Lords Sitting of 19 January 1994

Preamble
The House met at half-past two of the clock: The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers—Read by the Lord Bishop of Norwich.

Falkland Islands: Investigation
Lord Campbell of Alloway Lord Campbell of Alloway asked Her Majesty's Government:
In the light of the debate on the Falklands Islands investigation held in this House on 15th December 1993 (H.L. Deb., col. 1361), whether the investigations set up in August 1992 by the Secretary of State for Defence and the Attorney-General have provided acceptable evidence of an act of murder away from the battlefield; and, if not, whether they intend to make a statement on the matter and whether the files may now be closed.
The Lord Chancellor (Lord Mackay of Clashfern): My Lords, the position in this respect has not changed since the debate on 15th December. Police inquiries are continuing and they expect to submit a report to the Director of Public Prosecutions quite shortly. No decision can be taken prior to consideration of that report. Nor would it be proper at this stage to comment on the evidence.
Lord Campbell of Alloway: My Lords, I thank my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor for his response. In that context may I ask him whether consideration has been given to the incidence of the rules of war where a key position has to be taken and held at all costs; where, after an arduous all-night campaign, that position is taken against superior numbers of well-trained and well-armed troops; and where, after it is taken it is subjected to continuous artillery bombardment giving rise to the expectation of a counter-attack? Perhaps I may respectfully ask my noble and learned friend to confirm, first, that in such a situation there is no obligation to accept an offer of surrender and accord prisoner-of-war status under Articles 4 and 5 of the Geneva Convention. Secondly, and finally, I wish to ask whether, in view of his assurances given on 15th December, as the battlefield is still open, no prosecution for murder could ensue?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I think that it would be somewhat unwise for me to venture an opinion on a hypothetical case, although I understand that the assumption of the question put to me may be that those were the facts on the occasion in question.
I believe that the correct time to consider all aspects of this matter is when the police report is completed and the Director of Public Prosecutions has an opportunity of considering it.
Lord Strabolgi: My Lords, why was this matter taken out of the hands of the services, which know something about the problems involved?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I explained in the debate on 15th December that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Defence took the advice of the Attorney-General and then submitted the matter to the Director of Public Prosecutions. The result has been the police inquiry.
Lord Hailsham of Saint Marylebone: My Lords, will my noble and learned friend put me right if am wrong? I had always understood that as regards prosecution, ever since the Campbell case of 1923 and a subsequent but rather later statement by Sir Hartley Shawcross (as he then was), the question of prosecution or no prosecution was a quasi-judicial one in which political statements in either direction were not particularly welcome.
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I am sure that my noble and learned friend is absolutely correct. In the course of the debate on 15th December I narrated a statement in connection with an earlier case that was given by the Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan (as he then was). I believe that what my noble and learned friend says is entirely in accordance with the practice as it has been understood.
Lord Dean of Beswick: My Lords, can the noble and learned Lord tell the House whether there has been any occasion in the past where the public prosecution services have been brought in on a military case? If not, why is this case being treated and allowed as a precedent? Is there not the implication that if this is accepted, and at some time in the future the military forces of the country—the Army, the air force or the navy—were called into action and a loss of life occurred during a war, someone may decide, as time passes by, to rehash the situation and make accusations of murder? Are we not creating a dangerous precedent if we go along that track?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I have already explained the circumstances in which the inquiry was instituted. I have no doubt that all the relevant circumstances, as they appeared, were taken into account in deciding that that was the proper course for the inquiry. In preparation for the debate on 15th December, I inquired of the Judge Advocate General whether he would expect to have been consulted prior to that. My understanding of his position was that he would not have thought it appropriate for him to be consulted at that stage.
Baroness Strange: My Lords, is my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor aware that the longer the inquiry continues, the more agony and grief will be caused to the innocent widows, bereaved parents and orphans of those who served in the campaign?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, it is undoubtedly true that inquiries of this character, and inquiries which may occur in other circumstances in which the Director of Public Prosecutions is involved, should be taken to a conclusion as rapidly as possible in the interests of all concerned.
On the other hand, in most cases it is necessary for some time to be taken in order that the inquiry can be

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properly pursued. My understanding of the matter is that the police have pursued the inquiries as quickly as circumstances permitted and in the light of the circumstances as they emerged during the inquiry.
Viscount Slim: My Lords, perhaps I may ask the noble and learned Lord a question which was not answered in the debate, according to my reading of Hansard. Was it the account of the Battle of Mount Longdon and the story—one might almost say hearsay story—of an incident in that account that triggered the investigation? Following the comments of another noble Lord, why were the proper military channels not followed to the end? The noble and learned Lord is well aware of the tried and proven system within Her Majesty's forces of courts of inquiry and courts martial which can be carried out in the field. The whole system can be dealt with by the military. Was the Chief of Staff of the Army, having taken advice from the Judge Advocate General or any other senior military Army officer, consulted by the noble and learned Lord's right honourable friend the Secretary of State? Or was it an arbitrary decision by the Secretary of State to go alone to the Attorney General?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, so far as I know the position, my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Defence considered the matter carefully, as I explained in the debate, from the point of view of his own department and responsibilities. He then made a decision—and I should not wish to describe it as arbitrary—to seek the advice of the Attorney General. As I understand it, he then acted upon the advice of my right honourable and learned friend the Attorney General.
Lord Renton: My Lords, is my noble and learned friend aware that when the matter was raised at Question Time on 6th December, I asked whether the Judge Advocate General would be consulted, as it was a military matter. My noble and learned friend said that all responsible authorities would be consulted. Can my noble and learned friend say whether the Judge Advocate General has at last been consulted?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I think I have just indicated that when I last inquired of him he had not been consulted and that he did not expect to be consulted at the stage which the matter had reached.

European Council Meetings: Information Access
2.47 p.m.
Lord Bruce of Donington Lord Bruce of Donington asked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they have prepared a programme of proposals to put before the European Council during the Greek presidency; and whether, in conformity with "open government", they will publish it.
The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Chalker of Wallasey): My Lords, there is no UK programme as such for the Greek presidency. The Greek presidency programme has been placed in the Libraries of both Houses. Our priorities are the completion of the enlargement negotiations, following up the Commission report on subsidiarity and further work on growth, competitiveness and employment.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness for that reply. Will she inform the House whether the question of public access to information concerning Council meetings will be brought up during the Greek presidency at the European Council, as distinct from the Council of Ministers established under Article 145? Is she aware that at the Council of Ministers' meeting on 6th December last year, a series of regulations were passed concerning public access to Community decisions? That virtually guaranteed in the text that very little information would be given to anyone anyway.
Since it is desirable that the papers should at some time cross the desk of the Prime Minister, will the noble Baroness ensure that those documents which were forwarded to the Foreign Office by COREPER on 3rd December and 12th January are laid before the Prime Minister so that he may consider the desirability of raising this important matter at the next meeting of the European Council?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I understand the anxiety of the noble Lord, Lord Bruce; and there should be public access—something for which the British Government have argued—to documents which have been seen by the Prime Minister. It was of course under the Belgian presidency that the meeting of the European Council was held on 6th December. While I do not have the detail of the documents which, no doubt, the noble Lord has in his hand, I know that the Prime Minister is deeply anxious to see proper public access. I shall bring the noble Lord's remarks to his attention.
The point is that we cannot have a programme for the Greek presidency; but we can and will follow up our priorities during the Greek presidency, not only at the European Council but also at the Council of Ministers' meetings in the interim.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, is the noble Baroness aware that I have already been through the proceedings of the European Council's activities in Brussels, and there is nowhere in the document any mention of this question even being considered? Will she please ensure, in association with the matters that I have ventured to lay before her today, that copies are made available of the procedures adopted by the Council—which I was able to get after winkling them out for about four months, and which have been amended, essentially by the documents to which I have referred?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I understand the noble Lord's point. I shall certainly look into all that he has said today.
Lord Monson: My Lords, does the noble Baroness agree that during the debate over the Maastricht Treaty, her right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary said that if and when the treaty was ratified, subsidiarity would become the guiding principle of the Community? Does she further agree that there has not been much evidence of that so far, despite the ratification of the treaty? Can she say when we can expect to see a massive and determined effort to implement the principle of subsidiarity?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I believe the noble Lord was not able to be with us at Question Time yesterday. It is important that 16 out of the 24 of those issues on subsidiarity on the Anglo-French list were agreed to at the last Council. One directive has already been amended; namely, that on fisheries, and a number of other issues will come before successive Councils. As the noble Lord will see from Hansard, we do not intend to let this all-important issue go.
Lord Richard: My Lords, as I understood the questions asked by my noble friend Lord Bruce of Donington, it was not only that the general public should be better informed as to what went on at European Councils, but that the Government should be adequately and properly informed as to what these terrible institutions in Brussels were getting up to. Is the noble Baroness satisfied with the flow of information coming from the Government's representative on CUR EPER as to what the Community is considering and the documentation to back up that consideration? Or does she take the same view as some other people do, which is that perhaps our ambassador to the Community does not do his job properly?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, let me straight away refute the allegation just made by the noble Lord, Lord Richard—
Lord Richard: I have not made an allegation.
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, that is the implication of the noble Lord's remarks. Sir John Kerr is one of the best of Her Majesty's permanent representatives, and is absolutely diligent. I have no doubt that all documents, other than those on very trifling matters, do come to Ministers and do come to the Prime Minister. But I accept that there is worry that documents circulate within the Commission which do not always come to the Council. I know that is the anxiety of the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington; and he knows that I share it with him.
Lord Richard: My Lords, can I be perfectly clear about this? I am not saying a word against John Kerr. He is an excellent civil servant, and so far as I know he does a very good job. If any such implication could be drawn from my remarks, then I unreservedly withdraw it.

British Rail Pension Fund
2.53 p.m.
Lord Peyton of Yeovil Lord Peyton of Yeovil asked Her Majesty's Government:
What progress they have made in fulfilling the terms of the memorandum of understanding signed by a Minister of the Crown and the Chairman of the British Rail Pension Fund Trustee Company.
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, progress has been made in our discussions with the trustees on these complex matters. The Government intend to honour fully the terms of the memorandum of understanding. Both we and the trustees hope to bring these discussions to a mutually acceptable conclusion as soon as possible.
Lord Peyton of Yeovil: My Lords, is my noble friend aware—and perhaps he will remind his right honourable friends of this—that it is six months to the day since the memorandum of understanding was first signed? Does he agree that, to put it mildly, it is inappropriate to drag into the proceedings matters which were not in contemplation at the time of the signing of the memorandum; and that there is beginning to hang over this whole affair the odour of procrastination which is bound to involve discredit for Ministers?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, the Government have not introduced matters that were not provided for in the memorandum of understanding. We have made progress in the discussions, by agreeing principles that should be satisfied in any arrangement. It is in the interests of all parties concerned that a. satisfactory solution is reached as soon as possible.
Lord Carmichael of Kelvingrove: My Lords, the House will be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Peyton of Yeovil, for once again raising this matter. It was a very important question during the debate on the Railways Bill; and there is still a great deal of unease among railway pensioners. Can the Minister say whether there has been recent correspondence between the pensioner trustees and the Government; and whether the. Government have been able in any way to reassure the pensioners that a solution is not far off?
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, I can assure the noble Lord that meetings are continuing on a regular basis, in good faith and in a spirit of co-operation. We all agree that it is in everyone's interest for agreement to be reached as soon as possible. But the trustees consider, and we agree, that the separate issues must be considered together as a complete package on which we need to reach agreement.
Lord Peyton of Yeovil: My Lords, is my noble friend saying that the Government are not attempting to make fresh arrangements for the capital payments into the fund? That matter was not contained in the memorandum of understanding, and I am surprised to learn from him that it is not a subject that is now under discussion.
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, the memorandum of understanding made clear the possibility of deferment of government support contributions to the pensioners' closed fund, taking account of the absolute solvency guarantee being provided by the Government.

Russian Commemorative Medal
2.56 p.m.
Lord Williams of Elvel Lord Williams of Elvel asked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they have reconsidered their decision on the wearing of the Russian commemorative medal and, if so, with what result.
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, the Queen has approved a recommendation that the Russian commemorative medal—or to give it its correct title "The Russian 40th Anniversary of Victory Medal"—may now be worn by eligible British recipients. An announcement to this effect was published in the London Gazette on 4th January 1994.
Lord Williams of Elvel: My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Baroness for that Answer, which will come as a source of great satisfaction to those who served with such courage on the Arctic convoys in the Second World War. Will she now be good enough to pay tribute to those Members of this House who campaigned for a period of months on this issue: my noble friends Lord Callaghan of Cardiff and Lord Mason of Barnsley, the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Bramall, the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, and—last, but indeed foremost—the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Lewin, who was the man who really got this matter moving? If the noble Baroness is still in a benign mood, will she try to explain to the House why it took so long for the Government to arrive at a sensible decision?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I gladly pay tribute to all noble and gallant Lords, and particularly to the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Lewin, for his campaign, which resulted in this satisfactory outcome. The changed circumstances in Russia are what has enabled us, since the medal was first issued, to make this decision. It is a very special circumstance, and I think that it justified exceptional treatment. That is what we have done, and I am most grateful to all noble Lords who pursued this matter, to the great satisfaction of everyone concerned.
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that all Members of this House will be very glad indeed to see the Government's decision and that most of us recognise that this medal was earned by extremely arduous, and in many cases dangerous, work on the Arctic convoys—in which, I am happy to reflect, a kinsman of mine was involved?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, it is certainly right that we should pay tribute to all those who have fought so long and hard for the freedoms which we sometimes take for granted in this country.
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There is no doubt that this was a popular, if delayed, decision. It is one with which I am glad the Government could be associated.
Lord Kilbracken: My Lords, as one who was surprised to be awarded this medal, after an interval of a mere 40 years—my noble friend Lord Fitt is in the same position—I welcome the noble Baroness's Answer. But could she give me any idea of the kind of occasion on which I might want to wear it?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, the noble Lord poses a teasing question. I am sure that grandchildren ought to know exactly what was done in the name of this country so that children, grandchildren and even great-grandchildren will look with pride on such a medal worn by their relative.
Lord Lewin: My Lords, will the noble Baroness please accept that the elderly gentlemen who are eligible to wear that medal—they come from the Royal Air Force that was based in North Russia, the members of the Royal Artillery maritime detachments who served in the merchant ships and the men of the Merchant Navy and the Royal Navy—are most grateful to Her Majesty for her gracious permission to wear the medal, though a little sad that it has taken so long for that happy conclusion to be reached? Perhaps I may say to the noble Lord, Lord Kilbracken, that Remembrance Day is a very good occasion on which to wear the medal.
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble and gallant Lord. The difficulty is that there was a long tradition—I know that the noble and gallant Lord agrees—that only foreign awards approved by the sovereign should be accepted and worn by British citizens. We are all delighted that Her Majesty has seen fit to grant permission to wear the medal. I am sure that it should be worn on Remembrance Day.
Lord Mason of Barnsley: My Lords, does the Minister agree that now would be the time, in view of the circumstances, to have a review of the regulations with a view to some amendment? Is she aware that the British in the European Community monitoring mission in the former Yugoslavia have been advised by the Foreign Office not to accept the EC monitoring mission medal? Is she further aware that holders have been advised especially not to wear it? This is a case similar to the one we are now discussing? Is she able to say whether those who served in the former Yugoslavia eventually will be recognised by Her Majesty's Government?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, during my researches into this Question I discovered that it was far more complicated than it seemed at first sight. Certainly there is a difference between a campaign medal, which is issued on the anniversary of a campaign, and a medal issued to recognise service in the campaign itself.
There has also always been a tradition that a British citizen would not wear a foreign medal when his or her services have already been recognised by the award of

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a British medal for the same campaign. While some review, as happened in this case, might be necessary, I am not prepared to speculate about the future.
The EC monitors' medal is not a campaign or anniversary medal. It is not granted in circumstances similar to those that we have just been discussing in the main Question. In the absence of a relevant national award we felt that British monitors should be given permission to accept that particular special recognition for their service in Bosnia and Croatia.
Lord Callaghan of Cardiff: My Lords, is the Minister aware that we are not all as sophisticated as the noble Lord, Lord Kilbracken? I received a letter this morning from one who is entitled to wear the medal. He said—and I believe that he meant it quite sincerely—that he had tears in his eyes when he heard the news. So there is room for a difference of opinion on these matters.
Does the Minister have any information about the number of medals that are available? Is it accurate to say, as I have been informed, that about 2,000 of those people entitled to receive them have not done so and that sufficient medals have not been issued by the Russian authorities? If that is correct, will she approach the Russian Government to see that a proper supply is provided?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I do not have that information to hand. I shall study what the noble Lord has said and see what can be done if persons who are obviously entitled to that medal have not so far received it.
Lord Fitt: My Lords, does the Minister agree that had it not been for the involvement of the Soviet Union in the last war, many thousands of lives would have been lost? The medal in question was given to merchant seamen and others who have been mentioned. As the noble Lord, Lord Kilbracken, said, I was on a ship (a tanker) which was attacked by German submarines and he was on a Royal Air Force plane from an aircraft carrier in the same convoy. We found that out here in the corridors of your Lordships' House.
Referring to the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, is the Minister aware that there is great difficulty with regard to the number of medals that have been issued? Does she further agree that, naturally, all the people who were on Russian convoys would want to claim a medal for the services that they gave in those times? I believe that there is great dissatisfaction about the number of medals that have been issued, particularly in regard to merchant seamen. I appeal again, in the words of the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, for representation to be made to the Russian Embassy or the Russian authorities. Is she further aware that this is only a late invention by Mr. Gorbachev, to make certain that everyone involved in those Russian operations at that time is entitled to a medal that they will wear with pride?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I believe that that is exactly the meaning of the Answer that I gave to the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan. We also congratulate the noble Lords on all that they did.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, can the Minister say whether any money goes with the Russian medal? A friend of mine during the war held a high Russian decoration and when he ran out of money in London he would go to the Russian Embassy and collect a considerable sum.
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I am not sure that that is a question that I can answer.

Business of the House
3.5 p.m.
The Lord Privy Seal (Lord Wakeham): My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.
Moved, That the debate on the Motion in the name of the Lord Bonham-Carter set down for today shall be limited to three hours and that in the name of the Viscount of Falkland to two-and-a-half hours.—(Lord Wakeham.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Quangos
3.6 p.m.
Lord Bonham-Carter Lord Bonham-Carter rose to call attention to the increase in the number of quangos, non-departmental public bodies and executive agencies, the size of the resources at their disposal and the extent of democratic control and representation; and to move for Papers.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, we are fortunate that this debate follows yesterday's debate on the Police and Magistrates' Courts Bill. We shall discuss themes which arose in that debate, in particular the removal of responsibility from local authorities and the concentration of power in Whitehall. In addition, we shall discuss the issue of patronage and the accountability of quangos. Those four issues are grave and important constitutional issues and it is high time that your Lordships turned your attention to them.
The trigger that prompted this debate was the Answer to a series of questions that I asked about the number of peers on quangos. When I confine myself to the number of peers on quangos who receive salaries, it emerges that in all there are 44, of whom 31 are Conservative and 10 are Labour; there are no Liberal Democrats and three are Cross-Benchers. The Home Office appoints six paid peers, three of whom are Conservative, one is Labour and two are Cross-Bench, the Cross-Benchers being the noble Lords, Lord Chalfont and Lord Wyatt of Weeford. The Department of Health appoints 12 peers, 11 of whom are Conservative and one who is the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Peterborough. The Department of the Environment appoints 15 peers, 11 of whom are Conservative and four are Labour; there are no Liberal Democrats and no Cross-Benchers. I give just specimen answers. The salaries range from £92,000 a year to £230 per diem. That is not a scientific sample, but I suspect that it is not altogether unrepresentative of the political complexion of a number of quangos.

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The questions also elicited an unusual hierarchy of values. The part-time chairman of the Horserace Totalisator Board receives £92,000 a year and the part-time chairman of the Parole Board (an office of some considerable responsibility) receives £45,000 a year. I do not know what one can conclude from that. It demonstrates how unsuccessful governments have been in carrying out the undertaking made in 1980 by the then Prime Minister who said,
"There will always be pressure for new bodies … We shall be robust in resisting them".
I do not propose to become involved in a metaphysical discussion of the precise meaning of "quango", about which much has been said. In the course of my remarks, when I refer to a "quango" I shall be referring to organisations with executive powers appointed by Ministers or by bodies appointed by Ministers which spend public money. The members of those bodies have come to be known as "the new magistracy" and almost without exception they remove powers from local authorities democratically elected; they transfer those powers to persons appointed by Ministers; they reduce public accountability and they increase party patronage. They also dispose of an increasing proportion of public expenditure now amounting to around one-fifth.
That process has gone on quietly and steadily with little public awareness of what was happening. The main steps have been analysed comprehensively by Professor Stewart of the Institute of Local Government Studies at Birmingham University. I will not weary your Lordships with the various steps in that process which have taken place over the years but prominent among them is the removing of responsibility from local authorities in the fields of education and health in particular; the abolition of the GLC and metropolitan county councils; and the removal of further education and sixth form colleges from local authorities. The planned changes in the composition of the police authority is another example and we discussed that yesterday. The Education Bill and the Railways Bill will introduce new quangos and the national lottery will be directed by a quango.
So the process continues day after day in all the legislation which passes through your Lordships' House. What does the scene look like today? Estimates are that by 1996 there will be 7,700 quangos. Today 40,000 people are appointed by government. Expenditure by those largely non-elected and largely unaccountable bodies has increased since 1979 from £6,150 million to £13,750 million per year.
In Wales one sees an almost extreme example of what goes on. As your Lordships will be aware, in Wales 71 per cent. of the people voted against the Conservative Party in the last general election. The response of the Government was to outflank Welsh institutions, though democratically elected —local authorities—by letting loose on Wales 100 quangos largely manned by government supporters. According to the University of Wales, 34 per cent. of all Welsh
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Office expenditure will be through quangos. The people responsible for that are 1,400 people appointed by the Secretary of State.
Among those quangos is a notorious body known as the Welsh Development Agency, funded by £170 million of taxpayers' money. In the words of Mr. John Redwood, that quango was responsible for,
"a catalogue of serious and inexcusable breaches of expected standards".
In the words of the Financial Times—they are significant in relation to what I shall say later—those practices,
"might have attracted little attention in the private sector, but were not acceptable in a government funded agency accountable to Parliament".
They included £1.4 million on an unauthorised redundancy scheme and £228,000 for a retiring international director preceded by (a peculiar provision) eight months' gardening leave. So much for value for money! Its chairman was Dr. Gwyn Jones and he is now, surprisingly, Welsh governor for the BBC.
Those are appointed bodies and one might therefore suppose that their public accountability would be particularly rigorous. But as Professor Stewart shows in another study, that is not the case; indeed, it is the reverse. For example, they are not required to hold meetings in public; they are not subject to the jurisdiction of an ombudsman and neither are the members liable to surcharge.
The most sophisticated defence of quangos was made by the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, Mr. William Waldegrave. His argument rests on two legs. First, accountability has been strengthened by making services responsible to consumers; in his words,
"by making public services directly accountable to the customers".
Secondly, the accountability to Parliament remains unchanged. But it is the first argument on which he really rests his case.
While it is perfectly true that some government services can be looked at in that way, it is not true of all. The argument is based on the assumption that public services should follow the private sector model. That, of course, was the assumption on which the Sheehy Report was built and yesterday we saw the consequences of making such an assumption in inappropriate circumstances. There is a difference, and it must be faced, between the ethos of public service and private sector business and the practice, as the Financial Times comment on the Welsh Development Agency indicated.
There can also be some difficulty in the public sector in identifying precisely who is the customer. To take an extreme case, who is the Army's customer? Is it the enemy? Or is it the nation? To take a more relevant example—education in schools—who is a school's customer? Is it the pupil? Is it the parent? Or is it the nation? If it is not the nation, why do we have a national curriculum?
The fact is that in many cases the customer cannot be precisely identified. Therefore, the analogy and argument is not quite as powerful as might strike one at first sight. With regard to ministerial responsibility, as the Scott Inquiry indicates, it is often difficult to identify who is responsible for what. It is certainly difficult to

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exercise responsibility over 4,400 bodies and 40,000 individual people. Therefore, the use to which the quangos have been put by a government which preaches subsidiarity abroad and practises centralisation at home has been the perversion of a brilliant idea and a clever device. The classic quangos —the BBC and the Arts Council—were invented in order to keep the Government out of an extremely sensitive area where governments had no right to be; to provide a buffer between the broadcasters and the artists and interfering, ignorant politicians. Quangos are now used for the reverse purpose: that is, to introduce government into areas where previously democratically elected local authorities operated; to introduce central government into areas where it has no right to intervene and to give central government more power than any of us think they should have.
In this country we have no written constitution. We have no Bill of Rights and we have no constitutional court. But we have a sovereign Parliament. In those circumstances, our liberties and the liberties of our communities and the freedom of our lives depend on self-restraint by Parliament and by government. I do not believe that the present Government have exercised adequate self-restraint and as a consequence Mr. Waldegrave, who claimed that he joined the Tory Party because he wanted a limited government, is now facing a situation of unlimited government, and that is greatly to be deplored.
If quangos are to continue—and I assume that they will in some shape or form under any government—we have to take steps to see that they are made more accountable to the public, to see that the mode of appointment of people to quangos is more open and is by rules and regulations which we understand, and above all to see that the opportunities for party political patronage are limited. That is what we must do if we are to avoid a situation which would have made Lord Rockingham green with envy. My Lords, I beg to move for Papers.
3.20 p.m.
Lord Morris of Castle Morris: My Lords, in the beginning was the quango. And the quango was small and advisory. And its members were appointed by a benign Minister from the ranks of the good and the great, and the fairly good and the slightly great. And it was given a vague remit, and a budget of tuppence halfpenny, and left to get on with its job, and to publish an annual report, with recommendations which Ministers often implemented. And behold, it was very good. And it went forth and multiplied.
There are still a few such bodies in existence, doing a necessary and blameless job rather well, and they are a good buttress to central government. Their members are all unpaid, and claim only expenses "actually and necessarily incurred" in attending meetings. Until quite recently, I had the honour of serving on one for more than 15 years, and of being its chairman for the last five: the Museums and Galleries Commission. That body, under my infinitely more distinguished successor, Mr. Graham Greene, advises government on everything to do with 2,000 and more museums and galleries in the
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United Kingdom. It speaks, quietly, but with experience, knowledge and authority. It has recently created a registration scheme for museums which has greatly raised standards and which is the envy of Europe. It is up-to-date, and it has always been in the "sponsorship game", since one of its original terms of reference in 1930 was,
"to stimulate the generosity and direct the efforts of those who aspire to become public benefactors".
It distributes small amounts of public money, principally to the very cost-effective area museum councils, and it is, itself, very cheap to run. Not all the commissioners of the Museums and Galleries Commission have been members of the Conservative Party; indeed, it is rumoured that quite recently one was spotted surreptitiously reading the Guardian.
That is what a quango ought to be: independent but accountable; at "arm's length" from government, made up of members selected without reference to their party political opinions, who work part-time and unpaid in a tradition of public service. And the Museums and Galleries Commission is not unique. The National Heritage Memorial Fund, under the noble Lord, Lord Charteris of Amisfield (who I am delighted to see in his place), and his successor, the noble Lord, Lord Rothschild, operates in precisely the same way, and is universally acknowledged to be one of the most successful and efficient non-departmental public bodies in existence.
While they were few they were good. But they went forth and multiplied and the members became paid, and Ministers began interfering with their day-by-day working, and they were given large budgets and things got out of control. And in 1980 Mrs. Thatcher said of them:
"There will always be pressure for new bodies. We shall be robust in resisting them".
True, at that time some quangos were put down; but many new ones were set up, too; and they were given greatly increased resources. NHS trusts arid the reform of district health authorities, the plans for new police authorities and for schools and colleges all hinge on transferring £54 billion of taxpayers' money. It seems likely that £25 billion of spending has already passed from local authorities to non-elected quangos. Cardiff Business School suggests that some 40,000 quango appointments are at the personal disposal of Ministers. Think, my Lords, of a battalion of soldiers, if you can remember such a thing—40 of them.
Education in this country is now controlled by quangos. If you are in a university, you do exactly as you are told by the Higher Education Funding Council, and the School Curriculum and Assessment Authority dominates what is taught in English schools and controls the testing of pupils. The new Funding Agency for Schools will direct government money to opted-out schools, and in areas where 10 per cent. of pupils are in opted-out schools it will have enormous education planning powers. And these bodies are responsible wholly, and solely, to the Secretary of State. These bodies are merely a smokescreen to cover complete governmental control from the centre of education in England and Wales.

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If I may turn to Wales for a moment, not all your Lordships may be aware of the investigation by the Select Committee on Welsh Affairs into nominated bodies. According to official government figures, the Secretary of State for Wales was responsible for appointments to 81 public bodies in 1991. Their overall expenditure in that year amounted to over £1.4 billion. They employ 57,000 staff. The Welsh Office has appointed a total of 1,261 people to those bodies; and, not surprisingly, 82 per cent. of those appointed were male. Even when a token woman is occasionally appointed it often gives rise to the suspicion that it is another party political appointment, as when a constituency secretary to a Welsh Office Minister was appointed to the board of the South Glamorgan Health Authority, and, after protests in Parliament led by Welsh Labour Members, felt obliged to tender her resignation. The remark attributed in the press recently to the noble Baroness, Lady Denton, to the effect that she had never knowingly appointed a Labour supporter to any of the jobs under her wing would cause very little surprise in the hills and valleys of Wales.
Your Lordships' House has before it this very week further examples of quango-making with complete political control vested in the Secretary of State for Wales in the creation of the Residuary Body for Wales and the Staff Commission for Wales in Schedules 11 and 12 to the Local Government (Wales) Bill. Schedule 11, on the residuary body, begins:

"(1) The Residuary Body shall consist of not less than 4 nor more than 7 members appointed by the Secretary of State.

(2) The Secretary of State shall appoint one of the members to be chairman.

(3) The Secretary of State may by order alter either of the numbers in sub-paragraph (1)".

