been expressed. It is important that local authorities move forward with all members feeling that they are part of one authority. It is important that there is access to relevant information. It would be wrong if there were unnecessary divisions within councils, so I add my voice to those of hon. Members who have asked for another look at some of the detail of how the structures may go forward.
  There is provision in the Bill for directly elected mayors where local people feel that they are appropriate. Given the new structures and the emphasis on new powers of community leadership in local government, there is a role for a directly elected mayor, provided that the people of the area want one. A directly elected mayor could bring new focus, direction and confidence to local authorities, but it is essential that the powers given to directly elected mayors are sufficient to make a difference and are exercised for the benefit of all the people of the area.
  The Bill presents new challenges. It tries to revitalise local government, which was almost decimated by the Conservatives over all those years, but it also offers a new way forward. That new way brings opportunities, but also new challenges.
  I ask the Minister to recognise the great achievements of local government in the past and in the present. I ask the Government to maintain their support for local democracy through directly elected local government, and I ask local authorities to grasp the opportunities that are offered.
  8.13 pm
  Mr. Simon Thomas: I am pleased to have the opportunity to take part in the debate. Like many other hon. Members, I cut my teeth in local government, both as an officer working for a local authority and, later, as a county councillor. Therefore, having worked on both sides of the local government fence, as it were, I appreciate, and pay tribute to, the hard work that officers and councillors in particular undertake voluntarily, working for local democracy, local governance and continuing devolution in Wales.
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  Wales is in a unique position with regard to the Bill because it has universal unitary authorities, the National Assembly and the Partnership Council: again, a unique way of working involving the structure at both parliamentary and local government level. I hope that, because of the interest in Wales in what is happening in local government and in the Bill, there will be good representation from Wales on discussions of the Bill in Committee.
  In the White Papers in both England and Wales, the Government set out four main planks for modernisation; I hesitate to use that word after some criticism has been made of it, but let us accept it for the moment. The four main planks were: the introduction of the executive style of decision making; new standards of conduct for officers and members; the introduction of community planning; and the introduction of best value.
  Best value has had a hesitant start in Wales. The beacon council schemes had to be put back a year because of the plethora of bureaucracy, papers and difficulties. Local government has sometimes been asked to respond and to change perhaps a little too quickly after the recent shake-up of local government structures in Wales, but the Bill sets out the rest of the changes. I was pleased in particular to hear the Minister's comments on community planning. She confirmed that the intention is to place a duty on local authorities to bring in community planning and made positive comments about that.
  That duty is important. It is not in the Bill as amended. It is a pity that the Government did not use the other place to table their amendment, so that we could see what they meant by that. Nevertheless, the intention has been made clear and confirmed today. Therefore, I look forward to seeing the Government amendment to introduce the duty on community planning. [Interruption.] Excellent; the Minister has returned to her place. She is just in time. I bring to her attention what is perhaps an oversight in the Bill.
  I take it that, if community planning is to be a duty in Wales, clause 4 will be amended. Therefore, it will have to be brought within the ambit of clause 92, which gives powers to the National Assembly to make regulations and so forth. Otherwise, community planning in Wales will be run by regulations from the Department in England. That cannot be right. We need to look carefully at the matter and to tidy up that provision.
  On the whole, so far, what we have seen from the Government on local government is strong rhetoric about hearing local voices and enabling local decision makers, but weakness on practical methods of achieving that. The only way to involve local communities is to involve them at the earliest part of service delivery planning, so that they look at the options, are part of the vision of the future, and debate the different ways forward. That extends to businesses and voluntary and community groups.
  Executive structures on their own are no guarantee of greater local accountability. Indeed, they could tend to isolate councillors one step further from local people, and we must avoid that. Therefore, one of the key modernising requirements—that word again, I am afraid—must be to move local government from its tendency towards oppositional decision making to a more collaborative and consensual process.
  I appreciate that that is what the Government are trying to achieve in the Bill, but, without that key requirement, its other welcome measures could tend to strengthen, or

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  even to fossilise, current ways of doing things. The replacement of one set of, as it tends to be, slightly older men by one individual who is also likely to be a man, will not bring about the changes.
  Reference was made to the report by the right hon. Member for Camberwell and Peckham (Ms Harman) on the number of women in local authorities. I regret that a local authority in Wales, Ynys Môn, or Isle of Anglesey county council, has the lowest number of women—just 8 per cent. of its members are women. My own local authority only just creeps above that: four of its 44 members are women, about 9 per cent. That has been unchanged for eight years; there has been no improvement in the amount of women represented in Ceredigion in the past eight years.
  We must change that. The key way forward is to modernise our councillor profile. Community planning is an important step along that way. It can open up local government and encourage more balanced and informed participation.
  How do we achieve that? One of the ways is to change the way in which we elect councillors. The encouragement towards annual elections is to be welcomed—I know that not everyone in Wales agrees with me on that. We have little experience of elections by thirds, although the old Rhondda district council did elect by thirds.
  In the Representation of the People Act 2000, the Government introduced a rolling electoral register. That is welcome, but more important than all those changes—it is singularly lacking in the Bill—is the need to move towards proportional representation in local elections. That would be the single most important influence for change in local government. An amendment to the Bill to allow the National Assembly for Wales to experiment and to introduce PR would be a tremendously powerful tool for change.
  I know that the Government have experimented with the way in which the May elections in England will happen. There are different days and ways of polling. The London elections will take place over several days. Those changes are all welcome. We look forward to the detailed reports on how they have worked. However, Plaid Cymru has long supported the single transferable vote, and we see no reason why it should not apply at local authority level.
  My comments on the Government's proposals on the executive are perhaps not so warm. I welcome the Bill as amended in the other place. We should be seeking not to impose new structures on local government, but to establish best practice and to encourage local authorities to adopt it. Although I accept that the three new executive structures—potentially with a fourth or more—are flexible, that in itself does not greatly recommend them. We should be moving towards a system that allows local people to choose the local structure that suits them best.
  In Wales, about 19 of the local authorities are either introducing a shadow system or experimenting with one. I think that Flintshire and Powys have said that they want to keep a "new look" committee structure. I do not know whether Blaenau Gwent has joined those authorities in that, but it may well have done. However, I feel very strongly that the National Assembly for Wales should decide what systems of local authority should operate in Wales, and that the decision should be an example of devolution and subsidiarity—to use a now rather old-fashioned word—at work. As the hon. Member for
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  Cardiff, North (Ms Morgan) who has left the Chamber said earlier, it is an excellent opportunity for the Government to put into action their new-found appreciation—announced in The Observer, on Sunday—of the lessons of devolution.
  Elected mayors are a case in point on those lessons. The idea of elected mayors is quite popular in some of the larger cities in England—
  Ms Armstrong: And with the public.
  Mr. Thomas: Yes, I appreciate that. However, I do not think that the same is true in Wales. We could have elected mayors in Wales, and it might make sense to have one in places such as Cardiff or Swansea. Wales may also soon have a third city—although I should not make a pitch on behalf of Wrexham or even Aberystwyth. However, I do not detect a real groundswell of support for elected mayors in Wales. Indeed, I think that mayors are now very much off the agenda in Wales, thanks in no small degree to the antics of Cardiff's Lord Mayor. The antics were precisely what people feared might happen with elected mayors—individuals taking power for themselves, riding roughshod over others' opinions, feathering their own nests and generally ignoring events in the local community.
  Mr. Waterson: Does the hon. Gentleman, in summary, perhaps agree with the Deputy Prime Minister, who said that he was "not a fan" of directly elected mayors?
  Mr. Thomas: I agree that I am not a fan of directly elected mayors, but I am prepared to allow local people to have a say in whether they want to have directly elected mayors.
  Last May, in its press release on the new Lord Mayor, Cardiff city council said:
  Under the new set-up, the process for installing the Lord Mayor took less than three minutes instead of the usual two hours, there was no civic lunch and the Lord Mayor drove himself home instead of having a chauffeur-driven car, saving Council Taxpayers thousands of pounds.
  I do not know what mileage allowance Cardiff councillors receive, but that journey home has cost Cardiff's council tax payers a great deal.
  My concern about the new executive structures is that they do not seem to offer a real way of dealing with a failing system. If a mayor or a "new look" cabinet is failing, how can local people deal with that failure, get rid of the mayor or cabinet and install a different system?
  Plaid Cymru supports the principle of separation of the executive. Implementation of such a principle would only make explicit what already happens in most authorities.
  Ms Armstrong: It is in the Bill.
  Mr. Thomas: We feel that it should be done by encouragement of best practice and not by compulsion, and that the National Assembly should be the body to decide on the matter. I should like to see what the National Assembly and local government in Wales could come up with by using a voluntary framework and after real consultation with their communities, the voluntary community sector and businesses in Wales.

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  I acknowledge that de facto executive structures already exist. I have a very small footnote in the history of local government in Wales, as I was the first appointed political assistant—under whatever Act it was—in Wales. I have spent three years in party caucuses and party groups, behind the closed doors. I know how they work and have written up their minutes. Undoubtedly, the Bill's one real failure is that it does not deal with the need for access to information. I have been there behind the closed doors, and I know what it is like. Unfortunately, on that matter, as Labour Members have said, the Bill is a retrograde step.
  It is not good enough for the onus to rest on local authorities to open up their cabinets to scrutiny. It may well be that the National Assembly will establish more stringent regulations in Wales than apply in England—although many English Members may not appreciate that. Nevertheless, the principle that should apply is that the public should have access to information—precisely as they do under the Local Government (Access to Information) Act 1985—unless that information relates to personnel matters or commercial decisions.
  I think that the Minister put up a bit of smokescreen about matters such as emergency decisions, but those should be removed from legislation. In the absence of political balance in cabinets—I do not think that, practically, we can assist in achieving that balance in cabinets—we have to have public scrutiny and accountability. The best form of public scrutiny and accountability is not a scrutiny committee, but access to the information on which decisions are made.
  I pay tribute to those councillors in Wales who are now opening their cabinet structures to the public. There might be a slight Plaid Cymru balance in this, but I should like to name some of the councils involved. One can watch the meetings of Gwynedd county council's cabinet, for example, live on the internet. One can see it all happening on the internet. [Interruption.] It is live on the internet. Hon. Members should tune in and have a look at it, but they should choose the English-language feed, because the Welsh one might be slightly misleading.
  Ms Armstrong: Does that mean that, in those areas, Plaid Cymru has stopped having group meetings first to take the decisions?
  Mr. Thomas: Of course it does not. However, the decisions are taken openly, in cabinet. I do not think that the Labour party has stopped having group meetings. The day that political parties stop having group meetings will probably be the day that the cabinet structure is also no longer used.
  Recently, Caerphilly opened its cabinet meetings to the public. My own authority, Ceredigion, under pressure from the opposition Plaid Cymru members, has just opened up to the public its cabinet meetings.
  It is essential that the Bill is amended to give the public access to the documents on which decisions are taken, so that they can determine for themselves why the decisions were taken. We should not be going backwards. The 1985 Act has worked very well. It is valued by businesses, community groups and individuals. They are able to see
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  the agenda and papers beforehand, information can be provided, and the people can lobby. Often, at the end of that process, better decisions are reached.
  An important aspect of public access to information is that it allows us to make better decisions. Openness breeds a culture of consultation and accountability, but secrecy breeds arrogance and contempt for the electorate. We have recently seen some examples of that.
  Local government in Wales has an honourable tradition. It has introduced uniform secondary education, helped to establish the health service and widened provision of leisure facilities and libraries. Now, it is leading on sustainable development in Wales. Much in the Bill will continue that tradition. However, there are some serious sticking points in the Bill—on executive structures, access to information, community planning and proportional representation—which I hope will be fully dealt with in Committee.
  Plaid Cymru will certainly support the Bill on Second Reading, so that it can be considered in Committee and, I hope, knocked into even better shape.
  8.28 pm
  Mr. Llew Smith: My right hon. Friend the Minister for Local Government and the Regions said that the Government were committed to devolving powers, and that there was a need for people to have more control over their lives and more influence over decision makers. We all accept that. However, the Bill will not achieve that.
  The Minister may respond to my scepticism about the Government's commitment to devolving powers by repeating her earlier remarks that that commitment is shown by the fact that we now have a Welsh Assembly and a Scottish Parliament. However, some argued at the time of the referendum—and continue to argue—that a Welsh Assembly and a Scottish Parliament had little to do with devolution, but much to do with going down the road of nationalism and separatism. Almost 12 months on, I see no reason to depart from that view.
  In Wales, there is almost total disillusionment with that so-called act of devolved power. The people of Wales cannot see that they have any more influence over the decision makers because they now have an institution based in Cardiff. We were told that, with the Assembly, we would put powers back into local authorities. One of the ways in which that was to be done—we were told that this was the main reason for a Welsh Assembly—was by making a bonfire of the quangos. Almost 12 months on, that bonfire has not happened—indeed, it has been a damp squib. Most people knew at the time that that was a cheap publicity stunt to try to persuade people to vote for a Welsh Assembly. The quangos have not been scrapped, and are very much intact. Local authority powers have not been increased.
  One of the ways of maintaining the powers of local authorities would be to support the amendments in another place, which would give authorities the opportunity of having a mayor, a leader and a cabinet but would also give them the opportunity to continue with the committee system if they believed that that system was more relevant to their community and more able to respond to its problems.
  The Bill is not about devolving power. I cannot see the logic of a Government who are seemingly committed to devolution, but are also centralising power in the hands

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  of mayors, leaders and cabinets. That is not acceptable to me, or to my local authority. The role of councillors who are not in one of those bodies will be almost non-existent.
  The Government may say that they are setting up scrutiny committees and that councillors will have a positive role, not just in scrutinising decisions that have been taken, but in developing ideas which then become the policy of the local authority. However, from talking to local authority members, it is my view that those committees could be worthless, and that the role of local authorities then would be minimal.
  Local authorities should have the opportunity to continue with the committee system if that is what they want. If they think that a mayor or a leader with an elected cabinet would reflect the aspirations, or respond to the problems, of their communities more than a committee system, so be it. I have no argument with that. However, we should not take away the option of a committee system.
  If we are going to have a mayor, or a leader with a cabinet, the system should be far more open and democratic than is proposed by the Bill. The Government could legislate so that all cabinet meetings remained open to the public and to all councillors. The present system—of leaving that decision to the executive—is unsatisfactory.
  The agenda and the background papers should have to be made public in advance of the meetings. Every step in the decision-making process should be documented and made public. The decision of the proper officer of an executive to make an item exempt could be appealable. The officer's advice to the executive should be made public prior to the meeting.
  We should extend the period of availability of papers relied on by councillors before taking decisions. Public reports and background papers should be made available five working days in advance by the council and by the executive. All public reports produced by the council or executive should list background papers, and councils should publish all public reports and background papers on a web site—if there is one—seven working days in advance of any meeting, and the executive should have to do the same.
  The Minister may respond by saying that, in the guidance notes for the Bill, all these things are possible. However, I do not want them just to be possible; I want them to be compulsory. We will always have rogue authorities who pick the worst system to defend their unacceptable ways of operating. We must consider making compulsory those things that are optional under the Bill.
  Decisions should not be left to individual councils. Mayors and individual politicians will wield considerable powers in their own right, as their decisions will not have to be ratified by the executive or the council. That adds to concern about the arrangements. Vital decisions about housing, education, social services, the closure of facilities or the contracting out of services may be taken in far greater secrecy.
  The Campaign for Freedom of Information has made a number of points on the Bill. It says:
  Mayors are likely to be responsible for many decisions, which they will effectively take on their own. Individual "cabinet members" may also be given similar powers, and officials will be responsible for taking a wider range of decisions. As these decisions will not be taken at "meetings" the 1985 Act cannot directly apply.
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  However, the Bill should be amended so that the public is given equivalent rights to see papers before decisions. That is reports, recommendations and background papers should be open to the public unless they contain exempt information.
  The Bill should also be amended to require a short period of delay (a week has been suggested) before executive decisions can be implemented, with powers for non-executive councillors or a scrutiny committee.
  The Bill includes measures to improve ethical standards. But if decisions are taken in private, by the executives and individual politicians, there will be less scrutiny of whether councillors' private and financial interests are properly declared, and less oversight of the award of contracts and of appointments to outside bodies.
  Removing the requirement to publish agendas and papers in advance of decisions could encourage legal advice to politicians, and it will be harder for the monitoring officer to fulfil his/her responsibilities to ensure decision making is legal and ethical.
  The amendments made in the Lords to approve the present committee structure should be accepted. They would maximise opportunities for councillors and electors in every local authority area to have a say on decisions that may affect their community.
  The previous Government passed approximately 200 Acts that altered the role and powers of local authorities, almost always taking powers away. If the Government are committed to devolving power to local authorities, they should start by reversing many of the measures in those 200 Acts. They should also quickly scrap the private finance initiative, which gives private companies the right to build, own and, in many instances, run services.
  Many things can be done to give local authorities a greater role in the running of our communities. Giving them a bigger role in job creation, as happens in countries such as Germany, would help people to relate to local authorities, because they would see that they had some relevance to their communities. It is naive to believe that setting up a cabinet system or introducing mayors will result in people suddenly coming out in droves to vote in local authority elections. People will vote in elections if they see that they are relevant to their community. We should focus on policies that are decided by local authorities rather than constitutional or structural issues.
  8.40 pm
  Mr. Gerald Howarth: Having served as a councillor in the London borough of Hounslow for about a year before I translated to this place, I have some modest qualification, but none as extensive as those of the hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent (Mr. Smith). I shall study his detailed recommendations.
  I shall concentrate on clause 91, the proposed repeal of section 28 and the whole business of homosexuality and teaching in schools, principally because it is a matter of grave concern to people throughout the country. The Government are obsessed with homosexuality and race. The Bill is not the only measure in which we are faced with the issue. The Government's caving in to the European Court of Human Rights and admitting homosexuals to the armed forces also affects my constituency. Even as we are debating the Bill, the other place is debating the age of consent. The Government wish to impose on the other place a requirement to reduce the age of consent to 16, notwithstanding the clear warning issued by the Waterhouse report on the abuse of young people in north Wales.

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  This Bill and the Learning and Skills Bill show that the Government are in a shambles on sex education in schools. They face not just both ways, but all ways. The Home Office has published a document called "Supporting Families". The Home Secretary is keen to encourage us all to believe that marriage presents the best framework within which to bring up young people. I think that the Secretary of State for Education and Employment also holds that view. As the Bill before the Lords today shows, the Government want not just to appeal to middle England through "Supporting Families", but, through other measures, to square the circle with the minority groups that the Labour party is always in the business of seeking to appease.
  The hon. Member for Witney (Mr. Woodward) sought repeatedly to dismiss as prejudiced those of us who disagree with him.
  Ms Armstrong: Hear, hear.
  Mr. Howarth: It is fine for the right hon. Lady to say "Hear, hear"; dismissing one's opponents as prejudiced is very simple, but it does no credit to her or her party. There is a legitimate view on the other side of the argument. I wonder whether she says "Hear, hear" to my support for the Bishop of Lichfield, whom I was pleased to call a friend when I was the Member of Parliament for Cannock and Burntwood. He referred to the stabilising benchmark of section 28, but I suppose that in the right hon. Lady's terminology, he is prejudiced too.
  Parents are writing to all of us in droves about the issue.
  Mr. Swayne: The Minister thinks that they are all prejudiced.
  Mr. Howarth: Of course, in the Minister's view they are all prejudiced. She will know that many correspondents explain that they are not homophobic, but they do not believe that normal heterosexual marriage can be put on the same moral basis as two men or two women living together. That is what nearly all of them said, and many of them are teachers—I believe that the Minister herself used to be a teacher.
  Some of my hon. Friends from England may not be aware that in Scotland the issue is dominating the debate. The Daily Record, which is not known as a Conservative newspaper, reported on 19 January "2:1 against gay lessons". Some 66 per cent. of those surveyed wanted to keep section 28, which shows what the people of Scotland want. An anonymous Labour Member was quoted in the Daily Record yesterday as saying:
  The problem is that someone decided that they were going to make the abolition of section 28 a crusade.
  We have lost the support of a large section of the electorate and we have lost the support of Scotland's leading Catholic cleric.
  That, of course, is Cardinal Winning, who has done a magnificent job of articulating our concerns in Scotland.
  The country is up in arms and the Government have no solution. They will remove clause 117 from the Learning and Skills Bill, which was amended by Baroness Young in the other place. They will try to reinsert into this Bill the repeal of section 28 which they were prevented from doing in the other place. We are in limbo. Meanwhile,
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  the Secretary of State for Education and Employment has published some guidelines that have been roundly criticised by those who do not believe that they represent a proper instruction to our young people.
  The Government say that section 28 does not prevent homosexuality from being taught and promoted in schools. In that case, why do they wish to repeal it? Why is it necessary for the Government to engage in that confrontation with two thirds of the nation? There is an inconsistency, because originally the Government told us that they wished to repeal it to prevent bullying. Now they tell us that it is because it does not prevent homosexuality from being promoted in schools anyway.
  We are all against bullying in schools, of any description or on any grounds. To suggest that anyone is interested in protecting section 28 to allow bullying is unworthy of Ministers and the Government. They know that the chief inspector of schools, Chris Woodhead, has made it clear that it is nonsense to suggest that section 28 stops schools tackling the issue of bullying. Indeed, Mr. David Hart said at one stage:
  The Government needs to be very clear why it is going down this road. Section 28 has not caused difficulties but has constituted a protection which by and large has been welcomed.
  It is possible that he has changed his mind since then.
  The hon. Member for Witney said that schools in his constituency have expressed concern that section 28 stands between them and stamping out bullying, but that has not been my experience in my constituency. I suggest that many of my hon. Friends would agree.
  Parents do not wish to see the flood of pornographic material, for that is what some of it is, which was coming into our schools previously. Parents' view of how the matter should be treated is summed up in a publication that is produced by the Christian Institute and makes the case for extending section 28. It states:
  Civilised societies have always restrained sexual activity. Until comparatively recently, social control strongly promoted marriage. Homosexual proselytism seeks to reverse this and to manipulate young people into seeing homosexuality as an acceptable and morally right lifestyle.
  That is what people in this country overwhelmingly object to. They are not intolerant of what people do in their own homes, but they believe that certain standards in our society should be maintained.
  Section 28 was enacted in 1988, when I was a Member of Parliament. As Nick Seaton of the Campaign for Real Education has said:
  Before Section 28 came into force we were getting considerable numbers of parents complaining to us about the promotion of homosexuality in schools. After Section 28 it almost disappeared as an issue. If Section 28 were to be repealed it's almost certain that the promotion of homosexuality would become a huge bone of contention between parents and schools.
  We do not need to be assured by Ministers that that will not happen because their assurances will be worthless. That is because already material is coming into the public domain. The draft guidance of the Secretary of State for Education and Employment is out for consultation. Paragraph 6.1 states:
  Elements of sex and relationship education are also provided by a range of people in the wider community including health professionals, social workers, youth workers, peer educators and visitors.
  There we see it. There is no section 28 control in respect of health promotion, and a flood of material is coming in under that guise.

