Sitting of 30 March 1981

Preamble
The House met at half-past Two o'clock
PRAYERS
[MR. SPEAKER in the Chair]
Oral Answers to Questions
  WALES

    Farmers (Incomes)
    Mr. Hoosonasked the Secretary of State for Wales whether he is satisfied with the progress being made with measures to reverse the decline in Welsh farmers' net incomes has taken place over the past four years.
    The Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Wyn Roberts): Net farm incomes in Wales fell in only one of the last four years for which figures are available. I am satisfied that adequate measures are being taken by the Government to safeguard the interests of industry
    Mr. Hooson: Has my hon. Friend been able to make an estimate of the likely effect of the CAP negotiations on the state of Welsh agriculture?
    Mr. Roberts: I think that it is too early to speculate on the final consequences of the settlement, since the negotiations are continuing, but my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food is striving for a settlement that will provide a fair balance between the needs of producers, consumers and taxpayers and also contribute to the building of a common agricultural policy that reflects the many competing needs of the Community.
    Mr. D. E. Thomas: Is the Minister seriously telling the House that the hill farmers in the less favoured areas, whose incomes fell by 58 per cent. last year, are being adequately supported?
    Mr. Roberts: Yes, because we have improved the hill farming compensatory allowances
    Sir Raymond Gower: To what extent are farmers in Wales prejudiced or in a worse position than farmers in other parts of the EEC?
    Mr. Roberts: That is a very difficult question to answer. I do not think that our farmers are particularly badly placed. My right hon. Friend is determined in the current negotiations to see that British agriculture is protected and that it continues to prosper.
    Dr. Roger Thomas: In the light of his answer, will the Minister explain why the incomes of farmers in Wales and Scotland are suffering particularly badly compared with the incomes of livestock farmers in the Republic of Ireland? Secondly, why is the Republic of Ireland continually being given preferential treatment for land drainage and general land improvement?
    Mr. Roberts: Certain national forms of support are available for agriculture. We must await the outcome of the current negotiations and see what additional support farmers in Wales require.

    Unemployed Persons
    Mr. Barry Jonesasked the Secretary of State for Wales what is the latest number of unemployed in Wales expressed both as a percentage and as a total; and if he will make a statement.
    The Under-Secretary of State for Wales (Mr. Michael Roberts): On 12 March 1981 there were 146,781 unemployed in Wales, a rate of 13·6 per cent.
    Mr. Jones: Does not those objectionable figures dramatically support the 364 university economists—including 76 professors—who say that the Government are mishandling the economy of our country? Does the Minister know that in my constituency, after

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    8,000 steel job losses in a year, 380 textile workers are soon to be thrown on the scrap-heap? Where are the new jobs coming from for my very angry and disillusioned constituents?
    Mr. Roberts: This morning I took note of the 350 or so economists who signed their own "early-day motion". I also listened to one of them on the radio. I understand that he was an adviser to the Labour Government. Perhaps that is not a particularly good qualification. I am aware of the 250 additional redundancies at the Courtaulds Greenfield works. On 9 March work recommenced on a modernisation project. I am sure that all hon. Members hope that a slimline textile works will give the industry a better future.
    Sir Anthony Meyer: Will my hon. Friend ponder carefully the implications of the loss of 380 jobs at the Courtaulds Greenfield mill? Will he reflect that it is part of the process of modernisation? Can my hon. Friend envisage any way of avoiding the continuation of such a process if industry is to recover its competitiveness and thus provide the wealth to finance the expansion of the economy and, in particular, of the social services? That is the only way in which to provide the jobs needed.
    Mr. Roberts: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his comments. I confess that I am not particularly familiar with the Courtaulds Greenfield works. However, in 1980 there was a slimlining of the steel industry in South Wales, which led to both Llanwern and Port Talbot becoming much more competitive.
    Mr. Alec Jones: Does the Minister agree that the 146,781 unemployed to whom he referred include many who were involved in industries that had nothing to do with modernisation? People have been thrown on to the slag heap. The figure that he cited includes about 5,000 school leavers who are still on the dole queue. How many more Easter school leavers will join that dole queue as a direct consequence of the Government's actions?
    Mr. Roberts: Before I attempt to answer that question, I welcome the right hon. Member for Rhondda (Mr. Jones) back to his place.
    Modernisation is not the cause of all the redundancies or of all the unemployment in Wales. I recognise that recession has played a great part in unemployment. We are not unaware of the difficulties that face the unemployed, particularly school leavers. We have increased the number of youth opportunity positions for next year from 27,000 to 43,000.
    Mr. Best: Is my hon. Friend aware that not so long ago an additional £20 million was granted by the EEC for the steel and coal closure areas, which will probably create an extra 4,000 jobs? Is he also aware that the hon. Member for Flint, East (Mr. Jones) is seeking to deny Wales the prospect of more jobs by his stance of supporting the official Labour Party?
    Mr. Roberts: There can be no doubt that membership of the EEC is vital for the retention of many jobs and for the creation of others in Wales.
    Mr. Wigley: Does the Minister recall the forecast made by the economics department in Bangor a year ago to the effect that unemployment in Wales would increase to over 170,000? Does he now accept that forecast?
    Mr. Roberts: As is the custom of those who speak from this Dispatch Box, I have no intention of making any forecast. I shall certainly not accept anybody else's forecast.

    Pupil-Teacher Ratios
    Mr. Knoxasked the Secretary of State for Wales what was the pupil to teacher ratio in primary schools in Wales at the most recent count; and how this compares with the ratio in 1979.
    Mr. Michael Roberts: The ratio was 21·9 to 1 in January 1980 compared with 22 to 1 the previous year.
    Mr. Knox: Is the current ratio a record?
    Mr. Roberts: The pupil-teacher ratio in primary schools in Wales is, indeed, a record.
    Dr. Roger Thomas: Will the Minister comment on the anomaly of a comprehensive school in South Glamorgan which has a pupil-teacher ratio of between 13 and 14 to 1, whilst comparable schools in other parts of Wales have a pupil-teacher ratio of between 16 and 17 to 1?
    Mr. Roberts: The original question was about pupil-teacher ratios in primary schools, but I am happy to reply to the hon. Gentleman's question. The difference between the pupil-teacher ratio in a school in South Glamorgan and that in Dyfed, for example, could be due to falling school rolls. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman realises that it is not easy to transfer teachers from one school to another and from one authority to another.
    Mr. D. E. Thomas: Is not the Minister's answer thoroughly undermined by the report presented to him by the inspectorate, which made it clear that last year only one authority in Wales succeeded, overall, in improving its pupil-teacher ratio? In all other authorities the overall pupil-teacher ratio has been reduced.
    Mr. Roberts: Once again we have strayed from the subject of primary schools into general education. I can inform the hon. Gentleman that the pupil-teacher ratio for all schools in Wales is 18 to 1. Again, that is a record.

    Welsh Resource Centre
    Mr. Bestasked the Secretary of State for Wales what further progress he has made towards the establishment of a Welsh Resource Centre.
    Mr. Michael Roberts: We have no plans to set up a Welsh Resource Centre, but the feasibility of so doing is being studied as part of a research project set up by the Wales TUC. We have made a grant of £40,000 towards the cost of this study.
    Mr. Best: Would not the establishment of a Welsh Resource Centre be an ideal way of channelling private funds into future investment in the Principality? Do not the TUC's suggestion and the Government's gracious grant towards the feasibility study show that there is greater awareness and cohesion within Wales and that the TUC is prepared to work with the Government towards the prosperity of Wales? Is that not a welcome advance, upon which the Government could build? It is not necessarily only the Opposition who can co-operate with the Wales TUC.
    Mr. Roberts: The Welsh Resource Centre does not exist, but a feasibility study is being conducted by the

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    Wales TUC with the help of a grant from the Welsh Office. There can be no question but that the relationship between the Government and the Wales TUC is excellent. That is demonstrated in many ways, and not least by the splendid work on inward investment done by the chairman of the Wales TUC when he accompanied my right hon. Friend to Japan.

    Overseas Firms (Investment)
    Sir Anthony Meyerasked the Secretary of State for Wales what has been the total of investment in Wales since 1972 by firms based outside the United Kingdom; and how many jobs in Wales have been created by this inward investment.
    Mr. Michael Roberts: Investment by overseas-based manufacturing firms in Wales since 1972 is known to be in excess of £500 million. The projects in question currently provide over 11,000 jobs.
    Sir Anthony Meyer: Does not that illustrate the importance of continuing to attract such investment, particularly when a very small amount—less than 10 per cent. of public expenditure—goes into investment from our own resources? Is it not clear that if we were to withdraw from the EEC such investment would dry up altogether? Britain, and particularly Wales, is attractive to foreign investors as a means of access to the EEC.
    Mr. Roberts: I have no doubt that overseas firms are interested in Wales because of our membership of the EEC. The Ford plant at Waterton in South Wales is an excellent example. It is irresponsible to talk about withdrawal, because it would cost many jobs.
    Mr. Roy Hughes: Does the hon. Gentleman appreciate that, although the referendum campaign received multinational sponsorship, some of us were prepared to judge the Common Market on its merits? Does not the evidence show that the decision to join the Common Market was the most disastrous one to be taken by any post-war British Government?
    Mr. Roberts: It is generous of the hon. Member for Newport (Mr. Hughes) to judge the matter on its merits.
    Mr. Alec Jones: Does the figure given by the Minister include the £10 million for the development of the massive Hoover factory at Merthyr—a factory designed to produce goods for the Common Market, but which to date has produced nothing? Does the figure also include the investment which has been made since 1972 but which has been aborted as a direct consequence of the Government's actions? Will the hon. Gentleman, who is obviously a keen student of the newspapers, say whether he has seen the study conducted by University College, Bangor, which shows that the effect of the Budget on Wales will mean unemployment of 200,000 by the end of this year? If the hon. Gentleman does not want to make any forecast, may I ask whether he has any reason to believe that that figure of 200,000 will not be reached?
    Mr. Roberts: I have no intention of making any forecast of unemployment at any point in future.
    Mr. Tom Ellis: Does the Minister agree that inward investment in Wales in recent years would have been better if the Welsh infrastructure, particularly communications, had been better? If so, will he have a word with the
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    Chancellor of the Exchequer, with a view to implementing an immediate programme to develop the Welsh infrastructure?
    Mr. Roberts: There can be no question but that investment would have been greater if our infrastructure over the last few decades had been better. The Government are doing all that they can to ensure that the road programme is maintained. Advance factories are also being set up. I think that we are doing a good job in that respect in Wales.

    University of Wales (Heath Hospital)
    Mr. Abseasked the Secretary of State for Wales whether he will publish the report of the Welsh Health Technical Services Organisation on the defects in the construction of the University of Wales Heath hospital; what are the estimated costs of the needed remedial work; what steps are being taken to recover such costs from those responsible for the defective work; and whether he will make a statement.
    Mr. Wyn Roberts: The firm of consultant engineers commissioned to carry out a structural survey of the University Hospital of Wales building has prepared a draft interim report which I do not propose to publish, but which estimates the costs of the recommended remedial work at £6·29 million. The question of liability is under consideration by our legal advisers.
    Mr. Abse: Why will the Minister not publish the interim report? Will he assure us that he will at least publish the final report, as taxpayers' money is involved, and because from the beginning there has been concern about the way that the decision was made and the inadequate supervision? If legal proceedings are pending, and if, by discovery, any potential defendent can get access to the report, why is there a cover up at this stage and a refusal, in effect, to make the full facts known to the community?
    Mr. Roberts: There is no cover up. The publication of the final report will be considered when it is received. As liability issues are under consideration, I shall need to be sure that publication either of the interim report or of the final report will not prejudice any contemplated legal action. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman, with his legal knowledge, will understand that.
    Mr. Coleman: Will the Minister ensure that, despite the vast sum of money that is to be expended on this hospital in Cardiff, other projects throughout Wales will not suffer? We have had this difficulty in the past.
    Mr. Roberts: It is a tragedy that this has happened, but the situation is beginning to improve. Work is already planned to the tune of £500,000, and that is included in capital spending for the coming year. I shall seek to ensure that the necessary work is phased so that the capital programme for Wales as a whole is not adversely affected.

    Unemployed Persons
    Mr. Ioan Evansasked the Secretary of State for Wales what are the latest percentage figures of unemployment in Aberdare, Mid-Glamorgan and Wales, respectively; and what action is proposed to improve employment prospects.
    Mr. Hudson Daviesasked the Secretary of State for Wales what is the percentage increase in the number of persons unemployed in the Mid-Glamorgan area since May 1979; and what action he proposes to take to reduce this figure.
    Mr. Michael Roberts: The unemployment rates in Aberdare, Mid-Glamorgan and Wales on 12 Match 1981 were 15·6, 14·4, and 13·6 per cent. respectively. Between May 1979 and March 1981 the level of unemployment in Mid-Glamorgan increased by 80·2 per cent.
    Mr. Rowlands: Did the hon. Gentleman say 80 per cent?
    Mr. Roberts: It is 80·2 per cent. I am sorry that the hon. Member for Merthyr Tydfil (Mr. Rowlands) cannot hear. The employment prospects for these areas and the country as a whole depend upon reducing inflation and creating conditions in which industry can compete successfully.
    Mr. Evans: Is that not proof that the Government's economic and industrial policies are disastrous? Unemployment is increasing by more than 1 million per year. When the Prime Minister reiterates that there are no alternative policies, will she look at the documents issued by the Wales TUC, the British TUC, the CBI, the Select Committee on Welsh Affairs and the Select Committee on the Treasury and Civil Service, because they have said that monetarist policies will not work and will have disastrous consequences?
    Mr. Roberts: Some of the amalgams of those policies were put forward in a recent debate in the House by the right hon. Member for Stepney and Poplar (Mr. Shore), and the cost was analysed. That did not prove to be an attractive possibility.
    Mr. Hudson Davies: Does the Minister agree that the increase of more than 80 per cent. in unemployment in less than two years is deplorable? Does he further agree that that figure is likely to be exacerbated by the cuts in rail services in the valleys, which come into effect this day? Does he further agree that the ability of people to travel to work and the attractiveness of the Welsh valleys in terms of future industry depend upon the existence of viable rail services? Is he aware of the demonstrations taking place this day by railway employees in South Wales who have been asked to implement the new timetables? Will he seek—
    Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman has asked four questions. I think that the Minister should answer them now.
    Mr. Roberts: I deplore unemployment in Mid-Glamorgan as much as I do in any other part of Wales or the United Kingdom. Unemployment has seriously affected Mid-Glamorgan for a long time. There is no dispute about the need to improve the infrastructure to ensure that the valleys are prosperous.
    Mr. Delwyn Williams: Does my hon. Friend agree that the Opposition's hypocrisy is stunning? Is he aware that 100,000 people in Wales were made redundant under the Labour Government between 1974 and 1979? Is he further aware that 53,000 coal miners have been made redundant in Wales under Labour Governments since the war? Finally, is he aware that the rise in unemployment
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    in Wales in the past 12 months was only 59 per cent. which compares favourably with 69 per cent. as a United Kingdom average?
    Mr. Speaker: Order. This is a time for questions, not speeches.
    Mr. Roberts: My hon. Friend's questions show that the problems associated with unemployment did not start 18 months ago.
    Mr. Rowlands: Given the staggering figure of 80 per cent. unemployment since May 1979, will the Minister restore special development area status to those parts of Mid-Wales from which it has been taken away?
    Mr. Roberts: All areas of high unemployment in Wales are constantly being considered for regional area status. However, we recognise that aid should be concentrated on areas such as Ebbw Vale or Bargoed, where unemployment is highest.
    Mr. Alec Jones: It was remiss of me not to thank the hon. Gentleman earlier for his kind remarks about me.
    The Opposition are concerned not only with the rise in unemployment that has taken place throughout Wales, particularly in Mid-Glamorgan, with 80 per cent., but with the future. Whether the hon. Gentleman reads it and likes it or not, we are concerned that the CBI's latest forecast indicates that unemployment could reach 3¼ million next year. How much of that unemployment will be represented by the people of Wales joining the dole queue? What responsible body of opinion in Wales now believes that the Government's policies are working?
    Mr. Roberts: I am certain that many people in Wales recognise that over a long period previous Governments took an easy option. The Government have had to do something which may not be popular, but which, we believe, will bring prosperity to the whole of the United Kingdom.
    Mr. Ioan Evans: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. In view of the unsatisfactory nature of the reply, I beg to give notice that I shall seek to raise the matter on the Adjournment.

    Common Agricultural Policy
    Mr. Marlowasked the Secretary of State for Wales whether he is satisfied that the common agricultural policy provides an adequate arrangement to benefit Welsh farmers and Welsh consumers.
    Mr. Wyn Roberts: The Government believe that membership of the European Community is essential for the well-being of the economy but will continue to press for changes in the CAP which will benefit consumers and taxpayers while safeguarding the interests of producers.
    Mr. Marlow: We all believe that membership of the Community is important, but is the Welsh consumer currently satisfied with having to pay four times as much for his or her butter, three times as much for his or her beef and twice as much for his or her cereals as world market prices? Are the Welsh people as a whole satisfied with having to pay higher prices than they need to? Would not the Welsh farmer prefer to get his agricultural support from the United Kingdom rather than from the CAP, whereby we pay, not only for agricultural support for our own farmers, but for many Continental farmers as well?
    Mr. Roberts: My hon. Friend is suggesting a return to deficiency payments. He was not in the Chamber when I said in answer to a previous question that it was a little early to speculate about the results of the current negotiations. I said that my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food will bear in mind the needs of consumers as well as those of producers and taxpayers.
    Mr. Denzil Davies: As it is the Government's stated policy to defeat inflation, whatever that means, will the Minister give an assurance that the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food will veto all price increases in Brussels at the present price fixing review, especially for products in surplus? Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the Tory Party's manifesto said that a Conservative Government would do so?
    Mr. Roberts: I would not deign to interfere with the negotiations that my right hon. Friend is conducting.

    Steel Workers (Retraining)
    Mr. Roy Hughesasked the Secretary of State for Wales if he has had any recent discussions with officials of the British Steel Corporation concerning retraining courses for redundant Welsh steel workers.
    Mr. Michael Roberts: The Welsh Office maintains close and regular contact with officials of the British Steel Corporation on all matters concerning the corporation's activities in Wales.
    Mr. Hughes: Despite that close co-operation, does the Minister appreciate that there is considerable resentment among redundant steel workers at the delay in the payments they were promised after being made redundant and about the courses that have been made available, especially the welding course at Port Talbot which 60 men from Newport are attending? Will the hon. Gentleman promise to investigate these issues?
    Mr. Roberts: As for the delay in the payment of redundancy terms, it was ever thus. When East Moors steel workers were made redundant, I received many complaints from them about delay. If the hon. Gentleman sends me details I shall ensure that the complaints are taken up by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Industry. I am aware of the hon. Gentleman's concern about the Midland welding school at Port Talbot. I understand that he has written to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Industry, who is considering the matter. There is nothing further that I can add now.
    Sir Anthony Meyer: Is my hon. Friend aware that, thanks partly to aid from the Coal and Steel Community, the provisions for retraining redundant steel workers are, on the whole, satisfactory? Is he further aware that it is the employees of the private steel firms who are now feeling the draught, who do not receive such generous redundancy payments?
    Mr. Roberts: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for pointing that out. I was aware of it but I am not sure that every hon. Member is equally aware of the contribution of the Coal and Steel Community.
    Mr. Barry Jones: Will the Minister consider the laggardly payments to hundreds of my constituents who were formerly steel workers? Is he aware that this delay
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    is part of the general complaint that my hon. Friend the Member for Newport (Mr. Hughes) outlined in his supplementary question? is the hon. Gentleman further aware that there have been delays in the payment of travelling expenses to redundant steel workers who are attending skill centres?
    Mr. Roberts: I shall look into that. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will provide me with the necessary details.
    Mr. Alec Jones: In the close contacts that the Minister suggests that he has with the corporation will he ensure that the corporation does not grant to an American mining company a contract worth £50 million over the next three years for further coal imports? When he is taking part in the discussions with the corporation, will he remind it that, as the National Coal Board buys British steel, the corporation should buy British coal?
    Mr. Roberts: The main question relates to retraining courses for Welsh steel workers but I am happy to give the hon. Gentleman the assurance that I shall draw the attention of the British Steel Corporation to what he says.

    Industrialists (Financial Assistance)
    Mr. Wigleyasked the Secretary of State for Wales if he is satisfied that there is no duplication of function between the Welsh Development Agency and the industrial section of the Welsh Office which leads to unnecessary bureaucracy and the delaying in processing applications for financial assistance by industrialists.
    Mr. Wyn Roberts: Yes, Sir.
    Mr. Wigley: Is the Minister aware that when companies come to new factories in Wales, few though those be these days, they may have to approach both the Welsh Development Agency for the factory and the industrial department of the Welsh Office for grants? There is an independent vetting system for the two applications. If the applications run in sequence rather than in parallel, that can lead to considerable delays and can jeopardise projects as well as involving additional bureaucracy. Will the hon. Gentleman carry out an investigation into the independent vetting systems?
    Mr. Roberts: I know what the hon. Gentleman has in mind. We have had conversations about Anon Microelectronics Ltd. However, we must remember that the roles of the Welsh Office and the Welsh Development Agency are different. The Welsh Office is concerned with grants that have to be approved by WIDAB. The Welsh Development Agency is concerned with giving loans on a commercial basis. The criteria are different. It is for companies to ensure that the applications either for grant or loan run concurrently. That is a matter for them rather than for me.
    Mr. Delwyn Williams: Is not my hon. Friend saddened to think that the hon. Member for Caernarvon (Mr. Wigley) has not bothered to read the Select Committee's report on employment in Wales, which analysed these matters quite fully and made recommendations?
    Mr. Roberts: I do not know whether the hon. Member for Caernarvon (Mr. Wigley) has read the report. However, I can assure the hon. Gentleman that progress is being made with Arfon Microelectronic Ltd. I wrote to

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    its managing director today to tell him that the firm may go ahead with the project, without prejudice, of course, to any grant that may be made later by the Welsh Office.
    Mr. Ioan Evans: Is it not a fact that many other recommendations set out in the Select Committee's report have not been implemented by the Government? In view of the mass of closures, liquidations and bankruptcies, will the Government ensure that the WDA and the Welsh Office intervene to prevent further closures in Wales?
    Mr. Roberts: The Welsh Office and the WDA work closely together.
    Mr. Best: Will my hon. Friend direct his attention to the delay in the payment of regional development grants? I appreciate that the Government's stance is that no exceptions can be made. However, is he aware that in some circumstances future investments in Wales might be lost because of the delay in making payments? Will he consider this factor carefully with my right hon. Friend with a view to providing that in certain circumstances some exceptions can be made?
    Mr. Roberts: If my hon. Friend has any specific instances in mind, I shall be happy to consider any written submissions that he makes to me.

    Road Building
    Mr. Delwyn Williamsasked the Secretary of State for Wales if he is satisfied with the progress of the road building programme in Wales; and if he will make a statement.
    Mr. Michael Roberts: Yes. Our programme for trunk road improvement in Wales was set out in "Roads in Wales 1980" published last December.
    Mr. Williams: Is the Minister aware of the concern of my constituents about the Llanidloes and Welshpool bypasses? Is he aware that Llanidloes is scheduled to start in 1987? Is he further aware that the lack of firm proposals for the bypass means that the development of the industrial part of Llanidloes is being severely restrained? Does he realise that the social structure of Welshpool and its industrial development is being held back because of the doubts about the potential development of the Welshpool bypass? Does he—
    Mr. Speaker: Order. There must be something in the air in Montgomeryshire.
    Mr. Roberts: Dealing with Llanidloes bypass, I am aware of the recent representations from the town council and Powys county council about the bypass scheme, but it has not been given high priority. We have received a substantial number of objections to our proposals on the Welshpool bypass and those are currently being considered. I shall undertake to consider any suggestions made by my hon. Friend.
    Mr. Wigley: Is the Under-Secretary satisfied that the road building programme of the Welsh Office takes into account the implications of the Armitage report? Will he investigate the effect that heavy lorries might have on the A5, the A55 and the A470 in Gwynedd where the county council is seriously worried, especially about the dry stone walls which may crumble as a result?
    Mr. Roberts: I assure the hon. Gentleman that I shall look into the matter without delay.
    Mr. Hooson: Is my hon. Friend aware of the widespread approval in Wales for the high priority that has been given to the trunk road building programme in a period of necessary Government economy?
    Mr. D. E. Thomas: Necessary for whom?
    Mr. Roberts: We regard the trunk road programme as essential to the infrastructure of the Principality.
    Mr. Coleman: Will the hon. Gentleman give more urgent attention to the A465 road, as that gives access to the Rheola works, which is threatened by closure, a proposal that is being resisted most vigorously? Will he ensure that the road is developed so that the works has a future?
    Mr. Roberts: I am aware of the hon. Gentleman's concern about the A465. I have arranged to meet representatives of the West Glamorgan county council next month to discuss the scheme. At this stage I do not want to anticipate the outcome of that meeting.

    Anthracite
    Dr. Roger Thomasasked the Secretary of State for Wales whether, in his discussions with the National Coal Board in Wales, consideration has been given to further investment in the anthracite sector of the South Wales coalfield.
    Mr. Michael Roberts: In all his discussions with the National Coal Board my right hon. Friend takes account of prospests for future investment in the South Wales coalfield, including anthracite.
    Dr. Thomas: Is the Minister aware that, apart from opencast mining, there is a distinct shortage of top-class anthracite coal in South Wales? Is he aware that the National Union of Mineworkers is keen on reopening the Cwmgwili colliery, involving an investment of £5 million, to reach a deep deposit of coal underneath the villages of Llanarthney and Ty-Croes?
    Mr. Roberts: I am aware of the shortage of British-mined anthracite, despite the splendid record established at the Bettws colliery recently. It is a question of further investment by the National Coal Board. I shall draw its attention to that.

    Education Service
    Mr. D. E. Thomasasked the Secretary of State for Wales whether he accepts the conclusions of "The Effect on the Education Service in Wales of Recent Local Authority Expenditure Policies: An Assessment by Her Majesty's Inspectors."
    Mr. Michael Roberts: I have noted the report and accept the overall conclusion that the fabric of education in schools is intact.
    Mr. Thomas: Does the Minister accept the situation whereby the majority of schools now require parents to contribute to their children's education?
    Mr. Roberts: Parental contribution did not start last year or the year before. It has been commonplace in Welsh education. I have no doubt that it will continue and that parental contributions will be used as valuable additions towards school equipment.
    Mr. Delwyn Williams: Is my hon. Friend aware that, despite the serious matters that we are discussing, only six

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    Opposition Members of the 23 from Wales are present? Does he share my disgust at the lack of representation from the Principality?
    Mr. Faulds: Look at the quality.
    Mr. Roberts: If the hon. Member for Warley, East (Mr. Faulds) looks behind him he will see what that quality consists of.

    Factory Construction
    Sir RaymondGower asked the Secretary of State for Wales what is the total number of factories now under construction in Wales; how many are being constructed by the Welsh Development Agency and by the Development Board for Rural Wales, respectively; and how many are sited within the area of the Vale of Glamorgan council and within the area of South Glamorgan county council, respectively.
    Mr. Wyn Roberts: The Welsh Development Agency is building 423 factories, including five bespoke units, and the Development Board for Rural Wales is building 32 factories. In the area of South Glamorgan county council the WDA has 40 factories under construction of which 13 are within the Vale of Glamorgan district. Details of private sector building are not readily available.
    Sir Raymond Gower: Is my hon. Friend aware that the extent of that ambitious programme is appreciated? Is he satisfied that, in view of the size of the programme, the Welsh Development Agency will not be hampered by a lack of suitable staff in certain categories?
    Mr. Roberts: I am not aware of difficulties of the type that my hon. Friend has mentioned. Certainly no underspend is anticipated, either on the special programme for Port Talbot and Llanwern or on factory building generally. Staffing is a matter for the authority.
    Mr. Joan Evans: Despite the fact that large numbers of factories have been vacated because of the closure of firms, will the Government continue their policy of building new advance factories so that when the economic upturn comes manufacturers will be attracted to the area to provide the right jobs?
    Mr. Roberts: Top priority is being given now to finding tenants for the massive 4 million sq. ft. of Government factory space that is already available, under construction or planned throughout Wales. Despite the recession, 131 advance factories were let in Wales last year—almost equal to the previous year's record level.
    Mr. Best: While I welcome the amount of advance factory building in Wales, may I ask my right hon. Friend whether he agrees that serious consideration must be given by the Welsh Development Agency to expanding its facilities in the investment and loans sphere so that it can play a full part—together with the other welcome measures that were introduced by my right hon. and learned Friend's Budget—in assisting small businesses in Wales?
    Mr. Roberts: I am sure that the agency and its officers will note the helpful remarks of my hon. Friend.
    Mr. Wigley: Will the Minister contact the Welsh Development Agency and investigate whether there is any
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    way of speeding up the letting of factories? Is he aware that last week I received complaints about the slowness of letting, which concerns industrialists?
    Mr. Roberts: If the hon. Gentleman has had complaints, as he suggests, I should be grateful if he would send them to me so that I may investigate them with the agency.

    Housing Strategy
    Mr. Andersonasked the Secretary of State for Wales if he is satisfied with the progress of the Government's housing strategy in Wales.
    Mr. Wyn Roberts: As I told the hon. Member for Caernarvon (Mr. Wigley) on 2 March, no Minister can ever be satisfied so long as there is inadequate housing anywhere in Wales. We have tried to ensure that, within the resources available, local authorities and housing associations have a sufficient allocation in 1981–82 to enable them to undertake worthwhile programmes. As those who were present last Wednesday at the Welsh Grand Committee will know, I have announced further allocations for 1981–82 totalling £7·36 million.
    Special emphasis is being given to the promotion of low cost home ownership in Wales. This can go some way to meeting housing need with little or no recourse to public expenditure.
    Mr. Anderson: Is the Minister aware of the report of the directors of housing in Wales to the affect that we need a threefold increase in house building totals of last year if we are to maintain the current standards of housing? Are the Government planning, by their expenditure plans, accelerated decline in the Welsh housing stock, greater homelessness and greater unemployment in our construction industry?
    Mr. Roberts: The hon. Gentleman will know from previous answers I have given that the trend towards reduced house building was manifest under the Labour Government. In 1975, 8,336 houses were built, in 1979 there were 4,351, a drop a nearly 50 per cent. Of course, the Government are concerned about housing in Wales but housing has had to take a reduction in capital spending. The Government have, under the Housing Act, a 10-point scheme for improving houses and for enabling local authorities to increase their housing allocations through council house sales and using that money to improve properties.
    Sir Raymond Gower: In view of the high proportion of persons in Wales who own the older types of houses, is my hon. Friend satisfied that, even though the improvement scheme has been upgraded, it is adequate to meet the peculiar needs of the Principality in that respect?
    Mr. Roberts: I am satisfied, because when we drafted the relevant provision of the Housing Act covering improvements, particularly improvements for sale, the interests of Wales and of owners of older properties in Wales were very much in our mind.

  EDUCATION AND SCIENCE

    Craft Industries
    Mr. Blackburnasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science what steps he is taking to encourage the revival of craft industries.
    The Ministerfor the Arts (Mr. Paul Channon): My concern as Minister for the Arts is to develop the role of the artist-craftsman, so I give a grant to the Crafts Council which supports craft activities and individual craftsmen, but neither the council nor I have any general responsibility for the craft industries.
    Mr. Blackburn: Does my right hon. Friend appreciate the value, commercially and culturally, of the continuance of craft industries both in urban and rural districts? Will he give the House an assurance that a more positive role will be played by those industries, because they are part of our priceless heritage?
    Mr. Channon: I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. A great deal of support is given to the Crafts Council, significantly more than in the past. I am glad that it has a small exhibition gallery, which it plans to enlarge, and I hope that that will be of great value to individual craftsmen.
    Mr. Faulds: Is it not regrettable that the right hon. Gentleman's right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State rejected on 4 March my suggestion that he should launch an initiative to encourage the training of school leavers in the traditional crafts, and the more so because he gave as his ground the reason that market forces would work in this area? Will the right hon. Gentleman look at the suggestion a little more sympathetically than did his right hon. and learned Friend?
    Mr. Channon: That is a matter for my right hon. and learned Friend. I shall look at what the hon. Gentleman has said, but it is primarily a matter for my right hon. and learned Friend and not for me.

    Provincial Museums
    Mr. Jesselasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science what future support he plans for provincial museums.
    Mr. Hoosonasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science if he will make a statement on the progress of his consideration of ways of developing the role of the Standing Commission on Museums and Galleries to make the best use of available resources for museums.
    Mr. Channon: In the past the Standing Commission on Museums and Galleries has made an important contribution to the welfare of provincial museums. I am now considering how best this can be continued and improved. As I told the House in answer to a question from my hon. Friend the Member for Welwyn and Hatfield (Mr. Murphy) on 2 March, I hope to make a statement later in the year.
    Mr. Jessel: While we all recognise the value and importance of provincial museums, what can be done, in view of the current shortage of money, to improve the efficiency of their administration?
    Mr. Channon: There has been a whole number of suggestions, of which my hon. Friend will be aware, some of which were canvassed in the Drew report last year. Jam studying all those suggestions in the hope that we can make progress and that I shall be able to make a statement to the House in the not too distant future.
    Mr. Hooson: When carrying out that study, will my right hon. Friend also look at the possibility of slightly more selective expenditure in support of regional museums?
    Mr. Channon: I shall look at that, but I suspect that there are many minefields along that route. Everyone thinks that his own local museum is the best.
    Mr. Blackburn: Hear, hear.
    Mr. Channon: I had better not be too selective.
    Mr. Faulds: Is it not a fact that £400,000 was underspent by provincial museums in 1979–80 because of the inflexibility of the rules and the absence of any established procedure for appeal to the Minister? Will the right hon. Gentleman give his personal consideration to that important problem, because he might bring about a remedy?
    Mr. Channon: The hon. Gentleman is not quite accurate. If he is talking about purchases by purchase grants administered by the V and A and the Science museum, there is a good use for those funds. Of course, I am looking at that issue in my consideration of all these matters.
    Mr. Cormack: Will my right hon. Friend not pay too much attention to the injunction of my hon. Friend the Member for Brecon and Radnor (Mr. Hooson)? Will he accept that in museums and arts a little money goes a very long way and that museums are among our foremost tourist attractions? What facilities has my right hon. Friend for arguing priorites with his colleagues in the Cabinet and elsewhere, bearing in mind that in my constituency alone one stretch of motorway will cost almost as much as the entire Arts Council budget for a year?
    Mr. Channon: I have the same facilities as any of my colleagues. One of the things that helps me in fighting for the arts is the robust support of my hon. Friend and many other colleagues. I am sure that, with their assistance, I shall be able to continue my support for the arts. I agree with my hon. Friend that local museums are among our most precious assets and I shall do what I can to help them.

    The Arts
    Mr. Iain Millsasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science what visits he has made or plans to make to the regions in connection with his responsibilities in relation to the arts and the national heritage.
    Mr. ChannonI have recently visited Southampton and Merseyside and have so far about 20 engagements to all parts of the country planned for the next few months. I shall write to my hon. Friend giving details.
    Mr. Mills: I thank my right hon. Friend for announcing such a robust programme. Will he ensure that the regions have a fair share of the resources allocated to the arts and that such resources are not unfairly allocated to London and the South-East?
    Mr. Channon: I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. It is encouraging that the Arts Council allocates about two-thirds of its grant to activities outside London. That is different from the situation that existed 10 or 20 years ago and is an encouraging trend.
    Sir David Price: Is my right hon. Friend aware that he was extremely welcome in Southampton earlier this month? Will he bear in mind, on his regional trips, that there would be much merit in linking support for the arts with the work of local tourist boards, because, as he will understand from earlier supplementary questions, many of us feel that the two go together?
    Mr. Channon: I have had a meeting with the English Tourist Board today and we discussed a number of ways in which we could jointly help. I shall keep my hon. Friend's point of view in mind. I found my visit to Southampton most helpful, because it it a good authority for helping the arts. I wish that others were as good.
    Mr. Freud: Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that in France and West Germany the budgets for sales and promotion of the arts come from outside the arts councils there? Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that, however excellent and professional may be the quality of the arts, unless they can be properly sold and promoted there is not much point in providing money for them?
    Mr. Channon: I am not sure that I go as far as that, but it is important that they should be sold and promoted correctly. That is one point which the ETB made to me. There is a lot to be said for that, particularly as regards local museums. I accept a great deal of what the hon. Gentleman says.

    Arts Council
    Mr. Neubertasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science whether he will ask the chairman of the Arts Council to include in his annual report an account of the volume and nature of the complaints received each year and any action taken in consequence.
    Mr. Channon: It is for the Arts Council to determine the contents of its annual report but I shall naturally pass on to the chairman my hon. Friend's suggestion.
    Mr. Neubert: As the Home Secretary imposes such a condition on the BBC and the IBA, would it not be entirely appropriate for a similar condition to be put on the Arts Council which, in many ways, plays a similar role? Would that not be a salutary reminder of its obligations to the wider public, which pays through its rates and taxes for Arts Council grant-aided activities, compared with the much smaller numbers who directly benefit from State support of the arts?
    Mr. Channon: A great number of people, far more than the House may realise, benefit from State support for the arts, through museums, music, theatre, drama, pictures and all sorts of activities. However, I am not unsympathetic to my hon. Friend's suggestion, which has a great deal of good sense in it.
    Mr. Faulds: Perhaps there is some merit in the suggestion of the hon. Member for Romford (Mr. Neubert) and perhaps that matter should be considered, but, since there appears to be a general campaign of vilification against the Arts Council, primarily by the supposed quality
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    papers, will the right hon. Gentleman take an opportunity of standing up for the Arts Council and explaining that it is the best way of organising the arm's-length funding of arts activities throughout the country?
    Mr. Channon: I certainly believe it to be the best way, and that has been the view of all my predecessors from both parties. The public gets extremely good value for money, in the variety of ways that we have been discussing, from support for the arts.
    Mr. Dudley Smith: Will my right hon. Friend have a word with the chairman of the Arts Council about entirely inappropriate expenditure and will he take on hoard the suggestion that the Arts Council may have given some money towards a Marxist bookshop in Mid-Warwickshire?
    Mr. Channon: I do not know about that case. If my hon. Friend gives me details I shall take up the matter. I reiterate that there will be cases at the margin that may give rise to legitimate concern. I understand my hon. Friend's feeling. In general, however, people get very good value for money. The amount of interest and growth of activity in the arts over the last few years has been remarkable.

    The Arts
    Mr. van Straubenzeeasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science what criteria he employs in allocating Government assistance to the arts between the different art forms which seek support.
    Mr. Channon: My responsibilities include making allocations to the national museums and galleries and the British Library and also to the various organisations that support the different forms of the living arts, the Arts Council, the Crafts Council and the British Film Institute. All these bodies submit annual budgets which are discussed on the basis of their needs. In case of the latter group of bodies, it is its responsibility to consider its own grants to individual claimants.
    Mr. van Straubenzee: If my right hon. Friend, in the course of policy development, decides to make a change in some of those allocations, will he bear in mind that many activities require much planning in advance and that abrupt changes would be unhelpful? I appreciate that my right hon. Friend has no responsibility for the individual allocations of the Arts Council. Is there not possibly a lesson that could be learnt, not about decisions but about the abruptness with which decisions are implemented?
    Mr. Channon: Yes, I think that my hon. Friend has a good point. The chairman of the Arts Council, when he wrote to me recently, said that there may have been cases where the policy of informing people in advance had not been adequately implemented and that he would ensure that it did not recur.
    Mr. Cormack: May I reinforce the point that has been made? Is my right hon. Friend aware that the Royal Shakespeare Company is experiencing great difficulty because it cannot plan more than a year ahead? It is impossible for our great national companies to operate successfully unless they cart plan ahead for a longer period than that.
    Mr. Channon: I take note of what my hon. Friend says. There are a great many difficulties. The extent of the grant is not known until a quite late date. I shall consider the valid point that has been made.

Civil Service (Dispute)
Mr. John Peyton (Yeovil) (by private notice)asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will make a further statement about the effect of the threatened Civil Service strike.
The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Leon Brittan): About three-quarters of the normal tax revenues are currently being received by the Exchequer. There is no risk to overall economic management, as the money owed to the Government will eventually be paid over. At most there will be a short-term increase in the money supply, which will subsequently be corrected. The main effect at the moment is inconvenience to the public. But there would be serious damage to the prospects for a further reduction in inflation if the Government conceded an excessive pay settlement.
Mr. Peyton: Will my right hon. and learned Friend resist the temptation that Governments often feel to keep such difficult matters under wraps and, instead, take the public into their confidence so far as possible and certainly keep the House informed? Does he agree that persistence by those who are public servants and widely respected in harassing those whom they should be serving is likely to be counter-productive and to diminish sympathy and, indeed, call attention to the special advantages that they enjoy, which are not widely shared?
Mr. Brittan: I agree with my right hon. Friend on both points. I see no reason why the public should not be kept informed on what is a matter of public concern and interest. I also agree with him that actions that have the effect of delaying people at the ports and interfering with immigration procedures, to name but two examples, cannot assist the reputation of public servants who have an important and valuable duty to do.
Mr. Robert Sheldon: Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman tell the House how much revenue is actually being withheld and how much he estimates the borrowing requirement will increase as a result of this action? What effect will it have in numerical terms, so far as he can estimate, on the money supply? What damage will be caused to an already rather injured medium-term financial strategy?
Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman also say how he intends to carry out the extra borrowing that may be required? Will it be done through Treasury bills or the sale of gilts? From a Government who are always lecturing industry on how to behave—[HON. MEMBERS: "Too long."] This is an important point. From a Government who are always lecturing industry on how to behave, one of the worst aspects of the situation is that an employer should not give his employees—civil servants in this case—the feeling that they are disliked by the employer. This is an important matter to which the right hon. and learned Gentleman will have to return.
Mr. Brittan: I can assure the right hon. Gentleman that there is no question of the Government's disliking their employees. A serious dispute has arisen. That is a different matter. With regard to the more factual questions that the right hon. Gentleman asked, the position is that the deterioration in the central Government borrowing requirement due to the strike is of the order of £½ billion to £¾ billion.
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With regard to the financial effects, there has been no extra borrowing of any significant size. The Government were planning to borrow to the extent required in any event, at the moment. There will have been a very temporary increase in the money supply, the extent of which cannot be quantified at the moment, but it will be small. It will, on the other hand, be correspondingly reduced when the money comes in. I see no reason why it should have any effect whatever on the medium-term financial strategy.
Several Hon. Members rose—
Mr. Speaker: Order. This is an extension of Question Time. I propose to call two more hon. Members from either side.
Mr. Dudley Smith: Will my right hon. and learned Friend confirm that Civil Service employees have had a 50 per cent. pay increase over the past two years? Is he aware that thousands of my constituents would be grateful for such an increase, as, indeed, would the constituents of all hon. Members? Does he not think that in the circumstances it is time that the civil servants showed some responsibility?
Mr. Brittan: I very much hope that those involved in the dispute will listen to what hon. Members say. My hon. Friend rightly says that the average increase over the past two years has been 50 per cent.
Mr. K. J. Woolmer: If the right hon. and learned Gentleman is so convinced that civil servants have been given unduly favoured treatment in pay, why has he suspended the pay research system? Will he say what steps the Government, as the employer, are taking in relation to Inland Revenue staff today and in the course of this week, or what proposals they have? Does he not agree that the Government's handling of the dispute is highly likely to lead to the most serious situation between employers and employees that the Civil Service has ever seen?
Mr. Brittan: I do not agree with the hon. Gentleman's third point. On the second point, staff in local collection offices are refusing to bank cheques that they have received. The first stage of the temporary relief from duty process has started today in some local collection offices.
It would be a mistake to think that pay research has always been implemented automatically by Governments of either party. It has happened in only a minority of cases. With regard to the move forward, these are matters essentially for my noble Friend the Lord President. My right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer made clear last week that we want to find a system that will be genuinely acceptable.
Mr. William van Straubenzee: Does my right hon. and learned Friend appreciate that in common, I suspect, with other hon. Members I have received representations at the weekend from responsible Civil Service constituents expressing the view that the offer, in cash terms, is very reasonable, particularly given the economic state of the nation? They are, however, interested in and concerned about the very mechanics mentioned by my right hon. and learned Friend in his last answer—mechanics for the future. Will he consider, in concert with his noble Friend, giving greater publicity to the words that he has spoken and that Ministers have spoken about their hopes for the future in that regard?
Mr. Brittan: I welcome the opportunity that this question gives to do what my hon. Friend says. We want to reach agreement on an orderly and agreed way forward. I should like to take the opportunity to confirm that many people in the Civil Service take the view that my hon. Friend has reported. Many are working in a perfectly ordinary, orderly and responsible manner.
Mr. Clement Freud: Will the Minister give an assurance that cases raised by hon. Members dealing with hardship caused by the industrial dispute will be dealt with expeditiously by his Department?
Mr. Brittan: I can assure the hon. Gentleman that any such cases will be considered expeditiously.