What greater control could anyone have, short of putting them on a lead and taking them for "walkies"? The Secretary of State shall also determine what remuneration, pension, allowances, compensation and gratuities members shall receive. I am sure that they will all be truly thankful.
And all this is perfectly public—though its meetings will not be—and the Government are neither discomfited nor abashed. Indeed, if he is reported aright in the press, Mr. William Waldegrave, the Citizen's Charter Minister, defends the replacement of local authorities by quangos. He is not ashamed to do so.
The present situation puts democracy in peril. There are far too many quangos, and they are far too powerful. Many should be abolished and their functions restored, wherever possible, to local government. All of them should be made more accountable and more responsive to their main users, not to a Secretary of State alone. Mr. Geoff Mulgan, the director of Demos, recently suggested an innovative reform which might do something to check the present Gadarene headlong rush to centralise every aspect of Government under the total control of the Secretaries of State. He suggested a new approach to appointment, and a new public power of dismissal. Appointment to bodies like the health authorities would be the responsibility of an "appointment commission" representing the set of democratically elected institutions with a legitimate
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interest in the make-up of the relevant organisations. Similarly, it would be possible, in his submission, to sack a quango that under-performed. Security of tenure is a luxury that no quango ought to be allowed.
I, personally, would add further proposals for the urgently-needed reform of quangoland. Every quango should have an agreed, public, regular form of rendering account to its users; no quango should be created to usurp functions which can efficiently be performed by local government; the "arm's length" principle should be restored and revered wherever possible; and, to encourage the old, basic virtue of service to the community, members of quangos should be entirely unpaid. The need for reform is there, and it is urgent. Democracy in this country is under threat. The present burden of quangos is intolerable, because as the right honourable John Smith wrote recently of the present Government:
"Having aggregated unprecedented central power in Whitehall, they now impose their will through the new magistracy of Ministerially appointed quangos. The only qualification for membership is to be 'one of us'. The only purpose is to carry out Ministerial instructions. Any sense of a political plurality—that it might be proper to recognise differing interests in the community—has been ruthlessly abandoned".
3.31 p.m.
Lord Skidelsky: My Lords, the Motion tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Bonham-Carter, expresses concern that is felt by both supporters and opponents of this Government about the growth of an apparently unaccountable appointed bureaucracy, especially in the public services, and also concern about the seemingly inexorable growth of regulation under a government whose watchword was deregulation.
I would like to concentrate on the first matter because many of the problems to which both noble Lords alluded are the result of the attempt, laudable in itself, to make the public services more accountable to their users and to the elected government, than they used to be. It is that paradox, which is the attempt to make services more accountable and then setting up bureaucracies which seem to make them less accountable, which is really at the heart of the problem.
I have two serious reservations about the arguments which we have heard so far. The first is the view that public service reform has made the services less democratically accountable than they used to be. That suggests that the best model for the public services is the direct central management of services by their elected representatives. There are big problems in that. Aneurin Bevan, the Minister of Health in the 1940s, used to say that the clatter of bedpans in hospital wards ought to resound in the office of the Minister of Health.
Today MPs complain that when they write to Peter Lilley with an inquiry about benefit delivery they get a response from Michael Bichard, head of the Benefits Agency, rather than from Mr. Lilley. The suggestion is that the creation of the Benefits Agency under the unelected Mr. Bichard, has reduced accountability. But who do we think wrote the letter in answer to the complaint before the Benefits Agency existed? The answer is that it was written by a civil servant without involvement or responsibility in the area concerned, and

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simply signed by the Secretary of State. At least we can now identify Mr. Bichard's role, hold him accountable through his pay arid contract renewal, and hold the Secretary of State accountable for the action for which he is truly responsible; namely, the appointment and supervision of Mr. Bichard.
A layer of hypocrisy at least is removed by making accountability more transparent in this sense. It does not of course stop enormous abuses and it does not stop enormous mistakes being made, but at least one does not have to seek for redress through a system which is nominally accountable but in which accountability is almost impossible to identify.
The other more serious flaw in the argument of the noble Lord who introduced this Motion is that the answer to the perceived unaccountability of quangos is to make them more democratically accountable; to increase democratic control over their management. However, the political system at whatever level is an extremely blunt instrument for ensuring that users get what they want out of services or that governments get value for money.
I have had considerable experience of the unaccountability of local authorities. Their system of control over education has been praised by both speakers. But I have had experience of the gross abuse of power by nominally accountable local education authorities. I got involved in the education debate myself out of a sense of great injustice at what was done to people who spoke out against the tyranny of local government.
My argument is not that local elections are not decided on local issues, but on the national standing of governments and therefore cannot be represented as votes of confidence in the delivery of local services. My stand is simply on the old liberal principle that majorities do not have powers to coerce minorities when there are issues of conscience and principle involved. That is exactly what was happening in local education services up and down the country.
That is where I entered the debate. So I am not a great supporter of local government as an accountability mechanism, which does not mean to say that I do not believe some services are best administered by local government.
Another suggestion is that the democratic accountability of quangos might be increased by having their members nominated by professional bodies who are themselves democratically based or having them representative of interests. That would at least avoid the problem of their appointment at the whim of an individual Secretary of State. That sounds very plausible. It is the idea that they would be more representative if appointed in that way. But the danger in that kind of system of appointment is that they simply become representatives of the producers of the service.
It is a problem often disguised by the notion that bodies must be representatives of professional interests. Professionals should always be a very important element in the management of any service with a strong professional component. But they should not be the only element. Winston Churchill said that professionals should be on tap, riot on top. There are other interests;
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the interests of consumers and users are very difficult to get represented on bodies of this kind through that method of appointment.
Noble Lords have worried not so much, I believe, about the democratic failure in some of the appointments, but more about the lack of independence of many of the quangos. They are worried that the Secretary of State reserves to himself the right to appoint whoever he wants. But the argument of independence—I believe that that is a very important requirement—is not overcome by simply saying that we must have more democratic accountability. Perhaps I may give an example. The Liberal Democrats are in favour of setting up one of the most powerful quangos I can imagine. It is called an independent central bank. Its purpose is not to increase democratic control over monetary policy, but to remove monetary policy from the discretionary control of politicians. I am not against that. I think that it is a very good idea.
There are other examples of what used in the past to be called "the arm's length principle", and very valuable that principle was. "My hero", as some would say, Lord Keynes, set up the Arts Council in 1945 exactly on that principle. He was a fervent Liberal, but was not unduly enthusiastic about democratic control over the arts. The University Grants Committee used to be a quango of that kind, designed precisely to keep the Secretary of State at arm's length.
However, there was nothing democratic about those bodies. What was valuable about them was that they were independent. They were staffed by people who, in their characters and in their experience, would be independent of the wishes of a particular Secretary of State. The problem is to get appointments which guarantee that kind of membership. No one has solved that problem. One cannot get that degree of independence simply by suggesting that the representative principle should be applied to such appointments.
The public sector reform programme has not made the problems of accountability worse. It has made them more transparent. They were always there; now they have come to light. When public services are broken down into operating units and put under the acknowledged leadership of the people who have been running them for years, the problems of accountability that have always existed are revealed for all to see. Where I think that the noble Lord, Lord Bonham-Carter, is right is in suggesting that the Government have given inadequate thought to the problems that that new transparency reveals. Indeed, they have begun to dismantle the democratic model by appointing non-elected managers without properly designing alternative means of accountability.
I should like to end by suggesting a way forward. I was much influenced by a book by Albert Hirschmann called Exit, Voice, and Loyalty, in which he suggested that there were two models for the accountability of firms and services to their users. He called the first "Voice", which means kicking up a fuss and exercising democratic control over the service, and he called the second, "Exit", which is the market alternative. It is simply the right and ability of people to choose not to

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use a service which they find unsatisfactory. It is the choice model which operates over a large range of economic activity.
I think that in education particularly, which is something in which I have been involved, the most direct way of establishing the accountability of schools to their users is to give parents not only the right of exit, but the power of exit. That means that parents can choose for their children any school from a whole range of schools. They are given the financial power to do that through, for example, the operation of a voucher system. That has been tried in Sweden recently. I do not know how that experiment will work out, but the Swedes have abandoned their long-established method of democratic control over education in order to explore that route to accountability.
I think that it is an important route to explore. Unless we explore it, we shall be burdened with more and more regulation and more and more quangos. Provisions affecting the national curriculum, the testing system, the funding authority and the regulations governing the entry of schools into the system will all grow and will arouse the opposition of the professionals and the teachers. There will be a never-ending quarrel between the Government, the producers, and the users. Therefore, I recommend those alternative methods. I am extremely grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Bonham-Carter, for introducing this very important debate.
3.34 p.m.
Baroness Robson of Kiddington: My Lords, in opening this debate my noble friend Lord Bonham-Carter outlined the great concern that is felt by people all around the country and not only in this House about the ever-increasing number of non-elected agencies which are being created to run key services in our economy. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Castle Morris, that at the moment those bodies are responsible for administering something in the region of £54 billion of taxpayers' money with very little opportunity for ordinary citizens to make an input into the selection of the people running those services. There is undoubtedly a lack of any real obligation on those quangos to account for themselves to the community on a regular basis. Under the present system of ministerial appointments, there is a natural inclination—and it is a natural inclination—to appoint people of compatible political views.
I should like to take the opportunity of this debate to concentrate on the National Health Service and the changes that have taken place since the introduction of the internal market and the creation of health service trusts. I shall refer also to the diminution of community involvement and of accountability which that has created.
With your Lordships' permission, I should like to go back in history to make my points—back as far as the first re-organisation of the health service in 1974. I am not saying that the establishment of the regional health authorities, the area health authorities and the district health authorities in 1974 was an ideal set-up. They were too large and cumbersome for efficient
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decision-making. They did, however, have a very valuable asset. They contained members who were much more representative of the community than the present DHAs and NHS trusts. Their boards contained between four and six members who were appointed by the local authorities. There was, therefore, a certain amount of elected representation on the boards. The boards also comprised one university appointment—or two where teaching hospitals existed in the region. They also comprised a hospital consultant, a general practitioner, a nurse, a midwife or a health visitor and a trade union representative as well as representatives of voluntary organisations. It is possible to find people from the community to become members of such bodies through the voluntary organisations. Even then, however, it was an appointment system although there was much greater nomination input from the community as a whole.
Here I should like to pay a special tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Joseph. He was the man responsible for the first appointments under the new system in 1974. During that selection process, I was certainly not aware of any political bias on his part. He concentrated on finding people with knowledge of the health service and with a contribution to make.
However, since then things have changed. In all the reappointments and reorganisations that have taken place since then under whatever government, Labour or Tory, the political bias has been increasing. I have personal experience of that. When I retired from the regional health authority for family reasons in 1982, I was asked if I had any suggestions to make about who might be my successor. I went to see the then Secretary of State to recommend a man whom he might appoint. I expected to be questioned about why I was putting that person forward. When I saw the Secretary of State he asked me whether I knew what that man's political opinions were. I said, "No, I am afraid that I have not asked him. I think that it is irrelevant". The Secretary of State said, "But you do realise that almost every MP in your region is a Tory MP and we have to make certain that there is compatibility". That seems to me to be the last thing that anybody should consider when appointing a regional chairman. Even today political allegiance seems to be the overriding factor. That is not the right way to find the best man or woman for the job.
Since 1974, reorganisations have taken place more than once, but since the introduction of the principle of provider-purchaser the picture has changed completely. DHAs and NHS trusts are much smaller. They consist of five executive and five non-executive members plus the chairman. We all agree that small authorities are likely to be more efficient, but they must not become closed shops. The NHS belongs to the people and is funded by them through taxation. Taxpayers have the right to know how their money is spent.
The only statutory requirement on those new bodies—the DHAs and the NHS trusts—to communicate properly with the community that they serve is to hold one public meeting a year. That is not enough. There is no statutory requirement upon them to allow representatives of the CHCs, who represent the local communities, access to their local hospitals. That is a

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denial of the right of communities to know what goes on in their hospitals and what decisions are taken about the provision of services. I know that some trusts are enlightened and act differently, without a statutory requirement, and communicate with CHCs and voluntary organisations, but they are not in the majority, and there should be a statutory requirement to do so.
While I recognise that the NHS management had to become more businesslike, there is great concern about the make-up of the membership of DHAs and NHS trusts. It is estimated that three quarters of the non-executive directors have had no previous NHS experience and have come mostly from the business world or from professions, such as accountants and lawyers; about 12 per cent. only have come from voluntary organisations or community group organisations. That balance cannot possibly be right.
It is not necessary to hold up the previous organisation of the NHS as a model of accountable, accessible efficiency to question the present non-accountable, non-accessible structure set up by the present Government.
3.54 p.m.
Lord Taylor of Gryfe: My Lords, we are indebted to the Liberal Benches for introducing this important subject this afternoon. It should be clear that the debate is not about abolishing quangos: some quangos are good, useful and necessary. The debate is about the impact on our society of a vast increase in the number and power of quangos; their effect on the democratic structure; the consequences of increased centralisation; the dangers inherent in a system which places so much power and patronage in the hands of a Minister; and the lack of accountability. That is what the debate is about.
As the noble Lord, Lord Bonham-Carter, said, some quangos are extremely useful. I have had the pleasure of serving on a number of them. Indeed, I have served on so many that I used to think that I was the statutory Scot among the Minister's appointments; but I also had the opportunity many years ago of sitting on the Glasgow City Council. In those days, the local authority was responsible for health, education, housing and for the police—all the things that impacted seriously on the daily lives of the people of Glasgow. We held our meetings every two weeks. We had our committees. There was a public gallery to enable people to see what we were up to. There was a direct accountability to the people who had elected us.
Today the situation has changed. Those responsibilities are handled now by quangos appointed by the Secretary of State for Scotland. As was said by a previous speaker, there is inevitably political partiality—that happens in all parties—with regard to some of those appointments. That means, of course, that the people of Scotland—75 per cent. of whom voted against a Conservative Government—now find themselves governed in those basic and essential services by the nominees of the Secretary of State who happens to be a Conservative. So one can see that there is a feeling in local government that the powers and influence of local government have diminished substantially. That means
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that fewer and fewer people are prepared to do the necessary work of rubber stamping on local authorities. That is serious for the democratic structure.
The trouble is that only 45 per cent. of the people vote in local authority elections as compared to 75 per cent. at national elections. In France, the participation is 70 per cent.; in Italy 85 per cent.; and in Sweden 95 per cent. Why? Why do the people participate in municipal elections in those countries? It is because local authorities have a constitutional position within the government of those countries. They have constitutional rights laid down which cannot be impinged upon by a centralised government.
I am sure that all in the House applaud the Prime Minister's insistence at his European meetings on the principle of subsidiarity as being essential in democratic government. All we are asking is that the same principle of subsidiarity and decentralisation be a basic feature of our democratic society. Our democratic society is diminished by anything that centralises power. So I want to look at one or two of the things that have happened under the present arrangements.
The Financial Times has pointed out that one-fifth of all public expenditure now is spent by quangos. Excluding the NHS and the TECs, there are over 100,000 board members; a million members of staff serve those quangos. The general public has little knowledge of what goes on in that vast bureaucratic system. So I feel that it is time that we looked at that growth of quangos as being a serious threat, to the whole basis of our whole democratic government. By 1996 it is expected that there will be 7,700 non-elected boards in this country, and one-quarter of total government expenditure will be spent on those non-elected boards. That cannot be a healthy development in what we claim to be a democratic society.
Perhaps I may mention the experience of some of those business-orientated boards. There is a report in the Library on a recent survey into the operation of TECs—the training and enterprise councils. I commend that to your Lordships for reading. The survey indicates that the study of TECs is a quango; a business-led body mainly doing the Government's job for the unemployed. The deflection of TECs from their economic purpose of focusing on the workforce to the social problem of targeting the unemployed is seen as a central failure. The councils have become the dumping ground for government problems.
A report of the survey in The Times stated that a scheme to pay firms up to £2,340 for every job created for the long-term unemployed, which is being discharged by the TECs, has become a flop. The system is not working.
We are in for another collection of quangos following privatisation; their members will run our railways. On Monday 22nd November the Daily Telegraph outlined that in the same breath and on the same day as the Government were criticising red tape in government they appointed a giant environmental agency, a coal authority and the Teacher Training Agency. There are now in addition the British Rail organisations, which are to be overseen by quangos. Presumably "Ofrail" will be the title of the new quango. The Daily Telegraph also

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reported that Mr. John Swift QC, rail regulator, needs a chief economic adviser at a salary of £57,000; a director of freight regulation, a technical adviser and a pair of assistant directors at a salary of £49,000 each; a handful of economic and financial analysts and several senior managers all at £41,000. And so the figure multiplies. Mr. Horton, who is responsible for Railtrack, will draw £120,000 per annum.
There has been a proliferation in the number of quangos and the cost must be met by the taxpayer. There will not be a charge against British Railways because it will be privatised. Such expenses are multiplied each time the number of quangos is increased. The Government must look seriously not only at the economic justification of the quangos and whether they are working but at the democratic implications of the loss of power at local level and the greater centralisation that is taking place in our society.
4.4 p.m.
Baroness Miller of Hendon: My Lords, the issue is not how many quangos there are, but whether they do an effective job. The issue is not how much they cost, but whether they give the taxpayer value for money.
I begin by declaring an interest, or perhaps three interests. I am, or have been, a member of three quangos. I also wish to apologise because a previous engagement may mean that I am unable to stay until the conclusion of the debate.
My experience in each of the quangos is relevant to this debate. For two years, until last December, I was a member of the Monopolies and Mergers Commission. Immediately my elevation to your Lordships' House was gazetted, I was removed from an inquiry into the recorded music industry because that inquiry had its origins in the report of a Select Committee of another place, and there was a clear potential for a conflict if the MMC should come to a different conclusion.
After discussion with my honourable friend the Minister I tendered my resignation so that there could be no suggestion about the independence of the MMC both from Parliament or any political party—as indeed, considering its quasi judicial role, it must be. That is how for the first time in my professional and business career I had the traumatic experience of being handed my Form P45!
Speaking of salary, on my appointment to the MMC I was told that the time required would average about two days a week. What a joke that was! After my first inquiry, I returned to shred a pile of documents eight feet high that the commission had had to consider. That was apart from about 20 meetings to take oral evidence or to conduct internal discussions between members of the inquiry and one out-of-town site visit. The result of that inquiry was an immediate reduction in the price of contact lens fluids. The Historical on Line Data inquiry filled a complete filing cabinet drawer and the recorded music one was getting that way before I was taken off it.
This is an appropriate time for me to pay tribute to the hard work, skill and professionalism of the staff of the MMC in preparing and analysing the mass of material
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received or researched by them in the course of an inquiry. I also can confirm that once the evidence is in the report and conclusions are those of the members, uninfluenced by the staff. The MMC performs an important, efficient and effective public service, which gives the public considerable value for money. The cost of each inquiry is a matter of public record.
As the chairman of a family health service authority I am responsible for the primary health care of about 300,000 people. The budget for which I am responsible is some £40 million a year, which in industry or commerce would be regarded as a pretty large company. The salary is based on the assumption that I would have to put in only two half days a week. That is another joke! That does not take into account the statutory bi-monthly open public meeting, all the reading of everything that involves the NHS, conferences with region and others and recently four separate evening consultations with the public on local health service changes where, for the first time in my life, I met rent-a-mob. I can say, even to those of your Lordships who have experienced being heckled on the hustings, that there is nothing quite like it.
In the interests of efficiency, my authority is unofficially combining with our district in a joint health agency. My responsibilities, together with a colleague, now include secondary health care. My budget increases to £162 million, but because my position does not exist officially, despite all my increased productivity, I still receive the same salary as in 1991, which for fun I worked out to be less on an hourly basis than our cleaning lady.
Please do not misunderstand me. I am not complaining but merely wish to point out to your Lordships, and to the noble Lord, Lord Bonham-Carter, in particular, that membership of a quango is no cushy sinecure or job for the boys—or in my case, job for the girls.
The Crown Agents, of whom I am a non-executive director, has an unparalleled international reputation for integrity and efficiency. Strictly speaking, it is not a quango but a statutory corporation whose directors are nominated by the Minister for Overseas Development. Among other things, it is the channel for overseas aid for the World Bank, the European Development Fund, the EC, United Nations, the Japanese Government, the Overseas Development Agency and others. We had a turnover of some £37 million last year, and although we are not only involved in the supply of British goods and services our work has resulted in £2 billion in exports for British industry in the past 10 years and is probably worth 6,000 jobs in the country.
All of this is done without costing the Government a penny and despite being severely constrained by statute from doing many profitable things; things that we are well equipped for. It is also despite the fact that the Overseas Development Authority, a department which the noble Lord shadows, and other government departments which could use our services more, insist that we are given no special preference in the award of contracts. The Crown Agents were responsible for the

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earliest shipments of food aid that were sent to prevent a disaster in the disintegrating Soviet Union. We led and organised the delivery of aid to the former Yugoslavia.
In case any of your Lordships should think that that too was a cushy job, my son went along with one convoy to film it for the Crown Agents' archives, and found himself in the midst of flying bullets and being confronted, along with the rest of the drivers, by very angry, heavily armed militiamen. Incidentally, following what seems to be a family tradition, that job was unpaid, and he even had to buy his own flak jacket. I have arranged for the full details of the unsung efforts of the Crown Agents to be left in the Library for your Lordships' further information.
The noble Lord who initiated this debate has in the course of his very distinguished career of public service himself been the chairman of two quangos for no fewer than 11 years. I refer to the Race Relations Board and Community Relations Commission. That is apart from six years as vice-chairman of the governors of the BBC. He was also a director of the Royal Opera House for almost a quarter of a century, and has been chairman of the Royal Ballet for some eight years.
Those two organisations receive a great deal of public money, for which they are, of course, indirectly publicly accountable via National Heritage. I am certain that from all that vast experience the noble Lord is well aware of the considerable degree of close supervision that is exercised over quangos by Parliament or by the relevant government department and Minister. They, in turn, are fully accountable to Parliament.
I am also certain that the noble Lord, with all his vast experience, knows that the criterion for a public appointment is not mere "democratic representation", which means political intrusion into what should be the performance of non-political duties. Public service of that sort does not require placemen and political time-servers. The noble Lord does less than credit to those who, in a public spirited manner, give of their time and expertise for a reward that is less than their qualifications would earn them in a board room.
Anyone who thinks that he or she is qualified can ask the Public Appointments Unit to be considered for service. In 1987, the Women Into Public Life Campaign—supported by all parties, and of which I am the chairman—presented the Public Appointments Unit with a pile of CVs of highly qualified women. I am pleased to say that the number of women receiving public appointments has risen dramatically. It is not yet enough, I might add, but we have run out of campaigning money. I know very well how carefully the Public Appointments Unit vets all candidates and I know very well from personal experience how people of different political persuasions work together and perform their duties in an absolutely impartial manner. I should like to remind your Lordships what the word "quango" stands for: quasi autonomous non-governmental organisation. In my view, quasi autonomy is better than no autonomy at all.
This Government are dedicated to minimising government intrusion into the life of the country. What better way to do it than by taking responsibility away
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from the mandarins of Whitehall and putting it into the hands of those who have expertise in the real world of commerce, medicine, science or industry.
4.13 p.m.
Lord Desai: My Lords, after that excellent speech, I am relieved to say that I have no interest to declare. Either because of my youth, or because of the party to which I belong or because of some other deep flaw in my character, I am involved with no quangos whatever.
Baroness Hollis of Heigham: You are a failure!
Lord Desai: My Lords, I am a complete failure but, thank God, it gives me time to do something better. The noble Baroness, Lady Miller, made one extremely interesting comment when she said that when she was elevated to the House of Lords, she asked her friend, the Minister, what she should do. That is interesting. Why should one have to ask one's friend, the Minister, whether or not one should continue or resign? I should be master of my own judgment. No doubt I shall never be appointed to a quango.
A great deal has been said about quangos. I believe that there has been a misunderstanding. It is not the case that quangos are bad. Indeed, as a youth I remember studying the British constitution in India and there was a great deal of pride in quangos such as the BBC, the UGC and so on. Those organisations were not quasi-autonomous; they were autonomous. They were made to be autonomous because they were a buffer against the arbitrary interference of political power. Those models—the BBC, the UGC and so on —were used by many other countries as examples to follow.
Today we have something very different. It is not different by accident. If you read the analysis carried out by the Peterhouse intellectuals and Sir Keith Middlernas and others of the political foundations of Thatcherism, its first programme was to discredit those autonomous organisations. They were discredited as being powered by the elite (the great and the good) who were not representative of society. They were considered to be part of the British disease. They were a problem rather than something to be proud of in our British constitution.
Having undermined the credibility of those independent institutions, and having attacked civil society in that way, later, under the same kind of shell, a completely different type of organisation was created. Those are the organisations about which we are complaining today. They are not autonomous or quasi-autonomous. They are the servants of the Ministers who appoint them. They do not exercise independent judgment or authority. That is our complaint.
Indeed, one wonders sometimes when one reads about the people on the quangos, whether they be on an Essex health authority or in the Midlands. Not only do they prove to be massively incompetent and waste a lot of public money, but they also resist admitting that they have wasted public money. There are many inquiries in the press and by the Public Accounts Committee before

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they admit to the gigantic mistakes that have been made. But they have no shame. They continue or go on to something better.
The case of Dr. Gwyn Jones has been mentioned. How is it that after the Public Accounts Committee has criticised that person openly for a massive mismanagement of public funds—and it has not been denied—that same person can occupy a position representing Wales as a governor of the BBC? Why does he not resign? Why does not the Minister concerned make him resign? How many mistakes must one commit before it is admitted that one is incompetent to occupy a position of public trust. The BBC is extremely important because the Government are never slow to criticise the BBC for failing the great British public on questions of morality. They complain about the violence and sex that is shown on television. And yet, there is a certain moral corruption taking place, and I am surprised that such matters are allowed to continue in the name of quasi autonomy.
The trick here is very simple. First, you say that you want to take the power back to the people and away from local government. You say, "local government is terrible. Why is that? Because most councils are Labour-controlled; but we will not go into that". That power is then shifted but it does not go to the people. It goes back to the Ministers. A Minister then makes his own arbitrary little creations, and all the people serving that Minister know that they hold grace and favour appointments. They know that they are to obey only the Minister and they dare not oppose him. It will be a great day when a quango does oppose the Minister. We are all waiting for that day. There is a misuse of rhetoric as regards power to the people.
Secondly, there is the question of accountability. By creating such quasi autonomous bodies, we are allowing the Minister to be unaccountable. Therefore, when questions are asked Ministers can say, "It is nothing to do with us; they are autonomous things and therefore I cannot answer questions about them". Indeed, we have heard many examples of that during Question Time. The point is that although accountability has gone the power remains with the Minister; in other words, the Minister now has power without responsibility. Noble Lords opposite may recall what a former Conservative Prime Minister said about whose privilege it was to have power without responsibility.
What we have is a fundamental undermining of the constitution. It does not matter very much to me how much money is spent or how many people are employed. However, what does matter is that such money is being spent by people who are neither accountable to Parliament nor to the people. Therefore, they are getting away Scot-free. Indeed, we have seen that the Government's claim, so to speak, as regards competence has been proved to be wrong. Moreover, their claim to hold high moral office has also been shown to be defective.
Not only would I like to see the name of every person involved in quangos being publicly available for anyone to check, but also, if anyone is found by a parliamentary process or in any other way to have committed some
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sort of misdemeanour, they should be disqualified from holding any such office for ever. That is the minimum action required to ensure that we get some decent government in this country.
4.21 p.m.
Baroness Williams of Crosby: My Lords, perhaps I may first congratulate my noble friend Lord Bonham-Carter on introducing this very important subject to the House today. I must also say how pleased I am to follow the noble Lord, Lord Desai, who made an extremely interesting contribution. I should like to address most of my remarks to three subjects very briefly: first, the subject of accountability, which was touched upon by the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, in a very interesting way; secondly, the independence of quangos; and, finally, the civic society which we in Britain have for so long been proud to uphold.
However, before I begin, I should like to say a few words about one of the aspects of quangos that we saw literally during the past few days. In this House yesterday we agreed to the Second Reading of a Bill which, as we all know, will create a new set of quangos. It will take away at least in part the final remaining major responsibility of local authorities; namely, the police. Noble Lords on all sides of the House expressed with much justice their anxiety about the decision to replace the power of local authorities with at least the partial power of appointed men and women.
A few days previously, we heard a remarkable speech made to the Conservative Way Forward society by the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Mr. Michael Portillo. I have that speech with me this afternoon. In it, Mr. Portillo referred to his fear about those who,
"hold our national institutions in contempt".
He went on to talk about the fact that those to whom no respect is offered lose respect for themselves. The Government must ask themselves how far they are putting some of our greatest and finest national institutions into contempt, not least the police service which was throughout the world one of the most admired institutions for which this country was responsible in its history.
I could give your Lordships other examples. For instance, the reaction of a distinguished physicist who said to me a few months ago in the United States that we had succeeded in destroying one of the finest university systems in the world. I do not know whether I would agree with him; but I can certainly say that that kind of attitude of concern about this country, its institutions and what is happening to them is not uniquely one that I alone have heard.
Perhaps I may now turn to the three issues to which I referred; namely, accountability, independence and the civic society. There have already been several contributions on the issue of accountability, and I do not wish to duplicate them. However, as my noble friend Lady Robson said, one of the striking aspects of the quangos is how little accountability they have. My noble friend referred to the fact that in the case of the health service it is possible for a district health authority in its new guise—that is, that of a community health

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association or a National Health Service trust—to hold only one meeting a year. It is also possible for quangos to issue no public reports about what they do.
Moreover, it is widely unknown throughout the country just who members of quangos are and, as the noble Lord, Lord Desai, pointed out, there is no public list available anywhere from which one can check such membership. There is also no direct structure of accountability to the Minister. Increasingly, for the reasons so eloquently given by the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, Ministers are able to argue that they no longer follow the details of cases, and therefore cannot be held responsible for them. What the Prime Minister said Ito the Scott inquiry a few days ago is something that most Ministers today would echo, and that is even more so where their powers have been devolved upon a quango.
Accountability does not need to be as obscure and difficult as it is in this country. In the United States—a country to which Mr. Michael Portillo especially pointed to as sharing with us the peer position with regard to the establishment of democracy—there is a straightforward system of accountability for quangos. The chairman of every quango has to be confirmed by Congress; every quango can be questioned by a committee of Congress; and, every quango must make public its objectives and what it does about them. There is no need for the extraordinary obscurity and secrecy that shrouds quangos in our country. I do not believe that the people of Britain deserve to be treated like children from whom the facts of what is happening must be concealed.
Secondly, I turn to the subject of independence. My noble friends Lord Bonham-Carter and Baroness Robson, and other speakers, pointed to the fact that there is no such thing as independence for members of quangos. When I was a Minister, I appointed that incorruptible and fine public servant the noble Lord, Lord Cockfield, to be chairman of the Price Commission because he was the best person available for the job. I knew that he was not of my political view and that he was unlikely ever to be so; but I also knew that he was a man who would carry out his public service without fear or favour.
There are other instances of Ministers selecting for their merit men and women who do not share their political views; but, alas, it is increasingly being seen as a kind of extraordinary idiosyncrasy to speak of public service as if it is not directly related to political activity, political contributions and political donations.
Finally, I should like to speak about something which fills me with growing concern. More than any other country in the world, the UK has built up a civic society to which our citizens believe that they contribute. They believe that they participate in it and that they share responsibility for what our society is like. Seeing citizens as customers wholly misses the concept of public deliberation, the concept of participation and the concept of shared responsibility. For useful though the market is, it cannot capture in its psychology the concept of a civic society.
Like other Members of this House, I quite often go and speak, lecture and conduct seminars in Russia, in
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the Ukraine, in Czechoslovakia, in Poland and in Hungary. Looking at my notes, I notice how often I refer to the civic society that is the ideal that we want such new democracies to move towards. But how can I talk about the ideal of the civic society as realised in my own country when the latter is constantly limiting the abilities of ordinary citizens to contribute to policy, to ideas, to the development of their communities and to this society? That is the final tragedy, and I do not say that with partisan spirit. I have tried to indicate that I do not think that should be the ruling force in our discussion on these matters. I say it because I am sad to see my country losing the capacity to involve citizens, to be accountable to citizens and to recognise the responsibility of citizens. That is what the multiplication of quangos says in the most eloquent language every day that we create yet another one which takes powers away from elected officials.
4.30 p.m.
Lord Moyne: My Lords, I have always thought we should be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Bonham-Carter, for introducing this important subject and the course of this debate has made me even more grateful to him. I am also grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Castle Monis, for his splendidly biblical speech. I wish a few of the Bishops had been here to hear the speech as it might have convinced them of the grace and beauty of the Authorised Version.
There is such a thing as society—I believe that is the point the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, was addressing—and in this country it is a democratic society in which power rises and falls in a circular motion. This was recognised by my own party when we invented the term "quango" as a tease on Labour during the premiership of the noble Lord, Lord Wilson. The quango system is essentially socialistic and it sterns from the authoritarian streak inseparable from socialism. Government and Civil Service, under the quango system, reach down into all parts rather like Heineken beer. In 14 years of Tory rule—we should be ashamed of this—we have pushed quangos to the point where they now take (as someone mentioned) £54 billion of public money. Soon that figure will rise to one-quarter of public expenditure.
Ever increasingly quangos replace elected local authorities who dispose of fewer resources and fewer responsibilities. Yes, the noble Lord, Lord Skiclelsky, is right in this matter. When local education authorities were riding high, they sometimes exerted a tyranny. I remember that from my time in local government. There was a case for the move towards quangos in the days when militant, conspiratorial caucuses of wreckers could hijack local authorities. But thanks in equal measure to Neil Kinnock and Mikhail Gorbachev, times have now changed and our party can afford to reduce the number of quangos and increase the participation of the people, knowing that the people have now become more responsible. There is no sign now of any great extremism in any party in this country. We are fighting a dead enemy in proliferating these quangos and trying to save ourselves from the danger of extremist local authorities.