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  I draw the attention of the Under-Secretary, with whom I had the pleasure of serving on the Select Committee on Home Affairs, to a document that has been published by Camden and Islington community health services NHS trust, which is entitled "Colours of the Rainbow". It contains some pretty disgraceful stuff, and I urge the hon. Lady to read it. It is not something that might be available in the event of section 28 being repealed. It is available now because there is no control over the material that health authorities can put out.
  We have a key stage 1 lesson, the purpose of which is to
  consider one explanation of a family.
  It is intended for five to seven-year-olds. It ends by saying:
  Finish by making the point that different people live together as a family and what is important is that they love and care for each other.
  Those are laudable objectives. However, the document is seeking to promote homosexuality as a pretended family relationship. Many of us object to that.
  There is another example of an attempt to equate homosexuality with normality. We are told that research has found that
  about 50 per cent. of women and men have experienced a sexual attraction to someone of the same sex.
  There is the extraordinary claim that
  nearly 40 per cent. of all men had sex with another man at some point in their lives.
  This material is trying to assert that somehow homosexuality is perfectly normal and that children should regard it as being on a par with normality and a normal heterosexual relationship.
  The publication refers to resources and to the "Playbook for kids about sex" by Joanie Blank and Marcia Quackenbush, published by Sheba Feminist Publishers in 1982. For the assistance of the House, I have a copy of the playbook. I shall not explain some of what it covers, but one passage reads:
  When grown-ups choose someone to be one of their sexual partners, they sometimes choose a person of the same sex and they sometimes choose a person of the other sex. Some big words are sometimes used to name people by the sex partners they choose.
  We then have mention of heterosexual, homosexual and bisexual, as if they are all equally compatible. Many of us would argue that that is not the case.
  The biscuit is taken by the health promotion service in Avon in a publication entitled "A Practical Guide to Challenging Homophobia in Schools". Here we have "Roles for the 'Race' Game". That wholly contradicts the Prime Minister's understanding when he went to the Ayr by-election and found ghastly posters stating that there was no question of role play taking place in the schools in that area. In fact, it is happening today, and I have the evidence. Children as young as 12 are being encouraged to be
  a female sex industry worker—
  whatever that is—
  a Chinese bisexual 15 year old Young Man,
  a transvestite cabaret artist, a Black Disabled Lesbian who is a wheelchair user and a nun.
  It beggars belief to think that public money is being used to promote that.
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  Hon. Members may laugh, but the most disgusting literature of all is the "Gay Sex Now" booklet produced in Glasgow. I gather that £50,000 of public money was used to produce a booklet that children as young as 12 are seeing. I invite the Minister to have a look at it.
  Members of the House of Lords, led by Baroness Young and the Bishop of Winchester, and Mr. Brian Souter and some other public-spirited people are the only ones who want to protect our children by standing in the way of the Government's ambition, for which the Bill is the chosen vehicle.
  8.55 pm
  Mr. Neil Turner: We have just had 15 minutes of the hon. Member for Aldershot (Mr. Howarth) speaking about a Bill that introduces new proposals for local government. He did not mention local government once.
  I welcome the Bill, which represents the second phase of necessary change to local government. I have no ideological bias, but I have more than 20 years' experience as a councillor.
  I especially welcome the new structures in part II. The structures that existed for most of my time in local government seemed to work reasonably well. We had to do some tinkering around the edges occasionally and create a few new sub-committees to deal with the bits and pieces. However, our chief executive once told me that our council had 75 officer working groups. On investigation, they all seemed necessary, reasonable and forward looking, but it was clear that there was no democratic overview of those groups. Members had no control over them and could make no input to them.
  When the working groups' reports went to committee, they received no proper scrutiny because departmental input was partial in any given area, and no one was willing to take control to push items through. The working groups considered matters such as drug action teams and services for the elderly and for young people, which cut across several departments and committees. The absence of proper scrutiny, democratic control and direction was a result of the old committee structure in that council. There was a clear need to examine alternatives.
  Another major factor confirming my view that we needed to look at our organisation was my experience with best value. Twelve months ago, before I was somewhat unexpectedly catapulted into the House, I chaired the best value review panel in Wigan council. The panel was busy setting up ways to introduce best value in that local authority, and was studying the challenge process that involves the four Cs—compete, compare, consult and challenge. The panel was designed to look at those elements of the council that we wanted to review.
  It quickly became clear that the intensiveness of the process was being hindered because councillors did not have time to engage in that process and conduct their normal committee work. We had to find ways to free up time and give people more chance to do all the work demanded of them.
  It has been said that many of the Bill's proposals are too rigid. That is not my experience. Earlier this year, I attended the Labour party local government conference. I ran a workshop on the new structures, and it was attended by councillors from metropolitan, district,

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  unitary and county councils. Those councils were under all sorts of control—some were overwhelmingly controlled by the Labour, Conservative or Liberal Democrat parties, others were under no specific party control, and still others had only one or two Labour councillors.
  That diversity of experience was very useful. When we started talking about how to implement the new structures proposed in the Bill—and the cabinet structure in particular—it was amazing to discover the immense diversity of approaches that people were adopting. I say amazing, but it should not be all that surprising. Under the present system, no council has the same committee structure as its neighbour. The structures have evolved because of the history of those councils, the personalities involved and, more important, the way in which they want to serve the needs of their communities. Just as the committee structures have evolved, so, too, will the new cabinet structures.
  There must be scrutiny not only of what the cabinet has done but of what it will be doing. In my authority, policy development groups are part of the scrutiny process. Other councils take a different line. However, nothing in the Bill will prevent pre-scrutiny from taking place. If there is to be proper scrutiny, it is essential that it takes place before, as well as after, policy is decided.
  I welcome part I, and particularly clause 2, which deals with the need to promote the environmental and social well-being of communities. Clause 5 is vital in that respect: if the community leadership role of councils and councillors is to be exercised properly, unnecessary restraints must be freed up. Clause 5 will allow that to happen.
  We must ensure that partnerships are developed to the full. To be real partnerships, developed with the private sector and voluntary groups, both sides must bring something to the table. There is no room for aspirations alone—there must be the cash to back up those aspirations.
  When she replies to the debate, will the Minister tell us whether clause 3(2) excludes the possibility of councils making reasonable charges for the services that they provide? Will it prevent them from applying for additional funds through supplementary credit approvals?
  I am aware that other people want to speak, so I will finish on this point, Mr. Deputy Mayor.
  Mr. McDonnell: My hon. Friend thinks that he is back in local government.
  Mr. Turner: I beg your pardon, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I have not quite got used to my new role. I apologise.
  Part III deals with standards. Local government is remarkably sleaze-free—we have a lot of hard taskmasters and scrutineers in the form of the general public. I think that most councillors welcome such public scrutiny. The independent scrutiny committee will provide additional reassurance that allegations will receive independent consideration.
  When considering local government, we must recognise that people both inside and outside councils make vexatious and politically motivated allegations
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  against councillors. When the scrutiny committee considers such allegations, they should lance those boils quickly and cleanly. I hope that if the committee believes that vexatious and politically motivated allegations have been made, its members will be able to name the people responsible to ensure that in future those people will think twice and ensure that any allegations have a real foundation.
  9.4 pm
  Dr. Lynne Jones: The speeches of Conservative Members deteriorated rapidly after the excellent and constructive contribution by the right hon. Member for Skipton and Ripon (Mr. Curry). The hon. Member for Aldershot (Mr. Howarth) accused the Government and Labour Members of being obsessed with sex and race. I had no intention of speaking about section 28 because we are dealing with a complex Bill about local government, but it is interesting that both he and the hon. Member for Blaby (Mr. Robathan) chose to spend the whole of their speeches discussing the one aspect of the Bill that relates to sex. It is they who are obsessed, not Labour Members.
  Mr. Gerald Howarth: All that I was seeking to point out was that I am receiving a huge number of letters on the subject, as I suspect that the hon. Lady and other hon. Members are. The Bill is one of two measures that deal with the issue, which is of live concern to people now.
  Dr. Jones: I respond to those constituents who write to me, and they are not writing in droves, even though I have a high profile in the local press on the issue. I receive many letters from people who take the opposite view, including two correspondents who are senior members of the Church. They support the repeal of section 28.
  Both the hon. Member for Aldershot and the hon. Member for Blaby make it clear that they regard any relationship involving homosexual people as "pretend" and not at all valid. At least the hon. Member for Blaby had the honesty to admit that he advocated discrimination against such people. Discrimination is, of course, why the legislation as it is constituted is probably not in accordance with the European convention on human rights. The sooner we change it so that it does comply, the better.
  The material that was quoted by the hon. Members for Aldershot and for Blaby was an insult to the good sense of school governors, who, in consultation with parents, have the last say in decisions on policy involving sex and relationships education. There is plenty of inappropriate heterosexual material that people could quote, but I note that Conservative Members do not suggest that there should be a clause that prevents the promotion of heterosexuality. That would be just as ridiculous as section 28, which I hope will be abolished. It is inappropriate and unnecessary in the real-life situation in schools today.
  I want to spend most of my time talking about the local government provisions in the Bill and reforms to local democracy. No one would disagree with the Government's intention to bring new life to local democracy. We all realise that that is sorely needed. I listened to my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Garston (Maria Eagle), and I am pleased that things are not quite so dire in Birmingham as in Liverpool. It shows that there is a great variety of activity around the country.

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  Voting in local elections has fallen off, and there is less interest, although in last year's local government elections there was a 55 per cent. turnout in one of my wards, due to strong campaigning. If we are to revitalise local democracy, we must address two fundamental issues. First, local government must be more accountable to the electorate. Secondly, we need a surplus of competent people who want to take an active role and serve as local councillors. The right hon. Member for Skipton and Ripon admitted that in his area there is great difficulty in persuading people to come forward to take on that role. That is certainly the case in Birmingham. There is often little competition for candidates. Whatever structures are in place, if people do not want to come forward and take on the role of councillor, local government will not be healthy.
  I shall talk about greater accountability first. Over the years, there has been so much centralisation of decision making that it is well known that many of the decisions taken by local government are dependent on approval or finance from central Government. That is the main reason why people are less interested in taking part in local elections—either as voters or as candidates.
  It is difficult to decide who is really responsible for councils' decisions. For example, in Birmingham, there is much controversy over proposals to close old people's homes. The local authority was forced to take that route because the homes need refurbishment and modernisation to bring them up to standard, and the money is not available. Who is really taking that decision? Is it local government or central Government who hold the purse strings? When councillors are unable to take the decisions that they know their electorate want, they blame central Government. Unless we put that right, all the tinkering with the structure of the system will come to nothing.
  In the housing Green Paper, the Government propose new powers for local authorities to raise capital on their housing assets. In his statement to the House, the Deputy Prime Minister admitted that there was discrimination against council housing. However—as with many measures that seem to be moving in the right direction—there are so many strings attached that those additional powers will be given only to councils prepared to jump through the hoops imposed on them from the centre.
  That is not what local electorates want. It is not what council tenants want. By all means let us give them a vote on changing their landlord, but there should be a level playing field for the options. Tenants should not have to opt for another landlord because that is the only way to raise the finance for the modernisation and improvement of their homes. I hope that the Government will deal with that point.
  I agree with several of the points made by the hon. Member for Bath (Mr. Foster). It is wrong that such a high proportion of local government finance is centrally controlled—that is true of the Government grant and of the business rate. Until the introduction of the poll tax, things were moving in the other direction: about 60 per cent. of local government finance was raised locally.
  However, the figure went into reverse as a result of the introduction of the council tax. The Tory Government wanted to keep council tax low to try to make it acceptable after the poll tax fiasco, so they increased VAT to subsidise it. We should start to move back again—to
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  make local government accountable because it raises most of its finance locally. We need to do that over a long period, because we cannot make sudden changes.
  If the Government are serious about local democracy, they should think long and hard about that matter. Perhaps it could be addressed in the local government finance review Green Paper. In the short term, perhaps the council tax could be made more progressive; in that way, councils would be allowed to raise more money.
  As I pointed out, it is not only structures that are important in encouraging more people to participate. However, they do have a role. I share some of the concerns expressed by other hon. Members that the distinction between executive and back-bench council members could mean that there was a small number of high-profile, perhaps well-paid members, while the others were seen as second-class, with no real opportunity to influence decision making.
  Most people who want to enter politics—whether nationally or locally—do so because they want to bring about changes and improvements; they do not want to be glorified social workers. Taking into account the concerns of their electorate is a role for elected members, but they need to be able to translate those concerns into action at a political level so that policy changes are made to address them. That motivates people to get involved in politics, and I have grave doubts about whether the proposed model will enable the majority of elected members to take part in policy development.
  Many Members have suggested ways in which the system might be improved, but time is short and I do not have the time to go into them. However, it is important that we do not have central control. To return to the point about local accountability, surely the Government should impose on local government the responsibility to review its procedures and to consult the electorate—there may also be the opportunity to hold referendums—but final decisions should be taken locally, not imposed centrally.
  I do not accept the idea that the committee structure does not provide opportunities for scrutiny. As the chair of a major committee and as a back bencher, I took my scrutiny role seriously. I also had access to the most senior council officers. Under the separation that is proposed, will back-bench members have the same access to the chief executive and to the directors of housing and social services?
  It is interesting that we recently held a meeting between Birmingham Members of Parliament and the new director of social services for the city. I asked her to whom she felt accountable as director. She immediately said, "The leader of the council," then reluctantly added, "And the deputy leader." The executive member for social services did not get a look in.
  We all know from our experience of local government that a tremendous amount of patronage can exist within it. I urge the Government to consider mechanisms that will reduce patronage and provide genuine opportunities for back-bench members to participate in decision-making processes. If necessary, they should consider retaining the committee structure.
  Where I suggest that there is an important role for an overarching scrutiny committee is in budget setting. There is no doubt that the most important decisions made in local government are those taken at the annual meetings that allocate the budget for different services. I am not

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  satisfied with the way in which the system operates at present, because it is based on patronage and depends on which service is in favour rather than on who has made an effective case for more spending and has shown that a service is operating efficiently. If the chair of each committee, executive members and executive officers had to present their case to a scrutiny committee that considered all the different services and took an overview, we might have sensible decisions at the end of what should be an important process.
  Time is short, so I will conclude. It has been widely suggested that there is public support for elected mayors. If the concept of an elected mayor is distinguished from a leader who is given tremendous powers by means of an internal election in which patronage can be a factor, I suggest that an elected mayor is preferable. At least that person will be directly accountable to the people.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord): Order. The hon. Lady's time is up.
  9.19 pm
  Mr. John McDonnell: Like other hon. Members, I have served in local government. I was in it for 20 years as an officer or as an elected member. For most of that time—this is not a party political point because it applies to all parties—local government and councillors were denigrated. Their powers were restricted, whole structures were abolished and resources were curtailed. I welcome the debate and the Government's objective of reinvigorating local government and giving it strength, new powers, new resources and a range of structures and new methods of organisation and working that demonstrate the vital role of local democracy.
  The overall objective of hon. Members on both sides of the Chamber is to make every local councillor, every officer and every resident who gets involved in local government feel that they have contributed to something worth while. We were all brought up in the tradition of the Webbs and others who argued that local government comprises two roles—one is to involve and educate people in democracy and to provide them with a voice at a local level, and the other is to provide them with an opportunity to determine what local services should be provided effectively. Local government should not simply be an agent of central Government, but should mediate in the delivery of services to meet local needs.
  We should judge the Bill by how well it will enable local government to fulfil those two traditional roles. It could achieve that, but if we are not careful it could be a lost opportunity because it is too timid. The main thrust of our local government reform should be to provide effective local services that are responsive to local needs, not only at a cost that local people are willing to pay but on a basis that they determine. The key question must be how we empower people to determine the future of their communities and how they are governed locally.
  I welcome the new powers, which are part of the campaign for a general power of competence that we have waged for nearly 15 years. However, I am concerned about clauses 3 and 4, which take back power to the Secretary of State. I hope that in Committee we will be able to define the light touch that the Secretary of State will be limited to using in exercising those powers.
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  If we give local authorities new powers, we should give them appropriate vehicles for using them—which includes the reform of local authority companies—and a new resource base. The discussion about the restoration of the business rate has gone on for too long. We need urgent action to restore some control over the local business rate and enhance the resources on which local authorities can draw to implement the new powers.
  The new powers will give local authorities the opportunity to introduce community plans. That is an extended power for which they have long argued, and I am pleased that my right hon. Friend the Minister for Local Government and the Regions has said that she will introduce that as a new duty. To make sure that the community planning process is implemented successfully, we need also to consider what duties are placed on other agencies to participate in that process. For example, the local health authority and the police, among others, need to have a duty to participate.
  In the other place, there was an attempt to extend the duty placed on local authorities to include promotion of equal opportunities. The Minister who responded to that debate said that that would be part of the overall review of the Race Relations Act 1976, and I understand that approach. However, recent events have given us a sense of urgency about giving local authorities the duty to promote equal opportunities.
  I say that because of the debate about asylum seekers—and I am not making a party political point. This morning I met constituents who had been the subject of a racial attack within a week of leaflets about supposedly bogus asylum seekers being distributed for a by-election in my constituency. That attack was a direct result of the climate that has been whipped up. It behoves us all in central and local government to promote equal opportunities, and that is why we should, in this Bill, reconsider the proposal to place that duty on local authorities.
  On structures, we have had lengthy discussions about mayors, cabinets, leaders and managers, but I note, as my hon. Friend the Member for Walthamstow (Mr. Gerrard) pointed out, that the Bill contains the opportunity to have directly elected individual cabinet posts. We need more clarity on that point, because it has not been debated in detail in the other place or in Committee.
  Throughout the debate, the question has been raised of why we are giving local authorities and communities the opportunity to change their structures in only these restricted ways. Why are we not allowing them wider opportunities for discussion about different options? If this is about local democracy, why are we forcing the proposals on them?
  It is as though we were installing the parliamentary system into local government, with secret decision making, scrutiny usually fairly feeble and exercised only after the decision is made, and individuals frequently whipped to vote against their own principled positions. I understand that assurances have been given that most local authority votes will not be whipped: I look forward to that lesson being learned and applied in the House of Commons. To restrict options to near-parliamentary models undermines the general thrust of the Bill, which is about liberating local communities.
  The Bill is also timid in not considering the revision of local government structures. In my area, I want to re-establish the urban district council and deconstruct the

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  monolith of London borough councils that was erected in the 1960s. The Bill does not enable a decision to be made locally to achieve that. I accept that, under the Bill, local committees can be established, but that has more to do with decentralisation than with devolution of decision making.
  We should allow local authorities to experiment with smaller units of local government that can, if necessary, form consortiums to provide services that are best organised across more than one district. As long as the service is provided to an acceptable quality and at a cost of which central Government approve, such proposals should not be debarred from the local decision-making process. We should take a far more thoroughly democratic approach to energise local decision making by drawing on local people's loyalties, traditions and sense of place.
  Access to information is critical. Whatever the structure, policy making and accountability can be successful only if information about policy making is easily accessible and widely available as of right. Many reservations have been expressed by hon. Members this evening and by people outside the House, including editors of local newspapers, about the fact that the proposals will restrict access to information.
  I should welcome the views of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on the implications of the changes that we have made to the Freedom of Information Bill, and whether those counterbalance our concerns about lack of access to information in local government. The Standing Committee should address the whole issue of secrecy in connection with the modernisation of democratic government in this country, and whether the right to information should be about more than issues of fact, as we discussed last week, and should also cover issues of policy.
  I should like to raise one issue of participation that has not been mentioned so far. The Bill is designed to increase participation in local government, but 1980s legislation denied many local authority workers the right to participate. It is not merely a question of being elected to one's local authority; it extends to a local authority worker above a certain salary not being able to participate in local campaigns in his or her community—not being allowed to campaign against a local health facility closure, to write to the local press, or to make a speech to a community group that could be regarded as political. It was said in the other place that the Bill would help to tackle that issue through codes of practice and guidance, but I should prefer that the Bill explicitly abolished restrictions on politically restricted posts, which undermine certain individuals' civil liberties.
  On the question of electoral participation, I can understand the argument for annual elections. To be honest, it is a matter of indifference to me as a seasoned—not to say inveterate—canvasser. However, there will not be annual elections for directly elected mayors, so I urge consideration of some right of recall, if only through a petition of the electorate or a vote of confidence in the whole council. Otherwise, people will be unable to get rid of mayors who, even though they might have not have committed a criminal offence, have sustained some dishonour or become the subject of public opprobrium. Overall, however, the Bill offers opportunities to enhance local government.
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  Almost as an aside, I should like to say that my hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr. Woodward) made an excellent speech this evening, in which he revealed the homophobic nature of those who have been campaigning in support of section 28. I welcome the opportunity offered by the Bill to put that anachronistic provision behind us.
  I welcome the Bill for the things for which it stands. It offers the chance to rehabilitate local government and to re-establish local democracy. However, when change comes, it should be as a result of demand that is locally driven. Let us not, in the name of local democracy, deny the local voice.
  9.29 pm
  Mr. Nigel Waterson: This has been an excellent debate, with many contributions from all parts of the House by people who know what they are talking about. A great deal of good will was exhibited towards local government. We all share common goals—to improve the standing of local government, to improve voter participation, to attract even better candidates to local government elections, and to make the system work better.
  The problem is that the Bill will not achieve those goals. It is as though the Bill were a metaphor for the Government. First, it is inept and confused, and I am referring not just to the Minister's speech. There were 400-odd amendments in the House of Lords. There was the debacle of section 28 being taken out, and now it is to be put back in again. What the Minister in the Lords, Lord Whitty, described as the central part of the Bill was ripped out in the other place.
  We heard the wonderful concession by the Minister for Local Government and the Regions in her opening speech that the Bill was not yet finished. It is a kind of Spanish hotel Bill: some rooms are finished, some have the roof missing, and one or two were finished but have fallen down in the meantime—that is how we shall have to view it.
  No wonder the Deputy Prime Minister distanced himself, although even by his standards he went a little far by travelling to Japan. At least when we do not understand what the Deputy Prime Minister is saying, we understand what he means, which is quite different from the case of the right hon. Lady, who spoke the kind of modernising gobbledegook that we have all come to know and love.
  Another reason why the Bill is a metaphor for the Government is that it says one thing and does another. It mentions modernisation, improving local democracy and revitalising local government, but it will do nothing of the sort. It is a centralising measure which exhibits yet again the control freakery that is at the heart of the Government.
  Both Ministers must realise that the heart of the issue is compulsion. We in the Opposition do not argue that Cabinet systems are invariably wrong or inappropriate. They may suit certain circumstances on the basis of certain models, but they should not be forced on local government by central Government.
  The third reason why the Bill is a metaphor for the Government is that it is so clearly out of touch with ordinary people and local government. It fails the Kilfoyle test. It shows graphically, as has the entire debate,

  277
  the fault line between old Labour and new Labour. It ignores Labour heartlands in local government. It is a slap in the face for local democracy.
  If Ministers really believed—this is the acid test—in all the virtues and merits of the cabinet or executive system, why cannot they allow local councils and communities to make up their own mind on that matter? That is at the heart of the debate, and that is why the Bill is a wasted opportunity.
  The Minister began by saying that the Bill was a firm step forward. That is true, because it led straight into an abyss of the Minister's own making. She achieved the rare feat of creating near unanimity in all parts of the House—sadly, against what she was saying. She spoke about crude and universal capping, omitting the fact that the Government have continued capping, in an even more refined form. She spoke about best value, leaving aside the fact that some authorities will face 179 separate performance indicators.
  The Minister left to one side the problem of specific grants and the ways in which Government impose their own agenda on local government. She went to enormous trouble to demonise what she described as the red tape town hall committee culture, as though it were some obscure drug-taking bunch of freaks who practised in dark corners. It is wrong of her to demonise the committee system in that way. She must realise, even from her rather limited perspective, that things have moved on. We are not considering committee meetings for their own sake, but streamlined and modernised committee systems. The Minister presented the whole grisly lexicon of new Labour and local government: modernisation, new culture, dynamic, inclusive, empowerment, holistic, transparent, 21st century problems.
  The Minister lauded the new power that part I grants local authorities and it is right to say that local authorities have welcomed it. We also broadly welcome it. However, the Minister omitted to say that Lord Whitty made it clear that the new power would not be accompanied by new money. The hon. Member for Wigan (Mr. Turner), who spoke from great experience on local government matters, made a point about that. Local government cannot raise money for the power. Lord Whitty confirmed that in a written exchange with Lord Dixon-Smith.
  It is tragic that the Minister has told us yet again that the status quo cannot be an option. That flies in the face of all the advice that she has received, and all the debates and decisions in the House of Lords. She is wholly dogmatic about the matter. I do not understand the reason for that apart from the sketchiness of her grasp of local government history. She talked about the squirearchy who used to run local government. Surely she realises that we have moved on from 100 years ago, and that the committee structure, like everything else, has changed and adapted.
  The Minister mentioned directly elected mayors, but we know that the Deputy Prime Minister is "not a fan", as he put it, of them. The Minister also commented on the welfare provisions, which we broadly welcome. However, as with so much of the Bill, many details will have to be tackled through amendments.
  On section 2A of the Local Government Act 1986, or clause 91, I can only express our regret at the Government's bizarre determination to repeal section 28.
  278
  The first manifestation of their intention to do that was a tawdry example of gesture politics even from this Government. They accused those who opposed repeal of being a small minority of homophobes. However, the Government are the small minority. No one outside the House understands why many more hours will be spent debating that proposal when there are so many more pressing matters to debate.
  The Government initially said that section 28 prevented teachers from dealing with bullying and that it caused problems in schools. When all else failed, the Government fell back on the lawyers. We are told that section 28 is either contrary to the European convention on human rights or that it does not apply to schools. That will be news to many teachers, lobbying groups for the gay community and others who believed that it applied. As recently as January, the Prime Minister was convinced that section 28 applied to schools. I hope that, when the Under-Secretary replies to the debate, she will identify the wording in clause 91 that makes it incompatible with the European convention on human rights.
  The hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Mr. Fisher) made an eloquent contribution. He said that the Bill would give full reign to secrecy in local government. We agree with him.
  The hon. Member for Bath (Mr. Foster) expressed his party's support for our position on structure. We look forward to Liberal Democrat support in Committee. The hon. Gentleman also considered the fourth option at length. I agree with his comments on that.
  The hon. Member for Cardiff, North (Ms Morgan) spoke knowledgeably about the local government system in Wales. I agree with her comments on the role of women and that of back-bench councillors in Wales and elsewhere.
  My right hon. Friend the Member for South-West Norfolk (Mrs. Shephard) spoke from considerable experience. She asked whether the Bill tackled the real reasons for public apathy towards local government. She referred to the problem of best value and its imposition on many local councils. She talked about the "hole in the road" test: do people know who they should contact about a hole in the road in their street? There is a hole in the road in the shape of Government thinking—a black hole. She was right to raise the cabinet system in Norfolk and described the Bill as a wasted opportunity.
  The hon. Member for Liverpool, Garston (Maria Eagle) told us about the travails of local government in Liverpool. It must be mildly depressing, to put it at its lowest, for a local councillor to be told that only 2 per cent. of his electorate think that he is doing a good job. She also told the story of disgraceful manipulation by the Liberal Democrats, but I am afraid that she missed the point: that sort of behaviour is precisely what the Bill can and will promote.
  In a gem of a speech, my right hon. Friend the Member for Skipton and Ripon (Mr. Curry) spoke from massive experience and expertise. He rightly criticised the Government's obsession with structures, referred to the spin from No. 10 and made extremely interesting remarks on elected mayors and the conduct of referendums. All in all, he made a significant contribution. The hon. Member for Walthamstow (Mr. Gerrard) stuck up for the committee system despite its failures, of which he has experience, and told us his real concerns about the executive-scrutiny split, which many others share.