European Community (Fisheries Ministers' Meeting)
The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Peter Walker): With permission, Mr. Speaker, I wish to make a statement about the EEC Council of Fisheries Ministers on 27 March, which was attended by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland, my hon. Friend the Minister of State in my Department, and myself.
As the House will know, this meeting was called following the discussions on fish at the European Council at the beginning of last week. However, it quickly became apparent that one delegation was not able to negotiate on the crucial question of access and that therefore there was no possibility of agreement on a comprehensive, revised common fisheries policy. In these circumstances, the President decided that it would be wrong to prolong the meeting, which ended shortly after lunch. Ministers from all member countries committed their Governments to make every endeavour to reach overall agreement this spring, and invited the Presidency to reconvene the Council as soon as the necessary preparations allowed.
The Government consider that it is vital to retain the strength of the British fishing industry. It will be known that for this purpose during the past year the Government have already provided £37 million worth of aid to the industry, and it was envisaged originally that this aid was for the period ending on 31 March.
The House will know that the Government made the decision to bring forward the review of the financial position of the industry, and the results of this review show quite clearly that markets are weak and that increasing costs and continuing uncertainty are hitting the fleet hard.
The Government have therefore decided to make further aid available to the industry to help it through the continuing uncertainty and difficulty. Twenty-five million pounds will be made available for distribution through a scheme on broadly similar lines to the fishing vessel temporary support scheme introduced last August.
By taking this action the Government will therefore again have confirmed their determination to see that the British fishing industry continues to make an important contribution to our economy and continues in readiness for taking full advantage of a common fishing policy when negotiations are completed.
Mr. Roy Mason: On the first part of the right hon. Gentleman's statement, while recognising that the French have been the real culprits in blocking progress in the common fisheries policy talks, may I take it that there will be no progress at all until after the French presidential elections and that we shall have no more meetings of the Council of Fisheries Ministers for at least six weeks?
Secondly, when the Canadian cod deal with the Germans is eventually agreed, what prospects are there for United Kingdom fishermen getting fishing rights in Canadian waters?
Thirdly, will the right hon. Gentleman take this opportunity to clear up the criticism being levelled at his Minister of State that the hon. Gentleman has already sacrificed our demand for the 12 to 50-mile dominant preference zone?
Turning to that part of the right hon. Gentleman's statement dealing with aid, I am sure that the House and

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the industry will be most grateful. Without this financial assistance, all sectors of the industry—the deep-sea, middle-distance and inshore fleets—were facing widespread collapse. Many vessel owners are already up to their necks in debt, and the Minister's announcement will stave off bankruptcy. But can he say how long this aid is supposed to last, and will it go direct to the vessel owners, according to the sizes of vessels?
Finally, will the right hon. Gentleman consider taking steps to finance the restructuring of the British fishing fleet and not keep waiting for the eventual outcome of the common fisheries policy talks? Our competitors are already doing it—the Germans are a case in point—and once more we are slipping behind. If a deal is eventually agreed, those countries that have restructured will be best able to take advantage of it.
Mr. Walker: Obviously I cannot speak on behalf of the French Government and say when they will be prepared to discuss the detailed questions of access. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, last week I had a bilateral meeting with the French Minister and a great deal of time was spent showing him the details of our requirements in terms of access. He has promised to consider carefully the arguments that we put to him. However, the timing of the next meeting must rest, quite rightly, with the Dutch President of the Council, who is anxious to see that that meeting takes place as quickly as possible.
The right hon. Gentleman then asked about the ability of British fishermen to fish in Canadian waters. I remind him that the amount of fishing that Britain did in Canadian waters when the Government of which he was a member were responsible was very small. Alas, in one year when there was a quota the British fishing industry caught only half the quota allocated to it. The degree to which we can make demands on what is available in Canadian waters reflects somewhat our past performance in that respect.
As for the remarks made by my hon. Friend the Minister of State in my Department, I may say that I know of no person on either side of this House who more has the confidence of the fishing industry than my hon. Friend. There is nothing that he or I said in the fishing negotiations that has not been said in very close association with and with the understanding of the leaders of the fishing industry. That will continue to be the case until, finally, we obtain a satisfactory settlement to these matters.
The right hon. Gentleman asked about the method of payment of the proposed aid, and whether it would go to the proprietors as well as to the crews, and so on. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, the nature of the relationship between the proprietorship of a boat and its crew varies from one section of the industry to another. However, in all sections of the industry the very close association between management, proprietorship and crews is such that the aid that we are giving in this form will be of benefit to the continuation of the industry, to the continuation, therefore, of jobs, and to the continuation of appropriate rewards to all the crews concerned.
Mr. Michael Shaw: Will my right hon. Friend accept from my own fishermen the very warm welcome that they give to the new aid that has been promised, which itself shows the understanding of my right hon. Friend of the problems facing the industry? Is my right hon. Friend aware of the widespread support for the continued and very robust stand that he and the
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Minister of State have taken during these fishing negotiations and of the welcome that the industry will give to the statement just made by my right hon. Friend about the continued close links that he intends to have with the industry throughout all future negotiations? I hope that that will be the case.
Mr. Walker: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. The calculation of the degree of aid that we are providing on this occasion, which by any previous standards is very substantial, has been done on the basis of a joint assessment that we have made with the industry itself of the financial problems of the industry. I think that we can claim that the relationship between my own Department and the industry, and that of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland and the industry, is very close and is working well to the benefit of the industry as a whole.
Mr. J. Enoch Powell: Will the right hon. Gentleman take the opportunity afforded by the obduracy of the other members of the Council to regain a negotiating stance of an exclusive 12-mile zone and dominant preference up to 50 miles, which is approved by the whole of this House? Is he aware that, perhaps unintentionally, the apparent prevarication on that subject last week by the Prime Minister and this afternoon by him arouses anxieties on the part of fishermen?
Mr. Walker: They are political anxieties expressed by those who have no great enthusiasm for a common fisheries policy. The negotiating relationship on all matters of access between the industry and the Government is one on which we have total agreement. Every negotiating position that we have taken on access, and the position that we have put to the Council of Ministers and to the Commission, has been agreed with the fishing industry.
Mr. Albert McQuarrie: I want first to add my congratulations to my right hon. Friend and his Minister of State and to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland on the very firm line that they took to stand still and not allow the French make them come to terms on a common fisheries policy under duress. My constituency, which is one of the largest fishing constituencies, welcomes warmly this aid to the fishing industry. It is one more example of the Government's confidence in the fishing industry. In view of the comments made by the right hon. Member for Down, South (Mr. Powell), will my right hon. Friend say how much aid has been given by this Government compared with what was given by the last Government?
Mr. Walker: In terms of the position of the industry as a whole, obviously we hope in the coming months to reach a common fisheries policy that will be the policy for the rest of this century and that will provide immense opportunities for the British fishing industry. Therefore, it is the Government's view that it is important to retain the strength of our industry if it is to take full advantage of that situation when it occurs.
The volume of aid is roughly four times what was given in most years of the previous Government and is the volume of aid that we have calculated to be necessary to sustain the fishing fleet in a viable position, so that it can take advantage of the commom fisheries policy.
Mr. Donald Stewart: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware of the German claim that fisheries were included as part of the package covering the rebate of the United Kingdom's contribution to the EEC? The British version is that fisheries is an entirely separate issue. Which version is correct? Will the right hon. Gentleman now state the minimum requirement that the Government would regard as absolutely essential in order to safeguard the rights of our fishermen in any negotiations?
Mr. Walker: I repeat that one cannot do better than to work with the industry in order to decide a sensible position on every specific stock. It is meaningless to decide on an overall general figure without deciding what stocks are of interest to Scottish fishermen. That is what we have done.
The United Kingdom shares the German Government's disappointment about agreement last May. In May, the Heads of Government hoped that a number of issues, including fishing, would be settled by the end of 1980. The British Government warmly welcomed that declaration. They share the disappointment that, not due to any act of ours but because of the acts of others, we did not reach agreement on a common fisheries policy by the end of December.
Sir David Price: Having spent part of the weekend with the fishermen in my constituency, I assure my right hon. Friend that the South Coast fishermen very much support his robust attitude. Is he aware that they would rather have no common fisheries policy than one that sold out our inshore waters to the French, although they would prefer one if it could be obtained on reasonable terms?
Mr. Walker: It is in the interests of all fishermenn to have a common fisheries policy, because the conservation policies that can be operated only on a European basis are essential to the future build-up of stocks. They benefit our fishermen more than any other fishermen in Europe, because we have the largest fishing industry in Europe. Therefore, if we can obtain an arrangement that is satisfactory to our fishing industry it will be to the long-term advantage of all the fishermen.
Mr. James Johnson: The Minister indicated that there can be no settlement before June, at the best. Does that mean that British vessels will be left to wallow for the coming three or four months? Owners in Hull are selling their boats anywhere. In fact, British United Trawlers has put its last 10 big boats on the market. Will something be done in June or July? Is the right hon. Gentleman as optimistic as he was on the last occasion when he reported to the House?
Mr. Walker: I have not stated that June will be the earliest date. I have said that, quite rightly, the timing of the next meeting must be left to the Presidency, following soundings with the various member countries. On Friday, we urged that the meeting should be held as speedily as possible, when the Presidency judges that it has a considerable chance of success. At the Council of Ministers' meeting, the French Minister stated quite openly that he wanted carefully to consider the access position, and said that he was not willing to negotiate on it at that time. It is not only to the benefit of British fishermen to have a common fisheries agreement; it is also in the interests of French fishermen. I hope that the French
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Government share that viewpoint. If they do, there is no reason why, in the coming months, we should not reach a sensible agreement.
Mr. Barry Henderson: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the British fishermen do not like being a charge of the public purse, even though that is necessary in view of the present crisis? Will he say something about the time scale, and the way in which the welcome aid that he has announced will be distributed? Will he confirm that in December both French and British fishermen appeared to believe that a deal was possible, and that it came as a surprise that one was not completed?
Mr. Walker: It is true that that was the feeling of British and French fishermen in December. Indeed, at the December meeting all the other members of the Council of Ministers considered that we were near to reaching agreement.
The money will be distributed quickly, and the method will be similar to the one that was used last August. Although there are detailed snags, it is a system that, in the main, is welcomed by the industry. It is speedy and effective.
Mr. David Alton: I offer my support for what the Minister has achieved so far. However, on conservation, how serious has the depletion of our fishing resources become?
Mr. Walker: There has been some check on depletion in recent years. There is evidence that vital stocks, such as the herring stock, are beginning to build up. The tragedy is that once a stock has been destroyed and over-fished it takes many years to build it up again. If one were to adopt a system of free fishing everywhere I have no doubt that many stocks would quickly and substantially deteriorate.
Mr. Peter Fraser: In view of the carping remarks made by Opposition Members, I assure my right hon. Friend that the leaders of the Scottish fishing fleets are appreciative of the fact that he has taken them along with every decision that has been made at each stage of the Brussels negotiations. Is he aware that the increased amount of aid that has been made available to the fishing fleets is not the only matter of importance? It is also important that the aid should be distributed in a way that is sensitive, and truly responds to the needs of fleets of all sizes.
Mr. Walker: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his general remarks. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland and I have worked closely with the leaders of the Scottish fishing industry. Alas, there is no perfect method of distributing the aid. If it is done according to the size of ship, it adversely affects boats with different engine sizes. If it is done according to the size of the crew, it has an adverse affect on others. We have therefore concluded that the system used last August was broadly correct, and it was welcomed by most sections of the industry. It is also a speedy method of getting the financial aid to those who require it.
Mr. Joan Evans: Will the right hon. Gentleman assure the House that he will not be party to a package deal to sell out the fishing industry in order to obtain our EEC rebate in the future? As the CAP has worked to the disadvantage of British farmers, consumers

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and taxpayers, will he resist a common fisheries policy that provides the fish around our shores for the fishing vessels of our European competitors?
Mr. Walker: Obviously we have a strong case for obtaining as much fish as we possibly can for a vital and important industry. However, on the question of who the fish belong to, some people argue that the breeding grounds, as opposed to other issues, are equally important. It is not a clear, uncomplicated decision. I confirm that I shall be no party to a package that sells out the fishing industry, and I also confirm that no one in the Government would be party to such a measure.
Mr Teddy Taylor: Will my right hon. Friend make it clear that the Government will not accept unrestricted access in 1982 if we do not achieve a common fisheries policy this year? In view of its relevance to the Southend fishing industry, is it my right hon. Friend's aim to phase out historic rights within 12 miles, so that eventually we shall have a 12-miles exclusive zone?
Mr. Walker: Detailed points on historic rights are matters on which we are in close liaison with the industry. The industry recognises the important factors involved for the fishing industries of all countries in measuring the degree of historic rights and their importance to our industry. If we achieve agreement on a disappearance or phasing out of historic rights, it will be an improvement on anything which has existed up to the present time. I am sure that, as always, my hon. Friend will strongly welcome that.
My hon. Friend asked what would happen if there were no agreement by December 1982. The Government believe that it would then be vital, as mentioned in article 103 of the Treaty, for the Commission to present a future programme covering a common fisheries policy in Europe. In the absence of any agreement on such a programme, there is a degree of legal uncertainty about what the position would be.
Several Hon. Members rose—
Mr. Speaker: Order. I propose to call the four hon. Members who have been rising as well as the Opposition Front Bench spokesman before moving on to the Supply day business.
Mr. Nigel Spearing: Has the Minister noticed the considerable support that he has received from both sides of the House and from representatives of the industry for his robust policy? Will he confirm, however, that there is only one possible interpretation of his earlier answers, namely, that both he and the industry have departed from the previously stated principle of a dominant preference between 12 and 50 miles? If so, how does he reconcile that with his so-called robust attitude?
Mr. Walker: Everything that I have put forward has had the agreement of the industry. If the hon. Gentleman is criticising the industry for not knowing as much about fishing as the hon Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing) let him do so.
Mr. Spearing: What does the right hon. Gentleman mean by "the industry"?
Mr. Tony Marlow: Since the industry's problems arise to a large extent from the
30
European Community, will my right hon. friend seek to get the £25 million that this policy will cost as a partial rebate for the massive £705 million net that we put into the Community last year, rather than visit the cost on the hard-pressed taxpayer? After all, we are a Government who seek to cut public expenditure. I am sure that my right hon. Friend is the most persuasive person in being able to get the money back.
Mr. Walker: I suggest that my hon. Friend studies the history of the fishing industry. If he does, he will find that the main reason for the difficulty that faces our long-distance fleet and the industry generally has nothing to do with the Common Market. It is related to the loss of access to Icelandic waters. If my hon. Friend wants to use that argument, therefore, perhaps he will try to get some money out of Iceland.
Sir Anthony Meyer: Is my right hon. Friend aware that he has established beyond doubt his determination to uphold the interests of the British fishing industry against French demands for access that is no doubt as traditional and as important to them as was our access to Icelandic waters? Will he beware, however, of letting himself be boxed in by the natural enthusiasm of the spokesmen for the fishing industry, leaving himself no room for manoeuvre?
Mr. Walker: No, Sir. I have an immense respect for the manner in which the fishing industry has assisted me and collaborated with me in the negotiations. A common factor among the leaders of the fishing industry is a genuine understanding and sympathy for fishermen of other countries. Probably because they share the same dangers and hardships at sea, there is a genuine regard for other fishing communities throughout the Community. I have no complaints about the manner in which the leadership of the fishing industry has worked in close collaboration with the Government during these difficult and complex negotiations.
Mr. Toby Jessel: May I ask my right hon. Friend about the interests of consumers of fish? Practically all the questions put to him have reflected the interests of the fishing industry, and he has constantly stressed the needs of the industry. Does he agree that the interests of those who eat fish are at least equally important? Will he explain how recent events and the stand that he has taken have affected the consumers' interests?
Mr. WalkerThere was a time when British consumers devoured large quantities of herring at low prices because they were in plentiful supply and were caught in large quantities by British fishermen. A lack of conservation measures, over-fishing, and lack of coherent policing in European waters have meant the disappearance of that stock for the consumer. It is therefore very much in the interests of consumers that there should be a viable and successful fishing industry, seeking to catch increasing stocks.
Mr. Gavin Strang: I do not want in any way to detract from the Minister's achievement in securing this substantial additional tranche of temporary financial aid for the industry. May I suggest to him, however, that the last time aid was given in this form there was concern over the method of payment? It was concentrated on the vessel owners, with working

31
fishermen, including share fishermen, receiving no direct benefit. Will some of this money go directly to fishermen who do not own vessels?
Mr. Walker: Different sections of the industry and different proprietors will be in relatively different positions. Obviously, if, but for this aid, a proprietor may go out of business, and he uses the aid to pay his capital and interest payments and stay in business, that will be in the interests of the crew. My experience of the industry is that the relationship between crews, managers and proprietors is, by the nature of the industry, very close. The manner in which the aid is distributed will vary according to different needs. It would be wrong for the Government to specify a method of distribution between capital and interest repayments and meeting overheads, and the genuine requirements of the crews. I believe, however, that in the industry as a whole there is a good relationship between managers and crews.

Orders of the Day
  SUPPLY
  [14TH ALLOTTED DAY]—considered.
  SUPPLY

    Unemployment (Midlands)
    Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Cope.]
    4.5 pm
    Mr. John Sever: We welcome this opportunity to discuss unemployment in the Midlands. If they are fortunate enough to catch your eye, Mr. Speaker, my right hon. and hon. Friends will, I am sure, wish to pursue the question of the difficulties that they are experiencing in their constituencies and to outline the difficulties experienced by working people in the Midlands. Throughout the towns and cities in our region we see the plague of unemployment raging through the lives of countless thousands of families, bringing distress and unhappiness on a scale undreamt of in our wildest nightmares in May 1979. The wildest nightmare in that month, of course, was the arrival of the present Administration.
    Arguably, this Administration is the most doctrinaire and reactionary in modern British politics. Certainly, for many of us who have grown into politics in recent times it is the most doctrinaire Government that we have ever seen. The Department of Employment's figures released on 24 March show that the national unemployment level is now a shade below 2·5 million. If the number unemployed but not yet registered as such could be quantified, I believe that that figure would be well over 3 million. It would be difficult for the Minister to argue against that.
    The figure for the East and West Midlands together is now 428,700. In May 1979 it was 188,600. The current figure is most alarming. Will the Minister tell us today what he and his Department are able to do to reduce it? I hope that the debate will centre around the Government's proposals for relieving the misery facing thousands of Midlands families.
    We on the Labour Benches believed in May 1979 that the figure of just under 200,000 was unacceptable. Today, twice that number are out of work. The current level of unemployment is truly staggering, and I fear that it will increase. The Government are entitled to ask why that should be so. Many of us believe that the reasons for that fear are obvious, but I point to ample evidence from our Midlands experience to support the contention.
    First, hundreds of factories are working short-time. Every employee who is working within such an enterprise feels the threat that his firm may not weather the economic blizzard that has settled over those enterprises, and that the short-time working will in time develop to no-time working. Secondly, grossly unfair foreign competition, the import of cheap and often Government-subsidised goods, the high cost of borrowing, and the competition restrictions imposed by the high value of sterling will mean further reductions in the already thin order books of those firms.

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    All the business sectors in the Midlands, such as enginering—those firms known colloquially in the Midlands as the metal bashing businesses—motor cars, components and accessories, carpets, textiles, footwear and leather are experiencing extreme difficulties. I wonder how many of the good electors of Grantham, in the East Midlands, are now happy with their decision to support the election to high office of one of their daughters, who is now responsible for the loss of so many of their jobs and livelihoods.
    The list of substantial Midland businesses with redundancies totalling more than 100 recorded from reports received by the Birmingham chamber of commerce reads like a national "Who's Who" of British industry—or a list of who is going next in British industry.
    In January 1980, the British Steel Corporation subsidiary, Prothero of Wednesbury, sent 600 workers to the dole queue. GKN, Sankey at Wolverhampton sent 139 to the dole queue. In February, BSR at Cradley Heath made 1,200 workers redundant. Patent Shaft steelworks, at West Bromwich, made 1,500 workers redundant. I know from my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich, West (Miss Boothroyd) that those jobs are lost and gone for ever.
    In March 1980 there was more bad news from GKN, Sankey at Bilston, where 136 workers were made redundant. In the same month there was further bad news of proposed redundancies of about 12,000 during 1980 from British Leyland. In April, Triplex of Birmingham announced 200 redundancies. In May 1980 there was yet more bad news from GKN, Sankey at Telford, where 600 were declared redundant, with another 300 at Bilston.
    Midland Motor Cylinders at Smethwick announced 330 redundancies. In June the year was half over, but the situation was no better. Lucas Electrical announced 3,000 redundancies at various sites in the Midlands. Birmetals at Quinton announced 900 redundancies. BSR at Old Hill announced 600 redundancies, and there was a further startling announcement from GKN that 2,000 more jobs were to go.
    In July, Tube Investments at Wednesfield announced 350 redundancies. In August, Triumph (BL) at Canley announced 1,600 redundancies. In September, Cadbury-Schweppes at Bournville announced that 3,000 jobs were to go in the next four years. T.I. Raleigh at Handsworth, Birmingham made 220 redundancies. In October 1980, guess who—GKN, Sankey at Wolverhampton made 930 workers redundant.
    In November, Talbot Cars at the Stoke plant in Coventry, made 900 redundancies. In December, 500 Christmas-present redundancy notices were issued at GKN Forgings, Bromsgrove and 200 at Darlaston. Dunlop at Erdington, in Birmingham, made 1,000 workers redundant.
    In January 1981, it was a happy new year for 450 workers at GKN, Automotive Fasteners in Birmingham. In February, GKN said that there would be no further redundancies after 1,200 further redundancies at various sites. Talbot Cars at Ryton, in Coventry announced 525 redundancies. Recently, Ansells Brewery, in Birmingham—a household name in the City and the Midlands—announced 600 redundancies.
    Mr. Dudley Smith: I am listening to the hon. Gentleman with interest. He must know that bad industrial relations led to the Ansells redundancies.
    Mr. Sever: I am aware that the future of that company is in jeopardy because of the management's total inability to give working people a fair deal to which they can respond. As a result of that inability, 600 people are on their way to the dole queue.
    The question that immediately springs to my mind is: when will GKN decide that enough redundancies have been forced upon it by the Tory Government through their policies and that it will put no further funds into the Tory Party's coffers? Already the writing is writ large on the wall of the Conservative Party Central Office that no more money will come as the jobs go out the back door of the factories.
    The list of redundancies and closures in the Midlands is endless. I do not propose to take up the time of the House further in listing the long catalogue.
    Mr. Andrew Faulds: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for allowing me to intervene. I wish that he would go on with his litany of disasters. He has missed out from my constituency Chance Brothers, Mansill Booth's, Avery's, Dartmouth Autocasting, and other firms that have declared hundreds of redundancies as a result of the Government's policies. I hope that my colleague will be kind enough to continue with that litany of disasters.
    Mr. Sever: My hon. Friend tempts me. My list was typed and it contained some of the companies to which my hon. Friend refers. However, to try to ease the agony of Ministers I decided to take out some of the names. The redundancies and closures to which my hon. Friend refers reflect the distress in his constituency and in others. He presses me to continue with the list, but it is better that I should try to prise from Minsters their ideas for trying to resolve some of the disastrous problems that face working people in the Midlands.
    The number engaged in short-time working is also a fearful problem. In addition to all the redundancies that I could have listed this afternoon, short-time working is affecting the livelihoods and standards of living of many more thousands of people. In the week ending 17 January this year, 594,000 operatives in manufacturing industries in Great Britain were on short-time. Many of the operatives work in the Midlands.
    Mr. Greville Janner: Is my hon. Friend aware that the Ministry's figures are appallingly defective? They include only short-time working figures that are reported to the Department, generally because people are after temporary employment supplement. Is my hon. Friend aware that in areas such as Leicester, where unemployment is already over 10 per cent., about 15 per cent. of the work force is working short-time? That figure is not available from the Government because it can only be estimated.
    Mr. Sever: I am happy to confirm that. Many people are on short time but do not register. I accept that Ministers might have difficulty in dealing with that problem, because it is difficult to quantify the numbers involved. However, hundreds of thousands of families in the Midlands are affected. Their incomes have been reduced savagely and their standard of living is far below that

    35
    which the Prime Minister said it would be after two years of her Government. The short-time working figure compares with a total of 502,000 on short-time working in the week ending 13 December 1980.
    I now turn to the situation in Coventry. I should like to place on record the feelings of hon. Members on both sides of the House who will share my sadness at not seeing my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry, North-East (Mr. Park) here today as he is unwell. Many of us have listened with enthusiasm and high regard to what my hon. Friend has said in similar debates. Hon. Members will miss his contribution.
    Coventry has long been regarded as healthy. It has been regarded as one of Western Europe's most prosperous cities. Today the story is different. Coventry is also subject to Government gloom. Coventry has suffered, as has the rest of the Midlands, from the prophets of monetarism and from the dogmas pursued by the present Government.
    Factories that once boasted high production levels of goods readily saleable around the world are now empty. They echo only to the footsteps of property developers and auctioneers who are either trying to sell the space for warehousing or storage or to sell machinery for export or scrap. That is desperate and dangerous. It is destroying the whole fabric of the economy of that great city.
    When will the Government realise that they are presiding over the assassination of industry in the Midlands and the destruction of the hopes and dreams of countless thousands of families, because of their inability to provide work. I hope that the Minister can tell us today when the long-promised upturn and consequent improvement in the lot of Midlands workers will take place.
    Within a few hundred yards of the famous Matthew Boulton Soho foundry—the heart of the West Midlands industrial revolution—is the Soho Road area, in my constituency. The general neighbourhood is largely where ethnic minorities live. They feel justifiably disadvantaged for a range of reasons, including poor housing, lack of social provision, and inadequate services of all kinds. As a result, they are at a social disadvantage so pronounced that now every square inch of that district and the whole of my constituency is within the core area of Birmingham's inner city partnership area. Now, in addition to that social disadvantage, racial minorities are finding it extremely difficult to find work. They blame, the Government, as we do, for a lack of effective policies on employment and job opportunities.
    The Secretary of State would be well advised to reconsider the statement made as long ago as 1977 in the report to the OECD by a group of independent experts, under the chairmanship of Paul MacCracken. The report was entitled
    "Towards Full Employment and Price Stability".
    It said:
    "The fact that present high levels of unemployment have not caused more social and political unrest is a tribute to the effectiveness of today's systems of income maintenance and social security. But there can be no complacency about the consequences of prolonged unemployment on social, racial, religious and regional tensions and, in time, on attitudes to work and to society in general".
    Mr. Faulds: Does my hon. Friend agree that the utterances of the so-called right hon. Member for Down,
    36
    South (Mr. Powell), who appears certifiable in what he now says outside the House, do not help the dangerous situation that is developing for these ethnic minorities?
    Mr. Sever: Much public disquiet was expressed at the weekend by the leaders of ethnic communities, whom I was happy to meet on Sunday, about the words of the right hon. Member for Down, South (Mr. Powell). What the right hon. Gentleman says does nothing whatever to improve race relations and racial tolerance and harmony, particularly in our large cities.
    The MacCracken report went on:
    "Indeed the continuation of excessively high rates of unemployment could call into question the market-oriented economic system. It is clear, therefore, that a policy designed to minimise unemployment over the medium run cannot ignore the social and political costs being incurred in the short run."
    What worries me now is that we have long since passed the short run in 1977 and are well into the medium term. I hope that the Minister will say how the Government intend to allay the fears expressed in that report and felt by the unemployed in the Midlands.
    The situation becomes worse daily. I quote from a recent newspaper article, in which Mr. Brian Willis, of the chamber of commerce in Coventry, said:
    "The Prime Minister could so easily adjust the tappets, change the plugs of our engine instead of stuffing potatoes up the exhaust and putting sugar in the petrol tank".
    It is my view that Mr. Willis has got it nearly right, but not quite right. I believe that the right hon. Lady has pinched the engine.
    In the same article, Mr. Scott Glover, chairman of the large company section of the chamber of commerce and director of the Coventry factories for Massey-Ferguson, is quoted as having said:
    "The danger is that the current economic policies of the Government are going to lead to such a collapse of the industrial base that we will reach a position from which we can never climb back".
    That comes from a city that was once regarded by many in the House as probably the most prosperous in Europe.
    A growing fury is felt by many of the smaller Midlands industrialists and entrepreneurs—allegedly those whom the Government wish to encourage—who feel that they have been sold out by the right hon. Lady and her colleagues. They desperately want help from the Government with the high energy costs that they have been asked to absorb. They regard high energy costs as simply a further taxation on hard-pressed small businesses. I hope that the Minister will tell us what discussions he is having with the Department of Energy to try to relieve this worry, which I know has been expressed to his right hon. Friend in a number of representations from the Midlands and elsewhere.
    The crippling level of interest rates has damaged production capabilities, and companies are forced to scale down their enterprises and put many long-serving and well-trained skilled workers on the dole. During the 1979 general election campaign I spoke to groups of workers in a substantial engineering and electrical manufacturing company a hundred yards from my front door. Strangely enough, some of those workers did not want to listen to me when I told them that a vote for a Thatcher-led Administration would lead them eventually to the dole queue. I wonder how many of the workers who doubted what I said at that time feel about being out of work, particularly when they see the "For Sale" notice that is now stuck on the side wall of that factory.

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    It is the same story in companies, both large and small, throughout the country, but it is particularly true of businesses in the Midlands. The jobs that have now gone are likely to have gone forever throughout the region. Mr. Reg Parkes, vice-chairman of the regional CBI and chairman of the Brockhouse Group—one of the most substantial enterprises in the Midlands—is quoted as saying, a few days ago, that:
    "The Government had distorted competition and weakened basic industries so much that many would not survive".
    There we find a leader of organised management in the West Midlands complaining that the policies of the Government, which doubtless many of his friends in industry helped into office, have left industry in such a state that it is doubtful whether many of them will survive.
    Mr. Parkes is quoted as saying:
    "The Midlands has lost great chunks of industry most of which are lost for ever, we have over two hundred and seventy thousand unemployed. Another two hundred and thirty five thousand are on short-time working".
    He went on:
    "Successive Governments have directed industry out of the Midlands to designated depressed areas, assisted areas, and like so that although we have bounced back after each recession it has always been at a lower level".
    Moreover, it takes a longer time.
    With the constant body blows that the Government have inflicted upon industry, job opportunities for many thousands of young people seeking to enter industry will not be there. The Government's duty is clear. They must give greater support to financing apprenticeship training and must encourage such help through the engineering industry training board and other industrial training boards. Midlands TUC leaders, in their recent report on the crisis, called for a campaign for a new policy to support the Midlands, which is still not rated for financial assistance.
    Many of us on the Opposition Benches believe that the problems of the Midlands cannot be solved by throwing money at the area. We also believe that there is an immediate need for much extra financial help to be given to the Midlands, because that is where the growth and the long-sought-after upturn in the economy, to which the Prime Minister refers in her speeches, will come from. Unless it happens in the Midlands—unless encouragement is given to that region—the position will worsen.
    Those dire warnings come not only from trade unions and Labour Members but from established, recognised and well-regarded figures in the business community in the Midlands. The Government would do well to study the TUC report carefully and to regard the comments made in it as an indication of the way in which they can best help in the Midlands. They should read it and act upon it immediately. The Midlands area, once the centre of full employment—the boisterous, booming heart of the nation—is now in danger of a terminal seizure. The Government must provide a pacemaker at once.
    I believe that in this debate my right hon. and hon. Friends will conclusively prove that the welfare of the Midlands has for far too long been ignored by the Government. The priority must be to reflate the economy, support retraining schemes for workers, offer increased skill training opportunities to the young, and provide the climate for the development of an industrial renaissance. If the Government cannot or will not do those things within
    38
    a programme designed to reduce unemployment they should do the honourable thing and place their record before the electorate and seek a new mandate.
    4.31 pm
    The Under-Secretary of State for Industry (Mr. Michael Marshall): The whole House will have listened with particular interest to the speech of the hon. Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Mr. Sever). I believe that I am right in saying that it was his first from the Dispatch Box. I congratulate him on a well constructed, thoughtful speech, delivered with confidence and in a way that challenged the Government side of the House and enlisted the support of his hon. Friends over a wide spectrum. I am sure that we shall hear the hon. Gentleman speaking from the Opposition Front Bench on many occasions. He will be a great improvement on some of the others who appear there from time to time.
    This is an important debate. Those of us who have had the opportunity to take part in similar debates in the past regard them as occasions for serious and detailed contributions. I am sure that we shall have them today. There is a wide range of expertise present on both sides of the House.
    My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Employment will listen with particular interest and will later pick up some of the themes of the debate. I should like to speak briefly, because I do not wish to answer immediately some of the points that the hon. Gentleman put. I am sure that they will be taken up and orchestrated from both sides of the House.
    Perhaps I may immediately be somewhat more critical of the hon. Member's contribution. He naturally fell into the trap of giving us a gloomy picture. He did not try to strike a balance. We heard nothing about the good news.
    Let us look at the problem clearly. We are all aware that the Midlands is, in effect, two distinct regions—the West and the East Midlands, different in nature and with different industrial problems. In the West Midlands, the heartland of our manufacturing industry, it was inevitable that the national and world-wide recession would bite particularly deeply. I regret that the hon. Gentleman did not put his remarks in that context. In the East Midlands, traditionally a prosperous area with a wide industrial base, the problems have centred on the long-term decline of the relatively small number of important industries, particularly clothing and footwear.
    But to say that the regions have distinct sets of problems is not to say that they are in a traditional sense regional problems. I appreciated that part of the hon. Gentleman's speech in which he tried to look at the question of regional aid in a wider context. I shall come to that a little later. We have for a long time been faced by parts of the country suffering from locational disadvantages or long-term structural decline—the problems of Merseyside, the North-East and the far South-West are well known to the House. By and large, their problems are not the problems of the Midlands. They are very much a reflection of national problems, of, in some areas, historical failure to remain competitive, particularly certain industries, and to adjust to a changing world.
    That is a reality well understood in the Midlands, particularly in the West Midlands. Even with the conurbation suffering such historically high levels of unemployment, there has been remarkably little clamour for regional aid. A number of representations have been

    39
    considered, but so far as I am aware only Telford is currently putting in an application for assisted area status. A deputation led by my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin (Mr. Hawksley) will be seeing my hon. Friend the Minister of State next month to discuss its case.
    I find myself leaning very much towards the argument that, by and large, regional policy cannot offer solutions to problems of the sort faced overall in the Midlands. I shall come to some specific instances in which that policy must perhaps be looked at in practical terms in isolated cases, but in general I am inclined to agree with the hon. Gentleman's argument.
    In the East Midlands the problems are rather different. We now recognise the validity of a regional policy to meet some of them. In particular, the House will recall the prompt action that the Government took to help Corby when the steelworks closed, giving it the investment incentives of a development area. Equally, a number of hon. Members have in their constituencies assisted areas, which are, as part of our efforts to concentrate regional aid, to lose assisted area status in 1982. Hon. Members may make a case against that today. I shall listen carefully to such arguments, though they will have to be very strong to persuade us that we should be deflected in any way from our efforts to concentrate and to increase the effectiveness of regional aid.
    If the problems are, in general, not traditional regional-type problems, what are they? In the West Midlands they are the result of many factors: the legacy of inefficiency in some parts of industry; problems of industrial relations, which in the motor industry, for example, are well known; problems of industrial relations, in striking the right balance, such as my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. Smith) mentioned; the cost-plus, piecework mentality of the war years, nurtured by a virtual absence of competition, as many of us who worked in industry at the time will recall, during the first 10 post-war years, and sustained in many cases right up to the 1970s; low wage differentials between the skilled and the unskilled; the hoarding of skilled labour in times of prosperity; the advantage taken in the past of the influx of immigrants prepared to do less attractive, low-paid, unskilled work, thus removing the incentive to modernise old capital equipment; the carrying for so long by so many firms of the dead weight of overmanning.
    In the East Midlands and much of the rest of the country all the same problems apply. The diversity of the industrial base enabled the region to sustain a relatively high level of prosperity for a long period, but its hopes of escaping the recession have foundered on the heavy dependence of some areas on clothing and footwear, with their now so well-known history of competition from abroad.
    Against that historical background we have also to set a number of current problems. First, we must consider inflation. Time and time again industry in the Midlands, as elsewhere, has made clear its view that the control of inflation must be our first priority. The hon. Gentleman talked about some of the views of leaders of West Midlands industry. He may wish to recall that on his recent visit to Birmingham my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State was told by the chambers of industry and commerce that they had identified the reduction of inflation as a key factor likely to improve business prospects in the region.
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    I should like to feel that the hon. Gentleman welcomed the continuing fall in the rate of inflation in each of the past nine months.
    Mr. J. W. Rooker: Will the Minister also take on board the fact that four of my hon. Friends and I were told last Friday by leaders of West Midlands industry, in the guise of the CBI, that, whatever inflation came down to, we and our constituents would have to live with a permanent pool of 2 million unemployed? The Opposition are not prepared to accept that.
    Mr. Marshall: I note what the hon. Gentleman says. I do not think that anyone would relish the prospect of a high level of unemployment, but the hon. Gentleman knows, and the whole House knows, that this problem is not capable of immediate and instant solution. We are facing a long-term problem, not only in this country but over the whole of Western Europe.
    The other factor to which the CBI referred as being of key importance was interest rates, and the hon. Member for Ladywood also referred to it. The Government are seeking to bring down interest rates as fast as possible without disrupting the prime objective of controlling inflation. The House and industry welcomed the 2 per cent. reduction in MLR announced in the Budget and the contribution that this will make to business prospects.
    Mr. Sever: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman is right in saying that everyone welcomes every kind of reduction in MLR and interest rates. Although the 2 per cent. reduction was welcomed, many industrialists have told me that it was largely discounted in advance.
    Mr. Marshall: That is the natural approach of business men in this situation, and I appreciate the hon. Gentleman's point, but it is a significant and a progressive move. I hope that it will be part of a continuing process by which the reduction of interest rates goes steadily down, along with the reduction in inflation.
    Mr. Nick Budgen (Wolverhampton, South-West): Surely the important thing is the effect that a reduction in MLR will have in increasing demand. The fact that it may have been discounted by the money markets and the Stock Exchange is completely irrelevant, is it not?
    Mr. Marshall: Not for the first time, my hon. Friend has put the question into a broad statesmanlike perspective, and I entirely agree with what he said.
    I deal next with a set of particular problems that are specific to the region, and are important and worrying. First, there is the problem of the steel closures at Bilston, and, in particular, at Corby. I have mentioned some aspects of that area. There are also the inner city problems, particularly in the West Midlands conurbation. I have mentioned already the problems of the clothing and footwear industries.
    It is easy enough to list the problems, as the hon. Member for Ladywood did, but it is much harder to see the solutions. We should be looking at what can be done now to help the region weather the recession and the unemployment that it is currently facing, and in the short-term future at the ways in which it must adapt to ensure that it emerges from the recession with a sound industrial base and a level of prosperity comparable to that which it has traditionally enjoyed.

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    First, this means continuing our efforts to create a climate for the growth of industry. This remains the thrust of our industrial policy. The defeat of inflation through the control of the money supply is the course that we must follow. I shall not take up time by repeating the economic argument ad nauseam, because it is well known to the House, but I believe that it is right.
    Secondly, it means supporting—as long as there continues to be a prospect of viability—the single most important industry in the West Midlands, namely, the vehicle industry. I agree with the hon. Gentleman about not throwing money at problems. He went on to argue that there may be specific cases. The specific case that is of most value to the West Midlands is the vehicle industry. The House will not need reminding of the magnitude of our support—almost £1 billion committed over the next two years—but this support has taken into account not only BL but the large number of component manufacturers throughout the Midlands who are affected by the future of that great company.
    We took the dificult decision to support BL in the clear knowledge of its vital importance to the whole of the local economy. It has been a very difficult matter, because not only are we taking a view here about the motor industry in respect of that particular company; we are having to make a judgment on whether that company is becoming successful with its new models.
    Incidentally, it would have been nice to hear the hon. Gentleman talking today about the Metro. I hope that he will join all those who feel that the success of that new model is of great significance to his part of the world.
    In other industries we are prepared to continue to make aid available under section 8 of the Industry Act to help attract investment which is either internationally mobile—and might otherwise go abroad—or will lead to substantial improvements in performance or to the introduction of new products. The West Midlands has received over £17 million in the period from May 1979 to December 1980, and the East Midlands has received just over £9 million in the same period. Furthermore, as part of the effort to stimulate new enterprise in the region, we have introduced two enterprise zones, at Dudley and Corby, in the first experimental group of 11 zones. It is too early to evaluate the effect that these zones will have on the Midlands, but it is an important initiative and one that we shall watch with great interest.
    As the House will recall, firms within the zones are freed from rates and benefit from a simplified planning regime and from various tax concessions. They are given the freedom to develop. These developments—this is part of the good news that we did not hear this afternoon—have been warmly welcomed by the two communities, and they will do much to regenerate the local economies.
    Thirdly, if we are to pursue effective policies in the short or in the medium term, it will mean continuing to support a range of employment schemes designed either to keep people in employment or to provide opportunities for training or work experience for the unemployed in the Midlands as a whole. I remind the House that 181,000 people are benefiting from the temporary short-time working compensation scheme, 98,000 from the job release scheme, and 600 from the community industry scheme. Since April 1980, 53,600 people have joined the youth opportunity grant schemes, and 14,000 have joined the special temporary employment programme schemes.
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    Fourthly, it means help with the particularly acute problems faced in the region. I have already mentioned the help given to Corby to which we gave development area status. It has, as a result attracted additional support from the EEC. It means continued determination to see a viable textile and clothing industry in the Midlands and the United Kingdom as a whole.
    We shall implement the existing multi-fibre arrangement and press for a continuation of effective restraints when the current MFA expires at the end of 1981. Voluntary restraint agreements have already been signed with Mediterranean suppliers, and this matter will receive continuing attention. The hon. Gentleman spoke of unfair competition. If any hon. Members have evidence of that, my colleagues at the Department of Trade will be anxious to look at it as a matter of great importance.
    Mr. Sever: One of the difficulties is that when such cases have been brought to the attention of various Ministers it has been found that legislation is required in other countries to control the abuse of our system. The difficulty is that we cannot get the agreement of the countries concerned to help us in the way that we seek. Does the Minister agree that that is the difficulty?
    Mr. Marshall: The hon. Gentleman has made a fair point. I am not unaware of the difficulties in trying to deal with the subject in the way that he suggests, but he may agree that we have to continue to seek transparency and reciprocity in these matters. For an exporting country such as ours the stakes are very much higher than for many of the countries with which we are holding such conversations.
    Part of the assistance that we must consider is a continuation of our help for the footwear industry, through restrictions on imports from a number of countries. Quota or voluntary restraint agreements now apply to imports from Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania and China, and industry-to-industry restraint agreements on all footwear exist with the South Koreans and the Taiwanese.
    With regard to help for inner city areas, through the traditional urban programme and inner city policy £23 million of resources have been earmarked in 1980–81 under these headings alone.
    There is also the question of assistance for small firms. The hon. Gentleman was critical of the Government's approach to these matters, yet the West Midlands in particular is a classical example of an area where even tiny firms, which make a massive contribution to the prosperity of the area, may well find considerable support from what is provided in the Budget.
    Mr. Gwilym Roberts: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that although we have heard about the big firms—the headline snatchers—the real tragedy of the West Midlands has been the tens of thousands of jobs lost, six here and 10 there, with the decline of small firms?
    Mr. Marshall: A problem faces the whole of industry, including both large and small companies. I should like the hon. Gentleman, with his usual sense of fairness, to consider some of the good news coming up on the small business front. As he will know, the Budget contained no fewer than 10 measures of assistance to small firms, of which perhaps the most important was the loan guarantee scheme. It is designed to overcome the difficulties

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    currently faced in raising finance by the new small business that has no track record to display. We shall certainly continue with our efforts in that direction.
    Most importantly, it means helping the industries of the Midlands to adapt and change to meet today's competitive environment. Those hon. Members who take an interest in industry will know that there are many different types of business in the Midlands. There are some efficient modern businesses and some that are still, in a way, part of our long tradition of the Industrial Revolution. The climb out of the recession will be led by the new high technology growth industries.
    The House recognises the problems of rapid change. The Government have made available extensive schemes of assistance for firms with new processes or products, particularly where these involve microelectronics. We are maintaining the microprocessor application projects, the microelectronic industry support programme and the product and process development scheme. Industry in the Midlands has already benefited to the extent of over £15 million of assistance in this way.
    We all recognise the severity of the problems faced by the Midlands. Historically, unemployment is high. To put things in a broader perspective, it must be said that the problem has been evident and growing since 1975. In addition, the problem must be seen in the perspective of the country as a whole. Regrettably, the North, the North-West, Wales and Scotland still have much greater unemployment and industrial problems.
    It is right that the House should express concern about the problems of the Midlands. Our efforts should be directed towards ensuring that the Midlands weathers the recession without irreparable damage being done to its industrial base. That is why I stressed, for example, our support for the vehicle industry and the efforts that we have made on behalf of the clothing and footwear industries.
    Perhaps it is a function of the way in which not only our proceedings but industry affairs are reported that as the good news comes in the bad news tends to be stressed. However, we see encouraging signs. The Staffordshire Development Association reported this month that in the last two years it has pulled in 100 new arrivals, creating 2,500 jobs. In Coventry, Alfred Herbert has found increased demand for its CNC machine tools and intends to move towards double its present rate of production by 1982. Hon. Members will remember Alfred Herbert's background of problems. One could make a list of such companies, but the fact remains that the problems are being offset over a lengthy time scale.
    We often have to wait five or seven years before the real benefits of new investment come through. It is essential to bear in mind that the Midlands, like so much of British industry, will come through the recession by means of diversification into the growth industries of the future, by means of a sound growing base of small firms and by means of the employment potential that we all recognise. The solution to the employment problems of the West Midlands lies primarily in the encouragement of those sectors. That is precisely the aim of the Government's policy, but we can only encourage such growth. Ultimately, it is up to those in the Midlands to act and to
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    turn the spirit of enterprise—of which they are justifiably proud—towards new directions in which they will be able to secure their future.
    Several Hon. Members rose—
    Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bernard Weatherill): Order. This is a very important debate. Twenty-three right hon. and hon. Gentlemen have indicated their wish to take part in it. Those who speak at inordinate length will prevent their colleagues from speaking.
    Miss Betty Boothroyd: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. What about hon. Ladies? They also represent the areas involved and would like to be called.
    Mr. Deputy Speaker: I recollect that the hon. Lady mentioned that the other day. As far as the Chair is concerned, ladies are included in "hon. Gentlemen" and "hon. Members".
    4.54 pm
    Mr. Peter Archer: This House was, in its origin, a place where elected representatives came from the various localities to express the grievances of those who sent them, so that the Executive would know the problems and aspirations of local communities and could build up a picture of the country's needs. That was and is the purpose of the House. Our debates should echo the grievances of the localities and should provide a clear indication of what we are asking the Government to do.
    But that purpose is achieved only if the Government show by their actions that they have listened to the debate and respond accordingly. I do not say that they should carry out slavishly everything that is asked of them. There may even be conflicting requests. However, our debate, to be effective, should get through to the Government's consciousness and should influence the Government's thinking. If that does not happen, the people back home could be forgiven for asking what is the purpose of parliamentary debate or parliamentary democracy.
    I have a feeling of déjà vu. On 20 June 1980 the House debated this same subject of unemployment in the West Midlands. Indeed, at this point I should like to add my congratulations to those given to my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Mr. Sever). It is a great pleasure to see him sitting on the Opposition Front Bench. I congratulate him on the force with which he put our case. Even he will agree that what he said—and, indeed, what we all say—has mirrored and will mirror almost exactly what we said nine months ago.
    Mr. Gwilym Roberts: It is not quite a feeling of déjà vu, because since then unemployment has increased sharply throughout the region.
    Mr. Archer: That is precisely the point that I had intended to make. The arguments and the complaints are the same, but as my hon. Friend pointed out, the figures are worse. Indeed, the debate might never have taken place. As a whole, the Midlands has a depressing story to tell. In 1971 the unemployment rates in the East and the West Midlands—excluding school leavers—was each 2·9 per cent.— only the South-East had a better figure—but by December 1980 the figure for the East Midlands was 8 per cent. and for the West Midlands 9·9 per cent. Even the South-West had a figure of 8·1 per cent. The figure for the East Midlands was only marginally better and that for

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    the West Midlands was substantially worse. The debate was held nine months ago. Hon. Members from all parties explained the plight of our industry and of those who worked in it.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Coventry, North-East (Mr. Park), whose absence today we regret, pointed out that in 1966 the West Midlands contained 5 per cent. of the nation's unemployed. By June 1980 it contained 10 per cent. In addition, by June 1980, 22 per cent. of the unemployed among the ethnic minorities were situated in the West Midlands. We explained that the reason for such high unemployment did not lie in a lack of skills. If that vast reservoir of industrial skills is fast draining away, it is not the cause of unemployment but the result. As people are made redundant they leave to find work in different industries, away from those in which they developed their skills. Companies are reducing the number of apprenticeships on offer. Youngsters who leave school to acquire skills are told that no one will want them even if they take the trouble to acquire those skills.
    We explained that the reason for such unemployment did not lie in bad industrial relations, although Conservative Members have tried today to make that point. We all related examples of how managements and unions had co-operated to the full in introducing schemes to save their companies. We explained that the reason for such unemployment did not lie in the fact that the people were not prepared to work. They are not just sitting down and taking it but are fighting hard for their existence.
    In Cradley Heath, in my constituency, several small and medium-sized engineering companies have grouped together in a joint training scheme known as the provident joint training scheme. Not only has it revolutionised training methods, and persuaded managements to rethink their procedures; it has twice arranged a tour of Holland to demonstrate to our Dutch friends what British industry can do. On each occasion, it has returned with over £10 million of orders. But those companies are swimming against a current set running by the Government. The very existence of such schemes will be jeopardised if the Government place a question mark over the future of the Engineering Industry Training Board.
    It does not help to talk about a world recession. British industry is losing its share of world markets. The world is making too many tubes and too many industrial fasteners. So we are in danger of losing not only our export markets but our home markets, because they are being invaded by goods from countries where Governments accept responsibility for the welfare of industry. Companies in such countries receive concealed subsidies, cheap capital, tax concessions and sometimes patent subsidies. Our industry is racing against competitors who have the benefit of a half-length start. That is why some of us reluctantly argue for selective import controls.
    Let us not confuse the argument by speaking of technological revolutions. It may be that within 20 or 30 years the world's needs will be met by a small work force working short hours. That will require a readjustment in our thinking, and it is important that we should debate it. But that is not the issue that we are debating today. We are discussing unemployment while human needs are not being met. We are discussing unemployment side by side with material deprivation. We are discussing unemployment in the construction industry, while in Sandwell 4,800 families on the live housing list, apart from what is known as the supplementary list, are asking for any kind of
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    accommodation. We are discussing the laying off of thousands of people in vehicle building while in some countries people are starving for lack of agricultural machinery. It is nothing to do with the technological revolution.
    We are concerned with the circulation of money. People are unemployed because those who desperately need the goods cannot afford them. As more companies experience cash flow problems, the settlement of bills is increasingly delayed and the circulatory economic system slows to a halt.
    On 20 June last year we explained that the reasons lay chiefly in high interest rates. They distorted exchange rates so that we were less competitive abroad. It was impossible to carry large stocks, because they cost too much. Above all, high interest rates made it impossible to borrow for investment, so worn-out plant was not replaced and new technology was not installed.
    We explained that the problem remained with the money supply and that the Government must do something about it. We might as well have saved our breath. The Government were totally unresponsive to our appeals. They were impervious to our arguments. They were firm in their course, and the lady was not for turning. Monetarism still stalked through the land unchecked.
    Between January and June 1980 unemployment among people in the West Midlands, including school leavers, rose from 5·7 per cent. to 6·8 per cent. Then we held our debate and made our appeals to the Government. By December 1980 unemployment had risen to 10·4 per cent. In the past month, unemployment in the East Midlands has risen by 5,300 and in the West Midlands by 9,800. Those statistics tell the story of real communities and of interrelated complexes of industrial processes where each contract provides a spin-off for other sections of industry.
    Mr. Greville Janner: Does my right hon. and learned Friend accept that those figures tell only a fraction of the story, because they deal only with unemployment'? Did he note that, despite the assurance given to me by the Leader of the House during business questions last week, to the effect that the Mininster would note the request for details about short-time working, the Minister did not see fit to refer to it, still less to give any details? Would not the entire picture of the misery in my constituency and in my right hon. and learned Friend's constituency be reflected better by showing not merely the unemployment figures for short-time working, which often means unemployment for four days out of five?
    Mr. Archer: I agree with my hon. and learned Friend. The statistics tell a bleak but bare part of the story. We can talk about second incomes, short-time working and many concealed losses of income. I was about to put a little flesh on the bones.
    In the last debate on this subject I mentioned the names of some companies in my constituency, some of which have been mentioned by my hon. friend the Member for Ladywood, which for generations have been synonymous with British industy. Such names formed part of the vocabulary wherever in the world people spoke of engineering, industrial fasteners, tubes, chains and cables, boilers, lifting gear, and so on. They were family companies not only because they were owned by local families but because the labour forces consisted largely of people whose grandfathers had worked in the same

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    companies. Since that debate, some of those names have disappeared, such as Chance Brothers, referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Warley East (Mr. Faulds), Babcock and Wilcox, in boilers, and BSR, mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Ladywood, which has recently ended over 1,000 jobs. My hon.Friend the Member for West Bromwich, West (Miss Boothroyd) can tell similar stories about her area. In many of these places the topic of conversation is whether next week people will be working two days or three days.
    Miss Boothroyd: Or none.
    Mr. Archer: Or none. At first, in honesty, the evidence was not obvious to the eye. If pay packets were thinner, the deprivation was concealed. If the diet changed, it happened at meals at which only the family were present. If the holiday was nearer home, only the suntan was absent. But now it is showing through. People are still paying their round but the clubs and pubs are empty except at weekends, and then only later in the evening. Suits have been discreetly patched. Children are more frequently denied the chance of going on school trips, because their parents cannot spare the money. Self-respect has not gone, because people are papering over the cracks, but the paper is wearing thin.
    When councils are compelled to increase rates and rents there is something akin to desperation in those communities. That is why I pointed to the purpose of holding debates in the House. Elected representatives should express to the Government what is happening before it is too late. If the Government refuse to listen they cast doubt on the effectiveness of the parliamentary process.
    Last week some of us were confronted by desperate people saying that they could not afford to pay rent and rate increases because they were not earning enough money. There were those present who sought to persuade them to respond by witholding the payment of rent. I believe in parliamentary democracy and the rule of law. If those principles are endangered, the people that we represent will not benefit. I have said that continually; I said it then, and I say it now. But what does one say to people who remark "So you had a debate in Parliament about unemployment in the Midlands. What resulted from it? How differently will the Government behave?".
    My purpose in intervening was not to suggest remedies, because we have done that already. We know the arguments used by the Government to justify their policies. The Government claim that their policies will bring down inflation. Even if they were the most effective method of fighting inflation, the spectre which haunts us is of Britain with no inflation and no industry. Treating sickness by letting blood may prove effective for certain conditions, but if it is persisted in over a long period those conditions will become academic, because the patient will be dead.
    We have asked for assistance in Sandwell. If the Minister is unaware of it, we can give details. My hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich, West may give details in her contribution.
    We are grateful for any measures to alleviate the position even marginally, but no one has persuaded us that our salvation lies in cosmetic treatment. A Budget which
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    boasts of tax relief on start-up capital for small businesses but sends transport costs through the roof does not indicate that the Government have grasped the problem.
    The Minister spoke of the enterprise zone about to be established in Dudley just outside my constituency. I say this with respect to my good friend the hon. Member for Dudley, West (Mr. Blackburn): it may attract some business to the area but it has not brought smiles to the faces of those operating businesses just outside the area. They suspect that it will attract not a different kind of industry but competitors in the same kind of business taking advantage of rate concessions. So, for every job produced within the zone a job will be lost on the other side of the wall.
    My intervention is in the nature of an appeal. If the Government continue to ignore the sense of our debates and if Conservative Members who share our concern—I believe that some do—continue to uphold the Government in their course, they risk losing markets that we can never regain, dismantling entire industries that we can never reassemble, losing skills that we can never replace and producing a loss of confidence in a whole way of life. I beg them to take heed of what is said in the debate before another nine months pass, because next time it may be too late.
    5.10 pm
    Mr. Dudley Smith: The right hon. and learned Member for Warley, West (Mr. Archer) is always listened to with great respect. He is renowned for his sincerity. I was interested to hear his comments and his castigation of the Government. He took up some of the longer-term problems, and I was sorry that he did not go further along that path. So often that sort of analysis is absent from the arguments advanced by Labour Members when we debate, as inexorably as we do, unemployment and the problems that arise from it.
    When the Leader of the Opposition took office he said that he was determined to debate unemployment up hill and down dale, week after week. That is his privilege. We have had many debates on the levels of unemployment, nationally and regionally. It worries me that the arguments so far advanced from the Opposition Benches—I welcome the hon. Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Mr. Sever) to the Opposition Front Bench—are still sterile. We hear a recital of the problems about which we all know. No one would minimise them. They are extremely serious. Unemployment in the West Midlands has doubled over the past year or so. It seems that the Opposition's panacea is reflation. In effect they are saying "Give us more money. Let us print more money. Let us get things moving again to try to alter the present situation".
    Concern about unemployment does not lie purely with Opposition Members. My right hon. and hon. Friends are equally concerned. Like Labour Members, we too have constituencies. Surely it is time that the House moved forward to consider what should be done when the recession begins to come to an end and the country begins to take off again. There will be a long-term problem in the next three or four years to be dealt with by a Conservative or a Labour Government. The problem will not be solved by the generalisations that we hear so often from both sides of the House.
    The hon. Member for Ladywood made an interesting comment when he talked about Coventry. He said that it was once one of the most prosperous cities in Europe.