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The danger now is different. It is that if the Government were by any chance to change, Britain could become like America with its spoils system. If all the members of all the quangos were replaced, I suggest that chaos would result. If the present Opposition were to take advantage of their new power—if they were ever to get to power—and if we were to protest against such abuses, they could say, "You did it too". If that were to happen, how would we reply to that accusation? I believe that this danger should be taken seriously by Ministers. We should remember that we do not necessarily have a permanent lease on power. I also believe that our permanent lease on power becomes the less likely the more we try to rule the country as if we were trying to do everything for everyone. When I first learnt to ride a horse I was told, "Riding is 90 per cent. balance and only 10 per cent. grip". I believe that the art of government is similar.
4.35 p.m.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Moyne, on this matter and to note, very properly, that he has now taken out an insurance policy against the defeat of his Government in the next election. I have a non-interest to declare in this matter. It has been my fortune over my fairly long political career—it extends back to 1931—to have been appointed to two non-governmental organisations. Perhaps one cannot class my first post as such as I was the Parliamentary Private Secretary to Aneurin Bevan. That was an unpaid post and therefore it does not bring any grist to the mill. Later, from 1975 to 1979, I was appointed to another unpaid post, which in those days was the European Parliament. Therefore I can talk about this matter with some experience, albeit with experience that was not gained at a high remunerative level.
I also have some experience of working at the Ministry of Health with the right honourable Aneurin Bevan. I am minded to mention that by the remarks that passed through the lips of the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, who mentioned my colleague. I well remember when Aneurin Bevan was appointing the regional hospital boards in those days, that there were loud lamentations in the parliamentary party that we were appointing Tories to those posts. Indeed, there was much acrimony between some members of my party, notably the late Mrs. Bessie Braddock, as regards the composition of the Liverpool regional hospital board. In point of fact my right honourable friend adopted the principle—this was referred to in the excellent speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Williams of Crosby—of selecting the best person for the job.
There is one thing about which I am quite certain. I do not think we have yet heard, or will ever hear in today's climate, any complaints from the Benches of the party opposite that Labour people are being appointed to these various quangos because of course they can have no complaint on that ground at all. I implore the noble Earl when he replies not merely to refer to non-departmental quangos, for which the comparative figures are given in Public Bodies 1993 which is
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published in a glossy form and at a cost of £12, but to refer also to the departmental quangos where comparative figures have not been provided. If he challenges the figures that have been produced by the noble Lord, Lord Bonham-Carter, he would be wise not to refer to the restricted version contained in the Government's own publication on public bodies which, as I have said before, contains no comparative figures in respect of departmental quangos. The noble Earl will be aware of that.
I very much agree with some of the remarks made by the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky. I believe that there is scope for these non-governmental organisations. I do not believe it is always possible in respect of very specialised functions to have related bodies; but what is important is the political climate in which these quangos are established. Immediately following the war and almost up to the time that the present Government came into office there was a political climate in this country which broadly—I speak across party—believed in "fair do's" for all parties. A genuine endeavour was made by all Prime Ministers of whatever party to ensure that no accusation could be made against them that they were being partial in respect of their supporters. I doubt whether that condition exists today. Since 1979 we have had a progressive politicisation of the Civil Service of which there have been many examples, notably the recent court hearing in the Matrix Churchill case. In that case civil servants were forced to admit that they had been party to the deception of Parliament. All one has to do is read the proceedings to appreciate that. That is not the kind of climate in which public accountability flourishes.
Moreover, there has been a general growing tendency on the part of a government that has become arrogant after 15 years in office to assume that people who are to be given responsibilities are "one of us". That process has gone on to a considerable extent and has accelerated over the past few years. I do not wish to give too many quotations involving such instances. However, I must refer to a report that appeared in one of the remaining newspapers which are faithful to the present Government. I have not thought fit to make any quotations from the Guardian which I realise is highly suspect in government circles, although I draw your Lordships' attention to an article in that newspaper on 17th November last which contained a detailed examination of quangos. I refer your Lordships to a short feature which appeared in the Sunday Express of 16th January of this year:
"The newly-appointed chief of a hospital trust in Derbyshire is to earn £20,000 a year for working as few as seven hours a week. David Dawson will start work as chairman of the Derbyshire Royal Infirmary Trust this April. He already earns £50,000 a year in another job as chief executive of the Government-funded Derby Pride Ltd".
This gentleman is a former managing director of Rolls-Royce and Associates in Derby.
If the noble Lord, Lord Dean of Beswick, were here he would have been able to refer your Lordships to the reports of the Public Accounts Committee in another place which showed the gross incompetence and inefficiency of the Wessex and West Midlands Health

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Authorities. There is no reason to suppose that these are by any means isolated instances. This cannot go on. We must have far greater accountability than exists now.
The attitude of the Government has been made quite clear: it has either deliberately abolished local authorities with which it disagrees or severely limited them. Your Lordships will recall the abolition of the GLC. That was done on the somewhat spurious grounds that some of its expenditures of very minor amounts were eccentric in nature. In point of fact, the reason why the GLC was abolished was that after its enlargement it still obstinately refused to vote Conservative.
I may be wrong, but I predict that exactly the same thing will happen in relation to Kent County Council. That body is due to be abolished despite the resistance of all parties, including that of noble Lords opposite. In its place are due to be inserted seven independent f ld10district councils at an estimated extra cost of £26 million. On the basis of what has happened in the past, I predict that the district councils will be found to be inefficient—indeed, that is bound to be so because of their number and duplication—and the situation will resolve itself into another reorganisation that will further limit the powers of the new councils.
Exactly the same thing has been done to local authorities throughout the United Kingdom. From the point of view of the Government they have a titular responsibility, but in reality they cannot carry out the responsibility because the Government deliberately cap and limit them in every conceivable form. Instead, we have a plethora of quangos responsible to no one who are charged with getting value for money out of services that were never conceived as anything other than public services. I do not believe that this is an atmosphere that the country will put up with for very much longer. In the past few weeks there has been much talk about "back to basics". We have to get back to honour, integrity, justice, fairness and compassion, not merely the naked cash nexus 'twixt man and man.
4.48 p.m.
Lord Lester of Herne Hill: My Lords, it is a particular pleasure to follow a speaker such as the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington, with his robust common sense and manifest sense of dedicated public service. I am sure that we are all grateful to my noble friend Lord Bonham-Carter for having drawn attention to the almost tropical luxuriance of growth of quangos under this Government.
I wish to speak about the serious problem of partisan political patronage and the breach of the arm's length rule, to which the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, referred earlier. I am sorry to say that party connection and personal favouritism are eroding the back-to-basic or great Victorian principles of a public service based on individual merit, integrity and trust. The massive scale of abuse through political patronage is, I believe, unprecedented. We have seen example after example of political bias in appointments to quangos and executive agencies. (The lights are going out all over the House; I hope they will come on again before long).
I wish to give just one example of a gross misuse of a Minister's powers of appointment of patronage. Three
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years ago the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, published a thorough and comprehensive review of the causes of the prison riots. One of his main recommendations for greater justice in prisons was the creation of a prison ombudsman. In his report he emphasised the vital importance of the independence of that new public officer. He or she would have to deal with complaints and appeals concerning the rights and liberties of prisoners vis-a-vis the public prison administration. In their consultative paper, the Government accepted the recommendations of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf. The Home Secretary of the day, Mr. Kenneth Clarke, authorised a selection procedure using the Civil Service Commission. The selection procedure was based upon public advertising and one of the newspapers used was the Guardian. Those who took part in the Civil Service process were the Civil Service Commissioner, Mr. Michael Geddes, a Home Office Deputy Under-Secretary of State in charge of personnel, Mr. Terry Platt, and an independent expert in the field, Mrs. Mary Tuck who, until 1989, had been head of the Home Office Research and Planning Unit. She was described in the report as a particularly well versed person.
After considering the response to the public advertisements, the names of three people were submitted to the new Home Secretary, Mr. Michael Howard: Professor Sean McConville, a well respected academic who has spent many years teaching in Chicago, and I believe that he favours prison privatisation; Professor Rod Morgan, the Dean of the Law Faculty and professor of criminal justice at Bristol University and a magistrate of some 30 years' standing; and Stephen Shaw, the much respected director of the Prison Reform Trust.
However, the new Home Secretary, Mr. Michael Howard, rejected all three candidates as being too Left-wing or, in the Home office euphemism, because he wished to consider candidates from "a wider range of backgrounds". Apparently Mr. Howard even refused a request by his own Permanent Under-Secretary of State to meet one of the candidates in person who could not by any stretch of political language be described as Left-wing. The Home Secretary cannot have acted on the basis of an informed view of the objective merits of those well-qualified candidates, each of whom had been independently selected on the basis of public competition, public advertisement and objective criteria. Mr. Howard exercised a political veto because he did not like the political views which he ascribed to the three candidates.
Your Lordships will be interested to know that selection is now under direct Home Office control. The post has been readvertised, this time in the Daily Telegraph rather than the Guardian, and not by the Civil Service Commission. A firm of accountants—my own accountants—Coopers & Lybrand Executive Resourcing Limited have been retained to find a list of candidates more to Mr. Howard's liking. Given that history, whoever is chosen will be widely regarded as the Home Secretary's placeman, or woman, diminished by the political manner of the selection and appointment. The essential confidence of the public and

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prison population, and of prison staff, in his or her vital independence will have been gravely undermined by this misuse of the power of patronage.
As the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington, pointed out, it was not ever thus. My noble friend Lady Williams of Crosby has already reminded us of her arm's length ministerial record. However, perhaps I may mention another. When I served in the mid-1970s as special adviser to the Home Secretary, my noble friends Lord Jenkins of Hillhead and Lord Harris of Greenwich were careful to appoint well qualified candidates on their merits to important public offices on quangos irrespective of their politics. Prominent Conservative supporters were appointed, like Lady Howe as deputy chairman of the Equal Opportunities Commission and Sir David Lane, the former Conservative Minister of State at the Home Office, as the first chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality. It was well understood that those responsible for independent public authorities should be selected for their individual qualities from all political parties and from none.
Members of this or any future Government would do well to remember, in the words of the noble Lord, Lord Moyne, that they are only temporarily in office: that they enjoy power, not for its own sake but only in the interests of their fellow citizens. Government would do well to remember that public appointments are not the personal property of Ministers; that public officers occupy positions of public trust; and that appointments to those positions should be based on merit and ability rather than upon a positive answer to Mrs. Thatcher's famous question, "Is he one of us?". If Ministers continue to abuse their powers of appointment, to fragment public authorities and to sap their independence and morale, and to breed a mood of public cynicism about the corruption of patronage then I, for one, fear for the health of the great public service of this country.
4.58 p.m.
Lord Monkswell: My Lords, I, too, am worried about the political patronage of members of quangos, the high pay that they seem to attract, and their control over public resources.
As tail-end Charlie yet again in one of your Lordships' debates, I shall consider the matter from a slightly different matter—the erosion of democracy. As a supposedly democratic Government, it does them no credit to go about their business in a way that does not esteem the democratic process, as they have done for 15 years, and as they continue to do so.
One of the issues that worries people about quangos is the direct control that Ministers can exercise because members of quangos tend to be accountable to them. They are picked by them, appointed by them, paid by them and disposed of by them. One of the intriguing matters about which we have learnt this week is that Ministers are not in a position to exert such control because they cannot read all the papers that pass across their desks. They do not know what all their placemen are doing. That is critical. If a system has developed over the past few years whereby those men—it is
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predominantly men, and some women—who exercise power, spend public money and run public or quasi-public institutions are not accountable almost to anyone, we run grave risks. The problem of the Wessex Health Authority is one such example. There is so much of this going on that it is impossible for Ministers to direct those placemen in their activities. We need to think in terms of a structure, of the devolution of decision making. It must be a democratic structure which enables accountability to the people. We must recognise that that accountability is important and we are talking predominantly about the expenditure of public money—though it goes wider than that—which is provided by taxation paid by everyone.
With this structure which could be developed to provide accountability, I suggest that we start at the lowest level with the parish or town, a level that is responsible for dealing, for example, with nursery and primary education, the community and the family doctor health services, local roads and similar matters. At the next level, we could think in terms of the city, borough or district which would have responsibility for high schools, further education, tertiary colleges and the local district general hospital under the health service. Then going up another level, we may come to the metropolitan counties, the counties or regions of our country. That level would have the accountability of universities, teaching hospitals and other institutions which serve at county or regional level. At national level, there would be responsibility for national research and the equalisation of resources which will be disbursed.
If we had a structure built up in that way with various levels of accountability, we may then realise that all the activities currently carried out by quangos could be fitted in at one level or another and therefore they could be held accountable. It is sad that the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, is no longer in his seat because I was going to make a point about his anxiety over politics overriding professional judgment. Another noble Lord commented that it was important that professionals should be on tap and not on top. Most confident accountable politicians are happy to take the advice available from professionals and to use it wisely in the furtherance of public service.
One of the difficulties we have at the moment is a government in retreat who have no confidence particularly in the people of the country and the democratically expressed will of the people. While it is not in our hands to give the Government that confidence, I hope that they will realise that if they were to trust people more and trust democracy more, they might receive more support.
5.4 p.m.
Lord Holme of Cheltenham: My Lords, this has been an extraordinarily interesting debate, with several notable contributions during the afternoon. It is probably invidious to single out one particular noble Lord, but I should like to mention the aplomb with which my noble friend Lord Lester—who is relatively new to the House—dealt with the flickering lights, reassuring those of us with a nervous disposition that the

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debate would continue. Our principal thanks are due to my noble friend Lord Bonham-Carter, not just for prompting the debate and putting down the Motion, but for the extremely spirited introduction which he gave and which set the tenor for our subsequent discussions.
Several noble Lords mentioned the Cardiff Business School projection that there will be 7,700 quangos of one kind or another by 1996. We know that that is true from personal experience because there is hardly a debate in the House, hardly a Bill put before your Lordships which does not have as one of its provisions the creation of a new public body or quango. My noble friend Lady Williams mentioned yesterday's debate. What we have been witnessing over past years is a massive transfer of power from elected government to this new magistracy.
As we have been reminded this afternoon, the noble Baroness, Lady Thatcher, when Prime Minister, set herself as one of her objectives the defeat of quangos, to roll them back. We all know what happened; we can see what happened—the quangos defeated her. The party opposite is nothing if not pragmatic in its pursuit of power; when it realised that it could not beat the quangos, it decided to join them. So the members have, in their thousands. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, who sadly is not here now. What we need in a member of a quango is independence and sound judgment. I add another criterion to which several noble Lords referred—we need people who are public spirited, who look to the wider public interest.
I am not saying that many members of the Conservative Party do not have that public spirit, that wisdom or do not have some independence. But we need to look at what is happening in terms of appointments to those bodies. It has been estimated that 40,000 are in the gift of the Government. It is difficult for that process to be seen as reinforcing independence, if it is against a background of a government which used to be led by a Prime Minister who asked the question: "Is he or she one of us?"; where a government Minister is reported as having said as recently as March last year: "I can't remember knowingly appointing a Labour supporter".
We should make no mistake, what we see here is a veritable fountain of patronage. Many Conservatives bathe in that fountain; some may come out cleaner, but most of them come out wealthier as a result. We in this country have created a comprehensive system of social security for the Conservative Party—supplementary benefit for the boys. Despite the remarks of the noble Baroness, Lady Miller, they are mostly boys. It is a kind of welfare state within a state.
As for the recipients, what we have is what used to be called in the 18th century, "placemen". My noble friend Lord Bonham-Carter referred to Lord Rockingham and I would say that we have a spoils system now which would have made even the Duke of Newcastle's mouth water.
There is only one bright spot; this is not all gloom. With the increasing demand for places on quangos and what I understand is the rapidly declining membership of the Conservative Party, at some point the
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Government will run out of dependable friends. Demand for those close students of the market will begin to exceed supply.
More seriously, there are only three possible motives for the fact that the "one of us" philosophy has become so comprehensively entrenched in appointments to quangos. Two of them are disreputable and the third is unbelievable. The first has been referred to in this debate by the noble Lords, Lord Desai, Lord. Moyne, and others. It is that appointing Conservatives and Conservative supporters to the bodies allows Ministers to retain control through shared loyalty and shared ideology at the very point where they should be seeking independent judgment. It is government by stealth. It is Conservative government by other means, rather than part of the pluralism of the civic society to which my noble friend Lady Williams referred in her most interesting speech.
The second motive is perhaps even more disreputable. It is that membership of such bodies is a reward of some sort for faithful party support—a sort of pay-off for services rendered.
The third possible motive strains credulity to the limit. It is that Conservative Ministers might—and I ask noble Lords to entertain this proposition—actually believe that Conservatives have a monopoly on wisdom and civic virtue, and that those qualities are not to be found in members of other parties and people of no politics at all who do not support the Conservative Party. But perhaps even that motive is hot as incredible as it should be. After 14 years in power, with all the inevitable creeping arrogance to which the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington, referred, the Conservative Government seem very often to confuse party interest with the public interest, and the Conservative Government with the British nation. They are not the same.
I ask noble Lords opposite—I do not expect the noble Earl, nor indeed the Front Bench, to agree, but I include those who have made such thoughtful speeches this afternoon —to reflect whether this drift to the assumption that Britain is somehow a one-party country, and the arrogance that accompanies it, do not help to create the very cynicism to which Mr. Fortino referred last week.
We need new definitions of the proper best practice for quangos which will deal with questions of appointment; of arm's-length relationships with the sponsoring Minister and ministry; of responsibilities for their report and the form in which they measure progress against their given objectives; and of their independence of judgment. Then, we need the equivalent of the Public Accounts Committee in Parliament to ensure proper parliamentary supervision of quangos. Public confidence must be restored. I believe that that will need greater wisdom and restraint on the part of the Government in the way that they select members for such bodies and the way in which they allow them to proliferate. It will also need a greater willingness on the part of us all, on the part of Parliament, to exercise the responsibility of ensuring independence and proper operation.
5.13 p.m.
Baroness Hollis of Heigham: My Lords, much of the Maastricht debate was about the democratic deficit—yet it took place in a country which, as has been said today, has seen the disappearance of its Civil Service and the destruction of local government. Taken together, they generate a democratic deficit that is infinitely more damaging. Like other noble Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Bonham-Carter, for today's debate.
The Civil Service is increasingly fragmented into next-step agencies which are at one remove from ministerial and parliamentary scrutiny. By next year they might well cover two-thirds of the entire Civil Service. There has been a managerial revolution based on market testing, contracts and eventually competition; changes which, as Vernon Bogdanor has said, are subverting our constitutional understanding. The assumption that public services may be delivered more effectively along business lines is misleading. Many services are public, as the noble Lord, Lord Rayner, said, precisely because no sane business would undertake them—as the absurdities of the Railways Act have taught us all, except perhaps the Government.
In that process we have discarded the public ethic in a Civil Service that is unrivalled in Europe. We have discarded the idea of ministerial responsibility, the unity of the Civil Service, and the consensus governing its integrity, objectivity and impartiality. The doctrine of ministerial responsibility, as "Iraqgate" should tell us, is not (the noble Lord, Lord Skidelsky, notwithstanding) that Ministers are blamed, but that a Minister takes the blame; that is, that he rectifies mistakes and corrects situations that have gone wrong. It is designed not to protect a Civil Service from criticism, but to locate accountability for the actions of government where in a democracy it should be located; namely, in the hands of elected politicians.
Let us look at the Child Support Agency, which decided to maximise its yield and improve the performance related pay of its chief executive not by targeting those who paid nothing, but by hounding those who might be pressed to pay more. That was a shift of policy dictated by commercial considerations. That is financially very sensible if what matters is Treasury support and not child support, but it is utterly at odds with the intentions of Parliament. Yet there is no way for Parliament to hold the agency to account for that policy shift.
Let us take the Benefits Agency. How can it be considered to be a business when its 20 million customers cannot shop around, cannot remove their custom, cannot use market mechanisms to demand different services and cannot ensure increased expenditure on benefits in any way save through the ballot box? When, one commentator has asked, is a business not a business? The answer is: when it cannot go out of business.
In the past 15 years, and increasingly now, we have seen the Civil Service become increasingly fragmented,
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privatised, commercialised, more secretive and less accountable. And all that has long been happening to local government.
The Thatcher years placed their tanks on the lawns of dissent, gunning at trade unions, universities and, above all, local government. Local government failed the only test that the Government cared about; namely, that it should do as it was told. It is precisely because local government had its own democratic mandate, spoke for its local communities and reflected local differences that in the past 15 years the Government have introduced 150 Acts of Parliament in order to bring it to heel. They have done so because in government eyes it said too much, did too much, spoke too much, spent too much, and it was "Labour" too much.
Therefore, the Government capped and controlled local government finances and insisted that no matter what local citizens were willing to vote for and pay for, the Secretary of State would determine what they got—citizens had to be protected from the consequences of their own democratic judgment.
Did too much! Said too much! "Labour" too much! That is the core of today's debate. Government have removed local government responsibilities to central government and to quangos, placing them beyond local scrutiny and local accountability.
In consequence, as many noble Lords have said, spending on quangos is now far greater than that of all the local authorities put together. In East Anglia, at the last count, nearly 30 major quangos were spending my money in my name without my knowledge, my consent, my vote or my scrutiny. We have regional government in this country but we do not have regional democracy.
Let us take London. In 1985 the GLC was abolished. But London continued to have a government; it was merely not a democratic or an elected one. It was replaced with a corporate elite: the London Regional Transport Authority; the London Docklands Corporation; the London Residuary Body; the London Arts Board; the London Tourist Board; the London training and enterprise councils; the Housing Corporation; the London health authorities; the London city challenge boards. They all spend, without a vote, some £7.5 billion. Efforts are now ahead to bring them together in a London forum, which the Secretary of State, being the man he is, insists on calling London Pride.
Who replaces the elected representatives? Why, it is businessmen, of course. Thus, the three objectives of government are met: business methods, however inappropriate; the imposition locally of central government policies; and, as the previous Minister for the Environment said in this House, being "never knowingly Labour". In Professor Stewart's phrase, they are the new unelected magistracy.
Who are these bodies? A year ago the Financial Times survey of the 40 largest quangos showed that 38 of the 40 people who chaired them were men; 36 of the 40 had been to public school; and not one was identifiable as a Liberal Democrat or Labour supporter. It also showed that most of the companies from which those men were recruited donated to Tory Party funds.

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As an article in the Local Government Chronicle of 3rd December 1993 records, the London Docklands Development Corporation has four board members linked with companies donating to Tory party funds, as do four of the 11 members of the British Coal Corporation, the boss of London Transport and the chairman of the Housing Corporation, who is also chairman of Sun Alliance and who just happened to donate £50,000 to the Conservative Party in 1992. I could go on in the same vein.
As Phillip Holland wrote:
"Ministers have discovered that the system of quangos can be used for shedding personal responsibility, rewarding friends, expanding the corporate state, diminishing the authority of Parliament (and local government) and enabling them [the Ministers] to retain a measure of control over the interpretation of their own statutes".
The growth areas into which quangos have moved—local government, health and education, as we have heard tonight —are precisely those areas where there has been strong ideological support for Left of Centre and often Labour Party policies. The more that the Government have lost local elections, the more they have stripped power and functions from elected bodies to give to unelected bodies run by their friends and financial supporters. It has become an extension of the honours system. It is another way of giving "gongs" with pay to loyal supporters of the Tory Party, whose firms in turn contribute to Tory Party funds. As the Economist noted (quoted in the Local Government Chronicle):
"What power Ministers have taken for themselves they are giving to their friends".
Such cronyism, as my noble friend Lord Bruce suggested, may be the path to corruption.
When, in the last years of the 19th century, Gladstone, Chamberlain and Lord Salisbury corralled the unelected quangos of their day—the improvement commissions, poor law boards, health boards, school boards and the Metropolitan Board of Works—into elected local government, they did so for three reasons that are as valid now as they were then. The first reason was the issue of public probity. In most cities local government have annual elections, visible councillors, a register of their interests, annual reports and comparisons with other authorities, and performance indicators by which those who pay for the services may judge them. Councillors must declare financial interests and then not vote. It is much tougher than any code of conduct operating in this House or the other place.
The public in turn have a right to information, to attend meetings and to see documents. What angers me about the Westminster City Council scandal is not just the wretched way in which they treated the homeless, nor just the social cleansing for political gain but—to paraphrase Michael Portillo—the deliberate cynicism which has destroyed the civic values of public probity.
Quangos, by contrast, are deliberately secretive. The public and press have no right to attend any meeting other than an AGM. They have no right to inspect documents and no right to know. Private arrangements are made for audits. They have no district auditor and, except for the health authorities, they have no ombudsmen. They are not locally accountable and not
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even locally known. Their names, addresses and telephone numbers are kept anonymous, precisely to ensure that what they say and do cannot be scrutinised by the people who pay for them. To be accountable is not why such people joined a quango. Notwithstanding the noble Baroness, Lady Miller of Hendon, at best there is a long, opaque and uncertain line of accountability from such quangos to the Minister who appointed them or appointed the people who appointed them.
But if the first objection to quangos foreshadowed by Gladstone and Salisbury was the issue of public probity, the second was that quangos make bad policy. By definition they are single service bodies, confined to and blinkered by the boundaries of their formal responsibility and therefore with no responsibility for interconnecting with other organisations. So water authorities disconnect. They disconnected 21,000 properties last year and there has been a threefold increase in dysentery and hepatitis. Houses become unfit and families become sick. The bill for health, social services and housing rises. But so do the profits of water companies because they have exported their costs and their problems to other people. Who, in a world of individualised quangos maximising their profits, has an eye to community need or community interests.
Consider the police. We are in a time of rising crime and desperate need for policing by consent—for community policing. Yesterday's debate showed that we shall be destroying the old police authorities and snapping their links with local communities. They are bad policies. Or consider housing and the outrage at single mothers who lay back and thought of a council house. Precisely because rented housing is being bought by individuals and transferred to quangos and trusts, local authorities do not have the resources that they need to meet the needs of the homeless and those on waiting lists. As a result, the Government have turned the homeless, who are the victims of its housing policy, into the villains of the Government's moral decline.
Consider planning. There have been enterprise zones, UDCs, city action areas and urban regeneration agencies required to act commercially. They have declared UDI from local planning and thereby local authorities have lost the power to ensure that the benefits of economic regeneration are recycled back into local government. So for every three jobs created by a UDC, two jobs are lost elsewhere. They have often stripped rather than strengthened the economic fabric of their communities.
Or consider health. At just the point in time when Care in the Community needs networking and connectedness between health, social services and housing, it has been fragmented into free-standing trusts. We have removed local councillors from health authorities and joint planning has been fractured. It is the sick who are hurt.
The third and final reason that the quangos were corralled, and it still applies, is the democratic deficit. Public probity—yes; better policy making—yes; but above all what matters is the democratic deficit. In a quite extraordinary lecture last summer, the Minister for open government, William Waldegrave, insisted that the