  279
  My hon. Friend the Member for Blaby (Mr. Robathan) also drew attention to problems of cabinet secrecy and discussed clause 91 and the so-called section 28 issues. My hon. Friend the Member for Southend, West (Mr. Amess) made penetrating remarks about the proposals and, not least, the activities of Southend council. The hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs. Ellman) also spoke from considerable experience of local government and expressed coded concerns about unnecessary divisions in councils.
  The hon. Member for Ceredigion (Mr. Thomas) spoke at length about the situation in Wales and touched on the danger of isolating councillors from local people. Good contributions were made by the hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent (Mr. Smith), who again expressed scepticism about the Government's commitment to devolution, and my hon. Friend the Member for Aldershot (Mr. Howarth), who spoke knowledgeably and sensibly about the proposals to abolish section 28. The hon. Members for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Dr. Jones) and for Hayes and Harlington (Mr. McDonnell) referred to the dangers in the Bill, though hoping that the Secretary of State will apply some of the powers with a light touch makes the latter the eternal optimist—the Government will not listen.
  Why will the Government not listen to Sir Jeremy Beecham of the Local Government Association, who talks of
  witnessing the strange death of local democracy…?
  Why will they not listen to the Society of Editors, which talks of councils
  reducing the flow of information to the public and the media as a result of reforms…
  and of some councils being "secretive and defensive"? Why will they not listen to the National Union of Journalists, which talks of
  cabinets or executives, meeting behind closed doors, which are now being imposed will deny basic access to local democracy…?
  Why will the Government not listen to the concerns of the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives, which says
  if being "executive" means delving into operational management then the clock will have been put back several years, and the promises of modernisation will turn to dust.?
  Why will they not listen to the Local Government Information Unit, Charter 88 and the Campaign for Freedom of Information, none of which are obvious branches of the Conservative party? Why will they not listen to Mr. Ecclestone of the Campaign for Freedom of Information, who says that
  we are now finding a Labour government removing the rights Mrs Thatcher gave us…?
  Why will they take no notice of the Labour Campaign for Open Local Government and the views of so many Labour Back Benchers who have expressed deep concerns about the Bill and its central provisions, today and on other occasions?
  The Minister of State carried no one with her, not even her hon. Friends, and the proposals do not have a friend in the world, yet the Government are determined to force them through if necessary. We shall oppose them, and we shall not be alone. They like to talk a lot about open government, but prefer it to be practised behind closed doors. I commend our amendment to the House.
  9.45 pm
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions (Ms Beverley Hughes): The Bill is part of a long-term radical change for local government—a change that is, I believe, essential if local government is to fulfil its responsibilities to local people in the future, and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Garston (Maria Eagle) said, its potential. This is not change for change's sake; it is happening because the present Government, unlike the last, believe in local government. We believe in local democracy, and we want to strengthen it, to raise standards of local services, and to give people a real say in what their councils are doing.
  After 18 years of denigration from the Conservative party, local government in its present form simply cannot deliver effectively to local people. Fundamental change is needed. Our previous legislation, together with this Bill, will tackle all the key areas that must be tackled if councils are to work better. Best value and beacon councils are driving up standards of public service; the power of well-being underlines the overarching responsibility for improving the quality of life of local people. I can tell my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan (Mr. Turner) that we have already said we are prepared to use section 150 of the Local Government and Housing Act 1989 in respect of new well-being powers. We shall discuss that in the finance Green Paper.
  The community planning provisions emphasise the potential of local authorities as strategic leaders. The new constitutions will allow better, more effective, quicker decision making and the Bill will build into the structure of local government an important and detailed mechanism for the effective scrutiny of that decision making. We will also institute a robust ethical framework to ensure that councils are not only above reproach, but seen to be above reproach.
  A number of Conservative Members questioned whether the case for change had been made. The case for change is obvious. I want to make three points in particular, on the first two of which I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (Mr. McDonnell). The first relates to the need to involve local people to redress the democratic deficit. We should start from the point that we cannot claim a mandate in local government if only 10 per cent. of people—and, we have heard, 6 per cent. in parts of Liverpool—are voting for their local councillors. We need to strengthen local government: that is the first main objective.
  Mr. Curry: If the Minister has set a figure that validates a mandate, will she tell us what figure would be required in a referendum to validate a decision to change the structure of local government?
  Ms Hughes: I have not set a figure for a mandate, but when we are talking about very low turnouts for a local council election, we must question whether local people are really engaged.
  Secondly, we must improve standards of public service. In doing so, we must ask ourselves whether the present variation in council standards is acceptable. The top 25 per cent. of councils are excellent, and they are certainly not Tory councils. As was pointed out by my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs. Ellman),

  281
  the top 25 per cent. have demonstrated innovation and real delivery of good services to local people, but we must take seriously the difference between them and other councils.
  The third issue is the current system. We heard a considerable defence of that system today, and also considerable criticism of what some Members see as the potential for less transparency in the new arrangements. Let us take a moment to consider what the current system involves. Under the current system, reports are taken to committee. Who decides the agenda of that committee meeting? It is the chair of the committee, in consultation with officers. There is no accountability. No one knows what has been left off the agenda. No one knows what is not included in reports: for example, options that have been considered, but discarded. Different party groups meet before committees and decide their position.
  The reports do the rounds; the same report goes to committee after committee. All that time, committee chairs are meeting through the day and evening with officers and selected members, making decisions. Where is the scrutiny in that system? Where is the access for the public and the press? It is a bureaucratic, slow and unresponsive system that is opaque and inflexible. I defy anyone to say that any modern organisation starting from scratch would organise itself in that way.
  Several hon. Members, including my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Mr. Fisher) and the hon. Member for Bath (Mr. Foster), argued that executives should be made to meet in public. That fails to recognise the real world and what is happening under the current committee system.
  The meeting of the executive will not be a committee because executives will be individually, not collectively, responsible. If executives met in public, it would not challenge the integrity of our proposals. However, where executives have decided to meet in public, this is what is happening. They have a pre-meeting in private, which is not minuted, or divulged to the public. The public meeting then takes place in a short time. The minutes that come out of it are equally short. It is a way of closing access to information by the public. Members who argue for public executive meetings on the ground of secrecy are not taking into account what will happen. They have lost the plot. The real mechanism for openness in the arrangements is scrutiny.
  My right hon. Friend the Minister for Local Government and the Regions talked about those measures. Hon. Members are right: structure of itself will not deliver all that we seek to achieve. Culture and the way that structure is used is equally important. The views of Opposition Members and some of my hon. Friends seem to suggest that they do not trust local councillors to embrace a change of culture and to be more open with their electorate.
  Nothing in the structure inhibits openness; quite the opposite. Everything in the structure requires openness. It requires scrutiny in public for the first time, calling executive members to answer questions in public, calling residents—local people—to give their views or to be members of scrutiny committees, and calling expert witnesses to comment on executive policy and decisions.
  282
  Effective scrutiny is crucial, but I wonder why hon. Members who have made points of dissent ably tonight and on many other occasions believe that, when local authority councillors get the hang of scrutiny, they will not be able to deliver the challenge to the executive as effectively as some hon. Members in the Chamber.
  Mr. Waterson: May I explain? That is not the point. The point is why the Minister will not trust people to choose between that system and the system that they are probably operating perfectly well at the moment?
  Ms Hughes: I do not think that that is very good at all. The hon. Gentleman has missed the point. The system at the moment is not working very well. Most particularly—it is one of the telling points—the current system is not working effectively from the point of view of local people, who cannot find out what is going on. They cannot get access. If Opposition Members think that reading the average minutes of a committee meeting tells anyone anything about the real decisions that are being made behind closed doors in local councils, they are more naive than I thought.
  Mr. Curry: Will the hon. Lady give way?
  Ms Hughes: No; I must progress. I am terribly sorry, but I have to make some points on scrutiny to Opposition Members.
  The hon. Member for Tunbridge Wells (Mr. Norman) said that there would be no pre-scrutiny of executive decisions. That is a travesty. The Bill makes it clear that, at any time, any member of an overview and scrutiny committee, including co-opted members, can demand that an executive member or officer appear, put any item on the scrutiny committee's agenda and call executive members to account to explain precisely not only what they are doing, but what they are planning to do.
  Overview and scrutiny committees can initiate policy. They can make recommendations either to the executive or to the full council. The Bill makes it quite clear that they can look not only into the business of the executive, but into any council matter and even matters that are not the direct function of the council.
  Mr. Norman: Will the hon. Lady explain in what sense that is pre-scrutiny, please?
  Ms Hughes: The provision will enable scrutiny committees to raise issues and to discuss with executive members their intentions before they have taken decisions. It will therefore enable them to consider an issue before the process leading to a decision has even started. It is through scrutiny, area committees and full council that there will be important and challenging roles for non-executive members.
  Mr. Curry: Will the hon. Lady give way?
  Ms Hughes: No. I am sorry, but I must go on.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Garston made some good points about how current legislation fails to deliver

  283
  proper scrutiny. However, that is why we need the new legislation to make scrutiny really work.
  I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) that scrutiny committees are important and need to be given teeth to hold the executive to account. What we cannot do—it is surprising that the request is made when we are also hearing calls not to constrain councils—is to tell them how they will deploy resources on scrutiny committees. However, we shall strongly recommend in our guidance that councillors consider separate officer support and that scrutiny committees are properly resourced.
  The hon. Member for Blaby (Mr. Robathan) said that the debate on section 28 is not about tolerance. He is right—it is about prejudice. Let us set the record straight. Section 28 bites on the actions of local authorities. It does not apply to schools, although many teachers and governors have thought that it does. Independent research has revealed that. I am glad that the penny on that has finally dropped for the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Mr. Waterson).
  Let us be clear that that legislation singles out homosexual people for differential treatment and forces local authorities to discriminate against them. It is blatantly divisive and stigmatising, and it feeds the attitudes, and leads to the experiences, that were so poignantly described by my hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr. Woodward).
  Today, we saw some of the contortions that Conservative Members attempt in trying to portray themselves as new friends to local government. They talk about "A New Approach to Local Government: Bringing Common Sense to Your Local Council", but the problem is that they have a credibility gap. They introduced the poll tax, but they ditched it. They introduced compulsory competitive tendering, but they ditched it. They introduced capping, but they ditched that. Only 27 per cent. of councillors today are Tories. They say that they want a healthy mix, but the numbers of women and ethnic minority councillors are pitiful.
  The Government present the best future for local government. We are investing in the local services that hard-working families need. Real improvement in the quality of life and in local public services needs dynamic responsible councils, and the Bill will deliver that.
  Question put, That the amendment be made:—
  The House divided: Ayes 130, Noes 342.

  Division No. 160]

  [9.59 pm

  AYES

  Ainsworth, Peter (E Surrey)

  Butterfill, John

  Amess, David

  Cash, William

  Ancram, Rt Hon Michael

  Chapman, Sir Sydney (Chipping Barnet)

  Arbuthnot, Rt Hon James

  Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

  Clappison, James

  Baldry, Tony

  Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey

  Bercow, John

  Collins, Tim

  Beresford, Sir Paul

  Cormack, Sir Patrick

  Body, Sir Richard

  Cran, James

  Boswell, Tim

  Curry, Rt Hon David

  Davies, Quentin (Grantham)

  Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

  Davis, Rt Hon David (Haltemprice)

  Bottomley, Rt Hon Mrs Virginia

  Duncan Smith, Iain

  Brazier, Julian

  Evans, Nigel

  Brooke, Rt Hon Peter

  Faber, David

  Browning, Mrs Angela

  Fabricant, Michael

  284

  Fallon, Michael

  Madel, Sir David

  Flight, Howard

  Maude, Rt Hon Francis

  Forth, Rt Hon Eric

  Moss, Malcolm

  Fowler, Rt Hon Sir Norman

  Nicholls, Patrick

  Fox, Dr Liam

  Norman, Archie

  Fraser, Christopher

  O'Brien, Stephen (Eddisbury)

  Gale, Roger

  Ottaway, Richard

  Garnier, Edward

  Page, Richard

  George, Andrew (St Ives)

  Paice, James

  Gibb, Nick

  Paterson, Owen

  Gill, Christopher

  Pickles, Eric

  Gillan, Mrs Cheryl

  Portillo, Rt Hon Michael

  Gorman, Mrs Teresa

  Prior, David

  Gray, James

  Randall, John

  Green, Damian

  Redwood, Rt Hon John

  Greenway, John

  Robathan, Andrew

  Grieve, Dominic

  Robertson, Laurence

  Gummer, Rt Hon John

  Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)

  Hague, Rt Hon William

  Ruffley, David

  Hammond, Philip

  Sayeed, Jonathan

  Harris, Dr Evan

  Shephard, Rt Hon Mrs Gillian

  Hawkins, Nick

  Shepherd, Richard

  Heald, Oliver

  Simpson, Keith (Mid-Norfolk)

  Heathcoat-Amory, Rt Hon David

  Soames, Nicholas

  Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael

  Spelman, Mrs Caroline

  Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas

  Spicer, Sir Michael

  Horam, John

  Spring, Richard

  Howard, Rt Hon Michael

  Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John

  Howarth, Gerald (Aldershot)

  Steen, Anthony

  Hunter, Andrew

  Streeter, Gary

  Jack, Rt Hon Michael

  Swayne, Desmond

  Jackson, Robert (Wantage)

  Syms, Robert

  Tapsell, Sir Peter

  Jenkin, Bernard

  Taylor, Ian (Esher & Walton)

  Johnson Smith, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey

  Taylor, John M (Solihull)

  Townend, John

  Key, Robert

  Tredinnick, David

  King, Rt Hon Tom (Bridgwater)

  Trend, Michael

  Kirkbride, Miss Julie

  Tyrie, Andrew

  Laing, Mrs Eleanor

  Walter, Robert

  Lait, Mrs Jacqui

  Waterson, Nigel

  Leigh, Edward

  Whitney, Sir Raymond

  Letwin, Oliver

  Whittingdale, John

  Lewis, Dr Julian (New Forest E)

  Wilkinson, John

  Lidington, David

  Wilshire, David

  Lloyd, Rt Hon Sir Peter (Fareham)

  Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)

  Loughton, Tim

  Winterton, Nicholas (Macclesfield)

  Luff, Peter

  Yeo, Tim

  MacGregor, Rt Hon John

  Young, Rt Hon Sir George

  McIntosh, Miss Anne

  MacKay, Rt Hon Andrew

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Maclean, Rt Hon David

  Mr. Stephen Day and

  McLoughlin, Patrick

  Mr. Peter Atkinson.

  NOES

  Abbott, Ms Diane

  Benn, Rt Hon Tony (Chesterfield)

  Alexander, Douglas

  Bennett, Andrew F

  Allan, Richard

  Bermingham, Gerald

  Allen, Graham

  Berry, Roger

  Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)

  Best, Harold

  Anderson, Janet (Rossendale)

  Betts, Clive

  Armstrong, Rt Hon Ms Hilary

  Blackman, Liz

  Ashton, Joe

  Blears, Ms Hazel

  Atkins, Charlotte

  Blunkett, Rt Hon David

  Ballard, Jackie

  Boateng, Rt Hon Paul

  Banks, Tony

  Borrow, David

  Barnes, Harry

  Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

  Barron, Kevin

  Bradshaw, Ben

  Battle, John

  Brake, Tom

  Beard, Nigel

  Breed, Colin

  Beckett, Rt Hon Mrs Margaret

  Brinton, Mrs Helen

  Begg, Miss Anne

  Brown, Russell (Dumfries)

  Beith, Rt Hon A J

  Browne, Desmond

  Bell, Martin (Tatton)

  Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)

  Bell, Stuart (Middlesbrough)

  Burden, Richard

  Benn, Hilary (Leeds C)

  Burgon, Colin

  285

  Butler, Mrs Christine

  Fyfe, Maria

  Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

  Galloway, George

  Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

  Gapes, Mike

  Campbell, Rt Hon Menzies (NE Fife)

  Gardiner, Barry

  George, Andrew (St Ives)

  Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

  Gerrard, Neil

  Campbell-Savours, Dale

  Gibson, Dr Ian

  Cann, Jamie

  Gilroy, Mrs Linda

  Caplin, Ivor

  Godman, Dr Norman A

  Caton, Martin

  Godsiff, Roger

  Cawsey, Ian

  Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

  Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

  Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)

  Chaytor, David

  Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

  Chidgey, David

  Grocott, Bruce

  Chisholm, Malcolm

  Grogan, John

  Clapham, Michael

  Hall, Patrick (Bedford)

  Clark, Rt Hon Dr David (S Shields)

  Hanson, David

  Clark, Dr Lynda (Edinburgh Pentlands)

  Harman, Rt Hon Ms Harriet

  Harris, Dr Evan

  Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

  Heal, Mrs Sylvia

  Clarke, Charles (Norwich S)

  Healey, John

  Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

  Heath, David (Somerton & Frome)

  Clelland, David

  Henderson, Doug (Newcastle N)

  Clwyd, Ann

  Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

  Coaker, Vernon

  Hepburn, Stephen

  Coffey, Ms Ann

  Heppell, John

  Cohen, Harry

  Hill, Keith

  Coleman, Iain

  Hodge, Ms Margaret

  Colman, Tony

  Hoey, Kate

  Connarty, Michael

  Hope, Phil

  Cook, Frank (Stockton N)

  Hopkins, Kelvin

  Corbett, Robin

  Howarth, George (Knowsley N)

  Cousins, Jim

  Howells, Dr Kim

  Cox, Tom

  Hoyle, Lindsay

  Crausby, David

  Hughes, Ms Beverley (Stretford)

  Cryer, Mrs Ann (Keighley)

  Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

  Cummings, John

  Hughes, Simon (Southwark N)

  Cunningham, Rt Hon Dr Jack (Copeland)

  Humble, Mrs Joan

  Hurst, Alan

  Cunningham, Jim (Cov'try S)

  Hutton, John

  Curtis-Thomas, Mrs Claire

  Iddon, Dr Brian

  Dalyell, Tam

  Illsley, Eric

  Darling, Rt Hon Alistair

  Ingram, Rt Hon Adam

  Darvill, Keith

  Jackson, Ms Glenda (Hampstead)

  Davey, Edward (Kingston)

  Jackson, Helen (Hillsborough)

  Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

  Jenkins, Brian

  Davidson, Ian

  Johnson, Alan (Hull W & Hessle)

  Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)

  Johnson, Miss Melanie (Welwyn Hatfield)

  Davies, Geraint (Croydon C)

  Davis, Rt Hon Terry (B'ham Hodge H)

  Jones, Rt Hon Barry (Alyn)

  Jones, Helen (Warrington N)

  Dawson, Hilton

  Jones, Ms Jenny (Wolverh'ton SW)

  Dean, Mrs Janet

  Denham, John

  Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)

  Dismore, Andrew

  Jones, Dr Lynne (Selly Oak)

  Dobbin, Jim

  Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S)

  Donohoe, Brian H

  Keeble, Ms Sally

  Doran, Frank

  Keen, Alan (Feltham & Heston)

  Dowd, Jim

  Keen, Ann (Brentford & Isleworth)

  Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth

  Kemp, Fraser

  Eagle, Angela (Wallasey)

  Kennedy, Jane (Wavertree)

  Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

  Khabra, Piara S

  Edwards, Huw

  Kidney, David

  Ellman, Mrs Louise

  Kilfoyle, Peter

  Ennis, Jeff

  King, Andy (Rugby & Kenilworth)

  Etherington, Bill

  King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green)

  Fearn, Ronnie

  Kirkwood, Archy

  Field, Rt Hon Frank

  Kumar, Dr Ashok

  Fisher, Mark

  Ladyman, Dr Stephen

  Flint, Caroline

  Laxton, Bob

  Flynn, Paul

  Lepper, David

  Foster, Rt Hon Derek

  Leslie, Christopher

  Foster, Don (Bath)

  Levitt, Tom

  Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings)

  Lewis, Ivan (Bury S)

  Foster, Michael J (Worcester)

  Lewis, Terry (Worsley)

  Foulkes, George

  Liddell, Rt Hon Mrs Helen

  286

  Linton, Martin

  Reid, Rt Hon Dr John (Hamilton N)

  Lloyd, Tony (Manchester C)

  Rendel, David

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Robinson, Geoffrey (Cov'try NW)

  Lock, David

  Roche, Mrs Barbara

  Love, Andrew

  Rooker, Rt Hon Jeff

  McAllion, John

  Rooney, Terry

  McAvoy, Thomas

  Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

  McCabe, Steve

  Rowlands, Ted

  McCafferty, Ms Chris

  Ruane, Chris

  McCartney, Rt Hon Ian (Makerfield)

  Ruddock, Joan

  Russell, Bob (Colchester)

  McDonagh, Siobhain

  Russell, Ms Christine (Chester)

  McDonnell, John

  Salter, Martin

  McFall, John

  Savidge, Malcolm

  McGuire, Mrs Anne

  Sawford, Phil

  McIsaac, Shona

  Sedgemore, Brian

  McKenna, Mrs Rosemary

  Shipley, Ms Debra

  Mackinlay, Andrew

  Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

  McNamara, Kevin

  Singh, Marsha

  McNulty, Tony

  Skinner, Dennis

  MacShane, Denis

  Smith, Rt Hon Andrew (Oxford E)

  Mactaggart, Fiona

  Smith, Angela (Basildon)

  McWalter, Tony

  Smith, Rt Hon Chris (Islington S)

  McWilliam, John

  Smith, Miss Geraldine (Morecambe & Lunesdale)

  Mahon, Mrs Alice

  Mallaber, Judy

  Smith, Jacqui (Redditch)

  Marsden, Gordon (Blackpool S)

  Smith, John (Glamorgan)

  Marshall, David (Shettleston)

  Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

  Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

  Snape, Peter

  Marshall-Andrews, Robert

  Spellar, John

  Martlew, Eric

  Squire, Ms Rachel

  Maxton, John

  Starkey, Dr Phyllis

  Meacher, Rt Hon Michael

  Steinberg, Gerry

  Meale, Alan

  Stevenson, George

  Michie, Bill (Shef'ld Heeley)

  Stewart, David (Inverness E)

  Milburn, Rt Hon Alan

  Stinchcombe, Paul

  Miller, Andrew

  Stoate, Dr Howard

  Mitchell, Austin

  Strang, Rt Hon Dr Gavin

  Moonie, Dr Lewis

  Straw, Rt Hon Jack

  Moore, Michael

  Stringer, Graham

  Moran, Ms Margaret

  Stuart, Ms Gisela

  Morgan, Alasdair (Galloway)

  Stunell, Andrew

  Morgan, Ms Julie (Cardiff N)

  Sutcliffe, Gerry

  Morris, Rt Hon Ms Estelle (B'ham Yardley)

  Taylor, Rt Hon Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)

  Mountford, Kali

  Taylor, David (NW Leics)

  Murphy, Denis (Wansbeck)

  Temple-Morris, Peter

  Murphy, Rt Hon Paul (Torfaen)

  Thomas, Gareth (Clwyd W)

  Naysmith, Dr Doug

  Thomas, Gareth R (Harrow W)

  Norris, Dan

  Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

  Oaten, Mark

  Timms, Stephen

  O'Brien, Mike (N Warks)

  Tipping, Paddy

  O'Hara, Eddie

  Tonge, Dr Jenny

  Olner, Bill

  Touhig, Don

  O'Neill, Martin

  Trickett, Jon

  Öpik, Lembit

  Truswell, Paul

  Organ, Mrs Diana

  Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

  Osborne, Ms Sandra

  Turner, Dr Desmond (Kemptown)

  Pearson, Ian

  Turner, Neil (Wigan)

  Pendry, Tom

  Twigg, Derek (Halton)

  Perham, Ms Linda

  Twigg, Stephen (Enfield)

  Pickthall, Colin

  Tyler, Paul

  Pike, Peter L

  Vis, Dr Rudi

  Plaskitt, James

  Walley, Ms Joan

  Pollard, Kerry

  Wareing, Robert N

  Pond, Chris

  Watts, David

  Pope, Greg

  Webb, Steve

  Pound, Stephen

  White, Brian

  Powell, Sir Raymond

  Whitehead, Dr Alan

  Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lewisham E)

  Wicks, Malcolm

  Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

  Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Swansea W)

  Prosser, Gwyn

  Purchase, Ken

  Williams, Alan W (E Carmarthen)

  Radice, Rt Hon Giles

  Williams, Mrs Betty (Conwy)

  Rammell, Bill

  Willis, Phil

  Rapson, Syd

  Winnick, David

  287

  Winterton, Ms Rosie (Doncaster C)

  Wyatt, Derek

  Wood, Mike

  Woodward, Shaun

  Worthington, Tony

  Tellers for the Noes:

  Wray, James

  Mr. David Jamieson and

  Wright, Dr Tony (Cannock)

  Mr. Robert Ainsworth.

  Question accordingly negatived.
  Main Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 62 (Amendment on second or third reading), and agreed to.
  Bill accordingly read a Second time, and committed to a Standing Committee, pursuant to Standing Order No. 63 (Committal of Bills).

  BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
  Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 15 (Exempted business),
  That, at this day's sitting, the Motion on Standing Committee on Regional Affairs may be proceeded with, though opposed, until any hour.—[Mr. Allen.]

  Question agreed to.

  LOCAL GOVERNMENT BILL [LORDS] [MONEY]
  Queen's recommendation having been signified—
  Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 52 (Money resolutions and ways and means resolutions in connection with bills),
  That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Local Government Bill [Lords], it is expedient to authorise the payment out of money provided by Parliament of—

  (a) any expenditure incurred by the Secretary of State under the Act; and

  (b) any increase attributable to the Act in the sums payable out of money so provided under any other enactment.—[Mr. Allen.]

  Question agreed to.

  DELEGATED LEGISLATION
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord): With permission, I shall put together the motions relating to delegated legislation.
  Motion made, and Question put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 118(6) (Standing Committees on Delegated Legislation),

  WELFARE REFORM AND PENSIONS
  That the Report by the Secretary of State for Social Security under section 82 of the Welfare Reform and Pensions Act 1999, stating the changes in the law which the Secretary of State is proposing in the Child Support, Pensions and Social Security Bill by way of amendments to the Child Support Acts 1991 and 1995, the amount of the expenditure which the Secretary of State proposes to incur and the purposes for which he proposes to incur it (HC 270), which was laid before this House on 13th March, be approved.
  SUPREME COURT OF ENGLAND AND WALES
  That the draft Access to Justice Act 1999 (Destination of Appeals) Order 2000, which was laid before this House on 22nd March, be approved.

  LOCAL GOVERNMENT FINANCE
  That the Local Government Finance (England) Special Grant Report (No. 57) on the Promoting Independence: Prevention Grant for 2000/2001 (HC 338), which was laid before this House on 23rd March, be approved.
  That the Local Government Finance (England) Special Grant Report (No. 56) on the Promoting Independence: Partnership Grant for 2000/2001 (HC 337), which was laid before this House on 23rd March, be approved.
  That the Local Government Finance (England) Special Grant Report (No. 58) on the Promoting Independence: Carers Grant for 2000/2001 (HC 339), which was laid before this House on 23rd March, be approved.—[Mr. Allen.]
  Question agreed to.

Standing Committee on Regional Affairs
[Relevant document: The unnumbered Paper from the Leader of the House, entitled "Regional Standing Committee".]
10.30 pm
The President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mrs. Margaret Beckett): I beg to move,
That Standing Order No. 117 shall be repealed, and that the following Standing Order shall be made:
117.—(1) There shall be a standing committee called the Standing Committee on Regional Affairs, which shall consider any matter relating to regional affairs in England which may be referred to it.
(2) The Committee shall consist of thirteen Members representing English constituencies nominated by the Committee of Selection; and in nominating such Members, the Committee of Selection shall—

(a) have regard to the qualifications of the Members nominated and to the composition of the House; and

(b) have power to discharge Members from time to time, and to appoint others in substitution.