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    Indeed, the West Midlands was one of the most prosperous areas in Europe. It is still prosperous, but not as prosperous as it was. Why is that? Coventry was overmanned. It did not produce as much as it should have done. It fed on the seedcorn. It was overmanned and overpaid. It was receiving far too much money for the productivity that it was achieving, and we are now picking up the bills. Many of those who were amongst the most prosperous citizens within Europe are now unemployed or on short time.
    Mr. Geoffrey Robinson rose—
    Mr. Smith: I shall give way once. I promised to be brief. I am aware that others wish to participate in the debate.
    Mr. Robinson: The hon. Gentleman has laid the catalogue of evils solely at the door of working people in the Midlands. Can he not find it in himself to attribute at least equal blame to a lack of management, especially in engineering development, in his catalogue, put the responsibility side by side and balance the argument? Surely it was the right of management to give a lead and to produce the necessary engineering. If that had been done there would have been a different result in the West Midlands.
    Mr. Smith: I agree with that. The hon. Gentleman was one of the managers. The company with which he was connected has gone through some rough times. Time and again management gave way to organised labour. It did not have its industrial relations on the right lines. It seemed that management and organised labour were unable jointly to work out the right approach for the future. I accept that management bears much responsibility. Many of those who are now calling out for help—some of them have been quoted by the hon. Member for Ladywood—were once saying "The world is prosperous. There is nothing to worry about in future. We can go on in the same sweet way." We have suffered a great fall. Both management and employees share responsibility for the past and the present situation.
    I am especially concerned about the West Midlands, as I represent a constituency within it, but the Midlands generally has been known as the workshop of Britain. It is right that it should still be so regarded in future. Constituents have lobbied us strongly and said that it is wrong for this Administration,with their tough and realistic policy, to give large sums to nationalised industries. It is an aspect that worries me considerably. However, I agree with the Government in forwarding funds to BL. It was a hard judgment to make. I have in mind the many jobs not only in BL but in the car component industry, to which my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State referred. Many jobs are at stake, and it would be folly not to support the efforts of Sir Michael Edwardes in the new and realistic approach that BL has adopted.
    The company still has some way to go. I am not entirely convinced that it will succeed, despite the Metro. However, I hope with all my heart that it will succeed. It is not merely a West Midlands problem. The future of British industry is involved. I support the Government wholeheartedly in what they are trying to do to get BL on the right lines, but in the West Midlands and in the
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    Midlands generally we should begin to question whether the area should be known as the heartland of the car industry in Britain.
    We have gone through Many phases over the years. In some respects the car industry has had its day, when it is remembered what it was 15 or 20 years ago. There will always be a place for it, but it is dangerous to put all our eggs in one basket and to make the industry the major industrial factor in the West Midlands.
    It is a controversial statement for me to make. but I do not support those who are lobbying strongly for the new Nissan project to come to the Midlands. There is a case for making that claim. There is a desperate need for jobs, but there are other areas where unemployment is greater. The claims of Wales and other parts of the peripheral areas of the British Isles are strong. I shall not seek to identify those areas. I merely say that they may have a stronger case to submit that the Nissan project should go to them.
    If the project were to come to the West Midlands, we might still be pushing forward with the idea that forever and a day the Midlands will be the centre of the car industry and that the industry will be the motivation for the industrial future of the British Isles. I cannot subscribe to that idea.
    Only today the TUC's figures have been published, which state:
    "One in five of the 107,000 redundancies reported between last October and February were in the vehicle industry."
    The decline is continuing. The Midlands must now turn its attention to new and innovative industries that will provide long-term jobs. Such industries will provide an opportunity for future generations to get away from the concentration of heavy industry that we have had in the past. These industries will enable the Midlands to be not only a workshop but an innovative area.
    In the area that I represent, there are new companies with new ideas. Each of these companies is contributing in a small way to improving employment opportunities, and there is the prospect that that will give a lead to other areas. A few years ago, IBM came to Warwick. The company now has one of the main computer centres in Britain. It is enormously successful, with a good rate of employment, and good employers and employees. There is no redundancy. It is making progress and is a most successful company.
    Recently, in Leamington Spa, in my area, ASDA has opened a new superstore, which has provided much-needed employment for many. It is appreciated by the local community and gives the sign for future developments of that kind throughout the Midlands. Further, a large new hotel complex is about to open. It is to be called the Ladbroke Hotel. It is on the outskirts of Warwick and will make a significant contribution to tourism and provide much-needed jobs.
    I have mentioned before the need to regard tourism as a major industry. We are extremely naive in our approach to the matter. We all talk about it and subscribe to it, but we do not realise its potential for providing employment. We must change our attitudes and do more as a country, with our enormous wealth of tourist potential, to encourage more and more people to enter that industry, because jobs can be created in tourism. There will be many opportunities in the future if we plan in the correct way.
    The other point that I wish to make was also raised by the right hon. and learned Member for Warley, West in his interesting remarks. Nationally, whatever the policies of

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    the Government of the day, we must face the fact that over the next 20 or 30 years we shall have a much larger pool of unemployed than we have known in the past. The right hon. and learned Member for Warley, West and I have been Members of the House for between 15 and 20 years. In that time, although there have been quarrels about the numbers, by and large the number of unemployed has been reasonably acceptable, give or take a few thousand.
    Those who will follow us in the next 20 or 30 years will be faced with well over 1 million permanently unemployed. It will be extremely difficult for the Government to know exactly how to harness their talents and employ their abilities if they are not to rot or fester and become totally disillusioned. The right hon. and learned Member knows as well as I do that one can go round large modern factories today and see them being run by 25 or 50 people, whereas 15 or 20 years ago the employees were numbered in hundreds. It is a modern-day problem. I do not think that it is insuperable, but it is one that we have constantly to bear in mind.
    It is essential that in looking towards the future, and in planning to ensure that in areas such as the West Midlands we retain the prosperity that we have known for many years, and still to a large extent retain today, with all the difficulties of a high rate of unemployment, we do what we can to preserve present employment. We constantly hear talk from the Opposition and those outside about the fact that so many are out of work, and that one in 10 is out of work. I prefer to put that more positively and say that nine out of 10 people are in employment.
    I am worried about some of the activities of those who, instead of competing against industry, which is still working reasonably succesfully, are trying to hamper it. I draw the attention of hon. Members to an article in today's edition of The Daily Telegraph.It said:
    "Manufacturing companies believe State industries are abusing their monopoly power by demanding swifter payment of bills while delaying their own payments."
    That matter has been called to the public's attention by the Engineering Employers Federation. Private industry has enough problems with cash flows and competition from world sources without being hamstrung by the pressures generated by the electricity boards, the gas boards, British Telecom and others.
    My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary is in the right Department to pay attention to the pressures being generated against private industry. Private businesses can cope with many pressures, but if the burden becomes too great others will go to the wall who do not deserve to do so. I hope that my hon. Friend will bear my remarks in mind.
    Unemployment has been growing inexorably over the past 15 or 20 years. There are easy answers and easy options—they are put forward every time by the Opposition—such as reflation, which is the cosmetic approach to get more jobs quickly. We need a second Industrial Revolution and the sort of approach that will create permanent employment and provide a firm base. As my hon. Friend the Minister said, that will not come about overnight. It will be five, six or seven years before we have the permanent employment that will stand us in good stead in our relations with the rest of the world.
    I think that the upturn is not so far away. At the weekend I was talking to a prominent accountant in my
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    constituency who has his ear close to the ground. He said "It is turning already. I know two or three firms where improvement is taking place." I queried that and said, "I am sure you are wrong. I have not detected it myself." He said "Yes, it is. I have other evidence as well. It is coming through rather more quickly than is believed." I hope that he is right. I am sure that we all hope that he is right, but, in the meantime, until that reflation can be started by productive means and not by printing money, the Government are on the right lines. They must intensify their efforts. They must be steadfast and courageous, in view of the strong criticisms coming from all quarters. I hope that they will reject the advice that 364 so-called distinguished economists gave.
    Mr. Budgen: One for every day of the year.
    Mr. Smith: As my hon. Friend says, one for every day of the year. But with economists one pays one's penny and takes one's choice. Economists have not had a very good track record in their advice to various Governments. Part of the trouble that we have today stems from the advice tendered to the Labour Government. I hope that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and my hon. Friend will stick to their task. If they do, the country will come through.
    5.28 pm
    Mr. Robert Edwards: I am greatly tempted to follow the remarks of the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. Smith). The Opposition would prefer the advice of 300 British economists to the advice of one £50,000-a-year American economist who is the person advising the present Government.
    Nearly half a century ago I marched with 380 unemployed workers to Lancashire from London. We were protesting against the deflationist policies of the National Government, led by Ramsay MacDonald. The only area in the country where jobs were available during the 1930s was in the Midlands. Unemployed workers from Lancashire, Scotland and South Wales migrated to the West Midlands and were able to find jobs which lasted for many years. The whole situation has changed fundamentally because now the Midlands has ½ million unemployed and about 60,000 workers on short time.
    Some of the industries in the Midlands cannot possibly compete in world markets. Even if some of those industries paid no wages at all they would not be competitive. The traditional, highly efficient industries cannot meet the high interest charges on money that they have to borrow to pay the wage bill. Among the industries that were expanding and were a credit to the country was the paper-making industry, including Bowater's and Reed's who had factories as modern as any in the world and full order books. Yet they have closed. The reasons are the high value of sterling, high interest rates and the cost of fuel, which is double that paid by their overseas competitors. How can they compete under those conditions, which are entirely due to Government policies, urged on by an American so-called economist?
    The chemical industry has never before known a slump, but now factory after factory is closing and massive redundancies are being declared, even by ICI. The chemical industry, which has always expanded, is in dire trouble. The troubles have to be related to the

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    Government's policy of deflation. That policy failed in the 1930s and only massive rearmament and the Second World War saved our economy. I hope that we are not heading for that sort of solution again. I hope that we have learnt that massive rearmament and war will not solve the problems of the system.
    In the old days we used to liken the financial system to a railway train that had broken down. It had three compartments; in the first-class compartment were bankers, financiers and the very rich, in the second-class compartment were small business men, top civil servants and the like, and in the third-class compartment were working people, the unemployed, the sick and the poor.
    The train had broken down and the order went out "First-class passengers, retain your seats. Second-class passengers, get out and walk. Third-class passengers, get out and push." Working people are still expected to do all the pushing, but there is something different today. The third-class compartment has millions of new passengers, including hundreds of thousands of low-paid civil servants and scores of small business men and workers who would not have been considered third-class passengers in the 1930s.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Mr. Sever), who made an excellent maiden speech from the Opposition Front Bench, mentioned small businesses. In 1950 about 75 per cent. of net manufacturing industry consisted of small businesses employing 200 workers or fewer. Today, such small businesses perform only 25 per cent. of net manufacturing. The 100 largest companies in the country have moved from 25 per cent. of net manufacturing in 1950 to 75 per cent. last year.
    Those large companies are responsible for more than half our total export trade. Whatever we do to help small companies, they will be taken over by large firms that were once British, but are now multinational. The assets of small companies are squeezed and often the companies are closed, as though they had never existed. There is no future for small companies in present circumstances.
    The Under-Secretary of State for Employment (Mr. Peter Morrison): The facts do not bear out what the hon. Gentleman is saying. Last year, the two Midlands small firms centres received more than 5,000 inquiries, an increase of 65 per cent. on the previous year.
    Mr. Edwards: They were only inquiries. The only real progress among small companies has come from the development of industrial co-operatives that have grown in number from 20 to 300 in the past five years. But what are the Government doing to help that massive development? They have stopped the subsidy that the previous Government willingly gave to industrial common ownership finance and they are threatening to stop money going to the Co-operative Development Agency, a worthy institution that is more responsible than any other for the development of small companies through industrial common ownership.
    I know that other hon. Members wish to speak and I shall conclude shortly, though I am tempted to go on. The West Midlands did not face a massive slump during the 1930s, but the situation is becoming almost hopeless today. A total of ½ million working people feel that they are treated as criminals and outcasts. It seems that nowhere in this big world is there a place where they can fit in and
    54
    do a useful job. We must end that tragedy, and to do so we need not a new Industrial Revolution, as was suggested by the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington, but a new and courageous social revolution.
    5.38 pm
    Mr. Esmond Bulmer: I was recently in Australia, where I saw that school leavers in Sydney were finding it, if anything, more difficult to get a job than are school leavers in my constituency. We should remind ourselves that unemployment is a problem throughout the free world and that in many countries it is accelerating.
    If we ask ourselves the reason for that we must conclude that the major cause is the huge increase in the price of oil. There is a lesson to be learnt by contrasting the way in which we behaved in 1974 with the way in which the Japanese and Germans behaved. We allowed wage inflation to develop, and our goods consequently became increasingly uncompetitive.
    Our competitive position was maintained only by the pound falling greatly. That drop in the value of the pound ripped off our farmers and our savers. Between 1974 and 1979 industry's profits were remorselessly squeezed. Who can doubt that many of the industries in difficulty today would be better able to weather the storm if their profits had been going up over that period and they had some fat on which to draw, or if the previous Government had run a tight ship so that when we became a petro-currency our exporters were not faced with the huge reversal in the relative positions of the pound and the dollar?
    The previous Government reinforced our Achilles heel—the rigidity of our labour market. Much of their legislation, including the Employment Protection Act, made it much more difficult for employers to take on people and much more difficult for them to react to market conditions if they had to trim. Equally, they progressively and, I would argue, finally destroyed the private rented sector. It has become extremely difficult for people to travel from one part of the country to another to find a job.
    Many of the seeds of the present unemployment were sown during the years from 1974 to 1979. I recall how the Chancellor of the Exchequer at that time put £1 billion on the payroll tax without even consulting the then Secretary of State for Employment. Some of the panic measures that followed the introduction by the IMF of sensible housekeeping bore hardly on the private sector. If my memory serves me correctly, the then Chancellor of the Exchequer took £5 billion out of the capital programme. It was an easy way of cutting public expenditure, but it also bore hardly on private industry.
    It remains true in the West Midlands that if our motor industry were as good as it is bad there would be no problems. That is probably true for Great Britain as a whole. The problems of the motor industry go back a long way. I subscribe to the view that one does not have bad regiments. One has bad officers. One does not have bad companies. One has bad management. However, bad management can be made much worse if Government decisions are equally bad. Some of the decisions of the right hon. Member for Bristol, South-East (Mr. Beni) were positively disastrous for the motor car industry. I wonder whether his right hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Varley) now believes that he was right to bail out Chrysler.
    We are beginning, thank God, to see some improvement in industrial relations. I hope that the great

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    blessing to come out of the recession will be a greater awareness among those who work together in a company that they are all in the same boat. I should like to see not only management developing involvement at every level where appropriate, and through profit sharing, but a response from the trade unions. If unions can get together to form a single bargaining point to tempt Nissan to invest, I hope that they can get together to find a single bargaining point in some of the companies where wage bargaining is still a traumatic experience.
    Japan and Germany benefited from having their economies destroyed during the war. We have not replaced our capital base, as should have happened. We have concentrated too much on preserving jobs in old industries rather than on creating conditions in which new industries can come forward. The most important question for the Government to ask themselves is how industrial confidence can be rebuilt. The Government have made a good start, measured by the criteria of what one constituent put to me three years ago. He asked "How can I run my company when I cannot pay my people what they deserve and when I cannot get my best managers back from abroad because of the fiscal system? I cannot raise money on the Stock Exchange because I cannot pay the dividend that justifies my getting the money at the right price. I cannot locate my plant where the market is."
    The Government have swept away all those constraints—
    Mrs. Renée Short: Industries still cannot survive, can they?
    Mr. Bulmer: —and that is important. I also believe that my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer was right in his Budget to concentrate on one point. Minimum lending rate had to come down as it did, and those in industry must have confidence that it has further to fall. This is crucial in my constituency. As the interest rate falls, the mortgage rate falls. This is good for a return of confidence to the carpet industry, which is the major industry in Kidderminster.
    Mr. Michael Latham: It is also important for house building.
    Mr. Bulmer: As my hon. Friend says, it is also extremely important for house building. If interest rates go down to the point at which large companies can raise long-term money at between 10 and 12 per cent., they will do so. If interest rates can be reduced to single figures, many smaller companies will have the confidence to raise money. At no time during the period of office of the previous Government was it possible for companies to borrow money at a fixed term at what could remotely be described as a commercially sensible rate. I look forward to the Government creating a situation in which that can happen.
    My constituents tell me continually that there is now an enormous contrast between the rate of price increases in the private sector and those in the public sector. Behind all the public sector bills that land on our desks, there is a monopoly union and a monopoly supplier. I hope that people involved in those industries will reflect on their relatively privileged positions compared with the private sector. It is impossible in equity to defend the level of
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    redundancy pay that can be expected by my constituents in the carpet industry against that enjoyed in the public sector. I hope that the TUC will think hard about this matter.
    I believe, however, that the Government have been insensitive in adjusting their energy pricing, against the background of all the other increases that have been coming forward from the public sector. My right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor, in his Budget Statement, gave some indication that action would be taken. I hope that it will not be a case of too little, too late.
    I have touched already on the damage done by the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the Labour Government in the way that he cut public spending during his period of office. He allowed far too much of the burden to fall on the private sector. I look to the Government to ensure that public sector spending, in so far as it grows at all, grows on capital account and not on revenue account. I look for a continual move towards a broader balance between the private sector and the public sector. That can only benefit my constituents.
    We have now a record number of school leavers. I welcome the action taken by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment to see that more money is available to provide useful training, and, I should like to hope, skilled training, for those leaving school. I believe that some skill shortages could develop even by next year. I hope that those in the Department of Employment will read carefully the recent research carried out by Warwick university, which identified six major growth sectors. I hope that the Government will ensure that training, so far as possible, is directed to those areas where jobs will be available in the future. I hope, too, that the trade unions will show a greater flexibility in their attitude to apprenticeships. The late Ernest Bevin remarked that after the age of 18 he could become Foreign Secretary but could not become a craftsman in his own union. That situation needs urgent attention.
    I welcome the help that the Budget is giving to small businesses. This is the only way to create jobs. I believe that when the recession ends, many large companies will not take on more people. They will look outside for services. They recognise how difficult it is to shed labour once they have become overmanned. It has to be recognised, however, that many small businesses have to be started to produce even two or three potentially big businesses in the years ahead.
    Anything that the Government can do to encourage small businesses has the support of all Conservative Members, and certainly of my constituents. At a time when, in my constituency, the carpet industry has lost 6,000 jobs, small businesses have been putting back jobs in hundreds, albeit that they have been lost in thousands. As the recession ends, I look to those small businesses to begin to fill the gap. For that to happen the Government need to stay on course and continue to reduce the rate of inflation.
    Many matters lie within our own hands. Two do not, and they are vital to the restoration of full employment. The first is the recycling of the Arab oil surplus, and the second is to see that the less developed countries receive super Marshall aid-type schemes that allow them to buy our manufactures. I hope that the Government will see that everthing is done to encourage those two developments.
    5.50 pm
    Miss Betty Boothroyd: I was most interested in the comments of the hon. Member for Kidderminster (Mr. Bulmer). I have heard him discuss these matters before. He will not expect me to agree with a good deal of what he said, but I was especially interested in his remarks about the increase in the number of school leavers that there will be in the coming years, and if he will bear with me I shall touch on that point later in my speech.
    First, however, I want to emphasise that I have taken part in quite a number of debates on industry and unemployment. But, most importantly, I have listened carefully over many years to what Treasury Benches have had to say about these matters. They seem to me to chorus each time the same well-worn song. The Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether in this House or outside, always have a duet about encouraging the economy and stimulating the creation of wealth. A couple of weeks ago, on 16 March, the Secretary of State for Employment added his support in a solo about the West Midlands and the signs that the recession there was beginning to bottom out.
    The same point was made today by the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. Dudley Smith), who said that there would be an upturn very soon. I hope that he is right. However, it is in complete contrast to what the CBI says in its forecast today. It gives the opposite view. It says that manufacturing output will carry on sliding, that it will be 20 per cent. below the 1979 level, and that unemployment is expected to follow that slide and to continue rising. So the reality is contrary to what we hear from the Government. Unemployment is biting very deeply into the West Midlands and all the indications are that it will continue to do so over the coming years. Job losses there have increased more traumatically since this Government came to office than they have in any other region.
    I shall not go on to enumerate the picture in the West Midlands, because my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Mr. Sever) did that expertly, but I want to talk a little about my own locality because, in a debate such as this, we tend to relate our speeches to the areas that we represent and to the people who sent us here to represent them.
    I speak for a moment about the Sandwell and Dudley travel-to-work area, where there are now 65 people chasing every job. Job losses are occurring there at an appalling rate. Today, 37,000 people are registered as unemployed in that one area.
    There is one aspect of unemployment in all this which to me stands out like a sore thumb. It is the present and future prospects for young people. As I see it, of all the damage that has been inflicted during the short lifetime of this Government, the bruising of a generation of young people is very worst feature.
    Hot off the press only last week from the Manpower Services Commission came the publication "Labour Market Trends in the Midland Region". It is an assessment of labour trends between now and 1983. It makes very interesting though very depressing reading. It warns that further job losses are to come in the manufacturing sector and that further considerable increases in unemployment are inevitable with a further worsening in the area's position. So today the CBI has simply joined the
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    Manpower Services Commission in making nonsense of the statement by the Secretary of State for Employment on 16 March that the recession was just about bottoming out.
    Even on the training of apprentices the report recently published tells us that private industry has reduced the number of apprenticeships in all industries to below the 1979 level and that engineering apprenticeships alone are now down by one-third. The report goes on to say that if the current reduced rate of intake persists the number of trained craftsmen available by the end of the planning period—1983—will be insufficient to meet any upturn in the economy.
    In my area the young are particularly vulnerable, because the labour demand for them is falling at a faster rate than in the region as a whole. At the same time, projections indicate that the total number of young people reaching school leaving age will be on the increase over the coming years. That was the point made by the hon. Member for Kidderminster. In my area it will rise over the coming years to a total of 11,500 new people coming on to the labour register each year. What is very frightening about this is the indication in the assessment that they will be joining a labour force in an area where unskilled and semi-skilled jobs have contracted enormously. In circumstances such as these there are obvious implications—social and economic—for their job opportunities and their future.
    Last year, when I talked to the careers staff in Sandwell, we concluded that we had a very bad deal. We found that we had only 40 vacancies on record and 950 people to squeeze into them. That is not the case today. In 12 months the number of vacancies has fallen to 14, and we now have 2,700 youngsters looking for work. What is more, as my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Warley, West (Mr. Archer) said, they will be joined in only a few weeks by the Easter school leavers. In our joint area they represent an additional 500 to that human factor.
    Training and work experience in engineering and manufacturing in the Black Country towns are all-important. Some training is going on, but not enough. The overwhelming number of young people in my area have had their training interrupted, and that has happened for two general reasons. The first is that training officers tend to be among the first to be made redundant. When redundancies occur they tend to be some of the first to go. Secondly, the amount of work experience on employers' premises has diminished. More than 500 places have been suspended recently by companies which find themselves with insufficient adult workers left to carry out the supervision. My hon. Friend the Member for Lady wood mentioned Patent Shaft, a very important firm which was in my constituency until it got the chop one Friday. In that one firm alone 100 craft apprentices were made redundant. Some of them were being trained in specialist furnace fabrication. That type of training can be carried out by only one other firm in the country.
    It is difficult to follow the career courses of those 100 young people and to discover exactly what happened to their careers. I have done as much research as I can with the careers officer, and I discover that many of them have moved down market. They have grabbed any jobs that have been going. In other words, they have become underemployed. That continuing process has increased the problems for young people who are less qualified. It has been a matter of squeezing out the less qualified and, in doing so, increasing social tensions and other problems.

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    I want to discuss some of those social problems, and I do so first by relating my remarks to the condemnatory statement made today by academics from British universities. It is no good the Government joking or making jibes about that. What the academics say is serious, and attention should be paid to them.
    In addition to condemning the Government's economic therories they now threaten our social and political stability. Those raised voices, which have been joined by those in the CBI, the TUC and many other organisations, should be listened to. Never has there been a period in history when the Government have been more roundly and authoritatively condemned.
    I relate my argument to my own area, because this is an important issue to people who live in Sandwell. Ten days ago, I was approached by the chairman of the local citizens' advice bureau. The object was to seek more money for the bureau. Even with voluntary help, the increased case work with which it must deal, resulting chiefly from unemployment, has caused greater pressure than ever before. Its work load is increasing as a result of the social problems created by unemployment.
    Last Friday I looked at the local newspaper, which is a responsible regional newspaper. An article on the front page said that suicide calls to the Samaritans in the Black Country towns had nearly doubled. I hope that that does not put the usual smile on the faces of Conservative Members. According to the director of the Samaritans, the stark conclusion to be drawn from this enormous increase in calls for help is that many peope feel worthless and view the future without hope. He added:
    "Young people see their fathers on the dole and they can see no future for themselves. It is all extremely worrying".
    The annual report of the Samaritans for the Black Country area, which many Labour Members represent, states:
    "Those who come to us appear to feel that they have nothing of value to offer to the community and, more so that the community is breaking faith with them. There are no signs that things are getting any better and as the recession continues problems will mount".
    Voluntary organisations know that the problems are mounting. We see that every day through letters and various deputations, yet the Government tell us that there is no alternative strategy. The Prime Minister tells us that only her policies will succeed in the long run. Those are cruel and arrogant claims for anyone to make. Moreover, they are patently false.
    A month ago, in a London Weekend Television broadcast, the Prime Minister tried to argue that unemployment was costing the country £2·4 billion. However, she did not take loss of taxation into account. In fact, her figures were wrong.
    An unemployed man with two children costs the country more than £6,000 a year. If we take lost tax revenue into account we find that unemployment benefits are costing us about £8 billion a year and producing nothing. That does not take into account the cost of lost productivity. Therefore, the cost of all unemployment benefits outstrip the revenue from North Sea oil. There must be borrowings to make up the shortfall. The Prime Minister is also wrong when she tries to argue that those resources are insufficient to create the necessary jobs.
    The hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington asked about the Opposition's alternative policies. I remind
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    Conservative Members that a Conservative Government are in charge of Britain's economy. They should have an alternative policy, but I shall try to make some suggestions. The Government consistently fail to distinguish between capital spending and current spending. Spending for investment is just what the country needs, yet the Government fail to make the crucial distinction between money for investment and money for consumption.
    If it is right that economic recovery will occur if private sector companies borrow to invest, I must be convinced that disaster will follow if British Telecom or British Rail also borrow to invest.
    An alternative lies in using the nation's wealth for huge investment programmes to rescue industry. Most of it should be put into the public sector and used for electrifying the railways, spending on gas pipelines, renewing outworn sewerage and, above all, investment in construction. As my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Warley, West said, it should be used to get people off the housing waiting lists.
    Mr. Kenneth Carlisle rose—
    Miss Boothroyd: I am sorry, but I shall not give way.
    In the process, much of that cash will flow into private industry, such as the engineering sectors of the Black Country and the small companies there which supply the accessories. It would flow into the small firms, which we all want to help. That goes some way towards an alternative which the Government will not face. They deal in faith rather than fact. There is work to do and there are men and women available to do it. They must be brought together.
    Mr. Carlisle rose—
    Miss Boothroyd: I am sorry, but many other hon. Members wish to speak. If the hon. Gentleman is patient I am sure that he will be able to make his point in his own time and not in my time.
    As I was saying, those men and women and that work must be brought together. While we wait for an economic upturn, the unused labour of working people who could produce the country's wealth is not piling up to our credit to be used at a later date. It is running to waste.
    As today's censure on the Government by the CBI and those in British universities indicates, other alternatives must be examined. The policies now being pursued threaten the very social and political stability of this country. It is time that the Government addressed themselves to that problem.
    6.8 pm
    Mr. Warren Hawksley: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for calling me in this important debate. I hope that the hon. Member for West Bromwich, West (Miss Boothroyd) will excuse me if I do not follow her argument. However, I disagree with her suggestion that we should take notice of the academics, for that is possibly the attitude that has harmed the nation for a number of years. We should perhaps take note of more practical ideas than those being advanced by those academics.
    My constituency has the highest level of unemployment in the West Midlands, and in the whole of the Midlands

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    with the exception of Corby. In fact, in numbers, a few thousand fewer are unemployed in Corby than in The Wrekin constituency.
    As hon. Members will know, I also represent a marginal seat. If Labour Members think that will convince me that I should become an ally they are in for a surprise. The pledges that we gave in 1979 and the strategy that we have followed since then were those we were elected to carry out.
    Mr. Bill Homewood: The hon. Gentleman referred to my constituency, which I understand has the highest level of travel-to-work unemployment in the whole of the United Kingdom, with one exception. The hon. Gentleman seems to question that. I should like him to put me right, because it is what I intend to say in my speech.
    Mr. Hawksley: My point is that there are more people out of work in The Wrekin than in Corby, although there is a higher percentage in Corby, because fewer people live in the area. We in our part of the country could possibly agree with the hon. Gentleman on certain points.
    Unemployment in my area is running at 17 per cent. To that will be added 1,000 GKN workers in the not-too-distant future. The BKL factory is to close under an announcement made only last week. In those circumstances the level of unemployment is unacceptable, but who does one blame? It is clear that Labour Members blame the Government. I do not. We in the Midlands cannot be sheltered from the winds of the world recession. We must recognise the seriousness of the international scene. In Belgium unemployment is 50 per cent. higher than in Britain. France and Germany are repatriating some of their immigrant workers to keep their unemployment levels down. In America there is a growing realism that that country must move over to a policy of sound money. It is against that background that we should view the world recession as causing our high unemployment.
    In 1979—when many Conservative seats were won in the West Midlands—we were elected not to go for the easy option of borrowing and printing money. That had been tried by successive Governments and it had failed. In 1979 the electorate knew that a Conservative Government would go for medicine that in the short term would hurt but in the long term would cure. The medicine is still hurting. Partly because of the intensity of the world recession, it is hurting more than many people thought it would. But we cannot get out of our troubles by printing money. The nation is currently borrowing the equivalent of £240 for every man, woman and child in it. If people wish to see effect given to the views of the TUC and the CBI, the onus is upon them to say where the money will come from. The money does not exist. It will come only from efficient and profitable industry moving, as we hope it will very shortly, out of the world recession.
    I turn to a more local issue—in particular, the suggestions made in 1979 that a Conservative Government would make public expenditure cuts that would kill many of our areas. I want to paint a different picture of what is actually happening in the West Midlands generally and in my constituency in particular. At the 1979 election, my opponent contended that in supporting me and a Conservative Government the electorate would be supporting the death of the new town corporation in Telford. We have seen not a bit of that. The board has been strengthened and its life has been extended. We were told
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    that there would be no motorway connecting Te [ford and the West Midlands. That has proved not to be true. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport has not only put out the contract for the tender, but has arranged for the work to begin in June. That is different from what happened under the Labour Government, when the motorway project was beset by one delay after another.
    During the Labour Government's period of office a hospital was closed in the constituency. We have how been given the go-ahead for the purchase of a site and for the training of staff to work in a new hospital. That w ill create many jobs in the area when the hospital is ready to open. How different that is from events under the previous Government, who closed the local hospital at Cosford in the face of spirited opposition from many people in the area.
    An Inland Revenue computer has now been located in our area and will start operations shortly. In spite of the tale of woe told by the hon. Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Mr. Sever) about GKN Sankey, the Government have given the company a defence contract for an Army personnel carrier. We should be thankful for that example of Government help for the West Midlands. Still on the defence side, there is also to be an expansion of COD Donnington, which is creating jobs and improving the local position considerably.
    It is childish for anyone to criticise the Government for not doing enough. I hope that I have managed to convince hon. Members that the Government have done a great deal. Let me deal, however, with the point mentioned by my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State about Telford's application to be considered for development area status. That would be an important event for the area. Our 17 per cent. level of unemployment will rise to nearly 20 per cent. when the GKN Sankey redundancies work through into the system. At the Madeley exchange the level of male unemployment is currently 32·9 per cent. That demonstrates the seriousness of the position. Of the 29 special development areas, only four will have higher unemployment than that.
    I do not like the idea of development areas because they distort economic factors, and many people in the West Midlands realize—
    Mr. Budgen: Does my hon. Friend agree that if Telford were given development area status, it would be particularly disadvantageous to Wolverhampton?
    Mr. Hawksley: I agree entirely with my hon. Friend. Let me in due course give other examples of how regional policies affect my area and other parts of the West Midlands in that way. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment recently visited my area. He saw at first hand how bad the position was and he gave public support to our campaign for development area status. My hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Budgen) referred to the effects of such measures on other areas. My constituency is already suffering from the effects of the Wrexham special development area. Jobs that the Telford development corporation had expected to obtain have been lost because those creating them discovered that they would get grants if they went to Wrexham.
    I agree with those who want to abolish the development areas but while they exist it is important to ensure that the help they provide goes to those in greatest need. It is on

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    that ground that I claim that status for my area. EEC aid can at the moment be given only to areas which enjoy some development area status. May we have confirmation from the Government tonight that they can do nothing to arrange for European aid to be considered for a wider area? Certain Members of the European Parliament suggest that it is possible for us to decide where EEC aid should be directed. I hope that we may be told tonight whether the West Midlands can be considered as a recipient of European aid.
    Another of our problems concerns regional policy. I bear no malice to my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley, West (Mr. Blackburn), who has succeeded in getting an enterprise zone located in Dudley. We in Telford would have liked it. We thought that we had won the argument, but unfortunately one of the conditions was that we should carry the support of the local authority. The Socialist-controlled Wrekin district council was flatly opposed to the idea. It seems that the Socialists in Telford are different from those in other parts of the West Midlands. In some other parts the Socialists were on bended knees begging for the enterprise zone to be given to their areas. Instead, it was given to Dudley. That action will increase Telford's problems.
    It is therefore important that when the delegation of councillors, industrialists and trade unionists visits my hon. Friend the Minister of State, Department of Industry in the first week of April our case should be considered seriously. If we could develop a prosperous area on the edge of the conurbation, that would help the surrounding areas and would be of great benefit to many people who are outside the area we are discussing.
    In asking for development area status we do not ask for permanent charity. The Government should consider giving the area such status for five years to prevent its being worse off than special development areas. That status would help us until the benefits of the motorway could be seen. Once the motorway has been built and industrialists realise that it is not just an idea they will have confidence to come to Telford.
    Mr. John G. Blackburn: I have been following the debate intently. My hon. Friend said that his constituency was worse off. Does he agree that one of the reasons for that and the horrific unemployment figures was Government policy between 1975 and 1978, when 118,000 jobs were taken from the West Midlands by Government intervention? Does he agree that many of those jobs were not real jobs? They went to my hon. Friend's constituency and now he has to tackle the problem.
    Mr. Hawksley: I do not accept that jobs that came to Telford denuded other areas. I have mentioned what the Labour Government failed to do for the West Midlands. We needed help then. I sometimes agree with hon. Members who attack the principle of new towns. There is agreement that the third-generation new towns are the last. However, they are with us. A commitment was given by the incoming Government in 1979 that the new towns would be completed. They must be allowed to run their course.
    I finish as I began, on a note of confidence in the Government's policies. I believe that the Government's overall economic strategy is right. However, if they are to
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    retain their regional policy they must ensure that aid is given to areas with the greatest need. I hope that I have convinced hon. Members that with its high unemployment my constituency is an area of greatest need.
    6.22 pm
    Mr. Clement Freud: I shall not pursue the claims by the hon. Member for The Wrekin (Mr. Hawksley), but I make no excuse for contributing briefly to the debate. The Liberal Party does not have a Member in the Midlands at present, but my constituency is a historically low unemployment area. The Minister said that the Midlands area was not as bad as some areas. That is no relief to the 2,053 unemployed people in Wisbech, chasing 56 vacancies, or to the 883 people who were unemployed in March, when that figure was only 377 when the Government came to power. It is no relief to the 808 unemployed people in Ely, 139 of whom have had no job for over a year.
    Most of those people are unemployed not as a result of five years of Labour misrule, as the hon. Member for Kidderminster (Mr. Bulmer) said, but because of the Conservative Government. They are in their fourth six-month period in office, and they predicted that the rightness of their policies would begin to become evident by now.
    The Minister talked of the Government's encouragement of industry. What encouragement is being given, and what could be given? The Government could do more. They have given some complicated help to small industries, and that is welcome. They have also created enterprise zones. I agree with the right hon. and learned Member for Warley, West (Mr. Archer) that for every job created in an enterprise zone one is jeopardised in a non-enterprise zone.
    The Government would do well to examine short-term enterprise zones on the basis that Lord Rothschild used to sack his chef every three years. He believed that if his chef had not made a fortune after three years he never would make any money. If an enterprise zone existed for three years it would provide an incentive to start up in business without making life difficult for others.
    We should remember what other countries are doing to encourage industry. The Minister would be wise to examine what happens in France. People there are given a six-month advance of unemployment benefit so that they can buy jobs for themselves by creating some type of industry. In Italy, no employer's contribution is charged for job creation. They are sensible ways to help.
    Pension funds must be encouraged to invest in small businesses. Many small businesses do not have the expertise of the pension funds. Industry should not be encouraged simply because of the need for employment in a specific area. The Government might consider encouraging industry to grow round seats of learning, such as the universities and polytechnics, so that the applied knowledge could fan out and create something new.
    A company in my constituency made its entire work force redundant last week, and 96 jobs were lost. The company is losing about £200,000 a year. It is part of the Howden group, the profits of which last year went up from £6·5 million to £7·5 million. I am sure that it would not have closed the Wisbech offshoot, which makes hydraulic valves, without the most careful searching of its accounts. It could not have been difficult for the Government, who are faced with an unemployment bill about three times as

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    high as the losses of that company, to give the encouragement that the Minister said he was giving to industry.
    Tax concessions are not available. We hoped that the Budget would bring relief from the employer's contribution surcharge. That would have helped the Howden group to keep Andrew Fraser of Wisbech going. Instead, 96 jobs have gone and £5,500 per man and woman will have to be found in unemployment benefit. Not much encouragement would have been needed to make the company think again. If we are to believe the Government when they talk of deep regret at the unemployment figures, for heaven's sake they must consider constructive job creation. The Government's energy pricing policy is no help.
    In Japan, people look ahead to the next boom. To what is the Minister looking? The public sector borrowing requirement is not a divine instrument. Indeed, nothing that can be estimated within only 50 per cent. of reality has much divinity.
    Does the Minister intend to invest money in British Rail, in the Channel tunnel, or in communications? Hon. Members are aware of the plight of our communications industry. One has only to try a House of Commons telephone and get two wrong numbers for every right one, or to hear a boring voice saying "Lines from London are engaged" to understand the industry's plight. The updating of the communications industry has to be done sooner or later. While we have the current crisis, why not have it sooner rather than later?
    Young people are growing up with no work experience, and that will have grave consequences for future industrial relations and society in general. In my constituency, about 30 per cent. of the under-18s have never had a job. A period of unemployment used to be characterised by frantic job searching. Now it cannot be long before, in many places, what has traditionally been a hiatus has to be faced as a lasting condition for many younger and abler people.
    6.30 pm
    Mr. Michael Latham: I thought that I was to be the first hon. Member not from the West Midlands to speak, coming as I do from the East Midlands, but it turns out that I am second, because the last speaker—the hon. Member for Isle of Ely (Mr. Freud)—does not represent the Midlands at all. Nevertheless, he made an interesting speech, and I am glad to have the opportunity to follow it. I am also very pleased to see the hon. Member for Leicester, South (Mr. Marshall), who I understand is to reply to the debate from the Opposition Front Bench. I wish him every success, in a bipartisan spirit. No doubt he will continue to make many speeches from the Opposition Benches.
    I want to give the present unemployment position in my constituency. As from 12 March, the Melton Mowbray jobcentre had 1,399 registered unemployed, representing 9·9 per cent. Since December, the figure has risen by 202, of which 120 came from lay-offs at the British Steel Corporation factory at Holwell. A further 80 redundancies have since been announced by Holwell, and these will be reflected in the April figures. There are only 44 registered vacancies. The Melton figure is 1 per cent. above the Leicestershire average and 0·6 per cent. above the East Midlands average, though it is slightly below the national average.
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    Many of my constituents live in an area covered by the Loughborough agency. There, I am glad to say, the position is better. The unemployed percentage is 6·3, and last month vacancies rose from 120 to 128. Nevertheless, the figures are bad, though my constituency as a whole is one where unemployment has not been a problem in the past.
    All hon. Members are particularly concerned about youth unemployment. I met the principal of Melton Mowbray college of further education—Mr. Pobjoy—last Friday, and I am also in touch with the area careers officer, Mr. Goddard. Although some local employers have responded extremely well to the challenge of the youth opportunities programme—indeed, Pedigree Pet foods Limited had a scheme of its own, involving 25 youngsters—much still needs to be done.
    I hope that the Minister will be able to tell me whether the Easter guarantee will be honoured in Melton Mowbray. I sincerely hope so. I hope that my hon. Friend can reassure me in that regard, either this evening or by letter.
    We need more YOP sponsors. I hope that my hon. Friend will consider the arrangements whereby young people have to pay the first £4 of any travel expenses. The careers service tells me that this allowance, which is very low for rural areas, and lower still as a result of the increased petrol prices following the Budget, is making it almost more worthwhile for a young person to stay at home on supplementary benefit than to participate in a YOP scheme in Melton Mowbray. Clearly, if that is happening it is most unsatisfactory. I hope that my hon. Friend will give the matter careful consideration.
    I realise that the recession is the main problem, and that my hon. Friend cannot wave a magic wand to make it go away. I am sorry that the Budget did not give more help to industry, particularly to help people to stay in work, whether through the short-time working compensation scheme or through a wider job release scheme, rather than find projects for unemployed people, useful as those projects are. I hope that my hon. Friend will be able to bring forward further proposals in this regard in the next few months.
    Unemployment is already intolerably high. Some of the figures being bandied about, of 3 million, 3·7 million or 4 million unemployed, are not to be contemplated. The public expenditure White Paper made the gloomy prediction of 2·7 million unemployed, excluding school leavers, in 1982–83 and 1983–84. Those figures, which assume a higher level of unemployment in two and a half years' time than we have now—supposedly in the depth of the recession—are simply not acceptable. Ministers should make it plain that if those are the underlying assumptions—let alone nightmarish figures like 3 million or more—the assumptions will have to be looked at again.
    The economy of Leicestershire is well spread. That is why the county has avoided the worst of the storms in past years. At present, there are some brighter signs. Clearly, private house building is recovering sharply throughout the county and country. That is confirmed by the latest survey of the House Builders Federation. By holding clown its precept increase to a very modest 4 per cent. this year, Leicestershire county council has eased the crushing burdens on private industry. In that regard, I must point out that there is great resentment in private business about price increases in the public sector, some of which, such as those relating to telephones, are blamed directly on the