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development of quangos strengthened public accountability because they were more responsive to their customers. Apparently, for him democracy is simply mass consumerism; citizen means customer; and public accountability means the market. We hope to heaven that the hidden hand in politics, as in economics, will deliver the community good. Turn citizens into consumers and customers and you empower the powerful and magnify the voices of the big spenders; but you render invisible those with little access to the market place: the old, the poor, the sick and the inarticulate.
Democracy is about representation and accountability. As Professor John Stewart, said: those who exercise power in society should be answerable for it, because the power does not belong to those who exercise it but to the citizens on whose behalf it is exercised.
Monetarism has helped to wreck our manufacturing economy. Quangos have done the same to our civic economy. Cronyism and corruption, as at Westminster Council, will wreck our moral economy. The evidence is around to see and has brought politics into contempt.
5.28 p.m.
The Parliamentary Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Earl Howe): My Lords, the House will undoubtedly be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Bonham-Carter, for tabling this very interesting debate. It has stimulated some eloquent and indeed forceful contributions. I shall endeavour to cover as many points as I can in my reply.
First, we ought to be clear about what the Motion asks us to do. It has been said that every list of quangos is as long as a piece of string. That is because of the difficulties of definition and classification. "Quango" is an American term in origin. As my noble friend Lady Miller reminded us, it is an acronym for quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisation. The Motion yokes quangos with those more definable animals, non-departmental public bodies and executive agencies, which are in fact part of government departments.
The Motion is a blunderbuss. In one discharge it sprays with shot such very diverse organisations as the Benefits Agency, the Housing Corporation, the Patents Office, the Passport Office, the Arts Council, the British Council and a whole host of tribunals and advisory committees. Some noble Lords who have spoken want to add new forms of organisations in the education sector; others want them in the NHS. We are debating an amorphous list within which is an immense variety of organisations in terms of size, purpose and spending power. Can sensible generalisations be made about such an aggregation of different purposes and functions? I doubt it.
What would perhaps be useful therefore is to home in on the more definable terms in the Motion and, more specifically, to non-departmental public bodies, or NDPBs. By that we normally mean those public bodies which have a part to play in the processes of national government and which, although part of the public sector, are in some degree distinct from and independent
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of government departments. The number of such bodies has been recorded on a consistent basis since 1979—that is to say, on the basis of definitions broadly corresponding to those set down by Sir Leo Pliatsky in his report on the subject. The count of such bodies does not therefore include individual educational establishments; it never included universities, for example, and does not include grant-maintained schools.
If we look at NDPBs in the context of the Motion, there is a simple fact which deserves stating: it is that numbers, far from having risen, have fallen substantially. Certainly it is true that within those lower numbers expenditure has grown. Among the big spenders we find the funding bodies for housing associations, legal aid and many of the arts, sports and heritage funding bodies. We find also the regional health authorities, the bodies through which resources for much of the health service are channelled and the higher education funding councils. It is therefore worth asking noble Lords opposite a question. Do they really deplore the size of the resources at the disposal of bodies such as those? I will expand on that theme in a moment.
Then we come to executive agencies. As the noble Lord, Lord Bonham-Carter, is aware, executive agencies are those units within government departments which have been set up as a result of the programme of reorganisation of the executive functions of government under the Next Steps initiative. That programme has been very successful. It brought into the open whole areas of the executive which were previously submerged in Whitehall departments and made them more accessible. Ministers are accountable for their functions now as they always have been. And if we look at the substantial resources at the disposal of those bodies, there is nothing sinister about them. Their size is simply a result of transposing a large range of functions from the traditional departmental Civil Service into a new form of organisation. The principles of the Next Steps agency have been extensively debated and to a great extent have bipartisan recognition and support. It is perhaps due to the blurred focus of the Motion that the agencies are included in what must be one of the most extensive charge sheets ever placed before the House.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, before the noble Earl leaves that point, perhaps he will refer to page viii in the document Public Bodies 1993, which refers to another category which has not yet been touched upon. I refer to the number of departmental appointments by gender to boards and tribunals. Included in those are NHS bodies which he himself included in the previous category. The total number of people employed there in 1993 was 42,606. No comparative figures are put in for 1979.
Earl Howe: My Lords, I am coming to the detailed numbers in a moment. If we look in more detail at NDPBs during the period 1979–1993, as I said, there has been a reduction in their number from 2,167 to 1,389. That is a fall of 36 per cent. The 1993 total includes 829 advisory bodies which cost little and provide specialist advice, as well as 68 tribunals which protect the interests of the individual. Those figures were published

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last month in Public Bodies 1993. The figure quoted by the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, of 7,700 quangos by the year 1996, has no basis in reality.
Executive NDPBs are set up generally under specific legislation to operate at arm's length from government. That has always been their purpose. They include bodies which provide useful functions such as the housing corporations, museums, English and Scottish National Heritage and funding councils such as the Arts Council. Similar bodies have existed for a long period; for example, the poor law boards in the 19th century. I fail to see why we should condemn the existence of NDPBs as the Motion invites us to do. Indeed, as I shall explain, everything points to the opposite view.
The noble Lord, Lord Bruce, looked at me disapprovingly when I dealt somewhat briefly with the figure that he mentioned. That figure was lifted straight out of an article in the Guardian. How did they purport to arrive at it? They did so by including executive agencies which do not fall into the category of NDPBs. But, more significantly, they did it by including an estimated future total of 5,000 grant-maintained schools. If one includes every grant-maintained school as a quango, one begins to distort the English language.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, I trust the noble Earl will forgive me for interrupting him again. I did not quote any figures from the Guardian. He may be confusing me with another noble Lord who spoke either before me or afterwards. If the noble Earl looks at the report tomorrow, he will find no figures from the Guardian in my speech.
Earl Howe: My Lords, the figure was quoted. I apologise if it was not the noble Lord, Lord Bruce, who quoted it.
Executive NDPBs have governing boards whose members serve out of a sense of public duty, some of them receiving little or no remuneration. Whatever noble Lords opposite suggest, appointments to the boards of those bodies are made solely on the basis of suitability.
I want to pay tribute to noble Lords and others who give their time and expertise to those duties. As a number of noble Lords have dwelt on this topic in an air of some unreality, let me briefly put reality on the record. The names of potential candidates for appointments may be drawn from a variety of sources. They may come from the public appointments unit; from professional and representative groups; from self nominations; from advertising; from executive researchers; or they may be names already known to the Minister or senior officials involved. But wherever the names come from, selection is on merit and aptitude and depends on the careful appraisal of candidates against the specification for the appointment.
Ministers need always to be satisfied that the successful candidate has the qualities and expertise required, and the necessary time to give to the appointment. As for political bias, the public appointments system is an open system. Individuals are free to nominate themselves or other people to be included on the databases of people willing to serve on public bodies. Opposition parties regularly nominate
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such people and prominent posts in public bodies have been and continue to be held by those who do riot support the Government.
Baroness Williams of Crosby: My Lords, perhaps the noble Earl can name one chairman of any of the 40 leading quangos who has an association with any party other than his own.
Earl Howe: My Lords, I do not carry names in my head but I shall gladly write to the noble Baroness. What I say is correct.
My noble friend Lady Denton was mentioned in the debate. The quotation given was accurate, but only because my noble friend never inquires into a candidate's political affiliations. As she said at the time of that quotation, and as the newspaper which quoted her conceded in a correction, she aimed always to appoint the best qualified person for the job. That is as it should be.
That said, it is right that every proposal for new NDPBs should be examined very carefully. In fact, a new body is set up only if it can be demonstrated to be the most appropriate and cost-effective instrument for the task. The relationship between each NDPB and its sponsoring department is clearly defined in a way which supports the appropriate degree of delegation and independence of the NDPB, while assuring the accountable Minister and departments that financial management arrangements are as they should be.
Furthermore, each executive NDPB is subject to a comprehensive review at least every five years. The review addresses the continuing need for that body, the scope for privatisation or contracting out, the body's objectives and its financial and other management systems. In order to take account of the views of those outside parties which may have an interest, Ministers have agreed that the reviews of each large executive NDPB will be publicly announced so as to allow an opportunity for discussion about its future structure and status. Advisory and other bodies are also reviewed every five years. And of course bodies which have completed their task or are no longer needed are wound up.
The Motion invites us to assume that most NDPBs were once under democratic control and are no longer so. That, as it happens, is by no means true. But the idea that NDPBs are not accountable for the use of public funds because they are not elected is completely misconceived. I remind noble Lords opposite that the Minister responsible for an NDPB is accountable to Parliament for the degree of independence which that NDPB enjoys, for its usefulness as an instrument of government policy and so, ultimately, for the overall effectiveness and efficiency with which it carries out its functions.
As I previously said, most executive NDPBs operate under powers laid down in statute. That is an important point because their role is thereby restricted to specific purposes designed to serve national aims and objectives. Every executive NDPB publishes annual reports and accounts which enable Parliament, the taxpayer and customer to judge whether that NDPB is securing value for money. As the noble Lord, Lord Bonham-Carter,

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well knows, accountability does not stop there. The accounts of executive NDPBs are subject to audit by the National Audit Office which reports to Parliament on their operations. The Public Accounts Committee scrutinises the activities of NDPBs closely and may summon the chief executive of an NDPB to give evidence if there is any suggestion that it is not conducting its operations as economically, efficiently and effectively as it should. Those are very real controls.
There are, however, ways of improving accountability, both to Parliament and to customers. The Government are committed to applying Citizen's Charter principles to NDPBs and encouraging executive NDPBs to prepare management statements—similar to Next Steps Agency framework documents—as a means of clarifying respective roles and responsibilities. We also want to see increasing emphasis placed on the use of performance targets covering financial performance, quality of service and efficiency; and publication of how well those targets have been met.
During the past year, the number of NDPBs has fallen by 23. Expenditure and government funding have gone up. It is worth just saying that the rise in funding has been confined to a small number of bodies and relates to increases in programme expenditure—in other words, resources that are distributed—not administrative costs. Between them, the Housing Corporation, the Legal Aid Board, the Scottish Legal Aid Board and Scottish Homes accounted for more than two-thirds of the total funding and expenditure increases in 1993.
The noble Lord, Lord Bonham-Carter, has criticised the Government's public service reforms on the alleged grounds that they have transferred power from elected and therefore accountable bodies to a range of appointed and therefore unaccountable quangos, trusts and other organisations; and instead of increasing the control of the individual citizen over his or her public services, he contends that the reforms have reduced it. That theme was echoed by many noble Lords. When one hears that kind of criticism it is generally accompanied by a call for more power to local authorities, particularly in the fields of health and education. Indeed, so it proved today. Of course, these issues are not new. There has always been some tension in the boundaries between central and local government. However, far from there being a loss in accountability of this country's public services to the electorate, there has actually been a gain.
Let us take education. Education is often regarded as a prime example of the loss of accountability because of the removal of grant-maintained schools from local authority control. But what the Government have actually done is to break crucial new ground in strengthening real accountability. The establishment of the national curriculum enables parents to be clearly aware of the distinct and separate responsibilities for this fundamental element of their children's education. The Government are accountable for the framework of the curriculum and the ground rules for its application; while individual schools are accountable for the standards of teaching within that framework. That is a considerable gain over the previous arrangements, where accountability for establishing and following a
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curriculum was effectively shuffled and lost between the schools themselves, the local authorities, the then Department of Education and what one might call a broader education establishment. In the old system there was no real accountability and no open debate about the most crucial element of all in schooling—the curriculum.
In other respects, the Government have made schools directly accountable to parents through the provision of information. Because of the Parent's Charter, clear and comprehensive information about schools is available to parents often for the first time, enabling them to make fully informed decisions about their children's education: a full written report at least once a year; comparative tables of exam results; truancy levels and information on the career paths of former pupils. I associate myself with the pertinent remarks of my noble friend Lord Skidelsky on this subject. In providing parents with information, the Government are ensuring that control is genuine. I do believe that a school's headmaster and governors are more likely to be able to run a school more efficiently and effectively, and with a greater sense of responsibility to pupils and parents, than are local councillors.
If the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Castle Morris, really thinks that this is all a smokescreen for complete government control, I suggest that he has not spoken to many parents, head teachers or governors. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, that citizens are more than just customers. They are active participants. They have a say in the running of the services which they enjoy.
The noble Lord, Lord Morris, made a most eloquent but somewhat misleading speech. I point out to him that the process of becoming a self-governing school is in itself a democratic one. No school becomes self-governing without a parental ballot. The Funding Agency for Schools will take on an executive and operational function, a function which incidentally I believe is inappropriate to a department of state. It will pay grants to self-governing schools and the functions that it has are defined in statute. It will not get involved in the day-to-day running of schools. That is for individual governing bodies. Governing bodies of self-governing schools contain more elected members than all but the largest of their LEA counterparts.
The noble Lord, Lord Moms, referred to the Higher Education Funding Council. He said that it is there to ensure that universities do as they are told. He knows that that is not correct. For a start, the Higher Education Funding Council is not a new principle.
Lord Morris of Castle Morris: My Lords, I am most grateful to the noble Earl for giving way. I did in fact say that if you are in the universities you do as the Higher Education Funding Council tells you. That is a slightly different thing.
Earl Howe: My Lords, I accept that that is what the noble Lord, Lord Morris, said and I apologise for not paraphrasing him correctly. But the point is still valid, because it is precisely to ensure that higher education is at arm's length from Ministers, and thus that the independence of universities is strengthened, that the

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HEFC has been created. As I said a moment ago, it is not a new principle in itself. Again, the funding councils do riot direct in detail how the grant should be spent. That is a matter for the individual universities. The legislation prevents the Secretary of State from imposing conditions of grant on the funding councils relating to individual institutions or to matters such as the curriculum.
The other area of most frequent debate is the NHS. The noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, referred in her speech to a long, opaque, uncertain line of accountability. Before the Government's reforms started to take effect the NHS was a prime example of confused accountability, dissipated between too many half-responsible interests—that is to say, the hospital administrator, the district health authority, for a time the area health authority, the regional health authority and the Department of Health.
The NHS reforms have retained the Secretary of State's ultimate responsibility to Parliament for the service as a whole. Once again, the purpose has been to clear up the confusion below. We have established a firm division between purchaser and provider, which has been absolutely fundamental in clarifying responsibility. And we have delegated that responsibility down to individual units. As a result, management accountability has actually never been clearer.
Baroness Hollis of Heigham: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Earl for giving way. In his remarks will he explain in what way accountability has been enhanced with health authorities by removing democratically elected councillors from them?
Earl Howe: My Lords, I am glad to do so. If the noble Baroness will bear with me I hope to satisfy her on that point. When there are problems in an individual hospital, it is now the chairman or chief executive of the trust board who answers. Not surprisingly, this encourages the feeling of local ownership. In the NHS, public debate and accountability is being increased for the first time by clear, published information at all levels. Strategic purchasing plans from regional and district health authorities are published, allowing debate for the first time about health priorities. Reports on the performance of individual local hospitals and ambulance services are available. Quality standards and maximum waiting times under the Patient's Charter are produced throughout the service. National priorities, openly debated in the Health of the Nation process, can be set where necessary.
The noble Baroness, Lady Robson, complained in particular about the accountability of NHS trusts. I remind her that trusts are accountable for the delivery of care through contractual relationships with purchasing authorities. Those authorities are accountable to the public for the care they purchase. Both the authorities and trusts are accountable, through the NHS management executive, to the Secretary of State, who in turn is accountable to Parliament.
Baroness Robson of Kiddington: My Lords, how is it accountable to the community in which it functions under the present set-up?
Earl Howe: My Lords, as I said, trusts are accountable for the delivery of care through contractual relationships with purchasing authorities, who in turn are accountable to the public for the care which they purchase. As the noble Baroness knows, trusts have an annual general meeting open to the public. As she said herself, many go much further than they are legally required to do. Their annual report and accounts are published; health authority meetings are open to the public; both trusts and health authorities are subject to independent audit by the Audit Commission. These are real controls.
Baroness Hollis of Heigham: My Lords, the Minister is always courteous in giving way. Perhaps I may emphasise a point with which I am sure he will agree: to simply increase information is not the same as being accountable to the public for the policies pursued. Will the Minister tell us how the public has control over the policies by the accountability of those trusts?
Earl Howe: My Lords, I believe that the noble Baroness was advocating passing back the control of services to local authorities. If that is the case the question has to be asked: how can it strengthen accountability to pass to local authorities unfettered control of services for which they do not raise the money? There is the idea that local authority control will solve everything. Control should rest with those who manage the services and with those who use them. Those who use them now have a voice because they have the necessary information on which to base a judgment about the standard of those services.
Alongside these changes there also has been a democratic gain in the Civil Service. In the Civil Service, executive agencies are not independent organisations, nor are they hived off, but are fully accountable to Parliament through their respective Ministers. They are not therefore the same —not remotely the same—as NDPBs or quangos.
Let us remind ourselves of what an agency is. An agency is a government department, or semi-autonomous unit within a department, headed by a chief executive who is accountable to Ministers, which carries out executive functions within a policy and resources framework set by Ministers. I stress, particularly to the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, that agencies are part of the Civil Service.
The creation of agencies stems from a recognition that the executive functions of government, as distinct from policy advice, should be carried out by clearly defined and designated units within departments. Our policy since 1988 has been to put that principle into practice. There are now 91 agencies, with responsibilities ranging from weather forecasting to managing prisons; issuing driving licences and providing support services to the Armed Forces. If you count the 31 executive units of HM Customs and Excise and the 33 executive offices of Inland Revenue (which also operate on Next Steps lines), then it is true to say that agencies now cover some 60 per cent. of the Civil Service, or 350,000 civil servants. This percentage should rise to 75 per cent. within the next 18 months to two years.

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This rapid programme is not being undertaken just for the sake of it. The Government's aim continues to be the best long-term value for money in the delivery of services. That is why, before any agency is created, Ministers conduct a thorough review of the activity in question to ensure, first of all, that it is needed; and secondly, if it is needed, that other possible ways of carrying it out, namely privatisation or contracting out, are not appropriate.
Then, once an agency is up and running, it is subject to a regular and equally rigorous review by its parent department —with the benefit of public consultation—to ensure that it continues to offer the best long term value for money. The benefits of the Next Steps initiative are plain to see.
Next Steps has increased accountability by making the workings of government more visible and more easily understood by the public. Publication of framework documents, annual key targets, annual reports and accounts has significantly increased information available to Parliament and the public; thereby allowing more thorough parliamentary scrutiny. Through the framework documents, the links in the accountability chain are clarified, with a particular emphasis on the respective responsibilities of the Minister and the chief executive.
Ministers remain fully accountable to Parliament for their respective agencies. It is Ministers who remain responsible for setting strategy and key targets. Chief executives are civil servants (or military personnel in some MoD agencies) and as such are bound by rules on political impartiality. Like other civil servants, chief executives help explain government policy, but they do not decide policy. The chief executive is accountable to Ministers and Parliament for the performance of the agency and the efficient use of resources. He or she may be required to appear before the Public Accounts Committee and other parliamentary Select Committees to account for the discharge of his or her responsibilities.
Accountability to the "customer" by means of responsive services does not, however, replace accountability to the public through elections, it complements it. That is why we have ensured that the fundamental structure of accountability to Parliament has been maintained. As I have already said, some critics have suggested that public accountability through local government needs to be rebuilt. In fact, local democracy—real local democracy—has been strengthened. There has been a democratic gain throughout locally provided services.
The gain lies in clear divisions of responsibility, and contracts which make explicit the performance targets and standards expected. It lies in the Citizen's Charter and its derivatives for parents, patients and others, which promote consultation of service users and effective methods of redress. It also lies in greater openness or, as my noble friend Lord Skidelsky said, in greater transparency.
The Government's White Paper on open government took forward a key area in making the working of
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government more accessible and hence more accountable. This is, of course, one of the main principles of the Citizen's Charter. The White Paper's proposals include a new code of practice on access to information held by central government and public bodies, and consultation on the introduction of similar codes for the NHS and local authorities; independent policing of the new code by the parliamentary ombudsman; and statutory rights of access to a range of official information.
The key point in these arguments is not whether those who run our public services are elected, but whether they are producer-responsive or consumer-responsive. You do not necessarily ensure that services respond to the public simply by giving citizens a democratic voice in how services are delivered, which would in any case be a distant and diffuse voice. Services can be responsive by giving the public choices or by instituting mechanisms which build in publicly approved standards and redress when they are not attained. That is the essential guiding principle in the accountability argument.
Let me conclude by summing up the central points which rebut this Motion. The number of non-departmental public bodies (or quangos) has not increased, but in fact has decreased by 36 per cent. since 1979. Although their expenditure has increased over the years, I hope that noble Lords will agree that the use of public money for functions such as the provision of housing, legal aid and support for the arts is very important. Moreover, by improving and clarifying the lines of accountability, the Government are not weakening democratic control, but strengthening it.
Equally, my Lords, the increase in the number of Next Steps executive agencies, which, as I pointed out earlier, are quite different from quangos, has in no way diminished democratic control or representation. On the contrary, the agency programme has brought tangible benefits and clearer accountability. It has done so within a framework of tough financial and commercial disciplines which have helped to ensure the best possible use of taxpayers' money.
I hope that I have said enough to convince the House that the noble Lord's Motion should be rejected.
Lord Lester of Herne Hill: My Lords, before the noble Earl sits down, I wonder whether he can answer one point and shed a little more light on it than was available to me during my brief intervention. The Minister has not dealt at all with the allegation of political bias and political patronage. I gave one detailed example which I took the trouble to investigate and check with the Home Office—the allegation being that at the moment a judicial officer is being selected on politically partisan grounds by the Home Secretary. I should be awfully grateful if the noble Earl could deal with that.
Earl Howe: My Lords, the only reason that I have not dealt with it is because the clock is against us and I wanted to give the noble Lord, Lord Bonham-Carter, an opportunity to sum up. I should be very happy to write to the noble Lord, Lord Lester, but I can tell him that a

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selection board will meet in early February and that an announcement will be made shortly thereafter as regards the prisons ombudsman.
6.4 p.m.
Lord Bonham-Carter: My Lords, I always think that the last words in such debates cannot usefully be employed in responding to the answer that the Minister has given, particularly as the noble Earl took 36 minutes and covered a very large area of ground. Before saying anything about that, however, I should like to thank all those who have participated in the debate for their contributions, to which I shall refer in a moment.
I shall say only this on the Minister's response: he is the only noble Lord to participate in the debate who has found any difficulty in deciding what we were talking about. We were talking about quangos. He talked about a large number of things that had nothing whatsoever to do with quangos. He did not really touch on the question of centralisation. He avoided the issue of patronage. He did not face up to the importance of the transfer of powers from local authorities, except to say in some fashion which I could not follow that it did not matter because that is not a good way of representing the people's voice. I must confess that I have found his answer extremely unsatisfactory.
I have come to the conclusion at the end of the debate that there is substance in the point made by my noble friend Lord Lester and the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington, that the convention which obtained for many years—in fact, until 14 years ago—whereby appointments by government to public bodies attempted to he impartial and exercised what I call self-restraint, has now gone. That is a grave loss. When the noble Earl says that these matters—
The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Hooper): My Lords, the time allotted for this debate has now elapsed. Does the noble Lord wish to withdraw his Motion?
Lord Bonham-Carter: My Lords, I beg leave to withdraw my Motion for Papers.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

Nursery Education and Child Care Costs
6.7 p.m.
The Viscount of Falkland The Viscount of Falkland rose to call attention to the case for an increase in the provision of playschool and nursery education and help with the costs of child care throughout the United Kingdom, particularly in deprived urban areas; and to move for Papers.
The noble Viscount said: My Lords, I am grateful to have the opportunity to introduce this debate on nursery school education and other provisions which include playgroups, with particular emphasis on the provision in deprived areas. I am no expert and I am gratified to see that a number of experts will be contributing to our debate, as will a number of noble Lords who are deeply interested in the subject. I count myself in the latter category. I am very much looking forward to welcoming the maiden speech of my noble friend Lord Bath. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich has
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indicated that if it is at all possible he would like to say a few words in the "gap" before the Front-Bench responses. I am very much looking forward to hearing him.
The context for this debate is that, in my view, children in this country start their formal school life probably at too low a level. Others may disagree with me on that point. The level varies from country to country. The categories of provision which precede formal schooling fall into two main classes: nursery school and playgroup; but there are also three others: primary school reception classes, local education authority day care and private child care. Levels of publicly funded provision over that whole range are low.
I do not think that we should be too timid or too shy to compare ourselves with other countries now that we are more firmly in Europe. Compared with France and Belgium, for example, which are extreme examples, we do not do at all well. Both those countries have funded provision of the nursery education type for 95 per cent. of children aged three and four, and there is 20 per cent. provision for the under-threes. In this country, education authority-funded nursery provision is available to only 25 per cent. of three and four year-olds. What is important is that most of that is part time only, and continuity of cash funding for that provision is not assured. The majority of children in that age group use playgroups. They are run voluntarily. Whereas nearly 60 per cent. of children in that age group attend playgroups, there is provision for only about 35 per cent., which of course implies that places are shared. Children can expect to have about two sessions a week, if they are lucky. There is not a great deal of choice for parents. They take roughly what they can get. Demand far outstrips supply.
The reasons for most parents agreeing that such provision is necessary vary between the two groups—the better off and the not so well off. Better-off parents tend to want to send their children to whatever may be available so that their children can make contact with others socially and be better equipped to go on to school. For poorer parents, particularly those in deprived areas, the reason is often merely to provide care for their children when they work or study or even, in some cases, and far too many cases, when the parent is too exhausted and under too much stress to carry on and wants somewhere to leave the child.
The different types of pre-school provision have different aims and purposes. They are open for different hours; they make different charges to parents; they are staffed by workers with different training and conditions of service, and so on. Of course they are used by children from different backgrounds with different needs. Local authority day nurseries are primarily for children in need. Private nurseries and childminders are for the children of working parents. Part-time nursery education in some areas and play groups are for children of parents for whom part-time provision is convenient or who cannot find full-time places.
I do not believe that there is any great argument about the need for the provision. There is general consensus in the country on that. The difficulty arises over what kind

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of provision there should be and how it should be funded. The arguments are strong and have been expressed in many powerful quarters. In the past 10 years the number of women in this country with children under five who work has increased enormously. It has increased from about 25 per cent. to nearly 50 per cent., and some 12 per cent. of children under five live with one parent only. Of course in some areas that concentration of single parents is much higher. The number of children who live below the perceived poverty line—one which we all accept—has increased from 10 per cent. to nearer 25 per cent. All those factors make it clear that there is a need for day care and early pre-education.
The Select Committee on Education, Science and the Arts of the other place reported on this subject in 1989. It made some interesting comments, but I shall not go into them in detail. It emphasised the great pressure that there is on parents, and the increase in the numbers of families where both parents work. That means that the family has less time to focus on the development of children. I believe that that is true and that no one would argue with it. The stimulus for children under five, whether it is provided in a play group or nursery, is important. Few people would disagree with that. In fact when the noble Baroness, Lady Thatcher, was Secretary of State for Education some 22 years ago she drew attention to that fact. Other reports, especially the Rumbold Report, confirm what I have said and emphasise that the behaviour patterns which are established in the first years of a child's life are essential for providing a firm basis upon which a proper education structure can be built.
I do not believe that we need to go into the arguments for such provision, although other noble Lords may stress and expand upon what I have said. The Warnock Report pointed out that one in five children between the ages of three and five need some kind of specialist help. Those special needs are identified at nursery age. Children who do not have access to such provision could be damaged enormously later in life as a result of the enormous stresses which follow in the family.
One of the most conclusive studies, although in our country we are always wary about experiments in the United States, was one where 126 children from a poor, black neighbourhood took part in a high quality nursery programme. That is generally known among experts now as the High/Scope Programme. They became disenchanted because when the children reached the age of 11 there was no clearly identifiable link between their behaviour then and the nursery school education they had had, but at 19 there were some remarkable results. Compared with other children, they had done much better in school and were much more likely to have gone on to higher and further education and to have jobs. People conducting the experiment made the point that those children were less likely to get into trouble with the police and the girls were less likely to have unwanted pregnancies. As is typical of an American report of that kind, they gave the financial benefits
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which were estimated to be a 7 dollar return for every dollar invested. That is a long-term experiment which has produced some interesting information.
Nursery school education is favoured above most other forms of pre-school provision; sometimes, I believe, rather too rigidly, but others may disagree with me. The report of the Select Committee of the other place to which I have referred, rightly said that the case for education for the under fives should not be put merely in terms of the longer term benefits, but that such provision caters for the child's needs at the time and can be justified in those terms alone.
I believe that nursery schools and playgroups are complementary. I may be at variance over this with some of my colleagues on these Benches and with some noble Lords on the Labour Benches. I do not see that it is necessary to stick rigidly to a demand for universal nursery education. It depends upon how playgroups and nursery school education inter-react on the basis of particular needs in particular areas. For example, a Labour-controlled local authority has been extremely successful and progressive. It provides nearly all the nursery school education in its area, but, curiously, in the deprived areas, and there are some very deprived areas within that local authority, the parents have not responded well to the provision of nursery education. There is some hostility to the professional teaching which is supplied. It is the old fear of the superiority of middle class expertise felt by the deprived. In those areas playgroup provision has proved to be successful. An experiment carried out in Bootle was particularly telling. In that poor area 80 per cent. of the mothers were single; but, as a result of inspired voluntary help, they became involved and the effect on them and their children was truly dramatic.
The noble Baroness, Lady Blatch, has a great deal of experience of playgroup education. She knows of a promising playgroup which existed in the borough of Hammersmith and Fulham. Although it was proving to be of great benefit, the funding was taken away, rather like the Bootle experiment. The local authority considered that there were other priorities for the funding; probably nursery education.
I am no expert on the subject. I have five children and so I suppose that gives me some right to speak on this matter. My youngest child is coming up to nursery school age. I have been fathering children over the past three decades and have seen many changes. There have been a lot of changes in the language and I find it difficult to understand much of my brief. What we said in the 1960s is now described in a different way. We no longer talk about working-class people but about people living in deprived areas.
I am optimistic; there is a lot in modern life that is extremely good. We are excellent at talking ourselves down and saying how bad everything is but there is a great spirit in this country as regards young children. There is a universal energy there that wants to put things right. I hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Blatch, will tell us the Government's views and intentions on this matter. I am sure that they will be comforting to us.
Time is short and therefore I shall not deal with the other types of care. They are minor compared with these

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two main types. The quality of provision is constantly improving, in particular that of playgroups, and more training is available. However, as always there is a great deal of confusion about the Government's policy. That may be due to the fact that the Prime Minister, for whom I have great regard in many ways, appears to get his messages confused, whether it is about back to basics or whatever. If he had said he was going back to basics on education, "full stop", I would have supported him all the way. But he allowed himself to be misinterpreted and allowed some dangerous new ideas to be introduced.
Will the Minister tell us whether the argument between the Prime Minister and Secretary of State exists or whether it is a figment of the imagination of the national press? The noble Baroness nodded, and I expected her to do that. However, her right honourable friend has somewhat distorted the figures for nursery education because he has added to the figures for provision other items which are not nursery education, and that is misleading. He has produced a figure of about 55 per cent., which is incorrect. The figure is about 25 per cent., and therefore the Minister has introduced some items which are not nursery education. I know that the noble Baroness will respond to that.
It is well known that my party was prepared to extract an additional penny in the pound from taxpayers which was to be spent on education. My party takes the view that nursery education and other provisions should be provided properly and imaginatively and that money should be spent on doing that. I shall cut my speech drastically short and look forward to hearing the contributions of other noble Lords who are more expert than I am.
My Lords, I beg to move for Papers.
6.25 p.m.
Baroness Macleod of Borve: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Viscount, Lord Falkland, for introducing the debate. He always makes speaking well sound so easy and he is always well informed. We are all grateful to him for his speech, despite the fact that he had cut it short. On behalf of other noble Lords, I welcome the noble Marquess, Lord Bath. He has considerable interests in various fields and we look forward to hearing him speak on the subject for debate tonight and on other subjects in the future.
My noble friend the Prime Minister is on record as saying that nursery schools and schools for young people under the age of five are desirable when affordable. That was reported in the Daily Telegraph. Perhaps tonight we can send out the message that they need to be affordable now—as soon as possible and sooner rather than later.
The Chamber is full of academics who are brilliantly clever. They have shown the world how clever they are by becoming heads of various universities, colleges and other centres of higher education. But it is rare that we have the opportunity to discuss the future of small children. It is rarer still to have the great pleasure of being able to hear the Minister reply to such a debate. She has taken the trouble to come here tonight to do so.
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In my view children between the ages of three and five are the most important people in our country today. We are educating, or are failing to educate, in various ways the children who will grow up to lead the country when they have completed their education. In my view, those are the most formative years.
I speak with a certain amount of knowledge because although it might not be of interest to your Lordships I live in a farmhouse whose farm buildings until recently were used for housing Jersey cattle. One of the big farm buildings now houses a nursery school for children between the ages of three and five. In order to obtain a nursery place at the age of three their names must be registered at birth. The school is run privately—there is nothing wrong with that —and is staffed by fully-qualified people. There is a long waiting list.
I have the opportunity of seeing the children and. the way in which they are taught. That is mostly by example and also by discipline. They learn from each other and from their adult teachers. Their behaviour is almost impeccable. I never hear any of them cry. They come out to play and kick the balls around and throw themselves around as all small children do. It is a formative part of their lives and I believe that we should plough more money into that age group as the future generation.
I was interested in the fact that the children learn by example and that they will retain what they have learnt for the rest of their lives. Yesterday morning as I was leaving my house I was interested to hear them singing nursery rhymes which I was taught 75 years ago. They were exactly the same nursery rhymes. They will teach them to their children. They will have the discipline which they have learned in a nursery school. My aim—and I hope it is the aim of the Government—is for all children to be taught by qualified people in nursery schools. If that is done, the outlook for the future will be much brighter than it is at present.
One of the problems as regards babies and young children is that created by one-parent families. We are all extremely worried about the increase in the number of one-parent families. As we all know, those families usually consist of a mother with one child. I remember during the war trying to bring up one of my children without losing my temper. I have two children but the one to whom I am referring is my first child who was always a thorough nuisance. However, she has grown up to be so beautiful that it does not matter now that she was a thorough nuisance. At that time there were no nursery schools. We had to look after our children without any help at all. I am sure that my temper became ragged and frayed at the edges, far more so than would have been the case had there been nursery school provision.
If the mother of a one-parent family is able to send her children to a nursery school, I am quite certain that her family life will be much happier, more regulated and more tenable for the children than if she had nowhere to send them during the day. Also, children from a one-parent family need to be able to play with other children. Children need encouragement to be able to play by themselves, but they need to be able to go out during the day and learn how to play with other children.