(3) Any Member of the House representing an English constituency, though not nominated to the Committee, may take part in its proceedings, but may not make any Motion, vote or be counted in the quorum; provided that a Minister of the Crown who is a Member of this House but not nominated to the Committee may make a Motion as specified in paragraph (10) below.
(4) The quorum of the Committee shall be three.
(5) Paragraph (1) of Standing Order No. 88 (Meetings of standing committees) shall not apply to the Committee; except that the proviso to that paragraph shall apply to any sitting at Westminster.
(6) A Motion may be made in the House by a Minister of the Crown to specify (or to vary) any or all of the following:

(a) the matter or matters to be referred to the Committee;

(b) the period to be allotted to proceedings on such matters;

(c) when and where (within England) the Committee shall meet;

(d) the hours for the commencement and conclusion of any sitting;

(e) any days when the Committee shall meet at Westminster at Ten o'clock;

and such Motion may be moved at any time; and the Question thereon shall be put forthwith and may be decided at any hour, though opposed.
(7) Where any order made under paragraph (6) above makes no provision for the period to be allotted to the proceedings on any matter or matters which have been referred to the Committee for consideration at a particular sitting, those proceedings shall be brought to a conclusion no later than three hours after their commencement.
(8) At the commencement of business at any sitting of the Committee, the Chairman may permit Ministers of the Crown, being Members of the House, to make statements on any matter or matters referred to the Committee for consideration at that sitting, and may then permit members of the Committee to ask questions thereon.
(9) No question on a statement by a Minister of the Crown shall be taken after the expiry of a period of one hour from the commencement of the first such statement, except that the Chairman may, at his discretion, allow such questions to be taken for a further period not exceeding half an hour.
(10) The Committee shall, following any such statements and questions, consider each matter referred to it on a motion 'That the Committee has considered the matter'; the Chairman shall put the Question necessary to dispose of the proceedings on each matter at the time, or after the period, specified in accordance with
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paragraph (6) or paragraph (7) of this Order, and the Committee shall thereupon report to the House that it has considered the matter or matters without any further Question being put.
(11) Any period allocated to the consideration of any matter or matters shall include any time spent on statements by Ministers of the Crown and questions thereon, except when otherwise provided by any Order of the House made in accordance with paragraph (6) above.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord): I remind the House that Madam Speaker has selected amendments (a) and (b), which stand in the name of the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Inverness, West (Mr. Kennedy) and his right hon. and hon. Friends. There will be a joint debate on the main motion and the two amendments. Decisions on the amendments will be taken when the debate ends.
Mrs. Beckett: I propose to be brief in moving the motion because the proposal that it enshrines is perfectly straightforward and simple and because the procedure that it suggests is already extremely familiar to the House. The Standing Orders already contain provision for a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs, to debate primarily matters that are of concern to Members who sit for English constituencies. The Standing Order was decided and placed on, so to speak, the statute book of the House in the context of previous moves—[Interruption.]
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I ask right hon. and hon. Members who are not staying for the debate to leave the Chamber quickly and quietly.
Mrs. Beckett: The Standing Order was decided in the context of previous moves to introduce devolution for Scotland and Wales. It means that the House has already debated and decided the issue of principle.
The Standing Order ceased to be used after 1979 but it has never been removed from the statute book of the House. In consequence, it remains part of our potential procedures. However, since it was carried, many of our procedures have changed. That is why the motion brings the Standing Order up to date, as I see it, using today's procedures. I hope that this will make the Standing Order both more flexible and more useful to the House.
It will be apparent already to hon. Members on both sides of the House that the model that has been used is that of the European Scrutiny Committee. The Government believe that that is an effective model both in informing Members and in calling Ministers to account.
Mr. Dale Campbell-Savours: I wonder whether my right hon. Friend will explain something to me. Many of us believe, certainly in terms of regional affairs debates, that there is an argument for bringing in civil servants, in a Select Committee mode, and taking evidence from them. At a regional level, they are critically important in the taking of decisions under the new structures that we have set up. When my right hon. Friend was considering these matters and the tabling of the motion, did she consider a procedure whereby that would be possible?
Mrs. Beckett: Yes, I did, and I accept my hon. Friend's point. It is a matter that the House may consider again in future. That is a point that I intended to make at the end

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of my remarks. However, it seemed to me that the important thing was to create or to revive a potential forum for debates for Members who sit for English constituencies, and to do so in a framework in which the priority would be for Members to have a capacity for statements to be made by Ministers and for questions to be put to them. It seemed also that that was the model of the European Scrutiny Committee. My hon. Friend will know that it is widely valued across the House as a model that works effectively.
Mrs. Gwyneth Dunwoody: My right hon. Friend will know that the Select Committee looking at matters concerning the environment and transport also has an involvement in regional affairs. How will the new Committee and the Select Committee work together?
Mrs. Beckett: My hon. Friend makes a very important point, which is part of the answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours). The Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs does indeed have the capacity to which my hon. Friend refers. To that extent, there is less of a gap in the House's capacity to look at issues such as that of regional civil servants.
My hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) is an expert, and is well aware that the Select Committee shadows the entire work of the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions. It is not possible for it to specialise in matters that have a regional context and edge, and it is possible only for members of the Select Committee to take part in its debates. That seemed to me the most powerful argument in favour of us using afresh a Standing Order which—I remind the House—has already been agreed by the House. The proposed Committee will be the only forum available to all hon. Members who represent English constituencies, and it will be available only to those hon. Members.
There is also the thought that, as in the European Scrutiny Committees, the presence of a relatively small core membership could lead to the build-up of expertise in regional matters. That, too, would be valuable to the House.
Mr. Owen Paterson: I am a member of European Standing Committee A, and regularly attend other Standing Committees on European matters. It is obvious to me that the right hon. Lady does not attend those meetings often. I can tell the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) that civil servants are present at those meetings, and that they spend their time frantically scribbling notes to Ministers who cannot answer questions because they have mugged up on the issue at hand only half an hour before the sitting.
Mrs. Beckett: With respect to the hon. Gentleman, I think that he cannot have been listening to the question that my hon. Friend the Member for Workington asked. He asked about taking evidence from civil servants, and that is not the point that the hon. Gentleman is making.
Mr. Edward Garnier: I accept the Leader of the House's point that all hon. Members with English constituencies will be able to speak at sittings of
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the Committee, but only 13 will be allowed to vote. Does the right hon. Lady not see a difficulty, in that the tiny core of Committee members—we do not know from what regions they will be drawn—will not be able to vote in a way that allows them to represent the interests of all the regions of the country?
Mrs. Beckett: The hon. and learned Gentleman may not have scrutinised the Standing Order as closely as he might have. It is not envisaged that the Committee will take the sort of decisions to which he refers. The Committee will give hon. Members with English constituencies an opportunity to scrutinise issues that are of concern to them.
As I mentioned a few moments ago, before I took one or two interventions, the Standing Order includes provision for ministerial statements to be made to the Committee, and that such statements can be followed by questions, when that is thought to be helpful and for the guidance of the Committee. Hon. Members of all parties will recognise that there is nothing like knowing that questions will be faced, in the House or in Committee, to concentrate ministerial attention on an issue. I repeat that all hon. Members will have the opportunity to debate matters that might be referred to the Committee.
The indicators from the regional development agencies highlight some of the subjects that are likely to be discussed in the proposed forum. Those subjects include economic development, social regeneration, employment and sustainable development skills. All those matters arouse particular concerns among hon. Members who represent English seats, and the forum will allow the matters to be aired in more detail than would be possible in other circumstances. Although there is a core membership of the Committee, Members representing any English seat will be entitled to attend and participate.
There are, of course, alternatives, such as the sittings in Westminster Hall, which provide a fresh opportunity for scrutiny. There is no doubt that that provides a potential forum for debates that highlight the affairs of the English regions. It is not solely a forum for Members who represent English constituencies. It is an experimental forum, but it was intended from the outset to provide more time for the discussion of Select Committee reports and specialist debates on, say, foreign affairs. It would be to lose some of the opportunities provided by the forum in Westminster Hall were we to seek to dominate that by matters that arose solely in the context of English constituencies.
Mr. James Gray: I am listening carefully to what the right hon. Lady is saying. I know that we will have some time to discuss the merits and demerits of the proposal in the hours ahead. In the meantime, will the right hon. Lady say whether the proposal comes from the Procedure Committee, which must presumably have looked at it, or from the so-called Modernisation Committee? If not, what is its provenance?
Mrs. Beckett: The hon. Gentleman is perfectly aware of its provenance. I made it plain in my earlier remarks that the proposal has come from the Government. It was aired in the Modernisation Committee, because it was thought to be a matter that might find common ground on both sides of the House. Given that much concern has been expressed across the House about the insufficient

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opportunities for debates for those who represent English constituencies, and only English constituencies, the Government thought that Conservative Members as well as Labour Members might appreciate the opportunity for those debates to be extended.
We shall shortly have the opportunity to test whether Conservative Members meant anything that they said about wanting opportunities for debate specifically for Members representing English constituencies, or whether they simply wanted to complain about the lack of those opportunities—all mouth and no delivery, to coin a phrase.
Mrs. Ann Winterton: I believe that the right hon. Lady said earlier that ministerial statements would be made to this Standing Committee. Were such statements made in the 1970s, when the Committee was previously in existence? Is it not right and proper that ministerial statements should be made in the House, and not to a limited Standing Committee?
Mrs. Beckett: No, that was not the procedure when the Committee was first set up. That is one of the reasons why we are moving an amendment to the existing Standing Order, which is thought to be somewhat inflexible. At that time, the House did not have the kind of procedures that it has today. The House did not have anything like the number of Committees that it has today. The House did not operate in forums in which it was possible or likely that Ministers would make statements. We do all those things in the proceedings of the House today. As I understand it, those procedures have developed because the House, as a whole, thought that they offered additional and more varied opportunities for scrutiny.
Mr. Peter L. Pike: My right hon. Friend rightly said that the proposal was aired in the Modernisation Committee. Would it not be true to say that one of the reservations that the Modernisation Committee had about launching the Standing Committee on Regional Affairs was that hon. Members, myself included, did not want to launch it at the same time as Westminster Hall? We wanted to allow that to get established before launching this Standing Committee, which is exactly what the Government have done.
Mrs. Beckett: My hon. Friend is correct. There were those who felt that it was not a good idea to launch two experiments, as they saw it, at the same time. Others, as it transpired, saw the proposal as some kind of pro-European plot. So it became apparent that it was not necessarily all that likely that the proposal would command common ground.
Let me return to the point that perhaps was behind the intervention from the hon. Member for North Wiltshire (Mr. Gray). When it became clear that there would not necessarily be all-party support for a move along these lines, I withdrew it from the Modernisation Committee because it is an all-party Committee which seeks to proceed by consensus. I made it plain at that point that, because this was a decision that the House had already
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made, the Government might seek to move forward on the proposal in another context, and that is precisely what we are doing tonight.
Mr. Patrick McLoughlin: Will the right hon. Lady give way?
Mrs. Beckett: I will, but after that I propose to end my remarks, which I had already almost concluded.
Mr. McLoughlin: The right hon. Lady says that statements could be made to the Committee. What will be the mechanism for notifying Members of what the statements will be on? What kind of notice will she give Members that a statement is to be made?
Mrs. Beckett: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman, especially in view of the honourable position that he holds in the House, is more than well aware of how such procedures work. It is intended that they should proceed by discussion across the House in the ordinary way. We would give as much notice as we reasonably could of issues that could be aired.
The reason for having a core membership is not merely so that members can build up a wide expertise in regional affairs rather than just in a particular region but so that they can begin to form views about what issues have not yet been aired. Should the House decide to set up such a Committee, I hope that that is something on which there would rapidly develop common ground. That is the way in which many of our affairs work and it is something—
Mr. John Bercow: Will the right hon. Lady give way?
Mrs. Beckett: I am sorry. The hon. Gentleman knows that I would readily give way to him, but I am about to conclude my remarks. I do not wish to detain the House unnecessarily about a straightforward and simple proposal. I propose—
Mr. Bercow: In one sentence
Mrs. Beckett: Oh, all right, in one sentence.
Mr. Bercow: I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for giving way. What is the rationale behind the first part of subsection (9) of the proposed standing order?
Mrs. Beckett: Without finding paragraph (9) immediately, I should simply say that the whole idea behind the proposal is to create an additional forum for the House. I do not intend to search for subsection (9) now.
The Government recognise that, in the aftermath of devolution to Scotland and Wales, which is an issue that has been debated extensively in the House and has long been decided, there is a call for a forum specifically for Members who sit for English constituencies. The Government recognise the validity of such a call. Or perhaps I should say that the Government thought that they recognised the validity of such a call, but we shall judge tonight whether that call was valid or was in fact merely an excuse for people to complain.

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The Government are perfectly prepared to extend the opportunities available to those Members who sit for English constituencies to air specific concerns that arise in their constituencies and to make that forum one that can provide not merely for debate but for extended scrutiny of Ministers, and the opportunity to seek ministerial statements and to question Ministers on those statements. We believe that such a forum will add usefully to the procedures of the House and to the opportunities available to Members to hold the Government to account. Conservative Members continually complain that they lack sufficient of those opportunities. We should judge whether they really mean it by how they vote tonight.
10.34 pm
Sir George Young: The good news about the motion before the House tonight is that the Government have at last recognised that post-devolution there are some unresolved questions relating to England. The Leader of the House confirmed that in her remarks. The bad news is that the Government have come up with the wrong answer. I want to explain why the proposal before us is, first, inconsistent with the Government's manifesto commitments for devolution in England; secondly, an inadequate response to the so-called West Lothian question; and, thirdly, one that cuts across the work of existing institutions of the House, especially the Select Committees and the recently established Westminster Hall.
The proposal for this new Standing Committee has not been put to the House with the approval of the Select Committees on Modernisation or on Procedure—the preferred way of changing how the House works—but comes from the Government.
A year ago, the Modernisation Committee reflected on this proposition, which had been put to it by the Leader of the House. After discussion, the Government decided—rightly—not to pursue it, so we heard no more for nearly a year. The week before last, in a great hurry, the proposition was taken off its dusty shelf by the Government, following some adverse press coverage of the Government's lack of progress in setting up regional assemblies.
The proposal appeared on the Order Paper shortly after the Prime Minister gave a speech on Britishness on 28 March. His speech generated some adverse comment:
PM rules out home rule for the regions…the move will be seen as a bruising rebuff to regions such as the North East and North West.
That was in the Daily Mail on 29 March. [Interruption.] I thought that the Daily Mail was most important to the present Labour party.
How about The Times? On 29 March, it stated:
Blair back-pedals on regional assemblies … Tony Blair rebuffed John Prescott's demands for the creation of regional assemblies in England yesterday.
On the next day—30 March—the Leader of the House announced the initiative at business questions. That is the background.
The motion is not a considered response by the House as to how its procedures might be improved. It does not fit into a coherent philosophy of devolution; it is a political gesture, made by the Government to head off criticism of yet another of their ill-considered constitutional changes.
Helen Jackson: The right hon. Gentleman is twisting history somewhat. He should
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acknowledge the arguments that were primarily about the fact that the House was trying to achieve a consensus on the establishment, in Westminster Hall, of a Chamber in which such issues could be debated—as my hon. Friend the Member for Burnley (Mr. Pike) has just pointed out. That is why the proposal was made.
Sir George Young: I am not sure whether the hon. Lady sustained her initial accusation that I had twisted history. However, she was able to insert her interpretation of events into my speech. I hope that she can catch your eye later, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
There are three reasons for my view that this proposal is not the best way forward. First, the new Committee would sit uneasily with other institutions of the House, especially the Select Committees and Westminster Hall. Since 1978—the last time that the Standing Committee met—there have been major changes in the operation both of the Government and of the House, which dramatically weaken the case for the Standing Committee.
We have a major Department—the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions—which has responsibility for English regional affairs. That Department is shadowed by an active and effective Select Committee—as one would expect of a Committee chaired by the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody).
The DETR annual report for 1999 on regional responsibility lists the Department's achievements in 1998 as follows: Royal Assent for the Regional Development Agencies Act 1998; the establishment of eight RDAs on 14 December; and the appointment of the chairmen, members and chief executives of the RDAs. The work in progress included the further development of RDAs; encouraging the development of voluntary regional chambers in each region; contributing to the development of the new assisted areas map; and improving relationships with Government offices.
That major Department of State has responsibility for regional affairs. Within it, there is a Minister with responsibility for the English regions—I am delighted that the Minister for Local Government and the Regions, is in the Chamber tonight. There is also an Under-Secretary with responsibility for the regions, namely the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions, the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Ms Hughes).
The House monitors the Government and holds them to account on regional matters through a Select Committee. That is exactly what the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee has been doing. It produced reports on regional air services on 25 July 1998, regional Eurostar services on 26 January 1999 and regional development agencies on 25 May 1999. It must remain the principal means of monitoring the Government on regional affairs.
We also have other departmental Select Committees that cover other subjects. For example, if the House wanted to examine agriculture in the south-west, fishing in the north-west or the motor industry in the north-east, those subjects come under other Select Committees. The proposal for a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs risks short-circuiting the existing Select Committees, assuming, of course, that the House could find Members

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to take an active part on it, given the difficulty that confronts many Committees in maintaining a quorum and a good turnout.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: The right hon. Gentleman has missed a crucial point. Any Member of the House of the Commons—not only members of the Select Committee—will under this proposal be able to ask detailed questions of Ministers and secure answers. He simply does not understand that point, but it is why the change is so important.
Sir George Young: If the hon. Gentleman considers the way the agenda is constructed, he will find that the Government, not the Committee members, will set it. I shall refer shortly to Westminster Hall, which is an appropriate forum for some of these issues.
Mr. Garnier: I wish to follow up the point made by the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours). All sorts of Members representing English constituencies may be able to go to the Committee, question Ministers and make speeches, but, whatever the views expressed by those attending, the Government will be able to pack the vote. They will have the majority on the Committee.
Sir George Young: Indeed, and the majority will reflect not the balance within England, but that within the United Kingdom as a whole. I shall discuss the relevant amendment shortly
Dr. Stephen Ladyman Dr. Stephen Ladyman (South Thanet)rose—
Mr. Edward Leigh rose—
Sir George Young: I want to make a bit of progress, and then I shall give way.
The agenda of the Standing Committee, unlike that of a Select Committee, will be dominated by the Government and not by its members. The House may have considered paragraph (6) of the motion. The matters referred to the Committee, the period for discussion and the location and the duration of the discussion will all be decided by the Government. The normal powers available to a Select Committee will not be available to the Standing Committee, which is further evidence of the Government's ability to talk the language of devolution, but to retain central control.
The House is familiar with the debate about Westminster Hall. One of the concerns about establishing a forum that did not meet in the Chamber but that potentially had a large membership was that it might shift the centre of gravity away from the Chamber and take Members out of it. The jury is out on that issue because Westminster Hall is still an experiment. However, a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs must accentuate that risk.
Dr. Ladyman: I wanted the right hon. Gentleman to give way before he moved too far away from his remarks on Select Committees. Does he not accept that those of us who sit on the Environment, Transport and Regional
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Affairs Committee are not able to proselytise on behalf of our own regions? The advantage of the Standing Committee is that we shall be able to represent our regional interests on it.
Sir George Young: If the hon. Gentleman had listened to what has just been said, he would have found out that he will not have that freedom. He can proselytise on any subject only if the Government decide that it is a subject that the Committee can discuss. The whole terms of trade are weighted in favour of the Government, not the House.
Mr. Leigh: On the point that the voting in the Committee will reflect party strength in the United Kingdom as a whole and not just England, does my right hon. Friend recognise that the project may be considered by some to be an embryo—if an inadequate one—for an English Parliament? If that is so, does he accept that it is a rare case where an early abortion of the project would be a great kindness?
Sir George Young: My hon. Friend has used rather violent language. We should not make progress with the Standing Committee for the reasons that I have set out, and its membership is one of them. If the proposal is being sold to English Members as an English solution of some sort, the Committee should reflect the balance in the House of Members from England and not the United Kingdom. I shall say a word shortly about the amendment that addresses that problem.
The Procedure Committee suggested that the Grand Committees should be suspended while we wait to see what happens with Westminster Hall. Its Chairman may catch your eye, Mr. Deputy Speaker. If his Committee wanted the existing Grand Committees to be suspended, it is difficult to see that it would want a new one to be established.
Westminster Hall already provides opportunities for debates on English regional matters, answered by Ministers. Subjects for debate included, on 16 January, shipbuilding on the Clyde; on 14 March, housing in Norfolk; on 21 March, housing in Hampshire; on 22 March, NHS provision in Oxfordshire and the economy of the east midlands; on 29 March, the Diamond Synchrotron and science in the north west; and, on 4 April, prospects for shipbuilding and related industries on the River Tyne. All those subjects are chosen by Members of the House and the Speaker, not by the Government.
Mrs. Beckett: I gently remind the right hon. Gentleman that although as a member of the Modernisation Committee, which recommended the experiment in Westminster Hall, he rightly and honourably voted for that proposal, the vast bulk of the Members sitting behind him voted against it, and now apparently will vote against this one. Where does that leave their claim to want a forum for English Members?
Sir George Young: The proposal for Westminster Hall came to the House from the Modernisation Committee, which approved it. This proposal has not come from the Modernisation Committee with the approval of a Committee of the House; it has come directly from the Government.
As I said earlier, my first reason for believing that this proposal is not the best way forward is that it does not make sense within our rules and procedures. Last May,

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the Procedure Committee published an excellent report entitled "The Procedural Consequences of Devolution". This proposition was not one of its proposals, nor indeed did it feature in the Government's response.
That brings me to my second reason. The motion in no way responds to the imbalance created by devolution. The House should tonight be implementing the Procedure Committee's unanimous recommendation that Madam Speaker should identify Bills that apply only to one part of the UK. That would begin to be a coherent response to the English question, as it would open up the way to a new procedure for English or English and Welsh Bills.
"The Procedural Consequences of Devolution", which we debated on 21 October, contained key paragraphs—23 to 27—which responded to the current inequity that affects English MPs and our constituents better than the proposal before the House. Paragraph 25 began:
However, the current Standing Orders do not deal satisfactorily with legislation relating exclusively to England, Northern Ireland or Scotland … No provision at all is made for Bills relating exclusively to England.
The next paragraph took the argument a stage further. It said:
The main point of principle to be considered is whether it is appropriate to retain special procedures for Bills relating exclusively to one of the constituent countries of the UK, as currently apply to Bills relating exclusively to Scotland or Wales. On balance, we believe it is.
That led the Committee to its recommendation in paragraph 27, which said:
We recommend that the provision allowing the Speaker to certify Bills as relating exclusively to Scotland be transferred to a new Standing Order and adapted so that the Speaker may certify that a Bill relates exclusively to one of the constituent parts of the UK.
That was the unanimous view of a Committee consisting of nine Labour MPs, three Conservatives and two Liberal Democrats. That is what we should be debating this evening.
That recommendation was rejected by the Government, who in their response asserted:
If…it were possible to identify some bills as relating exclusively to England, it is not clear what benefit this would have for the House.
The whole debate on the West Lothian question had gone straight over their head. It is not that they disagreed with the solution; they had not even seen the problem. The unanimous recommendation of the Procedure Committee would pave the way for the solution proposed by my party to the West Lothian question, and if the Government had tabled that as a motion today, they would have had our support.
The Standing Order would not allow the Committee to deal with Second Readings. The Procedure Committee also recommended that the Standing Order be lifted which requires Standing Committees to reflect party strength, so that the Standing Committee on Regional Affairs could reflect party strength in the constituent part of the UK. Again, the Government have not accepted that. The Government's proposal will perpetuate the inequity rather than solve it. An amendment has been tabled which would require the balance in the Committee to reflect the position in England rather than that in the UK. That strikes me as an amendment worth supporting if we are to have the Committee, but we do not believe that the Committee is the right answer to the post-devolution issues that concern many hon. Members.
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My third and last reason is that the proposition does not even fit the Government's agenda. Here we are, approaching the end of this Parliament, and the sad epitaph to the bold claims about regional devolution that we heard from Labour Members a few years ago is this Standing Committee. Elected regional assemblies have disappeared and, as a sop, we are to have a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs. The commitment to hold referendums on regional assemblies has gone the same way as the commitment to hold a referendum on electoral change.
Mr. William Cash: Does my right hon. Friend agree that, to deal with the question of Scotland and Wales—especially Scotland and the West Lothian question—it is necessary to adjust the Standing Orders to ensure that those who will otherwise vote twice are not allowed to do so?
Sir George Young: That was indeed the logic of the unanimous recommendation of the Procedure Committee that was put to the House last year.
At the general election, the Labour party pledged
legislation to allow the people, region by region, to decide in a referendum whether they want directly elected regional government.
The Home Secretary has also promised that
devolution to Scotland and Wales, to Greater London and to the English regions, greater responsibility to local authorities, far better accountability for quangos, will decentralise and devolve power across Britain and give people a say where one is denied today.
Regional government was intended to break up Britain and create a Europe of the regions. As Labour argued before the election:
The regional chambers would become each region's voice in Europe and would co-ordinate regional bids for EU funding.
Despite that initial enthusiasm, Labour's attitude appears to have cooled. The Minister for Local Government and the Regions recently described regional government as a "diversion", claiming that few of her north-east constituents were interested. That was reported in The Guardian on 4 August.
It appears that the motion we are debating is all that remains of the Government's bold pledge to devolve power to the regions. As is so often the case with the Labour Government, they are all mouth and no delivery. We do not support the idea of regional assemblies, and my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Mr. Loughton) will explain why. They would be wasteful and bureaucratic and they do not attract significant support in the country. In my part of the country, when people talk of Wessex, they mean Sophie and Edward, not a regional assembly.
What Labour Members really want is elected regional assemblies, especially in the north-east, to which decision making is devolved from Westminster. However, the motion pulls in the opposite direction. The Campaign for Yorkshire's background paper states:
The Campaign for Yorkshire is not asking for yet another body, but looking for the RDA to be made into an elected assembly.
The Local Government Association's letter about the proposal states:
though we welcome greater scrutiny of RDAs by Parliament, the Association favours increased scrutiny by the region itself. If the RDAs are to be a genuine step towards increased decision making in the English regions, the Committee must recognise that RDAs should ultimately be accountable to regional interests themselves.