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    Government. If the net result of the system of external financing limits is to force up charges of nationalised industries, already in surplus, at the expense of jobs in the private sector, it is high time that we changed the financing system, whether by wholesale privatisation or by taking capital sector borrowing out of the PSBR.
    I congratulate Leicestershire county council on playing its part in holding down rates. I welcome, too, the facilities of the small firms centre in Leicester, and I am delighted to see that there is to be a Leicestershire week in Saarbrucken, in Germany, next week, where much of the county's attractions will be displayed to our German friends. I hope that it goes very well and produces more work for our people, both in exports and in revenue from tourism.
    The county, which is at the heart of England and which has the M1 running through it, has excellent communications. I hope that the electrification of the Midland railway line to Leicester will go ahead. The project could provide considerable benefits, as well as providing more work.
    I should like to say a brief word about two traditional industries of the East Midlands, both of which are in serious straits. I refer, of course, to footwear manufacturing and hosiery and knitwear. The fact that they are traditional industries does not mean that they are not modern or inventive. Quite the contrary; their performance is excellent. The footwear industry is badly affected by the strength of the pound. The level of import penetration is high, and Britain is the easiest place in the world into which to import shoes. An importer can go to the British Shoe Corporation in Leicester and then to Northampton and Manchester and see most of the shoe trade in a day and a half. If our domestic industry is to be maintained we shall have to take an increasingly hard line on imports.
    I can imagine what the French would do in such circumstances. They would create an elaborate inspection and testing agency—as they have done for imported doors—or some other bureaucratic or slow-moving obstacle to imports, or they would simply breach the EEC rules, as they did with sheep.
    At the same time, I hope that retailers, especially those with enormous buying powers, such as the British Shoe Corporation, will ensure that their purchasing policy is directed towards maintaining a viable domestic manufacturing capacity, not only in the corporation's own factories—where it makes 20 per cent. of its shoes—but among its suppliers. After all, the BSC owns Saxone, Dolcis, Manfield, Freeman Hardy and Willis, Trueform and Curtess. It also used to own Benefit, Phillips, and Lilley and Skinner, which it has since merged with the others. Its orders can literally make or break a supplier or manufacturer.
    Any such giant needs to have an exceptional sense of retraint and responsibility in its purchasing and pricing policy. Of course, it must also remain keenly price competitive, in the interests of its employees as well as of its customers or shareholders. But the House will look to the BSC always to act in the widest interests of the consumer that it serves and British industry and employment, with which it is involved. I am sure that the company will not disappoint us, and that the Office of Fair Trading will bear this issue closely in mind. While the
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    pound stays high, importing is fairly easy and exporting is hard, and all sectors of the footwear industry need to stick together for its survival in the years to come.
    Finally, I want to say a word about the Leicestershire hosiery and knitwear industry, which has had to shed many employees over the past 18 months. Only today, along with other Leicestershire hon. Members, I received a letter from the county council chief executive expressing the concern of the county council about the state of the industry. The council says that 6,000 people have lost their jobs and 8,000 out of a labour force of 40,000, are on the short-time working compensation scheme in the industry in Leicestershire.
    In a recent letter to me, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister rightly said that she was impressed by the improvement in textiles generally—including hosiery and knitwear—in both their efficiency and productivity, and by the industry's good labour relations record and export achievements. There are 400 quotas and other restraints on textiles. I am particularly pleased that my right hon. Friend felt able to confirm the Government's intention to press for a tough successor arrangement when the present multi-fibre arrangement comes up for renegotiation later this year. I hope that the EEC will do all that it can to plug loopholes in the MFA—we all know that there are loopholes—and that it will set its own house in order. Some EEC countries, such as Italy, which use child labour or cheap female outwork labour, are also trading unfairly. Ministers should pursue this matter strongly at EEC level.
    More needs to be done. The temporary short-time working compensation scheme is essential to the textile industry, which had received £31 million up to December 1980, let alone what it has received since. I hope that my hon. Friend will be able to keep the scheme going at a reasonable level.
    I am well aware that Leicestershire has not suffered as badly as some other areas in the present recession. It is well placed to take advantage of the upturn, when it comes, but far too many resources are having to go into unemployment benefit at present. That is necessary but unproductive expenditure. Let us see more people in jobs. I hope that the Government will increasingly direct their attention to that end.
    6.41 pm
    Mrs. Renee Short: Every Opposition speaker and most speakers from the Government Benches, including the hon. Member for Melton (Mr. Latham), who is not from the West Midlands, have spoken of their serious dissatisfaction with the present position, about which the Government seem to be so complacent. The Minister's speech was smug, complacent and unconstructive on ways of dealing with the problems that face us.
    The major problem, surely, is the Government's refusal effectively and speedily to mobilise' our resources of human skill, energy and talent, together with the country's financial resources, to remedy the present situation not only in the West Midlands but in many other parts of the country. I find that refusal incomprehensible. I cannot understand how the Government can sit back and make the same statements as they made at the time of the election about how they would deal with the country's problems. They see those problems become progressively worse as each month goes by, yet they refuse to change course. What hold does the Prime Minister have over other

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    members of the Cabinet and juniors Ministers that results in their refusing to join together to say "So far and no further. We must change course"?
    My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Mr. Sever), who opened the debate very effectively, said that the West Midlands region was fast becoming a wasteland, as firm after firm—many of them established for generations—disappeared. Many others of my hon. Friends also spoke of this problem. To survive, we must move fast and find a solution.
    We have seen no significant move by the Government to encourage the development of viable new industries. If they have developed, they have not come to the West Midlands. We see no encouragement of viable small firms, no energy or drive put into the development of new technology in the region. There is no vision, and little hope is offered for the future. All that we see is a continuation of the present position. Hon. Members have pointed out the possible social, political and economic consequences.
    Do the Government ever study what anyone abroad does, apart from looking at the EEC? Have they been made aware of what the Danes have done to stimulate industry? Denmark is a small country, with a small population and no material resources. By the Prime Minister's standards it should be poor and backward, but it is one of the most industrially advanced in Europe. Most Danish firms employ fewer than 500 people, so none of them is very large. The Danish Government have played a leading role in sponsoring a small-firms technology institute, similar to the Schumacher centre. Much development and innovation is going on, and that is what we want to happen here.
    In Japan there are 7 million small firms with only five or six employees. All those firms have developed since the war. The Japanese Government stimulated the growth of small firms by giving tax relief on modernisation schemes and on consultancy services, so that there was available proper consultancy advice for the new firms that were starting up.
    The major Japanese companies use the small firms to supply components. There is a strong link between small firms and large firms. For example, Toyota has 140 direct suppliers, which draw upon 40,000 small firms contributing 60 per cent. of Toyota's parts. That gives a guarantee of employment and survival to many small firms.
    What do the Government intend to do for the thousands of skilled workers now on the dole, and for the thousands of school leavers with no training who face a grim future? The Secretary of State's announcement last November of special measures to enable them to obtain vocational training may have raised their hopes. The director of special programmes in the Manpower Services Commission, Geoffrey Holland, has said:
    "Fourty-four per cent. of British young people enter work—or remain unemployed—with little or no training, compared with only nine per cent. who do so in West Germany, and we have the smallest proportion—24 per cent.—compared with other industrial nations in full-time vocational training."
    What will the Minister do about that? Half our unemployed young people are under 25 years of age. By the time they reach the age of 18 or 19 some are married and have children. Therefore, a large proportion of the young unemployed families face a dire future.
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    Since 1974 there has been a ninefold increase in the numbers who remain unemployed for more than 12 months. The position demands not talk and smug remarks by Ministers but action, determination and—inevitably—resources. None of those is forthcoming from the Government.
    There are considerable problems of education if the new small firms and the community enterprises are to get off the ground. I do not believe that young people want to lead idle, aimless lives. They all want to have jobs, to earn money and to take their place in society, but they often fear the alienation that comes from working in huge, impersonal units, where they feel overwhelmed and disregarded as human beings by management and often by those with whom they work. They feel themselves to be tiny, unimportant cogs in an enormous organisation.
    Our young people should be encouraged to learn what they can do to relieve the problems that face the world today—major problems of food shortage, energy conservation and the delivery of good health. Teaching must take all those problems on board and must encourage skills in those subjects as well. It must deal with the problems of the everyday lives of our people and of other peoples, especially in the developing world.
    We must encourage the doers and adventurous among our young people. We do not do that anywhere near enough. We tend to offer rather orthodox and often very boring opportunities to young people in their work experience schemes and training. We need to be much more adventurous and rather more unorthodox than we have been so far. We must have a change of policy away from the sterile and destructive attitude of the Government. If the Prime Minister will not turn, the Cabinet must insist on a turn being made.
    The latest count of unemployed school leavers in the Wolverhampton employment area shows that between 1977 and 1981 there has been an increase of three and a half times in the number of young persons under 18 unemployed. In the West Midlands as a whole, there has been an increase from 2,562 in 1977 to 8,285 this year.
    The rot appears not only in industry; it appears in the National Health Service. A large number of posts are vacant at every level in the National Health Service throughout the West Midlands simply because the regional health authorities do not have the resources and the money to pay the salaries. This applies to consultants, doctors and nurses, as well as to other staff. If those jobs remain unfilled, patients suffer. In addition to suffering from unemployment and short-time working, people are suffering from long hospital waiting lists. I refer especially to the increasing number of patients who are suffering from mental illness induced by the disastrous economic position that faces all of us. Those patients are having to wait even longer for help.
    The construction industry could do a great deal to generate jobs. An enormous amount of new industrial building is needed in the West Midlands. Many hundreds of jobs could be created if a go-ahead could be given for new industrial building. If local authorities were able to start their house building and house modernisation programmes again that could also help the building industry.
    The CBI—some of us on the Labour Benches had the pleasure of meeting its representatives in Birmingham last Friday—is forecasting 2 million unemployed for the foreseeable future. That is a very dreary prospect. But if

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    the measures that I have suggested could be adopted we could change that rather doom-laden attitude and regenerate industry and employment in the West Midlands.
    I hope, therefore, that the Minister will be able to give us some new ideas and will not repeat the same old jejune economic arguments which hon. Members on both sides of the House and the country at large are sick and tired of hearing. Those ideas do not get us any further. We want new ideas. We want some of the ideas that have been put forward from the Labour Benches—and, indeed, from the Conservative Benches—to be adopted by the Government. We want Ministers to tell us what is to be done to regenerate all the regions that are suffering so much from the Government's policies—and particularly the West Midlands region, which all of us care about very much.
    6.54 pm
    Mr. John Stokes: I welcome the serious tone of the debate. Members on both sides of the House are deeply concerned about unemployment in the Midlands. The Midlands has never really suffered in this way before. We may differ about the remedies but we are united in deploring the human tragedies involved.
    I remember the unemployment of the early 1930s, when I was a boy, and the Jarrow marchers. Fortunately, the poverty and hardship are not as great now as they were then. Some of the unemployed are now able to augment their incomes—in some cases significantly—by doing all kinds of jobs, which are now called "moonlighting".
    Nevertheless, I know only too well the anxieties and the sense of helplessness that afflict many of the unemployed—the young leaving school, worried about getting a job at all; the middle-aged man with a wife and children to keep; and the older man who wonders whether he will be able to get another job before he reaches pension age at 65.
    We must remember that the total work force now is much larger than it was in the 1930s. Not only has there been an increase in population; nearly 1 million extra women are now employed, compared with a decade ago. Many of these women are married, and their husbands are also earning. Even so, I hardly think that one can expect them to give up their jobs for the sake of unemployed men.
    Obviously, in these times of heavy unemployment firms will consider early retirement where suitable, and the engagement of young persons in the place of those retiring, but these are only palliatives. The great question that we are debating today is whether the Government can do any more and whether industry is doing all it can to make itself as competitive as possible in world markets.
    We all know why the present position has come about. The world is still in the deepest recession that it has experienced since 1929. The recession is deeper and has lasted longer than the Government and most people expected. Fortunately, there are now signs that the worst may be over and that we can look forward to a steady if slow recovery, from the summer onwards. Stock Exchange prices in the last week or two are pointing in that direction, and Stock Exchange investors are usually right in the longer term.
    The recession has hit the engineering industry very hard, and engineering is the heart of the Midlands. One
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    does not wish to criticise hard-pressed employers when they are trying so energetically to climb out of the trough, but the twin evils of British industry—overmanning and low productivity—are, with the slump, the main causes of the loss of orders and, therefore, of high unemployment.
    Another failure, which has not so far been mentioned in the debate and which is becoming generally more recognised in the engineering industry, is poor marketing and not sufficiently aggressive selling. The Midlands has always been able to manufacture products, but they have to be sold, and it is necessary to adopt a strongly market-oriented stance—to find out what the customer wants and then make it, rather than to hope to sell what has been produced for a long time.
    I recognise that in some trades, such as steel, there has been such an appalling drop in demand—not only here but in Europe, and, indeed, world-wide—that no amount of selling techniques will be able to overcome the problems. There are, nevertheless, encouraging signs. There is now much more realism on the shop floor. Sometimes there is more realism and less moaning than I find among managers, directors and owners. People on the shop floor are now realistic about accepting sensible and moderate wage increases. They understand the importance of productivity, and of moving, if necessary, from one job to another in a firm. Managements are at last, albeit slowly, making greater efforts to keep their employees more fully informed of what is going on.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Kidderminster (Mr. Bulmer) made an extremely sound speech and pointed out something that everyone knows, namely, that during the past 10 years we have paid ourselves an increase of over 300 per cent. while productivity has increased by only 10 per cent. That is one of the root problems. The Midlands has a magnificent labour force, which is as good as any in the world. I spent Friday evening in Cradley, that splendid small chain-making town that has some of the best Englishmen in the country. Both they and the rest of the work force in the West Midlands need good leadership from everyone responsible, including charge hands, foremen, managers and directors. That is the most important factor.
    That effort must be supported by good research and development, product planning, efficient marketing and the most cost-conscious means of production, followed by first-rate technical services. There is no substitute for such things if we are to compete with the French, Germans, Americans and Japanese. After all, this country has enormous brain power, but it must be harnessed to commercial success.
    The Midlands is still too dependent on the motor industry, and wise firms will diversify as much as they can. We all remember that in the early years after the war motor manufacturers, anxious to take on labour, offered too high wages for too little work, coupled with poor supervision and bad discipline. For many years management in the motor industry lacked an "officer class".
    However, I hope and believe that this is one of the matters that Sir Michael Edwardes is turning his attention to. British Leyland has slimmed down greatly, but even now it must increase production of the Mini Metro in order to enable a profit to be made on each car produced. At least two other volume cars are required. They must be models that the public at home and abroad and employees of British Leyland will want to buy. The recent white-collar

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    strike of employees working on the Metro could well hold back progress. Surely the shop stewards and union leaders, who have done such immense damage to the motor industry, have learnt their lesson.
    In the West Midlands there are big companies, such as British Leyland, GKN, Tube Investments and ICI. I doubt whether such companies will ever recruit such large numbers of employees. The trend towards the microchip and automation will see to that. Small employers and the self-employed are, therefore, vital as the future recruiters of labour. That is one reason why the Government gave them so much help in the Budget.
    Few hon. Members know what new industries will come forward. Such new industries may be developed in one of the small properties that new business men can now acquire. They may even be developed in a backyard or in a garage, with only one or two people to start with. That is how the plastics industry started in this country after the First World War. We need to encourage inventors and entrepreneurs as much as we can. It is they, and not the Government or the House, who will eventually produce the wealth that the country needs.
    I know full well that industry has its complaints. I sometimes think that there are more complaints from management than from the shop floor. The high rate of exchange has fallen slightly, but industry must to some extent learn to live with a high pound. Interest rates have fallen and may fall a little further. Energy costs and the national insurance surcharge must be borne in mind. I hope that the Government will reconsider energy costs, particularly in terms of coking coal for foundries. English foundries are at a disadvantage compared with those in Europe.
    Otherwise, I wholeheartedly support the Budget and the Government's determination to reduce inflation and to return to sound money. That must benefit industry and help employment more than anything else. It will inspire confidence and enable further investment to be made.
    We must ensure that we make the best of present investment by shift work and proper utilisation of plant and machinery before we clamour for additional investment. I utterly condemn wildcat schemes of large public investment that have to be supported either by printing money or by further borrowing. It will lead only to further inflation and will nullify the sacrifices made.
    The slump will come to an end and things will get better. The remedy lies not, as Opposition Members seem to think, in more Government action but in more determined action by industry. Many severe and long-lasting faults in British industry are at last being corrected. That alone will help towards big profits when the slump is over. It is profits that British industry requires, and with them there will be many more jobs for a great many people in British industry.
    7.6 pm
    Mr. David Winnick: Having listened to the speech of the hon. Member for Halesowen and Stourbridge (Mr. Stokes), it is not difficult for me to imagine him being just as complacent during the slump before the war. He might have told the House that things would get better and that hon. Members should not worry. He said that he was a supporter of the Budget. He is very much in a minority in the country at large. Indeed, if there were a free vote he would probably find himself in a minority in the House.
    Mr Stokes: I was alive before the war and perhaps I was a little older than the hon. Gentleman. Things got better in the 1930s, as a result not only of rearmament but of a big boom in the South, when towns such as Watford and Slough became the great towns that they are today. There was an enormous leap in house building and it was possible to buy a good three-bedroomed house for £880.
    Mr Winnick: I have been proved more correct than I had anticipated. The hon. Gentleman has confirmed the attitude that he would have adopted before the war. At that time millions of people rotted on the dole queues. His views are hardly likely to conflict with recorded history. The Conservative Party suffered a large and humiliating defeat in 1945 mainly because those who had never voted Labour before said that they did not want to return to the pre-war days.
    It has been said that we shall have to accept the fact of a great many permanately unemployed people. My hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, North-East (Mrs. Short) mentioned last Friday's meeting of the CBI in the West Midlands, which I attended. The Opposition find unacceptable the idea that 1½ million or 2 million people might be permanently unemployed. If we were to accept such an idea we should be falling into the Government's trap of saying that there is no alternative and of accepting—as before the war—a large number of unemployed. People do not want to rot their lives away on the dole queue. We must continue to work for policies that will eliminate large-scale unemployment and see a return to the situation that prevailed in most parts of the country during the first 20 to 25 years after the Second World War.
    The debate reflects the crisis in both the West and East Midlands. Nowhere else in Britain is unemployment rising so high as in the West Midlands. For example, in the past year adult unemployment in the United Kingdom has risen by 69 per cent. In the West Midlands the increase has been 102 per cent. and in the East Midlands 80 per cent.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-East (Mr. Edwards) was right when he said that before the war there were jobs in the West Midlands, and that people travelled from the most depressed areas to Birmingham and Coventry. But who would wish to go to the Midlands today to find work? With unemployment rising, there is no prospect of people coming into the region and finding relief from unemployment.
    Hon. Members on both sides of the House referred to school leavers. Last week in my constituency I met a girl who has now found a job. She told me about her difficulties in finding work. She applied for countless jobs. One job for which she applied—not a very distinguished job—was an assistant. in a jewellery shop. When she was interviewed she was told that there had already been 81 applicants for the job and that no doubt there would be others.
    Those who leave school with few formal qualifications, who in better circumstances might have difficulty in finding work, are now having the utmost difficulty in getting any employment. When employers have the pick of the market, it is understandable that those who have reasonable qualifications but do not go on to higher education will be taken on for jobs that would otherwise go to school leavers such as I described. This tears at our social fabric. It undermines stability when school leavers with few formal qualifications have very little chance, of finding work however hard they may try. How many

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    months—indeed, years—will they have to remain on the dole queue? We must deal with this problem. It is one of the reasons for this debate today.
    One in 10 of all jobs in manufacturing industry has been wiped out during the past year. I bore that point in mind when listening to the hon. Member for Halesowen and Stourbridge. The crisis in the West Midlands is the result of the Government's policies for manufacturing industry. There have been constant redundancies and closures, and extensive short-time working. Many firms in the Black Country have closed down completely. Some factories are unlikely to be reopened. The equipment is being dismantled and shipped abroad.
    An official of one large trade union provided me with a list of many pages of redundancies that have occurred in his area during the past 12 months. There is sheet after sheet of firms that have declared redundancies and of firms that have closed down.
    Of course we are worried about school leavers being unable to find work, but let us not forget men who, in many instances, have worked for a company for 25 years, have based their working lives on the reasonable assumption that they would continue with that firm, and have saved money and made arrangements for their retirement—men whose lives have been shattered in the past 12 to 18 months through redundancy. Some are unlikely to work again. When their unemployment benefit is exhausted, if they try to claim supplementary benefit, what will be the result? If they have more than £2,000, which is perhaps redundancy pay, or if their wives have money, they will not receive a penny. Their savings during their working lives are taken into consideration. That is shameful. It is humiliating for the Government to inflict such hardship on the victims of their own policies. My hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich, West (Miss Boothroyd) referred to the report in the Express and Star about the large numbers who have taken or attempted to take their lives as a result of the depression in the region.
    It is interesting to look at "Labour Market Trends in the Midland Region", a document prepared by the Manpower Services Commission. No doubt in replying to the debate the Minister will wish to refer to the MSC's report on the East and West Midlands. It says that
    "there are no signs that the rise in unemployment in the West Midlands is abating."
    This informative report, which should be studied with care, concludes that
    "the West Midlands will be more affected by the recession than the country as a whole."
    Some Conservative Members are optimistic. There are pages and paragraphs in this report—and there might have been one or two that I have overlooked—but it shows that there is little to be complacent about in the East or the West Midlands in the next few years.
    The region has a narrow industrial base. Two weeks ago I took a deputation to see the Under-Secretary of State. I pointed out that in my borough in Walsall 48 per cent. of the working population were engaged in metal-based manufacture. In one part of the borough, Darlaston, represented by my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, South (Mr. George), 80 per cent. of all employment is in metal-based manufacture. This is a worrying matter.
    Of course BL had to be rescued. Unemployment would have increased enormously if the previous Government
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    and the present Government had not acted to ensure the company's survival. We must not, however, continue to place so much reliance on metal-based manufacture, vehicles, and so on. We must be willing and able to take new growth industries into the region. That point was made by the deputation from the borough council a fortnight ago. We must recognise the need for new growth industries, and the Government should be willing to promote such industries coming into the region. If we continue to rely on metal-based manufacture, and if present policies continue, there is a strong possibility—I hope that I am proved wrong—of the West Midlands becoming a depressed area.
    Last weekend the right hon. Member for Down, South (Mr. Powell) made a disgraceful, inflammatory speech. It could only incite race hatred. My right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Sparkbrook (Mr. Hattersley) was right to describe it as being full of Munich beerhall remarks. He was referring to pre-war Munich. Acute economic insecurity, caused by the Government's extreme policies—obviously supported by the right hon. Member for Down, South—is the greatest danger to stability and our social fabric. The danger is presented not by ethnic minorities but by policies that produce mass unemployment. That is where the tensions come from, and such tensions can only be aggravated by speeches such as that made over the weekend by the right hon. Member for Down, South. The right hon. Gentleman represents a part of the United Kingdom that has seen so much violence in the past few years—to a certain extent that violence has been due to the policies pursued in Ulster over the past 50 or 60 years—and we do not need any lectures on social harmony from him.
    Mr Dudley Smith: What has that to do with unemployment?
    Mr. Winnick: A great deal, for reasons that I have stated.
    It is a coincidence that 364 leading and distinguished economists have today condemned the Government's economic policies. There are those who will say that they differ from those economists, but Conservative Members cannot merely dismiss their arguments and claim that they do not know their subject. The economists say that the policies being pursued by the Government will deepen the recession, erode the industrial base of our economy and threaten its social and political stability. Moreover, they make the claim that the Prime Minister wants always to refute—namely, that there are alternative economic policies.
    There is a tremendous need for investment on a much larger scale. When the Chancellor of the Exchequer produced his first Budget we were told that his policies would galvanise industry and promote the type of investment that has been lacking in the past. There has been little sign of that. We need more public services. Many Conservative Members condemn public expenditure, but it is necessary in many areas. If employees in the public sector were to be made redundant, which I should oppose, they would in most instances join the dole queue. That would lead to an increase in public sector borrowing powers.
    It cannot be emphasised too much that by depriving people of jobs we are taking away demand. If there are firms in the West Midlands and elsewhere creating goods

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    for the home market and the British people do not have enough purchasing power to buy those goods, the recession is deepened and there is more deflation. Conservative Members are arguing that it is essential to reduce public services and to make those who work in them redundant. Such a policy will merely aggravate the present unemployment.
    There have been no riots in the streets. It is true that mass unemployment, as we have now, has produced a milder attitude on the part of trade unions. The type of incomes policy now being pursued is the sort of policy that we had before the war. Those whose jobs are under threat take a different attitude towards wage increases and take less than the current rate of inflation.
    I welcome evidence of a fight-back. There is to be a people's march in May. It is being organised by the North-West TUC. It will be from Liverpool to London. Boroughs in the West Midlands have said that they will give every hospitality to the marchers, provide overnight accommodation, and do what they can to boost the morale of those taking part. A trade union official, referring to this debate, asked me "What good will it do?" I replied "There is no guarantee that a debate in the House of Commons will necessarily do any more good than a march, demonstration or public meeting."
    But it is the duty of the British people to ensure that there is not permanent unemployment. It is their duty to organise a fight back that challenges the Government's policies. If the Government refuse to change their policy, they must be forced out of office. The Government have inflicted tremendous hardship on ordinary people. Their record is, indeed, a rotten one.
    7.25 pm
    Mr. Hal Miller: A common theme running through the debate has been the problem of school leavers and the training to be provided for them between leaving school and obtaining their first job. I shall expand upon that in the latter part of my remarks. First, I must deal with the cynical, hypocritical rubbish spouted by the hon. Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick). The hon. Gentleman aped some earlier remarks. He and others who take a similar view do no service to the real problem of unemployment or to those who are suffering from it. Their cynical purpose is to try to make use of the unemployed for political ends. They are flattering them to deceive. They have produced no policy to ameliorate the lot of the unemployed. Their arguments are hypocritical because—this was admitted by the hon. Gentleman—a great deal of the decline in employment in the West Midlands has been due to the narrow industrial base and a worldwide recession in the motor-car industry.
    Britain is uniquely dependent on its trade throughout the world. A very much higher proportion of its gross domestic product is derived from trade than that of any other country, and the West Midlands is uniquely dependent on manufacturing. Over 42 per cent. of its employment is in manufacturing. A unique feature of the West Midlands is its dependence, within the manufacturing sector, on the motor vehicle industry, and employment in that industry has declined over the past 10 years by over 100,000. That more than accounts for the decline in total employment in the West Midlands over the same period. My hon. Friend the Member for Halesowen and Stourbridge (Mr. Stokes) advanced the valid argument that there are many more people in work than one might
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    suppose. It was only last year that we saw an absolute decline in the total number employed, and that was due to the decline in the motor vehicle industry.
    That may be illustrated in another way by the relative decline in earnings in the industry over the same 10 years. At the beginning of that period the motor industry worker was the highest-paid worker in the land. His earnings are now below the national average. That is a sure sign of decline in the industry. One reason for our difficulties is that we have been locked into the industry by successive Governments. New developments have been diverted by regional policy and new industries have been prohibited from establishing themselves in the West Midlands.
    I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Industry for getting rid of the industrial development certificate requirement—a decision which has allowed some development to take place in the West Midlands. I hope that he will further reduce the special development areas. As my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin (Mr. Hawksley) said, in our area we are faced with the most rapidly rising unemployment in Britain. We have some of the highest levels of unemployment. There can be no justification for producing special incentives to divert businesses of all types to other areas.
    I spoke on the motor industry when we debated unemployment in the West Midlands on a previous occasion and I shall not pursue that line tonight. The Government have taken many constructive measures to try to ease the problem of unemployment. My fear is that they are largely short-term measures, and they are expensive. I refer to the youth opportunities programme and the temporary short-time working compensation scheme. The West Midlands has the highest proportion of people helped by that scheme. There is a real threat to our employment. We have also received considerable help through the investment funds for British Leyland.
    I am trying to turn minds to a longer-term approach. We have to face the inevitability of more and longer-term unemployment than we have been willing to contemplate so far. I am not trying to make a political point. Unemployment was rising rapidly under the Labour Government. It rose under the previous Conservative Government and the Labour Government before that. We face a new situation with the new technologies and we must come to terms with it. We shall have to re-jig our whole approach so that we not only investigate all the various opportunities available for employment but look at the situation more from the point of view of unemployment.
    Among the problems to which I want to see the Government giving more long-term attention is the need to bring forward easier terms for earlier retirement. I do not believe that the job release scheme—although I welcome the recently-announced improvement—is yet adequate for the task.
    We shall have shorter working weeks, which must be accompanied by more intensive use of machinery. I was connected with the textile industry 10 years ago, when it had a much shorter working week, coupled with continuous 24-hour working seven days a week, but at that time the workers were working only four days or nights a week. That is the sort of pattern which we can expect with more capital-intensive equipment needing more intensive working.
    Therefore, we shall have to provide a higher level of skills. We need to break down the frontiers between

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    education and training. I have been urging my hon. Friends in the Department of Employment for some time to dispense with the artificial barriers that exist between them and the Department of Education and Science.
    Reference has been made to the shortage of apprentice places, as many firms are no longer able to provide that sort of training. We need to aim to produce a replacement and we need an amalgam of work experience and further training and the necessary financial support to enable that to continue to lead us away from the present stupid 21-hour rule imposed by the DHSS before benefits can be paid to people studying. There has been a welcome relaxation, in that study for a qualification now carries entitlement to benefit, but only after an individual time-consuming interview. We need to achieve a basis of approving courses for that purpose.
    Another example of the barriers that exist is the siting of the Redditch skillcentre. I urged that it should be built on the site for phase 3 of the Reddich college, and should be amalgamated with it. But the Department insisted on going ahead on its own site on the ground that it would provide regional training in skills. Nobody believes that, with travel costs at their present level, people will travel from all over the region to Redditch. Even that argument was inadequate because the regional skillcentre is nowhere near the railway station or the bus station, whereas the Redditch college is within easy walking distance of both. It is blinkered thinking.
    We are still experiencing the same difficulty where people are trying to co-ordinate their approach, some on a voluntary basis. A remarkable committee operates which combines both sides of industry, careers officers, Church leaders and the college authorities. It is trying to provide a training workshop. Can they make use of that unused skillcentre? No, it is impossible—that would be crossing the bureaucratic line. There is no way that that use can be facilitated. Yet such a training workshop is the only way to provide such training for school leavers.
    There needs to be more follow-up of the progress through training workshops and college courses, trying to provide a replacement for apprentice courses with the necessary financial backing through the benefit system. As a recent report made plain, we must get away from the plurality of offices through which benefit is currently paid—unemployment, supplementary, injury, all sorts of benefit. I hope that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State will be able to reassure me that we still definitely intend to move towards the introduction of a tax-credit system. Only in that way can we bring sense to the benefit system.
    As many more hon. Members want to speak, in passing I should say that it is rather cynical of the Opposition to introduce the motion on unemployment in the West Midlands when they cannot find even as many speakers as the Conservative Party. We have heard all the sham protests from the Leader of the Opposition during Prime Minister's Question Time, and all the demands for debates. When those debates are held the Opposition enrol the services of one of their Whips to speak on the subject to make up the numbers—
    Mr. Geoffrey Robinson rose—
    Mr. Miller—and keep the pot boiling.
    Mr Robinson: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
    Mr. Miller: In conclusion, I should say—
    Mr. Robinson: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
    Mr. Deputy Speaker Mr. Bryant Godman Irvine: Order. The hon. Gentleman is not giving way.
    Mr Robinson: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.
    Mr Deputy Speaker: I am unaware that a point of order is likely to emerge.
    Mr Miller: In conclusion—if I may be permitted to conclude—I make the point that attitudes are changing. There is no doubt that businesses have become more competitive, leaner and hungrier. But a price has been paid for reversing the years of decline. We need to look seriously at providing for new ways of working, new methods of manufacture, and new skills, training and education, so that there can be a pew approach to what is considered as the normal working life. I am looking to the Government for a lead to meet the challenge. I am confident that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary will not fail, as the Government are not failing in other challenges.
    7.28 pm
    Mr. Geoffrey Robinson: I am grateful to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I would have risen earlier and you would have ruled me out of order, but the imputation made by the hon. Member for Bromsgrove and Redditch (Mr. Miller) was as silly as it was totally unjustified. For an hon. Member to descend to that sort of futile remark in a debate which he had characterised as being of the utmost importance is not worthy of the House.
    We are discussing the regional issue of unemployment in the West Midlands, which is taking place against the gravest recession and the worst unemployment that the country has had the misfortune to suffer since the great slump of 1929 to 1931. In the past 12 months we have seen national unemployment rise by 1 million to a record postwar level of 10 per cent. Whether one attributes that to the design and intention of the Government, which I do not, or to their total incompetence and ignorance, which I do, does not matter. The simple fact stands out. A total of 1 million more people who wish to be in jobs earning a decent living are, through no fault of their own, in the dole queues and without employment, with all the shame and degradation that is attached to that.
    If one turns to the regional situation, one sees that the figures become much starker and more real, and bite far deeper. The figures for the West Midlands have already been quoted and many of my hon. Friends have emphasised particular aspects of them. There is no need for me to pursue them further, but I must speak of Coventry and its travel-to-work area, which I have the privilege to represent.
    There has been a 69 per cent. increase in unemployment in the West Midlands as a whole in the past 12 months, but Coventry has had a 101 per cent. increase in the same period. Through a brilliant management of the economy which will astound everyone the Government have managed to increase unemployment in Coventry by more than 100 per cent. In the Coventry travel-to-work area, which includes Bedworth and Nuneaton, the rise in unemployment has been nearer 110 per cent.
    The hon. Member for Bromsgrove and Redditch could single out only young people in the Government's policies, which are in total disarray. In the Coventry area

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    there are 35 per cent. more young people without a job today than there were a year ago. In the city of Coventry alone 4,600 young people are without a permanent job.
    That is not surprising when one considers what the economic management of the Government has achieved in terms of its impact on the activity of the part of the economy towards which they have directed their deflationary policies. They have been directed towards the manufacturing sector. The Prime Minister said precisely that in a speech in Cardiff at the weekend.
    Everything in our economy has to live on the manufacturing sector. After all, manufacturing will go on after the oil wells have run dry. Despite automation, it is a sector which employs people and it is still the wealth-creating and employment-creating base of the country.
    I must apologise for misleading the House when I intervened during the Chancellor of the Exchequer's winding-up speech in the Budget debate. I said that in one year he had done nearly as much as was done in the two worst years of the 1929–31 slump. In fact, he has done far worse. The most up-to-date figures show that from January 1980 to January 1981 manufacturing output fell by 14·4 per cent., compared with only 10·8 per cent. in the two worst years of the slump.
    I cannot imagine what scheme of things, what magical formula, or what theoretical proposition can underlie a policy that hits at the epicentre of the country's well-being and wealth-creating sector. But that is what has happened. We in Coventry and the West Midlands have been at the sharp end of a policy the vicious effect of which has been sheer, simple, old-fashioned deflation.
    Time and again we in Coventry, like many of my hon. Friends, have put forward cases and justifications for different classifications of various parts of the United Kingdom. We have asked for assisted area status, but, despite the worsening situation, we have been denied it. We have already had a 110 per cent. increase in unemployment in the area to a rate of 13 per cent. We face the prospect of that rate rising this year to 15 per cent.
    There can be only one reason why the Government, with the blinkers on—as the hon. Member for Bromsgrove and Redditch rightly described them—can refuse Coventry that status and refuse a change of direction in the country as a whole. It is the belief, which has been much canvassed in the Corridors of the House and peddled among certain economists, that things are on the up—they will get better, the slump will bottom out, industrial production will increase, new companies will come into being, the young technocrats will fill the places of the old industries, and we shall see that the masochism of the past two years has been worth while.
    There are two views about that. I share the House's sceptical view of economists, so I shall not refer to the views of the 364 economists, though as 364 of them agree there may be cause for concern. My experience has been in industry and I do not look much further forward than to what an industrialist can anticipate. Distinguished, learned, able and theoretically competent though economists may be, I prefer to take the view of the CBI. I dare say that those holding the opposite view could produce as many supporters if they wished, but, unlike me, they believe that they are winning and I suppose that they have not tried to get together.
    A report in The Times today on the CBI's forecasts and figures states:
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    "The forecasts, which have been revised to take account of the impact of the Budget measures, are exceptionally gloomy. Unemployment is expected to continue on an upward trend to the end of next year, when CBI economists are predicting about 3·25 million people will be out of work."
    The CBI recognises the contribution that the manufacturing sector, in particular, must make. The report in The Times continues:
    "Manufacturing output which, it had been hoped might recover once stock pipelines were emptied"—
    that is the specious hope on which the Government are basing their expectations of a recovery—
    "is expected to continue falling until the first half of 1982, to reach nearly 20 per cent. below its 1979 level."
    That is the realistic view. It is a view of industrialists and not economists. The industrialists are surrounded by industrial facts of life and have to take account of them in a way that academic economists, sitting in the ivory towers with which we associate them, do not.
    The quarterly Coventry monitor of the local economy states:
    "In the conclusion to the report"—
    that is the most recent quarterly report—
    "on the survey for the third quarter of 1980, it was suggested that the 'worst effects of the recession are yet to be felt in the local economy'. In the current survey, production and orders were continuing to fall, investment plans were again being cut back, and many firms intended to trim their workforces."
    That is the reality as I see it. That is the situation in which the economy, nationally and locally, finds itself—manufacturing industry in particular. Against that has to be set the current view, put by two or three Conservative Members, who spoke in defence of the Government's policy, that we are on the point of an upturn that will prove every one of the 364 economists, the CBI, and the Coventry monitor of the local economy, wrong.
    The Prime Minister stated that until she came to power
    "no one had the courage to stick at the remedy for long enough to allow it to work."
    We come up against the famous argument that time is of the essence, that the upturn is round the corner and that the Government alone have the courage to see it through. It is probably a misquotation but Napoleon is said to have told one of his generals that he could give him everything but time. This Government have time on their side. They have effectively been in power for two years. How much longer do they want? The most disturbing part of the Prime Minister's speech, speaking of the road that has Led to record deflation, record unemployment and also virtually to a period of record inflation and a massive loss of production—worse than that experienced in the 1929–31 period—was her remark:
    "This is the road I am resolved to follow. This is the path I must go. I ask you all to have the spirit—the bold, the steadfast and the young in heart—to stand and join me as we go forward. For there is no other company in which I would travel."
    It would be a funny sort of fellow traveller who would go down that road today. I do not think that there are anywhere near as many on either side of the House as the Prime Minister might imagine. That road is leading this country to disaster. A sort of Messiah complex seems to have infected the Prime Minister. That is a very dangerous disease. Fortunately, it is evident that the disease is not infectious or contagious among her Cabinet colleagues. Instead of this sort of messianic complex, what is needed from the Government is a little realism, a little pragmatism and a little understanding of the real problems that face industry, which is where the future for this country lies.

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    I should like to put some questions to the Government. How much more time do they want? When shall we know whether the measures have proved successful? Two years in Government is a long time. Will it take no longer than one more year for output to rise again, against all the predictions that I have read to the House? No Government can be entitled to more than that.
    What level of unemployment are the Government prepared to tolerate? That is the second question. It goes hand in hand with the first. One cannot dodge the unemployment question. There is no way round it. The longer that policies are pursued that lead to a rise in unemployment, a drop in demand and a decrease in productive capacity and production, the longer and the faster this country will continue to go downhill.
    The truisms of the past are still relevant today. I make no apology for quoting the Prime Minister again. When unemployment rose above 1 million under the previous Labour Government the Prime Minister remarked that a Conservative Government would have been drummed out of office in that situation. It was from the West Midlands southwards that the terrible swing occurred. I am delighted to see the Secretary of State for Employment enter the Chamber at this critical juncture. At the weekend the right hon. Gentleman spoke specifically of the North-South divide and the necessity for the Government to pay more attention to people and conditions in the North of England. I ask the Government again to state what level of unemployment they are prepared to tolerate before the Government and the Secretary of State himself call it a day. That day will certainly come. The existing policies are doomed.
    It was in the West Midlands that the vote went wrong the last time. Across the broad spectrum, trade unionists and housewives put this disastrous Government into power. It will be for the trade unionists, the housewives and the voters of the West Midlands, who are suffering most from unemployment, to put right that terrible mistake and see that it is reversed at the next election.
    7.55 pm
    Mr. Kenneth Carlisle: I am grateful to be called in this important debate. It is important for the Midlands. I point out to the hon. Member for Coventry, North-West (Mr. Robinson) that the debate covers both the East and the West Midlands. Not least is it important for my constituency, where over one-third of the people work in engineering, and many in heavy engineering, which is the hardest-hit sector. My constituency, therefore, shares the worries and the problems experienced by other constituencies.
    All hon. Members know how unemployment eats into the spirit of a community. Concern about unemployment is not simply a party matter. Opposition Members who claim that it is do the House a disservice. The right hon. and learned Member for Warley, West (Mr. Archer) was one of the few who recognised that this is a matter of concern to the whole House. One becomes angry on hearing some Opposition Members assert that they have a better right to be smug over unemployment than have Conservative Members.
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    We have heard how levels of unemployment have grown whichever party has been in power. I affirm that Conservative Members share the concern that exists about unemployment. We differ over the remedies.
    Unemployment is clearly a deep-rooted problem. Those who examine the issue honestly realise that one has to look further than the short-term effects of party politics. There are no easy solutions for unemployment. Often, politicians believe that they can influence events rapidly, especially when in Opposition. Opposition Members believe that they could speedily cure this awful disease. In truth, events take time to work through.
    One needs only to examine the Reform Acts of the last century to understand this. Before they were passed, people thought that they would overturn society. In fact, it took many decades for political events to work through. The same applies to employment policies. The existing level of unemployment is the result of 20 years' relative decline in our economy, allied to the fiercest recession since the war. We should do what we can to alleviate the hardship. That is one reason why the Government have doubled the provision for the youth opportunities programme. However, in Lincoln and, I believe, in many constituencies, although the Government schemes are welcome as an alternative, what people really want are true jobs—jobs that they know are needed.
    Therefore, although at present it is reasonable to spend more and more money on these unemployment schemes, they do not fool the British people. The people want policies that they know will create substantial jobs in the long term, and it is the Government's prime job to pursue consistently the main themes that can lead to those jobs in the long term.
    I should like to look more closely at these main themes, for it is not good enough just to denounce unemployment for the evil that it is. That is easily done, as we have discovered from many Opposition Members. They have denounced unemployment. But what we want to hear from them, and what we must ask, is what should be done about it. We have to be creative in our approach to unemployment.
    First, there is no doubt that inflation is the major destroyer of jobs. It has a devastating effect on industry, and I am surprised that the hon. Member for Coventry, North-West, with his experience, did not mention it. Inflation destroys confidence, it destroys investment, it puts up interest rates, it encourages wage demands and, over a number of years, it eats into the very heart of our productive processes. It saps industry's power to compete. Despite this, there are still many successful businesses in Britain.
    Now, at least, the Government have got inflation falling, and at such a time it is easy to forget the damage that inflation does. But it would be foolish to forget the long-term damage that it can do. Any Government who wish to be taken seriously in their fight against inflation must have a coherent anti-inflation policy. Yet, when we listen to the Opposition we hear merely about a programme for massive public expenditure which will entail borrowing on a scale vastly in excess of even what we are borrowing now. Surely, if we have learnt anything in the past 20 years it is that large injections of borrowed money into the economy serve merely to refuel inflation, with a consequent increase in the level of unemployment.