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I know that the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich wishes to speak in the debate so I shall cut short my remarks. However, I wish to ask the Minister whether she will try to encourage young males into the teaching profession. Some young children rarely hear a male voice at all and often they do not have a male teacher until they are eight or nine years old. It makes a considerable difference if children hear a male voice giving commands and making them obey the discipline of the school.
My main point relates to Northern Ireland. I believe that the state should provide mixed-faith schools for all three to five-year olds. That should be mandatory. All children in Northern Ireland should have to attend those mixed-faith nursery schools. The reason for that is obvious: the children of mixed faiths would learn to play together; the parents would come together for events such as carol services, fetes and other functions, which parents must attend. The parents of the children would then meet one another, talk to one another and, in some cases, they may even become friends. I feel sincerely that if we can make that provision in Northern Ireland we shall build a future for the very young children in that extremely unhappy Province.
I should like the Minister to take away the message that I hope that the Government will be able to spare the time in the foreseeable future to educate in play and discipline the three to five-year olds of this country.
6.34 p.m.
Baroness Gould of Potternewton: My Lords, I join with the noble Baroness, Lady Macleod, in thanking the noble Viscount, Lord Falkland, for initiating the debate.
For far too long child care has had a low priority on the political agenda. It has been understood only as a welfare issue which allows women to work and which protects vulnerable children. However, child care arrangements are an essential component of the economic infrastructure, something which the Government have consistently failed to understand.
Child care is an issue of the labour force, of family policy, of the welfare of children and women, of child development and equality. It relates to the work and responsibility involved in caring for children and meeting a child's full range of needs, and to how that work and responsibility are organised and divided.
At present, the division is unequal. Women carry too great a share, while society, employers and men carry too small a share. Despite the growing number of women at work, despite the fact that 45 per cent. of mothers of children under five are at work, and despite the economic importance of women's work both to the family and to the country as a whole, the care of working mothers' children is still seen as a private matter for the mother to arrange and pay for. The cost is a hidden tax on women.
Even taking into account the child care allowance announced in the Budget, which will provide limited relief to working parents, many mothers will still be precluded from working because of the cost of child care. As has been pointed out, that is especially true for lone parents.
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For most working mothers, finding adequate and suitable child care is a headache. I have been through it; I have had the experience. It is rather like a national lottery. If you live in Cleveland, Nottinghamshire or Humberside—three Labour-controlled authorities—you will have a better chance of access to child care than if you happen to live in Somerset, Norfolk or Kent. The European child care network study carried out in 1990 identified only Portugal as having a worse record than Britain as regards the provision of nursery education. But Portugal recognised the problem and launched a national crusade to increase the level of provision.
Meanwhile, in the United Kingdom, the level of nursery education remains at only 35 per cent. to 40 per cent. There are child minding and day nursery places available for less than 10.5 per cent. of children under the age of five.
There has been discussion about playgroups and I have no wish whatever to denigrate their role. But it must be clearly understood that for working women who wish to carry out a full-time or even a part-time job, a playgroup will not satisfy their needs. Sending a child to a playgroup for two or three mornings per week still restricts a women as regards being able to work and contribute to the family budget. Nor do playgroups have the educational content that should be and is required for children of the age in question.
A quantity of care is not by itself sufficient. We are talking about quality. The noble Viscount, Lord Falkland, referred to the Select Committee on Education, Science and the Arts, which recognised that nursery education and child care are an indivisible and vital part of national and personal development when it stated in its 1989 report:
"Education for under-fives can not only enrich the child's life at the time but can also prepare the child for the whole processing of schooling".
The report further pointed out that, while early years education is of benefit to all children, it is particularly beneficial for those with special needs, those from socially or economically deprived backgrounds and those whose first language is not English. There is ample evidence of the effectiveness of good quality early education leading to improved educational performance and better social behaviour, particularly in children from disadvantaged backgrounds.
The noble Viscount referred also to the High/Scope research undertaken in the United States. That showed that, for every dollar invested in good child care, some seven dollars were returned to the taxpayer by way of savings in the costs of juvenile delinquency, remedial education, income support and joblessness.
The lack of national urgency in Britain has led not only to a poor service but to a confusing array of services in both child care and education for the under-fives. That includes nursery schools, nursery classes in primary schools, day care nurseries, pre-school playgroups, child minders, family centres, out-of-school hours provision in schools, workplace nurseries, nannies and the invaluable support of family and friends. They all have a part to play, but the lack of proper co-ordination has led to considerable overlap and gaps in the service.

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The latter underlines another key problem; namely, the failure to unify responsibility under a single competent national authority. I shall be interested to hear the Minister indicate whether there are any such proposals. Such divisions are mirrored at local level with the split of responsibility between education and social services. The development of more and better services could be more simply achieved if child care matters were the responsibility of a single administration. That administration would be responsible for co-ordinating the supply and funding of the services. I know that there is considerable opposition from the Government to the role that Labour-controlled councils play. However, I believe that the Government might do well to look at some of the provision being provided by Labour-controlled authorities and assess the impact on the local economy of those schemes which have been achieved by an imaginative partnership of public and private finance.
For example, the borough council in North Tyneside has attracted money from employers who have sponsored places in nurseries. In my home town of Leeds, local employers; have hired the services of the council to manage their workplace nurseries and to co-ordinate child-minding schemes for company employees. The Northam Neighbourhood Training Centre in Southampton provides a crèche dedicated to trainees' use which is funded jointly by a number of private and public sources, including support from the European Social Fund.
There is a growing consensus as to the need for a national child-care strategy co-ordinated by government. The organisation Employers for Childcare has stated that,
"unless there is a nationally recognised childcare policy and strategy, any efforts to enable staff effectively to combine work and family responsibilities can only be piecemeal and fragmentary".
The National Commission on Education has called for a national strategy for improving early childhood education and care, as have the Daycare Trust and many other organisations working in the field. The Government's response has been to ignore that consensus and, instead, to attack those who are already disadvantaged by the lack of child care. However, I have to say that the Government's response is not surprising. Indeed, one can go back, for example, to October 1979. At that time the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin of Roding, was then Secretary of State for Social Services—and I regret the fact that the noble Lord is not present in the Chamber today—and made clear his opposition to provision for the under fives when he said:
"If nurseries are made available at public expense too readily they can all too easily be seen as the expression of a philosophy which preaches that parents can do as they like and it is the duty of the state to look after children".
I find that to be a most extraordinary statement. Again, in 1991, the current Chancellor of the Exchequer, then Secretary of State for Education and Science, publicly abandoned the promise made in 1972 by a former Secretary of State for Education and Science (now the noble Baroness, Lady Thatcher) to provide a nursery
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place for all three to four year-olds whose parents wanted it by saying that he did not think it was a promise that anybody could sensibly renew.
It was therefore encouraging to hear that it is the Prime Minister's ambition to renew that promise when affordable. But, yet again, we have a different view being expressed by the Education Secretary, who rejected nursery education for three to four year-olds on the grounds that it is too expensive. I see that the Minister who is to reply to the debate is shaking her head. I look forward to hearing her explanation for that, as what I have said has been well and truly reported.
We therefore have to ask if the newspaper report last weekend under the headline, "Nurseries seen as a Tory vote-winner", is true; namely, that prior to the European elections the Government will initiate a campaign to boost the number of three to four year-olds in nursery classes and bring provision nearer to continental levels. We can only hope that that will be the case and that this time the view of the Prime Minister will actually prevail; that his Government will accept the need for a national strategy and, as the noble Baroness, Lady Macleod, said, the need for the ploughing in of more resources to provide good quality nursery provision.
I hope that the Government take on board and understand that the effectiveness with which they deal with the reconciliation of employment, family responsibilities and equality of opportunity will have profound consequences for the economic prosperity, the social well-being and the quality of life for families in this country. Let us sincerely hope that, in the Year of the Family, the Government will take that challenge seriously.
6.45 p.m.
Lady Kinloss: My Lords, the noble Viscount, Lord Falkland, and the noble Baroness, Lady Gould of Potternewton, have already mentioned the report from the House of Commons Select Committee on Education, Science and the Arts of 1989 on educational provision for the under-fives. In its conclusions and recommendations, the Select Committee states:
"We recognise that in a world of scarce resources it is not enough to say something is very valuable, and we have considered it equally important to demonstrate why it is particularly vital now".
Its reasons are, first, that the child of the 'eighties may be lonelier than in the past; families are smaller; and it is more difficult for children to play with others in public places. The second reason is the increase in the number of families where both parents work, and there is less time to focus on the development of the child. That seems to me to be just as relevant today, if not more so, than in the 1980s.
The Select Committee also strongly supports the place of the playgroup movement as part of the various forms of provision for the under-fives. In our mixed cultural society of today, it is important that children are able to play together and learn together whatever their ethnic origins were. My own children started their school lives in East Africa (Tanzania), then in Aden and also in Ghana where many nations were represented— not only the local population, but also from many

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countries of the world—and where they played and learnt together very happily. It also helps those whose first language is not English. They quickly learn the language through playing together.
More children will attend playgroups than any other form of provision; yet many playgroups do not receive a grant. The Education Committee of the North Yorkshire County Council values the work of the pre-school playgroups, especially in rural areas, and has given them a small grant which I am sure is very welcome. The NSPCC finds that the early years of education are undoubtedly enhanced by the diversity of ways in which the provision for under-fives is provided; for example, nursery schools and classes, local authority and voluntary sector nurseries, playgroups, parent and toddler groups, among others. The latter is an important one in rural areas or very small communities, where the toddler and parent are on their own all day, in helping the child to learn to play with other children and giving the parent the opportunity to talk with other parents.
The noble Viscount, Lord Falkland, is to be congratulated on his choice of subject for today's debate as education is so much in the public eye at the moment. The Motion mentions the need for playgroup "and nursery education", in particular in deprived inner-city areas. I am sure that we are all agreed on the need for parent and toddler groups, as well as playgroups and nursery schools in deprived city centres. However, there are equally deprived situations in rural areas. They may have different needs in rural areas, but, nonetheless, they are just as real.
In my county of North Yorkshire, there are enormous variations of need to be met. In the rural areas when trying to site a nursery school, or playgroup, or any under school age group, account has to be taken of community circumstances, social circumstances, the availability of access to provision and family mobility. As in many very rural areas families often have no car, or one, which the breadwinner needs to get to work, or even use for work, and no bus service. For this reason North Yorkshire Education Department started peripatetic nursery education.
In rural areas where pupil numbers are lower and schools smaller, it would not be feasible to have full-time nursery schools or nursery classes in individual schools. They have therefore at present established four peripatetic nursery schools, which serve 12 village schools in total, each nursery school serves three schools. This provides for anything between two and five half-day sessions in each of the schools served. The number of sessions provided varies according to the size of the school. The arrangements vary from place to place according to availability of accommodation. So far the nursery schools have been able to use spare space in existing schools.
It is also arranged with local voluntary providers, usually a playgroup working under the auspices of the Pre-School Playgroups Association, to target the nursery school provision on days of the week, when any other local voluntary group is not operating, thus maximising the provision in any particular area.
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Also in North Yorkshire, one of the LEA's objectives in trying to build a network of nursery schools across the county is to ensure that there is access to a nursery school for any young child with special educational needs. Special schools and units are inevitably thinly scattered in a rural county because they need a concentration of pupil numbers. A young child with special needs could therefore be many miles from a special centre, so that nursery schools or nursery classes in primary schools can provide great help and a starting point for such children. All this of course costs money; but may I ask the Minister whether the need for extra financial provision for these clearly essential needs in our educational system will be looked at sympathetically when the Education Bill goes through Parliament?
6.52 p.m.
The Marquess of Bath: My Lords, I would like to voice my support for the idea of universal nursery education. But I remain concerned over the choice in the direction which this could take, according to whether or not it should be introduced as an integral part of the state system.
My preference for the concept of state education, even at its nursery level, relates to the value I attach to a fully integrated society. Although I myself am an unashamed product of the private system in education—I enjoyed it greatly, and might even claim to have been successful while there—I chose the comprehensive system for my children on the ground of it being less class divisive. If we promote a system where the majority of those who are affluent send their children to private schools, while those who are devoid of affluence send theirs through the state system, then we entrench the class divisions in our society in a manner where they are likely to endure over the course of that entire generation.
Universal nursery education offers each community the possibility of a bonding experience, even when their subsequent educational tracks might differ. I believe in the importance of that bonding. I would be happier, of course, if the Government were to advocate a more prolonged period of shared educational experience, in that the bonding would then be even greater and the class divisiveness that much diminished. But I would like to think that whatever the Government advocate could be regarded as an initial step towards an eventual universalisation of the whole schooling process.
The bonding experience is perhaps more important still to those who are disadvantaged in our society, and I am particularly concerned for the welfare of one such group—namely, single parents: both single mothers and single fathers incidentally—where the existence of nursery education will be invaluable. The position of single parents is currently under threat, especially in the case of unmarried mothers. It might be anything from the proposed loss of benefits to the question of reverse discrimination in their application for housing. There is also a suggestion that the Government might be intending to force them into the monogamous fold with threats of disadvantage while they choose to remain single.

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One of the threats is that benefits could only be paid to them via the grandparents, even when this might be seen as a denial of an adult's option to set up house for herself. Or there is talk about obliging single parents (as a condition that has to be met before benefits are on offer) to dwell together in distinctly unlisted buildings, which might otherwise be ready for demolition—a suggestion that could be paraphrased as driving them into ghettos. Then, on raising such a family within the disadvantaged environment that our society creates for them, they find their children categorised as potentially criminal. This may take the form of a statistical forecast, which is then offered as spurious justification for pressing the case for adoption, which goes against any mother's natural inclination to raise a child herself.
It is a matter of great importance to single parents that free nursery education should be on offer and readily available at the hands of the state. With all the problems peculiar to her situation, the knowledge that her children are in safe professional hands throughout the time of day releases such a parent to the freedom to get back to work. Even prior to nursery schooling, there should be day care centres and playschools which would furnish for her children the most appropriate arena for their initial bonding with society. When objection is raised as to the expense to the taxpayer on this issue, then the cost should be measured against the reward to all of us in the attainment of an integrated society, and in the satisfactory development even of its more disadvantaged members.
I would like to stress that single parents frequently do not choose that status for themselves in that it often takes the form of an unintended situation which arises to clobber them (so to speak) from out of the blue. When it does arise as something planned, then it should not be our role as legislators to punish them for not having chosen differently. A mother's freedom of choice as to the family form which might suit her the best should be respected, no matter what form that it takes. It is the psychological welfare of her children, even if we have personal reservations concerning the advisability of that choice, which should emerge as our prime concern. So it is especially, though not solely, in the interests of single parent families that I beg your Lordships to do all that is possible to accelerate the introduction of both day care centres and nursery education in general.
7 p.m.
Lord Desai: My Lords, when I found out today that it would fall to me to congratulate the noble Marquess on his maiden speech little did I know that I would be able to do so wholeheartedly. We have heard a radical speech. Having followed his career, I know that he is a person with radical and different views. He has argued his case with such power and eloquence that I look forward to many more of his speeches in the House.
I shall confine myself to a fairly limited argument about the affordability of day care, playschool and nursery education. It is often said, "It is very good but we cannot afford it". About 10 years ago, when the noble Lord, Lord Joseph (then Sir Keith Joseph), was Secretary of State for Education, I remember the argument being made that the nation could not afford
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higher education. He commissioned a study by Professor Robin Marris of Birkbeck College who had recently returned from America. At that time the UGC (as it then was) put out a circular asking how it was intended to restrict the expansion in student numbers. Professor Marris, being a straightforward, good, applied economist with no political affiliation, i.e., he was not a member of the Labour Party, found that the return to higher education was 18 per cent—much higher than the return from any other investment that the Government could possibly make. It was possibly due to that that a few years later we saw, quite correctly, a substantial expansion in higher education. I have some minor complaints about resourcing but I will not go into them.
When we talk about affordability we ought to examine the question very carefully, because things are affordable if we take a broader and longer rather than narrower and shorter term view. I do not want to stick to "nursery education". I refer to universal provision for children between the ages of two and five to do creative and interesting things for a substantial part of the day. I am referring to active education of children under five. I cannot imagine that such activity is not affordable. I believe that not only is it affordable but that it will be massively profitable. It will help children when they are small and improve their performance when they are older—socially, economically and as members of the community. It will release their parents so they can do things that they wish to do. Last but not least, it will perhaps produce some revenue to the Treasury when those parents go out to work and pay taxes.
I know there is good will. I believe that there is less partisan division here than has perhaps been apparent. I believe there is a consensus among people that this provision is needed. The doubts are about affordability. I strongly urge the Government to have the question examined as carefully as possible. I know from studies done in other countries—for example, those conducted by the World Bank and other agencies—that this kind of education produces higher yields per dollar spent than is normally suspected.
Having said that, I will stop. I know that the right reverend Prelate wishes to speak during the gap, and I wish to give him time. I also apologise to the House that for the first time in many years I cannot stay to the end of the debate. Therefore, I beg forgiveness.
7.5 p.m.
Lord Northbourne: My Lords, perhaps I may tell the House a little fairy story. The story is about a king who lived in a country where the children were liable to get rickets. Being a generous man, he bought crutches for the children when they got rickets. One day, along came a doctor, who was a wise man. He told the king that if he gave the children vitamin D they would not get rickets any more. But the king said that he could not afford to do that; it would be much too expensive. He went on buying crutches. I think that some of your Lordships will agree that that was an unwise decision on his part.
There is ample evidence that good parenting of under-fives and their preparation for entry into school

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saves later social costs and wasted lives. I should like to quote the words of one or two people wiser than myself. I turn first to the report of the National Commission on Education by the noble Lord, Lord Walton, and Sir Claus Moser. I quote from page 114:
"The research which has already been undertaken, supported by informed opinion, does provide convincing evidence of the beneficial impact which good pre-school services can have on young children's learning and social behaviour. Studies in the USA and in the UK have amply demonstrated this potential".
I turn now to a report by the Family Policy Studies Centre, Crime and the Family, with which some of your Lordships will be familiar. The report notes (at page 11):
"Seven out of ten deprived children receiving poor maternal and domestic care before the age of five became delinquent compared with four out of ten whose parental care was judged to be good".
The report goes on to say (at page 17):
"One early-stated conclusion of this report is that the scope for family-based crime prevention work begins as early as parenthood itself".
The report also says (at page 23):
"David Farrington and Donald West in one of the most recent reports from the Cambridge Study in Delinquent Development call for a series of practical experiments: 'It is clear from our research that problem children tend to grow into problem adults, and that problem adults tend to reproduce problem children. Sooner or later, serious efforts, firmly grounded on empirical research results, must be made to break this cycle".
Finally, to show the breadth of opinion on this matter, I turn to Relate, the marriage guidance counsel service. Their experience covers over 70,000 couples and individuals each year. They say:
"The quality of the parents' relationship in a family is crucial to their capacity to provide effective parenting … there is now plenty of evidence of the correlations between the quality of parenting and juvenile crime".
The consistent theme of these reports is the need for universal affordable access to pre-school education of high quality in partnership with parents. The problem is cost. I found the evidence on cost confusing, and it took me a little time to discover why. Having made inquiries and discovered the underlying costs, I realised that some authorities were talking about the basic needs of care for the child whilst other authorities effectively talked about the needs of the parents.
Therefore I produced some budgets. I set out a "menu" of services which, in my view, and in the view of other experts, provide a better than adequate level of support in relation to the needs of the child. The average cost per year over the four and a half years before the child goes to primary school was approximately £1,000 per year. All-day care, calculated to enable both parents in the case of the two-parent family, or the single parent in the case of a single-parent family, to go out to work, costs four times as much.
There is a danger that we may be allowing the best to become the enemy of the good. I immediately acknowledge that allowing parents to go out to work when they want to do so is an extremely important political issue which needs to be debated. To a significant extent, it is a separate question from the welfare of the child. No doubt we shall debate that subject on other occasions. I do not intend to address it today.
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Perhaps I may detail my menu of services for the child. From nought to one year, I envisage some home support; for the one to two year-olds, parent-toddler groups; for two to three year-olds, a playgroup or parent-toddler group; for three to four year-olds, nursery school; and for four to four and a half year-olds, nursery school. The total cost over four and a half years is approximately £4,500, or an average of £1,000 per year. When parents cannot pay, I believe that it is in the interests of the taxpayer to pay for these services, which are necessary to ensure that every child has a good start in life. We have adopted that principle in regard to physical health. Why should we not adopt it in relation to emotional health?
Investing in vitamin D is a good investment as compared with investing in crutches. Two noble Lords have already said that the evidence from the High Scope scheme in the United States indicates that there is a seven to one return on an investment in good quality nursery education. Furthermore, we have to bear in mind the costs of doing nothing. A Home Office working party report estimates that the prevention of crime, and losses due to crime, are together costing the country something like £18 billion a year. We know that the cost of the new secure accommodation that the Government propose will be of the order of £200,000 per child per year on recurrent costs alone.
Perhaps I may ask the Minister to give an indication, if it is known, of the cost to the taxpayer of disruption in schools by disruptive children, of truanting, and of provision for emotionally and behaviourally disturbed children. Those costs could be largely eliminated if children went into primary school emotionally and socially adapted to get on with the job of learning.
Clearly, if support is given it has to be targeted. There are two problems about targeting support in the area of concern. One is the possibility of stigmatisation; the other is the importance of keeping an appropriate mix in schools of children from disadvantaged and non-disadvantaged homes so that we do not end up with all the disadvantaged children together. Such a situation is difficult to manage and is not in the interests of the children.
I propose a voucher scheme. Out of a total under-five population of 3 million, there are a little over a million children under five whose families are on income support. That is 35 per cent. Every child whose parents are on income support should receive a free moneys-worth voucher encashable only on behalf of a named child at registered facilities appropriate to the age of the child. Parents who are not on income support, and not disadvantaged, should have the opportunity of buying similar vouchers at the Post Office, or wherever, so that every child's parents would arrive at school presenting a voucher. There would be no social distinction. If all parents could afford to pay in that way, there would be a rapid increase in the facilities available. That increase would arise as a result of demand; and the problem of certain children being privileged and using up the available facilities would not arise.

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I shall be grateful if the Minister will seek to persuade her eight colleagues—it may be seven—who have involvement in the issue that it is better to provide vitamin D than to pay for crutches.
Finally, I commend to the Government the proposal of the right honourable Member for Devon West and Torridge that, as a token of their good faith, they should provide user friendly facilities for children in the place of employment which is probably the most child-unfriendly in the United Kingdom—the Palace of Westminster.
7.18 p.m.
Baroness Faithful: My Lords, during the passage of the Education Bill through your Lordships' House many noble Lords argued the case for nursery school education. We were greatly encouraged by the understanding and support for the value of nursery education given by the Prime Minister.
I hope that the noble Viscount, Lord Falkland, will forgive me if I talk about more than the nought to five year-olds. I make a plea to the Minister that, as they are about to leave school, we educate our children in what family life will involve. We do not give our children that education. Family life, and the care of children, is a personal affair. If it is a personal affair, people should know what is wise, right and good for the children for whom they may be responsible.
The noble Marquess, Lord Bath, spoke about the bonding experience. Perhaps I may tell noble Lords a story. One Sunday morning I was called to a hospital where two women had just had their babies. One was a happily married woman. She had had her baby at the same time as a very unhappy woman. I spoke to both as I walked out of the ward. The one woman had her baby in her arms, was crooning to it and was looking sublimely happy. The other woman's baby was in its cot and she was looking at it not with love and affection, but with appalled horror at what she had done and what lay before her, knowing that she had an unhappy life to face. She was not bonding with her baby; and I have to say that I needed to give her considerable care all through her life. Indeed, I am still in touch with her—and I am 83 and she is 40-something.
The bonding experience is something that children in schools should learn about. I believe that in every school human growth and development should be taught as a subject. Older children should learn the importance of bonding with their children by having a relationship with them, caring for them, loving them, giving them security and consistency and giving them education when they are small by reading to them. I believe that to be important. Older children should learn to use the toy libraries and look after their health. How can we expect people to have personal responsibility without training them for it? We do not train our young. By the same token, teachers in the teacher training colleges have given up the subject of human growth and development, whereas those who spend long hours with children should know of the need for bonding and care for children.
We should also know of the research being done at the Maudsley Hospital and the teaching of two
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outstanding psychiatrists, the late Dr. Winnicott and Dr. John Bowlby. We have not realised what it is for a child to be cared for by someone who is unhappy and at odds with life. The Maudsley Hospital has shown that, when a child is looked after by parents or a parent who is insecure and unhappy, that unhappiness and insecurity are mirrored in the child.
How do we know that? An extraordinary organisation started by the Rowntree Trust is called the Nurturing Group. With it, either a health visitor or a teacher will recommend a disruptive, unhappy child to the nurturing unit. The unit will not visit the child; it will be concerned not with the child but with the parents. Teachers in primary schools will say that, when parents have faced and understood their difficulties and gone some way towards resolving them, that in turn helps the child, which loses its disruptive and unhappy behaviour. These points should be known to our adolescents leaving school.
Many parents love their children deeply, but, if they have practical difficulties with finance, housing, work and relationships, the texture of their love alters. It is not that they do not love their children, but they do not have the love within themselves to give to the children. Therefore, the texture of the love is riot as deep and helpful as it should be and does not show awareness. Children in our schools ought to know that. Therefore, they should know what family life, marriage and the upbringing of children are concerned with. I make a plea to my noble friend the Minister, now that the Education Bill is being considered, that children should learn of these things so that they can make the right decisions. I say hurriedly that that applies to boys as well as girls. Not enough help is given to the boys in their late teens on what it means to be a father and to the girls on what it means to be a mother and what the family means to a child.
In this country an enormous number of organisations have carried out an outstanding piece of work. I should like to enumerate them all but I shall not. I wish to ask my noble friend the Minister whether it has ever been considered that the structure of education should be altered and that up to the age of six education for children should fall under the umbrella of nurseries and from six onwards it should happen in our schools. That is what happens on the Continent and I believe it is the right way to do it. We ought to work towards it and I am sure that many people agree with that.
My other point is that there are many outstanding organisations dealing with the needs of children. The parents must have choice. It must not be for us to put on to parents what they should do and how they should do it. I believe in nursery school education and that the pre-school playgroups have much to offer. I received a letter today giving the figures they deal with. I believe that some parents want to stay at home. A brilliant woman with a good degree said to me the other day in Oxford, where I live: "Why am I made to feel inefficient and hopeless because I want to stay at home and look after my children?" Everyone has the choice to do what he or she wants, but the choice must be based on knowledge, understanding and the teaching they have received.
7.26 p.m.
Lord Hooson: My Lords, it is right that in the International Year of the Child your Lordships' House should address itself to the issues of nursery education and child care costs. In general, it has been shown, particularly in research in America—which is the best example of research in depth and was referred to by my noble friend Lord Falkland—that children who are exposed to education early respond more positively to education throughout their school lives.
It has also been suggested that children at this formative stage are highly receptive to certain forms of education. It is very important. For example, in the multi-cultural society which we now have, and which is becoming even more so, the ability of children to acquire facility with languages is considerable. This point has been excellently illustrated in my country, Wales, and I shall return to that later, save that I make the observation that we start teaching second languages in our country generally at far too late a stage.
The positive response of young children is not limited to the area of languages. Early exposure to education also shows advantages in many other areas; basic arithmetic and reading are two good examples. Numeracy and literacy in adults are very often the product of early training in both those subjects.
The American report to which I referred showed that the benefits of nursery education were not limited to the educational development of children. Children who had been to nursery schools were less likely to get into trouble in their teens and also stood a better chance of getting work after leaving school.
The social benefits of nursery education need not be limited to children. Nursery schools can offer an excellent opportunity for mothers and fathers to meet and develop an interest in their communities. The bonding is not confined to the children. Equally, the school may provide a mother or father with an opportunity to get away from a child for a brief period a few times a week.
Those functions may be of particular benefit to children and parents coming from deprived or unstable backgrounds. In such circumstances the nursery school, as well as providing a degree of stability and care for a child, may also provide an opportunity for tension and strain in parents to subside; thereby reducing the risk of such latent irritation manifesting itself in an unattractive form.
In some areas, a nursery can operate as an alternative creche, allowing mothers to supplement their income with part-time work and helping them to avoid the sometimes prohibitive costs of child care which might otherwise condemn them to a life of state dependency during the infancy of the child.
If I may, I shall now direct myself to the position of nursery education in Wales and the exceptional functions that it fulfils there. As well as the internationally recognised benefits of nursery education which I have outlined briefly and which apply as much in Wales as in any other area, nursery education in Wales can and does perform the highly desirable function of encouraging children to learn the Welsh
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language at an early age. Children become bilingual by the age of four or five. Learning the language is not a separate part of the nursery experience. Rather it goes on simultaneously with the learning activities common in any other nursery. Through all the activities of the nursery group—for example, playing music, listening, observing, discovering and creating—the children also acquire a mastery of language, and an appreciation that there is more than one language and more than one culture. That approach has been very successful with young children. Indeed, the younger the child, the greater is the hope for effective teaching.
Among other organisations is one called Mudiad Ysgolion Meithrin—the National Association of Welsh Medium Nursery Schools and Playgroups. It has played a leading role in promoting nursery education for that purpose. The organisation is a voluntary body which charges children who attend its nurseries a minimal amount, determined in each case by its local committees. It has over 600 nursery groups in Wales attended by over 10,000 children. It should be noted that over 60 per cent. of those children come from non-Welsh speaking homes, showing the considerable demand that exists for such a provision. The greatest area of growth in that organisation's activities is in the predominantly English-speaking south-east Wales, where the call for more Welsh nurseries accompanies the development of several Welsh medium primary schools.
The playgroups and the nurseries meet daily. However, owing to a shortage of staff, space and other limitations, each child gets only two to three sessions a week. Statutory nursery education for five mornings or afternoons a week would offer considerably more contact hours with each child, perhaps in the region of 10-plus hours a week. The implications of increased contact time on the rate of learning are obvious.
Another reason for the adoption of statutory nursery education is to provide and improve the uniformity in the provision of nursery education in Wales. At present provision varies greatly from county to county, and policy can vary between schools in the same authority. For example, in the county of Gwynedd, in North Wales, if there is a viable group of children older than three, then nursery education is provided by local schools. That happens in about 20 schools in that county. Resources are supplied by the county council and children going to those schools get free nursery education. In contrast, children under three, or those who live in other counties, must pay to attend voluntary nurseries. There is little doubt that at present the provision of nursery education throughout the country is irregular and inadequate.
During the course of this debate I have enjoyed no contribution more than the exhilarating maiden speech of the noble Marquess, Lord Bath. He touched on an important matter. I could not help thinking as I listened to his speech—I do not know who coined the phrase, but the noble Baroness will know—that the language of politics is the language of priorities. The question for our country is: what priority do we give to nursery education? At the moment I regret to say that it is a fairly low one. Yesterday this House was concerned