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The motion is yet another example of the Government thrashing around in a constitutional vacuum, starting a reform that they have no idea how to finish, responding to some bad press with an ill-thought-through response. We do not believe that it should be supported and I invite my hon. Friends to register their opposition in the Lobby.
10.54 pm
Mr. Paul Tyler: I beg to move amendment (a), in paragraph (2), leave out "thirteen" and insert "twenty-four".
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael J. Martin): With this it will be convenient to consider amendment (b), in paragraph (2)(a), leave out "composition of the House" and insert—
"party representation of Members of the House sitting for English constituencies".
Mr. Tyler: The motion is a curious proposition and, as has been made clear by hon. Members on both sides, its paternity is odd. The Standing Committee on Regional Affairs has been in abeyance for 20 years and we do not appear to have managed too badly without it.
Already, inquiries have been made of the Leader of the House about the function that this child is to perform. What is its purpose? Government Members have already suggested that a body with some of the characteristics of a Select Committee would be more appropriate than a Standing Committee; but, as the Chairman of the appropriate Committee has also already pointed out, to set up such a Committee would entail duplication. Already there is doubt about the purpose of the exercise.
I hope that all hon. Members have taken the trouble to read the Order Paper and the amendments. The House is now debating a series of amendments starting, obviously, with amendment (a). We will then debate amendment (b). I hope that later we will have an opportunity to consider some of the other issues.
I have some sympathy with the point of view of the Conservative spokesman, the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir G. Young).
Mr. Campbell-Savours: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Tyler: With due respect, I have hardly started. I know that it was said of Mr. Gladstone that he was an old man in a hurry, but will the hon. Gentleman please be a little bit patient? I wish to be as brief as possible, as others want to speak, so I do not intend to take a lot of interventions.
As the Conservative spokesman made clear, the aspirations of many parts of the country, including my own, for some form of real devolution are to be denied this evening with a sop—a stopgap. I know that that will cause disappointment in all parts of the House. It looks as though old Labour has produced a knee-jerk response to those aspirations. As it has burned its fingers in Cardiff, Edinburgh and now London, real devolution is being put on the back burner and we are to be fobbed off with yet another Committee—a puppet Committee with a built-in Government majority.
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I do not believe that that is what people want. The Prime Minister promised, not just at the general election but more recently, that we would have more accountable regional government. This is not regional government. It does not even bring regional administration under the control of the House or any other elected body. For that reason, we must study the proposition carefully. It may be just a modest improvement. If so, perhaps it has some merit, but it is certainly not what it is cracked up to be by the Leader of the House or anyone else.
Amendment (a) would expand the core membership of the Committee so that at least a sufficient number of members would not only attend meetings, but vote there, to give the Committee a more effective role in scrutinising Government policy and practice at regional level. Our suggestion is that the number should be 24.
More important still, it would be a constitutional absurdity if the calculation of the Committee membership by party were based on representation in Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and even London. We therefore suggest in our second amendment that party representation should reflect party balance in England, if that is to be the agenda for the Committee. It would be totally illogical for those who represent Scottish constituencies effectively to determine representation on the Committee. The Government have clearly made a ludicrous blunder.
Mrs. Beckett: As the hon. Gentleman suggests that a ludicrous blunder has been committed, I should inform him that it has been calculated not by me, but by the relevant authorities, that his proposal would mean an extra seat for the Conservatives and one fewer for the Liberal Democrats.
Mr. Tyler: I have no problem with that. The argument of simple party advantage is ludicrous. I well recall the Labour protest when the Conservatives in the previous Parliament insisted on putting English Members on the Scottish Grand Committee. That was ludicrous then, and the proposal now is ludicrous. I hope that we will see no double standards from Labour Members who objected at that time.
Mr. Andrew Miller: Will the hon. Gentleman give way.
Mr. Tyler: No, I will not.
The motion reflects a subtle but extremely important difference in the way in which the Committee is to be managed, compared with 25 years ago: a Minister of the Crown will take all the major initiatives in deciding what comes before the Committee, where it meets, when it meets and so on. In our view, that is inappropriate. If the Committee is to be an effective organ of scrutiny that will make the Government accountable, the Chair of the Committee should have that role, and he or she should be an Opposition Member. Surely that is the right approach. I hope that hon. Members will re-examine the motion.
The proposal's greatest defect is the lack of a timetable. It is as though the Committee is intended to act for ever and a day as a substitute for effective regional scrutiny of the regional administration of national government. That is why we have proposed a sunset clause. Although Standing Orders cease at the end of every Parliament and

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the motion will therefore be effective for only a short time, I hope that the Government will not pretend that it is a permanent solution to the democratic deficit in the regions of England.
The motion is not a substitute for effective regional government. Anyone who claims it is such a substitute misunderstands the Government's proposition completely.
Mr. Bercow: The hon. Gentleman referred to the proposed Chairman of the Committee. Does he believe that the Chairman should be plucked from the Speaker's Panel or appointed in some other, unspecified way?
Mr. Tyler: If we are considering a Standing Committee, the Chair must be a member of the Speaker's Panel. It includes Opposition Members, so that is not a major problem. If the initiative, the agenda, the timing, the location and the business are in the hands of the Government rather than the Chair and the Committee, the Committee will not be an effective organ of scrutiny for all Back Benchers and all parties.
I represent Cornwall, which we do not regard as part of England, but I am prepared to make an exception for the purpose of our discussion. My constituents are entitled to know that the Committee will be an effective scrutineer of regional and local government.
Mr. Nicholas Winterton: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Tyler: No, I want to complete my remarks. [HON. MEMBERS: "Go on."] I spoke in the Chamber at 1.10 this morning; I do not believe that anyone wants to hear me speak at length this evening.
Mr. Bercow: We want Tyler.
Mr. Tyler: The hon. Gentleman can have Wat Tyler if he likes.
Hon. Members on the Treasury Bench want to buy off parts of England that have a perfectly reasonable aspiration in the aftermath of devolution to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland—we hope that devolved government will resume in due course in Northern Ireland. The motion is simply a stopgap and must be treated as such. It may have short-term merits, but only if it is greatly improved by our amendments.
11.2 pm
Mr. Dale Campbell-Savours: I have listened to the hon. Member for Truro—
Mr. Tyler: North Cornwall.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: I am obviously thinking of the previous Parliament.
I tried to intervene on the hon. Gentleman early in his speech because in his opening sentence, he suggested that things had worked perfectly well without the Committee for which we have pressed. I remind him that his part of the world is applying for objective 1 status. That suggests that there are major problems in Cornwall. Twenty years of Thatcherism and all that that entailed have left a legacy that the hon. Gentleman does not enjoy. He should
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therefore have been at the forefront of those who required the Government to table the motion that has been presented this evening.
I welcome the motion. We have asked for it for 20 years; we have finally got it. In 1979, when I was first elected, the first debates in which I participated were about regional affairs. We had to argue with the Government through the usual channels for those debates. They were repeatedly refused. We asked for the establishment of a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs immediately after the election in 1979. Our request was refused. Over the following year and every year, the issue was repeatedly raised in Labour party conferences up and down the country and in trade union conferences. If the truth be known, Tory Back Benchers wanted a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs just as much as we did. I am looking at one now—the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Winterton). In the early 1980s he attended meetings of the textile group of Members of Parliament to ask for such a Committee to be established.
Mr. Nicholas Winterton: I hesitate to counter what the hon. Gentleman says, but it would be appropriate to quote chapter and verse, such as a date and a relevant Hansard column. Although I participated in the Committee under the old Standing Order, which I much prefer to the Standing Order that we are debating, it is wrong to introduce the motion as we are still involved in the Westminster Hall experiment. We should see whether it succeeds. I have the honour to chair Westminster Hall and I must tell the House that I am trying to create some atmosphere and make it work.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: The hon. Gentleman is a weather vane. Clearly he has completely changed his position over the past 20 years.
Mr. Winterton: Rubbish.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: I remember those occasions.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Winterton) must not shout across the Chamber.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: Those matters were discussed by the Paper and Board Federation because we were concerned about the impact of energy prices on the paper and board industry. We argued that we needed a mechanism in the House of Commons whereby we could debate such issues intensely with Ministers, but that was not provided. In the 1980s, we repeatedly made requests through the usual channels for a structure to be set up, but we never got what we wanted. This time we have got it, and I thank my right hon. Friend for that.
Let me tell the House why the Committee will work. Many of my hon. Friends may not have had the opportunity or have needed to attend European Standing Committees. They are perhaps the best in terms of holding Ministers to account.
Mr. Paterson: Oh come on!
Mr. Campbell-Savours: Oh yes, those Committees are excellent as they sort out the good Ministers from

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the bad. In the previous Parliament, I was leading in Committee for the Opposition and a Minister said, "Do you realise, Dale, that I had to get up at 4 o'clock this morning to prepare for this because I do not want to muck it up? When I go before the Committee, I want to be sure that I have done my homework." They provide the only mechanism that I have seen in the House of Commons that subjects Ministers to persistent questioning on issues of which they often have little notice. Ministers are held fully to account, which is why I want this structure to be created.
Ministers will have to be fully briefed and able to reply if they are to appear before the Committee on issues that relate directly to our constituencies. The danger is that they will look inadequate if they do not answer detailed questions. Nothing keeps Ministers on their toes more than the need to impress a Committee, particularly when they are live on the box.
Mr. James Paice: Although I do not agree, let us accept the hon. Gentleman's point about the effectiveness of European Standing Committees. Is not there a significant difference here because the European Scrutiny Committee, not the Government, decides whether an issue is appropriate for debate? In the new Standing Committee, issues will be debated at the behest of Ministers. If they do not want to be interrogated in the way that he describes, they can purposely avoid that by not putting certain issues down for consideration.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: Within the structure that we are establishing, it is inconceivable that Ministers would be able to find some way of avoiding giving detailed answers to questions about the northern region or the north-west region. The Government will announce the business of the Committee for a particular day, for a particular region and probably for a particular Department. It could be Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, northern region, Department of Trade and Industry, north-west region, lottery matters covered by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, south-west region, or whatever.
I presume that when those items go on to the agenda, Members—if they are inclined to do what I intend to do—will give Ministers notice in detail of the questions that they mean to ask, so that there is no excuse for those Ministers to give half-baked answers. Then, during the questioning session that will open the proceedings, they will ask their questions, receive live answers and follow them up, as can be done under the European Committee structure that we have already established. Members can ask supplementaries repeatedly, and press Ministers into a corner in order to exploit fully the issues that they are raising.
Mr. Pike: I am sure my hon. Friend does not believe for a moment that, once the Committee has been established, Conservative Members will not press weekly at business questions for issues to be debated in it.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: I am absolutely sure that they will. Every Thursday afternoon they will ask for items to be discussed in the Committee. Having begun by meeting
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perhaps once a week or once every two weeks, the Committee may well meet two or three times a week, depending on the nature and scale of demand from members of all parties. The Tories, if they are wise, will be just like us, and use the new structure to hold Ministers to account. I think that they are mad to reject it.
Dr. Ladyman: Let me ask my hon. Friend a question to which I genuinely do not know the answer. What would stop an individual Member tabling a parliamentary question asking the Government when they intended to debate a particular subject in the Committee, and what would stop the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee making recommendations to the Government, if it so wished? Whether the Government accepted them would be another matter.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: Everything that my hon. Friend has said is possible, and I am sure that Conservative Members will find ways of ensuring that it is possible. They will exploit the system in exactly the same way. There must be Conservative Members who know in their hearts that this is the very structure that they want in order to secure regional accountability.
Mr. Bercow: Given what the hon. Gentleman has just said about the scope for taxing interrogation, can he explain why, in paragraph (9) of the proposed standing order, the period for ministerial statements is unlimited, but the period for questioning of those ministerial statements is strictly limited? There is an incompatibility there.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: The procedure has worked perfectly well under the European scrutiny arrangements; and these are early days. It may well be that, in the end, most of the proceedings in the Committee are dominated by questions. We may well find that in a year's time, or in two years' time—depending on the scale of the great success of this procedural change—Members want more time in which to ask questions. I will be in the Lobby with the Tories if they want to table a motion to that effect: I have no problem at all with it, and nor have my colleagues on the Front Bench.
Mrs. Beckett: Having now found paragraph (9), which I must admit was not present in my memory, I can assist my hon. Friend, and respond to the concern raised by the hon. Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow).
The whole point of the procedure, which is modelled on that of the European Scrutiny Committee, is to prevent Ministers from monopolising the Committee by making overlong statements, but to allow the Chairman the facility to extend the period of questioning should the Chairman conclude that the Committee has not had sufficient opportunity to press a Minister. That is what happens in the European Scrutiny Committee, and that is the reason for our proposing this procedure.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: That is a very sensible response to the question asked by the hon. Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow). He should go away and consider the whole procedure again. He is one of the Members who will be able to use it, because, as we know, he is a questioner. He, along with some of his

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hon. Friends, will be able to exploit the procedure—and I hope that they will, because we all want Ministers to be held to account.
Mr. Gray: The hon. Gentleman talks about persistent and demanding scrutiny of Ministers. Has he seen the official record of the recent meeting of the Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs, where Lord Sainsbury was reduced to a quivering jelly by the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody)?
Mr. Campbell-Savours: I am sure, then, that the hon. Gentleman will look forward to many similar occasions with other Ministers, if he gets his way. We accept that. Indeed, Ministers accept it.
I draw attention to one or two issues that I should like to raise in the Committee. It is not only about the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions. It will cover other Departments.
Mrs. Dunwoody: What concerns me is not that we should follow the European Standing Committee—
Mr. Campbell-Savours: Where my hon. Friend was very good.
Mrs. Dunwoody: I enjoyed it. It was an interesting and useful sitting because we could keep a Minister there for more than an hour, forcing him to answer questions. One thing worries me. Given the number of English Members who would have the right to come along and to question the Minister, rightly, how long would each one get to put trenchant and important questions? How many answers would they receive?
Mr. Campbell-Savours: During a sitting of European Standing Committee B that dealt with agricultural matters, my hon. Friend always seemed to secure answers to the repeated questions that she asked; it was particularly the case on European matters. She was very able to do so. I do not see any problem arising. Anyhow, it is not as if the Committee will meet only once. As I say, it may meet regularly every week on a number of occasions. I hope that it does. I hope that Members take advantage of it.
Mr. Paterson: The hon. Gentleman should listen to his colleague, the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody). She makes the very good point about the one hour available on European Standing Committees. The most that I have ever achieved is three questions to a Minister, interspersed with other questions from other Members.
If the hon. Gentleman had been at the Select Committee on Agriculture this morning and heard his colleague, the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Mitchell), going on and on and on and on at Baroness Hayman, the Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, he would have seen what persistent questioning means. A Select Committee is a far more effective format for grilling an ineffective Minister than a Standing Committee, as we see with the European model.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: We are splitting hairs. [HON. MEMBERS: "We are not."] I am sorry. I think that we are.
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The Committees provide adequate opportunity for Members to question Ministers. It might be true that, in the proceedings this morning, the Minister was pressed, but there is one advantage that Standing Committees do have; I suppose it applies to Select Committees, too. If they are very clever, a group of Back Benchers will get together and ambush a Minister. That is the real art.
I saw that happen once. It was during a very well attended sitting—I am sure that the hon. Member for Macclesfield will remember the day. Mr. Oppenheim was the Minister. He was answering questions during the run-up to Maastricht. There was a big sitting in Committee Room 12. The proceedings had to be transferred to that Room because so many people wanted to speak. Does the hon. Gentleman remember the ambush? Did it work? It did. That is why the new procedure will work. [HON. MEMBERS: "It did not work."] It did. You got the ambush in. I was there. I witnessed it. We sat back and said nothing. Your people did the job against your own Ministers.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman could not be referring to my people because my people are not in the Chamber.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I should never have made that remark. The people of the hon. Member for Macclesfield ambushed his own Minister and it worked very well.
Mr. Nigel Evans: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Campbell-Savours: I shall. I like these exchanges.
Mr. Evans: Does the hon. Gentleman believe that the 13 core Members should reflect the political make-up of the English regions, or of the whole House of Commons?
Mr. Campbell-Savours: I have not given the matter a thought. I am leaving that to Liberal Democrat Members, who have tabled an amendment on it. I shall look to my Whips for a bit of guidance on how I should vote on it, because it is not the issue that is concerning me. I am interested in the principle.
Mr. Tyler: The hon. Gentleman will have to vote soon on our amendment.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: I am going to ask my Whips which way to vote—I am very honest about that. When I am ignorant about something, they invariably give me very good guidance.
When the new regional structure and the north-west regional development agency—in the north-west of England—were established, there was much argument about whether Cumbria should be covered by it. Many of us wanted to be included in the northern region. I do not want to re-open old arguments, but the reality is that there was a very heated discussion. Although that structure is now working quite well, at that time we believed that we were not being listened to. If we had had in place the structure proposed in the motion, what a field day I would have had. Ministers would have been pilloried in that Committee and driven into a corner, to reveal the true

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reasons why the decision had been taken. That is only one example of a situation in which I believe that the proposed structure would have operated better.
A decision was then taken, at a regional level, without the intervention of Ministers, on where the regional development agency's offices in Cumbria were to be located. It was small matter for people in Westminster, but it was very important for us in Cumbria. I wanted the offices in Cockermouth, but the agency wanted them in Penrith. The agency won, but why? It won because there was no accountability and no process by which I could influence events. When I tried to influence events in informal proceedings, it turned out to be a complete and total waste of time. I want a structure whereby I can hold a Minister to account on a decision of that nature because I am elected and I am accountable, just as every other hon. Member is. We have to find a way of ensuring that our voices are heard and that we can question Ministers on those issues.
Mr. Andrew George: The hon. Gentleman said earlier that anything is possible, and he mentioned the definition of "regions". Surely that issue really is at the heart of the proposal and the factor determining whether the emperor has any clothes at all. Do regions as defined by central Government exist other than as part of the diseased mind of a bureaucratic and centralised Government? Does he agree that the fundamental issue in the debate is the possibility of identifying regions that are based on real community identities?
Mr. Campbell-Savours: I agree with the hon. Gentleman.
Mr. Stephen Day: The hon. Gentleman mentioned the debate on which region Cumbria should be in, and I remember the debate well. However, surely he does not believe for a minute that that issue—which was a great one for him—matters at all to his constituents. They do not recognise the north-west as an entity—it does not exist. They recognise their own county and city, and those are what make them what they are. They also recognise the fact that they are English. That is the issue that needs to be addressed. We are talking about rights for English Members to represent their constituents here in this House.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: Those who are taking administrative decisions within the county of Cumbria recognise the north-west regional authority as the entity that is responsible for the region's future. There is no problem about that—we accept the north-west as an administrative entity. However, the hon. Gentleman is raising issues that we are not addressing in this debate.
There is an argument about the impact of the strength of the pound. [Interruption.] At Question Time, I have heard Tory Members and Labour Members, including me, repeatedly asking questions about the impact of sterling's high value on industry in the regions, particularly in the north of England and in Scotland. I think that it is perfectly reasonable that we should have a structure whereby we are able to bring in even Treasury Ministers, so that we can ask them questions and to justify their policy on the current value of the pound in relation to the
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euro. I should like to see Treasury Ministers put under pressure by answering questions on those issues. Hands up any hon. Member who does not agree with me. Surely they would all want to ask Treasury Ministers these highly important questions.
Mr. Paterson: Where does it say in the motion that the Committee will have the power to call anyone? The Government will decide who goes before the Committee. That is the critical difference between a Select Committee and the way in which the proposed Committee will be constituted. There is no power whatever—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. Interventions must be brief.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: When the hon. Gentleman asks on the Floor of the House for a debate on his part of the country on a matter relating to the currency, he requests or requires the attendance of a particular Minister to make a statement to that Committee.
Mr. Malcolm Bruce: Last week, the Scottish Grand Committee heard a statement on the Budget and debated the strength of the pound and its impact on the Scottish economy. In spite of the fact that the Chancellor of the Exchequer is a member of that Committee, we had no Treasury Minister replying to us.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: I am sorry for the hon. Gentleman; he should have exercised his influence. There is a special Committee for Members to exercise influence over a Labour Government, and we have provided them with the opportunities to do so.
Mr. Evans: The hon. Gentleman says that, during business questions Back-Bench Members ask the Leader of the House for debates. I am an assiduous attender of business questions, and the Leader of the House says time and again, "This would be a subject for Westminster Hall." Surely what the hon. Gentleman is asking for is already served by the Select Committees and by Westminster Hall.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: That is one option; we are now offering another way to secure such a debate. The incidence of the hon. Gentleman's success should now double.
Mr. Evans: Twice zero is zero.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will get it in the end.
I am worried about the disparity between property prices in the north and the south. The people in the south have a huge advantage over my constituents. A terraced house in London costs £500,000 to £1 million. A terraced house in my constituency might cost between £20,000 and £40,000. When there is property price inflation, the people in the south benefit, yet it is my constituents in the north of England who are putting their backs into the use of equipment and machinery and generating the wealth that keeps the country working.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman may wish to discuss these matters when the Committee is set up, but he will not dwell on property prices.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: The powerhouse of the nation is to be found in the industrial areas in terms of generating

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wealth. I am worried about the disparities that arise when the product of that wealth does not go to those people. I want to see Ministers questioned on these matters, and this proposal is exactly the structure in which that can be done.
I am not a member of the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee. I am on two Committees—I cannot take on any more work in that sense. However, when the issue of property prices in the north of England arises on the agenda of the Regional Affairs Committee, I will turn up, along with the hon. Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Evans), to question Ministers on these matters. I will see the hon. Gentleman there.
11.30 pm
Mr. Nicholas Winterton: I shall be brief. It is always most entertaining to listen to the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours). I was looking at him closely as he addressed the House and I do not think for a moment that he believed half of what he was saying, but he made a good case and I am sure that he pleased his right hon. and hon. Friends on the Treasury Bench.
I shall vote against the motion, because it has not been properly thought out. I shall not cover the same ground as my right hon. Friend the shadow Leader of the House, who said that the measure was a sop to Labour's comments before the general election and in their early days in government about establishing regional government subject to referendums throughout the United Kingdom. My only observation on that is that the cost of government under this Administration has increased by £1 billion. That takes account of devolved government in Scotland and the huge cost of the Parliament building, as well, no doubt, as the Assembly building in Cardiff, which the First Secretary of Wales has fortunately put a stop to, albeit only for the time being.
If the Leader of the House wanted to pursue the idea of a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs, I am saddened that she did not resurrect the old Standing Order No. 117, which gave Members from the various parts of the United Kingdom an opportunity on a proper equal basis to participate in open debate about matters relating to their area. I took part in debates on more than one occasion. The hon. Member for Workington was seeking historically to put words into my mouth. Of course I was concerned about the north-west of the United Kingdom, but I did not ask for such a procedure to be set up. I have always believed that we can have proper debates on the Floor of the House of Commons, as we have done on many occasions on so-called regional affairs, ranging widely over all matters of concern to a particular area.
Mr. Jim Cousins: I recognise that the hon. Gentleman was in the House at the time and I was not, but is not one reason why the Standing Committee under the old Standing Order No. 117 died that it had no core membership that could drive it on and ensure that the pace of business was maintained? Are not the Government right to introduce a core membership in the new Standing Order to ensure that that defect does not recur?
Mr. Winterton: I greatly respect the hon. Gentleman, not only because I have heard him speak fervently and
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with great knowledge many times, not just about his constituency, but about the whole of his area of the United Kingdom. However, I do not agree with him. The proposals that we are debating provide for a core membership, but I suspect that it will be a controlled core membership that will reflect the party in government. I am inclined to support the views expressed by the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler), on behalf of the Liberal Democrats, who wanted a wider membership of the Committee, increasing it from 13 to 24, and a Chairman from the Opposition parties. I have the honour to serve on the Chairmen's Panel and Madam Speaker normally appoints two Chairmen to a Standing Committee, one from the Government party and one from the Opposition party, to ensure a balance. As the hon. Member for North Cornwall—and the hon. Member for Blaydon (Mr. McWilliam) who is a leading member of the Chairmen's Panel and who is in his place—will know, once a Chairman is appointed, he or she does not take part in any further progress on a Bill. In the case of a close balance in the House, such dual appointments mean that one party is not disadvantaged in relation to the other.
Mr. Cash: In reference to this matter, does my hon. Friend agree with the proposition made by the Liaison Committee recently that the Whips should be precluded from exercising influence on the core membership? For that matter, why not have free votes in the Committee, if we are to have one at all?
Mr. Winterton: I shall come on to that point, if my hon. Friend will wait a moment, because I wish to return to the question posed by the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, Central (Mr. Cousins). Core membership is a disadvantage because core members would not necessarily know much about the subject of any particular debate. For example, the hon. Member for Workington, coming as he does from Cumbria, would not know much about what was going on in south Manchester or north Cheshire. Indeed, I am grateful to the Deputy Prime Minister because he now knows where the Poynton bypass and the Manchester airport east and west link roads are located. Whenever I ask him a question, he thinks that it will be about that issue. My message for the hon. Gentleman is that if one perseveres in the Chamber, one can get one's point across and make the representations that he appears to believe can be made only in a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs.
There would be an inequality in the activities of such a Committee, and a core membership would not be to the advantage of the Committee or the debate. As the Leader of the House will know, any Member from the region in question who wished to participate in the Standing Committee under the old Standing Order No. 117 system could do so, attending on an equal basis. Those Committees did not have a core membership who could attend and vote every time. Under the new proposals, some Members would be able to attend, speak and ask questions, but they would have no vote. The Committee would have little authority. I regret that, because if we are to have another Committee it should have purpose and authority. The proposed new Committee would have no standing at all.
Mr. Bercow: Was not it also fanciful for the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) to

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envisage quivering Ministers being dragged before the Committee, when in truth—as he would readily see if he studied paragraph (6) of the proposed new Standing Order—it is Ministers who will call the shots?
Mr. Winterton: I would have hoped that the Leader of the House might have clarified that point.
Mrs. Beckett: If either hon. Gentleman looked back at the original Standing Order, they would see that those provisions precisely mirror the Standing Order that already exists.
Mr. Winterton: With the amendments that are proposed, I am not sure that the structure proposed by the Leader of the House will work.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr. Cash) mentioned the splendid report from the Liaison Committee, which is the Committee of Select Committee Chairmen. Those experienced and authoritative hon. Members are concerned with holding the Government of the day to account, and about how hon. Members are appointed to Select Committees. Those appointments should not be done by the comfortable mechanism of the usual channels—I have had experience of tame hon. Members being appointed to Select Committees, as the Leader of the House knows.
Appointments to Select Committees should be made by a special committee of the Liaison Committee. That would improve the House's integrity. Those appointed would be committed to the subjects in which the Committees specialise and could add their experience.
Mr. John McWilliam: I am Chairman of the Selection Committee and a member of the Speaker's Panel, and I am having trouble with the hon. Gentleman's contribution on both counts. As for the latter, it does not matter to which party a Standing Committee Chairman belongs, as all Chairmen do the job objectively. Hon. Members of all parties have felt the rough of my tongue, and that of the hon. Gentleman.
The Selection Committee works in a straightforward manner. There are no nuances or nonsenses—at least, not since I have been its Chairman, although I understand that the hon. Gentleman had a rough time in that post under a previous Government. I do not understand what he is talking about.
Mr. Winterton: I have the highest regard for my colleague on the Chairmen's Panel, who is also an additional Deputy Speaker for Westminster Hall sittings. In no way am I impugning his chairmanship of the Selection Committee when I say, however, that influences have been brought to bear—and even rules created—in the past, of which the House knew nothing. In that way, the reappointment or otherwise of hon. Members to Select Committees was influenced—but I do not want to go over all that again.
The excellent Liaison Committee report was compiled under the splendid Chairmanship of the right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon). It picks up a number of matters that have been dealt with by the Procedure Committee, which I have the honour to Chair.
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I do not want to talk about how the House debates Government expenditure, although the Government's reply on such matters was disappointing.
My right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir G. Young) talked about the Procedure Committee report on the procedural consequences of devolution. I want to be as brief as possible, so I shall not cover the ground that he covered in his excellent opening presentation. The all-party Committee put forward ways of recognising what has happened to Wales and Scotland since devolution. After a great deal of mature consideration and evidence-taking, we did not recommend a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs.
Mr. Evans: Post-devolution, the Scots have their Parliament and the Welsh have their Assembly. Both bodies are directly elected. If we are to have this sop of a Standing Committee on Regional Affairs, is there any logical reason why the core membership should not reflect the political make-up of those representing English constituencies, rather than including the other regions of the United Kingdom?
Mr. Winterton: Again, I am bound to refer to amendment (b), tabled by the Liberal Democrats, which was selected. It seeks to leave out "composition of the House" in line 10, and insert
party representation of Members of the House sitting for English constituencies …
My view, which I understood my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire to put forward on behalf of the Conservative Opposition, is that we are sympathetic to the amendment. If there is a Division, I hope, as he indicated, that we will vote for it. It is the right move if we are to be fair to England. Incidentally, I have not, overtly or tacitly, promoted an English Parliament, because I am a strong Unionist who believes in the union of the United Kingdom—England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales. I am hoping against hope that the damage done by devolution will not be irretrievable, and that there is a real purpose for the United Kingdom as a whole.
Mr. Desmond Swayne: If we accept amendment (b), should we not, by logical extension, apply that principle to the regional Select Committees of Scotland and Wales? Is there any prospect, therefore, that I and my hon. Friend the Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson) will be relieved of the need to attend the Select Committee on Scottish Affairs?
Mr. Winterton: I am sure that my hon. Friends the Members for New Forest, West (Mr. Swayne) and for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson) find it neither inconvenient nor burdensome to attend the meetings of these valuable Committees which play a vital part in the integrity of the United Kingdom, and truly reflect in this House the needs of all those countries comprising the United Kingdom.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: I cannot imagine a Scottish Committee being a burden to anyone.
Mr. Winterton: I know that you do not, Mr. Deputy Speaker, nor would you even have dreamt of it. I was merely responding to the views expressed by my hon.