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    Certainly, as we know from the past, a few jobs will be created in the short term, but only at a very heavy long-term cost.
    No responsible Government should follow such a course, but in the few days since the formation of the SDP it has become clear that the new party would borrow just as large sums as—or even larger ones than—the official Opposition. Such a policy is a cruel deception of the British people. On the other hand, the Budget, however unpopular it is in the country—and it is very unpopular—has confirmed the Government's intention to secure consistently falling inflation, which is an essential ingredient in the long-term creation of jobs.
    Secondly, it is only by being productive and fully competitive that we can secure jobs. The history of shipbuilding since the war is a sobering example. After the war we had nearly half the world's market for ships. Now we have a negligible share. Perhaps the major reason for the decline was the desire to save jobs in the shipbuilding industry. Restrictive practices remained, and whereas the rest of the world created a modern industry, we held on to what we had, which, in the end, meant fewer jobs in shipbuilding today than would have been the case if we had gone flat out for modernisation.
    This recession has made many businesses become more efficient, and when we come out of the recession the potential for greater productivity will be large. But the major task facing the Government is to ensure that we keep the benefits, the changes and the better practices that have been created in this recession. In order to do that the Government have to provide a much better framework for communications and co-operation in industry. They cannot be content with the gains that have been won from or perhaps forced on the unions. They must create a better structure.
    In their battle to make the work force feel better involved and more willing to co-operate in defeating restrictive practices, I urge one aspect upon them. The Government have made progress with profit sharing. But they should go much further still with it. It is quite right that the people who help to create the profits should benefit from those profits and the money which they help to generate. When the recession ends we shall make good profits again. Now is the time to create a better structure. Just as we should invest in industry during a recession so that the machinery is available for the upturn, so we should do much more by way of profit sharing, so that the work force can become involved when the upturn comes.
    Profit sharing is an important element in industrial participation, along with many other factors. In this and other ways the Government should consolidate the progress in productivity secured during the last two years. Thus, we must reduce inflation and increase productivity.
    But these measures alone will not solve the unemployment problem. The example of my own constituency is relevant. After the recession, businesses there will be able to produce much more without employing many more people. They will have to do so if they are to remain competitive and to protect the jobs that already exist there. We do not want to see them go the way of shipbuilding. We delude ourselves if we believe that the old industries will take on more people when the recession is over. Therefore, we must look for genuine growth from smaller businesses to provide new jobs.
    Some Opposition Members decry what the Government have done to help the birth of small businesses. However,
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    the sum of the three Budgets shows that there has been substantial progress. We have a coherent and consistent policy to help small businesses both to set up and to grow. When we come out of the recession, these measures, which are small individually but impressive as a whole, will help in the creation of many new jobs.
    It is strange that although many Opposition Members point out that the old businesses will not take on more people when we come out of the recession they are loth to give their full backing to the creation of small new businesses. Therefore, in their approach to inflation, productivity and support for small businesses, the Government have the right themes. Anyone can find fault with the details—that is always easy—but if in the main the themes are right, in the end the details will fall into place.
    As well as urging the Government to stick to their main themes, I ask them to continue to formulate a more imaginative approach to unemployment. Unemployment seems certain to stay with us in a larger measure than we have known since the war. We must work at both ends of the age scale to diminish the number of people looking for jobs. The youth opportunities programme is already developing towards a national community service. I believe that there is scope here to extend it further and more imaginatively, so that not only have young people some training and some form of job to go to but they can believe that it is really creative and that it contributes to society. It needs developing imaginatively.
    In the same way, we must look more closely at retirement. The job release scheme is one of the few schemes that genuinely provide real jobs and have the scope for extension.
    The youth opportunities programme, the job release scheme and other imaginative ideas need money. As we come out of the recession, Government borrowing will tend to fall and the funds can therefore be released. But the thinking for that more imaginative extension has to be done now.
    This debate is about the Midlands. I have concentrated on national issues rather than on the Midlands because the problems of the Midlands embrace both the strengths and the weaknesses of our national industrial performance. The Midlands is a region still rich in talent and innovation—a region whose industries can compete with the industries of any other country. If the Government continue to provide the right framework for the regions the Midlands will thrive again. I believe that the Government are pursuing the main themes that will provide the correct framework for the Midlands and the nation.
    8.10 pm
    Mr. Bill Homewood: I want to make three points in reply to some of the comments that have been made by Conservative Members. The first relates to 'what was said by the hon. Member for Lincoln (Mr. Carlisle), who made a thoughtful speech, although I believe that it was totally misconceived.
    The idea that inflation causes unemployment is anything but proved anywhere in the world. I certainly have not seen any proof. When the hon. Gentleman gets as old as I, he will realise that in the past—in my case, the 1950s—people argued that inflation was caused by over-employment. Many Conservative Members have constantly referred to the world recession as a means of explaining our dilemma, not only in the Midlands but

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    throughout the country. There is no doubt that there is a world recession, but we should highlight the difference between the situation in Britain and that in the rest of the world.
    As was pointed out in the press on Sunday, in the past 12 months unemployment has risen by 3 million in the 24 OECD countries. Britain has contributed one-third of that total. Our increase has been 1 million. However, our contribution to the GDP of the OECD countries is exactly 6 per cent. Therefore, for that 6 per cent. we have contributed 33 per cent. of OECD unemployment.
    Conservative Members also refer to our lack of competitiveness and low productivity. I am sorry that the Secretary of State for Employment has left the Chamber. I listened carefully to the speech that he made during the Budget debate. He repeated the theme, which we hear so often from the Conservative Benches, that our problems emanate from low productivity and lack of competitiveness. However, he ended that speech by saying that unemployment is rising in every country in the world. What has happened to their competitiveness? What happens if we catch them up? Do we take their level of unemployment on board, or do they take ours on board? The problem goes much deeper throughout the capitalist world, and the remarks that have come from Conservative Members are more appropriate to a general economic debate than to a debate such as this.
    I claim the dubious honour of representing the area with the highest level of travel-to-work unemployment in the Midlands. As I have already said in an intervention, with one exception it has the highest level of unemployment in the United Kingdom. The March unemployment figure for Corby stood at 22 per cent., but male unemployment was 24·8 per cent. One in four males in Corby was out of work. The overall unemployment level in Kettering was 11·4 per cent., but male unemployment amounted to 16·2 per cent. Those figures seriously underestimate the problem.
    More than 1,000 persons in those two towns are now involved in retraining schemes at technical colleges. Those schemes are financed by the BSC and are rapidly coming to a conclusion. There is no doubt that a further 1,000 people will shortly be added to the dole queues in those two towns, and there is little prospect of that retraining ever being put to use in the area. Indeed, there is very little prospect of them ever finding jobs at all. I estimate that within another three months Corby will have a male unemployment level of more than 30 per cent., and Kettering will have a male unemployment level of more than 20 per cent.
    I remember arguing in the House that the closure of the Corby steelworks would not help the PSBR. I was interrupted by the Secretary of State for Industry, who said that I talked as though none of those people would ever get a job. I did not say that, but imagined that in the medium term they would probably not get a job. However, in the current economic situation, which the Government have created, I should like the Secretary of State for Industry to tell me when it will be possible for those people to get jobs.
    I would not feel so outraged about the plight of my constituents if more concern was expressed by Conservative Members—[HON. MEMBERS: "Come off it."] Conservative Members may say that, and I know that the hon. Member for Lincoln said that there was concern
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    on both sides of the House. Unfortunately, not many Conservative Members represent the sort of area that I represent. I am not aware of such concern being portrayed by Conservative Members.
    If we could have an acceptance of the fact that the worst economic problem is unemployment and that it is a form of mass human deprivation which, in a civilised society, should not exist to anywhere near this degree, we would be well on the way towards making progress. However, Conservative Members treat and talk about unemployment as though it were some sort of academic exercise.
    Very little will improve in Corby or Kettering as quickly as is necessary until the Government change economic course. I appreciate their difficulties. I have been married for more than 40 years, and although I have won 50 per cent. of the arguments which take place within the family, I have never yet been able to get my wife to admit that she was wrong. That is the Government's problem.
    However, the Government are not dealing with my domestic problems. They do not decide whether I should buy a new house, have the garden redesigned, or have a room decorated. They are dealing with the lives of my constituents in a variety of ways—whether the kids are ill-treated, whether marriages break up, whether the level of non-accidental injuries rises, whether crime increases, whether vandalism damages a fair town, whether alcoholism and glue sniffing become a norm rather than an exception, whether local shops go bankrupt, and whether there is a grave danger of the whole social structure in a limited area breaking down. When we reach the level of unemployment which exists in my constituency, those are the sort of conditions that must be taken on board.
    I did not need 364 economists, the CBI or anyone else to tell me that if the Government do not do a V-turn—not a U-turn, because I see from today's Financial Times that we have V-turns, U-turns, W-turns and many others, although the V-turn attracts me more than any of the others—on public expenditure, interest rates, the £ sterling, the Common Market and import controls, the social fabric of this country will be in danger of breaking down.
    I am amazed at the defence of free trade advanced by some hon. Members. Ministers are not even able to give me a satisfactory answer when I tell them, as even Conservative Members have told them, that child labour is used in Italy to produce footwear that is subsequently imported into this country. Ministers tell me that it cannot be stopped. I do not believe in free trade. It has so many aberrations in it that it can never work. I do not see how anyone could believe that it could be a viable theory.
    When the Secretary of State for Employment talks about a steady strategy with flexible tactics he should realise that his comments will bring no cheers from the Corby dole queues. The people there will have not the slightest idea of what he is talking about, and, frankly, neither have I. I carefully consulted the Oxford English Dictionary this morning, and I discovered that both those terms are applicable solely in the context of military activity. I understand that the Secretary of State for Employment is one of the "wets". Indeed, I understand that he is an almost half-soaked wet. He would do a good turn to his party if he produced the sort of splinter group that has developed from my party. I could suggest a name

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    for such a group, which would not be so far from the SDP. We could call it the HSD party—the half-soaked democratic party.
    If the country is to get out of the mess into which the Government have put it, it must have radical policies. Let me explain how such an approach would help Corby if the Government had the will to adopt it. The Government do damage other than by their economic policies. I have argued for many months with the Secretary of State for Transport about the need for him to give a starting date for the M1-A1 link, which everyone apart from a small agricultural coterie in the county council in Northamptonshire, agrees is essential for the revival of Corby. The Secretary of State constantly contends that the road cannot be started until 1983. It was approved almost three and a half years ago. I find it inconceivable that if there is any will to assist the people of Corby and Kettering the starting date for the road cannot be brought forward.
    The other area in which the Government could have helped but have instead injured was the decision by the Secretary of State for the Environment to change the rate support grant for the block grant system. That decision cost Corby £600,000 of Government money. Had the Corby council decided to continue its services and employment at an unchanged level rates in the area would have had to rise by 83 per cent. Of course, it responsibly cut back and produced a rate increase of about the average for the country, putting more people on the dole and cutting services in an already horribly depressed town. Those are two instances of where the Government should be more careful in dealing with local problems such as those in Corby.
    I do not want to quote the national CBI reaction to the optimism that was expressed about the recession bottoming out. Instead I rely on a quote from the East Midlands CBI, which was reported only a few days ago in my local newspaper under the headline "No End to Gloom". The report stated that the East Midlands region of the CBI has reported that more people would lose their jobs and more people would go bankrupt over the next few months. It is against that background that I have indicated what must be done to help Corby.
    I turn, finally, to the question of retraining in the Corby area. The principals of the technical colleges in Kettering and Corby have told me that the BSC schemes are running out and that when they are finished the technical colleges will not have the funds to continue the courses. That is happening in an area where unemployment is more than 22 per cent.
    The whole basis of my contention is that there will be no well-being in the nation until the Government make a substantial change of economic course. That is necessary to secure an improvement in conditions in my constituency. They are worse than anywhere else, and the rate at which they improve depends on the Government's national economic policies.
    8.26 pm
    Mr. David Knox: I wish to pursue only one of the points raised by the hon. Member for Kettering (Mr. Homewood). It serves no useful purpose to throw taunts across the Floor of the House accusing people of not caring about unemployment. Right hon. and hon. Members on both sides of the House care about it, but they have different solutions to the problem. Even hon. Members on
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    the same side have different solutions. We all care about unemployment, and the hon. Gentleman achieves no useful purpose by accusing us of a lack of care or concern.
    I am grateful to have been called to speak in the debate, and I do not apologise for doing so. Unemployment in my constituency, which was very low for the first 30 years after the war, now represents a real, growing and serious problem.
    Many hon. Members may find it difficult to associate Leek with the Midlands, because when they talk about the Midlands, especially the West Midlands, they tend to think of Birmingham and Coventry, and the towns that lie around those two great cities. They tend to think of the car and engineering industries. However, the Midlands area stretches much further than that, and Leek is just as much a part of the Midlands as is Birmingham or Coventry, albeit on the northern tip bordering on the North-West region.
    Over the past seven years there has been a serious deterioration in employment in North Staffordshire., and, of course, I am particularly concerned about the situation in my own constituency. In March 1974, when the Tory Government left office, 644 people were out of work in the Leek constituency. By March 1979, just before the Labour Government left office, the figure had risen to 1,661. At the most recent count, in March of this year, the figure was in excess of 4,000. There was a substantial increase in unemployment under the Labour Government and it has continued under the present Government. If people wish to attribute blame they must remember that both Labour and Conservative Governments are at fault.
    Despite the increase in unemployment of over 500 per cent. since 1974, my constituency receives no special help from the Government to deal with the problem, except that the town of Leek and the moorlands area that surrounds it have received help from COSIRA, which has provided advance factories. We are grateful for that help Almost all the factories were occupied immediately they were built. They make a real contribution to helping small businesses to start up in the constituency. I pay tribute to the Development Commission and COSIRA for the work that they have done in my constituency and in other parts of the country.
    Apart from the serious overall unemployment position in my constituency, I should like to single out the plight of Biddulph, where unemployment is particularly serious. A figure of 20 per cent. out of work is bandied around, but that is an exaggeration, because large numbers of people in Biddulph are commuters to Stoke-on-Trent and Manchester.
    In February 1974 only 131 people in Biddulph were out of work. The number today is 836. The number increased steadily under Labour and Conservative Governments. Despite that dramatic increase in unemployment, no special help has been given to the area. The argument advanced by the Department of Industry is that Biddulph is in the Stoke-on-Trent travel-to-work area.
    That is nonsense. Unemployment in Stoke-on-Trent is not as high as it is in Biddulph, but some people in Stoke are out of work. When my Biddulph constituents seek employment in Stoke they face an inevitable problem. If two people of equal ability apply for a job in Stoke the employer will take the person who lives nearer the job rather than the person who lives five or 10 miles away. He therefore does not employ the person from Biddulph. I urge the Minister to examine that problem. The position

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    is not satisfactory. The hon. Member for Cannock (Mr. Roberts) nods in agreement. I expect that his constituents have a similar problem.
    We are told that the present high level of unemployment is a consequence of excessive wage claims, restrictive practices, overmanning, bad labour relations, managerial incompetence and lack of investment. The industries in my constituency cover a wide range. They include textiles, engineering, electronics, chemicals, mining and farming. The work forces have a wide range of skills. The people are hard-working, but not highly paid. They have never received big wage or salary increases.
    Labour relations are good today, and have been for many years. They are as good as anywhere in the United Kingdom. Strikes are infrequent, and always have been. There is excellent co-operation between management and workers. Management is good. Firms have invested in new plant and machinery. My constituency has a good labour force, which is engaged in efficient factories and mills. I do not say that just because I represent them. It is true, as anybody who has visited the constituency will know. It is therefore unfair that my constituents should suffer high unemployment in the same way as, but to a rather greater extent than, many who have conducted themselves less well in recent years.
    Management and unions alike in my constituency are puzzled by the fact that, having done all the right things over the years, they are heavily penalised for the sins of others by a dramatic increase in unemployment.
    As I have already pointed out, my constituency receives no help except from COSIRA. I ask the Minister to reconsider that. I hope that he will make special help available to my constituency because of the increase in unemployment in recent years.
    Much as we would appreciate such help, and considerable as would be the advantage to my constituents, it is important to recognise that the best way to improve employment in Leek and North Staffordshire generally is by a revival of the national economy. North Staffordshire was prosperous and enjoyed full employment when Britain as a whole was prosperous and enjoyed full employment, and when Britain again enjoys those advantages North Staffordshire will follow suit.
    How do we achieve that? I find no evidence in this country, or in any other, that prosperity is the automatic consequence of stable prices. The current battle against inflation and the obsession with stable prices, even if successful, will not ensure a return to economic prosperity and full employment. Because the success, to date, of the anti-inflationary policy is due to a tight squeeze on company profits and a severe depression of demand, a return to prosperity and full employment is impossible as long as this policy continues in its present form.
    If we are to return to economic prosperity we need to expand the economy and get economic growth. In my view, that will not happen naturally. The Government must act. Demand must be stimulated for British products, and then more people will be needed to produce those goods.
    There are two ways in which that should be done. First, the exchange rate must be reduced to a level that bears a greater relationship to comparative manufacturing costs. That can be done in three different ways: first, by a further and substantial reduction in interest rates; secondly, by
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    ensuring that more of the revenue from oil is invested abroad to ensure that investment income from abroad flows into this country when the supply of oil eventually expires; and, thirdly, by talking down sterling. If the exchange rate could be reduced to a more realistic level, our exports would be cheaper in world markets and imports into this country would be dearer. As a result, the demand on home industry would be higher. In my constituency, the textile, engineering and electronic industries would benefit because they are all engaged in exports, and they are all adversely affected by cheap imports.
    In addition to the beneficial effects that would accrue from a reduction in the exchange rate, there would be the advantage of increased demand following a further substantial reduction in interest rates.
    The second way to return to economic prosperity is to cut taxation, either direct or indirect. If direct taxes were cut there would be an incentive effect. If indirect taxes were cut there would be a price effect. Either way, people would have more money to spend and more to save. It would help to increase the proportion of the national income taken by the private sector. That part of the tax cut that was spent would result in more consumption and increased demand, and in time that would mean more jobs and encourage more investment. The other part of the tax cut that was saved would mean extra funds for investment.
    It will be argued by some people, including my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Budgen), that that would increase the public sector borrowing requirement. That would not worry me too much, because I have a feeling that the figure of £10½ billion given as the estimate for the deficit in the year ahead is not scientifically based. In any event, if expansionist policies were pursued it would, I believe, bring into employment the unemployed and underemployed, bring into use under-utilised capital equipment, generate more wealth, and eventually be self-financing. The important point is that a more realistic exchange rate and tax cuts would result, first, in the stabilisation of employment and then in a reduction in unemployment. That could only be beneficial.
    Unemployment in my constituency and in the country as a whole is a waste of resources and is socially damaging and divisive. It is the most serious domestic problem that the country faces. We suffered from high unemployment in the 1920s and 1930s. Apart from the suffering imposed on the people then, it left a legacy of bitterness and class hatred. In industry it left a legacy of fear of change, of innovation and of new labour-saving plant and machinery.
    Most of our overmanning problems are due to the natural tendency of people afraid of losing their jobs to spread their work, in the belief that that protects those jobs. It would be a tragedy if today we continued to repeat the follies of a mere 50 years ago. Therefore, I ask the Government to make the reduction of unemployment their No. 1 priority. In my view, it is the greatest human problem that we face in Britain.
    8.41 pm
    Mr. Bruce George: I am proud to represent one of the three Walsall constituencies, which are in an area that has, regrettably, suffered considerably over the past 18 months or two years. A distinguished politician, David Lloyd George, to whom I am not related—although after watching the television

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    programmes about him I am not as certain as I was—said a long time ago that Walsall was a town of 100 trades. Unfortunately, the present Government are creating what may be in the not-too-distant future a town of just 100 firms.
    This once thriving town, in a once thriving area, has been reduced to dire straits. It would be foolish and immoral for anyone to argue that its crisis began on 4 May 1979, but this Government's misguided policies and wrong decisions have contributed considerably to exacerbating the already considerable problems facing the town and the West Midlands as a whole.
    Let me look at the stark statistics, as many other hon. Members have done. The national average unemployment is 10·3 per cent. In the West Midlands the average is 11·9 per cent., and in the Walsall travel-to-work area it is 13·9 per cent., representing a total of 23,542 people. Those figures exclude Darlaston, which is not in the Walsall travel-to-work area. On the basis of my research, I add to those figures about 2,000 people in Darlaston, 2,000 in job creation schemes, perhaps 2,000 who are not at this stage registered as unemployed, and the thousands on short-time working. One then finds that the real figure of unemployment is not 23,500 but well over 30,000.
    We read in the press today about proposed coups in 1968. Unemployment then was 542,000, or 2·3 per cent. of the population. If we had threats of coups in those almost halcyon days, the ghosts of usurpers of power, past and present—Videla, Pinochet, Amin, Franco, Hitler, Master Sergeant Doe, the Greek colonels and Korea's Park and Chun—should be heading for London with the speed and numbers of people in the London marathon yesterday.
    The unemployment figures are startling and unacceptable. About two years ago a then Minister in the Department of Industry—my hon. Friend the Member for Nuneaton (Mr. Huckfield)—visited my constituency. He visited Darlaston and took a great deal of stick from the trade unionists there. Inflation was then just over 9 per cent. and unemployment was 6·5 per cent. Those were the supposedly bad old days when we were in office. How many people now regret supporting this Government on 3 May 1979?
    I also remember vividly the cries of so many Conservative Members that the unemployed were unemployed of will. With 23,500 unemployed in my town, how many vacancies are there? There are 192. That shows how misguided is the view that large numbers of people are deliberately seeeking to remain unemployed. The jobs are not there.
    The roll-call of defunct companies in the Walsall area is growing by the day. Were these companies really inefficient or were they potentially viable economic entities? I suspect that in most cases the latter is true.
    We in Walsall have no giant companies, yet the thousands of small companies, shedding labour with a constant drip, drip, cumulatively represent a position as disastrous as some of the major crises which have befallen areas such as Corby. The lifeblood of the town has been ebbing away, with companies closing. Aluminium Bronze has closed, with 300 unemployed; Eaton Axles, with 450 unemployed; TI Sunhouse, with 500 unemployed. GKN, once very strong in Darlaston, has virtually abandoned the town. Rubery Owen, one of the giants of former years, is now but a shadow of its former self.
    In Darlaston, once the heartland of nuts and bolts, the industrial fasteners industry is now struggling to survive.
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    Leather goods, once a dominant industry in Walsall, is suffering from imports from Italy, South America, South Korea and Taiwan. In many cases firms are struggling on the very margin of extinction.
    The decline of industry in the West Midlands has been well documented. It is, indeed, alarmingly bad. Walsall is not just a microcosm of the West Midlands. In a report commissioned by Walsall council it was said that Walsall is an exaggerated version of the West Midlands economy, with a rather higher level of dependence on metal-based manufacture and relatively lower levels of service sector employment.
    The crisis has not bottomed out. The crisis has not been unexpected but has been coming for some 20 years. It has been accelerated in the last two years. Many of the reasons for the decline can be laid fairly and squarely on the shoulders of this Administration. When Conservative Members put the blame on the world crisis they are seeking to delude their constituents.
    Many parts of my constituency are suffering more than others. What should be done? Obviously, the Government should end their lunatic economic policies. T. can understand why some Conservative Members seek to denigrate the views of the 364 economists who have spoken against the Government's economic policy, but will those Conservative Members find in the newspaper tomorrow, or the day after, 364 economists who have put their names to a sheet of paper in trying to defend the Government's policies?
    No wonder Conservative Members feel rather tetchy. Milton Friedman has virtually colonised their collective mind. Indeed, many of the Government's policies emanate directly from that academic. But I am not suggesting that we should denigrate academics. Had we paid more attention to some of the solutions offered by them we would not be in the mess that we are in today.
    The Select Committee on the Treasury and Civil Service has shot out of the sky the remnants of respectability of the Government's economic strategy, and I commend it for that—although I suppose that it is difficult to shoot out of the sky a kamikaze pilot. The Government have lost support from those who put them into office—the press, the business community, large and small, and working people. Indeed, the Government have lost a great deal of support from their own Back Benches and in the Cabinet itself.
    I liken the Prime Minister to a latter-day General Custer, gloriously leading her troops into certain oblivion. When I went to the battlefield at Little Big Horn, one thing surprised me. I knew that there would be crosses on the spot where the soldiers died, but I thought there would be 250 crosses surrounding Custer. There were not, for it was obvious that when the crunch came most of his forces had already begun to disappear, and one could see the crosses in the distance around the battlefield. Clearly, that is what is happening today to this Government.
    The Government must therefore do many things. They must lower the exchange rate, introduce selective import controls, seek to reflate the economy, reduce energy costs, abandon their loony Friedmanism, and present a new Budget with a new Chancellor of the Exchequer.
    In my local area I should like to see specific aid for companies to enable them to invest, as happened under the Labour Government with the Industry Act. A great deal

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    more must be done to provide infrastructure assistance to the local authority to help it to provide factory units for prospective companies.
    Training must be given a boost. I am sad that so many apprentices are being shed by companies in my area and in other industrial areas. More aid should be given to the microprocessor industry. The aid given so far is nothing short of piddling. We need a positive rather than a negative approach to industry in the West Midlands. We must seek to give assistance to those local authorities that want to use their powers to attract industry. If some of these things are done, the reversal or our economy can be halted and we can look forward to some form of economic revival.
    I believe in a healthy, mixed economy and in a healthy private sector that works alongside an expanded, healthy, public sector. I have set out what the Government should do to encourage industry. Far more must be done. There are problems in our constituencies. People are becoming agitated. Unless the Government respond to pressure from academics, Members of Parliament and their constituents, the unemployment queues, which are already far too long, will grow even longer.
    8.50 pm
    Mr. Jocelyn Cadbury: The hon. Member for Walsall, South (Mr. George) spoke with great sincerity, as did the hon. Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Mr. Sever), when he read out a catalogue of disasters—
    Mr. Sever: Some of them.
    Mr Cadbury: The hon. Gentleman cited some of the disasters in terms of redundancies and factory closures that have characterised the Midlands during the past few years. However, I disagree with Labour Members, because they seem to believe that such disasters can simply be put down to two years of rule by one party. The reasons for the recent closures go back many years. In addition, they have a lot to do with the structural nature of industry in the Midlands.
    One of the main reasons why unemployment in the Midlands has increased faster than in other regions is that it is over-dependent on about four major industries. Obviously, the motor industry is the most important one. The motor industry, metal manufacturing, and mechanical and electrical engineering account for about 68 per cent. of the region's output, compared with a national average of 45 per cent. As a country we have performed less well in those industries, and particularly in the motor industry.
    We have failed to stem the import of foreign vehicles that has arisen as a result of our relative inefficiency and it is therefore inevitable that unemployment in the Midlands should rise disproportionately. In the West Midlands, about 250,000 people are employed in the motor industry. In Birmingham, British Leyland employs 9 per cent. of the working population. This inherent weakness is nothing new. From 1970 to 1978, manufacturing employment in the region declined by 102,000. That decline in the number of those employed in manufacturing industry, and in particular in the motor industry, has been going on for a long time. It is futile to argue that it is simply the product of two years of one Government's rule.
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    The fundamental problem in the Midlands is that high technology is not of paramount importance in the industries involved. In the production of a family-sized motor car it is not the degree of sophistication that will sell the car but its price and quality. As a country, we have failed to compete, particularly with the new industrial Powers of the Far East, such as Japan. We have completely failed to raise our rate of productivity to anything like that of the French and Germans—let alone the Japanese.
    Why have we failed? In the Midlands there are wonderful specimens of industrial archaeology. There are old factories, such as Fort Dunlop and the factory that I worked in at Bournville. Indeed, that factory celebrated its hundredth anniversary a couple of years ago. It has some fine old buildings, but they are difficult to modernise and to put new machinery into. Such factories have systems of industrial organisation that are also nineteenth century in origin. There are companies employing people in five or even 10 different trade unions. That is one of the main reasons why we have experienced difficulty in raising productivity. Productivity in skilled trades is four to 10 times lower than in Japan.
    For example, recent figures supplied by the Ford Motor Company about the numbers involved in making one motor car are alarming. For every one man employed on making a motor car in Japan, in West Germany there are three and in the United Kingdom there are six. That is the difference in productivity between this country and other countries. That is why we have failed and why we have such high unemployment.
    I do not blame any particular group for this situation. We are all to blame. Managers are to blame, because since the Second World War they have failed to face these issues. There has been a failure to invest sufficiently in new factories. Managers have failed to tackle the multi-union issue. They have not communicated commercial reality to their employees. They have not gone on to the shop floor and explained the commercial situation. They abandoned the role of communication to the shop stewards, and that was wrong.
    Since the war the unions—there are shining exceptions—have been intensely conservative. In my experience in factories, I discovered that we spent too much time on niggling disputes instead of getting on with the job and planning for the future. In Ford factories in this country, production managers regularly spend 50 per cent. of their time sorting out small industrial disputes, whereas their Continental colleagues spend only 10 per cent. of their time on such matters.
    Governments of both major parties have been to blame for a regional policy that scattered the traditional industries of the Midlands throughout the country. Part of the motor industry that was happily working in the Midlands was sent to Scotland and goodness knows where else. That is another reason why it has become inefficient. At the same time, regional policy prevented new industries coming into this country. That is why Birmingham and other such cities have few companies involved in high technology.
    The Government's record has been roundly condemned by Oppposition Members, but I defend the Government's record on aid to industry. If they had not allocated nearly £1 billion to British Leyland, the West Midlands would have become an industrial desert. Opposition Members should take that factor into account.

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    The Government have provided help for small businesses. The reduction in corporation tax from 50 per cent. to 40 per cent. was of great help to small companies. Incentives to build small factory units, of which there is a dearth in the Midlands, are of great help.
    The loan guarantee scheme outlined in the Budget will help those wanting to start up small businesses to solve the difficulty of getting risk capital. That has been of great help.
    Much more needs to be done. The Midlands must attract high technology and growth industries, or the region's decline will go on.
    I have certain specific suggestions to make, some of which sound mundane. For example, it is difficult to believe that in Birmingham there is not much land available for industrial development. Going into New Street station by train one sees on either side of the railway track large areas of industrial wasteland. I ask my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Employment—the hon. Member for City of Chester (Mr. Morrison)—to convey to his ministerial colleagues, especially those in the Department of Environment, the fact that further pressure needs to be put on nationalised industries and private companies that are sitting on land—pressure to sell that land so that it may be used for new industries and firms.
    Secondly, we must learn to use university technology to a much greater degree. We need to make much more use of the technologicial expertise that exists in our universities. I am a Birmingham man, and I think of Birmingham and Aston universities. I suggest that we follow the American example of setting up industrial estates—which are known in the United States as science parks—next to our universities. High technology industries should be encouraged to move to these sites, where they could take advantage of the expertise that is available to them in university laboratories. Around the campus of Stanford university there is a truly remarkable scene of billion-dollar companies making microchips and engaged in computer technology—companies that have sprung up around a synthesis that has emerged between business men and academics.
    In the long run the responsibility for reviving the West Midlands depends on individuals—individual managers, individual trade unionists and individual employees. Managers must give greater leadership to their work forces. They must make greater efforts to explain economic realities to their work forces so that we can avoid tragedies of the sort that have occurred in my constituency. For example, the closure of Birmetals was due to a failure to communicate. That happened at Ansells brewery, which again was the scene of a failure to communicate between workers and managers. Let us get the managers to communicate. I ask trade union leaders to accept and welcome rapid changes in working practices and the introduction of new technology, and to do that more rapidly than in the past. Only by both sides of industry working together shall we rebuild the strength of the Midlands.
    9.3 pm
    Mr. Gwilym Roberts: I agree with the hon. Member for Birmingham, Northfield (Mr. Cadbury) that unemployment and industrial problems did not start with this Government. It would be a foolish party that suggested that it could cure the problems of technological
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    unemployment overnight. Our criticism of the Government is not that they have failed to cure unemployment but that their policies, whatever the alleviation in certain areas, in terms of finance and economics are the great creators of unemployment. Unemployment in Britain under this Government has accelerated much more rapidly than in any other country.
    The Under-Secretary of State for Employment spoke about the efforts made by the Staffordshire Development Association. I am appreciative of its work and I welcome the jobs that it has created over a period. However, the hon. Gentleman did not say how man4, jobs have been lost in Staffordshire during the same period. My constituency has consistently had a level of unemployment far higher than the level throughout the West Midlands. Indeed, it has one of the highest unemployment levels in the country. It is running currently at about 17 per cent.
    The reason for this high unemployment lies with the decline of the mining industry. During the 1950s there was a great fall-off in the industry. Mining jobs were replaced—largely through the work of the local authorities—by a great mass of small industries. An unfortunate feature is that when the squeeze is on small industries feel the pinch much more quickly than large industries, and suffer the most. That is part of the problem. Another part of the problem is that in an area such as mine, which is near to a conurbation, there are often subsidiary units to the larger units within the conurbation.
    There is always a tendency for industry to squeeze at the outer ends rather than at the centre in times of recession. We have those problems. My fear is that, never mind what has been said about the upturn, we are only at the beginning of the downward road. The fall-off m demand will create further problems later this year.
    We have heard that Lucas is talking about laying off between 4,000 and 4,500 workers. In my constituency about 2,000 people are employed by Lucas Industries. Clearly, we have enormous problems in my area.
    What are the solutions? There are no absolute solutions, but something can be done to alleviate the problems. Like the hon. Member for Northfield, I welcome a departure from the blanket regional policies of the past. Successive Governments have tended to take away industries from their more effective areas. The introduction of enterprise zones is a move in the right direction, but the basic need is the revival of the whole of the West Midlands industry.
    There has been talk about the possibility of attracting the Nissan project to the West Midlands. Although that was not welcomed by some hon. Members earlier, I welcome it because it would provide thousands of jobs in the motor industry and many more for the component firms. The sad fact is that if Nissan comes to Britain, the West Midlands motor industry will suffer from additional competition, but the siting of Nissan in the area would be a compensation at least to the component firms in the area. The West Midlands has the land and the component firms which are necessary.
    I want to see closer consideration of the operation of British Leyland and its treatment of component firms. As the Minister will know, BL recently was humming and hawing over the question whether it should buy headlamps and accessories from Lucas. It was threatening to offer the contract to firms in other parts of the world. Clearly, a large firm such as BL—an enormous recipient of public money—has a considerable responsibility to component manufacturers in the region.

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    The greater need in the longer term, if the area is to expand and flourish, is the introduction of new high technology industry. That is the real problem. I agree with what the hon. Member for Northfield said about the vital role of the universities in that direction.
    Of equal importance is the location of Government research establishments. Government research in whatever Department is located in the belt through Cambridgeshire and Oxfordshire and the so-called desirable areas of the South-East, which the scientists are supposed to find attractive. One of the great needs is to introduce Government research centres of that sort into the West Midlands. Together with the universities they would form the nuclei of high technology and would produce jobs in the technological industries.
    In my constituency I have the additional problem of the local lack of growth of the mining industry. We have enormous coal reserves in the area, running to 200 or 300 million tonnes. At one time it was hoped that the new Park colliery would be used to develop some of those reserves. We realised that there were difficulties because of the chlorine content of the coal, but it was a disappointment to the constituency when that plan was put back. It is an even greater blow that the Coal Board seems lethargic about the proposals for a drift mine which could be used to explore large parts of the reserves.
    Although I ascribe some blame to the NCB, at board level, the greater share of the blame must lie with the Government and their restrictive financial policies towards the NCB. The board is conscious that it must balance its budget by 1983–84, and that requirement is a stranglehold on the development of the coal industry.
    The Government's policies are at the heart of the problems of the West Midlands. They are already undermining our whole industrial base. That is our indictment of their policies. In my area there is a threat that they may undermine our energy base, and that unless there is a sharp and rapid U-turn by the Government the whole of the West Midlands, which was basically our industrial heartland, will be converted into an arid wasteland. Areas such as my constituency, which were living communities, will be converted into desolate dormitories without hope or a basic future.
    9.12 pm
    Mr. Nick Budgen: I cannot say much about the plight of Wolverhampton in the few moments left me, but as the third hon. Member from the borough to speak in the debate I do not think that I need to emphasise the hardship being felt in the Wolverhampton area.
    I wish to say a few words about the splendid campaign being run by the West Midlands county council to attract Nissan to the area and, I hope, especially to Wolverhampton. I accept that, as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Industry said, Nissan's decision on the siting of its factory will be a commercial one, but I wish to suggest what advice my right hon. Friend should give the directors of Nissan before they reach their decision.
    I accept that Japanese society is more authoritarian and perhaps more respectful than ours, though I do not say that it is necessarily a society in which I would wish to live, so I suspect that the directors will wish to have the advice
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    of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. He may like to point out that in the long term the political direction of industry is not particularly happy for those who get the industry.
    The hon. Member for Kettering (Mr. Homewood) made that point much better than I can. The political direction of a large firm to a new area may appear to be satisfactory for that area in the short term, but if the industry has to be closed, in the long term far greater misery is caused to the area than would have been caused if it had been allowed to grow organically and slowly, with a diversity of industries.
    I hope that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State will be able to tell the Japanese that the stick of the IDC system has gone, and that he will point out that although there are still substantial bribes—as I am rude enough to call them—to take industry away from its natural area of the West Midlands, we have advantages that are not enjoyed by other areas. Perhaps my right hon. Friend will remind the directors of Nissan that in the past industry was driven to Linwood, where a remarkable situation recently arose. Linwood was first run by Rootes, then by Chrysler, then by Peugeot. A situation ensued in which this so-called hard-hearted Government were asked "What are you going to do about Linwood?" The Secretary of State for Scotland asked Peugeot, in effect, whether there was any sum of money that would persuade the company to continue its operation at Linwood. The directors of Peugeot said "No". They had discovered that Linwood was too far from the component manufacturers, but too far away, most of all, from the highly skilled work force that the West Midlands possesses.
    The industry had been grafted into an alien land—alien, that is, to motor manufacturing. It simply did not work. I hope that we in the West Midlands will be able to say that we have the support of the West Midlands county council, which is important from a planning point of view, that we have the support of all the employers' federations, which is also important, and that we have the support of the trade unions. One has only to recall what happened when Hitachi wanted to go to the North-East recently. For all the distortions that can be put into the system by the bribes to go elsewhere, industry grows best where it grows naturally. The motor industry grows most naturally in the West Midlands. I hope that my right hon. Friend will indicate these points to the directors of Nissan.
    9.16 pm
    Mr. Jim Marshall: It is my experience that the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Budgen) always manages to say as much in four minutes, whether about his own constituency or other subjects, as any other hon. Member says in 10.
    The House will agree that we have had an interesting and wide-ranging debate on the problems of the Midlands. There have been times, unfortunately, when I gained the impression that the Midlands was synonymous with the West Midlands. I believe that I am only the fourth speaker from the East Midlands. In one sense I regret that we have to discuss the East Midlands in this context. It is a sign of the times that a formerly prosperous area like the East Midlands should be discussed in the context of this debate.
    In the time available I should like to bring to the attention of the House the problems of the East Midlands. I should also like to raise one or two points that previous speakers mentioned. I agree with my hon. Friend the

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    Member for Wolverhampton, North-East (Mrs. Short) in her description of the speech of the Under-Secretary of State for Industry as smug and complacent. I accept the hon. Gentleman's point that the problems of the West Midlands are different from those of the East Midlands, but the Minister misleads himself and the House if he is of the opinion that the problems of the East Midlands are centred on a few industries.
    I tell the Minister and the House that the problem goes far deeper. In Derby redundancies have occurred in the Parker factory and in the Qualcast factory. In Nottingham there are problems at T.I. Raleigh. In Leicester redundancies have taken place, and will take place, in the machine tool industry. In Northampton British Timpkin has been on short time since the middle of last year and recently announced 300 redundancies. The problem is far deeper than the Minister would have the House believe. It is the depth of the depression that worries those in the East Midlands.
    The Minister was a little churlish when he said that the Opposition did not pay due regard to success stories in the Midlands, and he referred specifically to the Metro project. Obviously we are as proud as are any other hon. Members of the success of the Metro. What concerns us is that such successes are so few and far between. Our view is that the Government's policy makes it more difficult rather than easier to succeed.
    The hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. Smith) spoke very early in the debate, but found it unnecessary to remain until the end. He said that unemployment was a long-term problem and would not be solved by glib generalisations; nor, he said, were there any easy solutions. But then he made a glib generalisation and suggested an easy answer to the problems of Coventry, which he said were caused solely by overpay and overmanning. I am sure that all my hon. Friends will agree that that is arrant nonsense.
    The hon. Member for Kidderminster (Mr. Bulmer) said that the Government had got off to a good start. That must have something to do with the hon. Gentleman's 15,500 majority at the last election.
    My hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich, West (Miss Boothroyd) and my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Warley, West (Mr. Archer) spoke of the difficulty facing young people and the rapid drop in the number of apprenticeships available. I agree with that assessment. I have some evidence of the problem in Leicester. I read, for example, from a letter from the district secretary of the AUEW in Leicester. She says:
    "We have the situation where many companies are offering no apprenticeships during the coming year—1981—and companies have made apprentices redundant during their training period, which means that their whole career is destroyed, as we have been unable to find firms able to offer alternative training. This will create a vacuum in the future for skilled labour."
    That really is a case of inadequate provision being made for the country's future if and when the upturn in the economy that we are promised actually takes place.
    I then refer to the speech of the hon. Member for Melton (Mr. Latham) if only because he made some complimentary remarks about me. He made a courageous speech. It was a typically East Midlands speech in its pragmatism. He said that unemployment was intolerably high, and he also drew attention to the far deeper political problem when he said that economic assumptions would have to be questioned if the forecast figures of unemployment appeared to be coming true. That needs to
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    be said more often. It was said also by the hon. Member for Leek (Mr. Knox). It cannot be stressed too often to Ministers.
    I want now to refer in more detail to the problems that beset the East Midlands. Those of us who represent seats in the region will agree that it managed to hold out against the recession much longer than elsewhere in the United Kingdom, despite the Government's mismanagement of the economy.
    Looking at the figures for July 1980, we see that economic activity was still at a very high level. In Market Harborough unemployment was only 2.2 per cent. In Loughborough, an area to which the hon. Member for Melton referred, it was 3.5 per cent. In Northamptonshire it was 4.2 per cent. In Derbyshire it was 4.4 per cent. That prosperity has ended. In many ways the recession has hit the region with a vengeance. The watershed came in April and May 1981, when many firms appeared to lose their orders overnight. Without doubt, the East Midlands is in the worst recession that it has experienced since 1945. If anything, the slump has been more dramatic than elsewhere in the country.
    Let me illustrate that again by referring to some unemployment figures published on Tuesday of last week, which indicate that unemployment in Market Harborough has quadrupled. In Leicestershire it has almost doubled. In Northamptonshire it has increased two and a half times, from 4·2 per cent. to 10·6 per cent. In Kettering unemployment has increased from 4 per cent. to 11·6 per cent. Unemployment in Corby is 22 per cent., or almost one in four of the adult population, in the region as a whole 150,000 people are now out of work, representing an unemployment rate of 9·3 per cent.
    In addition to the unemployment figures, tens of thousands of jobs are being maintained through the temporary short-time working compensation scheme. Unfortunately—I regret saying this—many of those jobs must be considered at risk, particularly in the hosiery, clothing, footwear and engineering industries.
    It is no use Ministers, from the Prime Minister clown to the Secretary of State for Employment, pretending that in the East Midlands, of all regions, excessive wage demands and poor industrial relations are the cause of unemployment. I am sure that there would be general acceptance that the East Midlands region in general is a model of moderation in wage negotiations and wage settlements. It is also a model of good relations between management and workers.
    Grabbing trade unionists and poor industrial relations are not to blame for the problem faced by the East Midlands. Most of the problems can be placed fairly and squarely at the door of the present Administration. There is widespread dismay throughout the East Midlands region about these influences, which have brought about the region's present industrial problems.
    The influences most often quoted by both industrialists and trade unionists are the high value of the pound, interest rates, public sector charges—referred to by the hon. Member for Melton in the form of telephone charges—increasing import penetration, particularly in the textile industry and, more recently, energy costs.
    Before the Government start crowing about interest charges—the Under-Secretary of State went down that path in his speech—let me quote Mr. Patrick Radford, the regional chairman of CBI. He said:

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    "The council were disappointed generally about the Budget and stressed that some firms would lose all the benefit from the cut in minimum lending rate because of higher fuel prices."
    He also criticised the unforeseen and artificial problems caused by arbitrary Government intervention. As an example, Mr. Radford pointed out that two Derbyshire pipe suppliers—Stanton and Stavely, and Clay Cross—have seen demand plummet due to cash limits on the water and gas industries as well as a curb on public sector capital spending. He said:
    "These companies need steady demand not violent fluctuations caused by Government intervention."
    If I understood the speech by the Secretary of State for Employment at the weekend, that will raise some sympathy in his breast, because I understood that the right hon. Gentleman was now in favour of increasing public expenditure on capital projects.
    The shadow of Thatcherism hangs over the East Midlands, bringing with it more and more redundancies and higher records of unemployment. The Chancellor's Budget is looked upon at best with disdain and at worst with outright anger. However, whatever the emotional reaction to the Budget, there is a unanimity of view that it offers no solution to the region's problems and needs. In addition, all areas and all industries in the East Midlands have been affected by the recession. Unemployment in the construction industry has increased by 45 per cent. since 1979. The increase in mining and quarrying since then has been 27 per cent. But the manufacturing sector is the worst affected. Unemployment in it has increased by 137 per cent., from 21,485 in 1979 to 51,207 this year. The shrinking of the manufacturing base is the worst aspect of the recession, since if that is happening in the East Midlands it augurs ill for the country as a whole in terms of future prosperity and levels of employment.
    I deal next with one or two of the areas to which my hon. Friends and hon. Members have drawn attention. My hon. Friend the Member for Kettering (Mr. Homewood) mentioned Corby, where one in four is now unemployed because of the ending of steel making there. It ended in spite of the valiant effort by my hon. Friend and the community as a whole to try to maintain the operation. I see the Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office sitting on the Government Front Bench. Perhaps I may therefore refer to Hinckley, which is in his constituency of Bosworth. Hinckley has problems that stem largely from the problems in the West Midlands, since many of the people in Hinckley are in the Coventry travel-to-work area. Those people, like the people of Coventry, have been hit by short-time working and closures.
    The hon. Member for Lincoln (Mr. Carlisle) referred to the problems there, but I emphasise that it is heavy engineering that is having to cope with a great deal of short-time working. The hon. Member for Melton referred to the difficulties in Melton Mowbray in the hosiery and knitwear, clothing and footwear industries, but he will know that Melton Mowbray is famous for its pies and pet foods. I do not know whether there is any relationship between the two. Neither of those industries is doing particularly well.
    In Nottingham 4,000 engineering workers are on short time, and the same applies to over 2,000 engineering workers in Northampton and—I say this with particular regret—to 4,360 engineering workers in Leicester. The problems facing the hosiery and knitwear, clothing and
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    footwear industries have been described many times in the House and I do not wish to go into them at great length this evening, but unless action is taken to curb unfair competition, whether it be from the Far East, from the State trading countries or from the United States, those three industries will disappear.
    It may surprise you to know, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that many people in the East Midlands voted Tory in 1979. They did so because they lived in an area that they thought had most to benefit from the Thatcherite experiment. They thought that they would enjoy tax cuts because employment was available in plenty. They worked in small to medium-sized companies which have maintained good labour relations and invested in sufficient amounts to be able to keep up with their competitors. They are the industries that the Prime Minister said that she was pledged to support.
    In addition, the five counties comprising the East Midlands have a wide range of industry which is totally different from that of the West Midlands. Its industry covers bicycles, pharmaceuticals and high technology, and it has good communications. Only two years ago the right hon. Member for Sidcup (Mr. Heath) said in Leicester that Leicester was Britain's most successful city. One can permit politicians a little hyperbole, but that assessment was not far from the truth. He might have gone further and said that the East Midlands, of which Leicester, Nottingham and Derby are the linchpins, was the most prosperous region in Britain. The base of that prosperity is being undermined, if not destroyed, and the people of the East Midlands regret placing their trust in the Tories.
    If one could look forward to the future with confidence the sacrifice might be worth while. My hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick) referred to the document published recently by the Midlands branch of the Manpower Services Commission. That offers little optimism either for the Midlands or for the Government. It concludes that in the East Midlands there is little indication of any improvement in the current employment position. Indeed, with so many jobs maintained by the temporary short-time working compensation scheme it sees a further substantial decline in jobs. In addition, and perhaps worse from the Government's view, it foresees no recovery in production levels until 1982, and suggests that even then output will be increased with fewer workers. Young and unskilled people will be most affected. The commission underlines the inadequacy in the numbers of apprenticeships.
    I shall refer to comments which the Prime Minister has made in the past as well as comments made as recently as Saturday. The Prime Minister is fond of saying that unemployment doubled under the last Labour Government. In most parts of the East Midlands unemployment has doubled in the last 12 months. The only thing that the Government have managed to do in the last
    In a speech at Cardiff on Saturday—and it was a small meeting, even though all the Tories in Wales were there—the Prime Minister said:
    "This is the road I am resolved to follow. This is the path I must go".
    The road that she is following is strewn with bankruptcies, unemployment and the fear of unemployment. The Prime Minister continued:
    "Let's praise the Chancellor for his judgment—in tactics, flexibility; in strategy, resolution."

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    I think that that is supposed to be complimentary. If the same words were applied to the Secretary of State for Employment they would be condemnatory. We are supposed to praise the Chancellor.
    It is not up to me to comment on the Chancellor's judgment. That has been called into question on a number of occasions. Perhaps I am the least appropriate person to make that judgment. Surely "tactics" must be shorthand for unemployment. "Flexibility" must be shorthand for more unemployment, "strategy" for more and more unemployment, and "resolution" more and more and yet more unemployment.
    The road that the Prime Minister is following is the road to economic bankruptcy. I suggest, with due humility, that she takes a different road, namely, the one that leads from No. 10 to Buckingham Palace, and there submits her resignation and asks for the Dissolution of this Parliament, so that the country as a whole can pass judgment on this incompetent Conservative Government, who have visited the evil of unemployment upon us on a scale not seen in this country since the 1930s. The country would then be able to vote in a Labour Government committed to reducing the present highly unacceptable level of unemployment.
    9.42 pm
    The Under-Secretary of State for Employment (Mr. Peter Morrison): Were I to reply fully to the debate I should need to hold all the senior Offices of State. I apologise if I am unable to reply in full to all the matters that have been raised, and I assure all those who have spoken that I shall pass on their remarks to my right hon. Friends the Secretaries of State concerned.
    I begin by congratulating the hon. Member for Leicester, South (Mr. Marshall) on his first appearance at the Dispatch Box. He looked relaxed and calm—much more so than I was a few weeks ago when I was in the same position. I hope that he will continue in that role for many more occasions. I appreciate that it must be difficult for him—now that the hon. Member for Leicester, East (Mr. Bradley) has deserted his party—to make sure that all is quiet on the Western Front. It must also be difficult for him because although it is an Opposition Supply day, Labour Members have not put in an appearance to demonstrate their concern about what is a very important matter, namely, the high level of unemployment in the Midlands. There are now eight Labour Members present, and I do not believe that Labour, Conservative or Liberal supporters would consider that a particularly good turnout.
    Mr Gwilym Roberts: Will the hon. Gentleman accept that the only time we have had the opportunity to debate unemployment in the West Midlands or the Midlands has been on Supply days, in time offered by the Opposition?
    Mr. Morrison: That proves my point. This is exactly the time that one would expect to see more Labour Members present. In fact, there are twice as many Conservative Members present as there are Labour Members.
    The right hon. and learned Member for Warley, West (Mr. Archer) rightly said that this was an important debate because it concerned that part of the country which was the powerhouse and engine of Great Britain. I shall return to that matter. However, my hon. Friends the Members for Kidderminster (Mr. Bulmer) and The Wrekin (Mr.
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    Hawksley) pointed out at some length that the situation in the West and East Midlands was determined by what happened in the world. The Midlands as a whole is highly geared to manufacturing, and therefore has to look to what is happening in the world generally.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Northfield (Mr. Cadbury) put his finger on the problem. He said—I paraphrase his remarks—that the trouble was that we had stayed in the 1940s and 1950s, had not modernised enough, and were now paying the penalty. I regret to say that he is right.
    Not long ago I went to Birmingham for the day, to hear for myself what was happening. I enjoyed my visit. I was told beforehand that all was gloom and doom. However, I inquired whether it would be possible to meet some people from new businesses. During the morning, before meeting the West Midlands county council over lunch and again after lunch, I met representatives of 10 small businesses. When I asked "Flow is business?", somewhat to my surprise and certainly to the surprise of many of those accompanying me, the reply was "Very good indeed.".
    My hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington (Mr. Smith) talked about the small companies in his constituency. He talked about IBM, a new superstore, and a new hotel in Warwick. Those are the companies of the future.
    In the first two months of this year the two Midlands small firms centres received over 5,000 inquiries—an increase of 65 per cent. over the same period last year. Nearly half the inquiries related to the starting up of a new business. That is the future.
    Mr Geoffrey Robinson rose—
    Mrs. Jill Knight rose—
    Mr. Morrison: I give way to my hon. Friend.
    Mrs Knight: While he was in Birmingham, did my hon. Friend discover that, because of the duties laid upon employers, it is extremely expensive to employ people? Even the local council has people on double time on Sundays, because it is so expensive to pay all the necessary dues before it even starts to pay salaries. Did anyone raise this matter with my hon. Friend? It is a substantial point.
    Mr Morrison: Nobody raised it, but now that my hon. Friend has done so I shall—without any commitment—look into the matter.
    Mr Robinson rose—
    Mr Morrison: I shall not give way. I allowed myself 20 minutes because I knew that hon. Members wanted to make their constituency speeches.
    Not all is gloom and doom. Every month 250,000 people leave the unemployment register, and a large proportion of them come from the Midlands.
    The hon. Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Mr. Sever), who opened the debate, rightly asked "What will you do?" We have already built a bridge between the past Great Britain and the future Great Britain. That is why we have special measures, some of which are operated by the Department of Employment and others by the Manpower Services Commission.
    In the Midlands as a whole there are just over 181,000 people benefiting from the temporary short-time working compensation scheme. In the West Midlands there are 5,252 people benefiting from the job release scheme, and

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    there are 4,520 people benefiting from it in the East Midlands. Between last April and 28 February, 36,310 people in the West Midlands and 17,290 in the East Midlands benefited from the youth opportunities programme. Therefore, to suggest that we do nothing is to give entirely the wrong impression.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Melton (Mr. Latham) asked about the youth opportunities programme. I am told that on 12 March there were still 16 young people living in Melton Mowbray who had not had a YOP offer. However, the local employment officer was very hopeful that they would receive an offer by Easter. I hope that that gives my hon. Friend some indication of what is happening in his constituency.
    But more important than the special measures—although they in themselves are desperately important—is what is happening in terms of real jobs. I do not know whether Labour Members heard the good news today. It was announced that an agreement had been reached on one of the largest export projects ever won by the United Kingdom—the sale of a very large coal-fired power station to Hong Kong, worth at least £550 million. This deal will provide about 34,000 man-years of work in United Kingdom firms, including over 6,000 man-years in the West Midlands. That is thanks to a partnership between industry, the Government and the City. I know that the City is not very popular with Labour Members—
    Mr. Sever: Obviously, any opportunities which are given to those seeking work in the Midlands are to be welcomed, and we welcome them. But will the Minister address himself to the essential underlying problem, which is that, notwithstanding the schemes that the Government are operating, there are still thousands of young people who, having gone through these schemes, discover that they are unable to find what he calls a real job at the end of it?
    Mr. Morrison: I should not have given way, because I shall be coming to that part a little later.
    With regard to the Government's help to the Midlands—
    Mr. Michael English: What about the East Midlands?
    Mr. Morrison: The hon. Member for Nottingham, West (Mr. English) has not been in the debate all day. I have been talking about the East Midlands and will mention it again.
    We have two enterprise zones, one in Corby and one in Dudley. I am sorry that the Liberal Party is not entirely enthusiastic about enterprise zones. That is a pity. In theory it should be, with its traditions. We have an inner city partnership scheme in Birmingham and a programme authority scheme in Wolverhampton, with the inner city partnership giving £14·8 million of taxpayers' money and the programme authority in Wolverhampton giving £2·8 million. To me, that denotes that we are—[Interruption.] It appears that Labour Members do not like the idea of the Government helping in this way. That is fine by me, but they should know that many of their constituents like the idea.
    My hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin quite understandably raised the issue of Telford. He also
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    requested assisted area status for his constituency. I know—as my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Industry pointed out—that my hon. Friend is bringing a delegation to discuss this matter. As he will appreciate, I cannot give any commitment from the Dispatch Box, but I am sure that my hon. Friends from the Department of Industry and the Secretary of State for Industry have noted the forceful way in which he put his case and have listened very carefully to it.
    Earlier in the day there was a good deal of talk about the manifesto of the 364 economists. I am always rather bamboozled by economists. They remind me of the sort of person who, when one has lost a telephone number, says "I will give you a guesstimate". I looked at the list of people who signed the manifesto and I came across the name of Lord Balogh—
    Miss Boothroyd: There are other names.
    Mr Morrison: As a certain celebrated lady said. "He would, wouldn't he?"
    Then I came across the name of Lord Kaldor. Again, "He would, wouldn't he?"
    The funny thing is that they did not agree on what should be done but only on what should not be done. When we consider the policies that have been pursued as a result of their promotion over the last 20 years we know why we are where we are today. Mr. Samuel Brittan, who is by no means an uncritical admirer of the Government, said in today's edition of the Financial Times that the attack on the Government's policies by 364 academic economists
    "was the best possible sign that these policies might be right after all…policy which has alienated so many of the great and the good is unlikely to be entirely wrong."
    The high pound has been discussed at some length, but Opposition Members did not mention the fact that as a result of the high pound several manufacturing companies in their constituencies can buy raw materials at a very much reduced price. They also failed to mention that during the expansion of the German and Japanese economies a high deutschemark and a high yen were in evidence. I do not know what the low pound did for the Labour Government. It sank to the equivalent of ․1·56. It did not seem to do much for them.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington spoke at some length about overmanning. I wholeheartedly concurred with him when he said that he could not put the blame entirely in any one place. He said that the situation could be the fault of management, of trade unions, and even of the Government. I agree with that. It is utterly pointless to say who was wrong. We were all wrong. Therefore, let us look to the future.
    Mr Dudley Smith: I am sorry to interrupt my hon. Friend's penetrating analysis. I understand that I was castigated by the hon. Member for Leicester, South (Mr. Marshall) for not being present throughout the whole of his diatribe. Does my hon. Friend realise that nearly all the Conservative Members who represent the Midlands have been in the Chamber throughout our proceedings? There has been a thin sprinkling of hon. Members on the Socialist Benches. One Liberal Member has been present, who is not taken too seriously, namely, our old friend the hon. Member for Isle of Ely (Mr. Freud). There has been no one to speak on behalf of the Social Democrats.
    Mr Morrison: My hon. Friend may know that I have already made that point. The hon. Member for

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    Birmingham, Perry Barr (Mr. Rooker) said that he had read a CBI report to the effect that there would be a permanent pool of 2 million unemployed people. How would the Labour Party operate? How would it pay for the expansion that it promotes?
    Mr. Geoffrey Robinson rose—
    Mr. Morrison: If Labour Members want to print money they should bear in mind that it means inflation and fewer jobs. If they wish to tax more they should realise that there will be less incentive for investment and for business. How will they do it?
    Mr. Robinson rose—
    Mr. Morrison: The hon. Member for Ladywood asked for a reduction in the minimum lending rate. Since last November four points have been knocked off the minimum lending rate. Those four points mean £1·4 billion back in the economy. The hon. Gentleman may say that that is not enough, but how could the Government fund their borrowing requirement if they were to slash interest rates? The hon. Gentleman may say that he knows the answer, but I believe that the Government's policy is right. It would be a disaster—
    Mr. Sever rose—
    Mr. Morrison: The hon. Gentleman should know that the right hon. Member for Huyton (Sir H. Wilson) and the deputy leader of the Labour Party said at the Dispatch Box that spending one's way out does not work. The hon. Gentleman and his hon. Friends now suggest that they should spend their way out.
    My hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-West (Mr. Budgen) talked about the Nissan car company, which has decided to invest in Great Britain. At least, we hope that it has, and that it will not be frightened away. Surely that is the greatest compliment that could be paid to the Government's policies. I am sorry that the Shadow Secretary of State for Industry does not want the company here. I understand that some Opposition Members would like it to see it in the West Midlands. The fact that a major Japanese motor car manufacturer would like to come to this country proves that perhaps we have more advantages than France, Germany, Italy and other—
    It being Ten o'clock, the motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put

    BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
    Ordered,
    That, at this day's sitting, the Parliamentary Commissioner (Consular Complaints) Bill[Lords] may be proceeded with, though opposed, until any hour.—[Lord James Douglas-Hamilton.]