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with great arguments on two very important aspects of he criminal justice system, in which I have been involved in varying degrees throughout my adult life. In my view, if one looks forward 20 or 30 years to the kind of society that will exist then, the investment that we make in nursery education is at least as important as any aspect of the criminal justice system.
7.34 p.m.
Lord Charteris of Amisfield: My Lords, I greatly enjoyed the maiden speech of the noble Marquess, the Lord Bath. I hope that we shall often hear him in this House. I congratulate him. I also congratulate the noble Viscount on having introduced this Motion calling for an increase in the provision of playschools and nursery schools throughout the United Kingdom and particularly in deprived urban areas. I cannot honestly pretend that 14 years as Provost of Eton has particularly equipped me to be an expert in this subject, although we did have a school for some 30 under-threes who were on the campus. It was a great success and I used to visit it.
I am very interested in this question and I give the noble Viscount's Motion my full support. I am convinced that nursery education, which is a convenient blanket phrase to cover the various different types of playgroups, nursery schools and child-minders which are available is a thoroughly good thing. I believe that nursery education has been shown statistically to be beneficial, not only in straightforward educational terms but also in helping children to become better adjusted socially. If I may he allowed to put it rather more bluntly, when they grow up they are less likely to get into trouble than those who have not enjoyed nursery education.
That that should be the case is not in any way surprising. On the contrary, it is exactly what anyone who knows anything about children would expect. In good nursery education they are taught the very difficult business of getting on with other children and accepting authority. It is not possible for that kind of learning to begin too soon. What is more, what is learnt when one is two, three and four stays with one for the rest of one's life. The Jesuits have told us that if they can have a child for the teaching until he is seven years old, he will remain faithful to the Roman Catholic religion until his death. I believe that nursery education can help to make people good citizens all their lives.
Good nursery education can help the parents as well as the children. I do not mean that it gives them time to do a job outside parenthood. I mean that it can help them to be better parents. In good nursery school education young parents will come into contact with other parents and with older women who can give them good advice. That is particularly important for the single parent who perhaps has to live at the top of a tower block in a deprived area. In the old days the whole of life took place in the street, and one was always in contact with other families over the garden fence. Things are very different now. Life at the top of a tower block can be dangerously lonely.
If it is correct that good nursery education has the advantages that I have outlined—and all the evidence shows that it does—it is a pity that we do not have more
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of it. According to the statistics prepared by Kathy Sylva and Peter Moss in 1992, some of which have already been reported, Britain is way down at the bottom of the European league table when it comes to publicly funded nursery education. According to those figures, Britain has between 35 per cent. and 40 per cent. of children catered for. Belgium and France each have 95 per cent.; Germany has 77 per cent.; and Italy 85 per cent. Only Portugal, with 35 per cent., is lower than we are.
If we are to have more provision, it will cost money. But, as we have been told, research seems to indicate that it is not very long before one gets one's money back. That is simply because if you have good nursery education, you get fewer people in approved schools and in prisons. There are all kinds of questions about the form that nursery education should take. Should it be a part of existing schools or should it be separate? Should it be voluntary or should it be compulsory?
My own view is that it should be voluntary but available to all. I concede that if it is voluntary it may mean that those most in need of it for their children will not take advantage of it. But if it is made compulsory, I fear that the system will become entangled in a jungle of bureaucracy. For instance, I have heard that some excellent nursery schools had to be closed because the ratio of "loos" to children required by the Children Act has not been achieved. I feel that one must not be too exact or pernickety when it comes to "loos" for small children. I believe that a great deal can be done with pots.
I believe that I am correct in saying that there has never been a comprehensive review of nursery education in this country. There ought to be one which would make recommendations on any required harmonisation with what is now available and recommendations on what needs to be added, so that we are properly equipped with facilities for nursery schools. Those should be available for all. They should be first class. The system should not be over-bureaucratised. It should probably be run by a few professionals with a great deal of voluntary support from mum's army.
7.42 p.m.
The Lord Bishop of Norwich: My Lords, I should like to add my congratulations to the noble Marquess, Lord Bath, on his excellent maiden speech which was both compassionate and courageous. We look forward to many such contributions in the future. They will be well received on these Benches, especially if he continues to honour us by wearing a purple tie.
I am also most grateful to the noble Viscount, Lord Falkland, for introducing this important debate and to other noble Lords for their generosity in cutting short their speeches and allowing me to speak in the gap.
I fear that my contribution will be slight and not worthy of their generosity, but I shall speak quite briefly.
There are three kinds of argument put forward in this matter: economic, educational and what one might call social and moral. I understand that there are good economic reasons for increasing the provision for very young children, though I do not feel at all qualified to comment on that aspect. The educational advantages

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have been thoroughly researched and convincingly demonstrated. They have been comprehensively set out, as the noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, said, in the report of the National Commission on Education. Those educational reasons will be very familiar indeed to the noble Baroness, Lady Blatch. I do not believe that there is any need to labour them at this point.
I want to speak briefly about the third factor: what one might call the social and moral aspect. There has been much discussion both inside and outside Parliament on the subject of single parent families. Most people would say that there is little doubt that the interests of a child's welfare are better served by an upbringing involving both parents. I hope that we would also agree that the encouragement of that natural care for children can more effectively be achieved by the provision of economic benefits to the married than by the negative device of penalising the single parent.
We might also wish to say that the care of a child up to the age of five years by one of its parents in a secure and loving home while the husband or wife is at work is the best preparation in early years for school and adult life. However, we do not live in an ideal world. The phenomenon of the single parent is a fact of life. We may regret it, but it is the reality with which we have to live and the situation that we are asked to address.
That leads me to my second point. Christian moral thinking is cautious about the concept of rights. Much of the talk about parents' rights is both muddled and morally questionable. When speaking of parenthood it is not the language of rights but the duties and responsibilities of parents which should be the guiding principle.
This is not the time to comment further, but the recent discussion about infertility treatment and embryo research has been dangerously distorted by talk of the rights of women to bear children. If one wishes to talk of rights in that context, the only legitimate use of such language is to stress that it is the rights of the children which should dominate all other considerations. Although the needs of parents, especially single parents, matter very much, I am sure that we all agree that in the Motion before us it is the needs of young children that must be at the forefront of our thinking. That is most certainly the priority for any Christian approach to these issues.
When Jesus admonished His disciples: "Let the children come to me. Do not try to stop them", He was rebuking those who found the children's presence a nuisance which interfered in the supposed rights of adults to His undivided attention. Jesus underlined the point dramatically: "Of such," He said, "is the Kingdom of God. Whoever does not receive the Kingdom of God as a little child shall never enter it." In this area, as in so many areas of moral debate concerning children, the interests of the child must be paramount.
The noble Viscount's Motion calls attention to the needs of children in deprived urban areas. Social and moral deprivation is not always confined to urban priority areas. There are many poor families in which children are brought up in a loving, secure and
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disciplined home. Conversely, wealth is no guarantee of a secure and morally sound upbringing. Also, though it is not on such a wide or well advertised scale, there is real deprivation in many rural areas, as the noble Lady, Lady Kinloss, pointed out. I hope that this Motion could be understood to embrace those areas too, where the problems can be very severe indeed.
However, the truth remains that in our inner cities there are worrying trends. Apparently there is an increasing number of such areas where children experience neglect and abuse, where there is no experience of consistency, affection, firm and loving discipline and no understanding of what is and is not acceptable behaviour or of what is right and what is wrong. Those are the very experiences that help a child to grow in mind and spirit and to relate to other children and adults.
Those are rights which children have. They are rights which, as a society that has a duty to care for its little ones, we have a responsibility to provide, especially when parents do not or cannot provide them. Where parents are struggling to survive, the lack of child minding, playgroup and nursery facilities makes the prospect of paid work impossible; and where the educational and social skills of the parents are themselves lacking, the peril to the moral welfare of the child is obvious. The effects are long term, as the noble Lord, Lord Charteris, pointed out. Studies have conclusively demonstrated that the influences received in the early years of childhood are formative into adult life. If those influences are morally confused or even depraved, the long-term effects on society are grim to contemplate.
There is already an increasing provision in the private sector, which is good. Few people are asking for wholesale provision of state nursery education. At the moment many of the parents of children most in need of that provision cannot take advantage of it. There is an area of serious need which can only be addressed by government action.
I repeat the question asked by many noble Lords this afternoon: is there a good reason why the United Kingdom should have one of the lowest levels of publicly funded pre-school provision in Europe? In response to that the Minister will doubtless say that we have to take seriously economic realities. That is correct. As a Bishop I am no stranger to the discipline of hard economic reality. But I believe the citizens of this country are deeply concerned about its moral welfare; that they are deeply anxious about moral confusion in society in general and in the young in particular. I believe that there is a willingness to support measures which would make possible a better provision for our children's moral and spiritual upbringing.
I may be naive but I find it difficult to understand why politicians think that the subject of increased direct taxation should be anathema to the public. I cannot believe that I am alone in my willingness to pay more taxes if the revenue raised is used for the kinds of purpose the Motion envisages and which I wholeheartedly support.
7.52 p.m.
Baroness Williams of Crosby: My Lords, I begin my brief remarks by adding my voice to the many voices who have already congratulated my noble friend Lord Bath on his maiden speech. He spoke with both conviction and compassion on a subject about which it is not always easy to speak. The sense that he had of the plight of single parents, the feeling that he had of the importance of children bonding with their society at an early age, is one which I believe impressed all those in the House. We all look forward to the contributions he will make not only on education but on many other aspects of the issues about which he spoke in his speech. I am therefore glad to add my thanks to the many that he received this evening.
I should like to say also that there will be no point in my repeating what has been a series of extremely eloquent speeches on the need for nursery and pre-school education. The noble Baroness, Lady Macleod, the noble Lord, Lord Charteris and the noble Baroness, Lady Gould, all addressed those issues with great strength and passion. I add just one point to what the noble Baroness, Lady Gould, said. She spoke of the position of mothers who are obliged to work when their children are young. It is worth adding to the group of single parents the devastating truth that it is increasingly difficult for men from the old industrial skill areas to obtain work at all.
I was looking recently at the figures which indicate that in the North of England unskilled men between the ages of 21 and 60 now have a rate of unemployment of 24 per cent. That means that in many cases the husband of the family cannot obtain a job because of the area in which he lives and the decline of heavy industry throughout the western world. Therefore, in that family it is a necessity for the wife to go out to work. Yet it is often in such families that the habit of husbands being very much fathers is one that has been slowest to develop.
The noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull, spoke of the importance of training children in parenting. I want to underline her passionate plea for boys as well as girls to be taught about parenting. We have increasingly learnt of the importance of the father and the significance of his being a model and example to his children.
Lastly, in referring to other speeches, I refer to the noble Lady, Lady Kinloss, who spoke of rural deprivation. My noble friend Lord Hooson spoke of some of the problems of trying to produce nursery education in the rural parts of Wales. Both produced some extremely interesting evidence regarding how early children can benefit from some form of structured education.
Having said that, I turn briefly to a question that I wish to ask the Minister regarding policy and finance. Several speakers in the debate—I associate myself with them—indicated that they fully approve of the recent changes made in the Budget with regard to families drawing child benefit which allows them to claim on the basis of the child care expenditure into which they enter. That is a step in the right direction which all of us
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welcome. I hope that it will be extended to tax relief for child care for working families as well, for the reasons I stated.
I should like to consider two points in regard to policy. The first is that my understanding is that the standard assessment made for local authorities is not, to use the jargon, ring-fenced in regard to the education of pre-school children. In other words, local authorities, under the pressure of rate capping and the recession, may begin to raid the very budgets which are currently ear-marked for under-fives in order to meet other more urgent needs. I am glad to see the noble Baroness, Lady Blatch, shaking her head. I hope that she can give us full assurance on that point.
It may be more difficult to give a full assurance on the other issue that I want to raise but the noble Baroness may be able to explain to the House the situation into which the Government have entered. I refer to the funding agencies for grant-maintained schools which, as I understand it, have no obligation made upon them to provide pre-school nursery education. The anxiety in that regard is that we may See a development of that sector which does not carry its share of responsibility for pre-school provision at a time when the strain on the schools that remain within the state system is likely, if anything, to be greater. Can the noble Baroness tell us what the position is with regard to grant-maintained schools and the responsibility of the funding agencies for the education of the under-fives?
Because I have some sympathy with the Minister I believe that she always finds it difficult to argue the urgent against the important. I recall that it was in my case, too. The urgent in government so often replaces the important, especially when the important contains a long-term aspect; in other words, the benefits will occur in 10, 15 or 20 years' time. Arguing with one's Cabinet colleagues about the importance of long-term provision is always a dreary activity. The short-term needs always come up and tend to push the long-term needs to one side.
I therefore conclude by saying that one of the areas that I believe could be most responsive to the kind of eloquent statement on moral and social needs described by the right reverend Prelate is the bringing together, in a single broad umbrella provision, of playgroups, child minders, nursery schools and day nurseries. Nursery schools can provide resources for those other areas of under-five education as well as for themselves.
We spoke of pre-school playgroups and they can certainly benefit from some training. But even more urgent is the position of child minders who are so often the residual legatees of the most disadvantaged children of all in urban areas: in areas where there are large minority populations and in areas where many parents are unemployed or in difficulties. Child minders are the provision of last resort. Those of us in this House who have seen child minding sometimes at an appallingly low level, with children being lined up and not developed in any useful way, will know that child minders should have the benefit of training, of toy libraries and reading libraries and of the expert advice of trained nursery school teachers.

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Bringing those things together—I know that the Minister has herself indicated how complementary these provisions are —would enable the least advantaged children, to whom my noble friend referred in his opening remarks, to be caught up in the general provision of pre-school education so that their needs can be met alongside those of their more favoured colleagues in the same age group. I commend the suggestion to the Minister that we try in urban and rural areas alike to bring together the provision and to see nursery schools as the central resource to train, advise and counsel those other kinds of provision that we make for the under-fives.
I have one final word with regard to what the right reverend Prelate had to say. He described in very eloquent terms the position in which many children find themselves. I could not agree with him more that it is the child's rights that need to come first and that we should think very hard indeed about what may be a selfish demand to take a designer child off the shelf and to do it even by the use of embryos from mothers who never saw adult life at all. The consequences of those ideas seem to be almost infinite in what they could mean for the mental and moral security of children in the future. I should like to associate myself very strongly with the words of warning that the right reverend Prelate gave to the House.
8.1 p.m.
Lord Judd: My Lords, I hope that when the Minister replies she will be able to deal with the important points that have just been made by the noble Baroness, Lady Williams.
The noble Viscount, Lord Falkland, deserves the appreciation of us all for having given the House the opportunity yet again to debate this vital topic. His own speech was distinguished and helpfully reflective, and we appreciated that. It is also good that the noble Marquess, Lord Bath, chose an issue so central to the future of our nation whose greatest asset is, as the noble Baroness, Lady Macleod, so persuasively said, its children. That he chose this subject to make his maiden speech augurs well for the future. He spoke powerfully and has given us all considerable food for thought. I greatly look forward to his future contributions to our deliberations.
I am afraid that in all the muddle surrounding the present Government's policies nursery education is no exception. Last April in this House the Minister told us during our deliberations on the Education Bill not to put,
"an impossible imposition on this House and the country",
and that comprehensive nursery education would be,
"an impossible bill to impose on this or another place".—[Official Report, 20/4/93; col. 1495.]
At the Report stage in the summer the Minister adamantly refused to accept an amendment argued from this side of the House and moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Warnock, with all her vast experience, which again sought to extend the provision of nursery education.
When the National Commission on Education reported in November last and added its stamp to the
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case for extending nursery education the Secretary of State himself immediately responded by saying that it could not be afforded. But within a week a major story appeared on the front page of the Daily Express, with all the indications of an authoritative leak. It told us that, notwithstanding the Secretary of State's position, the Prime Minister aimed to give every child of three a place in the nursery classroom; an objective repeated by the Prime Minister in an interview published in the Daily Telegraph on 23rd December. However, when questioned on the Daily Express report in the other place on 23rd November by Shadow Secretary of State for Education, Ann Taylor, the Secretary of State declined to comment. Significantly, in a letter to Ann Taylor dated 22nd December last—the day before the report of the interview appeared in the Daily Telegraph—the Prime Minister disappointingly said:
"Apart from the question of diversity, education for all three and four-year olds would be very expensive and, given the Government's other more pressing priorities for improving the standards of primary and secondary education, is unrealistic in resource terms at present".
The letter made no mention of even a long-term aim. And yet the confusing reports continue.
On 26th December the Sunday Times firmly stated:
"Parents of young children will be given government vouchers to help them pay for nursery education under plans to be unveiled by John Patten, the education secretary".
And only this past weekend the Observer told us that,
"Department of Education officials are working flat out on a scheme, to be announced shortly, that will bring provision nearer to continental levels".
The Minister is nothing if not candid, and even, let us face it, blunt. She is not one to prevaricate. Will she therefore categorically clear up this matter tonight? Are the Government or are they not about to do a U-turn and accept the case, repeatedly put from this side of the House, to make comprehensive provision for nursery education? I, for one, will lead the cheers if they are.
What, however, would not be acceptable is some fudge in the name of choice with nursery education available to all who can afford to pay for it, albeit with voucher subsidies, but only, as now, patchily available for those who cannot. Such a compromise would be grossly unfair. It would mean that far too often the children arguably most in need of nursery education —those from deprived circumstances—still would not get it. We are for variety and choice. Of course we are. Good play groups and other facilities have a vital place. While we favour the availability of nursery education with professionally qualified staff, we nevertheless respect the principle of parental choice with a variety of provision before the age of five. But it must be choice for all and not simply for those able to afford it.
At a time when community and community values are everywhere under attack amidst inflexible and unimaginative doctrinaire application of market dogma, what would also be sad is to see the future of nursery education increasingly in the hands of the private sector, unduly driven forward by the profit motive rather than by the motives of care and service. What is desperately needed, as tragic events last year so well illustrated, is a strengthening of community and neighbourhood concern for the young. That, I do beg the Minister to try and understand, is the reason why the role of local

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democracy in education is so important. When local democracy has failed, as it sometimes fails, the response should not be to run away or find alternatives but to determine to reinvigorate it.
As the noble Baroness, Lady Gould, has underlined, at present two different departments at national level—the Department of Health and the Department for Education—have the responsibility for services for young children. The Health Department oversees day nurseries, playgroups and the regulation of child minders. The Education Department is responsible for pre-school education. They do not plan together, budget together or provide comparable statistics. The discussion surrounding the Children Act recognised these problems but the legislation failed to take all the necessary steps to resolve them.
These divisions are mirrored at local level. Services for young children are split between education and social service departments with out of school care often funded through recreation departments. This is a recipe for disorder when new services are being introduced. Parents, employers and independent providers often do not know whom to approach for advice or to find out what the regulations are. This results in duplication and large gaps with no services at all. It would be helpful to hear the Government's thinking on all this, especially if they are, pray God, after all at last contemplating extended provision. Do they see the Department for Education or the Department of Health as the lead Ministry?
I have argued the case for the key role of local democracy, but I recognise that there is room for a genuine debate about which department of local government should take the desperately needed lead in achieving the best possible integration of child care, nursery education and other services to young children. I believe the LEA is a strong candidate, but what is essential is that a clear lead responsibility is established. It would therefore be helpful to know the Government's thinking.
On these Benches our position is unequivocally clear. We believe in the availability of nursery education to the children of all parents who want it, irrespective of their social circumstances—a goal powerfully and rationally argued in the cogent sixth chapter of the report of the National Commission on Education. We cannot conceive of any other single investment in our young which would yield more fruitful results both in improved performance through our primary and secondary schools, given adequate resources and a sensible role for those sectors themselves, and in helping to reduce delinquency and social fragmentation.
Nursery education for all children would be a constructive step towards making a success of our multicultural society where significant numbers of children start school at five from homes in which English is not the first language. It would be an ideal way to involve more parents naturally in a sense of shared responsibility for the education of their children. It would release more parents to enhance the financial well-being of their families and to contribute to the strength of the nation's economy. As we have heard again tonight, all the reliable evidence from both sides
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of the Atlantic powerfully suggests that in terms of enhanced educational performance, a strengthened economy, and greater social stability, it would rapidly pay for itself. The issue is not whether we can afford it, but how on earth the United Kingdom can convincingly meet the future without affording it.
No less than 50 per cent. of intellectual development takes place in the first five years of life. In no other advanced nation in the world is it necessary to argue that nursery education and childcare are an indivisible and vital part of national and personal development. As the noble Lord, Lord Charteris, said, at the beginning of this decade the Institute of Education in London revealed that, while in Belgium and France more than 95 per cent. of three to five year-olds were in nursery education, in the United Kingdom it was still only between 35 per cent. and 40 per cent. In the European Union only Portugal was below the UK. As my noble friend Lady Gould said, on recognising this Portugal set out to put things right.
Perhaps I may conclude by repeating the words of Charles Pollard, Chief Constable of the Thames Valley Police, speaking on Question Time last October. He said:
"Pre-school education is very important. It is at that stage that children learn habits. They learn right and wrong, life skills, so that when they get into school they can grasp what the school is teaching them and grow up as mature adults. If they don't, when they get to school they are lost and they just become completely alienated from society and that's where crime starts."
In the Government's current desperate struggle to decide on the definition of the basics to which they want to get back, they could not do better than to settle for a truly comprehensive system of pre-school education.I hope that the noble Baroness will be able to announce her conversion to that immediate objective tonight.
8.12 p.m.
The Minister of State, Department for Education. (Baroness Blotch): My Lords, as always, the enemy tonight is going to be time, but I shall do what I can to answer the points made in the course of the debate. Perhaps I may start by thanking the noble Viscount, Lord Falkland, for introducing this debate. It is a very important debate and I have enormous pleasure in answering it. I also join with the whole House in welcoming and congratulating the noble Marquess, Lord Bath, upon his speech. I know what a daunting experience it is. We look forward to hearing much more from him. Perhaps I may also say that I have the happiest possible memories, not only for myself, but of taking my own children—occasionally Sunday school children and playgroup children —to his great family home. We look forward to hearing from him on many more occasions in future.
This has been an interesting debate, as always in this House, with a wide range of issues raised. It is right that we should have this debate. Provision for under-fives is an important topic and it can lay the foundation for children's subsequent personal, academic and social development.
Let me take first the education provision for under-fives. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Judd, that we inhabit different planets. He speaks with almost total

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disregard for what has been done and what is being done for under-fives in this country. I find it a great sadness that we cannot at least arrive at some consensus on what is being done by our local authorities and by the encouragement which is being given by my department.
I understand the concerns which lie behind the speeches in favour of more and better education for under-fives. This Government recognise the benefits which can be derived from good provision, particularly for those who have special educational needs or who are socially disadvantaged. We have a very real commitment to development in this area, but to propose that universal free state nursery education as such is the answer to all our problems is greatly to over-simplify the position.
First of all, such an answer takes a very narrow view of parental and child needs. The present situation is one of a range of needs and a range of provision to match those needs. There are various providers—state, voluntary and private; a variety of settings—nurseries, nursery classes, nursery units and play groups; and different modes of attendance—sessional, part-time or full-time. For many, including working mothers in particular, a nursery class place would not provide the length of day care that is sought. New working and domestic patterns will increase further the need for a flexible response. That is why government policy is to encourage choice and diversity.
Secondly, to go down the route of universal free state nursery education would have an adverse effect on other forms of provision and might put them at risk. Pouring taxpayers' money into nursery education would make many perfectly good playgroups and private nursery schools unviable, perhaps to the point of closure—indeed, in the playgroup movement, perhaps to the point of extinction. That would be extremely wasteful of all the expertise and resources and personal commitment invested in the private and voluntary sectors as well as imposing another restriction on consumer choice. I welcome the views of the noble Viscount, Lord Falkland, on the diversity of provision which he certainly gave voice to in his speech.
Thirdly, it is not proved that a nursery class place offers a better outcome, pound for pound, than other forms of provision, including better infant schooling. The pro-nursery education lobby is far too dismissive of alternatives. There is much evidence to support the view that well run playgroups, often working in co-operation with infant schools, can offer an excellent and cost-effective social and educational experience for under-fives and provide a good preparation for primary schooling. The close involvement of parents in a playgroup is a particular strength of which we should not lose sight.
These factors explain why the Government's long-term ambition is to promote a variety of high quality, cost-effective forms of pre-school education, open to all who want it. But further progress must depend on the availability of resources. There is no conflict in that view across the Government as a whole. We are looking again at what might be achieved in that field and we are currently studying a range of possible
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options for the future. If and when we are ready to announce any new proposals we shall do so in the usual way.
Within the related child care area I want to remind the House of what initiatives this Government have announced in the past few months. In the last Budget speech my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer outlined a new child care scheme to be introduced. As from October of this year eligible families will receive extra help, worth up to £28 a week in family credit, towards the cost of a variety of registered child care.
Child care does not cease to be an issue when children reach school age. Indeed it can sometimes be harder to arrange, which is why the disregard extends to children aged 10 years. We already have a £45 million programme of out-of-school child care being administered by training and enterprise councils. That is providing capital and running costs, funding a variety of schemes to help with the care of children aged five to 12 years. It will stimulate much good practice in this area. We hope to create up to 50,000 new child care places over a three-year period.
These initiatives build on earlier ones, such as the underpinning of child-minder and day care quality, through the registration and monitoring arrangements introduced by the Children Act and tax concessions to employers to encourage the provision of workplace nurseries. These things will all indicate quite clearly that the Government wish to help families whose economic well-being is dependent on a sufficient supply of affordable child care.
Perhaps I may now turn to points raised during the course of the debate and begin with the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich. I deeply appreciate the points made in his speech. Many children do not enjoy a nurturing and loving home life. Therefore, for many of those children, school is the only anchor in their lives. It is the only place where they will receive any kind of ground rules and where they will have a framework within which to grow and develop. It is the only place where they will have any sense of right and wrong or of desirable and undesirable behaviour or be given any sense of morality and immorality. It seems to me that it is absolutely right that not only my department but local authorities also should give priority to making provision for those children. When my department approves nursery school places, we look for such factors when improving and considering priorities. I understand that investment. What we hope to do is to make better parents of those young people, who will be the parents of tomorrow's children.
I return now to statistics. Enough have been bandied around during the debate. At present—the latest statistics relate to 1992—over 90 per cent. of three and four year-olds receive some form of pre-school education with 26 per cent. admitted to maintained nursery schools and classes; (of whom four per cent. are in nursery schools and 22 per cent. in nursery classes); 23 per cent. are admitted to maintained primary schools (mainly four year-olds in reception classes); and 4 per cent. are admitted to special or independent schools. Thus, including pupils in independent and special