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Friend the Member for New Forest, West, who implied that he and my hon. Friend the Member for Hexham found their attendance and involvement with those Committees somewhat inconvenient and burdensome. I do not believe that they are and repeat that they are a vital part of the function of the House in maintaining the integrity of the United Kingdom.
Mr. Leigh: The analogy between the Select Committee and this proposed Committee is not a correct one. A Select Committee is there to hold the Executive to account and to study the subject. The proposed Committee is about righting an imbalance following devolution. Therefore, it is absurd that the proposed Committee should have a membership drawn from the entire United Kingdom. A Select Committee is quite different; it could be argued that we should all sit on the Scottish Affairs Committee if we wanted to, but this is different. That is why the proposed Committee is a logical absurdity.
Mr. Winterton: I do not support what is proposed on the Order Paper tonight and has been promoted by the Leader of the House. I come back to the views expressed by my right hon. Friend the shadow Leader of the House. The Procedure Committee, comprising as it does a majority of Labour Members, with two Liberal Democrats and three Conservatives, made proposals after proper mature thought, consideration and evidence taking that dealt as adequately as we could at this time with the procedural consequences of devolution.
Mr. Stephen O'Brien: Is it not right to observe that even during this debate, an hon. Member who represents a Scottish seat has, as is right, contributed to a debate that is solely related to English matters? He has now left his place. I was somewhat hesitant to make that point, given Mr. Deputy Speaker's intervention.
Mr. Winterton: My hon. Friend highlights the fact that you are an overlord of this Chamber this evening, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and you come from north of Hadrian's wall. I can only say that I am delighted to see you in the Chair and you are ensuring that we have a meaningful, positive and robust debate tonight.
Will the Minister who replies consider some of the observations that have been made from the Conservative Benches and the two amendments that have been tabled by the Liberal Democrats and selected for debate? I believe that they make a better balance. Will the Leader of the House say whether she thinks that the extension of the House in Westminster Hall is not also an appropriate forum for meaningful debate on regional matters? Of course, there was an important debate the other day in Westminster Hall on the Diamond Synchrotron, which is highly controversial. Any hon. Member from the north-west could attend on an equal basis.
Mrs. Ann Winterton: Or from anywhere else.
Mr. Winterton: Or from anywhere else, as my hon. Friend says. Does the Leader of the House not believe that that forum is ideal for the sort of debate that is to be transferred to the Standing Committee on Regional Affairs? I am sure that she has said so in various debates that we have had on modernisation.
Mrs. Beckett: Of course I accept that there may be occasions when Westminster Hall might be thought to be
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a suitable forum, assuming that the experiment continues. I do not rule it out, especially perhaps for matters that by their nature transcend more than one region. However, I would be reluctant to see Westminster Hall dominated by such debates, which I fear could happen if it were the sole forum. I am certain that, should such debates draw a large participation from Members representing Scottish and Welsh constituencies—there is no reason why they should not, as the forum is open to all Members of the House—we would not have addressed in any way the need for a forum for hon. Members who sit for English constituencies. It may be that Conservative Members have decided that they no longer feel that that is a matter of concern; I believe that it is.
Mr. Winterton: I am grateful for that constructive intervention. It is important that the House properly explores the motion that the Government have put on the Order Paper to amend substantially Standing Order No. 117. But will she give me, my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire and other Conservative Members an assurance that she will take seriously our concerns? Last autumn, we debated the Procedure Committee's recommendation relating to the procedural consequences of devolution, taken with other matters that have subsequently arisen in respect of a further report from the Procedure Committee about how we debate financial matters and estimates in the House, together with the far-reaching recommendations to shift the balance of the Liaison Committee. If she indicates that she will take those matters seriously, I shall be slightly more sympathetic to the motion.
Mrs. Beckett: I always take seriously recommendations such as those to which the hon. Gentleman referred—he listed a series of reports and recommendations—although that does not mean that we can accept all of them.
It is possible that my remarks did not include a point that I had intended to make—perhaps because I took 10 interventions. I had intended to say that I do not suggest that our proposals are set in stone nor that, over time, the House might not agree on ways to amend and improve them. I merely point out that they seem to be a worthwhile first shot.
Mr. Winterton: Again, I am grateful to the Leader of the House. However, I hope that, when her hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary, Privy Council Office replies to the debate, he will take on board and respond not only to many of the matters that have been legitimately and properly raised, but to some of the severe reservations expressed by my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire.
Under paragraph (6)(c), a Minister of the Crown can specify
when and where (within England) the Committee shall meet.
Can the right hon. Lady really be serious about that provision? Committees already find it difficult to obtain, or maintain, a quorum, and the proposed Committee could take a large number of people away from the House—because the motion states that it can meet away from the House—when other important business is taking place here. Bearing those points in mind, will she pay some attention to my serious concern—shared by other

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Chairmen of Select Committees—as to the inability of Committees to maintain a quorum when we are doing important business on behalf of the House?
It was premature to table the motion. The right hon. Lady said that the Modernisation Committee had not pursued the matter a year ago because of the Westminster Hall experiment. Although I make no bones about the fact that I am trying to make that experiment a success, it is none the less an experiment. We do not know whether it will survive. Do we need a further experiment that might complicate the way that the House is run and hinder Members in undertaking all the jobs that they want to do on behalf of the House, the country and their constituents?
The matter is serious. It did not receive adequate thought before the motion was tabled for debate tonight. My right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire and other hon. Members have done us a service in raising important issues that cause us concern.
11.58 pm
Mr. Andrew F. Bennett: I welcome what is perhaps a timid and faltering step towards the scrutiny of our regional government.
We should realise that we already have regional government. Planning conferences have been set up. There are regional development agencies and the Government offices. Regional chambers are being developed, although their role is somewhat ambiguous. They are supposed to exercise scrutiny, but most of their members are substantial providers in the regions. However regional government has been established, we need to provide for effective scrutiny of it. The measure is not ideal, but it is a first step, so we should welcome it.
It has been suggested that there could be a clash with the work of the Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs. There need be no clash. That Select Committee has a work load that is probably impossible. In the past two months, the Committee has met three times a week. It oversees a huge number of non-governmental organisations, but we are not able to scrutinise them all. There are more than 30 that we have still not examined in this Parliament. Members have referred a huge list of topics to us for our consideration and the members of the Committee want to consider them. Its work load is substantial.
The Select Committee considered regional development agencies when the Regional Development Agencies Act 1998 went through the House, and we examined them again last year. We should re-examine them, but it is difficult to envisage how the Committee could scrutinise each of the agencies in the English regions. That is an almost impossible task for us to perform. Two issues are involved. The first is the way in which the agencies are developing nationally and the other is the regional policies that each pursues. It is high time that we found a way to scrutinise them. Ideally, that would be done by Members of Parliament from the relevant regions, and this proposal is a small step in that direction.
The House should grasp this opportunity. It amazes me that the Opposition are likely to vote against more scrutiny in Parliament; that is crazy. I also find it odd that they are worried about voting. How many votes have they
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won so far in this Parliament? It is not their voting power that is significant. I should have thought that they would want to extract guarantees through the usual channels so that they could at least have some say on the debates to be held and on when they are held. However, they are demanding the right to vote and, presumably, to lose regularly, and it does not matter whether they lose on the basis of the votes of English Members or of those from the United Kingdom as a whole—they will still lose.
Liberal Members have asked who will chair the Committee. As I understand it, if the Chairman is a member of the Chairman's Panel, he will vote according to precedent. He would not exercise judgment in the party political sense. What will happen if someone chairing the Committee behaves as if he were the Chairman of a Select Committee? My experience in the previous Parliament as the Chairman of a Select Committee with a majority of Members from other parties is that, in many ways, the Chairman is constrained by the Committee's members. I do not think that worrying greatly about who chairs the new Committee is the crucial issue. I advise the Conservative party to get stuck into scrutiny. It should certainly get stuck into scrutiny of regional affairs and it should use the usual channels to ensure that it receives a fair amount of the time available for debate.
I will not follow my hon. Friend the Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) in listing all the subjects that I would like to be scrutinised in the north-west. It is a long and substantial list, and the sooner that we get to it, the better.
I am reluctant to speak on behalf of my hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody), but I give one assurance to the House for us both because we jointly chair the Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs. The new procedure will not in any way curtail or intimidate the activities of that Committee.
We should now move forward, accepting that the proposal is very limited. We should grasp the opportunity and demand that the Committee is used vigorously in the next few months. The Government could undertake that there will be at least one meeting in each of the English regions before July. We could then assess whether the Committee's powers were adequate or whether we needed to demand further powers.
12.4 am
Mr. Stephen Day: I am saddened by the way in which many Labour Members will unquestioningly support any proposal that seeks to remove the power of scrutiny from this Chamber. They will send that power anywhere, provided that the Chamber is not seen to be the place where the Government are held to account. However well intentioned their views on this matter may be, they are failing their constituents and themselves; by following the Government's lead on a range of constitutional issues, they are slowly consigning Parliament and themselves to eventual oblivion.
My constituents send me to this Chamber to hold the Government to account, and that is the prime job that every Member of the House is sent here to do. The Select Committee procedures are effective, and we should concentrate on those in seeking to modernise and improve the House, rather than usurp or seek to replicate powers that already exist and are effectively used by those Committees.

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The whole question of regionalism is abject nonsense. The regions exist only in the minds of the politically correct and the political elite; they do not exist in the minds of my electors in Cheadle. They know not what the north-west is, and I suspect that they care less.
Mrs. Louise Ellman rose—
Mr. Day: I shall give way in a moment.
Despite the fact that my electors have been part of Greater Manchester since 1974, they still vociferously defend their Cheshire identity. I heard a Liberal Democrat Member—I cannot remember which one—say from a sedentary position that we must have smaller units that people identify with. I am amazed that that hon. Member does not know that those units exist: they are counties and cities. They are where the English identity rests and what it is all about.
If hon. Members are concerned about making up any deficit in our role, as English Members of Parliament, of serving our constituents, they should redress the political deficit that England has suffered since the Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly were set up. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Winterton), I very much believe in the union of the United Kingdom. I know that the Government do not because the constitutional changes that they have introduced have greatly damaged the long-term survival of what I know as my country—the United Kingdom.
Although I accept that the Scottish people wanted their own Parliament—I do not accept that the Welsh wanted their Assembly, but they got it—that should not have gone ahead without thought being given to how to redress the problems caused for England. If we are to save the United Kingdom, the issue of English rights must be addressed. It will not be solved by setting up a nonsense Committee, which in effect will remove power from where it should be and from where we should be seen to be acting on behalf of constituents—this Chamber.
Mr. Bercow: I entirely agree with the thrust of my hon. Friend's remarks. Surely the whole purpose of the proposed Committee is simply to lend parliamentary legitimacy to regionalism, to give credence to the idea that we suffer from under-government and need more government and to underscore the notion of a bloated European Union chessboard on which this country is nothing but an insignificant pawn.
Mr. Day: My hon. Friend is right. Regionalism makes sense only within the concept of a European federal state of regions, and I reject that concept. I am wholeheartedly happy to be part of the European Union and to enjoy the benefits of friendship and trade, but I do not want a European super-state to be created. Nor do I want the rights of the House of Commons to control and question the Government of the United Kingdom to be removed to any significant extent to any so-called region, for that would undermine the whole concept of the United Kingdom to which I am wedded, and the whole reason for the existence of Parliament.
Serious issues lie at the heart of the Government's proposals. If hon. Members want to know what the people of this country think about where they come from and who they are, they should speak not to people who are involved
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in politics or to members of their own party, but to their own people, the people whom they represent, and to people who are active in industry. Incidentally, industry in my area is not desperate for a regional assembly in the north-west, nor are my electors: when I mention the prospect of such an assembly to them, they are horrified at the thought of yet another tier of politicians, who might be even worse than I am. That is the way in which the public regard the body politic: they want fewer politicians, not more.
Tonight, I shall, with great enthusiasm, vote against this ridiculous proposal.
12.12 am
Mr. Austin Mitchell: I shall not attempt to follow that performance by the hon. Member for Cheadle (Mr. Day), who appears to be arguing in favour of home rule for Cheshire and against regional or even national government. Do his constituents not shop or go to the theatre in Manchester? Do they not use the facilities of the whole region? Do they not go to Trafford Park to shop? Do they not think regionally in any way? The hon. Gentleman appears to be curiously insulated from reality.
Mr. Day: The hon. Gentleman might be surprised to learn that many of my constituents shop as far afield as London. It does not mean that they want to be part of Greater London.
Mr. Mitchell: It might make more sense if, on their way down, they stopped at Meadowhall, where things are much cheaper.
The debate should not be prolonged unnecessarily. All I want to do is sincerely welcome the proposals laid before the House by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House. In my view, the Committee should have been re-established years ago, before devolution took place. Devolution is not necessarily a spur to the action, but it adds to the arguments in its favour. It is right that we should have the power to discuss regional issues in our own way and in our own format. With or without devolution, we need such a forum.
Like it or not, we are all regionalists now. Life is lived more widely than the small constituency, village, town or even city. Manchester was once a powerful, but narrow, focal point; now, with modern transport such as the motor car, it is a focus for the entire region. Development must be handled on a regional basis. What Scotland now has creates competition for development and public spending—a competition in which the English regions need to be able to have their say and put their case if they are to compete effectively with Scotland.
Let us take the civilised parts of the country: the northern region is foremost among those demanding regional devolution. I have no doubt that regional devolution would be carried in a referendum in the north-east, and polls reveal that there is also demand in the north-west, Yorkshire and Humberside.
Mr. Day indicated dissent.
Mr. Mitchell: If there is no demand for some form of regional devolution, why have those three regions already created their own regional assemblies? Demand is stirring, rising and becoming more important.
Mr. Dominic Grieve: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Mitchell: No, I shall not give way for now.
The position taken by the two Opposition parties is extraordinary. I should have thought that the Liberals wanted devolution all round, but they are quibbling about a minute step towards that. I know that the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler) does not want devolution. He wants home rule for Cornwall—an even smaller unit. Just as the Liberals reacted to the problems of home rule in Ireland by calling for home rule all round, so they should logically react to devolution to Scotland and Wales by calling for devolution all round.
Mr. Tyler: Does the hon. Gentleman understand that home rule means rule at home, not here in the House of Commons? Devolution means delegation of responsibilities to the people who will be affected by those decisions.
Mr. Mitchell: Does the Liberal party not want that? Does it not want regional devolution? Why is it quibbling about this small step on the way?
I intend to turn now to the Conservatives, so let us hear something of their views.
Mr. Grieve: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. Is he aware that a poll taken throughout the United Kingdom for The Scotsman less than three weeks ago, which particularly addressed the question of devolution in the regions, showed that there had been a marked decline—10 percentage points—in support for regional devolution within England since the last general election? How does that square with his statement that there is massive demand in the regions?
Mr. Mitchell: The demand is emerging in the three northernmost regions: true north—the real Britain, in my view. The hon. Gentleman should study the poll in The Economist in March last year, which showed a demand for regional government in all those regions. He should also examine the surveys carried out for the Kilbrandon commission in the late 1960s and early 1970s, which showed a stronger degree of regional feeling, a stronger sense of deprivation, a stronger feeling of isolation from London and a feeling that there was a lack of concern in London about their issues in the three northern regions than in Scotland.
Mr. Grieve: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Mitchell: Once is enough.
The Conservatives' position on devolution is confused. They argued against it in the case of Scotland, then they accepted it. They are engaging in the same process of arguing against advances. That is conservatism as defined by Woodrow Wilson—do nothing and ask your grandmother.
Mr. Grieve: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way. The reason for accepting devolution in Scotland is that we accept that that is what the Scottish electorate wanted. The problem that the hon. Gentleman must face when he deals with regions such as the north-east is that devolution may be desired by some
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people in certain parts of those regions, but, 20 miles outside a town like Newcastle, the prospect of being governed from Newcastle and dominated by the urban centre is completely rejected.
Mr. Mitchell: The hon. Gentleman is merely quibbling. There are differences in Scotland about where the country should be governed from. There are some who do not like government from Edinburgh. Every region must have a centre—a focal point—and it is easy enough to define one in most of the regions of this country. I am referring particularly to the three northern regions, where regional feeling is strongest.
The Tory party opposes devolution and then accepts it, just as it will eventually accept regional devolution in England. The party is staggering around for a response to devolution to Scotland. One response proposed by a substantial body of Conservatives is that there should be a Parliament for England. It is a fairly asinine idea, so it is not surprising that it comes from the Opposition, but that would effectively be like an elephant in a cuckoo's nest.
What we want is regional devolution, with elected regional assemblies and regional government in those areas that want it. It is possible to move towards devolution as Spain has done, on the basis of variable geometry, with regions taking the powers that they want to establish those regions and governing themselves in their own way.
The three regions of the north would almost certainly want devolution and the maximum powers. My view is that what Scotland has, we want in Yorkshire and Humberside and in the other two northern regions. It is only fair that we should have it. We are in a competitive situation. Life is increasingly lived on a regional basis. Those regions have severe economic problems. By any measurement of the strength of the regional economies, whether in terms of unemployment, average wages or gross domestic product per capita, the three regions are behind the rest of the country.
There was an interesting survey in the Financial Times yesterday about our competitive disadvantage. In the knowledge-based sector, all three regions lagged behind the rest of the country and Scotland, which has the power to handle its affairs. When such deficiencies exist, it is important to mobilise the synergy of democratic involvement to fight them.
Mr. Richard Shepherd: How does the motion grant the Regional Committee the means to resolve the problems to which the hon. Gentleman refers? The hon. Gentleman's comments are off the subject; they are about other matters. It would be helpful if he tackled the motion.
Mr. Mitchell: I hate to disagree with the hon. Gentleman, but the issues that I have raised could and should be discussed in the Regional Committee established on the basis of the motion. Why are Yorkshire and Humberside and the whole northern region disadvantaged? That is a prime subject for discussion.

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What can be done about it? I want to go further than the motion—I want elected regional assemblies. The motion is a step on the way.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: Like the Scottish Grand Committee.
Mr. Mitchell: Yes. Why should the English regions not have a similar Committee? I support any step along the way, and I am in favour of the ultimate solution of devolved regions with elected regional assemblies.
I do not want to prolong my remarks, or make an angry speech. However, it is incredible that the Opposition are so intent on looking a gift horse in the mouth. The motion establishes an important forum in which we can discuss issues that are important in the regions. We do not currently do that. We can hold Ministers to account by means of that forum, and impress on them the importance of regional issues. Let us accept it with gibbering gratitude.
12.22 am
Mr. Richard Shepherd: Long before Standing Orders or the United Kingdom existed, there was a Parliament for England, which was sited on this spot. The hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Mitchell) pushes that point aside. The Parliament was a body corporate; anything that happened in the north-east, the north-west, the south-east or the west midlands affected us all. The House and taxation are the means whereby funds are sent and transferred to tackle grievances and anxieties. When the hon. Gentleman fights for money for Grimsby, I have an interest because it may be at the expense or to the disadvantage of my area. Money for Grimsby may also benefit my area if it opens up shipping lanes and so on.
We are considering what happens in this ancient Chamber; we are considering this England. Everything that happens here touches every hon. Member who represents England. When we became a United Kingdom, the body corporate reached out. That means that what harms another area harms me. Parliament should therefore act as judge and arbitrator; that was the theory.
The constitution has been broken down in the past three years. A motion has been tabled in the name of the Leader of the House—it proposes a new Standing Order. Standing Orders form the constitution of the House. It may seem a trite observation that is easy to dismiss, but we regulate our business through Standing Orders. They are determined not by general elections, but by Parliament as a body. To make our system work and to understand why it works, we seek agreement. When we have profoundly different beliefs and views about the conduct of the world outside, the way in which we treat each other is governed through Standing Orders. The conventions of the House are administered accordingly and Standing Orders are developed.
The motion is different—there is no attempt to tackle anxieties. I felt sorry for the Leader of the House because she has never appeared so nervous. She has never been so badly informed. She did not know the meaning of paragraph (9) and was unable to refer in detail to the purpose of the Committee or what is behind it. Is it a new substitute for regional government? Of course it cannot be within the terms of the Standing Order, as the hon.
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Member for Great Grimsby so ably showed with his interpretation of where he wants it to go. However, we are dealing not with where he wants it to go, but with the matter before us. That will bind the conduct of the House.
On devolution, how does one meet the imbalance with Scotland? Everything that the Government have done has been tentative. There have been advances here and reverses there, but the truth is that this is the Parliament of England as well as of the United Kingdom and every English Member sits in it. There is no need to divide ourselves on the issue; we can sit and talk here. I have heard a lot of guff about callings to account. We know what determines the business of the House and of the country—a majority vote. That is why one is always sensitive about Standing Orders. However, I cannot remember such a near total abrogation of due process.
There has been no consultation, as was pointed out by the Procedure Committee. [Interruption.] The Parliamentary Secretary, Privy Council Office, huffs, but he is brand new in the House, having served for no more than three years. [Interruption.] I understand that he has in fact served for seven; forgive me. We are continuing the debate about how we do our business and the proposal has been plonked on us. We are being told that a majority will operate tonight on a three-line Whip—[Interruption.] Oh, it is a two-line Whip. Now we have it.
Mrs. Beckett: The hon. Gentleman says that the proposal has been plonked before the House without consultation. I first put a proposal before the Modernisation Committee almost a year ago.
Mr. Evans: It was rejected.
Mrs. Beckett: The Modernisation Committee, of which the hon. Gentleman is not a member, did not reject the proposal. It became clear that a consensus was unlikely. I respected that and withdrew the proposal from that forum, recognising that that was not the right way to proceed. However, I made it plain to the Committee that the Government reserved the right to bring it back before the House for judgment in the proper way. In that sense, those words have been before the House for anyone to comment on and for any observations to be made for about a year. It is not right for the hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd) to say that there has been no consultation and that the proposal has been introduced out of the blue.
Mr. Shepherd: I am saying that we saw no detail in the Modernisation Committee, as the right hon. Lady well knows. We never had a proposed Standing Order before us. We were told about a concept, along the lines of that raised by the hon. Member for Great Grimsby, which was our fear. For the first time, we are confronted with a peripatetic House that presumably may journey to any part of England. [Interruption.] That is what it says in the Standing Order. What will that do? We were elected to sit and argue in Parliament—[Interruption.]
Mr. Stephen O'Brien: Read it!
Mr. Shepherd: Labour Members have not bothered to read the Standing Order. The hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) has manifestly failed to do so.