    Parliamentary Commissioner (Consular Complaints) Bill [Lords]
    Not amended (in the Standing Committee), considered
    10 pm
    The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr. Peter Blaker): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
    The essential purpose of the Bill, in the words of the long title, is
    "to extend the circumstances in which complaints about consular actions can be made under the Parliamentary Commissioner Act 1967."
    It is a short Bill, but I should like briefly to trace the background to its introduction.
    When the office of the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration was created in 1967 the actions of British officials overseas were specifically excluded from the Commissioner's scrutiny under schedule 3(2) of the Parliamentary Commissioner Act 1967. Complaints by British citizens resident overseas were also excluded under section 6(4) of the Act.
    In its fourth report for the 1977–78 Session the Select Committee on the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration recorded the conclusions of its review of methods of access to and the jurisdiction of the Parliamentary Commissioner. One of the conclusions was:
    "The Commissioner should be able to investigate complaints by British citizens about assistance requested from consular offices and overseas posts, including complaints by British citizens resident abroad."
    The Labour Government accepted the first part of that recommendation, and the Parliamentary Commissioner Order 1979 brought within the Commissioner's jurisdiction
    "action which is taken by an officer (not being an honorary consular officer) in the exercise of a consular function on behalf of the Government of the United Kingdom and which is so taken in relation to a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies who has the right of abode in the United Kingdom."
    Until the Government's nationality proposals have been enacted into law, the term "British citizen" will be imprecise as a legal term. Therefore, it was necessary to spell out in the Parliamentary Commissioner Order 1979 exactly what was intended. That accounts for the reference to
    "a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies who has the right of abode in the United Kingdom."
    Similar considerations apply to the Bill and account for the similar language in it.
    The 1979 order thus gave effect to the first part of the Select Committee's recommendation by bringing within the Parliamentary Commissioner's jurisdiction consular complaints by citizens of the United Kingdom and colonies with the right of abode and resident in the United Kingdom who are travelling abroad. It did not and could not—because a separate Act was required—bring within the Parliamentary Commissioner's jurisdiction consular complaints by citizens of the United Kingdom and colonies with the right of abode in the United Kingdom but resident abroad, which was the second part of the Select Committee's recommendation.
    The purpose of the Bill is to give effect to the second part of the recommendation. There is only one operative clause namely, clause 1, which amends section 6(4) of the
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    Parlamentary Commissioner Act 1967 so as to permit complaints to be made about consular actions overseas where the aggrieved person, although not a resident in the United Kingdom, is a citizen of the United Kingdom and colonies and has the right of abode in the United Kingdom.
    This small Bill has been the subject of a certain amount of debate during its earlier stages. That debate was largely concerned with the question how far we should extend the right that is given by the Bill—for example, whether we should extend it to the citizens of the United Kingdom and colonies with the right of abode, as the Bill does, or whether we should extend it further. I emphasise that the Bill extends the right of complaint to the Commissioner to those who do not have the right at present. I hope, therefore, that the House will accept it as the generous liberalising measure that it is and will welcome it.
    The Bill is not restrictive. It does not take away any rights already held by anyone. On the contrary, it extends the right to appeal to the Commissioner to about 3 million more people who do not now have it. It is worth noting that the majority of these people residing overseas, although citizens of the United Kingdom and colonies, are not United Kingdom taxpayers. Although they are entitled to British consular protection, they make little or no financial contribution to the maintenance of the Government, who supply that protection and maintain the office of the Commissioner to whom these 3 milllion people are to be given the right of appeal. However, these 3 million have close connections with the country—often close family connections. We think it right that they should be able to appeal to the Commissioner on any consular maladministration from which they claim to have suffered injustice.
    Labour Members have argued that other categories of person—namely, all citizens of the United Kingdom and colonies, whether that citizenship is acquired through a connection with the United Kingdom or with a present or former dependent territory, as well as British protected persons and British subjects without citizenship—should have the right of complaining against any alleged injustice that they feel they may have suffered at the hands of a career consular official. That would extend the right of complaint to a further 4 million, making a total extension of 7 million. The extra 4 million would have, in general, less connection with the United Kingdom than the 3 million who will be covered by the Bill, and many of them might have no connection with the United Kingdom apart from the mere fact of citizenship.
    We think that that would be going too far. We have to draw a line somewhere, and we think it right to draw the line at citizens of the United Kingdom and colonies with the right of abode. Paragraph 11 of the Government's observations on the fourth report from the Select Committee on the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration, Cmnd. 7449, states:
    "The Government are also prepared to consider whether the Commissioner's jurisdiction should be extended to cover complaints by citizens of the UK and Colonies travelling or resident abroad, provided that the action complained of was taken in respect of a citizen who has the right of abode in this country (ie a patrial)."
    That is the test that we have adopted. I draw the attention of the House to the fact that the reply to the fourth report was published in January 1979. Therefore, it was published by the Labour Government. We think that they

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    were right in drawing the line at that point. We take the same view, and that view is the one to which the Bill gives effect. I ask the House to support the Bill.
    10.9 pm
    Mr. Roland Moyle: The Opposition welcome the extension of the Ombudsman's jurisdiction to the consular services, and from that point of view we wish the Bill a favourable remaining career in the House. That is likely to be brief. As the Minister said, we have grave reservations about the restrictions of the right of complaint to those with the right of abode. Those are our old friends the patrials, as we mentioned in Committee. If we are talking about consistency, I remind the Minister that when we were debating the Immigration Act 1971, the Labour Party opposed the concept of patriality, and we have always been against it.
    As the Minister said, in Committee we put on record that we want all groups connected with the United Kingdom and who might use the consular services with a view to settling in the United Kingdom to have the right of complaint to the Ombudsman. We moved an amendment to that effect which the Government rejected. The Government must bear in mind that many of these people, who may not be taxpayers in the United Kingdom, may become taxpayers in the future and, possibly, voters as well.
    The debate in Committee allowed us to probe a number of problems. There is, however, one group to which we alluded whose problem seemed substantial. I regret that not only did the Minister avoid dealing with that group in Committee but, despite the fact that he was given notice about our concern, he has failed to deal with it again now. I refer to the East African Asians, especially the group which resides in India. The Minister did not refer to them, and, as the Bill is now likely to be passed, that group will be excluded from making representations to the Ombudsman. The result is that the injustices from which they are suffering—to which I shall refer later—will continue to be perpetrated.
    I shall outline the problem briefly. A number of Asians lived in East Africa before that part of the world was granted independence. When independence came, it was felt that the Asians might be under pressure from the indigenous Africans after independence because they held positions of modest privilege in those societies. They performed a number of services and some were independent business men. Again, I mention consistency. The late lain Macleod promised them British passports and entry into this country on independence as a way of assuaging their fears that they might be under some pressure.
    By 1968 those fears had become reality, but at that stage the United Kingdom felt that it could admit those Asians only at a rate with which we could cope, so a quota of special vouchers was imposed on those groups. Under pressure, some of those Asians went back to India, which took them on the basis that ultimately this country would admit them. The quota for Asians, whether they came from East Africa or were living in India, was 1,500 per annum. In 1972 that was increased to 3,500 per annum. In 1975 the number was increased to 5,000 per annum. The latest increase allowed the East African queues to evaporate.
    Unfortunately, the queues of Asians living in India who were connected with East Africa still remain. I do not
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    know what the quota was for those groups of intending arrivals. It might have been 500 per annum, but the figure has never been quoted. As a result of the Bill, if it is passed in the form in which it stands, the problems of that group are likely to be unalleviated because of the lack of any ability to complain to the Ombudsman.
    The quota for East Africa and India is not being taken up. In 1968, the quota was 1,500 per annum and slightly more than 1,000 heads of households, who may or may not have brought all or part of their families with them, were admitted. In 1972 the quota was 3,500 and 3,260 were admitted. In 1975 the quota was increased to 5,000 and 3,789 were admitted. That increase in the quota led to the evaporation of the East African queues. Since then, there has been a rapid fall in the number of Asians being admitted to this country as compared with the quotas. In 1979, the last year for which we have figures, the quota was 5,000 and only 1,604 heads of households were admitted. There was a big gap between the quota and the number of admissions.
    There is plenty of slack in the scheme, yet there is a lengthening waiting list in India. For example, in 1977 families had to wait three years to be admitted to this country under the quota. By 1978 the waiting time was four years, by 1979 it was four years and nine months, last year it was five years and two months and this year it was estimated to be five and a half years.
    We should like to know whether the lengthening waiting list is a matter of Government policy. There is large-scale unemployment in the United Kingdom, and against that background and, possibly, in the belief that the groups in India should be encouraged to settle there, the Government may have taken a deliberate decision to slow down the rate of admission. On the other hand, it may be due to consular inefficiency.
    If it is the first reason, we shall know where we stand. This is not the time to debate that decision, but it could be debated on another stage. However, if consular inefficiency is the cause, that situation will be perpetuated by the passage of the Bill, because access to the Ombudsman is not being extended to those groups in India and they will be ragarded by many people as suffering a considerable injustice.
    The whole problem is not a matter of mere impatience on the part of those concerned. The waiting list is extending so rapidly that it is becoming a self-perpetuating list. A number of applications are being made by young people who, if applications had been dealt with earlier, would have been regarded as coming here as part of a family on its voucher. They now have to be dealt with as separate cases.
    For example, Mrs. B, a widow, applied for a voucher in 1975, when she had as dependants four daughters aged 21, 19, 17 and 8 and a son aged 13. If she had been issued with a voucher promptly, the five children would have qualified for entry certificates as her dependants, but by the time she is issued with a voucher this year the two oldest daughters will be over 25 and will require vouchers in their own right, for which they lodged applications in 1975 in order to safeguard their positions.
    There is uncertainty. In 1978, people founded plans on the basis of a four-year waiting list. They find that this year the waiting list has extended to five and a half years. That may be the result of consular inefficiency. We have to assume that that is so in the absence of any Government statement to the contrary. But there can be no complaint

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    to the Ombudsman as a result of that. We are under a compulsion, by our agreement with the Indian Government, eventually to admit all these people if they so wish.
    As a result of an administrative decision, vouchers are issued in India on the basis of first come, first served. They could have been issued, as in East Africa, on the basis of priority categories so that those in the most vulnerable position were given the first chance of coming to this country. This might have been an issue that the Ombudsman could have examined if the Bill had been amended in the way that we wanted.
    The result of the manner in which the scheme is administered is that families are prevented from travelling to the United Kingdom as a unit. This often means that more than one of the limited number of vouchers is used for getting each family to this country. If the scheme was administered in another way, only one voucher for each family would be needed. There are one or two examples of cases of that sort. Mrs. D, a widow, wrote to the British deputy high commissioner in Bombay in October 1978.
    Mr John Page: What name?
    Mr. Moyle: Mrs. D, a widow. I am not declaring the actual name. Mrs. D wrote to the British deputy high commissioner in Bombay in October 1978. She said:
    "When I applied for a voucher, my son's name was included as a dependant though his age at that time was above 18 years. I am now advised that as he is above 18 years of age, he will have to apply separately. Will you please guide me in the matter and let me know whether he will have to apply separately?"
    The reply was:
    "The decision is up to your son if he wishes to apply. It is not compulsory in any way."
    The use of such opaque language might have been regarded by some as consular inefficiency that required investigation by the Ombudsman. In the form in which the Bill is likely to be passed, that sort of complaint to the Ombudsman is excluded.
    Mr E applied for a voucher in April 1975. He listed as his dependants two sons, then aged 17 and 18, and daughter. Two older sons and a daughter were already settled in the United Kingdom. He received his voucher in January 1980 but his sons, then aged 22 and 23, were refused entry on the ground that they were no longer dependent, although only one had taken occasional work. Both sons were left behind. As a result, three vouchers will be used to admit a single family whereas one would have been sufficient at the time of application.
    The other problems are legion. Medical examination can be conducted only at Bombay, about 260 to 500 miles from the main emigration areas. A visit there can entail a stay of a week in Bombay and can cost intending emigrants to this country about £500. If they go to East Africa, they may be told that they can apply for a voucher only in India. Three different overlapping forms have to be filled in. Ninety per cent. of the applications to come to this country originate in Gujarat, but the register of applications is held in Delhi. There are complaints about delays in the issue of passports. A valid passport and the issue of an entry voucher are required as a condition for admission to this country.
    There are complaints that letters are not replied to. The British High Commission says that this is due to the
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    unreliability of the post in India. If the Bill had been passed in a different form, a complaint about all these matters could have been made to the Ombudsman.
    A high standard of proof of identity is now required by our consular services in India in administering the scheme. Whether such a high standard of proof should be required is a proper field of investigation for the Ombusdman with a view to deciding whether there has been maladministration due to over-elaboration and over-perfection. That will now be precluded if the Bill passes in the form in which it now comes before the House.
    It would have been interesting to hear the Government's justification for lack of provision for complaints to the Ombudsman for this group of people in view of the large number of complaints about the manner in which the scheme is administered originating from East African Asians, who have decided to reside, temporarily in many cases, in India. So far, the only explanations have been that of cost and that, if people are encouraged to complain, they will cease to accept injustice and will begin to complain. Both those reasons have only to be stated to be shown to be totally invalid. They cannot be accepted by the Opposition.
    10.25 pm
    Mr. Greville Janner: The Bill introduces a new, important and very useful provision. The Opposition are only sad that its applicability is limited so that amongst the people who need it most are those who will get it least.
    My right hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham, East (Mr. Moyle) talked a great deal about the problems of the citizens of East Africa who are unable to make use of the provisions of the Bill specifically because of the exclusion that the person—
    Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bernard Weatherill): Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. and learned Member so early in his speech and I did not pull up the right hon. Member for Lewisham, East (Mr. Moyle) when he made mention of these matters, but strictly on Third Reading we ought to stick to what is in the Bill and not draw attention to provisions which might have been in it if other things had happened.
    Mr Janner: I hope that I have not given the impression that I was drawing attention to any words which did not appear in the Bill. The new subsection (5)(b) provides that a complaint may be entertained only where
    "the person aggrieved is a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies who, under section 2 of the Immigration Act 1971, has the right of abode in the United Kingdom."
    My complaint is that many of my constituents are citizens of the United Kingdom with the right of abode here but that many of their families are citizens of the United Kingdom by right—they are entitled to come here—but at the moment have no right of abode in the United Kingdom.
    As the Minister said, the Bill restricts the use of these new rights and, until the Government's proposals are enacted, the terms will remain imprecise. The Government's proposals to which the Minister referred are those in the new British Nationality Bill, which the Opposition regard as divisive, unfair, uncivilised, unreasonable, unkind and totally lacking in the sort of compassion which is introduced into our law by clause 1 of this Bill. In other words, here is an enactment which is

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    intended to create a compassionate arrangement to enable people to complain about the acts and omissions of servants of the Crown but which prevents such complaints from being made by the very people who are most likely to need to make them—people who are not able to comply with the rules because their right of abode is restricted by current legislation which will be made much worse by legislation which is on its way.
    A person has the right of abode: that means quite simply the right, as of the time of complaint, to reside here. A person will have the right to abide in this country when he is here in accordance with the rules and because the consular officials have exercised their powers in the proper manner. On the other hand, until those officials exercise their powers in a proper manner, these people have no right to abide here. Therefore, there is a deliberate exclusion from these rights of the very people to whom they are most applicable in compassion but not in law.
    In the good city of Leicester we have about 60,000 Asians, most of whom are Gujaratis and most of whom do not initially come with all of their families. As a result, an aggrieved person left behind will not, in accordance with the terms of the Bill as it stands, be able to complain to the new Ombudsman. I have visited India many times, and I have been deeply concerned at the lack of compassion in our rules and the way in which no swift right of complaint is currently provided. I understand that that is what the Bill is about. There are cases in my constituency of people who have been waiting six or seven years to come here. They have the right, as citizens, to come here, but until they arrive they have no right of abode as described by the Bill.
    These people would have had the right to complain about their treatment, but that right is being specifically excluded by this otherwise excellent Bill. I cannot see why we give a right with one hand while taking it away with the other for so many of our citizens who should be entitled to it. Once a person is a citizen in this country he should have the same rights as every other citizen, whether or not he was born here. If he has the right to be a citizen of this country he should have the right to bring his family here under our law. If his family is being messed around by consular officials, as sometimes happens, those people should have the right to complain, not here but where they are suffering. That is all that we are saying.
    Whilst reading of the right of abode I was reminded of that marvellous hymn:
    "Abide with me; fast falls the eventide"
    But until people have the right to abide with me they will not have the right to complain that they are not allowed to abide with me. Our law is being made increasingly and excessively unkind, and to lack in compassion, by the very measure that the Government are rightly bringing in to increase rights. In those circumstances I beg the Minister to reconsider this exclusion so as to give the right to the people who need it so badly.
    10.33 pm
    Mr. John Page: I came here this evening to congratulate, in a mild way, my hon. Friend the Minister on his sensible and wide Bill. I am surprised at the tone of the speeches by Labour Members. The right hon. Member for Lewisham, East (Mr. Moyle) delivered a speech that, when read in Hansard, will show up the diamond-hard, critical brutality of his words, which far belie the decency and general good sense of his personality
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    and the way in which he addressed the House. I hope that by speaking as I do I shall make a less strong cocktail of the vitriol of his speech. He talked about the Bill being a defence against unemployment in the United Kingdom—
    Mr. Moyle: I speculated that the reason for the Government's policy might be to protect the employment market in this country, but I did not advance the idea that that was the reason behind the Bill.
    Mr Page: The impression that the right hon. Member gave in his intervention is exactly the impression with which I was left when he originally spoke. He makes a kind of a smear. He says "I would not dream of smearing the Government by saying that they might be considering that the Bill might have a certain effect." It is unworthy of the right hon. Gentleman. He adopted an academic approach to the Bill.
    The right of abode is what the Bill and so much other legislation is concerned with. Nationality is secondary to right of abode. The Government and the Minister have got it absolutely right. Patriality should be the touchstone on which the Bill is based.
    If the suggestion by the right hon. Member for Lewisham, East were accepted, a full-time ombudsman would have to be attached to every consulate in Asia, because every person who applied to abide in Britain would have the right to appeal to an ombudsman.
    An ombudsman is not a person in the slips but a long-stop near the boundary. It is easy for hon. Members to send a dicey case to the ombudsman, but that is an unfair use of the ombudsman. All the arguments presented tonight contrary to the spirit of the Bill do not carry much weight.
    The right hon. Member for Lewisham, East made a most dishonourable and uncharacteristic attribution to the Government. He suggested that when the Government legislate they should take into consideration the fact that some people whom he suggests are being legislated against might in future become voters in this country. He suggested that that Government, whom I so wholeheartedly support, especially in the configuration of my hon. Friend the Minister, should demean themselves by going vote catching in the Orient among people who might dream of coming here in the future.
    That is the blank cheque that Labour Members offer. They say that any one of the 3,000 million people who, up to 1945, were entitled to a right of abode here, should be able to say "Oh, come on. If you do not let us in we will apply to the Ombudsman and gain entry."
    The more that I heard today in the debate, the more I was reinforced in my confidence in the Bill as it stands and in its presentation by the Minister. Everything that has been said by the Opposition has reinforced my confidence.
    10.39 pm
    Mr. Reg Race: The House has not had an opportunity to consider the Bill before, because it was in a Second Reading Committee upstairs. We have not had a debate on the Floor about its merits.
    In Committee upstairs the Opposition put forward a reasoned amendment to include those who are excluded by clause 1. In his speech tonight my right hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham, East (Mr. Moyle) referred quite properly to the biggest and most important group who are excluded by the Bill from going to the Parliamentary

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    Commissioner. It ill becomes the Minister to tell us that we are not concerned with the mere fact of nationality, and that we should be concerned only with patriality. British subjects without the right of abode—in East Africa, India, Pakistan, or anywhere else—who apply to enter the United Kingdom and are shabbily treated by immigration officers or consular officials, in Delhi, Bombay or anywhere else, should have the right to go to the Ombudsman.
    This is the first chance that the House has had to vote on the issue. I welcome the Bill because of its extension of facilities for United Kingdom citizens resident abroad, but because it excludes that large group of people who often have legitimate grievances against British consular officials, I shall vote against its Third Reading.
    The Government have not made out a proper case for drawing the line where they have. In Committee the Minister made it clear that the Government were drawing the line between patrials and non-patrials. Not a scrap of justification was put forward for that. Tonight the hon. Gentleman quoted the arguments of the Select Committee and the Government's response in previous years. On neither occasion was the House given any reason why the line should be drawn between patrials and non-patrials.
    The Opposition must be forgiven if they are a little suspicious about that distinction. Many of us believe that it is a racialist distinction. I believe that with a Bill of this kind, extending only to patrials the right to go to the Ombudsman, the Government are legislating on a racialist basis.
    Mr George Foulkes: Does not the fact that the Bill has been dealt with in the way that it has increase my hon. Friend's suspicion? It indicates that the Government have been trying to sneak it through without any real discussion on the Floor of the House.
    Mr Race: I agree. It was a mistake to send the Bill upstairs. I believe that the Government were trying to sneak it through on the quiet, without anyone noticing the terms of clause 1. Our public duty now is to make it clear that the Bill gives a right to some people but does not extend it to everyone who should have it. The Government should take the Bill away and return with one that simply extends to patrials and non-patrials alike the right to go to the Ombudsman.
    The people who are excluded from the Bill are more in need of protection by the Parliamentary Commissioner than are some of those who are included. Those who are eligible as British subjects without the right of abode, who can apply for a special voucher, are in an administrative maze. They have no right of appeal, because the special voucher system is not in the immigration rules. It is an administrative scheme, devised by the Government and administered by civil servants. Nobody covered by that scheme has any statutory right.
    I believe that Parliament has a duty to protect those people when civil servants or consular officials make mistakes, when passports are mislaid, or when people are asked to go 500 miles when the whole thing could be done by post. They also need protection when medical examinations are called for unnecessarily, or when they have to travel unnecessarily to Bombay.
    On Friday evening I was visited by a constituent who had relatives in India who had applied for a special voucher and wanted to get an entry certificate to come as
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    visitors while waiting for their special voucher. They had been waiting five and a half years for the special voucher, and were asked by consular officials to go to New Delhi on three occasions simply to be interviewed for an entry certificate. At the end, they were refused. If that had been about the special voucher application, it would have been exactly the kind of case that ought to be considered by the Ombudsman. Those people should have the right to go to the Ombudsman if they believe that they have been shabbily treated by consular officials.
    I do not believe that many people would exercise that function, or that our constituents would go to the Parliamentary Commissioner, whether in England, Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland, on a frivolous basis. But it must be realised that everybody in the United Kingdom, whether a United Kingdom citizen or not, has the right to go to the Ombudsman. Under the 1967 Act, everybody who is resident in the United Kingdom—that is the only qualification—has the right to go to the Parliamentary Commissioner. That includes aliens, Commonwealth citizens, United Kingdom citizens, and everybody else.
    The principle embodied in the 1967 Act is an important one, which ought to be defended, and we should extend that right to United Kingdom citizens living abroad, whether they are patrials or not.
    Mr Patrick Cormack: I thought that there was something phoney in the hon. Gentleman's argument, so I looked at the Standing Orders. I notice, under Standing Order No. 66(1), that if 20 hon. Members had objected to the Bill being taken upstairs in Committee it would have had to be taken on the Floor of the House. Why are we having all this synthetic vitriol? Opposition Members could have had a Second Reading debate on the Floor of the House if they had wished.
    Mr Race: These matters are not considered by the House as such; they are considered, as we are all aware by the two Front Benches. I am not making any criticism of my right hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham, East in this regard, because he clearly understood the principle involved in the Bill. All that I am saying is that the agreement to take the Bill upstairs in Committee arose because it was thought by the Government that it would go through on the nod and would not be objected to by hon. Members.
    The argument put forward by the hon. Member for Staffordshire, South-West (Mr. Cormack) does not for one moment undermine the basic point that we have been arguing, namely, that the Bill does not extend rights to people who should have them. Whatever the Standing Orders of the House may say, we are now exercising our right to make those points clear, and I believe that the right that we have now—
    Mr. Cormack: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. As I understand the position, the only arguments that are totally in order on Third Reading are extremely narrow. The hon. Gentleman and his hon. Friends could have had a debate on Second Reading had they wished it. The hon. Gentleman is now attempting to have a Second Reading debate on Third Reading, and I submit that he is out of order.
    Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bryant Godman Irvine): If I hear the hon. Member for Wood Green (Mr. Race) dealing with something that is not in the Bill, action will be taken.
    Mr. Race: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I am trying to confine my remarks specifically to clause 1. The objections to the clause are so substantial that I hope that my hon. Friends will vote against the Bill. The Government ought to take it away, look at it again, and bring back a Bill that gives the rights to patrials and non-patrials alike.
    In the Second Reading Committee I made it clear—as did my right hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham, East—that we were in favour of the principle of extending to patrials the right to go to the Parliamentary Commissioner. There can be no doubt whatever that we are in favour of the extension of this liberalising legislation, but we do not think that it goes far enough or that the Government have made any case whatever for drawing the line where they have. I hope, therefore, that my hon. Friends will join me in the Lobby in opposing the Third Reading.
    10.49 pm
    Mr. Patrick Cormack: It should go on record that neither the hon. Member for Wood Green (Mr. Race) nor any of his colleagues made the attempt that they could easily have made to have the Second Reading taken on the Floor of the House. Opposition Members had no need to rely on the usual channels; they could have included their names on a motionron the Order Paper.
    Secondly, if Opposition Members had felt that the Bill was deficient in any respect they could have tabled amendments on Report. They did not do that. I suggest that the opposition is spurious, and that the Bill deserves a speedy Third Reading.
    10.50 pm
    Mr. Blaker: With the leave of the House, I shall reply to the debate. The right hon. Member for Lewisham, East (Mr. Moyle) made several complaints about the United Kingdom passport holders' scheme. That subject was taken up by his hon. Friends and seems to have been their main theme. I gained the impression that the right hon. Gentleman was complaining about the scheme as a whole and the way in which it is administered. He knows that it is an administrative and discretionary scheme. It was introduced by the Labour Party when it was in power in the 1960s. It was continued by the Conservative Government of the early 1970s and by the Labour Government of the late 1970s. It has been continued by this Government.
    If the right hon. Gentleman wishes to complain about the operation of the scheme he should remember that he could have suggested in the 1960s that the Labour Government should adopt something different. If, by the early 1970s, the Labour Party had had second thoughts it could have changed the scheme. It is interesting that it is only when the Labour Party is not in power that the right hon. Gentleman appears to have doubts about the management of the scheme.
    Mr Moyle: The hon. Gentleman has misunderstood my remarks. I am not criticising the policy. We are discussing complaints to the Ombudsman, who has no say about policy. We are talking about the growing evidence of maladministration of the scheme, which the Ombudsman could have done something to correct. I refer
    122
    to the lengthening waiting queues and to the great gap between the number of vouchers applied for and the much larger number of vouchers issuable under the quota.
    Mr Blaker: I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for that clarification. Together with several other hon. Members, he referred to a report recently issued by the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants. It is an important document. It has been referred to Ministers and is being studied by them. They will reach their conclusions on it at the appropriate time and in the appropriate way. I have read the whole of that interesting document. However, it is for my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary to deal with the document, as he is primarily involved.
    I turn to the question whether special voucher applicants should be included in the Bill. I refer to persons who have never resided in the United Kingdom and who do not have the right of abode, because they lack a sufficiently close connection with this country. They therefore fall on the other side of the line. Indeed, it is right to draw that line. It is true that they do not have a right of appeal. Under neither Labour nor Conservative Governments have they had a right of appeal.
    I repeat something that was implicit in my earlier remarks, namely, that this is not the right forum in which to propose that such persons should have the right of appeal. If, as the hon. Member for Wood Green (Mr. Race) apparently believes, there is a case for having a right of appeal, it should not be given in this Bill but should be given in some other way. No doubt the hon. Member will make representations, if he thinks it right, to my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary.
    I come back to the point that in 1979 the Labour Government, in their reply to the Select Committee's report, took the same view as we have taken about where the line should be drawn. That reply included the word "patrial", which Opposition Members appear to dislike.
    Mr Foulkes: The Minister is confusing a right of appeal with a complaint of maladministration. Will he try to separate the two things in his mind, because they are completely different?
    Mr. Blaker: I am clear in my mind. The right to go to the Ombudsman is a form of appeal. But that form of appeal is not the right form of appeal, if there be such a thing, for United Kingdom passport holders.
    The hon. and learned Member for Leicester, West (Mr. Janner) referred to the British Nationality Bill. That, again, is outside the scope of this Bill. If he has views on the British Nationality Bill, no doubt he will take the opportunity to express them when it comes back to the Floor of the House.
    The hon. and learned Gentleman referred to the alleged lack of compassion of the Bill. He said that the Bill was "increasingly unkind".
    Mr John Page: Is the hon. and learned Gentleman listening?
    Mr. Blaker: This is a liberalising Bill. We are giving the right of appeal to the Ombudsman to an extra 3 million people. We are doing what the Labour Government intended to do if they had remained in office. I wonder whether, if they were in power now, the hon. and learned Gentleman would have taken the same view on what would have been an identical Bill.

    123
    I turn with relief to the speech made by my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow, West (Mr. Page). It was a breath of—
    Mr. Foulkes: Fresh air.
    Mr Blaker: —sanity. My hon. Friend agreed that the right of abode was the right test. I congratulate him on taking that view. I hope that he is not too put off by the fact that that was the view taken by the Labour Party before it was converted to its present view.
    The hon. Member for Wood Green objected that there had been no Second Reading debate on the Floor of the House. As my hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire, South-West (Mr. Cormack) pointed out, if 20 hon. Members had risen in their places they could have insisted on a Second Reading debate here. Surely, Opposition Members are not so supine as to rise in their places only when their Whips tell them to do so.
    Mr Foulkes: The hon. Gentleman is provoking us now.
    Mr Blaker: We realise that there are problems in the Opposition's ranks. If, however, 20 Opposition Members had felt strongly enough at the relevant time, they could have insisted on there being a Second Reading debate on the Floor of the House.
    The hon. Member for Wood Green asked why the line is drawn where it is. We discussed this matter in Committee upstairs, as he knows, because he took part in the debate. One of the reasons is the possible burden on staff overseas. We do not know what burden will be cast on them by the addition of 3 million people to those who are entitled to claim under the Bill.
    Mr Moyle: If our amendment had been carried, the number entitled to use the consular services would not have been increased. The same number would have been entitled to use the consular services after the Bill was on the statute book as before. Therefore, the number of complaints would not be increased, unless the hon. Gentleman is asserting that there are those who do not complain because they cannot get their complaint properly registered.
    Mr Blaker: The potential number who could complain to the Ombudsman would be increased by 4 million. We should beware of so burdening our staffs overseas that they become even more under pressure than at present.
    The hon. Member for Wood Green said that there is an element of racialism in the Bill. That I refute. That is nonsense. I shall continue to say that we are adopting the same criterion as the previous Administration. That should make the hon. Gentleman pause. The Bill applies to all, irrespective of race or colour.
    Mr Race: It does not.
    Mr Blaker: As, historically, Britain has been inhabited by people of white race, it is inevitable that there should be more white people than other races with the right of abode. For the same reason, African countries, for example, have more black citizens than white ones. This is not racialism. Anyone, no matter what his race or colour, who fulfils the conditions has the right of abode and the right to complain to the Commissioner. In the
    124
    world of cricket, I refer to the two great Surrey and England batsmen, Mr. Peter May and Mr. Raman Subha Row. Assuming that the children of both are citizens of the United Kingdom and colonies with the right of abode in the United Kingdom, they would be treated exactly alike for the purposes of the Bill.
    I ask the House to accept that this is a liberalising Bill. It is doing what the Select Committee proposed should be done. It is doing what the previous Labour Government proposed should be done. I believe that the House should accept it.
    Question put, That the Bill be now read the Third time:—
    The House divided: Ayes 67, Noes 14

    Division No. 125]

    [11.03 pm

    AYES

    Alexander, Richard

    Mills, Iain (Meriden)

    Ancram, Michael

    Mudd, David

    Arnold, Tom

    Neale, Gerrard

    Aspinwall, Jack

    Needham, Richard

    Baker, Nicholas (N Dorset)

    Neubert, Michael

    Beaumont-Dark, Anthony

    Normanton, Tom

    Bevan, David Gilroy

    Osborn, John

    Blackburn, John

    Page, John (Harrow, West)

    Blaker, Peter

    Page, Rt Hon Sir G. (Crosby)

    Bulmer, Esmond

    Pollock, Alexander

    Butcher, John

    Proctor, K. Harvey

    Clegg, Sir Walter

    Rathbone, Tim

    Cope, John

    Rhodes James, Robert

    Dorrell, Stephen

    Roberts, M. (Cardiff NW)

    Douglas-Hamilton, Lord J.

    Rossi, Hugh

    Dover, Denshore

    Sainsbury, Hon Timothy

    Dunn, Robert (Dartford)

    St. John-Stevas, Rt Hon N.

    Fenner, Mrs Peggy

    Shaw, Giles (Pudsey)

    Finsberg, Geoffrey

    Shelton, William (Streatham)

    Fowler, Rt Hon Norman

    Sims, Roger

    Garel-Jones, Tristan

    Speller, Tony

    Goodlad, Alastair

    Stanbrook, Ivor

    Gower, Sir Raymond

    Stanley, John

    Grieve, Percy

    Stevens, Martin

    Griffiths, Peter Portsm'th N)

    Stewart, A.(E Renfrewshire)

    Gummer, John Selwyn

    Stradling Thomas, J.

    Hawkins, Paul

    Tebbit, Norman

    Henderson, Barry

    Thompson, Donald

    Hurd, Hon Douglas

    Townsend, Cyril D, (B'heath)

    Jopling, Rt Hon Michael

    van Straubenzee, W. R.

    Knox, David

    Viggers, Peter

    Lawrence, Ivan

    Wakeham, John

    Le Marchant, Spencer

    Waller, Gary

    Lloyd, Peter (Fareham)

    McNair-Wilson, M. (N'bury)

    Tellers for the Ayes:

    Mather, Carol

    Mr. Robert Boscawen and Mr. Peter Brooke.

    Maxwell-Hyslop, Robin

    NOES

    Allaun, Frank

    Penhaligon, David

    Campbell-Savours, Dale

    Powell, Raymond (Ogmore)

    Cryer, Bob

    Snape, Peter

    Dalyell, Tam

    Steel, Rt Hon David

    Dixon, Donald

    Wainwright, E.(Dearne V)

    Foulkes, George

    Home Robertson, John

    Tellers for the Noes:

    McGuire, Michael (Ince)

    Mr. Greville Janner and Mr. Reg Race.

    Morris, Rt Hon A. (W'shawe)

    Question accordingly agreed to
    Bill read the Third time and passed, without amendment

    Statutory Instruments, &c.
    Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr. Bryant Godman Irvine): In order to save the time of the House, I propose to put together the two motions to approve statutory instruments.
    Motion made, and Question put forthwith pursuant to Standing Order No. 73A (Standing Committee on Statutory Instruments, &c.)

    RATING AND VALUATION
    That the Rating of Industry (Scotland) Order 1981, a copy of which was laid before this House on 13 March, be approved

    ATOMIC ENERGY AND RADIOACTIVE SUBSTANCES
    That the draft Nuclear Fuels Limited (Financial Limit) Order 1981, which was laid before before this House on 9 March, be approved.—[Lord James Douglas-Hamilton.]
    Question agreed to.

    Palace of Westminster
    Motion made, and Question proposed,That this House do now adjourn.—[Lord James Douglas-Hamilton.]
    11.12 pm
    Mr. Greville Janner: I am delighted to have the opportunity to raise the problem that faces all of us as a result of the deterioration of the fabric of the Palace of Westminster.
    The House will know that there was today a reply to a written question by the hon. Member for Staffordshire, South-West (Mr. Cormack) which set out, for the first time, the good news that at least we are to start on the work that should have begun so many years ago. I thank the Secretary of State and the Under-Secretary who is replying to the debate for the manner in which they have put forward the proposals and enabled them to be discussed by the House tonight—a method which is in accordance with the finest traditions of Parliament in that these matters are discussed and canvassed in the House before they reach outside it.
    We all love the House. We work in it, serve in it and live part of our lives in it. It means a great deal to us, and we have been deeply saddened to see it decaying over the past years. I remember being brought here as a child by my father, who first served here in the early 1930s. The chimes of Big Ben throughout the war were the symbol not of the House but of the permanence of democracy and the greatness of Britain. In the past 11 years, I have campaigned to have work begun on the structure, but until today we have had no good news.
    Recently, for a period of about six months, I saw this marvellous building in a way that few hon. Members have done. A dearly loved uncle of mine was spending his last few months in St. Thomas' hospital, on the tenth floor. I well remember one evening when he pointed to this great Palace and said how much it meant to him. He was former chief rabbi, Israel Brodie, and he compared this building with the Bible. He said "Like the Bible, every time I look at it I see something new and different and something from which I learn."
    All these years, we have watched this building crumbling away. We see now, alas, the results of this lack of sufficient love. We find the building collapsing inside and out, and it is only as a result of that collapse that at last a Government have been induced to start spending the money which is needed in order to keep the building alive.
    The fall of the roof of the House of Lords was taken by some to have a certain humorous aspect of putting constitutional advance into a rather swifter state than might otherwise have been the case. But those who work there did not treat it with a particularly fine sense of humour. When stonework started falling upon the public and, much worse, upon us from the area above the entrance to Westminster Hall and Members' Entrance, it was roped off and we began to feel the winds of change approaching this Palace. When we saw just a week ago that other areas were roped off, quite clearly something had to be done fast to avert tragedy.
    It is to be done, and I thank the Secretary of State and the Under-Secretary for managing to get at least some resources to enable the work on the Palace to begin.