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schools, the overall participation rate in education is 53 per cent. In addition, 41 per cent. attend playgroups (including some who go on to under-fives schooling daring the year and may also attend school and playgroup) and about 5 per cent. receive other group day care. Most playgroups are affiliated to the PPA. The playgroups cater for about 525,000 three and four year-olds. If one includes the under-threes also, the figure rises to 770,000—or 21 per cent. of all under-fives. That process involves 250,000 parents in running the groups.
As for four year-olds and what we call the "rising fives"—that is, the children who enter school in the term in which they are five—82 per cent. of four year-olds—that is, not including the rising fives or those children who are four by 31st August but of compulsory school age by January —are admitted to maintained nursery and primary schools.
When one puts all that together, one sees that the overall participation rate has gone up 10 percentage points since 1983. Over the same period, the maintained sector rate has risen by 9 percentage points and the number of under-fives in independent schools has risen by 56 per cent. So, the record is a good one.
The funding mixture of education, which is again probably a fine point between us, is a mix of private and public. All nursery education for the 53 per cent. of children to whom I have referred is free provision.
We are often compared with our European neighbours, so I should point out that 71 per cent. of the provision in Germany is paid by private funds. Indeed, in many of the European countries with which we are compared, some of the costs are met by private funds.
My noble friend Lady Faithfull referred to the importance of taking into account another group of parents. The interests of the parents who wish to stay at home must be taken into account. We need to bear in mind that the rights of those parents who wish to stay at home to look after their children must be respected.
Reference has been made to a strategy on education and care for young people. Our policy is to encourage diversity and to devolve decisions to the local level. That way the needs of parents are more likely to be reflected in the services provided. It is important to ensure co-ordination between the various services. The Children Act provides for this at local level. At central government level, there is an inter-departmental consultative group. It is chaired by my honourable friend Mr. Bowis. The group relates specifically to under-fives and involves regular contact between departments. Those points of contact should be sufficient to ensure effective co-ordination of education and child care interests.
I think that there is agreement right across the House on the long term and wider benefits of nursery education. We accept that there are long-term educational and social benefits to be derived from pre-school education. Where we would depart from those who call for nursery education for all children is that we believe that this benefit can also be obtained equally, or more cost effectively, from other forms of under-fives provision such as playgroups. It is important that the provision should include the involvement of
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parents; a suitable curriculum; appropriate resources and effective transition between stages. I have said that the issue of universal funding remains a point of conflict between us.
Reference has been made to research in the United States. I know of the High/Scope scheme, which was mentioned by the noble Viscount, Lord Falkland. As he acknowledged, it is fair to say that that was a limited scheme. It was very intensively funded and involved special provision with very close parental involvement in a particular type of pre-school experience for especially disadvantaged children. It is not clear that that could be readily translated to Britain, so we are not comparing like with like. We shall certainly take account of all the research that is conducted into the provision for the under-fives.
The noble Viscount was also concerned about the United Kingdom's provision as compared with other countries. International comparisons are quite inadequate unless they allow for the range of settings for the under-fives and the ages from which the different countries provide compulsory schooling. When this is done, the UK compares very favourably. As I have said, over 90 per cent. of our three and four year-olds attend either playgroups, education or group day care. This is an impressive figure especially as we have compulsory full-time schooling from age five. I note what my noble friend Lady Faithfull said about that. However, not only do we admit children at the age of five in this country, but we also provide the highest number of years of compulsory schooling. We are equalled only by the Netherlands, where children start school at five and finish at 16. Most other countries provide only eight, nine or 10 years of education.
Children who are socially disadvantaged or whose first language is not English are certainly a. government priority. Under the Children Act, local authorities have a general duty to provide a range and level of services appropriate to the children in their area who are "in need". This includes those with social problems. The Children Act also lays down principles of good practice on how to respond to needs arising from different racial, cultural, religious and linguistic backgrounds. Our colleagues at the Department of Health issue guidance to assist local authorities to meet this responsibility. There is real evidence of local services being better targeted as a result of these new arrangements.
Criticisms have been made that playgroups are under-resourced, have inadequate premises, lack equipment and have insufficient trained staff. Some playgroups may not come up to scratch: some, we know, are excellent. As a means of delivering pre-school education, playgroups have shown that they can achieve results. In recognition of this, the Department for Education has very substantially increased its grant for the training activities of the Pre-School Playgroups Association—to £887,000 in the current year—with the aim of developing the educational content of playgroup activities. The Department of Health and the Ministry of Defence also make grants to the PPA.
We are aware that LEA financial support for playgroups is very variable—but almost half receive an

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LEA grant towards running costs or receive some help with fees. In 1992 this contribution amounted to almost £7 million. We join with others in encouraging local authorities to regard playgroups as part of their comprehensive provision of education.
Many noble Lords have made the point that more help should be given to enable mothers to return to work. We have taken steps to help mothers who wish to return to work. Since April 1990, employees have not been taxed on the benefit of workplace nurseries provided by employers. Employers were already able to get tax relief, under the normal business rules, for day-to-day expenditure on child care provision. Also, the Department of Employment's current out-of-school child care grant—for which an allocation of £45 million has been announced—is helping employers. Many women returners benefit from the help in finding work that is given by the Employment Service and from the training programmes that are offered by the training and enterprise councils.
Many noble Lords were concerned about lone parents. It is not always easy for parents—particularly lone parents—to reconcile employment with family commitments. It would not be right to use taxpayers' money to subsidise the child care costs incurred by all parents, but there are special provisions that can help lone parents. These include the extra help given through the benefits system to lone parents, and the provision in the tax system whereby lone parents may claim an additional personal allowance.
My noble friend Lady Macleod of Borve wanted us to encourage male teachers into the system. We have a teaching-as-a-career unit which is doing just that: trying to persuade young men to come into education, especially into the early years of education. My noble friend made a point about Northern Ireland. I am sure we all accept that greater integration of young people, and at the earliest age possible, can only be a good thing and would help to solve some of the problems.
My noble friend Lady Thatcher was mentioned a number of times during the debate. Reference was made to her statement back in 1972. The first thing I should say to the noble Baroness, Lady Gould, is that her party has been in office a number of years since then. Its record does not bear too much scrutiny. I do not remember it having much of an impact on nursery education and certainly not on higher education. The proportion of children in nursery education at that time was only 40 per cent.; it is now 53 per cent. Only one in eight children went into higher education then and now one in three children goes into higher education. But the aim remains the same. When it can be afforded, when the balancing act between competing needs is addressed, we shall do what we can to improve the provision.
My noble friend Lady Faithfull was interested in preparation for parenting. Much is already being done by schools, but my noble friend will know, as indeed will the House, that there has been an issue on the overloading of the national curriculum, which is being addressed by Sir Ron Dearing and his colleagues at the moment. The intention is to free up time during the
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school day and week to allow schools more flexibility to provide alternative subjects. I know that a subject close to my noble friend's heart, such as home economics, could be reintroduced in what will be the equivalent of a day a week freed up during a child's school life.
The noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, proposed the use of vouchers for under-fives. Let me answer him by quoting from a speech made by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State at the North of England conference earlier this month, when he said:
"We do intend to explore ways of adding, as resources allow, to the choice already available to parents from all sources".
Nothing is ruled in and nothing is ruled out. We shall be exploring all possibilities.
On special needs for under-fives, a draft circular has been issued for children with special needs as guidance for local authorities which are making provision for under-fives. I know that that will be welcomed. It includes working together with the voluntary and private sectors as well as the state sector. The noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, was worried about truanting and its cost. I notice the clock. I am running out of time. I wonder whether the noble Lord would allow me to continue that debate at another time, because the point he raises is complex.
The noble Baroness, Lady Williams of Crosby, asked one or two questions. First, on ring-fencing expenditure, this is a House that has spent many hours arguing for the independence of local authorities to enable them to make their own decisions at a local level. If we were to pre-empt their funds and to ring-fence them for nursery education it would mean that we should be making the decisions nationally. I believe that local authorities will jealously guard their right to spend their grants in the way that they decide. I can say to the noble Baroness, because this is an important point, that no local authority can, in a cavalier fashion, merely close down nursery provision. Local authorities have to go through a procedure and come to our department. I cannot remember an application to close down nursery provision. It is much more likely that we should be asked to improve or expand nursery provision.
As for grant-maintained schools, they are in the same position as LEA-maintained schools, because the responsibility for expanding nursery education is that of the local authority. That does not prevent an individual school from saying, "We would like nursery provision", but it will be the local authority that will have to approve it.
I end on the point of balancing priorities. For bedtime reading, I have been browsing through some of the past Hansards and some of the political papers produced by the Labour Party and the Liberal Party, and they have made good reading. I have listed just a few areas upon which people wish to spend more money: nursery education, of course; more teachers in schools; more school transport; more on capital; more for housing; more for police; more for social services; more for local authorities; more for legal aid; greater increases in social security benefits; and greater increases in aid for special groups. That list is by no means complete.

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Governments in office have to face the challenge of balancing competing needs with the cost of those needs to the people who pay.
Finally, I reiterate our approach towards the provision for under-fives. We are not complacent. We recognise the case for continuing to move towards greater access to a wider range of better quality provision. We have already made good progress, but further progress will depend, in part, on the resources that can be made available in this field, and that will mean, as I have said, balancing this and urgent calls with the limited total of public funding that can be afforded. Your Lordships' debate today, as always, will be a powerful contribution to that discussion.
8.35 p.m.
The Viscount of Falkland: My Lords, the clock is against us. I would like merely to thank all noble Lords who have participated in the debate. There have been many moving and forceful speeches made today. I should like to draw attention, in particular, to the maiden speech of my noble friend Lord Bath, which, by any standards, was exceptional. We on these Benches obviously hope to hear him talk on our behalf and his own behalf on many occasions in the future. I beg leave to withdraw the Motion for Papers.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.

Summer Time
8.36 p.m.
Viscount Mountgarret Viscount Mountgarret rose to ask Her Majesty's Government whether, in view of the fact that the European Community will delay the termination of Summer Time until 20th October, they will now take action in accordance with the Summer Time Consultation Paper (Cm. 722), the result of which demonstrated a majority in favour of this country adopting the same time as the rest of the European Community.
The noble Viscount said: My Lords, I should perhaps explain at the outset that I may have the phraseology of the Question somewhat wrong in that I have referred to the date upon which the Community proposes to end its Summer Time as being definitively 20th October. I obtained that piece of information from a respectable newspaper; namely, the Daily Telegraph. It was only when I happened to look at the day upon which that date fell—a Thursday—that I realised that there might be some mistake. The seventh directive from the European Community refers to the fourth Sunday in October. The difference is only marginal and does not alter the subject matter of the Question.
Let us be clear about the Question that I am asking. It is, definitively, whether Her Majesty's Government:
"will now take action in accordance with the Summer Time Consultation Paper"
of 1989. I do not advocate, one way or the other, whether it is right or wrong to make any change, and, if so, what, or whether we should keep the status quo. It is a far-ranging question. I suggest respectfully to noble
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Lords that if we went down that route we should be here for a long time. It is a matter for proper and serious debate.
I suppose that we have to hark back to the Summer Time Order debated in your Lordships' House on 14th July 1992 from which I should like to take one or two remarks made by my noble friend which appear in Hansard (cols. 198 to 202) of that date. We have been assured frequently—I repeat the word "assured"—that we should have an opportunity to consider this matter after the Community had come up with its own suggestions and requirements. For instance, during that debate my noble friend Lord Astor said:
"Strong views were expressed on both sides of the argument, and … we concluded that more time for reflection was required before bringing this matter to a decision".— [Official Report, 14/7/92; col. 198.]
That was nearly two years ago. It is a long time to be considering a matter. My noble friend went on to say that the Government also would wish to take account of a review of the future of Summer Time within the Community. That review has been completed.
In that debate support came from the party opposite. The noble Lord, Lord Graham of Edmonton, asked whether the Government also had in mind that at the appropriate time there would be a proper parliamentary opportunity for a debate. Therefore, it would seem that the party opposite would like the opportunity of considering the issue in further detail.
At the end of the debate my noble friend Lord Astor said:
"it would clearly be premature to ask Parliament to reach a decision before the Commission's approach is clear. We shall keep in close touch with developments and report back to your Lordships in due course".—[Official Report, 14/17/92; col. 202.]
That simply has not happened.
In response to my letter of March 1993, my noble friend Lord Ferrers concluded his reply by stating:
"The short answer is that we shall want to wait until the European Commission has divested itself of its deliberations before we take any action ourselves".
I do not wish to play upon words but that appears to be a reasonably definitive statement; that when the Commission has made a decision there shall be a review of the matter or action will be taken by Her Majesty's Government.
The seventh directive from the Commission was proposed in September 1993 and it laid out the proposals. In essence, it was proposed that the termination of European Summer Time should be deferred from, I believe, 1st September to the end of October. The Commission wanted to fall in line with Great Britain and Northern Ireland and put back the change of the clocks on the Continent until the fourth Sunday in October. It was proposed that that situation should continue until 1998, some four years hence. I understand that no less than 10 member states of the Commission agreed with that; they actually agreed to harmonise with Great Britain and Northern Ireland. That is only half a loaf, but I suppose that half a loaf is better than no bread at all. It avoids the infuriating business of changing all clocks and timetables twice within four or five weeks. However, I do not believe that it goes far enough.

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The fact that 10 member states agreed attempts to harmonise their time with this country indicates that it is appropriate that we should at least be seen to be addressing ourselves to the point and that we should reach a definitive decision on what we want to do. Apart from anything else, it is not good manners towards our colleagues in Europe to do otherwise. We know that they want to harmonise completely. I should not have tabled the Question if I were not slightly inclined to that opinion myself. What will happen if, in four years' time, the Commission finds that it does not like the change on the fourth Sunday in October and wishes to return to the status quo? Is it not therefore eminently desirable that we in this country should reach a decision on what we want to do?
The results of questions circulated in the 1989 Green Paper broke down as follows: in England, Wales and Northern Ireland 96 per cent. of those who answered the questions indicated a wish to adopt Central European Time. In Scotland—and we know that there is a problem in Scotland —only 13 per cent. went along with that idea. The overall position for the United Kingdom showed 81 per cent. in favour.
I wish to choose my words carefully because I do not want to be seen to be anti-Scottish. I respectfully point out that there were only 5,475 responses from people in Scotland whereas, somewhat naturally, with a larger population, the responses from people in England, Wales and Northern Ireland totalled 25,392. It is a point for consideration that perhaps the tail ought not to wag the dog too much. If a majority in the rest of the United Kingdom wished to see a change it would not be right for the smaller minority to carry so much sway.
Perhaps I may draw your Lordships' attention to a magnificent publication entitled Time for Change published by the Policy Studies Institute. It is a clear and concise report and makes interesting reading. With reference to the 1989 Green Paper, the report states:
"In the event no action was taken. Given the convincing case for change which the Green Paper had presented, the survival of the status quo was bewildering. What the Guardian called 'a classic case of the views of the vocal minority triumphing over those of the silent majority'"
I need not elaborate any further on that. I could not have raised it better myself.
Are not Her Majesty's Government logically obliged to bring forward the necessary primary legislation, which was referred to by my noble friend Lord Astor, and which would be required to adopt Central European Time? Should they not have it fully debated and aired and, it is hoped, voted upon in order that the matter can be settled in one way or the other? At least we would know then where we were going. Have there been any Cabinet consultations on the subject? What was the cost of setting up the inquiry? I have been unable to discover that because the analysts do not appear to be able to tell me. The fact is that public money was spent on the inquiry and it is pointless to publish a Green Paper, to ask questions, to receive the answers and then to pigeonhole the matter. If the Government are not prepared to do anything about it, will the Minister tell the House whose decision it was to pigeonhole the Green Paper?
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As your Lordships can imagine, I feel strongly about the matter. If, when my noble friend replies, he finds that he is unable to provide even a chink of light at the end of the tunnel to indicate that there may be a reasonable opportunity of a debate and a decision taken on this matter within the very near future, I feel that it is incumbent upon somebody—it may be myself—to set in motion the necessary machinery to implement primary legislation. The matter can then be put to a vote and we can see what everybody wants. I make no pre-judgments about that. I believe that we, and the country, are entitled, to know that the matter is being properly and widely considered.
8.50 p.m.
Lord Howie of Troon: My Lords, it is customary on these occasions to congratulate the noble Viscount who has tabled the Question, and I gladly do so. However, I rather wish that he had not done so.
The Green Paper was published in June 1989, and apart from a slight flurry of excitement a few months later and another palpitation two or three months ago, it has lain fallow for most of that time.
I should like to see the Green Paper lie fallow for all eternity because I do not at all support the notion that we should take up what the noble Viscount, Lord Mountgarret, called Central European Time. The Government prefer to call it single double summer time—SDST. By doing that, I do not believe that they mean to dissociate themselves in any way from Europe.
We must remember that we have twice been round this course. During the war when I was a student in Glasgow, I lived in Troon. At that time we had double summer time. We had that experiment during the war because it seemed appropriate then —and no doubt it was. We take certain actions which seem appropriate in war time which may not seem appropriate in peacetime. It had an up-side. At the height of summer, on the longest day, towards the end of June, one could play golf at midnight. Not many people want to do that but it is possible. There was a down-side; namely, in January, in order to reach my college in Glasgow, I would catch a train from Troon at two minutes past seven in a kind of stygian darkness which is difficult to imagine. I arrived in Glasgow at quarter past eight, made my way up to college and I was in good time to watch the sun rising at around ten o'clock. That is ridiculous. That is the actuality of what life is like not very far away.
The point is that when one looks at one's diary and sees the time zones, one thinks in terms of the sun behaving in a neat way so that the zones are along the lines of longitude, which of course they are. But that is an idealised and inaccurate representation of what actually happens. Sunrise and sunset do not occur in a neat east-west configuration which fits snugly along the lines of longitude. If the sun behaved in that way, it would be necessary merely to shift the clock an hour or so for every 15 degrees that one moved east or west. But, in fact, the world is tipped on its axis and instead of being a north and south line, the path of the sun is like a spiral around the globe. That is demonstrated by the fact that Cape Town, which is almost due south from

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London, is in a plus two hour time zone. Although it is on the meridian, near enough, the time there is not the same as it is in London.
The effect of that is exaggerated by the fact that the United Kingdom does not lie north and south. We think of it as lying north and south but it is tipped to the west. For example, Bristol is further east than Edinburgh. Therefore, the effect of the axis of the earth in relation to the sun is compounded by the fact that the country is tipped over towards the west. That means that the sunrise in Glasgow is something like 40 minutes later, and in Inverness it is rather more than an hour later, than it is in London. That is not a trivial matter. It is not a matter of the tail wagging the dog but rather of the dog taking a good look at what happens to the tail; and it should do that.
In effect it means that if the change were made and the Londoner were to arrive at his office at dawn, at round about 9 o'clock, his counterpart in Inverness would arrive an hour before dawn. That is no way to treat our fellow countrymen.
If that is uncomfortable for office workers, it is dangerous for construction workers. We must recall that the average hours of work in the construction industry are from about half past seven in the morning until about half past four in the afternoon. At half past seven in winter, the conditions are uncomfortable. They are obviously dark, although there is artificial light these days on building sites. It is cold, miserable and uncomfortable. Because it is cold, miserable and uncomfortable, it is also dangerous. People fall off scaffolding at half past seven in the morning. If the clocks are changed, we are not talking about half past seven in the morning but half past six in the morning when it is colder, darker, more miserable and more dangerous.
It may be said, "Oh well, the construction industry can change its hours and work later in the day". That is possible. However, the only effect of that would be to throw something like 1 million workers into the rush hour in the morning and in the evening. That would make the situation worse than it is at present.
There are technical difficulties. At this point, I should remind the House that I have been involved with the construction industry for many years. I may be said to be speaking on its behalf in a sense although it has not asked me to do so. One problem is that the wet trades—concreting, plastering, and so on—are affected considerably by temperature. Concreting cannot be carried out at a temperature below about three degrees centigrade. Generally speaking, that is reached at about half past nine in the morning. In SDST, that would be at about half past ten in the morning, and that would mean the effective loss of one hour's construction work. It is estimated that the cost of that would be about £400 million. I should add that that was the estimate when the Green Paper was published. No doubt there would be a higher estimate now. That would be a burden on society.
There is another group of people which we must remember; that is the postmen. In that regard I merely wish to draw the attention of the House to a debate in another place on 27th October 1993, a few months ago, when Mr. Nigel Waterson of Eastbourne proposed a Bill
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to amend Summer Time. He received a reply from my honourable friend Mr. Peter Hain, a man with whom I hardly ever agree. However, I agree with him on this occasion. He argued the case for postal workers and referred to the dire effects on them of the proposed change. I do not wish to do any more than draw attention to that passage in the Official Report of the other place at which noble Lords may feel inclined to take a look.
We had another such experience in the late 1960s when the country was eager—indeed, avid—to go into Europe. It was felt that taking up European time would be a great aid to business. Well, we have been in Europe for 20 years and I must say that I cannot imagine that any of our difficulties in our European experience have actually been due to the time differences among ourselves, France and Germany.
The idea of time zones over a community the size of Europe is not unusual. Let us think, for example, of the United States. Suppose one were to superimpose the United States on a map of Europe. New York would be round about Constantinople—or, perhaps we should say, Istanbul—and California off the coast of Africa with Arizona somewhere in the Sahara Deserts. But the general mass of the United States would be not unlike that of western Europe, although somewhat further to the south.
The United States manages with four time zones. It is quite capable of carrying on business despite that fact. Last August, I travelled from Chicago to Pittsburgh, which is a distance of about 400 miles. That is about the distance from here to Glasgow. I am not asking for a time zone between London and Glasgow, even though it may come to that in due course. However, it is a little shorter than the distance between London and Frankfurt.
In my experience, businessmen in Chicago seem to be able to carry on business with businessmen in. Pittsburgh, despite the fact that they have to cross a time zone. It does not cause them the slightest bother. For example, if they have to telephone a man in Pittsburgh at 9 a.m., they actually get out of bed and telephone him at 8 a.m. Chicago time. It is quite possible. Indeed, my own colleagues do so. In my magazine publishing activities, we have advertising agents in Holland, Italy and elsewhere in continental Europe. My colleagues—happily, not myself—are involved in the advertising business. They get out of bed in time to telephone their counterparts in continental Europe. So far as I know, they suffer no great harm as a result. Sometimes, I dare say, they call from their motor cars using their mobile phones. Therefore, businessmen can get around the problem.
I have noticed that the argument in the press has changed a little. Whereas on the first occasion we spoke about war time and the exigencies of war and in the 1960s we spoke of the need for businessmen to get into Europe, the concentration now is on road accidents and how the proposed change would lead to increased road safety. I dare say that that is probably right. However, I have just two points to make in that respect. First, the most exciting and dire road accidents that happen in our country happen in the morning. They happen on the motorways and in conditions of fog. Of course, we have

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motorway madness, and so on, compounding the situation; but those catastrophes would undoubtedly be made worse. There is no questioning that fact.
In conclusion, I should like to remind the House that the last experiment in the 1960s was brought to an end because a group of schoolchildren in the North of Scotland were mown down on their way to school in the darkness of the early morning. That had a salutary effect on the other place and the experiment was brought to a close with a vote, I think, of something like 360 or so against it and about 80 or so in favour. The other place expressed its views quite convincingly at the time. I have no reason to suppose that those views have changed. I sincerely hope that the Minister tells us at the end of the debate that he has had an interesting evening and that he proposes to put the Green Paper under his pillow and leave it there.
9.5 p.m.
Lady Saltoun of Abernethy: My Lords, I must say, first, that I do not really think that two years is a very long time to be considering such a very basic matter. Secondly, I think—and I say so unashamedly —that I shall speak for Scotland and explain how the people there feel about the proposed change. When the noble Viscount, Lord Mountgarret, speaks about the country, I rather think that he is not really speaking about Britain; he is speaking about England.
When I opened the consultation document I started at the back with the appendices. In the list of those organisations wishing to retain the status quo which appears in Appendix E, I noticed without surprise that exactly half the 128 names—that is, 69—were Scottish. Then I looked at Appendix D containing the list of those in favour of SDST (that is, GMT plus one in winter, and GMT plus two in summer): only 15 out of 188 organisations were Scottish.
Appendix C—those favouring harmonisation of Summer Time dates—had eight Scottish names to it, or just under a fifth of the total, the population of Scotland being about one-tenth of the total. There was no appendix giving a list of those opposed to harmonisation, I presume because no one was.
I then looked at Appendix B—the comparison between the sunrise and sunset times in London and Glasgow. I looked at it with disgust for Glasgow is well south of the middle of Scotland even if you take no account of Orkney and Shetland. When you get to the far north, the time difference is far greater. It seems to me that, so far as the Home Office is concerned, Scotland stops at a line drawn between Edinburgh and Glasgow. Perhaps they think that north of that lies nothing but uninhabited wilderness.
I then turned to the conclusions and to the arguments in favour of SDST in paragraph 97. I must say that I do not think much of them. I cannot see that there is any proof that the adoption of SDST would reduce the number of accidents. In fact I believe the reverse might be the case. I was interested in what the noble Lord, Lord Howie of Troon, has just said on that matter. I should think that, if we adopted SDST, there would be more accidents in the morning and fewer in the evening.
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I do not think it would save much electricity, certainly not in the north. Consumption would merely increase in the mornings and decrease in the evenings.
As regards crime, surely the way to combat crime is to hang or punish adequately criminals and not to monkey about with the clocks. As the noble Lord, Lord Howie of Troon, further stated, businessmen cope perfectly well with different east/west time zones and I cannot see that there is any problem in coping with north/south time zones. As the noble Lord, Lord Howie of Troon, has also said, the adoption of SDST would pose all sorts of problems for construction workers and also for farmers. Finally, why should the Scots be forced to accept something they do not want because the Scandinavians have it?
The most important argument of all is that the Scots, particularly those living in the north and those living in the country, do not want this provision. It is important to remember that we had a trial run in 1968 to 1971 for three horrible years. Therefore we know what the proposed measure is like and we hated it. Where I live, which is about on the same parallel as Inverness, it was dark until nearly 10 o'clock in the morning, and further north it was dark until far later.
If people in England want SDST, let them have it, but let us in Scotland retain the status quo. I believe that that is what most people want. I have to say that the Government are extremely unpopular in Scotland at the moment and forcing SDST on the Scots will merely make matters infinitely worse, and I think it would be a foolish thing to do. What I am arguing for is a form of subsidiarity. It should be possible to have the Border as a demarcation line, or alternatively the 55th or 56th parallel. Personally, however, I should favour the Border. I believe that that would be much simpler. On the other hand, having argued like a tiger cat against synchronisation of times, I would certainly support the suggestion that Summer Time dates should be harmonised. I note that no one seems to be quarrelling with that.
9.12 p.m.
Lord Vinson: My Lords, we are indeed indebted to the noble Viscount, Lord Mountgarret, for raising this issue. The arguments for setting clocks forward by one hour throughout the year to coincide with continental time are well rehearsed. Indeed I believe that the social and economic advantages to the United Kingdom are so overwhelming that the tardiness of the Government in introducing this reform is near incomprehensible.
I hope noble Lords will not mind if I follow two speeches that have accentuated the negative by trying for a moment to accentuate the positive aspects that might come out of this move. Noble Lords will recall the end of the 1971 experiment. At that time the vast majority of local authorities and organisations that were consulted—it was a comprehensive consultation—voted in favour of the change but their MPs failed to echo that opinion in the House of Commons. The reason for that failure was the rather emotional stance that was adopted—it was adopted tonight by the noble Lord, Lord Howie of Troon—that children would be killed when going to school in the morning because it would

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be darker. First, I wish to remind your Lordships that children in Scotland already go to school in the dark and that sunrise in Inverness is already 40 minutes later than that in London.
There are advantages at the other end of the scale: children will come home in daylight, construction industry workers will be able to work longer in the afternoon in daylight, and the tourist industry will benefit enormously because there will be greater recreational time in the evening. All of that will greatly benefit the economy of Scotland. It seems to me that to take this decision on the entirely emotional basis that more children will be killed on their way to school is to miss the balancing statistic that very many fewer children will he killed in the afternoon on their way home from school. If we are to look at this matter objectively and not too emotionally we must try to weigh that in the balance.
The noble Lord, Lord Howie of Troon, dismissed the fact that there would he many fewer accidents. This matter has been extremely well researched. There is no doubt that the figures put forward have great merit. We are not talking about the lives of one or two people being saved as a result of the change. We are talking about annual savings of 140 fatal injuries, 520 serious injuries and 1,300 minor accidents. Those are quite apart from 32,000 fewer cars being damaged, which is one of the projected benefits if this change is introduced into the United Kingdom. What is more, in Scotland alone 60 deaths and 270 major injuries on the road will be prevented, quite apart from the car accidents themselves.
These are very important figures to bear in mind. One thinks about how the Government reacted to the Hungerford massacre where a lunatic got hold of a gun and killed a few people. The House was subjected to days and nights of legislation designed to prevent people being killed in such a manner. One would have thought that in any balance of priorities the significance of the huge saving of life and injury from which this country could benefit as a result of the time change would be a primary consideration in our minds.
There is more to it than that. Lighter afternoons will bring about a huge social benefit, not just tourist and recreational benefits. The fact is that an increasingly elderly population of this country are curfewed in their homes by darkness. Another hour's light in the afternoon will give them more freedom and pleasure and broaden their lives significantly. That is why on those two counts alone, quite apart from the economic advantages, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents and such well trusted organisations as Age Concern are very much in favour of this measure. Almost every major national body that one can think of is in favour of it. Therefore it is extraordinary that the Government resist it for what I believe are somewhat uninformed, emotional reasons put forward by those in Scotland. Those in the extreme north will no doubt be affected but no more than those in parts of Scandinavia who seem to be able to live perfectly satisfactorily with this situation.
At the end of the day, it is the job of the Government to lead and reach a balanced and statesmanlike decisionon
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on such serious matters. I have not stressed the economic advantages of co-ordinating time fully with Europe because they are self-evident. It is a paradox, to say the least, that in the year that we joined the EC (1971) the Prime Minister, Mr. Heath, took us out of the same time period.
I understand and accept the sensitivity that the Government have about Scottish opinion. No doubt if I lived in the north of Scotland I would also feel strongly about the matter. However, perhaps I may draw a parallel between this measure and the recent introduction of the measure to co-ordinate male and female retirement ages at 65. It appeared that the Government dodged and put off biting the bullet on that issue for about five years, but subtly during that period they let the arguments speak for themselves. Right is might. The expected vociferous feminist opposition to this very sensible co-ordination simply never happened. It did not happen because the facts spoke for themselves. The logic of the need for change was quietly put and the case was self-evident.
I believe that it is the job of the Government not to run away from the decision to effect this change, but to take the trouble to explain the facts, take Scotland by the hand, point out the economic and social advantages which would flow to Scotland—not just the disadvantages that have been accentuated tonight—and honestly to admit that, though there will be some inconvenience to a very small minority of people in the north, in a democracy the massive overall public gain that will flow elsewhere has to be regarded as paramount. Therefore I urge the Government not to continue to run away from the issue, but to face up to it and to make the change that will be socially and economically beneficial to the country.
9.20 p.m.
Lord Monson: My Lords, I normally agree wholeheartedly with everything that the noble Lord, Lord Vinson, says. However, on this occasion I have to part company with him. In introducing the Question, the noble Viscount, Lord Mountgarret, drew attention to an error in the wording to do with 20th October. I have to point out another error in the wording which refers to the possibility of this country,
"adopting the same time as the rest of the European Community".
There is no way in which this country can have the same time as the rest of the European Community because there is no way in which the European Community can have the same time throughout. It is not the case that the United Kingdom is unique in the European Community in not adhering to central European time. As noble Lords would expect in a Community which spans 39 degrees of longitude from the Dingle Peninsula in the west to Kastellorizon, just east of Rhodes, in the east, the Community contains three different time zones, just as Australia does. Australia spreads across 40 degrees of longitude and in that respect is almost identical to the European Community.
The western time zone, GMT, contains the Republic of Ireland, the United Kingdom, Madeira and the Canaries. Until last year it also contained mainland Portugal. However, the Portuguese—I think mainly in