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There has been much discussion of regional development agencies and chambers of commerce, but the proposal is not a substitute for the West Lothian question, the Scottish question or the English question. Nor is it about Parliament; it deals with the management of how English Members discuss the business of England. The membership of the Committee will be based on membership of the United Kingdom Parliament rather than of an English Parliament. We know what happened in the past and we should not forget it. A Committee was set up in the 1970s to try to perform that function and I understand that a couple of votes were lost there. It was never heard of again because Labour had an uncertain majority, which may be the case after the next election. The proposal amounts to a temporary expedient to provide today's answer to the West Lothian question, but it is not a substantial answer.
That returns us to the fact that the proposal has been imposed by the Leader of the House. Being Leader of the House means more than just being a member of the Labour Cabinet, or of the Cabinet of the governing party; it means reaching out beyond the interests of the Government. As all Members who have been here for any time know, the right hon. Lady represents the House. That is slightly different from being a Labour partisan—or, as I should say in deference to the right hon. Lady, a new Labour Cabinet Minister. In a sense, she represents us all.
I am grateful to the right hon. Lady when she interrupts to explain things better, because we need such explanations; but she is now taking all the wider dimensions represented by all sides back to the Cabinet table. She makes representations on our behalf, but she is not doing so on this occasion; she is saying that she must bring the matter back to the House and that she must be the engine for the mobilisation of what we are now told is a two-line Whip. [Interruption.] I have just been informed across the Floor that it is a two-line Whip. Previously, I was happy to accept that it was a three-line Whip.
In any event, on a Whip, the Government with the largest majority for a very long time—the largest majority for a century, I believe—are forcing through a measure that is not necessary in terms of the business of the House. It should be rejected on that basis alone. Moreover, it does not meet the criteria specified by the three Labour speakers for it to provide a substitute for regional government.
The population of the west midlands is 5.1 million, that of Scotland is 4.9 million, and we have skewed our constitution in a way that forces us to determine that the great bulk of the money comes from England. The transfer payments are made, yet there can be no proper discussion on the basis of the old body corporate—where what affects you affects me—and the Treasury must make the balancing judgment about the needs of us all, as a body corporate—as an England united, or, formerly, a United Kingdom united.
I believe that the proposal should be rejected until there has been better consideration of the issues.
12.32 am
Mr. Derek Foster: In most ways I am exceedingly glad to follow the hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd), for whom I have
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immense respect. I am sad not to be able to agree with him tonight. In fact, I felt that in his peroration he was advancing the strongest possible argument for setting up the Committee—and that is just the kind of issue that I would like to discuss in the Committee itself.
I wholly welcome the initiative of my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, in the sense that I welcome the fact that a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. This is only a small step for Parliament. I am reminded of an observation by one of the great managing directors of General Motors, who said, "If the pace of change outside the organisation exceeds the pace of change inside it, the end is nigh." As I listened to the debate tonight, I reflected on how difficult it is to change anything in this place. How many words have been wasted on what is really a very small step indeed?
Of course we can quibble about whether the Committee has the right powers, and whether it has been set up in the right way. The hon. Member for Aldridge-Brownhills said that the objective of all of us was to proceed by consensus, and of course it is; but if there is no consensus, can we not proceed at all? Is it not possible for us to change anything without a full consensus?
I applaud my right hon. Friend for taking this initiative. I am among those who, for the last 15 years or so, have pleaded for it, often through the usual channels. We talk of "all mouth and no delivery"; I spent 10 years being all delivery and no mouth. But when I was Opposition Chief Whip, we as a shadow Cabinet pressed the Government to set up this Committee again, although we made no progress whatever. We asked for that because, as English Members, we felt that there were not enough ways in which we could advance the argument for our regions.
I want regional government. I am a committed devolver and decentraliser, despite the problems that my party is having with Scotland, Wales and London. That has not diminished my enthusiasm for devolving and decentralising. I see the proposal as a small step on the road to regional government.
Power has gone to regions. Whether Opposition Members recognise it or not, Government offices and regional development agencies are spending huge amounts of money. Those powerful civil servants and appointees are not accountable to anyone in the regions. That is what the clamour is for.
Mr. Grieve: Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Foster: Just a moment.
The hon. Member for Cheadle (Mr. Day) said that there was no demand for regional government. Oddly enough, in the north-east the chamber of commerce and the CBI are clamouring for regional government because they see the need to control both the government of the north-east and the regional development agency.
I do not want to prolong the debate. I would have preferred not to speak, except that I wanted to welcome the Leader of the House's initiative. We will press for the Committee to grow organically. We want it to have more powers. I should like the Chairman to have the power to determine a private notice question, which can come from an individual Member. I do not like the idea of Ministers wholly determining the agenda and the procedures, but I welcome the proposal. We can make it work, make it grow and make it into a positive idea.
12.37 am
Mr. Tim Loughton: It has been an interesting, but extraordinary debate, which we should not have had at this time of the night. It is interesting that it has been sidelined to this late hour.
Conservative Members have touched on the nature of what England is about. Last week, the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, Central (Mr. Cousins) suspected that the change in timing reflected the fact that regionalism was not a priority for the Government. Why have we not held the debate in prime time, or is it the latest chapter in the sorry tale of the Deputy Prime Minister's flagship regional policy?
The Deputy Prime Minister's regional policy was only recently panned in a report from the Cabinet Office performance and innovation unit. It said that a
proliferation of initiatives by individual Whitehall departments had created a "very substantial bureaucratic burden for those on the ground…Too much time is spent negotiating the system rather than delivering."
That resulted in the parachuting in of Lord Falconer to take the reins from the Deputy Prime Minister under the guise of regional co-ordination units.
Regionalism has led to much criticism among regional development agencies themselves. Then there has been a distinct cooling-off of the Government's commitment to regional assemblies. Now, as has been shown tonight, the situation is completely confused by the proposal to set up yet another Committee. It is a classic example of, "If in doubt, set up a Committee." It attempts to paper over the severe cracks in regional policy and the Government's back tracking fast from regional government assemblies—much to the annoyance of many regionalophile Labour Members—by offering them an inadequate sop in the form of yet another talking-shop committee.
The proposal is little short of a panic, knee-jerk, rearguard action to try to address the substantial imbalance inflicted on the way in which we govern the UK and hold our institutions accountable after devolution to Scotland and Wales, which has created a Frankenstein of fragmenting nationalism, as always leaving England short changed, having paid most of the bills. On that, the proposal again patently fails. It is, regardless, not proposed that the Committee should deal with real legislation.
Is it not odd that the Leader of the House has today proposed establishing the Committee, although the proposal did not come from the Modernisation Committee or the Procedure Committee and was not a manifesto commitment?
The right hon. Lady gave a pitiful performance, leaving us completely confused about what the Committee should do. She failed dismally to deal with the concerns expressed by the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) on the Committee's interaction with the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee. She failed to tell us what the Committee would actually do. In answer to the question of my hon. Friend the Member for North Wiltshire (Mr. Gray) on the Committee's provenance, she said that the matter had been "aired" in the Modernisation Committee. If it has been aired in the Modernisation Committee, it left that Committee in a very damp condition.
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The right hon. Lady has yet again made excuses for the Government's sidelining of the convention to make ministerial statements in this Chamber. She had no idea at all of the effect of paragraph (9) of the proposed standing order on ministerial statements.
The proposal is a rather desperate measure that has come out of the blue. It is a desperate throw back—back 22 years, to be precise—to a Committee that last sat in 1978. As my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir G. Young) said, time has moved on, and that Committee has been replaced by the Select Committee system. In that system, hon. Members are able to call for witnesses and evidence on any manner of subject that could even loosely be said to be relevant to the regions.
The Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee itself has discussed numerous subjects, ranging from town and country parks, regional development agencies, housing and planning, the integrated transport White Paper and the future of United Kingdom shipping, to name only a few. All those matters have been dealt with by that Select Committee using the current Committee structure.
We understand that the regional Standing Committee would expect to draw on the experience of Select Committee members, such as those on the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee. Will the regional Committee rank over that Select Committee? Will it make Select Committees redundant?
The Committee's structure is wrong. It fails singularly to address the issue of the English deficit. It is supposed to be a Standing Committee on English regional affairs, yet its composition of 13 members is to reflect the composition of the whole House, to include Scottish, Welsh and Ulster Members. Surely that will only compound the unfairness by which English Members are now excluded from speaking and voting on many policy and expenditure matters north and west of the borders, whereas Scottish and Welsh Members have lost no power to speak and vote on matters affecting exclusively England. The Committee will simply further institutionalise that injustice.
As my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire said, the Committee is 22 years out of date also because of the innovation of the Westminster Hall experiment—about which we have heard so much today. Westminster Hall enables all hon. Members not only to raise issues affecting their particular region, all the regions or no region, but to have a Minister attend and reply to the debate on those issues. Regardless of whether we believe that the experiment is working, that is supposed to be the principle behind it.
In the past month, I myself have participated in three debates in Westminster Hall—on housing in London, the economy of the east midlands and the effect on regeneration of banking closures in Norfolk. Interestingly, all those debates were replied to by DETR Ministers.
Is not the proposal a threat to the Westminster Hall system, and does it not present a prospect of serious overlap? We shall have yet more talk, but yet less delivery.
Mr. Campbell-Savours: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Loughton: I shall not give way, if the hon. Gentleman does not mind.

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The motion includes a procedure for matters to be put by a Minister before the House for approval, but it does not include a formal mechanism for the Committee to contribute to that process. It is not clear in the motion whether the Committee should have an informal input into that process, or whether such matters will be decided through the usual channels. As my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow) pointed out, the proposals limit Ministers' talking or scrutiny time to just one hour. It took the Leader of the House over an hour to work out what the clause meant. Under the terms of the clause, she would have been out of time.
Mrs. Beckett: If the hon. Gentleman looks at the Standing Order, he will see that it has a number of sections. The hon. Member for Buckingham hoped to catch me out on the terms of paragraph (9). He did so—I freely concede it. There is no need for the hon. Gentleman to make such a meal of it. I am perfectly aware of what the Standing Order means.
Mr. Loughton: We may have touched a raw nerve, but it did not take an hour and a quarter to remember. It was easy to look at the Order Paper and refer to the top of page 1436 to see what it meant. The matter is not clear, because the whole ethos and purpose of the Committee is wholly confused. It is confused in the Government's mind, and it is not clear to other hon. Members, who are being confronted with it out of the blue this evening.
The proposals for the Standing Committee pose more questions than they attempt to answer. I have asked how the Committee relates to the Select Committee structure, and whether it will usurp their role. How does the Committee relate to Westminster Hall? Is it an admission that the second Chamber has failed? We are not entirely sure what the Liberal Democrats are trying to achieve, but we have some sympathy with their second amendment, which would restrict Committee Members to English Members only. Surely we should support that.
Is this proposal a genuine attempt to attack the culture of cronyism that riddles regional development agencies and regional assemblies and the political affiliations of RDA board members? Will the Committee introduce new mechanisms of accountability for vetting appointments to those boards? Will the Committee vet the RDA annual reports? What will its role be in the relationships between the RDAs and the regional assemblies? Are these assemblies now a dead project? They were referred to by the Minister for Local Government and the Regions as purely a "diversion", but are they now dead? Perhaps the Leader of the House could tell us.
It is inevitable that if the Committee is to work under those structures, it will take considerable powers away from the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions. Has anyone told the right hon. Gentleman? Did anyone mention it to him before he went off to Japan?
Will the Committee have any influence on the way in which RDA money is spent? Which regions should get the biggest hand-outs from central Government? Will the Committee further blur the lines of democratic accountability? Will the Committee promote the artificial
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regional identity that we have seen? Is the Committee simply a further mechanism for softening up an England of the regions, fit for a European federation of the regions?
What will the Committee do to help repair the yawning north-south divide—revealed yet again by today's report by the International Chamber of Commerce—where London and the south-east are performing well, on a par with the most dynamic economies in the world, but where Wales, the north-east of England, Yorkshire and the Humber area are no more competitive than Hungary or Chile?
The Standing Committee on Regional Affairs is a bad resurrection. A Government who are always crowing about modernisation are now desperately harking back 22 years to cobble together a feeble remedy to problems that are of their own making. The proposal does nothing to restrain the Frankenstein of devolution that has been created in Scotland and Wales, and it does nothing to address the English imbalance. It adds insult to injury by diluting English influence on the English regions when we have diminishing influence on Scottish and Welsh affairs. The proposal does nothing to add accountability or coherence to the Government's creation of artificial regional structures.
Above all, the proposal is yet another insult to the integrity of this House of Commons and to this Chamber, where all Members have equal rights to voice their concerns for their constituencies, their regions, all the regions or the whole United Kingdom—an interesting concept about which we hear little from the Government today.
The proposal is an anachronism; another new Labour invertebrate that talks much and delivers little. It dilutes ministerial accountability yet further. It is a throwback that should be thrown back. It is a thoroughly bad idea, and we shall be voting against it.
12.50 am
The Parliamentary Secretary, Privy Council Office (Mr. Paddy Tipping): At the least, we have had a lively, interesting and stimulating debate. A range of views have been expressed, with no consensus apparent. We have had an opportunity to discuss at great length an issue that has concerned many of my hon. Friends for many years. If the enthusiasm, activity and tension that have been evident in the Chamber tonight go forward to the new regional Committee—if the House agrees—it will be a good Committee to serve on.
Hon. Members will be only too well aware of the recent pressures on parliamentary time on the Floor of the House, and the effect this pressure has had on our working hours. In the present Session we have sat
on numerous occasions
after 10.30 pm. A number of factors have contributed to this. The major one is that the Government have a very large legislative programme.—[Official Report, 9 June 1975; Vol. 893, c. 165.]
[HON. MEMBERS: "Whose fault is that?"] The House might be amused to hear that those words are quoted from the debate in June 1975. Nothing has changed since then. As was said back in 1975 and again in the House tonight, our proposals are very modest. They are the single step that my right hon. Friend the Member for Bishop Auckland (Mr. Foster) talked about.
We want to revive Standing Order No. 117. Perhaps in the longer term that small step can be a move forward to develop and deliver our policies on the regions.

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[HON. MEMBERS: "Never."] Conservative Members shout "Never." They have demanded an opportunity to hold Ministers to account, but they do not want to do so in Westminster Hall; they want to do so here on the Floor of the House, as the hon. Members for Cheadle (Mr. Day) and for Aldridge-Brownhills (Mr. Shepherd) have said. The Conservatives have learned nothing from their period in opposition. They know that that is not possible.
We are keen to take forward our legislative proposals and to give hon. Members opportunities to raise issues for debate in Westminster Hall, in the Select Committees and now in the new Regional Affairs Committee, but Conservative Members do not want those opportunities. They complain, but they have no real solutions. There has been a lot of whingeing and a lot of talk about how they want to represent their people and their neighbourhoods, but the Conservatives are interested in doing that only on the Floor of the House.
The shadow Leader of the House points his finger, but he well knows that time is at a premium. With this small step, we are trying to give hon. Members an opportunity to raise issues that affect people in their communities. That is an idea that rings bells with some of my hon. Friends. My hon. Friend the Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) talked about the importance of the European Scrutiny Committee and how it can be used to scrutinise Ministers. My hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish (Mr. Bennett), who is the distinguished Chairman of the Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs, clearly told the House that there was no conflict of interest. My hon. Friend the Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Mitchell) spoke movingly about the focus on regional affairs and the need to do more and to respond to the voices from the north.
There have been some genuine, principled objections to our proposals and some objections of a more practical nature. The hon. Member for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler) and his colleagues support the principle of the move forward in general terms, but they do not think that it goes far enough. They want a great deal more to be done. Their two amendments are practical suggestions that would make minor modifications.
Dr. Ladyman: Since my hon. Friend is dealing with practical concerns, can he assure me that he will use his influence to try to ensure that the core membership of the Committee is fairly distributed geographically across England? Some of us who represent deprived areas in the south-east wish to ensure that the voice of the south-east is clearly heard on the Committee.
Mr. Tipping: Much has been made of the Standing Orders tonight and my hon. Friend will see that paragraph (2) of the proposed Standing Order requires the Committee of Selection to take those points into account.
The point at issue with the Liberal Democrats is that they would like a larger core membership of 24, but there is not much difference between us. A smaller core membership of 13 would be efficient, and a larger Committee would lead to problems. The hon. Member for North Cornwall also mentioned amendment (b), but the Liberal Democrats' proposal would lead to a possible reduction in the number
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of members that they would have on the Committee. It appears not to matter to them, but I am keen that other voices are heard in the regional Committee.
Mr. Evans: If Scots, Welsh and Northern Ireland Members are not allowed to sit and speak on that Committee, surely its political make-up should reflect the political make-up of the English Members, not the entire House of Commons. That is only logical.
Mr. Tipping: The hon. Gentleman should have listened to the hon. Member for New Forest, West (Mr. Swayne), who has some eccentric opinions but pointed out that one of his eccentricities was that he sat on the Scottish Grand Committee, as an English MP.
The Liberal Democrats will know, because they study such matters closely, that the Standing Orders of the House are constantly reviewed. The difference between us is not great and we will come back and review the issue. It may even be, in the course of time, that we will move towards the Liberal Democrats' position, if the present system does not work.
The right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir G. Young) argued out of principle that we should not proceed with our proposals. He raised the English question and argued that our proposals did not solve the devolution deficit. I say bluntly that they are not designed to do so. Our small, modest proposals would give Back Benchers the opportunity to raise regional issues—real issues that affect their people and communities. Other Members mentioned an English Parliament, but he mentioned a special procedure whereby only English Members could discuss and vote on English matters. I have studied the matter carefully, but I cannot find one issue on which that situation would arise. It may arise in time as devolution develops, and we may have to revisit the issue.
Mr. Nicholas Winterton: If the Minister is fair to my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir G. Young), he will agree that the matter has been considered in depth by the Procedure Committee and recommendations were made in its report, which was debated in the autumn. The matter is serious and the Committee, which has a majority of Labour Members, felt that the current system was wrong and that we should move towards the proposition that my right hon. Friend advocated.
Mr. Tipping: The hon. Member makes a serious point. He raised it earlier in the debate and my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House replied seriously to him. I repeat, if he can define and identify particular English issues, we would be interested in taking the discussion further. However, my right hon. Friend said that we might have to return to the matter. I strongly believe that devolution will affect how the House approaches its business. We need to be able to adapt and change. That is the British way, the parliamentary way: we have evolved and developed.
This is a small step forward. It is a chance to discuss real and important issues affecting our families, regions, people and neighbourhoods. I am astonished that the Opposition do not see the opportunities that the Committee will give them.
I conclude by noting that, regardless of what the Government do or propose in the way of putting Ministers on the line for questioning, the Opposition whinge. They ignore our offers and, perhaps most importantly, they bungle the chances that we give them.

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I hope that my hon. Friends will back the Government tonight and support the way forward for all the regions of England.
Mr. Tyler: I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Amendment proposed: (b), in paragraph (2)(a), leave out "composition of the House" and insert—
"party representation of Members of the House sitting for English constituencies"—[Mr. Tyler.]
The House divided: Ayes 130, Noes 190.

Division No. 161]

[1.2 am

AYES

Amess, David

Harris, Dr Evan

Arbuthnot, Rt Hon James

Harvey, Nick

Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

Heald, Oliver

Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)

Heath, David (Somerton & Frome)

Baldly, Tony

Heathcoat-Amory, Rt Hon David

Ballard, Jackie

Horam, John

Beith, Rt Hon A J

Howard, Rt Hon Michael

Bercow, John

Howarth, Gerald (Aldershot)

Beresford, Sir Paul

Hughes, Simon (Southwark N)

Boswell, Tim

Jack, Rt Hon Michael

Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

Jackson, Robert (Wantage)

Bottomley, Rt Hon Mrs Virginia

Jenkin, Bernard

Brazier, Julian

Key, Robert

Breed, Colin

King, Rt Hon Tom (Bridgwater)

Brooke, Rt Hon Peter

Kirkwood, Archy

Browning, Mrs Angela

Laing, Mrs Eleanor

Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)

Lait, Mrs Jacqui

Burstow, Paul

Leigh, Edward

Butterfill, John

Letwin, Oliver

Campbell, Rt Hon Menzies (NE Fife)

Lewis, Dr Julian (New Forest E)

Lloyd, Rt Hon Sir Peter (Fareham)

Cash, William

Loughton, Tim

Chapman, Sir Sydney (Chipping Barnet)

Luff, Peter

MacGregor, Rt Hon John

Clappison, James

McIntosh, Miss Anne

Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey

Maclean, Rt Hon David

Collins, Tim

McLoughlin, Patrick

Cran, James

Madel, Sir David

Curry, Rt Hon David

Moore, Michael

Davey, Edward (Kingston)

Moss, Malcolm

Davies, Quentin (Grantham)

Nicholls, Patrick

Davis, Rt Hon David (Haltemprice)

Norman, Archie

Day, Stephen

O'Brien, Stephen (Eddisbury)

Duncan, Alan

Page, Richard

Duncan Smith, Iain

Paice, James

Evans, Nigel

Paterson, Owen

Faber, David

Pickles, Eric

Fabricant, Michael

Portillo, Rt Hon Michael

Fearn, Ronnie

Prior, David

Flight, Howard

Randall, John

Forth, Rt Hon Eric

Redwood, Rt Hon John

Fox, Dr Liam

Robathan, Andrew

Fraser, Christopher

Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)

Gale, Roger

Ruffley, David

Garnier, Edward

Russell, Bob (Colchester)

George, Andrew (St Ives)

Sanders, Adrian

Gibb, Nick

Sayeed, Jonathan

Gorman, Mrs Teresa

Shepherd, Richard

Gray, James

Simpson, Keith (Mid-Norfolk)

Green, Damian

Smith, Sir Robert (W Ab'd'ns)

Greenway, John

Spelman, Mrs Caroline

Grieve, Dominic

Spicer, Sir Michael

Gummer, Rt Hon John

Spring, Richard

Hammond, Philip

Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John

Hancock, Mike

Steen, Anthony

334

Stunell, Andrew

Walter, Robert

Swayne, Desmond

Waterson, Nigel

Syms, Robert

Whitney, Sir Raymond

Tapsell, Sir Peter

Whittingdale, John

Taylor, Ian (Esher & Walton)

Wilkinson, John

Taylor, John M (Solihull)

Wilshire, David

Taylor, Matthew (Truro)

Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)

Tonge, Dr Jenny

Winterton, Nicholas (Macclesfield)

Townend, John

Young, Rt Hon Sir George

Tredinnick, David

Trend, Michael

Tellers for the Ayes:

Tyler, Paul

Mr. Tom Brake and

Tyrie, Andrew

Mr. Don Foster.

NOES

Abbott, Ms Diane

Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)

Ellman, Mrs Louise

Allen, Graham

Ennis, Jeff

Anderson, Janet (Rossendale)

Etherington, Bill

Armstrong, Rt Hon Ms Hilary

Field, Rt Hon Frank

Atkins, Charlotte

Fisher, Mark

Banks, Tony

Flint, Caroline

Barnes, Harry

Foster, Rt Hon Derek

Beckett, Rt Hon Mrs Margaret

Foulkes, George

Benn, Hilary (Leeds C)

Fyfe, Maria

Benn, Rt Hon Tony (Chesterfield)

Gardiner, Barry

Bennett, Andrew F

Gibson, Dr Ian

Benton, Joe

Gilroy, Mrs Linda

Betts, Clive

Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

Blackman, Liz

Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

Blears, Ms Hazel

Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

Borrow, David

Hall, Patrick (Bedford)

Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

Hanson, David

Bradshaw, Ben

Heal, Mrs Sylvia

Brown, Russell (Dumfries)

Healey, John

Browne, Desmond

Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

Burden, Richard

Hepburn, Stephen

Burgon, Colin

Heppell, John

Butler, Mrs Christine

Hill, Keith

Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

Hood, Jimmy

Campbell-Savours, Dale

Hope, Phil

Cann, Jamie

Hoyle, Lindsay

Caplin, Ivor

Hughes, Ms Beverley (Stretford)

Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

Chisholm, Malcolm

Humble, Mrs Joan

Clapham, Michael

Hurst, Alan

Clark, Dr Lynda (Edinburgh Pentlands)

Iddon, Dr Brian

Illsley, Eric

Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

Jackson, Helen (Hillsborough)

Clarke, Charles (Norwich S)

Jamieson, David

Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

Jenkins, Brian

Clelland, David

Johnson, Miss Melanie (Welwyn Hatfield)

Coaker, Vernon

Coffey, Ms Ann

Jones, Ms Jenny (Wolverh'ton SW)

Colman, Tony

Connarty, Michael

Jones, Dr Lynne (Selly Oak)

Cousins, Jim

Keeble, Ms Sally

Cox, Tom

Kemp, Fraser

Crausby, David

Khabra, Piara S

Cryer, Mrs Ann (Keighley)

Kidney, David

Cunningham, Rt Hon Dr Jack (Copeland)

Kilfoyle, Peter

King, Andy (Rugby & Kenilworth)

Cunningham, Jim (Cov'try S)

Kumar, Dr Ashok

Dalyell, Tam

Ladyman, Dr Stephen

Darvill, Keith

Lepper, David

Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

Leslie, Christopher

Davidson, Ian

Levitt, Tom

Davies, Geraint (Croydon C)

Lewis, Ivan (Bury S)

Davis, Rt Hon Terry (B'ham Hodge H)

Liddell, Rt Hon Mrs Helen

Lloyd, Tony (Manchester C)

Dean, Mrs Janet

Lock, David

Denham, John

Love, Andrew

Dismore, Andrew

McAllion, John

Dobbin, Jim

McAvoy, Thomas

Donohoe, Brian H

McCabe, Steve

Eagle, Angela (Wallasey)

McDonnell, John

335

McFall, John

Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

McGuire, Mrs Anne

Savidge, Malcolm

McKenna, Mrs Rosemary

Sawford, Phil

Mackinlay, Andrew

Shipley, Ms Debra

McNamara, Kevin

Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

McNulty, Tony

Skinner, Dennis

MacShane, Denis

Smith, Rt Hon Andrew (Oxford E)

Mactaggart, Fiona

Smith, Angela (Basildon)

McWalter, Tony

Smith, Miss Geraldine (Morecambe & Lunesdale)

Mallaber, Judy

Marshall, David (Shettleston)

Smith, Jacqui (Redditch)

Marshall-Andrews, Robert

Spellar, John

Martlew, Eric

Squire, Ms Rachel

Maxton, John

Stevenson, George

Miller, Andrew

Stinchcombe, Paul

Mitchell, Austin

Stoate, Dr Howard

Moran, Ms Margaret

Stringer, Graham

Morris, Rt Hon Ms Estelle (B'ham Yardley)

Stuart, Ms Gisela

Sutcliffe, Gerry

Mountford, Kali

Taylor, Rt Hon Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)

Murphy, Rt Hon Paul (Torfaen)

Naysmith, Dr Doug

Taylor, David (NW Leics)

Norris, Dan

Temple-Morris, Peter

O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

Thomas, Gareth R (Harrow W)

Organ, Mrs Diana

Timms, Stephen

Osborne, Ms Sandra

Tipping, Paddy

Pendry, Tom

Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

Perham, Ms Linda

Twigg, Derek (Halton)

Pickthall, Colin

Vis, Dr Rudi

Pike, Peter L

Watts, David

Plaskitt, James

White, Brian

Pond, Chris

Whitehead, Dr Alan

Pope, Greg

Wicks, Malcolm

Pound, Stephen

Winterton, Ms Rosie (Doncaster C)

Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

Woodward, Shaun

Prosser, Gwyn

Wright, Dr Tony (Cannock)

Purchase, Ken

Rapson, Syd

Tellers for the Noes:

Reid, Rt Hon Dr John (Hamilton N)

Mr. Don Touhig and

Roche, Mrs Barbara

Mr. Jim Dowd.

Question accordingly negatived.
Main Question put:—
The House divided: Ayes 187, Noes 130.