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    The written answer which was given today unfortunately leaves many questions to be answered, all of them, I hope, by the Minister in reply to this debate. The answer stated:
    "Following a fall of stone in New Palace Yard on 2 March, thorough inspections of other areas of stonework, including the Clock Tower and the Victoria Tower, have been started."
    My first question is: why were they not started long before? I understood that the Services Committee in its various reincarnations had required this to be done, and I had been assured in answer to various questions over the years that examinations were already being made to see whether the stonework was in order. Yet today's answer says they "have been started." How long will they take? When will we know other areas of danger? When will they be concluded?
    The written answer continued:
    "As was the case after the fall in Speaker's Green in 1979, further potentially dangerous stonework has been found after every new inspection."
    I do not know why that should be a surprise to anyone. One has only to walk along the outside of this building and scrape away at the exterior of the stonework with a finger nail to find it flaking away. When one goes up to see one of the greatest sights in the land—the floodlit tower of Big Ben observed from the roof at night looking like a stage set in all its glory with the blackness of the stonework hidden by the sky—it is possible to touch any of the gargoyles or any other part of those ancient stone works which were hidden away by former generations in a most spendthrift manner. One wonders how they stay aloft because of the years of grime and decades of filth which have eaten their way into them.
    I quote again from the written answer:
    "Since 2 March numerous decorative pieces of stone have been taken down; some of these could have been dislodged by a slight movement."
    Is the Minister prepared to assure the House and the thousands of people who visit this Palace that there are not now pieces which may fall and cause grave injury? Would it not be a disgrace if that were to happen? If this were an industrial or commercial building, would not the Government have to step in to ensure that such a disaster did not occur? Why should we, because we occupy a Royal Palace to which the rules do not apply, have a privilege which enables us to avoid the sort of prosecution which should otherwise follow?
    A commercial building would be dealt with by the local authority. It could not be used while it was unsafe. What is more, a heavy legal liability would fall on those who occupied such a building if they should have known and could have known that it was dangerous. They would be liable to be sued. No Government should hide behind their freedom from suit in a Royal Palace to avoid the results which obviously might follow if the fears which we all now entertain turn out to be realised.
    Is it not enough for us, when we have watched the roof fall in the House of Lords and seen stonework fall from the exterior of the building, to recognise that the entire work ought to be commenced immediately and with energy, and with such funds as are necessary, before we are forced to undertake it by a further disaster such as is now all too nearly upon us?
    I shall continue to read the Secretary of State's reply:
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    "The pavement beneath the Victoria Tower has also been closed as a precaution while a canopy is erected to give protection from any stone that might fall from the upper half of the Tower before it can be properly inspected in a few weeks' time."
    It should have been inspected years ago. Hon. Members on both sides have been protesting for years about the disgraceful and dangerous state of the building. We on these Opposition Benches wish to know how many other areas are dangerous and whether it is suggested that, by protecting the public where they normally enter the building, all is being done that is necessary to ensure that there will not be a disaster.
    The Secretary of State continued:
    "The inspections so far completed have increased my concern about the condition of the stonework, and, although any identifiably dangerous stones have been removed, I have decided that a start should be made as soon as possible"—
    I ask, when?—
    "on a major programme of repair, restoration and conservation."
    We all welcome that, but the word "cleaning" is sadly absent. Surely, while the building is being repaired, restored and conserved, there should be a full, sensible and intelligent cleaning programme.
    The Secretary of State continued:
    "In order to reveal the condition of the stonework, it is essential to remove the corrosive deposits. This will also prevent further chemical attack on the face of the stone."
    That is a purpose with which we must all heartily agree
    "The first phase of the conservation programme, costing about £¼ million, will start in the recess this summer."
    Why do we have to wait until then? What is the ludicrous tradition by which the face of the building which is the home of the Mother of Parliaments can only be cleaned, washed, restored, painted and repaired while there are no Members within it? Surely, if there is danger, we should start now. If it were any other building in this country in which the public were at such risk, the repair and restoration would begin at once. Why the delay? Perhaps the Minister will be good enough to tell us tonight.
    The first phase is to start this summer, and
    "the rate of progress thereafter will depend on the extent to which work can proceed while Parliament is sitting"
    May we have an assurance that there is no reason in law, no reason in fact and no reason in reality why the work should not begin while the House is sitting?
    The Secretary of State says:
    "My aim is to complete the work in as short a time as possible."
    That is an aim which we all heartily applaud, and we trust that the work will be done.
    This magnificent marvel of a building is a symbol to the world of the democracy which we here serve. It is a disservice to democracy that any Government should allow it to decay. Regrettably, the last two Governments, one Conservative and one Labour, failed to take action. We are grateful for the fact that this Government will take that action now, and we applaud the Minister's decision. However, it looks very much as though the action will be too little and too late. I ask for an assurance that everything in the Minister's power will be done to see that the job is concluded as swiftly as it is begun. I ask the Minister to use this opportunity to tell the House all he can now about the steps which the Government propose to implement a decision for which, I repeat, we are grateful.
    11.25 pm
    Mr. Tam Dalyell: I simply want to say that many of his colleagues are deeply grateful to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Leicester, West (Mr

    129
    Janner) for raising this important subject. I repeat his question. Is it true that, if this were not a Royal Palace, different rules would apply? If it were a factory or if it came under the care of a local authority, would matters be different? This is an important factor.
    11.26 pm
    Mr. Patrick Cormack): I, too, congratulate the hon. and learned member for Leicester, West (Mr. Janner) on raising this extremely important matter. I thank my hon. Friend the Minister and, through him, the Secretary of State for the answer I was given earlier today. It was a very encouraging reply. It is certainly about time that the Government looked at this problem realistically and provided the House with a sensible solution.
    We are not talking here about Parliament, the House in which we are meeting. We are talking about one of the greatest buildings in the world, certainly the greatest building erected in the last century, one of the architectural wonders of the universe, which is an incalculably rich and priceless possession of us all and deserves and needs proper treatment.
    I quote a rather telling phrase from a debate which took place in the last century, when this wonderful building, having been built with rather unsatisfactory stone, was, even then, showing signs on decay. A Member of the Liberal Benches got up and said:
    "that was not economy but scandalous parsimony which grudged what was necessary to support our national monuments."
    This is a great building, of which we are the stewards and trustees for posterity. It is incumbent upon the Government to recognise their responsibilities.
    I am delighted that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary have given me this parliamentary answer. There is only one thing I would say. As a member of the Services Committee, which helped to draw up the report, I feel this deeply. At the end of the answer, the Secretary of State says:
    "the rate of progress thereafter will depend on the extent to which work can proceed while Parliament is sitting"—
    The hon. and learned Member has referred to that—
    "and on the level of funds that I can allocate to this programme in successive years."
    I know that our country is facing a hard time. I know that it is the policy of the Government, rightly, to regard with great care and detail every item of public expenditure. But the Services Committee came to the conclusion that the total amount needed to put this building right was no more than about £5 million. That represents less than a mile of motorway.
    It would be a terrible condemnation of our generation and of our regard for our architectural heritage if we could not find, and quickly, the £5 million which is needed to put this building right. I look forward to my hon. Friend's reply. I again thank the hon. and learned Member for Leicester, West for raising the subject, and I hope that tonight we can show the people of Great Britain that their great Parliament House, the Palace of Westminster, will be safeguarded for generations to come.
    11.28 pm
    The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Geoffrey Finsberg): I begin by thanking the hon. and learned Member for Leicester, West (Mr. Janner) for drawing the attention of the House once again to this
    130
    subject. His considerable interest in the appearance of this historic building and the safety of those who enter it has been shown by his persistent questions to Ministers. I hope that what I have to say tonight will satisfy him that we are determined to conserve this part of our national heritage.
    It is my privilege, as a Minister within the Department of the Environment, to hold special responsibility for the Palace of Westminster. The maintenance and protection of its fabric is no light task when one considers that this building covers 8½ acres and contains two miles of corridors, 100 staircases and more than 1,000 rooms. I think that hon. Members can judge for themselves just how much care and thought have been given, and continue to be given, to this task.
    At the present time, our efforts are being co-ordinated by the Parliamentary Works Officer based in the Palace, who has the benefit of day-to-day advice from the Department's Directorate of Ancient Monuments and Historic Buildings. Futhermore, architectural drawings relating to the Palace and its furniture and works of art are now being catalogued by Mrs. Alexandra Wedgwood and Miss Phillis Rogers, the recently appointed curator from the Inspectorate of Ancient Monuments, both of whom are also available to advise us on the fabric. I should also remind the House that my right hon. Friend has, in addition, the services of Sir Robert Cooke as his special adviser on the Palace—a man to whom Parliament and its Members are deeply indebted.
    We have inherited the legacy of the finest nineteenth-century building in Britain, with parts dating from earlier centuries. Following the fire which almost entirely destroyed the Palace in October 1834, a Select Committee decided that the new building should be either Gothic or Elizabethan in order to harmonise with Westminster Abbey and Westminster Hall, and Mr. Charles Barry's design was accepted.
    The external decoration of the building was Barry's own design, and his plan was to make the new Palace a monumental history of England. The plan was Barry's but the details owe much to Augustus Welby Pugin, whose monuments one finds all around this place and in many other parts of the country. Some 300 statues representing saints and sovereigns of England from the Norman Conquest to the reign of Queen Victoria, were therefore incorporated into the main facades of the building.
    Most of the original stonework came from South Anston in Yorkshire. Whilst this stone has a pleasant colour, it is vulnerable, and serious decay set in very quickly, the first report of it being as early as 1861. In 1928 a major refacing programme was begun, which took about 10 years to complete. The stone then used was Clipsham, which is harder and has a good record of resistance to atmospheric pollution. Nevertheless, considerable soiling has occurred on all the Clipsham refacing and in the remaining Anston stone.
    The sulphate deposits corrode the surface of the stone and obscure the condition of the undelying material. Stonework that is in urgent need of restoration would be revealed by the removal of the deposits and could be repaired more cheaply whilst the scaffolding was in position.
    I shall not remind the House of the various investigations that have been made into the conservation and repair of the stonework. They were set out in the third report from the Services Committee in the 1977–78 Session. Unfortunately, the Government of the day made

    131
    no time available for a debate on that report, and it was not until the publication of the Committee's fourth report, in the 1979–80 Session, that the seriousness of the situation received the attention that it merits. That report made seven recommendations about the work which needed attention. Of these, work on the first two recommendations has already been completed and will shortly be started on the third and fourth.
    The two main questions which are being asked tonight are whether the fabric has deteriorated further since the Committee reported and how the Government intend to complete the major elements of the proposed programme.
    I turn first to the question of safety. The house will recall that in evidence to the Select Committee it was stated that much of the stonework had not been subject to a detailed physical inspection. It was conceded by an expert witness that the real state of the stonework could be far worse than it was possible to tell by examination through binoculars and that it might get worse as each year went by. I told the Committee that I did not think anyone could give a cast-iron guarantee that there was no danger, and I have to repeat that statement tonight.
    Although we have removed the potentially dangerous coping stones and the string courses that were identified up to last June, and brushed off spalling stone surfaces, it was still no surprise to me to learn of a fall on 2 March this year. This occurred on the north face of Westminster Hall, not far from the entrance. Although only a few pieces the size of a table-tennis ball came down, this was sufficient to indicate that something was wrong.
    As a precautionary measure, the Parliamentary Works staff instigated a series of physical inspections,using a long-arm platform, of areas that had previously been examined only from the ground. They found that it was possible to lift off some decorative stonework without effort. They quite rightly considered it prudent to remove such pieces. To date, they have removed 42 decorative finials from the north elevation of Westminster Hall, and a further 21 pieces from between St. Stephen's Entrance and the Victoria Tower, of which three were fairly substantial in size. These items have been stored for subsequent restoration.
    Mr Dalyell: Will the Minister ask his civil servants not to give us the history of England? St. David and St. Andrew are also out there. I simply want to ask whether the latest techniques of using a laser beam to detect faults in stone and metals were being used.
    Mr Finsberg: I shall find that out for the hon. Gentleman. I am told that, with the advice of the best stone experts in the country, all that can be done will be done. I shall look specifically at the point that the hon. Gentleman has raised.
    It has not been possible with a long-arm p:atform to inspect the top half of the two Towers. Inspection of the lower parts gives cause to believe that some stonework on the upper half of the Victoria Tower may be defective but that the Clock Tower is in a better state of preservation. The pavement beneath the Victoria Tower and further to the south has been closed as a precaution until a protective canopy can be erected. The upper half of that Tower and other areas will be inspected in coming weeks. It is just not possible to do everything at one time. I hope that the hon. and learned Gentleman will accept from me that a
    132
    limited number of people are capable of doing it. There were problems in doing what we wanted, which was to get a long-arm crane to go right to the top, because the pavement would not bear the weight, and this means that scaffolding will have to be erected.
    While I have no reason to believe that a serious fall is likely in the immediate future, I cannot entirely rule out that possibility. We must remember that the Palace is not only a great historic building but is a place of work. About 3,000 people are employed here daily, and hundreds of thousands visit the building during the year both to see the Palace itself and indeed to visit their Members. This and the constantly changing requirements of the two Houses put enormous pressures on the fabric of the building and on the staff who maintain it. I commend our Parliamentary Works staff for the very prompt exercise of their professional judgment to ensure that, as far as possible, Members of either House, staff working in the Palace and the general public are not exposed to any significant risk that could be foreseen.
    The difficulty in carrying out the work recommended in the Services Committee's fourth report has simply been due to the very large sums of money required. I told the Committee in evidence that I was not able to confirm the availability of funds on this scale—a full programme now being estimated to cost £5½ million over three or more years. The House is well aware that the Government are committed to reducing public expenditure, and it was not felt that the House should be—nor, indeed, would wish to be—exempt from the constraints placed on other sectors.
    As a result, the level of funds available for maintenance and new works in the Palace of Westminster and parliamentary precincts has been reduced from some £7½ million per year to £6½ million. Of what remains, about £4½ million is taken up by running costs and essential maintenance. Besides dozens of jobs which hon. Members and the staff consider essential to improve the facilities and efficient running of the building, there are several large and urgent schemes competing for the limited funds that are left. The plant that cools the air in this Chamber is on its last legs. It will cost more than £1 million to replace, and a breakdown would leave us with no cooling at all for at least eight months. I leave hon. Members to imagine what the working conditions would be in such a situation.
    Secondly, the House will recall that a heavy wooden boss fell from the ceiling in another place last year. A thorough survey has now been completed, and it is apparent that this outstanding example of Victorian craftmanship can be restored only at a very considerable cost, yet to be accurately estimated. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State is determined that this particular piece of our national heritage should be restored for future generations.
    Parliament is rightly proud of its home. But, at the same time, Members may shrink from committing large sums of money to work on the Palace lest they be thought to be too self-centred and unaware of the economic difficulties which we face. There are, however, vast numbers of people outside Parliament who insist that we preserve our inheritance properly. This was brought home to me last year when my Department received numerous small gifts of money from people all over the country—and abroad—in response to the publicity which surrounded the Services Committee's fourth report. And only three weeks ago The Times urged us to brace ourselves to meet the costs involved.

    133
    My right hon. Friend has, therefore, today announced his decision to proceed with the repair, restoration and conservation of the stonework. Work will start in this Summer Recess. One of the reasons is that the management of work here comes under the Services Committee. My Department acts as the agent of that Committee, and we shall be putting to it a proposal and telling it that the cost can be contained within reasonable bounds only if the two Houses are prepared to accept any inconveniences resulting from work continuing whilst Parliament is sitting. I must make it clear that it is not our decision. Many hon. Members will recall the experiments into stone conservation methods in the 1970s and that the working conditions inside the Palace close to the experimental areas were by no means intolerable.
    I shall, therefore, shortly be consulting the House authorities to see whether continuous working would be acceptable to them. I am sure that hon. Members will accept any inconveniences as their personal contribution to a most worthy scheme.
    It is not possible to say how long it will take to complete the conservation programme until we know whether work will go on while Parliament is sitting and the exact level of funds that can be provided in future years. My
    134
    Department's aim, however, is to carry it out in the shortest possible time. The House will wish to see the speedy completion of this work.
    Up to now, I have not referred to the contribution by my hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire, South-West (Mr. Cormack). He has done a signal service to the House in three ways: tonight by his words, in the past years by views given to the Services Committee, and by his delightful book, from which I quote to end this speech. He describes it as at once the home of Western democracy and the greatest building of the last century. We are determined to do all we can to ensure that future generations will not be able to accuse us of destroying that precious heritage.
    I hope that when I am able to put the document to the Services Committee it will take on board the points I have made and—
    The Question having been proposed after Ten o'clock and the debate having continued for half an hour, MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order
    Adjourned at eighteen minutes to Twelve o'clock Midnight

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

Helsinki Agreement: Madrid Review Meeting
Lord Brockway: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will report on progress made at the Madrid Conference on European Security and Co-operation to extend human rights, expand economic co-operation and ensure a European Disarmament Conference.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Trade (Lord Trefgarne): My Lords, the Madrid Review Meeting is in its final stages. It is too early to forecast the outcome, but I hope it will be possible to reach agreement on a number of substantive measures in the fields of European security, human rights, freedom of movement, information and family reunification.
Lord Brockway: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that optimistic estimate. Is it not the case that this conference has been meeting for six months, with failure up to the present time? Has that not largely been due to recriminations between the two power blocs? Was it not saved by the non-aligned nations, when there was controversy over the dissidents of the Soviet Union—a legitimate protest—and will the Government do their utmost now to secure at least acceptance of the French proposal for a European disarmament conference to extend the confidence-
2
building measures, in view of the fact that President Brezhnev has said that he is prepared to expand supervision over the whole of Soviet Europe extending 1,600 miles, instead of the 160 miles that now obtains?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I would not accept the noble Lord's description of the non-aligned countries as the saviours of this conference. It has, indeed, been a long and difficult one, but one of the reasons for that was initial Russian reluctance to discuss the implementation of the Helsinki Final Act in the period since the last review conference. As for the French proposal, it is true that the Soviets have accepted at least one part of that proposal—indeed, only one part of that proposal. However, the proposal itself consists of at least four elements, all of which are necessary to form a credible whole, and it remains to be seen whether the Soviets will accept the whole of that proposal.
Lord Goronwy-Roberts: My Lords, may I put two queries to the Minister? First, will he consider issuing, when the conference is over, a statement including verbatim reports of the speeches made by the leading delegates and identical to or similar to the statements in the White Paper which we issued in 1978 after the Belgrade conference? I leave that query for the noble Lord to go into. Secondly, on the question of disarmament and the French proposal, is the noble Lord aware that there is a very firmly-held opinion—and it is, I think, a bipartisan opinion—that any advance on the French proposal, while welcome in itself, should not prejudice whatever success awaits us in Vienna and Geneva, and certainly not in the SALT talks, which everybody hopes will be resumed as soon as possible?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I most certainly agree that the negotiations to which the noble Lord refers, and which are being held in Geneva and Vienna, as well as the SALT process itself, are separate from the Helsinki review conference which is now reaching its final stages. But I think that the French proposal, as a whole, is likely to be the most important outcome of this Madrid conference.
Lord Gladwyn: My Lords, is there now some reason to suppose that the Soviet Government will agree to the international supervision of manoeuvres right up to the Urals?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, that remains to be seen. But I have to confess that, going on past performance, the prospects are not good.
Lord Segal: My Lords, can the noble Lord say whether Poland is represented at the Madrid Conference on European Security and by whom?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, Poland is represented, but I do not know the name of its representative.
Lord Brockway: My Lords, is not verification the difficulty about the French proposal? Is it not the case that the Soviet Union has fulfilled its obligations under the present agreement to inform the West of its manoeuvres? Will the Government do everything they can to encourage the non-aligned nations, which are now seeking to save the conference, as—despite what the Minister said—they saved it before?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, the French proposal envisages, initially, the negotiation of what are called militarily significant, verifiable and binding confidence-building measures applying to the whole of Europe, from the Atlantic to the Urals. It is this last point, of the geographical extent of these measures, that the Soviets appear to have initially accepted, but the other three aspects of the proposal are apparently still being considered by them.

Vacant Houses: Cost to Ratepayers
2.42 p.m.
Baroness Elliot of Harwood: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how many empty houses owned by local authorities (in England, Wales and Scotland) have remained vacant for more than 12 months and what is the estimated cost to ratepayers arising from those local authority dwellings (in England, Wales and Scotland) which have remained empty for more than 12 months.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of the Environment (Lord Bellwin): My Lords, estimates on returns indicate that 23,000 dwellings had been vacant for more than 12 months. For Scotland and Wales this information is not collected centrally. Information on the estimated cost to ratepayers arising from vacant dwellings is not available, but the Chief Inspector of Audit in his report for 1979–80 estimated that rent losses for that year arising from all empty dwellings in England were in the order of £35 million.
Baroness Elliot of Harwood: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord very much for his Answer. I hope the Government will encourage as much as possible the
4
habitation of these empty houses, if there is a housing shortage, though this does not operate in all areas. In fact, in the area in which I live there is a housing surplus. I hope very much that the Government will do their very best to see either that these houses are sold or that they are let as rapidly as possible.
Lord Bellwin: My Lords, perhaps my noble friend would like to see a booklet which my department has just produced, entitled Reducing the number of empty dwellings. There is a copy in the Library. I should be glad to send a copy to my noble friend.
Lord Avebury: My Lords, would the noble Lord send a copy of that document to the Property Services Agency so that they can take steps to eliminate the large number of vacant dwellings which were formerly occupied by military personnel, in particular the 400 dwellings at Tidworth which were the subject of a Question last week?
Lord Bellwin: My Lords, the publication refers to empty dwellings in the ownership of local authorities. Should there be any aspect which applies to the dwellings to which the noble Lord refers, then of course we shall look at it.
Baroness Birk: My Lords, is it not true that many of the empty houses to which the noble Baroness has referred would have been made fit for occupation if local authorities had not been subjected to the moratorium, in addition to the sharp cuts in the housing investment programme? Secondly, in view of the acute housing shortage, will the Government now treat finance to enable local authorities to repair vacant property and bring it into use as a priority allocation? Before he tells me that there were a number of empty houses under the last Government, which unfortunately was the case, may I also ask the Minister whether he is aware that the last Government issued a circular, 1977, on the better use of vacant property?
Lord Bellwin: My Lords, I am glad that the noble Baroness requires no reminding of the situation which pertained under the previous Administration. In answer to her question, perhaps it should also be said that if certain authorities had not so enthusiastically embarked upon municipalisation, the problems that they have of dealing with great numbers of empty dwellings would not be so great as they are. The application of the resources of an authority to housing as, indeed, to any other service is for the authority itself to decide. I would only remind the noble Baroness, though I am sure she needs no reminding, that those authorities which will be selling council houses will have an additional source of income which they can then apply to this or any other aspect of their housing.
Baroness Birk: My Lords, may I further ask the Minister how he thinks this is going to help housing in the short term, which is what we are also talking about? Are the Government going to raise the moratorium? In view of the lengthening housing waiting lists, will they allocate additional finance?
Lord Bellwin: My Lords, so far as the moratorium is concerned, that is a quite separate question from the one as to what can be done to help authorities to bring their empty dwellings into repair. I say again that the authorities which have the worst of these problems are those which embarked upon so much municipalisation. Their problems have not suddenly come about because of any moratorium or anything else.
Lord Barnby: My Lords, would not the Minister agree that the figure which he has just quoted, regrettable as it is, of empty houses indicates how relatively little the current recession has as yet bitten into the economy by comparison with the official figure for 1931 of over 300,000 empty houses in the country?
Lord Bellwin: My Lords, I am not sure how far that figure which my noble friend has mentioned was divided between private and public housing. Therefore, I cannot help him by drawing any useful comparison. But I note what he says.
Baroness Faithfull: My Lords, may I ask the Minister whether it is known how much money is being spent by local authorities under the Homeless Persons Act upon placing homeless families in hotels and boarding houses instead of in empty properties?
Lord Bellwin: My Lords, I am not aware of that figure. I will gladly ascertain it and write to my noble friend.
The Earl of Lauderdale: My Lords, could my noble friend supplement what he said regarding the number of empty houses in Scotland by making a statement and putting it in the Library? He mentioned that his figures did not cover Scotland. Could he place a statement either in the Official Report or in the Library stating, authority by authority, how many empty houses exist?
Lord Bellwin: My Lords, as I think I said previously, this information is currently not collected centrally for Scotland and Wales. I shall have to ascertain exactly what would be involved in obtaining that information. If it is practicable, I will see what can be done to help my noble friend.
Lord Strathclyde: My Lords, would the noble Lord also tell us how many houses are in the programmes of local authorities? I can remember that at one time a Conservative Government had 300,000 houses, 40,000 of them in Scotland. Could the noble Lord find out whether they are building anything like that number today?
Lord Bellwin: My Lords, this is so far away from the first Question that I shall have to ask my noble friend to allow me to discuss it with him privately.
Lord Hawke: My Lords, could my noble friend say whether his figure includes only those houses which are habitable at present or whether it also includes those very many houses which could be made habitable if money were spent upon them?
Lord Bellwin: My Lords, these are the figures which come in from the housing investment programme returns. Without a detailed analysis, which I do not have before me, it is very difficult to answer exactly. But I think that the figure of 23,000 is sufficiently large to cause real concern. That is why we have produced the booklet, which I hope all those interested will find both constructive and helpful in considering this particular problem.
Lord Hawke: My Lords, undoubtedly the figure of 23,000 causes concern, but to me it is an incredibly low figure if it includes those houses which could be put into operation if some money were spent upon them.
Lord Bellwin: My Lords, I would only say that it is a figure which varies so much from authority to authority. In some authorities it is as low as ·01 per cent. of their housing stock, while in other authorities it is as high as 9.7 per cent. of their housing stock. That indicates the wide variation which the problem presents.

BAOR Personnel Dependants and Unemployment
2.50 p.m.
Lord Brooks of Tremorfa: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how many young persons of BAOR personnel who are of working age, are unemployed and whether they are receiving unemployment benefit or any other welfare payment.
Viscount Long: My Lords, at the end of December 1980, which is the date of the latest figures available, there were some 600 children of British Army of the Rhine personnel who were in the 16–19 age group and were not at school. It is possible that some are working in the German market or with organizations such as NAAFI or YMCA, but the Army keeps no figures of those in employment.
While certain social security benefits are available to service dependants overseas, unemployment benefit and supplementary benefit are not, although the former may be paid for a maximum of three months if drawn previously in the United Kingdom.
Lord Brooks of Tremorfa: My Lords, in thanking the noble Viscount for his reply, may I ask him whether he is aware that many Members of both Houses, involved and concerned in these matters, are completely unaware that this situation exists, and will his department consult with other relevant departments in order to rectify the situation and to ensure that these youngsters who are unemployed receive exactly the same benefits as youngsters unemployed in this country?
Viscount Long: My Lords, the administration of social security benefit is of course the responsibility of the Department of Health and Social Security. The Minister of Defence has examined thoroughly the question of extending the payment of supplementary

7
benefit for service dependants overseas through the DHSS but this has not proved possible. As I mentioned earlier, it would be a major step to amend the law in this way.
Lord Shinwell: My Lords, will the noble Viscount explain why these 600 children, who presumably could join the British Army of the Rhine, are not being employed in that fashion? Do any of them seek employment along with their parents?
Viscount Long: My Lords, the 600 children that I mentioned just now are aged from 16 to 19, and of course if any of the 18-year-olds wish to join the forces, we shall be only too happy. Some do, but I have no figures on that because it is a slightly different question.
Lord Shinwell: My Lords, is it not possible to get the figures? Is it not all wrong that the adult sons who are entitled to join the British Army or one of the other services, should be unemployed? Is it advisable that nothing should be done about it?
Viscount Long: My Lords, some of those unemployed are in the United Kingdom and, of course, when their families go over to BAOR they are given three months' benefit in order to get a job if they have not already tried to go into the forces, but I cannot really go any further than that at this stage.
Lord Avebury: My Lords, when the House was debating the EEC draft directive on extending the rights of residence to people who were not seeking employment but were students, self-employed businessmen or retired persons, the noble Viscount may recall that it was said that unemployment benefit and the equivalent of supplementary benefits were in theory available to British citizens in Germany so long as they were in fact looking for work there. So how does it happen that these young people, aged between 16 and 19, if they are registered for work in Germany, do not obtain the unemployment benefits and supplementary benefits that German citizens would obtain if they were in this country?
Viscount Long: My Lords, if I may go one further, unemployment benefit is a contributory benefit: to receive it one must have worked for a minimum time, made the necessary contributions and also be available for work within the United Kingdom. I have already said that we are looking at the age group of 16 to 19, but I am afraid that, as your Lordships know, the 16-year-olds do not contribute at that stage; only the 18 to l9-year-olds contribute. So it is unlikely that school-leavers would be entitled to unemployment benefit if they were in this country. Under certain specified conditions, however, this benefit may be paid outside the United Kingdom. Service dependants who qualify in this country may continue to receive it for up to three months after arriving in Germany. They must, however, have registered as unemployed before they left this country and they must sign on as unemployed within seven days of arriving in Germany. This concession can of course be useful in giving a period of grace in which to obtain a job in Germany.
8
I think the noble Lord mentioned the EEC situation. I have no answer in regard to that at this stage, but I will write to him.

Passports: Format
2.55 p.m.
Lord Balfour of Inchrye: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government when it is proposed to replace the present United Kingdom passport with some form of EEC passport; whether until this change takes place the Foreign Office will continue to issue United Kingdom passports for the same periods as at present; and whether this House will have an opportunity of expressing a view on this proposal.
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, there is no question of adopting any form of European Community passport. Our passports remain British. We do, however, intend to adopt the European Community common format for United Kingdom passports at the same time as we adopt the International Civil Aviation Organisation's recommendations for a passport in a simplified standardised format with machine-readable capability. A considerable amount of work is needed to assess the costs and the technical problems involved, and until this has been done it is not possible for the Government to set a date for the change in the format of United Kingdom passports. Until that change takes place we will continue to issue United Kingdom passports for the same periods as at present. There will be opportunities for the new format of United Kingdom passports to be debated before any change is made.
Lord Balfour of Inchrye: My Lords, I must say, in thanking the Minister for that reply, that at the end of it I am not quite sure whether the proposal is or is not to do away with the traditional British passport in blue with gold lettering which has been carried all over the world by tens of thousands of citizens with pride and confidence. Further on this matter, does the Minister not think it about time that the EEC bureaucrat enthusiasts for standardisation in all forms of our national life should be curbed? We have already heard about the proposals to do away with our milk deliveries; we have already heard some proposals that we should learn how to pour our beer—
Noble Lords: Question!
Lord Balfour of Inchrye: We are not allowed to have summer time when we want it, and now we have the passport proposals. Surely it is time that the passion for international standardisation of the customs and habits of our nation should cease. These small, petty matters do little good but much harm for support of the larger issues of the EEC, and, believe me, the EEC needs all the support that it can get at the present time.
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I can assure my noble friend that the Government's position on this matter has been that no important change like this should take place unless there is some real and identifiable benefit to be derived from it. The principal benefit, to which I referred in my main Answer, will be the machine-readable capability, which will greatly enhance the processing of passengers moving through our ports and airports. Also, a United Kingdom passport in the common format as we foresee it will retain the main characteristics of our present passport, such as the Royal coat of arms on the front and the rubric about Her Britannic Majesty's Principal Secretary of State inside the front cover. It is likely to be burgundy coloured instead of blue, and the front cover will bear the additional words, "European Community".
The Earl of Lauderdale: My Lords, can my noble friend tell the House whether this has the unanimous approval of the Council of Ministers?
Lord Trefgarne: Not yet, my Lords. I think the details are coming before the Council of Ministers at their next meeting.
Lord Strabolgi: My Lords, are the Government aware that the EEC passport control channel at Heathrow gives considerable priority to those using it? Further, can the Minister say which category of persons is allowed to have this preferential treatment?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, that is a slightly different question. Speaking from memory, I think there are more than two channels for the various passport holders going through Heathrow. There are EEC passport holders, United Kingdom passport holders and I think there is at least one other channel, and all, of course, are treated equally when they get to the desk.
Lord Strabolgi: My Lords, are the Government aware that the other two channels have considerable queues, while those holding EEC passports are allowed to pass through without any delay at all? Who are these people? That is all I am asking.
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, the time taken to process persons going through the immigration controls depends among other things on the purpose for which they are coming here.
Lord Segal: My Lords, can the noble Lord say whether the proposed burgundy colour is due to French influence?
Lord Trefgarne: I should not be surprised, my Lords.
Lord Shepherd: My Lords, may I take it from what the noble Lord has said that there can be no agreement by Her Majesty's Government without prior approval of the two Houses? Will the noble Lord recognise that there are many who are British nationals who live within overseas territories which carry our passports, and that, if we wish to avoid a second relationship—and may I say how much we applaud the Government's decision in regard to the Nationality Act as it applies to the people of Hong Kong in particular—there should
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be no differentiation in the passports between ourselves and those who claim British nationality?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, on the question of parliamentary approval, the position, as I understand it, is this: that formal parliamentary approval for the format of the passport that we issue is not required, but of course the Government would wish to take very carefully into consideration the views which Parliament has already expressed and will express in the future.
Lord Goronwy-Roberts: My Lords, while welcoming the Minister's assurance that Parliament will be consulted, will he consider putting in the Library of this House, and possibly the other place, a facsimile—he need not produce the whole passport—of what is proposed, so that we can judge the rubric and the contents, as well as the relationship of the EEC to the extra-British nationals who will be using our passport?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, a committee of your Lordships' House considered this matter a year or so ago. We had a debate in your Lordships' House on the report at about that time, and I had with me then, and showed to a number of noble Lords, a specimen of how we then thought the passport might look. There has been no substantial change in our thoughts since then. On the other hand, this matter has still to be finally decided, so I should be reluctant to put a specimen in the Library at this stage, when our thoughts are still rather fluid. However, we have made no secret of the way our thoughts are going, which includes the explanation that I gave earlier.
The Earl of Lauderdale: My Lords, when my noble friend says the matter still has to be finally decided, are we to take it that a proposal will be put before both Houses of Parliament and fully debated before the Government give their consent in the Council of Ministers?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, I am not, I am afraid, in a position to give that assurance. After all, this matter is, at this stage at least, a European matter. However, we shall certainly want to take the views of Parliament very carefully into account.
Baroness Burton of Coventry: My Lords, as a member of the committee to which the noble Lord referred, may I ask him whether it would not seem that the fears of his noble friend Lord Balfour are perhaps exaggerated? May I ask the noble Lord whether he recalls that in the report of the Select Committee to this House, we did say:
"The committee support the proposal for a uniform European passport as a modest symbol of the Community's identity provided that passports retain their national character."?
May I ask the noble Lord whether he recalls that that was an all-party committee and assure him that we very much support the Answer that he has given to the House today?
Lord Trefgarne: Yes, indeed, my Lords, but I must emphasise that it is not proposed to issue a European Community passport. It is proposed that the passport will remain a national document, issued by national

11
authorities, although in a common format. It is worth noting that most other European countries are being called upon to make substantially greater changes in format than we are contemplating.
Lord Leatherland: My Lords, does the noble Lord recall that he used the expression to "process" a person? Will he in the interests of the English language try to discover a different form of words to explain what he had in mind?
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, what I had in mind was, of course, processing a person's application to enter the United Kingdom. If the noble Lord wishes me to use all those words on every occasion, I may unduly detain your Lordships.

Business
Lord Denham: My Lords, at a convenient moment after 3.30 this afternoon, my noble friend Lord Mansfield will, with the leave of the House, repeat a Statement that is to be made in another place on the Council of Ministers (Fisheries).
It may also be for your Lordships' convenience if I announce that dinner will be available this evening at the usual time. Subject to the progress of the Wildlife and Countryside Bill, it is proposed that the House should not adjourn for dinner.

Charterhouse Japhet Bill
Read 2a, and committed to a Select Committee.
Sion College Bill [H.L.]
Read 3a, and passed, and sent to the Commons.

Wildlife and Countryside Bill [H.L.]
3.7 p.m.
Lord Denham: My Lords, I have it in Command from Her Majesty the Queen and His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales that they, having been informed of the purport of the Wildlife and Countryside Bill, have consented to place their prerogative and interest so far as they are concerned on behalf of the Crown, the Duchy of Lancaster and the Duchy of Cornwall at the disposal of Parliament for the purposes of the Bill.
Lord Bellwin: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a third time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read 3a.—(Lord Bellwin.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
Clause 1 [Protection of wild birds, their nests and eggs]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 1:
Page 1, line 10, leave out second ("or").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, with the permission and, I hope, to the contentment of the House, I should like to speak also to Amendments Nos. 2, 10, 11, 12, 25, 26, 29, 33, 35 and 37. These are the first of a number of amendments to tidy up the drafting of the Bill. These amendments remove a number of superfluous "or"s. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 2:
Page 2, line 43, leave out ("or").
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Burton Lord Burton moved Amendment No. 3:
Page 3, line 8, leave out from ("of") to ("the") in line 9 and insert ("Woodcock (except in Scotland)").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, in moving this amendment, I should like to speak to Amendments Nos. 5, 73, 110 and 113 at the same time. When this matter was raised on Report, there was practically no valid argument against the amendment; indeed it was supported all round the House and a number of noble Lords told me that they were sorry I had not pressed it. That is the reason why I have put these amendments down again. I have made two slight alterations. One alteration is that I have added this to one of the clauses where it should bave been included before, and the other is altering the season slightly, to meet one of the objections.
The only possible argument against these amendments was that they increased the open season by one month in the summer. This would in fact have had no effect; I did it only to regularise the dates to 1st September, which applies to a lot of other birds. However, to meet the objection, I have altered it so that the season is exactly as at present. What is not appreciated is that, although it may seem an anachronism to make a bird or a beast a quarry species, it is one of the best means of protection one can give it. If partridges had not been game birds, there would be practically none left in the north of Scotland; they would probably all have been wiped out by predators. The reason why there are so many foxes in England and Wales is because they are a quarry species. Therefore, to make these birds game birds would give them the best possible protection.
The only other argument produced was that another Act of Parliament would be opened up. But many Acts of Parliament have already been opened up in this Bill. If one looks at the end of the Bill, one finds that no fewer than 17 Acts of Parliament have been opened up. Therefore, I think that argument is really a very poor one; it will not make any difference. I believe that the Government, rather than change this Bill, will maintain that all that is desired by these amendments can be secured by licence.
Surely it ill becomes this Government unnecessarily to increase bureaucracy with form-filling and possibly with a payment for the form as well? Do they intend to cut the public sector or not? My amendment,

13
albeit in a small way, seeks to restrict unnecessary bureaucracy. I think that all those noble Lords with a knowledge of capercaillie supported me on Report. Indeed, I had so much support that I regretted that I did not press the amendment, and a number of noble Lords said that they wished that I had done so. Therefore, I hope that the Government have re-thought the matter since then. I beg to move.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I, too, would like to speak to the same amendments. I am surprised that my noble friend thought that there was no valid argument against his case last time. I thought that I presented a valid argument, but perhaps he failed to understand me. Although I appreciate that as the capercaillie is a grouse there is a superficial attraction in including it with them in the Game Acts, the Government do not believe that this would bring any conservation benefit. Indeed, it could be detrimental to the conservation status of the species.
Let me explain again. The Bill provides ordinary protection for the species, and should it be thought necessary this could be increased by, for example, reducing the shooting season under the powers in Clause 2(5) or by taking it off the sale list—that is, Schedule 3, Part III. It could also be given protection in particular localities. None of this is possible under the Game Acts. I understand that the only area where the Game Acts might be considered to have better powers than this Bill is as regards penalties where a prison sentence is available. However, it was the general feeling in this House that while protection of our wildlife heritage was of prime importance, offences against wildlife were not of the order of gravity for which imprisonment would be appropriate, and that is the reason why the prison sentence penalty for offences has been removed from the Bill. Therefore, this, too, goes against the feeling of the House. The Government are also, as my noble friend is aware, unwilling to see amendments to the game laws in this Bill. I remind the House that the Bill is still to be considered in another place. We are most reluctant to accept piecemeal revision of the law in this area which is already confusing enough.
The amendments are also deficient in that they make no provision for the capercaillie in Scotland—where most of the birds are—and the part of the Game Act which my noble friend seeks to amend does not apply to Scotland. They would therefore be without protection there, and unless I have misunderstood my noble friend that is the opposite of his intention. I really do not think that this is a matter upon which I should delay the House any further and I hope that my noble friend will accept my reasoning.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, at the last stage of the Bill when this matter was discussed we on this side of the House agreed with the Government in their objections to the amendment, and I must say that I would strongly agree with everything that the noble Earl, Lord Avon, has just said and I hope that the amendment will be withdrawn.
Lord Burton: My Lords, I am sorry that my noble friend was not advised that the amendment was faulty at the Report stage because we might have corrected
14
it. But clearly, if the amendment is faulty, I cannot sustain it, and therefore I beg leave to withdraw it.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 4:
Page 3, line 34, leave out ("the Secretary of State") and insert ("him").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 4. This is a simple drafting amendment.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
[Amendment No. 5 not moved.]
Clause 4 [Exceptions to ss. 1 and 3]:
3.14 p.m.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 6:
Page 5, line 27, leave out ("or").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 6. This is a drafting amendment to remove another surplus "or". However, I should explain that this "or" was inserted in Committee as a result of an amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Melchett. I am taking advantage of his offer, at that time, to delete it if necessary when we were tidying up the drafting. I hope the House will accept that in this matter it would be sensible to take the advice of the experts. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 7 and 8:
Page 5, line 39, after ("was") insert ("urgently")
Page 5, line 39, leave out ("and urgent").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendments Nos. 7 and 8 en bloc. Noble Lords have wrestled with the problems of how to make it clear that the defence in Clause 4(3) is for emergencies and not appropriate for situations where the prudent man would have sought and obtained a licence. On Report the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, moved an amendment which this House accepted which added the word "urgent" to the word "necessary" as the justification for action to protect crops.
The guardians appointed among other things to watch over the syntactical and etymological purity of this House have suggested that "urgently necessary" is better than "urgent and necessary". On the basis that we are grateful for all the help we can have in our difficult task, I beg to move.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I am quite happy to accept the superior wisdom of which the noble Earl has had the benefit, and I am grateful to him for moving these amendments.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 9:
Page 5, line 43, after ("livestock") insert ("foodstuffs for livestock").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 9 and, with your Lordships' permission, I shall speak also to Amendment No. 55

15
which makes identical provision in Clause 16(1)(l). My noble friend Lord Sandys said on Report, when speaking to the amendment moved on Report in the names of my noble friends Lord Stanley of Alderley and Lord Burton to reinsert the words "any other form of property" in Clauses 4(3) and 16(1)(l), that we had written to the European Community Commission about the matter.
We have heard unofficially that they agree that the term "any other form of property" would be contrary to the directive as at present written. However they regard "crops" as intended to cover animal feed-stuffs, but may need to amend the directive to make this clear. As we see it, our amendment clarifies the European Community's intention; other areas troubled by birds such as food factories and grain stores are covered by the "public health" purposes.
It may also be a suitable moment to mention that there has been some understandable but unjustifiable concern because some lawyers have held that "fisheries" would not include "fish farms". That is as may be—however, we still believe "fisheries" covers them, but if it does not then the fish in them are covered by the word "livestock" and can therefore be protected. I beg to move.
Lord Stanley of Alderley: My Lords, I should like to thank my noble friend for that statement, and also to thank him very much for the letter that he wrote in the intervening period explaining the problem which I think is now resolved.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 5 [Prohibition of certain methods of killing or taking wild birds]:
3.17 p.m.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 10, 11 and 12 en bloc:
Page 6, line 8, leave out second ("or")
Page 6, line 13, leave out ("or")
Page 6, line 28, leave out ("or").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I spoke to Amendments Nos. 10, 11 and 12 when I moved Amendment No. 1. I beg to move.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
The Earl of Caithness The Earl of Caithness moved Amendment No. 13:
Page 6, line 28, at end insert—
("(ix) any air weapon; or").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 13 and, with the leave of the House, I should like to speak to Amendments Nos. 19, 38 and 71. All these amendments refer to airguns, and this time I am very pleased to have the support of not only my noble friend Lord Stanley of Alderley, but of the noble Lords, Lord Melchett and Lord Houghton of Sowerby. We have discussed this matter in detail in your Lordships' House and I would just summarise the argument by saying that we should like to prevent the use of airguns on animals and mammals except for what is colloquially known as the "pest" species.
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I think that the arguments which we have put forward are substantial. I have listened very carefully to what my noble friend at the Home Office has said. He has been very kind and we had a long meeting with him on Friday. However, I am afraid that I am not convinced by his arguments and I think that the amendments as drafted would only help the situation.
I ought to mention Amendment No. 71 in a little more detail. That amendment classifies the words "air weapon". It does not refer to those that are already covered by the Firearms Act and thus is not causing any complications to the legal system at the moment. I think that the best thing I can do now is just to move the amendment. I beg to move.
3.20 p.m.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Belstead): My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for briefly moving the amendment and I shall try to be reasonably brief, although perhaps just a little longer than my noble friend. First, on the general merit of the case to which my noble friend has spoken, I appreciate the humane considerations which lie behind this group of amendments. The problem of air weapon misuse is, of course, one which extends beyond misuse against wildlife and embraces damage to property and, indeed, sometimes danger to the public. This is more a problem of enforcement than a result of any inadequacy in the existing controls.
The misuse of an air weapon in nearly every case involves the commission of one or more offences under existing law. Indeed, I would put it to your Lordships that the power already exists to control misuse of air weapons by unauthorised persons in the way which my noble friend who tabled this amendment would wish to see. I mean that it is already an offence to carry a loaded air weapon in a public place or as a trespasser on private land without lawful authority or reasonable excuse.
My right honourable friend the Home Secretary has made it clear that he has no plans to strengthen the controls in the Firearms Act 1968. I say to my noble friend and to other noble Lords who have put their names to this amendment that this does not mean that the Government are complacent about the problem of misuse of air weapons. We should prefer to proceed by consent. As I said to your Lordships at a previous stage of the Bill, it seems that a good way forward would be to seek to heighten public awareness and sense of responsibility about the general dangers of air weapons misuse, and consideration is now being given to the possibility of mounting a campaign on these lines. The misuse of air weapons against wildlife could form part of that campaign. The whole question of what should be done would then be reviewed when the outcome of any campaign has been evaluated and, of course, the order-making power in subsection (3) could be used for that purpose.
Therefore, the problem with which we are dealing is one of enforcement against unauthorised persons and one of good sense to be shown by authorised persons. It seems right to try to proceed by consent in order to solve this problem. Legislation exists to deal with misuse of air weapons and we would hope to make the general public more aware of it. It would be our intention to seek the views of the British Shooting

17
Sports Council and other interested bodies on the form and nature of any campaign against air weapon misuse.
So the policy of the Government is to try to move by agreement. I am bound to say that, before moving an amendment of this sort into a Bill, it would have been desirable to talk to the police and to the gun trade in order to explain what is being proposed, to see whether they believe this is the right way to proceed. For those reasons and given the assurances that I have attempted to give the House, I hope that my noble friend will think again and not press these amendments, but rather might lend us support in proceeding in the way that I have outlined.
In conclusion, I think that there may be a misprint in this group of amendments; Amendment No. 15 is correct and the following amendment ought to have been printed as Amendment No. 15A. I must apologise to the House for my oversight; I have also spoken to Amendment No. 72, which is purely consequential.
Lord Houghton of Sowerby: My Lords, when small measures of reform are put forward Governments frequently have two reasons for not accepting them. One is that they want to do more, and the other is that they want to do nothing or something different. Why is it that Governments cannot see that progress is gradual, that one thing leads to another and that if you do not make a beginning, you do not get any further anyway? In one place or another I have been listening to this kind of argument for 30 years, and it is extraordinary how even the new generation of Ministers put forward the same excuses as their predecessors, who grew old and grey repeating this kind of formula.
When the noble Lord says that we ought to consult the gun trade, what he is really doing is letting the cat out of the bag. It is the gun trade that is his worry. Who got us into this muddle anyway? Earlier on the noble Earl, Lord Avon, gave us an assurance about the airgun. He had received a clearance that morning from the Home Office and he was so joyful over it; we joined in his glee. We thought that at last we had won something on this Bill and then lo and behold! he had to write a long letter to say that all sorts of reasons could be given for not following up what almost amounted to a promise that he gave.
Just now the noble Lord said that the problem of airguns goes much further than the birds listed in Part II. Of course. Noble Lords may have read the article published in the Guardian on 24th March on a very sad case; it was that of a man who said that a cat was raiding his pigeon loft so he shot it with an airgun. He hit it in the eye; poor pussy was blinded. The owner took proceedings against the man and the magistrates fined him £30 with £65 compensation for damage to the cat. So the case was then taken to the Crown Court and the Crown Court decided that the gentleman who had done the shooting had not caused unnecessary suffering to the cat. Whether this case will go from the Crown Court to the High Court and eventually come to your Lordships' House, I do not know. However, quite obviously, it is a very important case of, as the Guardian put it, "the cat among the pigeons".
This is an indication of how wide the problem of airguns goes. Two things are important: first, that the
18
man who did the shooting said that he aimed between the cat's eyes and he intended to kill the cat; and then his defending counsel said that if the conviction stood, pigeon fanciers would be unable to protect their pigeons. You see what a mess we are in with this wretched airgun. Apparently a man can freely shoot a cat between the eyes, blind it in one of them, be convicted by the magistrates, the conviction can be quashed by the Crown Court, and his counsel can make the silly remark that if the conviction stands no pigeon fancier will be able to protect his pigeons.
Lord Belstead: My Lords, can the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, tell the House in what way the present amendment prevents a cat from being shot at with an airgun?
Lord Houghton of Sowerby: My Lords, not at all. I was merely confirming what the noble Lord said, that the problem of the airgun goes much wider.
Lord Belstead: My Lords, I have been at great pains to tell the House that those problems are already covered by existing legislation.
Lord Houghton of Sowerby: My Lords, I am suggesting that there is a wider problem of the use of the airgun. The serious point about the airgun is that it is a weapon. It was really intended to be a target weapon; the sort of weapon that was used at fairs, rifle ranges, and so forth. I am illustrating the fact that some people are using the airgun as a weapon to kill mammals and certainly birds. Earlier we tried to get a wider ban upon the use of the airgun. Now my noble friends on the other side—the mafia led by the noble Lord, Lord Stanley of Alderley—have put forward a fresh amendment which comes within the rules of order. I am merely trying to start off on an entertaining note for the afternoon and urge your Lordships to disregard the advice of the Minister and accept the amendment.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I should like to say a few brief words. We have had debates on the abuse of air weapons at every stage of the Bill. I should like to reinforce what my noble friend has said about the abuse; it certainly goes much wider than that which would be controlled by the amendments. I had two letters this morning from parents, both of whom had children who had been hit in the eye by airgun pellets, and both of whom had lost the sight of that eye as a result. One was from Wales and one from England. It is a widespread and serious problem.
These amendments will not of themselves do anything to prevent people breaking the law by shooting children in the eye with airguns, and I do not think that any of us who have our names to the amendment claim that it would. The argument goes like this. This Bill, particularly in Clause 11, already prohibits a number of things which would be offences under existing legislation. For example, the use of explosives to kill wild mammals. I am not aware that it is possible without a licence and without complying with all sorts of rules and regulations in existing laws to go around blowing up wild mammals in the countryside. There are already laws which cover that, but the Bill repeats the prohibition, and quite rightly.