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an effort to attract well-to-do tourists from Spain where people are used to light evenings and eating late—changed to Spanish time in 1993. My Portuguese friends are still reserving judgment on the change.
In the centre zone one has most of western and central Europe and in the east one has Greece. I am sure that the proponents for moving to central European time would not suggest that the mere fact of EC membership obliges all member states everywhere to adhere to a common time. For example—it seems fanciful in the extreme at this moment but miracles happen—if Russia ever became democratic and prosperous enough to qualify for EC membership, presumably she would be admitted to the Community in due course. There is a seven-hour time difference between Moscow and Vladivostok—the same time difference that exists between London and Denver, Colorado, in one direction and London and Bangkok in the other. It would be amusing in the extreme if M. Jacques Delors or his successor were to decree that, nevertheless, all European Community countries should adopt a uniform time zone.
What is the EC doing issuing directives on this matter? What has happened to the principle of subsidiarity about which we have heard recently? In the United States, the land of the free, individual cities are free to decide their own starting and finishing times for the adoption of Summer Time. For hardheaded, economic reasons most of them decide to co-ordinate their starting and finishing times. Nevertheless, any city which wishes to break away from the crowd is free to do so. In the centralised dirigiste Colbertian entity in which we now find ourselves, such freedoms evidently will not be permitted.
A few days ago, a well known Cabinet Minister, Mr. Michael Portillo, attacked elites who, he claimed, were mocking and undermining long-admired British traditions and institutions. What could be more of a British institution in which to take pride and from which to draw inspiration than Greenwich, and everything that goes with it—its magnificent architecture, its observatory and, of course, the Greenwich Meridian?
If Britain—followed in due course, I dare say, by Ireland, north and south—decided to become part of the central European zone, then the only territories left to adhere to the once-famous GMT would be, roughly from north to south: the Faroes, Iceland, Madeira, the Canaries, Morocco—the only country of any size in population terms —Sierra Leone, Gambia, Togo, Liberia and half-a-dozen other very small West African countries, Ascension Island, St. Helena and Tristan da Cunha. What a come-down!
Some may argue that these considerations of sentiment and tradition are all very well, but what about practical considerations? What about the poor businessman who has to get up at some ungodly hour to fly to Paris, Brussels, Dusseldorf or Milan to arrive at a meeting in the office that day at 9 a.m. or 10 a.m.? As the noble Lord, Lord Howie of Troon, reminded us, exactly the same problem is faced by our American counterparts when flying from Chicago to New York or from Los Angeles to Phoenix, Arizona. Our Canadian
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counterparts face the same when flying from Vancouver to Calgary or from Toronto to Halifax. Indeed, they are rather better off than our Australian counterparts who have to fly from Perth to Adelaide because, as your Lordships know, there is a time difference of one-and-a-half hours between Perth and Adelaide.
One of the reasons that London is still about the world's most highly favoured financial centre is because, from the time point of view, it lies nicely between the financial centres of New York, Hong Kong, Sydney, Tokyo, and so on. Some of those advantages, especially vis-a-vis the USA, would—"evaporate" is too strong a word—diminish if we switched to central European time.
That may be so, some would argue, but the switch would nevertheless massively reduce crime and road accidents. Under the present dispensation—in other words with ourselves sticking to the GMT time zone—sunset and sunrise in midwinter would occur at almost exactly the same time in Berlin as they do in London and almost exactly the same time in Copenhagen as they do in Glasgow, give or take five or six minutes. So if the hard-headed, practical, highly scientific Danes and Germans believed that there is anything in the argument that darker mornings and slightly lighter evenings would reduce crime and traffic accidents, they would surely have switched to eastern European time many years ago.
Do I think that any further change from the status quo is desirable? Yes, I do, as a matter of fact. I urge Her Majesty's Government to do their best to persuade our continental partners of the merits of switching the starting date of Summer Time from the end of March to mid-March, as used to happen in this country until quite recently. Such a change would not be at the expense of the Scots, the Northern Irish, the farmers or the construction industry. It is a modest example of harmonisation which would bring disadvantages to practically no one and would find favour with and benefit practically everyone in whatever country they happen to live.
9.28 p.m.
Lord Mountevans: My Lords, I too welcome the opportunity given by my noble friend Lord Mountgarret to debate the issue tonight, not least because I found myself largely in sympathy with many of his arguments. I have to say at the outset that I was not desperately sympathetic with those advanced in favour of Scotland.
We, or Europe, have taken a small and tenuous step in the right direction by agreeing to harmonise the autumn changeover date. That will be of enormous benefit to a very successful branch of our industry—the carriers. I know that when I mention the word "carriers" my noble friend on the Front Bench twitches a little; but I shall not go down our usual path tonight. The fact that one no longer has to produce three different timetables every year is an enormous advantage to them.
However, I believe that at the moment we have the chance to build on Europe's example and to go further by means of joining a European time zone rather than lagging behind it. Business would benefit because there

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would be an extra hour of the day when most of Europe's businessmen are in their offices at the same time as British businessmen are.
I declare an interest on behalf of the British Tourist Authority. When I worked in Stockholm, London was always one hour behind. When I worked in London, Stockholm tended to be one hour ahead. That complicates matters because it shortens the time that is available to one. Also, because we come in one hour later, we all get onto the international dialling network at the same time. I wonder how many noble Lords can remember that dulcet tone: "All lines to Brussels are engaged. Please try again later". In that sense, the change would certainly be of benefit to businessmen. There would also be the benefit of face-to-face contact, since travel patterns would be changed.
I said that the harmonisation of the autumn date would benefit the carriers. But I believe that harmonisation throughout the time pattern would benefit them even more. To support that, there is the timetable point that we have already raised. There would be some reduction in the need for British airlines to night-stop aircraft in Europe in order to take account of the morning peak period for travel into Britain. At the same time, they would benefit a little as there would be a disadvantage to European carriers, who at the moment get into London in particular so early that they can take advantage of the outward rush from London into Europe at the end of the morning peak. Common time zones would certainly reduce that advantage a little; and it would be to the advantage of our aviation industry.
As has already been mentioned, the tourism industry certainly believes that a common time pattern would be advantageous. On the one hand, the industry believes that more daylight later in the day would extend the autumn tourism season by some two months. Such a change must benefit the industry, which is already one of Britain's fastest growing and successful ones. That would increase both domestic tourism—Britons travelling within Britain (dare I say it, English people travelling to Scotland?) and also international tourism, which would be of benefit to our tourism balance of payments, which is not, alas, as favourable as I should like it to be.
Furthermore, the Sports Council has established that additional daylight later in the day would be of great benefit in exploiting the many sporting facilities that are nationally, municipally or privately owned in this country.
I have one final reason for hoping that eventually we shall get into the same time zone as Europe. It is a more personal one. I like daylight, and I prefer to have it when I am up and about than when I am down and abed.
Of course I take note of the Scottish anxieties. But I should like to put the counter-argument. I have spent a quarter of my life in Sweden and Norway. Much of that time was spent in Gothenburg, which is on the same level of latitude as Aberdeen, and much of it was spent in Stockholm and Oslo, on approximately the same latitude as the Fair Isle Channel. Having done so, I have become used to the Scandinavian life-style, which maximises the use of available daylight. Schools start early. Business starts early. Shops are increasingly
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opening earlier. Everything happens much earlier. The rush hour on my local train in Stockholm was 6.30 to 7.30 a.m., whereas in London it would probably tend to be 7.30 to 9 a.m. That is an important point. Obviously, if one is to try to change people's life-styles—and quite clearly a time zone change would have a major impact in Scotland—one has to give the people whose life-styles one is changing the facilities to make that change.
I am a European by heredity (through my grandparents), by environment, upbringing, education, eventually by marriage, and by career. I hope that it will not be too long before I am also a European in terms of time zone.
9.35 p.m.
Lord Tanlaw: My Lords, I am very pleased to take part in this discussion. However, I feel that there are some elements of confusion in it. Apart from some noble Lords who may have confused longitude with latitude, there may also be some confusion in the wording, some of which was referred to by the noble Viscount himself.
I should like to ask the noble Earl who is to wind up the debate for some clarification. The Question implies that the European Community has already decided an agreed day of termination of Summer Time. However, I understand that that is not the case. The noble Viscount mentioned that Denmark and the United Kingdom have still not signed the directive which requires that all the clocks be changed on the same day. It would be very helpful if the noble Earl could clarify the position and tell us whether the document has been signed or when it will be signed and, if there is any delay, the real reason for it. This country is one of the main beneficiaries of having clocks set at the same time all over Europe.
That day is the day following the third Saturday or, if that day is Easter Day (which will not be in this century), the day following the second Saturday in March and the day following the fourth Sunday in October. If those specific days can be agreed throughout Europe it will help enormously in time-tabling, which was a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Mountevans, and other speakers, especially on the cross-Channel rail service, which is to come into operation this year. Millions of pounds will have to be spent on rescheduling the timetable and on additional train services, and so on, if this matter is not sorted out before then. Despite the words of the noble Lord, Lord Howie of Troon, I see no advantage in delaying or forgetting about the directive. It is quite right that it should not go away.
Speaking as a fellow Scot to some noble Lords who have already spoken, I feel that there is always a general hostility to any suggestion that comes from south of the Border or across the water and affects Scotland; that such a suggestion must be a bad one, and therefore rejected. This proposal is just one more. I sometimes allow myself the luxury of sharing with many other Scots, and possibly some Members of the other place who speak on this topic, the feeling that Scotland somehow should be preserved independently of both time and space. It can be seen as some sort of

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"Brigadoon" where every night is Burns' supper night—somewhere that is different from the rest of Europe and something that is entirely Scottish. The debate about time is a perfect example of how the Scots can show their independence.
As the noble Lord, Lord Mountevans, and others asked, how is it that people in Norway, Sweden and other Northern latitudes are not bothered by this situation? It seems to bother some of the noble Lords who have spoken. They seem to be bothered by the time and the dark. There are adequate proper lighting systems in their streets. People do not walk about in the dark. They walk abut in the light. Scotland exports more than 50 per cent. and possibly 70 per cent. of all the electricity that it generates. I feel that perhaps some of the local councils should not be quite so mean as they are by not providing adequate public lighting in small villages and around schools and places where children are picked up by cars in the morning. That is something that could be done. With the lighting systems that are now available on the market it is possible to have more lighting without polluting and obscuring the night sky with a horrid orange glow.
There have been one or two misalignments in longitude and latitude in some of the comments so far. If noble Lords will bear with me for a second, I shall try to explain. Since time immemorial in Britain the reasons for the various daylight changes have been astronomical. They are changes which are due to the two equinoxes and the two solstices that occur every year. At the equinoxes the local times of sunrise and sunset are roughly equal all over the world. Most of the year the variations of sunrise and sunset in different northern latitudes do not affect the working day. They affect the times of leisure, a point which again has been mentioned by other noble Lords, but not the working day.
At the summer solstice there is an early sunrise in the north of Scotland combined with a late sunset. In fact, if double Summer Time were in operation the sun would set in Inverness about half an hour into the next day—0030 hours. It is in the months of November, December and January that difficulties begin to arise in the working hours. For instance, today the sun rose in London at approximately 0755 hours and set at 1628 hours, while in Inverness the sun did not rise until 0844 but set around the same time as it did in London. A number of noble Lords did not make the point that sunsets are virtually the same in winter regardless of the location in Britain; it is only the sunrise which varies. I shall not go into the complications of why that occurs.
The difference in the times of sunrise and sunset are governed by nature and cannot be altered. What can be altered are the times of the working day to suit, for instance, the schools in those latitudes. There is a strong case for the Government to do more than they are at the moment to try and persuade local schools and councils to consider putting back the time of the morning school in northern latitudes. There is also a case for doing more to supply school children with reflective clothing or belts, again in northern latitudes.
My noble friend Lord Monson asked what was to happen in Russia. When the noble Earl replies perhaps
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he will confirm that, as I understand it, Russia has agreed to take Central European Time regardless of the extraordinary time zone differences in that country. They want to do business with Europe and are prepared to move into Central European Time. That was bound to happen. Businessmen the world over are trading in markets on a global basis. I see nothing wrong or peculiar in their using Europe, even an expanded Europe, to use the same time zones for business.
We must recognise that there are changes which are due to nature and nature alone that cannot be altered. It is us, as homo sapiens, who must adapt to them as best we can; we must obtain the best out of our working day and maximise the use of the natural sunlight that is given to us in northern latitudes. I therefore ask the noble Earl a final question. If the directive is to be signed shortly, as I understand it is, can he confirm that there will be harmonisation on the day that all the clocks change? I refer to the day I described in March and the day in October. That will be simple to achieve and will not affect any of the problems that other noble Lords seem to experience. It will take us a great step forward.
The British Horological Institute, to which I am a consultant—which does not seem to have been consulted under the Green Paper but I hope that it was, even though it is not recorded—would like confirmation that the Government intend to do something about the situation. It makes obvious commonsense and takes us one step nearer the possibility of a global synchronisation of those days which recognise the natural changes by which the planet is affected.
9.43 p.m.
Baroness Mallalieu: My Lords, the gratitude of those of us on this side of the House to the noble Viscount, Lord Mountgarret, for bringing this matter back before the House is, at the same time, matched by sympathy for the Minister who must shortly reply. Yesterday evening he faced a barrage of criticism from every part of the House during the Second Reading of the Police and Magistrates' Courts Bill. He manfully defended the Government with his characteristic swash and buckle against charges which included introducing unnecessary legislation without seeking proper consultation.
No sooner has he bandaged up his wounds and limped back to his post tonight than he finds himself under attack yet again, somewhat less extensively and less comprehensively perhaps, but this time for the Government's inaction, for their failure to legislate and for the interminable consultation on this matter. I am not in the least bit surprised that the Government have chosen to prevaricate on this one.
When he was last called upon to deal with this matter in the House back on 10th December 1992 the noble Earl described the whole subject as one of,
"beastly and foul complexity".—[Official Report, 10/12/92; col. 312.]
I can well understand the Government's reasons for indecision. If they take one course on Summer Time they will surely incur the wrath of 15,000 members of the Scottish NFU. I have no doubt that the noble Earl can picture thousands of elderly crofters, led perhaps by

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the noble Lord, Lord Howie of Troon, and the noble Lady, Lady Saltoun of Abernethy, packing into the Peers' Lobby to complain that they are going to be forced to milk their cows in darkness and thus incur additional paraffin costs for their Tilley lamps. If the Government do nothing then I suspect that the noble Earl fears for his safety at the hands of some crazed Eurobond dealer who, with millions at stake, has been sitting drumming fingers on his desk top, trying to telephone Continental offices when everyone has gone home due to the time change, and has finally snapped. But I am afraid that the Government can prevaricate no longer over this issue.
The consultation document on the whole issue of Summer Time was presented to Parliament as long ago as June 1989. Those consultations could scarcely have been wider. Among those who made submissions, according to the appendices at the end, were the Briar Pipe Trade Association, Butlins, the Jockey Club, Friends of the Earth and the Zip Fastener Manufacturers Association. Indeed a list of those who did not make submissions would have been very much shorter. The noble Lord, Lord Tanlaw, has managed to identify one of them.
An overwhelming majority of those who made submissions or were consulted found in favour of the adoption of a Central European time. Did the Government reach a decision as a result? In the inappropriately titled "Conclusion" section of the paper the Government's position is set out. I quote from page 27:
"the Government recognises that there are many, particularly in Scotland, who are opposed to any change in the present position. This paper is intended to stimulate discussion on the issue and the options to assist the Government in reaching a decision".
That was the Government's conclusion at the end of that paper. That was four and a half years ago.
Two years later, on 14th July 1992, the noble Viscount, Lord Astor, was sent into bat introducing the Summer Time Order in the House. That gave the Government a further two years of the status quo in order,
"to enable the Government to complete their consideration of the options for future Summer Time policy including whether there is a case for change".
The noble Viscount promised to discuss the position and report back to your Lordships' House.
Six months passed and by December 1992 the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, was growing restless about the position and asked Her Majesty's Government whether, in view of the single European Market in early 1993 and the imminent opening of the Channel Tunnel, they would expedite their review of the desirability of adopting Central European time. The noble Earl then told him that the Commission was reviewing its position, and added:
"We shall bring forward our proposals when the approach of the Commission is clear".—[Official Report, 10/12/92; col. 312.]
Another two years have passed by and now the noble Viscount, Lord Mountgarret, wants some answers, as do some of the rest of us. The Government, I fully understand, may not wish to upset the Ladies Scottish Climbing Club, which argued for the status quo in the consultative document, or the British Edible Pulse
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Association, which wanted single/double Summer Time. But in the words of a well known television quiz master, it must surely be "Make your mind up time".
I speak for myself in expressing a personal view. But at the very least, when France is only about 30 minutes away; when we are part of a single market; when, like it or like it not, we are daily more closely linked to the European Community and when many people are commuting regularly to and fro, both for work and pleasure, business, travel, communications and tourism would all be simplified if we shared the same time as our European partners or at the very least, if the question of Summer Time dates was harmonised.
Apart from some of those who live in Scotland, who, if their arguments tonight are right, are doomed to live short lives in total darkness until, perhaps mercifully, they are wiped out on the roads should Central European Time be adopted, I suspect that it does not really matter to most of us in practice what dates are adopted for Summer Time or how that time is calculated, so long as the dates are the same as those of our close European neighbours and we all know where we are.
So I ask the Minister tonight to muster such strength as he can command after last night; to take his courage, as usual, in both hands and to tell us at last what the Government intend to do.
9.51 p.m.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Earl Ferrers): My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, is always a fascinating person both to listen to and to follow. I shall cogitate a little on what she has said. She spoke in reply to the Question of my noble friend Lord Mountgarret. He has always had a longstanding interest in this subject which he has frequently expressed in that characteristically forthright style of his when expounding the views which he holds. Of course, in this he is not alone.
I was grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, for what she said. She began her speech, and I thought, "Now, there is a person who really understands the difficulties". In what she said she encapsulated exactly what I was thinking. Yesterday we had the police Bill and I, as the representative of Her Majesty's Government, was castigated for being, as I believe someone said, a young man in a hurry who wants to get on and do things. Why can he not listen and take note of what everyone else says? Today I am being castigated as an old man in a rut who will not get on and make up his mind and come to a conclusion. The noble Baroness understood that. I wish she had been here yesterday, but she was not—anyhow, not participating in that respect.
My noble friend Lord Mountgarret is always keen on getting a move on on this subject. When he made his speech it seemed to me pretty obvious that that is what we should do. That was until the noble Lord, Lord Howie of Troon, said that the whole thing is totally different in Scotland and that he could not think why on earth anyone should agree with my noble friend sitting behind me. Then the noble Lady, Lady Saltoun of Abernethy, said that she agreed with the noble Lord, Lord Howie of Troon.

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As they were talking, I recalled the days when I was in Scotland during the war. We had Greenwich Mean Time plus two. We were in Stranraer, which is only just north of the Border. I remember that it was light at night at 12 o'clock. I always wondered how that was. It seemed to me that, if you subtract two from GMT plus two, two hours from that would mean it would still be light at 10 o'clock. But it is not like that in the south of England. I always think of that as part of my childhood which I shall always remember. The curious part was that my school was moved to Stranraer, oddly enough, to the home of the noble Lord, Lord Tanlaw. I well remember the headmaster saying to us, "We have a new boy coming this term. We must all be polite to him because this is his house. He is a fellow called Simon Mackay". That fellow, Simon Mackay, appeared in a kilt and we all thought that was very strange because we had all come from the south of England. We still think that he is quite strange—in a very agreeable way. I shall always think of that occasion whenever I think of that castle; and whenever I do, I think of the very light nights as a result of GMT plus two but, as the noble Lord, Lord Howie of Troon, said, that is nothing compared with the light in Inverness.
I was fascinated, too, by the argument of the noble Lady, Lady Saltoun, that if we were to move to Central European Time, crime would decrease. She had a very abrupt answer—that we should hang everyone but not monkey around with the clocks. We can all understand that very simplistic attitude. Some of us might agree with her—but not everyone. However, I think that comparing whether one should hang people for certain crimes or whether we should move the clocks back is rather like saying, "Would you like a slice of Gorgonzola or would you prefer to go for a drive in a motor car?" There does not seem to be total relevance between the two.
My noble friend Lord Vinson then came along to say that he thought that the Government should take, as he described it, a strong and statesmanlike decision on this matter. In other words, why do the Government not get on and agree with his point of view? My noble friend Lord Mountevans said that he likes daylight to be when he is up and not when he is in bed. So, there is an enormous divergence of view over what appears to be quite a simple subject. The noble Lord, Lord Tanlaw, encapsulated that by saying that he cannot see any reason why on earth we should not change to Central European Time now. All that I can say to that is that it shows that those who hold views on this matter are quite convinced that only their view is reasonable and that everyone else's view is totally unreasonable.
There are many people who would agree with the firm conviction of my noble friend Lord Mountgarret of the benefits which would accrue if the United Kingdom were to adopt Central European Time; but others take the opposite view. I hope that my noble friend will at least be reassured to hear that the Government are actively considering whether there is a case for moving to Central European Time and that we expect to reach a conclusion soon. The noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, always an impatient young lady in a hurry, wants to
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know the answer straight away, but she must wait just a little. We shall need to weigh both sides of the argument carefully and we shall have to take proper account of the many issues which my noble friend and others have raised.
My noble friend Lord Mountgarret referred to the change to the end of Summer Time which is proposed by the 7th European Community Directive. This directive proposes that, from 1996 onwards, all member states should end Summer Time on the last Sunday in October. This would have the effect of bringing the rest of Europe, which at present ends Summer Time one month earlier at the end of September, into line with the United Kingdom and Ireland. And so, in the words of 1066 And All That, that would be a "Good Thing".
Negotiations on the directive are not yet complete, but the outcome will be relevant to our consideration of future Summer Time arrangements, as it will, in effect, change the periods of summer and winter as they occur under Central European Time.
The noble Lord, Lord Monson, was concerned about the European Community directive and subsidiarity. I can only tell him that the European Community's interest in Summer Time is confined only to the start and the end dates. The United Kingdom is content with the terms of the latest draft directive; but we have argued in the negotiations in Brussels that, on subsidiarity grounds, it should be a matter for a recommendation—in other words, for guidance rather than for a directive, which is a European Community law.
The noble Lord, Lord Tanlaw, was also concerned about the directive. A common position on the directive among member states has not yet been reached because the procedures which are required by Community law, including consultation with the European Parliament, have not yet been completed. No member state has yet formally indicated acceptance of the directive. I can confirm to the noble Lord, Lord Tanlaw, in answer to a specific question, that if the latest European Community directive is adopted it will mean that all European Community countries start and end Summer Time at the same time. I cannot say when the Council of Ministers will be in a position to decide upon the directive. It will depend upon when the procedures under European law are complete.
Although the European Community proposes harmonisation of the end dates of Summer Time, there is no question of the European Commission obliging the United Kingdom to join Central European Time. In other words, it is not seeking harmonisation of time zones. Whether the UK should move to Central European Time will be decided on its merits, and I fear that that is not as straightforward an issue as my noble friend or others would seem to suggest.
As many of your Lordships will recall, the 1989 Green Paper canvassed opinions on options for future Summer Time arrangements. The retention of the status quo—that is, Greenwich Mean Time and Greenwich Mean Time plus one hour from the end of March to the end of October was the option most strongly favoured in Scotland. In England and Wales there was considerable

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support for the adoption of GMT plus one hour in winter and GMT plus two hours in summer; in other words, moving to Central European Time.
Opinions were strongly divided, and the Government concluded that, as there was such a divergence of view, it would be in the wider interest to allow more time to enable the arguments to be given the consideration which they deserved.
My noble friend Lord Mountgarret asked about the cost of the Green Paper. The information on the cost of the consultation exercise is not readily available, but apart from the cost of publishing the Green Paper, which would be at least partly met by sales through HMSO, there was no significant additional expenditure. The cost of drafting the Green Paper and analysing and advising the responses was met within established resources. It has not been pigeonholed as he rather obliquely suggested; it has merely highlighted the extraordinary divergence of opinion.
The noble Lord, Lord Howie of Troon, taking, as usual, the opposite view, said, "Put it under the pillow and forget about it". A child's joy in putting a sweet under the pillow is that it can always pick it out later and suck it. I dare say that that is what will happen.
My noble friend Lord Mountgarret was worried about the responses to the Green Paper. He quoted various figures. They include both the letters and the signatures on the petitions. In England and Wales, a total of 598 letters and 100 per cent. of the signatures on petitions supported Central European Time. In Scotland, of course, the reverse is the case: 90 per cent. of letters and 80 per cent. of petitions supported the status quo.
The arguments put forward in support of a move to Central European Time rest mainly on the expected reduction in road traffic casualties, to which my noble friend Lord Vinson, referred; the easier communication between the UK and Europe, to which the noble Lord, Lord Tanlaw, referred; and the social advantage of lighter evenings. Of those, the savings in road casualties is the one which is the most easily supported by statistical evidence.
My noble friend Lord Vinson gave figures. I can give him the same or different figures. My figures are that the Department of Transport has estimated that, if Central European Time had been in force in 1991, about 140 deaths, 520 seriously injured people and 2,000 casualties in total would have been saved. I do not quite understand how one works out such mysterious figures, but the statisticians have a remarkable way of doing those things. I have no reason to think that they are incorrect. It is of particular interest that three-quarters of those savings would have occurred in the 22 weeks during the winter months when GMT is at present in force.
The move to Central European Time would also be supported by many in the business community. They argue that by entering the Central European Time zone the United Kingdom will gain a competitive advantage from the longer period in which business can be transacted. Business travel will also become easier, reducing the need for very early starts and overnight stays. Against that, it must be acknowledged that
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countries such as the United States, Canada and Australia straddle several different time zones and there appears to be no evidence that businessmen there cannot adapt themselves perfectly satisfactorily. Of course, the harmonisation of our time with that of our European partners would widen the difference between members and the United States.
Among the other arguments for Central European Time is that tourism, which is a major growth industry in the British economy, would benefit by enabling the tourist season to be extended. The responses to the Green Paper also showed that the opportunity which might be afforded by lighter evenings for greater participation in sport and leisure activities after work and school weighed particularly heavily. While there is no evidence that a change to Central European Time would affect crime rates, it could help at least to reduce the fear of crime, in particular among the more vulnerable members of society such as the elderly, who are less willing to go out after dark. The noble Lady, Lady Saltoun, who has such an abrupt reaction to crime, will no doubt take comfort from that fact.
While there would undoubtedly be benefits from a move to Central European Time, we must also recognise that there could be drawbacks. This would apply in particular to those sections of the community who would be most affected by the darker winter mornings which Central European Time would certainly bring. We have heard from the noble Lord, Lord Howie of Troon, and the noble Lady, Lady Saltoun, that, for instance, Central European Time would have the result that the sunrise in Glasgow in December would not be until 9.48 a.m.—that is, nearly 10 o'clock. It would, of course, be later still for places further north.
There are reservations too about a change to Central European Time among those groups which start work early, especially those who work out of doors, such as postmen, building and construction workers and farmers. As was said by the noble Lord, Lord Howie, they are concerned that under Central European Time there would be a longer period when they would be working in the dark before sunrise, which would not only be unpopular but which could, they fear, lead to more occupational accidents and slower working. The National Farmers' Union has said that the darker winter mornings would necessitate arable farmers delaying an hour before beginning work on their crops in the growing season. As a farmer, I have never followed that argument but I am sure that if the National Farmers' Union says so it must be true. Livestock farmers would be similarly disadvantaged because, I suppose, the cows would eat their food an hour earlier or later depending on how the clock moved. It is argued that the time could not be spent on other important tasks such as the maintenance of machinery. Again, I am surprised by that because it seems to me that one can maintain one's machinery in the dark just as well as one can in the light. Apparently, the National Farmers' Union find that an important factor.
Builders, like farmers, also spend most of their working time out of doors. Traditionally they start work early, usually between 7.30 and 8 a.m. The noble Lord, Lord Howie of Troon, referred to that and said

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graphically that they fell off their scaffolding at 7.30. He does not want the change because, as he explained, they will then fall off their scaffolding at 6.30. I thought that that was a cavalier argument. I should have thought it more important that they should not fall off their scaffolding at 7.30, 6.30 or 5.30. Apparently, in the view of the noble Lord, Lord Howie, that is an important reason not to change the time.
The noble Lord, Lord Howie, also said that it would be colder at 6.30 a.m. That is a forthright statement. He said that it would also be more miserable and more uncomfortable at that time. I must say, he paints a horrible picture of the country from which he comes but he must be right in saying that it is horrible, colder and more uncomfortable. No doubt that is why he is always down here—
Lord Howie of Troon: My Lords, it was not a picture of the country; it was a picture of half-past six in the morning.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I can only suggest that the noble Lord accepts the advice which my grandfather used to give to me. He said, "I always sleep slowly". If one does that one does not have to get up at 6.30 in the morning.
As the noble Lord, Lord Howie, said, builders are concerned that on cold winter mornings it would be necessary to delay work for an hour because plastering, concreting and so on does not set until there is a temperature of three degrees centigrade.
There are other less obvious groups of people who would object to a move to central European time; for example, the community of Orthodox Jews whose hours
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of prayer are governed by the times of sunrise and sunset. Those people feel sufficiently strongly about it that they have written to my right honourable friend the Home Secretary.
Therefore, there are many problems associated with moving to central European time. It is possible that some of those difficulties may be overcome by changes of routine, working practices and even prayer practices. But inevitably some general inconvenience would be caused by darker winter mornings which would need to be set against the general benefits of lighter winter evenings.
From the representations which the Home Office and other departments have received and from the responses to the Green Paper, it is apparent that feelings on this issue are just as strong as they ever were. Therefore, it is important that the fullest consideration should be given to all the arguments before a decision is made which will affect the daily lives of every man, woman and child throughout the United Kingdom. Those arguments within government are the same as—and, indeed, a reflection of —arguments which have prevailed today.
I should love to tell my noble friend Lord Mountgarret and the noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, this evening that the Government have reached a wonderful, clear, concise conclusion. I cannot do that. I cannot say when a decision will be made, but, in reaching a conclusion, we need to determine where the balance of advantage lies for the people of the United Kingdom as a whole. If there is to be a change, primary legislation will be needed.
House adjourned at twelve minutes past ten o'clock.