Division No. 162]

[1.13 am

AYES

Abbott, Ms Diane

Campbell, Alan (Tynemouth)

Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)

Campbell-Savours, Dale

Allen, Graham

Cann, Jamie

Anderson, Janet (Rossendale)

Caplin, Ivor

Armstrong, Rt Hon Ms Hilary

Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

Atkins, Charlotte

Chisholm, Malcolm

Banks, Tony

Clapham, Michael

Barnes, Harry

Clark, Dr Lynda (Edinburgh Pentlands)

Beckett, Rt Hon Mrs Margaret

Benn, Hilary (Leeds C)

Clark, Paul (Gillingham)

Benn, Rt Hon Tony (Chesterfield)

Clarke, Charles (Norwich S)

Bennett, Andrew F

Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

Benton, Joe

Clelland, David

Betts, Clive

Coaker, Vernon

Blackman, Liz

Coffey, Ms Ann

Blears, Ms Hazel

Colman, Tony

Connarty, Michael

Borrow, David

Cousins, Jim

Bradley, Peter (The Wrekin)

Cox, Tom

Bradshaw, Ben

Crausby, David

Brown, Russell (Dumfries)

Cryer, Mrs Ann (Keighley)

Browne, Desmond

Dalyell, Tam

Burden, Richard

Darvill, Keith

Burgon, Colin

Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

Butler, Mrs Christine

Davidson, Ian

336

Davies, Geraint (Croydon C)

McNulty, Tony

Davis, Rt Hon Terry (B'ham Hodge H)

MacShane, Denis

Mactaggart, Fiona

Dean, Mrs Janet

McWalter, Tony

Denham, John

Mallaber, Judy

Dismore, Andrew

Marshall, David (Shettleston)

Dobbin, Jim

Marshall-Andrews, Robert

Donohoe, Brian H

Martlew, Eric

Eagle, Angela (Wallasey)

Maxton, John

Eagle, Maria (L'pool Garston)

Miller, Andrew

Ellman, Mrs Louise

Mitchell, Austin

Ennis, Jeff

Moran, Ms Margaret

Etherington, Bill

Morris, Rt Hon Ms Estelle (B'ham Yardley)

Field, Rt Hon Frank

Fisher, Mark

Mountford, Kali

Flint, Caroline

Murphy, Rt Hon Paul (Torfaen)

Foster, Rt Hon Derek

Naysmith, Dr Doug

Foulkes, George

Norris, Dan

Fyfe, Maria

O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

Gardiner, Barry

Organ, Mrs Diana

Gibson, Dr Ian

Osborne, Ms Sandra

Gilroy, Mrs Linda

Perham, Ms Linda

Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

Pickthall, Colin

Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

Pike, Peter L

Hall, Mike (Weaver Vale)

Plaskitt, James

Hall, Patrick (Bedford)

Pond, Chris

Hanson, David

Pope, Greg

Heal, Mrs Sylvia

Pound, Stephen

Healey, John

Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

Prosser, Gwyn

Hepburn, Stephen

Purchase, Ken

Heppell, John

Rapson, Syd

Hill Keith

Reid, Rt Hon Dr John (Hamilton N)

Hood, Jimmy

Roche, Mrs Barbara

Hope, Phil

Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

Hoyle, Lindsay

Savidge, Malcolm

Hughes, Ms Beverley (Stretford)

Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

Shipley, Ms Debra

Humble, Mrs Joan

Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

Hurst, Alan

Skinner, Dennis

Iddon, Dr Brian

Smith, Rt Hon Andrew (Oxford E)

Illsley, Eric

Smith, Angela (Basildon)

Jackson, Helen (Hillsborough)

Smith, Miss Geraldine (Morecambe & Lunesdale)

Jamieson, David

Jenkins, Brian

Smith, Jacqui (Redditch)

Johnson, Miss Melanie (Welwyn Hatfield)

Spellar, John

Jones, Ms Jenny (Wolverh'ton SW)

Squire, Ms Rachel

Stevenson, George

Jones, Dr Lynne (Selly Oak)

Stinchcombe, Paul

Keeble, Ms Sally

Stoate, Dr Howard

Kemp, Fraser

Stringer, Graham

Khabra, Piara S

Stuart, Ms Gisela

Kidney, David

Sutcliffe, Gerry

Kilfoyle, Peter

Taylor, Rt Hon Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)

King, Andy (Rugby & Kenilworth)

Kumar, Dr Ashok

Taylor, David (NW Leics)

Ladyman, Dr Stephen

Temple-Morris, Peter

Lepper, David

Thomas, Gareth R (Harrow W)

Leslie, Christopher

Timms, Stephen

Levitt, Tom

Tipping, Paddy

Lewis, Ivan (Bury S)

Turner, Dennis (Wolverh'ton SE)

Liddell, Rt Hon Mrs Helen

Twigg, Derek (Halton)

Lloyd, Tony (Manchester C)

Vis, Dr Rudi

Lock, David

Watts, David

Love, Andrew

White, Brian

McAllion, John

Whitehead, Dr Alan

McAvoy, Thomas

Wicks, Malcolm

McCabe, Steve

Winterton, Ms Rosie (Doncaster C)

McDonnell, John

Woodward, Shaun

McFall, John

Wright, Dr Tony (Cannock)

McGuire, Mrs Anne

McKenna, Mrs Rosemary

Tellers for the Ayes:

Mackinlay, Andrew

Mr. Don Touhig and

McNamara, Kevin

Mr. Jim Dowd.

337

NOES

Amess, David

Kirkwood, Archy

Arbuthnot, Rt Hon James

Laing, Mrs Eleanor

Atkinson, David (Bour'mth E)

Lait, Mrs Jacqui

Baldry, Tony

Leigh, Edward

Ballard, Jackie

Letwin, Oliver

Beith, Rt Hon A J

Lewis, Dr Julian (New Forest E)

Bercow, John

Lloyd, Rt Hon Sir Peter (Fareham)

Beresford, Sir Paul

Loughton, Tim

Boswell, Tim

Luff, Peter

Bottomley, Peter (Worthing W)

MacGregor, Rt Hon John

Bottomley, Rt Hon Mrs Virginia

McIntosh, Miss Anne

Brake, Tom

Maclean, Rt Hon David

Brazier, Julian

McLoughlin, Patrick

Breed, Colin

Madel, Sir David

Brooke, Rt Hon Peter

Moore, Michael

Browning, Mrs Angela

Moss, Malcolm

Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)

Nicholls, Patrick

Burstow, Paul

Norman, Archie

Butterfill, John

O'Brien, Stephen (Eddisbury)

Campbell, Rt Hon Menzies (NE Fife)

Page, Richard

Paice, James

Cash, William

Paterson, Owen

Chapman, Sir Sydney (Chipping Barnet)

Pickles, Eric

Portillo, Rt Hon Michael

Clappison, James

Prior, David

Collins, Tim

Randall, John

Cran, James

Redwood, Rt Hon John

Curry, Rt Hon David

Rendel, David

Davey, Edward (Kingston)

Robathan, Andrew

Davies, Quentin (Grantham)

Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)

Davis, Rt Hon David (Haltemprice)

Ruffley, David

Day, Stephen

Russell, Bob (Colchester)

Duncan, Alan

Sanders, Adrian

Duncan Smith, Iain

Sayeed, Jonathan

Evans, Nigel

Shepherd, Richard

Faber, David

Simpson, Keith (Mid-Norfolk)

Fabricant, Michael

Smith, Sir Robert (W Ab'd'ns)

Fearn, Ronnie

Spelman, Mrs Caroline

Flight, Howard

Spicer, Sir Michael

Forth, Rt Hon Eric

Spring, Richard

Foster, Don (Bath)

Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John

Fox, Dr Liam

Steen, Anthony

Fraser, Christopher

Stunell, Andrew

Gale, Roger

Swayne, Desmond

Garnier, Edward

Syms, Robert

Gibb, Nick

Tapsell, Sir Peter

Gorman, Mrs Teresa

Taylor, Ian (Esher & Walton)

Gray, James

Taylor, John M (Solihull)

Green, Damian

Taylor, Matthew (Truro)

Greenway, John

Tonge, Dr Jenny

Grieve, Dominic

Townend, John

Gummer, Rt Hon John

Tredinnick, David

Hammond, Philip

Trend, Michael

Hancock, Mike

Tyler, Paul

Harris, Dr Evan

Tyrie, Andrew

Harvey, Nick

Walter, Robert

Heald, Oliver

Waterson, Nigel

Heath, David (Somerton & Frome)

Whitney, Sir Raymond

Heathcoat-Amory, Rt Hon David

Whittingdale, John

Horam, John

Wilkinson, John

Howard, Rt Hon Michael

Wilshire, David

Howarth, Gerald (Aldershot)

Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)

Hughes, Simon (Southwark N)

Winterton, Nicholas (Macclesfield)

Jack, Rt Hon Michael

Young, Rt Hon Sir George

Jackson, Robert (Wantage)

Jenkin, Bernard

Tellers for the Noes:

Key, Robert

Mr. Peter Atkinson and

King, Rt Hon Tom (Bridgwater)

Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown.

Question accordingly agreed to.
Ordered,
That Standing Order No. 117 shall be repealed, and that the following Standing Order shall be made:
117.—(1) There shall be a standing committee called the Standing Committee on Regional Affairs, which shall consider any matter relating to regional affairs in England which may be referred to it.
(2) The Committee shall consist of thirteen Members representing English constituencies nominated by the Committee of Selection; and in nominating such Members, the Committee of Selection shall—

(a) have regard to the qualifications of the Members nominated and to the composition of the House; and

(b) have power to discharge Members from time to time, and to appoint others in substitution.

(3) Any Member of the House representing an English constituency, though not nominated to the Committee, may take part in its proceedings, but may not make any Motion, vote or be counted in the quorum; provided that a Minister of the Crown who is a Member of this House but not nominated to the Committee may make a Motion as specified in paragraph (10) below.
(4) The quorum of the Committee shall be three.
(5) Paragraph (1) of Standing Order No. 88 (Meetings of standing committees) shall not apply to the Committee; except that the proviso to that paragraph shall apply to any sitting at Westminster.
(6) A Motion may be made in the House by a Minister of the Crown to specify (or to vary) any or all of the following:

(a) the matter or matters to be referred to the Committee;

(b) the period to be allotted to proceedings on such matters;

(c) when and where (within England) the Committee shall meet;

(d) the hours for the commencement and conclusion of any sitting;

(e) any days when the Committee shall meet at Westminster at Ten o'clock;

and such Motion may be moved at any time; and the Question thereon shall be put forthwith and may be decided at any hour, though opposed.
(7) Where any order made under paragraph (6) above makes no provision for the period to be allotted to the proceedings on any matter or matters which have been referred to the Committee for consideration at a particular sitting, those proceedings shall be brought to a conclusion no later than three hours after their commencement.
(8) At the commencement of business at any sitting of the Committee, the Chairman may permit Ministers of the Crown, being Members of the House, to make statements on any matter or matters referred to the Committee for consideration at that sitting, and may then permit members of the Committee to ask questions thereon.
(9) No question on a statement by a Minister of the Crown shall be taken after the expiry of a period of one hour from the commencement of the first such statement, except that the Chairman may, at his discretion, allow such questions to be taken for a further period not exceeding half an hour.
(10) The Committee shall, following any such statements and questions, consider each matter referred to it on a motion 'That the Committee has considered the matter'; the Chairman shall put the Question necessary to dispose of the proceedings on each matter at the time, or after the period, specified in accordance with paragraph (6) or paragraph (7) of this Order, and the Committee shall thereupon report to the House that it has considered the matter or matters without any further Question being put.
(11) Any period allocated to the consideration of any matter or matters shall include any time spent on statements by Ministers of the Crown and questions thereon, except when otherwise provided by any Order of the House made in accordance with paragraph (6) above.

PETITION

  Rights of the Child
  1.23 am
  Dr. Ian Gibson: I am delighted to present a petition from young constituents in Norwich who have drawn attention to an issue that is important to the Government and to the whole of Norwich and Norfolk.
  The petition has been signed by 1,792 people and it states:
  To the House of Commons,
  The Petition of the people in Norwich,
  Declares that Her Majesty's Government has ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child and is therefore committed to children's rights and therefore has a responsibility to do all it can to help end the exploitation of child labour in overseas countries.
  It is amazing that young people have such commitment.
  The petition continues:
  The Petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons should urge the secretary of state for International Development that all aid to countries such as Indonesia, India, Mali or Pakistan where child labour is known to be an extensive problem should have a reasonable percentage of the aid linked to a programme of education for child labourers.
  And the Petitioners remain.
  I commend the petition to the House and I am proud to present it on behalf of constituents in Norwich.
  To lie upon the Table.

Schools (Poor Behaviour)
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Jamieson.]
1.25 am
Mr. Vernon Coaker: Although the hour is late and many people are going home to bed, this is an important Adjournment debate because it touches on one of the most important issues affecting our schools and the Government's attempts to raise educational achievement.
I should start by declaring an interest as a member of the National Union of Teachers. Before I address the main topic of the debate, I want to set the context because it is important to realise that we have a Government who are committed to the education of our children and determined to put more money into our schools to raise achievement and to introduce policies that will improve standards. In particular, we can see the success that the numeracy and literacy strategies have had over the past two and a half years. They have started to have an impact on the quality of education that primary school children are receiving.
I praise our teaching profession. It is important that the debate sends out the message that we recognise the tremendous work done by the vast majority of our teachers, often in difficult circumstances. It is important to recognise that Ministers often acknowledge that. They are often criticised for not praising teachers but, when they do so, it is not reported as widely as when they sometimes say that there are challenges to be met. The majority of members of our teaching profession are doing an extremely good job.
The important point at the heart of the Government's policies is that they are tackling the social exclusion in many of our communities. They are prepared to take on social exclusion, and not to duck the issue.
In their agenda of raising achievement, the Government face the challenge of the disaffection of a sizeable number of young people which is evident in our classrooms. All hon. Members will have heard examples of that from our constituents. Poor behaviour includes shouting out in class, kicking out, fights that teachers are expected to break up, vandalism, intimidation of staff, increasing numbers of attacks of staff and serious verbal abuse that constantly challenges and undermines teachers and the school's authority. There is a basic refusal to co-operate.
It is important to recognise the difficulties and stress experienced by teachers who are trying to teach a group of children but who do not have the basic standard of behaviour or the teaching environment that we would want them to have. Unfortunately, when schools try to get the support of parents in dealing with poor behaviour, a small number of parents not only refuse to support the school but join in the undermining of its authority.
Recently, we have seen evidence of that from the National Association of Head Teachers, which pointed out that increasing numbers of parents challenge what is happening in schools. It is important to acknowledge that parents have a right to know what is happening and to ask questions but, where children and young people are challenging the school's authority, some parents support that. That is a crucial issue, because if we cannot address the poor behaviour and social disaffection in our schools, we will not prevent the massive exodus of pupils from many of our cities.

341
In my own city, Nottingham, as hard as some of our schools work, people flood out of the city to the suburbs, where they believe that they will find a better education for their children. However, it is not only an inner-city problem: in other areas, people try to avoid problem schools.
To illustrate the scale of the problem, I shall quote from "Young People", the social exclusion report published last week by policy action team 12. Each year, one in 16 young people—almost 40,000—leave school without qualifications; of those, 80 per cent. were not entered for examinations. In England and Wales, more than 30,000 children in year 11 truant for days or weeks at a time; in England, about 60,000 truant at least once a week. There are 1,500 permanent exclusions from primary schools and 11,500 from secondary schools each year; and, at any one time, more than 150,000 young people are out of school on fixed-term exclusions.
There has been a 400 per cent. increase in permanent exclusions from primary schools since 1990–91, although the rate has been stable since 1995. There has been a 350 per cent. increase in permanent exclusions from secondary schools since 1990–91, although, in the past year or so, there has been a small drop. Those massive figures reveal the scale of the challenge facing us.
The previous Government's answer and the reason for the huge rise was that everything should be left to the market—the market would deal with it through the mechanism of parental choice. In fact, schools pushed out children who caused problems and we witnessed the creation of sink schools and a two-tier education system. This Government will not tolerate that and we will not allow sink schools. We want the best for all pupils in all areas.
We cannot simply tell schools to stop excluding pupils. We have to establish a framework to support schools and teachers as they try to deal with the problems. If we are to raise standards, teachers must be able to teach in an effective learning environment, and pupils must be able to learn. We cannot allow a small minority to deprive the majority in the classroom of their entitlement to an education. Parents understand the problems that some individual pupils have, but their view is that those problems must not be dealt with at the expense of the minority of pupils and in a way that undermines the authority of teachers.
Effective head teachers, good management and good-quality staff are key factors, but so are better training and implementation of sound policies to tackle the problems. If fresh start initiatives, city academies and our efforts to raise the achievement of all pupils in all schools in all areas are to succeed, we have to meet the challenge head on. In addition to improving teachers' training in dealing with difficult situations, we have to increase the number of learning support units in schools.
We should not underestimate the extent of the problem. There are problems with a small number of pupils not only in the inner cities, but in almost all our schools. If we are serious about raising standards right across the ability range, learning support units must be available to every school, whether they are provided in the school or whether schools have a collaborative arrangement. Every school in the country needs access to a learning support unit.
342
Pupils who are persistently disruptive or violent and who simply refuse to co-operate need a learning support unit off-site, not as a dumping ground—that was the policy of the Conservatives, who were prepared to throw difficult pupils out and were not worried where they went—but as a unit where an alternative curriculum can be offered and individual counselling can take place, with the aim of re-integrating those young people back into mainstream education. The objective should be their return to ordinary classrooms when they have learned to act in a way that is consistent with effective learning.
If we set up a system of learning support units across the country, that would make a real difference not only to the education of the young people concerned, but to the morale of the teaching profession, who would see the Government acting to support teachers in their schools.
There is an issue for society as well as for Government. One of the main problems in our schools and in society is that there has been an erosion of respect for what I call legitimate authority, whether that is represented by a police officer or a teacher. As a Government, we need to consider how we can restore legitimate authority to schools, head teachers and teachers, so that we get back the respect that many of us remember from our school days. Our parents often told us about the respect that the school teacher enjoyed in the community.
All parents want and demand decent education for their children. If we can start to restore authority to the teaching profession, we will have done a great service to the country. We must do that by working with parents and local authorities. We must lay down what is acceptable and hold to it, even when the rules and standards of behaviour in a school are challenged.
It is up to us as a Government to send out a clear message to our teachers and schools that, where they are sensibly implementing standards of behaviour and codes of conduct in a school which are designed to create an effective learning environment and to provide teachers and schools with the authority that they need, the Government will support them. We must reiterate that to teachers.
When I was a deputy head teacher and we had to enforce the uniform code, there were parents who asked why their children should wear a uniform to school and challenged our authority to impose a uniform. We must support schools in such circumstances. If a school has determined with parents that a school uniform and certain codes of behaviour are required, that should be respected by those who attend the school. If we do not enforce that, it will undermine the authority of the teacher and the school, and their efforts to create a learning environment.
The Government are concerned about rights for individuals, and also about responsibilities. They have an agenda to raise achievement, to put more resources into schools and to modernise the comprehensive principle. If we ensure that we create in all our schools—rural, inner city or suburban—the learning environment that is essential to achievement by all our pupils, we will raise achievement right across the spectrum of ability.
What a radical, hugely satisfying achievement that would be: city schools to which people flocked and to which, because they were beacons of excellence in their communities, they wanted to send their children. Education would play a part in regenerating communities that have been neglected for so long. We face that

343
challenge. To meet it, we must recognise that teachers in many of our schools face genuine difficulties in tackling the challenging behaviour of some young people. If we support teachers, we can raise standards together.
1.40 am
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education and Employment (Jacqui Smith): I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Gedling (Mr. Coaker) for his thoughtful speech. Despite the lateness of the hour, we always have higher quality debates when hon. Members bring the benefit of experience—as my hon. Friend does—to them, or when they represent their constituents' interests in the same hard-working, conscientious way as my hon. Friend.
We are determined to raise standards for all pupils. Children get only one chance at school, and they and their teachers have the right not to have that chance disrupted by other pupils' behaviour. I hope that the debate will send that clear message. I strongly endorse my hon. Friend's commendation of our teachers' excellent work, in sometimes difficult and challenging circumstances, with difficult children. I hope that our debate will also convey that clear message.
We have an overall strategy for tackling poor behaviour and preventing exclusion. It is backed up by generous amounts of funding. The key to avoiding disaffection and disruption is early intervention and prevention through multi-agency working and partnership with parents.
How are we helping to achieve that? The Government have provided nearly £500 million over three years through the "Social Inclusion: Pupil Support" grant for preventive work. Funding in 2000–01 will be £140 million—that is 110 per cent. higher than in 1999–2000. The requirement to devolve the grant to secondary schools in 2000–01 will offer schools throughout the country a better way of tackling developing problems at their root. My hon. Friend rightly suggested that that was important.
The money will be supported by the "Social Inclusion: Pupil Support" guidance, which was sent to schools and local education authorities last July. It is important to stress that the guidance is a joint publication between the Department of Health, the Home Office and the social exclusion unit. That emphasises, as my hon. Friend did, the need for a joined-up approach to poor behaviour in schools, and the realisation that such problems are often closely linked to wider problems in the home and in society. It is essential that different agencies, for example, social services departments and youth offending teams as well as local education authorities and schools, work together effectively to tackle the problems that affect a child.
Schools and teachers are not responsible for social exclusion, but they have to deal with its effects every day. That is why Government policy on crime reduction, community renewal and developing parental skills and responsibilities has a key role to play. My hon. Friend has contributed to that through his proposals on curfews.
Teachers need and deserve practical support. That is why the guidance includes case studies and examples of good practice in managing poor behaviour. It recommends a range of practical strategies that have been shown to work, including, as my hon. Friend pointed out, in-school learning support units for disruptive pupils, which have
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been funded by the "Social Inclusion: Pupil Support" grant. They provide separate, short-term teaching, which is tailored to the needs of difficult pupils while preventing disruption to normal classes and the need for exclusion. Research that the Department published last October shows that the units were successful in reducing exclusions and that they were also cost-effective.
The guidance also recommends innovative multi-agency pastoral support programmes. The pastoral support programme is a practical intervention to focus a school, together with support agencies, on early intervention for pupils at serious risk of permanent exclusion or criminal activity. It offers designated support when pupils have failed to respond to other interventions. The pupil should be set short-term targets broken down into fortnightly tasks and the PSP should be reviewed halfway through its agreed duration. That practical support is the background to our target to reduce exclusions and truancy.
The social exclusion unit report "Truancy and School Exclusion" sets targets to reduce truancy and exclusion by a third by 2002. We believe that our goal of raising standards is achievable only if children are in school and learning. However, that does not mean that exclusion can never be an option. We have never pretended that that is the case and recently confirmed that a head teacher can exclude a pupil for a serious offence—a violent incident, for example—without first needing to implement alternative strategies. As my hon. Friend said, head teachers must make the decisions about exclusions. There was no action or practical support under the previous Government and exclusions rose, but we are providing the support and the money for schools to be able to achieve that reduction.
Successive reports by Her Majesty's chief inspector of schools have found that most schools are orderly and that violence is fortunately rare. Our teachers and school managers deserve congratulations on that. Certain schools face greater than average problems of indiscipline or bullying and their teachers need additional advice and support. I agree with my hon. Friend that such problems occur especially, although not exclusively, in deprived inner-city areas. We have recognised the wider problems facing teachers and pupils and are putting more resources than ever before into on-site units for disruptive pupils.
In addition, we are supporting more work-related learning for 14 and 15-year-olds to reduce disaffection. The Department has funded 36 work-related learning projects at key stage 4, and early evidence shows that unauthorised absence rates have been reduced from above average to below. At a project in Leicester, a student who attended 49 per cent. of year 8 attended 97 per cent. of an off-site placement in year 11. We are putting many more learning mentors in secondary schools so that pupils who need help will get it to overcome barriers to their individual learning. There are early indications of the success of that strategy. For example, a learning mentor at a school in Southwark is involved in counselling, running programmes to improve behaviour, running a sports leadership award scheme for disaffected pupils and working closely with parents.
Our aim in those strategies is to tackle the causes of the problem, not to transfer it from one school to another or out on to the streets, as the previous Government were willing to do. That is why we are funding the learning mentors as well as the additional learning support units

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through the excellence in cities initiative. It currently operates in 24 local education authorities that form some of the most disadvantaged inner-city areas.
On 23 March, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Employment announced an expansion of the initiative to 21 new local education authorities from September and among the additional cities to be included are Nottingham, Leicester, Stoke-on-Trent and Hull. Aspects of the initiative will be piloted in primary schools in the existing inner-city areas. If our objective is early intervention, we should recognise that primary schools are affected as well.
Poor behaviour can also be a problem for other children. Bullying is a serious problem, and much of it goes unreported. It can seriously affect a child's emotional well-being and educational achievement. We attach a high priority to helping schools to prevent and combat bullying in all its forms, because there is no excuse for it. It is disruptive and intolerable, and should have no place in our schools. Since last September, schools have been required by law to have an anti-bullying policy. Further advice on bullying and harassment was contained in our "Social Inclusion: Pupil Support" guidance.
We shall also shortly be launching a new anti-bullying initiative. We shall be updating and reissuing our anti-bullying pack for schools, and producing a video for them to use as a teaching resource to generate discussion of the problem. It will emphasise the simple but powerful message that pupils need not suffer in silence, but should speak out and let someone know. We may not be able to eliminate bullying completely, but everyone needs to work together to reduce and prevent it wherever possible. We should not allow the misery and disruption caused by bullying in our schools to go unchallenged; as my hon. Friend said, the stakes are too high in the context of our children's education and achievements.
We are also very concerned about the rate of unauthorised absence from school. My hon. Friend mentioned that as well. The 1999 Audit Commission report "Missing Out" showed very mixed approaches on the part of local education authorities to the tackling of truancy. Some performed very well, while others did less well. We need to respond to the challenge.
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Schools themselves must actively discourage truancy, and they need support to be able to do that. Our guidance recommended that schools should report unauthorised absence to parents on the morning on which it occurs. That sometimes presents a practical challenge, but it has been shown to help in increasing attendance. We hope that the "Social Inclusion: Pupil Support" money can be used for that purpose as well.
Following consultation on our "Tackling Truancy Together" strategy document last autumn, we recently announced that the level of fines for parents of truanting pupils would increase to level 4 of the national scale of penalties. That will, in particular, allow magistrates to require parents to attend court or risk arrest, and will give them more opportunity to emphasise the seriousness of the offence to parents. I agree with my hon. Friend that the community and parents have both a right to expect schools to deliver a high standard of education and a responsibility to ensure that children attend schools, and to support the policies implemented by them.
I do not minimise the task that teachers must perform in deciding on appropriate strategies for the management of pupils. I know my hon. Friend is aware of that, given his extensive experience in the teaching profession. Although the Department has provided detailed guidance, it is for heads and other teachers to apply it to the circumstances of their schools.
I agree with my hon. Friend that inexperienced teachers need training and help from more experienced teachers, although if experienced teachers occasionally experience difficulties they should not see that as a sign of personal failure. Initial teacher training should focus on issues of discipline, and how to tackle disaffection.
Because this is essentially a two-way process, my officials—with assistance from the National Children's Bureau, and other Government Departments—are currently involved in disseminating the key recommendations of "Social Inclusion: Pupil Support" guidance, in order to give schools and teachers the practical support and assistance that will enable them to cope with the problems.
We can lead as a Government by setting the framework, but we cannot do everything that is needed. We can provide the resources that are important, but in the end it will be for schools and local partners across the country to work together to achieve the goal of higher standards for our young people.
Question put and agreed to.
Adjourned accordingly at five minutes to Two o'clock.