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It controls a number of other things which would be offences under cruelty to animals legislation, like the use of crossbows, of live decoys tethered, and a number of other things—gas, smoke and so on; a number of things which are already covered by existing rules, regulations, or laws. Nobody, including the Home Office, has complained to your Lordships' House about all of that, presumably because it was put in by the Government and was therefore all right. Now noble Lords on all sides of the House want to put in a similar prohibition on air weapons and we are told we should not do it. I do not think that that is any more acceptable today than it was when the noble Lord came to the House and said it at Report stage.
I am surprised at the new point the noble Lord made. He said that before moving this amendment the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, and others should have talked to the police and the gun trade. We all imagined that during the Committee stage of the Bill that is exactly what the Home Office had done before the Home Office said that it would be all right to have an amendment of this sort in the Bill and the Government would do it. If they did not, before they gave that clearance, I would suggest to the noble Lord that it is a bit rough on us several weeks later, when the Home Office has had about a month or six weeks, or something, to talk to the gun trade and the police, for the noble Lord to come along and say that we should have done it.
The Home Office said at Committee stage that this amendment was quite all right and the Government would do it. I know the Home Office have since had second thoughts, but I do not think that your Lordships' House has had second thoughts. I hope we will now get these amendments, which do not go nearly as far as my noble friends and I would have liked but nevertheless are an agreed compromise which all of us who have taken an interest in this feel that we can support. I hope we shall now put them in the Bill.
The Earl of Onslow: My Lords, when my noble friend on the Front Bench said that consideration would be given to an inquiry, does that mean consideration will be given and then nothing will happen, or does it mean that consideration will be given and the inquiry will then be actively pursued? If that second one is the case, one would be very happy to support my noble friend. If it is what my relations call the "bug letter", which is an excuse for doing absolutely nothing, then my noble friend Lord Caithness, and the noble Lords, Lord Houghton and Lord Melchett, have much more string to their bow, if I am excused mixing metaphors appallingly.
Viscount Thurso: My Lords, to accept what the Government have said this afternoon is to hand a ready-made excuse to those who already misuse air weapons. I cannot believe that the police in any police force in the country would not welcome the amendment as it stands. One of their difficulties is in identifying the misuse, and in explaining the misuse, of air weapons to people who are misusing them. It is clear here that everybody who is interested in wildlife, and the question of conservation, control and management, is for this amendment.
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I cannot see why the Government should go on resisting this amendment when clearly it is in the interests of the welfare of animals, the conservation of wildlife, and the safety of everybody, to make this point clear and not to leave a vague area of excuse, "Oh, I was only shooting at a few birds" for those who misuse air weapons. I support the noble Lords whose names are down to this amendment.
Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge: My Lords, may I add my support from this remote Bench? I hope that the noble Earl will press his amendment.
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, before I sum up I wonder whether my noble friend could answer the point raised by my noble friend Lord Onslow?
3.35 p.m.
Lord Belstead: My Lords, with your Lordships' leave, perhaps I may briefly reply. May I also say that the onus of replying to amendments on this difficult Bill seems to have been too much for me, and I attempted to move Amendment No. 72 which has in fact got nothing to do with this clutch of amendments under the name of my noble friend Lord Caithness and other noble Lords. Amendment No. 72 we come to in a moment, and is in the name of my noble friend Lord Bellwin.
I was a little surprised that the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, should have talked about winning something. It is a pity when country pursuits, and indeed the use of weapons, is put into the context of thinking that in Parliament people are going to win something or lose something. I have lived in the country all my life and have always been brought up to believe that sport in the country is something for responsibility, for bringing young people up to realise what are the joys and the dangers, and is not set in the context of winning or losing points concerning discussions upon those subjects.
May I say in all friendliness to the noble Lord who referred to the strange case of the cat which was shot between the eyes, and indeed thereby encouraged the noble Viscount, Lord Thurso, with all his experience of this Bill, none the less to take the same line about general safety, that this amendment, with respect, has nothing to do with general safety. The misuse of an air weapon in nearly every case at the moment involves the commission of one or more offences under the law. As the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, fairly said, the effect of this particular clutch of amendments is limited in its scope.
The problem with which the amendments are trying to deal, I have been suggesting to your Lordships, is better dealt with by two ways: one by the enforcement of existing legislation, and the other by a voluntary campaign to try to heighten public awareness and to increase public responsibility. I therefore end by answering my noble friend Lord Onslow that it would be the intention of the Government, if your Lordships agreed that that would be the way forward, to run a public campaign to bring home to members of the public the dangers of the use of air weapons, part of which would be the subject-matter of these amendments, namely, shooting at birds which, arguably, should not be shot at by airguns. Then, as a result of that campaign,

21
it would be perfectly possible for the Government to bring into effect by order under subsection (3) subordinate legislation in order to do what it was deemed right to do. It seems a great pity to move into the Bill legislation which people may misinterpret, and not, first of all, try to carry people along in a voluntary way.
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, my noble friend has persuaded me, but only on one point, and that is that I will lend support to his proposed advertising campaign. He of course slightly misinformed the House about the intention of the amendments. These amendments draw the net a little closer as to what species may be shot. That is the point that he has not put over to your Lordships. It reduces the species that may be shot to the pest species. Under present law you may shoot at many more species, and I think it is wrong.
It would be much easier for the police to know that there are ten birds in Schedule 2 Part II that may be shot. As for any other bird that somebody shoots at, that creates an immediate offence. That is not the case under the present law. My noble friend did not give a satisfactory answer to my noble friend Lord Onslow. In fact, we have been waiting since the Green Paper in 1973 for something to be done about airguns and nothing has been done. A recommendation of that paper was that there should be further restriction on the use of airguns. This is a small step in the right direction. I beg to move.
3.40 p.m.
On Question, Whether the said amendment (No. 13) shall be agreed to?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 92; Not-Contents, 82.

CONTENTS

Aberdeen and Temair, M.

Gaitskell, B.

Adeane, L.

Gladwyn, L.

Airedale, L.

Goronwy-Roberts, L.

Amulree, L.

Gosford, E.

Ardwick, L.

Granville of Eye, L.

Avebury, L.

Greenwood of Rossendale, L.

Balogh, L.

Hale, L.

Banks, L.

Halsbury, E.

Beaumont of Whitley, L.

Hampton, L.

Birk, B.

Hanworth, V.

Blyton, L.

Harris of Greenwich, L.

Boston of Faversham, L.

Hatch of Lusby, L.

Briginshaw, L.

Hayter, L.

Brockway, L.

Henderson, L.

Bruce of Donington, L.

Henley, L.

Buckinghamshire, E.

Hooson, L.

Burton, L.

Houghton of Sowerby, L.—(Teller.)

Byers, L.

Caithness, E.—(Teller.)

Hunt, L.

Caradon, L.

Hylton-Foster, B.

Clancarty, E.

Ilchester, E.

Collison, L.

Jacques, L.

Craigton, L.

Janner, L.

Cranbrook, E.

Kinloss, Ly.

David, B.

Leatherland, L.

Davies of Leek, L.

Listowel, E.

Davies of Penrhys, L.

Llewelyn-Davies of Hastoe, B.

Denington, B.

Lloyd of Hampstead, L.

Donaldson of Kingsbridge, L.

Loudoun, C.

Dulverton, L.

Melchett, L.

Elliot of Harwood, B.

Mersey, V.

Fortescue, E.

Newall, L.

22

Northfield, L.

Spens, L.

O'Brien of Lothbury, L.

Stanley of Alderley, L.

Oram, L.

Stedman, B.

Paget of Northampton, L.

Stone, L.

Pargiter, L.

Strabolgi, L.

Peart, L.

Taylor of Mansfield, L.

Phillips, B.

Thurso, V.

Richardson, L.

Underhill, L.

Roberthall, L.

Wallace of Coslany, L.

Sainsbury, L.

Wells-Pestell, L.

St. Davids, V.

Wheatley, L.

Sandford, L.

White, B.

Sefton of Garston, L.

Wigg, L.

Shinwell, L.

Wigoder, L.

Sligo, M.

NOT-CONTENTS

Alexander of Tunis, E.

Hornsby-Smith, B.

Allerton, L.

Ironside, L.

Auckland, L.

Kemsley, V.

Avon, E.

Killearn, L.

Balfour of Inchrye, L.

Lauderdale, E.

Barnby, L.

Long, V.

Bellwin, L.

Lucas of Chilworth, L.

Belstead, L.

Lyell, L.

Brentford, V.

Mackay of Clashfern, L.

Bridgeman, V.

Mackintosh of Halifax, V.

Campbell of Croy, L.

Macleod of Borve, B.

Chelwood, L.

Mansfield, E.

Clitheroe, L.

Margadale, L.

Clwyd, L.

Morris, L.

Cockfield, L.

Mowbray and Stourton, L.

Cottesloe, L.

Murton of Lindisfarne, L.

Cullen of Ashbourne, L.

Northchurch, B.

Davidson, V.

Nugent of Guildford, L.

De Freyne, L.

Onslow, E.

De La Warr, E.

Peel, E.

Denham, L.—(Teller.)

Penrhyn, L.

Derwent, L.

Portland, D.

Digby, L.

Reigate, L.

Drumalbyn, L.

Renton, L.

Dundee, E.

Romney, E.

Eccles, V.

Runciman of Doxford, V.

Effingham, E.

Saint Oswald, L.

Ellenborough, L.

Saltoun, Ly.

Elles, B.

Sandys, L.—(Teller.)

Enniskillen, E.

Skelmersdale, L.

Faithfull, B.

Soames, L.

Ferrers, E.

Strathclyde, L.

Fraser of Kilmorack, L.

Strathspey, L.

Gainford, L.

Swansea, L.

Gibson-Watt, L.

Swinton, E.

Gridley, L.

Terrington, L.

Grimston of Westbury, L.

Trenchard, V.

Hailsham of Saint Marylebone, L.

Vaux of Harrowden, L.

Vivian, L.

Hawke, L.

Willoughby de Broke, L.

Home of the Hirsel, L.

Wynford, L.

Hood, V.

Resolved in the affirmative, and amendment agreed to accordingly.

Council of Ministers (Fisheries)
3.48 p.m.
The Minister of State, Scottish Office (The Earl of Mansfield): My Lords, with the permission of the House, I will repeat a Statement being made by my right honourable friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food in another place. The Statement reads as follows:
"With permission, Mr, Speaker, I wish to make a Statement about the EEC Council of Fisheries Ministers on 27th March, which was attended by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State

23
for Scotland, my honourable friend the Minister of State in my department, and myself.
"As the House will know, this meeting was called following the discussions on fish at the European Council at the beginning of last week. However, it quickly became apparent that one delegation was not able to negotiate on the crucial question of access and that therefore there was no possibility of agreement on a comprehensive, revised common fisheries policy. In these circumstances, the president decided that it would be wrong to prolong the meeting, which ended shortly after lunch. Ministers from all member countries committed their Governments to make every endeavour to reach overall agreement this spring, and invited the presidency to reconvene the Council as soon as the necessary preparations allow.
"The Government consider that it is vital to retain the strength of the British fishing industry. It will be known that for this purpose during the past year the Government have already provided £37 million worth of aid to the industry, and it was originally envisaged that this aid was for the period ending on 31st March.
"The House will know that the Government made the decision to bring forward the review of the financial position of the industry, and the results of this review show quite clearly that markets are weak and increasing costs and continuing uncertainty are hitting the fleet hard.
"The Government have therefore decided to make further aid available to the industry to help it through the continuing uncertainty and difficulty. £25 million will be made available for distribution through a scheme on broadly similar lines to the fishing vessel temporary support scheme introduced last August.
"By taking this action, the Government will therefore again have confirmed their determination to see that the British fishing industry continues to make an important contribution to our economy and continues in readiness for taking full advantage of a common fishing policy when negotiations are completed".
My Lords, that concludes the Statement.
Lord Peart: My Lords, the whole House will basically support what the Government have sought to do in Brussels. I know of the difficulties that arise there, but I believe that our Minister, though his political point of view is different from mine, has tried very hard, and I am certain that at some time we shall achieve success. Unfortunately not all Governments act in the same way, and during discussions at the European Council meeting last week it quickly became apparent, as the Minister said, that one delegation was not able to negotiate on the question of access. I assume that that was the French delegation. Of course, we must recognise that they face problems, but I believe that our stance has been right, and I hope that we shall be able this spring to secure an agreement on a common policy. There has been much controversy in the press regarding this matter, and I hope that we can achieve success. I think that the president was quite right in deciding that it would be wrong to prolong the meeting,
24
which ended shortly after lunch. I know what negotiations are like in Europe, even though I never undertook any fisheries negotiations, despite being a fisheries Minister. I believe that Ministers from all member countries committed their Governments to make every endeavour to reach overall agreement this spring.
It is important that we have a common fisheries policy. I am glad that the Government have stressed the fact that it is vital to retain the strength of the fishing industry until such time as they are able to take full advantage of a common fisheries policy. Some of these very important matters could be raised in the Bill that we are to debate tomorrow.
I am grateful for what the Government have done; they have done well for the industry. They have already provided £37 million worth of aid to the industry; it was originally estimated that the aid was for the period ending on 31st March. Again, £25 million will be made available for distribution through a scheme on broadly similar lines to the fishing vessel temporary support scheme, which was introduced last August. I think that this will be welcomed by the industry. I believe that in taking this action the Government will have confirmed their determination to ensure that the British fishing industry continues to make an important contribution to our economy. This is not a party matter. I strongly support the Minister on this issue, and hope that after a further meeting at some later stage we shall go on from success to success.
3.53 p.m.
Viscount Thurso: My Lords, on behalf of my colleagues on these Benches I should like to thank the Minister for the Statement he has repeated. We support the Government in the stand that they are taking for the British fishing industry. We urge them to continue to seek a proper comprehensive policy for the EEC on fisheries and to ensure that that policy provides for the proper conservation of our fish stocks within our own waters and ensures that the fishing industry continues as one of the great industries of this country. We welcome the fact that the Government are to give aid to our hard-pressed fishing industry. We hope that the aid might also contain a measure of protection against the dumping of cheap fish within our markets. On these Benches we notice that that point has not been mentioned in this context, and perhaps the Minister would care to say a word or two on it. However, we certainly support the stand that has been taken, and we sympathise with the Government in the difficulties which obviously they have been experiencing.
The Earl of Mansfield: My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Lord and the noble Viscount for their support of the Government's stance on the negotiations for a common fisheries policy. It is of no little comfort to my right honourable friend when he goes to Brussels or Luxembourg month after month to know that broadly speaking there is a united front so far as the United Kingdom is concerned. I must also thank the noble Lord and the noble Viscount for their welcome of the very large injection of cash into the industry. Not for one moment do I say that the injection of cash is other than thoroughly deserved, but it is a large amount of money, and we hope that it will continue to keep the fishing industry in a position

25
where it will be able to take advantage of a common fisheries policy when negotiations are completed.
In reply to the noble Viscount, Lord Thurso, on the point about imports, I would say that one must take this in two stages. With regard to imports into the United Kingdom under the reference price, we have for some time been pressing the Commission to take action, and indeed it has prepared a regulation prohibiting imports into the United Kingdom under the reference price. While no decision has yet been taken on this question, we shall continue to press the matter.
With regard to illegal and unfair imports, as the noble Viscount might be aware, my right honourable friend has set up a small team, consisting of representatives from the catchers' organisations and officials, which is inquiring into these matters. I can tell the noble Viscount that it is making good progress and it hopes shortly to complete its work and report to Ministers.
Baroness Gaitskell: My Lords, mention has been made of cheap fish dumped in this country, but any housewife will testify that we cannot get cheap fish anywhere, whether it be clumped or not dumped.
The Earl of Mansfield: My Lords, with respect to the noble Baroness, the question of the price of fish on the slab is rather outside the content of the Statement that I have repeated.
Lord Davies of Leek: My Lords, I should like to ask the noble Earl how the aid is being distributed to the men who go out to win our food and who sometimes pay with their lives. What help will the smallest enterprises receive, and how will the vessels be subsidised? In asking these questions I am not criticising; I think that the Government have done a good job of work here.
The Earl of Mansfield: My Lords, the aid will be distributed on lines broadly similar to those in what is known as the fishing vessel temporary support scheme, which we introduced last summer. I can tell the noble Lord, very briefly, that a cash sum will be paid for each vessel that can be shown to have been fishing on a regular basis. The cash sum is determined approximately by the length of the vessel in the water. Though the scheme is slightly arbitrary, it has commended itself to us as being the fairest that can be devised, but, above all, it is easy to administer, quick to pay out, and seems to be effective in getting the money as quickly as possible out of the hands of the Treasury into the pockets of the fishermen.
Baroness Hornsby-Smith: My Lords, I should like to join in welcoming the Statement repeated by my noble friend, and indeed the stand that has been taken by his right honourable friend the Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries. I also have in mind those Members of the European Parliament who represent fishing constituencies and who have been battling very hard in support of our claims. May I take it that the grants are a measure of the Government's determination to ensure that we really can sustain an adequate fishing industry?—which is one of our most traditional industries. May I ask my noble friend whether the
26
negotiations will in any way deal with the much higher fuel prices which our fishermen are having to pay? Will they deal with the measures of control that have been forecast relating to quota catches in the interests of conservation? While we know that the controls are ruthlessly imposed here, will the negotiations ensure that they are adequately imposed by some of our colleagues on the Continent? Also, will they in any way deal with the factory ships, which deprive our fishing ports of most valuable landing charges when those factory ships are from non-EEC countries?
The Earl of Mansfield: My Lords, I think, if I may say so, that most of the questions that my noble friend has directed to me this afternoon might be better directed to me tomorrow afternoon, when I hope to move the Second Reading of the Fisheries Bill, which in the legislation, so to speak, will answer a lot of her points. But taking the matter briefly, this scheme is designed to put money into the very hard-pressed fishing industry as quickly and as effectively as possible so that it can, as it were, continue in effective being until we work out a common fisheries policy and can fish fairly and profitably in the way that it always has in the past.
Matters of imports and the regulation of fishing are really quite apart from this support scheme which my right honourable friend has announced today, but I should like merely to reflect my noble friend's opinion that the Government take the plight of the fishing industry very seriously indeed. My right honourable friend the Prime Minister has made it plain from a very early stage in the Government's life that she regards the fishing industry as being crucial to the economy of some of the most hard-pressed and vulnerable parts of the United Kingdom and, indeed, to the rural economy as a whole, and the Government are determined that they should support the fishing industry until such times as we get a fair, just and equitable common fisheries policy to enable it to pursue its traditional calling in its traditional way.

Wildlife and Countryside Bill [H.L.]
4.2 p.m.
Third Reading resumed.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 14:
Page 6, line 38, leave out from beginning to ("shall") in line 40 and insert ("Subject to the provisions of this Part, if the owner or occupier of any land causes or permits to be done on that land any act which is made unlawful by subsection (1), he").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, with permission should like also to speak to Amendments Nos. 16 and 17, which are consequential. When, at Report stage, the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, moved his amendment, which was agreed by a small majority, he allowed that there might be some shortcomings in its drafting. While the Government, as the House knows, did not agree with the amendment, we have nevertheless undertaken the redrafting. I beg to move.
Lord Renton: My Lords, although this amendment and the others that go with it are necessary as drafting amendments, may I express the hope that the Government

27
will in due course revert to their original and correct view of this matter? Under the present law, anyone who aids, abets, counsels or procures the commission of an offence is guilty. Those words are clear, adequate and well understood. But the words "causes or permits" are imprecise, confusing and can lead to injustice. Therefore, while accepting this drafting amendment now, I do so in the hope that the Government will try to persuade another place to do better than we have done.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, may I disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Renton? I think that this amendment rewords something which the House accepted at the last stage considerably better than the attempt that we made at it, and I would hope that, now that the Government have put down an amendment to this effect, it will be accepted. It does not go nearly as far as I wanted and it does not go as far as the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, wanted—he moved an amendment on this matter both at Committee and at Report stage—but it seems to me to be a useful step. I think it is possibly to the credit of your Lordships' House, which must contain more landowners and farmers than certainly another place and possibly any other similar gathering of the same number of people, that the House has agreed to make an amendment which recognises the responsibilities of landowners and farmers. I think it is an excellent thing, and I am grateful to the Government for moving this amendment.
Lord Beaumont of Whitley: My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord, and I am grateful to the Government for having taken this on board. As the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, has said, while it does not go quite far enough, it was an important thing, I think, to try to close what was quite clearly a real gap in the law, or what could in practice turn out to be a real gap in the law, and we are grateful to the Government for going quite a long way to meet us.
The Earl of Onslow: My Lords, I should like to disagree very strongly with my noble friend Lord Renton, although on several of these points in this Bill we have been in agreement. I think this is a good amendment, and I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Avon for making the original amendment better. Furthermore, I should like to suggest to your Lordships' House that the position under the health and safety at work regulations is, I think, that if somebody does something—for instance, lifts somebody up on the front of a fork-lift tractor to enable him to do something which the health and safety at work people would get very cross about—then even if I am in your Lordships' House "rabbiting" on about something I could still be in serious trouble if it was done behind my back or even if it was done when I was at home and even though I may have given instructions that it should not be done. I think this particular amendment is a good thing, and I hope that my noble friend will disregard what my noble friend Lord Renton has suggested to him.
Lord Burton: My Lords, I must disagree with my noble friend Lord Onslow. I certainly agree with
28
what my noble friend Lord Renton has said. "Permits" could mean "has not prevented". The amendment is clearly intended to make the employer liable for the acts of his employee. This would be tolerable, but as the amendment is at the moment drafted an owner of land could well be liable to blackmail. Anyone finding any chemical-impregnated bait which could have been set for the taking of a bird could have the owner and the occupier taken to court as they did not prevent the bait being set. Under these proposals, owners or occupiers could be placed, and are likely to be placed, in a most invidious position. Indeed, I believe there has already been a case of attempted blackmail, where a poisoned bird has been left near a keeper's house. Furthermore, not all employees are angels, and even employers who are completely innocent could be placed in an extremely invidious position.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Belstead Lord Belstead moved Amendment No. 15:
Page 6, line 42, at beginning insert ("Subject to subsection (3A)").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move this amendment, and would speak to Amendment No. 72 at the same time. If I may repeat what I said earlier, I think there is a typing mistake in the Marshalled List and that these should be Amendments Nos. 15 and 15A. I think it is fair to say that the Bill is designed primarily to conserve and protect wildlife. It is not intended to be a means of introducing controls on fire-arms for other reasons. There is also the need to ensure greater consistency with the provisions which are to be found in Clause 11(3). As your Lordships are aware, the powers in Clause 11(3) limit the adding or omitting of methods of killing or taking of mammals to those for the purpose of compliance with an international obligation.
With these considerations in mind, the Government feel that it is right similarly to limit additions of firearms to the list of proscribed weapons in Clause 5 to those required under international obligations. This would still provide the necessary safeguard against new or improved firearms, and would not of course prevent the addition of other methods of killing or taking, such as chemicals, to which birds are particularly vulnerable. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Belstead Lord Belstead moved Amendment No. 15A:
Page 6, line 46, at end insert—
("(3A) The power conferred by subsection (3) shall not be exercisable, except for the purpose of complying with an international obligation, in relation to any method of killing or taking wild birds which involves the use of a firearm.").
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 16 and 17:
Page 7, line 1, at end insert ("or subsection (2)")
Page 7, line 2, leave out ("by the accused").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I have already spoken to Amendments Nos. 16 and 17. I beg to move them both together.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
4.10 p.m.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 18:
Page 7, line 5, leave out ("mammals") and insert ("animals")
The noble Earl said: My Lords, with permission, I will speak also to Amendments Nos. 28, 30, 31, 32, 34, 36, 39, 41, 43, 44, 45, 47, 65 and 168. This is a series of amendments to replace references to mammals by references to animals. This meets the point which the noble Lord, Lord Houghton, raised at Committee stage, and which my noble friend Lord Cranbrook pursued at Report stage, that at some stage in the future we might incur an international obligation to protect various wild animals such as reptiles or amphibia, in addition to the birds and mammals for which the Bill presently provides, against the use of indiscriminate methods of killing. My Lords, I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Caithness The Earl of Caithness moved Amendment No. 19:
Page 7, line 18, at end insert—
("(d) the use of any air weapon by an authorised person for the purpose of taking a bird included in Part II of Schedule 2;").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is consequential on Amendment No. 13. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 6 [Sale etc. of live or dead wild birds, eggs etc.]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 20 and 21:
Page 7, line 32, leave out ("things falling within paragraph (a)" and insert ("any of those things").
Page 8, line 3, leave out ("things falling within paragraph (a)") and insert ("any of those things").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, with permission I will speak to Amendments Nos. 21, 23 and 48.
These are drafting amendments. I beg to move Amendments Nos. 20 and 21.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Clause 9 [Protection of certain wild animals]:
The Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Earl Ferrers)The Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Earl Ferrers) moved Amendment No. 22:
Page 11, line 17, after ("dead") insert ("wild").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, if I may, I should like to speak to Amendments Nos. 46, 59, 60 and 74. The principal amendment is in Clause 27 and the others are consequential. These are drafting amendments to clarify the distinction between birds and animals for the purposes of the Bill. I beg to move.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I do not have any worries about the later amendments to which the noble Earl has spoken. But could he perhaps write to me at some stage and reassure me about this amendment which might be introducing a loophole, in that somebody could claim that the animal concerned was not a wild animal, although it was an animal to which it would otherwise be illegal to do what they were going to do. Because they could claim that it was bred in captivity,
30
they would not be committing an offence. There is a similar problem in the part of the Bill dealing with birds and it has been met in some way. I saw this amendment only late this morning. I may not have made myself clear and I may be barking up the wrong tree in any case. My worry is that somebody will be able to say that this is not a wild animal, that it was bred in captivity, and that that would provide a loophole. It is not a major point. If the noble Earl does not know the answer now, perhaps he will write me.
Lord Beaumont of Whitley: My Lords, I cannot find anything in Schedule 5 which would need this exemption or which would benefit from being subject to this extra qualification. If the noble Earl is not able to answer now, it would be good to receive an explanation by letter; but I should have thought that we ought to have a verbal explanation now. On the face of it, it looks as though it is modifying something which not only does not need to be modified but which ought not to be modified.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I can understand the reason why the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, is in a quandary. I will try to help him. If he looks at Amendment No. 22 on its own, it appears to imply that there are some animals in Schedule 5 which are wild and some which are not. If the noble Lord addresses himself to Clause 27, which is Amendment No. 74, that is the definition clause and the point of the whole amendment is to define "animal" as meaning an animal other than a bird. It therefore excludes wild birds. That is the reason why the word "wild" is put in the place where it is. I think that that covers Lord Beaumont's problem. I think that also covers Lord Melchett's problem. He wags his head in dissent—which is not an unfamiliar posture for the noble Lord. If he is worrried about it, I will look into it and write to him.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers moved Amendment No. 23:
Page 11, line 23, leave out ("things falling within paragraph (a)") and insert ("any of those things").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is consequential. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 10. [Exceptions to s. 9]:
[Amendment No. 24 not moved.]
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 25 and 26:
Page 12, line 3, leave out second ("or")
Page 12, line 7, leave out ("or").
The noble Earl said: I spoke to these two amendments with Amendment No. 1. I beg to move.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers moved Amendment No. 27:
Page 12, line 25, leave out ("bats") and insert ("a bat").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is a drafting amendment to make this subsection consistent with the rest of the Bill, where the singular is used. I beg to move.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, if I may bend the rules a little, may I take the opportunity to point out two printing errors in Clause 10? In page 11, line 39, I think that the words, "subsection (2) of Section 9" should read: "subsection (3) of Section 9". On page l2, line 19, "Section 15" should read "Section 16". I do not know whether these are errors which can be corrected when the Bill is reprinted. Perhaps the Government can look at them.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, if the noble Lord wishes to bend the rules then perhaps I may be permitted to do so by saying that I will see whether the points he makes are valid.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 11 [Prohibition of certain methods of killing or taking wild mammals]:
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers moved Amendments Nos. 28 to 37:
Page 12, line 32, leave out ("mammal") and insert ("animal")
Page 12, line 33, leave out ("or")
Page 12, line 34, leave out ("mammal") and insert ("animal")
Page 12, line 40, leave out ("mammal") and insert ("animal").
Page 13, line 1, leave out ("mammal") and insert ("animal")
Page 13, line 5, leave out second ("or")
Page 13, line 7, leave out ("mammal") and insert ("animal")
Page 13, line 9, leave out ("or")
Page 13, line 11, leave out ("mammal") and insert ("animal")
Page 13, line 18, leave out ("or").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, these are consequential amendments. I beg to move.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Alport): My Lords, would it be your Lordships' wish that I move Amendments Nos. 28 to 37 en bloc?
On Question, amendments agreed to.
The Earl of Caithness The Earl of Caithness moved Amendment No. 38:
Page 13, line 18, at end insert—
("(v) any air weapon; or").
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers moved Amendment No. 39:
Page 13, line 20, leave out ("mammal") and insert ("animal").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is consequential on Amendment No. 18. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
[Amendment No. 40 not moved.]
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers moved Amendment No. 41:
Page 13, line 22, leave out ("mammal") and insert ("animal").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is consequential. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
[Amendment No. 42 not moved.]
4.20 p.m.
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers moved Amendments Nos. 43 to 48:
Page 13, line 23, leave out ("mammal") and insert ("animal")
Page 13, line 27, leave out ("mammal") and insert ("animal")
Page 13, line 29, leave out ("mammals") and insert ("animals")
Page 13, line 35, after ("wild") insert ("birds or wild")
Page 13, line 37, leave out ("mammals") and insert ("animals").
Page 14, line 17, leave out ("things falling within paragraph (a)") and insert ("any of those things").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, Amendments Nos. 43 to 48 are all consequential. I beg to move these amendments en bloc.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 49:
Page 14, leave out lines 20 to 24.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, in moving this amendment I should like, with permission, to speak also to Amendment No. 50. At Report stage your Lordships' House accepted an amendment by the noble Baroness, Lady David, to require a person charged with selling a protected plant on Schedule 8 to show that it was not taken from the wild. The amendment as drafted was defective; I hope the noble Baroness will find the redraft acceptable. I beg to move.
Baroness David: My Lords, may I ask this question? Does the new amendment really put the onus on the vendor of the plant to show that the plant was not taken from the wild?
The Earl of Avon: That is certainly our intention, yes.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 50:
Page 14, line 29, at end insert—
("(5) In any proceedings for an offence under subsection (2)(a), the plant in question shall be presumed to have been a wild plant unless the contrary is shown.").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I have already spoken to this amendment. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 15 [Endangered species (import and export)]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 51:
Page 15, line 25, at end insert—
("(2) The functions of the Nature Conservancy Council shall include the provision of advice and assistance to persons enforcing or seeking to enforce the provisions of the said Act of 1976 or any order made under it.").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I shall, with your permission, also speak to Amendment No. 67. I said on Report that the Government accepted the principle of an amendment moved by my noble friend Lord Craigton which provided that the Nature Conservancy Council could appoint persons to advise and assist those engaged in enforcement of the Endangered Species Act 1976 and Part I of this Bill, and undertook to table suitable amendments. Your Lordships will remember that there was a general reference to the police who in fact act as individuals. This amendment is framed to cover both police and H.M. Customs and Excise. I beg to move.
Lord Craigton: My Lords, I am very grateful.
Lord Renton: My Lords, Amendment No. 51 is very properly saying that the Nature Conservancy Council shall give advice and assistance to people seeking to enforce the provisions of the Act of 1976. Under Amendment No. 67 it is said that it shall be their function to give advice and assistance to people enforcing or seeking to enforce the provisions of Part I. But the advice of the council will undoubtedly be required—perhaps in a big way—under Part II as well. I wonder why it is that Amendement No. 67 is confined to advice and assistance under Part I only.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, without getting technical advice I shall endeavour to answer my noble friend in this way. I imagine it refers to Part I because that is where the birds and mammals are considered. It really only refers to Part I.
Baroness David: My Lords, I moved an amendment at an earlier stage of the Bill trying to strengthen the enforcement clauses because we did not think they went far enough. This amendment has gone some way. It shows that the Government have ack-knowledged the need for enforcement and this is to be given by the advice and assistance of the Nature Conservancy Council. We wanted them to have officers who could enforce it because they are the people who have the actual knowledge. We have gone some way but I do not think that this amendment gives them the means to enforce the Act. I hope that in the other place there will be further amendments which will definitely strengthen this clause. We still think that it does not go far enough as it is.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I have a suspicion that the Nature Conservancy Council itself is somewhat worried about going much further on the enforcement levels.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 16 [Power to grant licences]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 52 and 53:
Page 15, line 27, leave out ("3")
Page 15, line 27, after ("8") insert ("and orders under section 3").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, with permission, I shall move Amendments Nos. 52 and 53. These are simple drafting amendments. I beg to move the amendments.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 54:
Page 15, leave lines 35 and 36.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, with your permission, I shall also speak to Amendments Nos. 56, 58 and 63, which are consequential. The noble Lords, Lord Melchett and Lord Donaldson, suggested on Report that Clause 16(1)(f)—for the purpose of human consumption—might be misinterpreted in Europe and that it would be better to state in the Bill exactly what we are prepared to allow to be taken for human consumption. The amendments are designed to
34
achieve that end. The practices listed are traditional and harmless to conservation. The noble Lord, Lord Melchett, also suggested on Report that taking for human consumption was not allowed by the directive. Provision is in fact made in Article 9(1)(c).
We have had a lot of goes at this particular clause. I hope that this will satisfy the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson, on his higher perch. I beg to move.
Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge: My Lords, I am most grateful.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 55:
Page 16, line 3, after ("livestock") insert ("foodstuffs for livestock").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I have already spoken to this amendment with Amendment No. 9. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 56:
Page 16, line 6, at end insert—
("(1A) Sections 1 and 3 do not apply to anything done for the purpose of providing food for human consumption in relation to—

(a) a gannet on the island of Sula Sgeir; or

(b) a gull's egg or, at any time before 15th April in any year, a lapwing's egg,

if it is done under and in accordance with the terms of a licence granted by the appropriate authority.").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I have already spoken to this amendment with Amendment No. 54. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
[Amendment No. 57 not moved.]
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 58:
Page 17, line 5, after ("(1)") insert ("(1A)").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I have already spoken to this amendment with Amendment No. 54. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 59:
Page 17, line 6, leave out ("other").
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 60:
Page 17, line 8, leave out ("other").
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 61:
Page 17, leave out lines 12 to 20.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, Clause 16(6) was originally included to allow for the sale where appropriate of birds and other animals taken under licence. It has been made superfluous by the amendments making wider provision for sale which were accepted by your Lordship's House on Report. This amendment removes subsection (6). I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 62:
Page 17, leave out lines 37 and 38.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, with permission, I shall speak to this amendment and Amendment No. 70 together. These are drafting amendments to include the definition of "Agriculture Minister" in the interpretation clause. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 63:
Page 18, line 2, after ("(1)") insert ("subsection (1A)").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I also spoke to this amendment, which is consequential, when moving Amendment No. 54.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 22 [Power to vary Schedule 5]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 64:
Page 21, line 10, leave out ("wild").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is a drafting amendment. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 65:
Page 21, leave out lines 33 and 34 and insert ("or Schedule 6; and").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I spoke to this amendment with Amendment No. 18. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 23 [Advisory bodies and their functions]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 66:
Page 22, line 31, after first ("may") insert ("out of moneys provided by Parliament and").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is another drafting amendment, and I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 24 [Functions of Nature Conservancy Council]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 67:
Page 23, line 9, at end insert—
("(4) The functions of the Council shall include the provision of advice and assistance to persons enforcing or seeking to enforce the provisions of this Part or any order or regulations made under it.").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I spoke to this amendment with Amendment No. 51. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 26 [Regulations, orders, notices etc.]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 68 and 69:
Page 23, line 34, at beginning insert ("except in the case of an order under section 2(6)").
Page 23, line 36, leave out ("2(6) or").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I should like, if I may, to move Amendments Nos. 68 and 69 together.
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Clause 26(4)(b) as presently drafted requires in the case of orders made under Clause 2(6), the protection of Schedule 2, Part I birds in the open season, that local authorities shall be given an opportunity to make representations. This is clearly inappropriate and any order has to be made very quickly in order to give protection when it is needed and will usually be for the whole country. The amendments remove that requirement. I beg to move.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Clause 27 [Interpretation of Part I]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 70:
Page 24, line 12, at end insert—
(""agriculture Minister" means the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food or the Secretary of State;").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 70. I spoke to this with Amendment No. 62.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Caithness The Earl of Caithness moved Amendment No. 71:
Page 24, line 29, at end insert—
(""air weapon" means any air rifle, air gun or air pistol not of a type declared by rules made by the Secretary of State under section 53 of the Firearms Act 1968 to be specially dangerous;").
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Belstead Lord Belstead moved Amendment No. 72:
Page 24, line 41, at end insert—
(""firearm" has the same meaning as in the Firearms Act 1968;").
On Question, amendment agreed to.
[Amendment No. 73 not moved.]
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 74 and 75:
Page 25, line 22, after second ("animal") insert ("(other than a bird)").
Page 25, line 22, leave out lines 30 to 32.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I should like, if I may, to move Amendments Nos. 74 and 75 together. I have spoken to them before and I beg to move.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Clause 30 [Maritime nature conservation]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 76:
Transpose Clause 30 to after Clause 33.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is a technical amendment to re-order the clauses. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
4.35 p.m.
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers moved Amendment No. 77:
After Clause 31, insert the following new clause:
("Restoration where order under s. 29 is contravened
.—(1) Where the operation in respect of which a person is convicted of an offence under section 29 has destroyed or damaged any of the flora, fauna, or geological or physiographical features by reason of which the land on which it was carried out is of special interest, the court by which he is convicted, in addition to dealing with him in any other way, may make an

37
order requiring him to carry out, within such period as may be specified in the order, such operations for the purpose of restoring the land to its former condition as may be so specified.
(2) In determining whether to make an order under this section against any person, the court shall have regard to his means so far as they appear or are known to the court.
(3) An order under this section made on conviction on indictment shall be treated for the purposes of section 30 and 42(1) and (2) of the Criminal Appeal Act 1968 (effect of appeals on orders for the restitution of property) as an order for the restitution of property; and where by reason of the quashing by the Court of Appeal of a person's conviction any such order does not take effect, and appeal to the House of Lords the conviction is restored by that House, the House may make any order under this section which could be made on his conviction by the Court which convicted him.
(4) In the case of an order under this section made by a magistrates' court the period specified in the order shall not begin to run—

(a) in any case until the expiration of the period for the time being prescribed by law for the giving of notice of appeal against a decision of a magistrates' court;

(b) where notice of appeal is given within the period so prescribed, until determination of the appeal.

(5) At any time before an order under this section has been complied with or fully complied with, the court by which it was made may, on the application of the person against whom it was made, discharge or vary the order if it appears to the court that a change in circumstances has made compliance or full compliance with the order impracticable or unnecessary.
(6) Any person who, without reasonable excuse, fails to comply with an order under this section within the period specified in the order shall be liable on summary conviction—

(a) to a fine not exceeding £500; and

(b) in the case of a continuing offence, to a further fine not exceeding £50 for each day during which the offence continues after conviction.

(7) In the application of this section to Scotland—

(a) subsections (3) and (4) shall not apply; and

(b) for the purposes of any appeal or review, an order under this section is a sentence.").

The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 77, but I feel I should point out to your Lordships that there is in fact an omission on the Marshalled List. The fourth line from the end of subsection (3) should have the word "on" appearing before the words "appeal to the House of Lords". It should read as follows:
"the quashing by the Court of Appeal of a person's conviction any such order does not take effect, and on appeal to the House of Lords the conviction".
I should like also to speak to Amendment No. 108, if I may.
When your Lordships discussed at an earlier stage Amendment No. 167C, which was moved by the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, and which referred to the restoring of certain Clause 29 sites which might have been destroyed, I was somewhat pessimistic about the time which might be taken to resolve some of the problems that seemed to be posed by the amendment. Your Lordships will recall that the amendment sought to give the courts a power to require a person to restore so far as was practicable the special interest of land which had been made subject to an order made by the Secretary of State and which had been destroyed. It appeared to be the wish of your Lordships that something on the lines of this amendment, which could be seen as making the penalty fit the crime, should appear in the Bill before it left here for another place.
I feel I should make a special mention of Parliamentary Counsel's efforts, because I believe that we have here an amendment which meets your Lordships'
38
wishes. It will empower the court, in addition to any other way in which it decides to deal with an offender, to make an order requiring him to make good, in whole or in part, so far as practicable and reasonable, the damage which has been done to the scientific interests of the land covered by a Section 29 order. I must point out, though, that the clause is not loaded against the owner or the occupier but is against the potential offender. It provides that the court shall have regard to his means, for it would do no good if a restoration order were made and the result were ruinous to the offender. Provision is also made for an appeal against the order and for the order to be rescinded or varied by the court as the circumstances change. But the court would have a power to impose a penalty for non-compliance with its order. We think this penalty should be a fine of up to £500 and we have provided, where the offender continues to be in breach of the order, for a further fine not exceeding £50 a day while the offence continues.
I should perhaps refer to subsection (7). This is merely a technical provision to ensure that a restoration order made in Scotland is subject to appeal under Scottish jurisdiction and Scottish procedures. Therefore it expressly disapplies subsections (3) and (4), which are relevant only to England and Wales, and then provides that as regards Scotland a restoration order is a sentence to which the normal Scottish appeal procedures automatically apply.
I am glad that we have been able to respond to your Lordships' wishes in a way which caters for both the principles and the technicalities involved in such a measure, and I hope it will meet with the approval of your Lordships. I beg to move.
Lord Renton: My Lords, I should like to join with my noble friend in saying that the draftsman has done a good job on a rather difficult matter. However, I should like to ask my noble friend just one question which could well arise in the courts and I think we ought to be clear about it. It may call for a further amendment in another place. At the end of subsection (1), we find:
"the court … may make an Order requiring him to carry out, within such period as may be specified in the order, such operations for the purpose of restoring the land to its former condition as may be so specified."
I wonder whether I may ask my noble friend: is that intended to refer only to geographical condition of the land or would it be held that he should so far as possible restore it to its biological condition as well?
That would very often be impossible, because if a very rare plant, for example, has been uprooted—it may have been the last known specimen of it—nothing can be done. If, on the other hand, rare plants have been taken up or, for example, fauna which previously inhabited the land have been excluded from it but could, by finding them elsewhere, be reintroduced, that would be as far as possible restoring the land to its biological condition. Therefore, the word "condition" may very well need further explanation.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, may I very briefly thank the noble Earl very much indeed for this amendment, and echo what he said about the work of the parliamentary

39
draftsmen in dealing with a very difficult point, which I apologise for originally introducing. But I am sure that the provision that will now be in the Bill will be very much welcomed by a number of noble Lords. I know that the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, and others spoke strongly in favour of this at previous stages of this Bill.
Maybe I could take this opportunity of praising not only parliamentary counsel, but all those officials who are working for noble Lords opposite and who have done so much work between the Report stage and this stage of the Bill, not only for producing all these amendments but also for writing a number of very helpful letters. I hope they will feel that their hard work has been rewarded by the fact that there are no amendments down in my name, or in that of my noble friend Lady David, except for one occasion when I joined my name to an amendment of the noble Earl, Lord Caithness.
I should have thought that the answer to the problem of the noble Lord, Lord Renton, was that the operations have to be specified by the court and the court will take into account, I imagine—and I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Renton, will agree with me—what it would be reasonable and practicable to ask an offender to do. It would not be reasonable or practicable to ask an offender to restore the land to the state it was in if it is an impossibility to reproduce wild flowers or to reintroduce fauna which have since left. Our previous discussions have made quite clear what was the intention behind this. I should have thought that the courts would be able to deal with it in a reasonable way, and there is plenty of provision for appeal if the offender in a particular case does not feel that that has been done. I myself very much welcome the amendment and I am grateful to the Government for it.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, for those kind words which I totally endorse. The work that has been done by officials of the department concerned and by parliamentary counsel has been quite extraordinary; in particular, in trying to meet many of the real and difficult points which have been raised. I thought—and it is a happy thought—that the reason why there were no amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, was that the department had considered all of the points that he made and met them, as well as the noble Lord's total mental exhaustion over the Bill, with which I have some mild sympathy.
In fact, I think that he answered my noble friend Lord Renton, but I will see that his point is taken into account. Clearly, if a farmer has ploughed up the one and only unique pink flower that exists in the country, it is impossible for that to be restored. On the other hand, the amendment as drafted permits the court to give an instruction for such operations, for the purpose of restoring the land to the former conditions "as may be specified". It may well be that the court would specify that in certain circumstances the offending work could possibly be restored, but, obviously, where it could not be restored that would be an impossibility. But I will certainly make sure that it covers the biological point which my noble friend made, as well as the normal one relating to land.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 32 [Limestone pavement orders.]:
4.44 p.m.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 78 to 80:
Page 31, line 19, leave out from beginning to ("would") in line 28 and insert—
("(1) Where the Nature Conservancy Council or the Countryside Commission are of the opinion that any land in the countryside which consists substantially of limestone exposed on or lying near the surface of the ground is of special interest by reason of its flora, fauna or geological or physiographical features, it shall be the duty of that Council or that Commission to notify that fact to the county and district planning authorities in whose areas the land is situated.
(1A) Where it appears to the Secretary of State or the county planning authority that the character or appearance of any land notified under subsection (1).").
Page 31, line 36, after ("may") insert ("after consultation with the Council and the Commission").
Page 31, line 38, after ("may") insert ("after such consultation as aforesaid").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, if I may, I should like to speak to Amendments Nos. 78, 79 and 80, as these stem from Amendments Nos. 170 and 170ZA, the principles of which the Government were pleased to accept at Report stage. The effect of Amendment No. 78 is to meet the general wish of your Lordships' House that the county planning authorities or the Secretary of State should be able to make orders protecting the limestone pavements, where either the Nature Conservancy Council or the Countryside Commission had notified both the county planning authorities and the district planning authorities that the land was of special interest. Amendments Nos. 79 and 80 meet the wish that orders made by the county planning authorities or the Secretary of State should not be amended or revoked by them, until both the Nature Conservancy Council and the Countryside Commission have been consulted. I beg to move.
Baroness David: My Lords, I do not consider that the Government have carried out their obligations and the assurances which they gave at the Report stage. When the clause dealing with limestone pavements was dealt with in Committee, one point which was made was that the Countryside Commission should have a say. But the second, and most important, point was that the landscape value of the pavements should be recognised in the clause. This was stressed over and over again.
It was recognised by the noble Lord, Lord Sandys, who said at the Committee stage—if I may quote from column 379 of Hansard of 12th February—
"… they are also areas of great beauty which are a delight to many. It might seem reasonable that the Countryside Commission should be able to act positively to ensure that the contribution which the limestone pavements make in the landscape is not in any way debased".
This was stressed by, I think, everybody who spoke, and at the end of his speech the noble Lord, Lord Sandys, said at column 380:
"We are sure the Countryside Commission and the local planning authorities will want to work closely together to preserve these areas of limestone where there is risk of exploitation that would cause irreparable damage to the landscape.".
That was followed up at Report stage, when we had hoped that the Government would put down an amendment. They did not do so, and an all-party

41
amendment was moved by the noble Lord, Lord Inglewood. Unfortunately, he is unable to be here today. I am sure that if he were here he would be backing this amendment or speaking himself. At Report stage, the noble Lord said:
"They aimed to achieve that the landscape value of these limestone pavements should be one of the reasons which should weigh with the Minister when it came to making an order." [Official Report, 12/3/81; col. 549.]
That was repeated by the noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, and the noble Lord, Lord Hunt.
Incidentally, the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, asked me to say, if he was not back by the time this amendment was called, that he, too, is dissatisfied with it. The noble Lord, Lord James, also spoke of the landscape value and hoped that something would be put in the amendment. The noble Lord, Lord Inglewood, and I withdrew the amendment because we had those assurances. Owing to the lateness of the time when the amendment was put down by the Government—and, of course, we cannot put down amendments on the day of Third Reading—we have been unable to do anything about it. But I feel that we have been let down by the Government, and I should like to ask that they now commit themselves to putting down a further amendment in another place to meet the assurances which we had earlier.
The Earl of Onslow: My Lords, I should have thought that the word "physiographical" was a long and rather pompous lawyer's word for "landscape". It seems to me that my noble friend on the Front Bench has done what he said he would do.
Baroness David: My Lords, with the leave of the House, may I just answer that? The word "physiographical" has been in the clause right from the beginning, and I understand that it means the scientific study of land form and does not actually refer to the landscape. The NCC were there to consider the scientific features of the pavements and we hoped that the Countryside Commission would be there to look after the landscape side. The Countryside Commission is in, but the landscape is not particularly mentioned.
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, may I raise one point on limestone pavements? I tried to put down a manuscript amendment, but under Standing Orders was not allowed to do so. At the Report stage the Government promised to include the words "a limestone pavement order". They have not put down such an amendment. Perhaps they could just confirm that it is their intention to do so.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, if I may first answer the noble Baroness, Lady David, we do, indeed, recognise that the word "physiographical" includes landscape value. I will, of course, look through all that the noble Baroness has said and, if I find that we are in default, we will take appropriate action to meet her point. On my noble friend's point about limestone pavements and the problems of definition, we have tried to do what my noble friend suggested but, as has been said already, we have been under considerable pressure. At the moment we have not found a
42
satisfactory solution to meet his point. However, we are still considering it. If we can come up with something, of course we shall certainly ensure that the Bill is so amended.
Lord Beaumont of Whitley: Suitable assurances, my Lords, have been given about the landscape value. I think, however, that without the words of the noble Earl, people would not necessarily take the word "physiographical" as meaning anything to do with beauty as such. We welcome his assurance that it does include it and that, if he receives advice that there is any doubt about it, the Government will do something about it in another place. Having said that, I am under instructions from my noble friend Lord Winstanley also to thank the Government for having put down this amendment. Unfortunately, my noble friend has a major engagement in the North of England. He will be here as soon as possible He had hoped to be here in order to give thanks himself but, as I say, he is not able to be here yet.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Clause 34 [Grants and loans by Nature Conservancy Council]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 81:
Page 33, line 8, leave out from beginning to ("ensure") in line 9 and insert ("The Council shall so exercise their powers under subsection (3) as to").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I will, with permission, speak also to Amendment No. 87. The House accepted on Report amendments by the noble Baroness, Lady David, to make sure that when grants are given in national parks and other areas proper provision should be made for disabled people who might go there for recreation. Parliamentary counsel have done some tidying up of the drafting and I hope the noble Baroness will find this acceptable. I beg to move.
Baroness David: Yes, my Lords, this is quite acceptable. I thank the Government.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
4.51 p.m.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 82:
After Clause 34, insert the following new clause:
(" Duties of water authorities etc
.—(1) In subsection (3) of section 22 of the Water Act 1973 (areas of special scientific interest) the words "not being land managed as a nature reserve" shall be omitted.
(2) After that subsection there shall be inserted the following subsections—
" (4) Where any land has been notified to a water authority under subsection (3) above, the authority shall consult with the Council before executing or carrying out any works or operations appearing to them to be likely to destroy or damage any of the flora, fauna, or geological or physiographical features by reason of which the land is of special interest.
(5) Subsection (4) above shall not apply in relation to any emergency operation particulars of which (including details of the emergency) are notified to the Council as soon as practicable after the commencement of the operation.
(6) References in this section to water authorities shall include references to internal drainage boards and the reference in subsection (3) above to the water authority in

43
whose area the land is situated shall include a reference to the internal drainage board in whose district the land is situated.".").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I will be brief. I should also like to speak to Amendment No. 105 which is consequential.
This amendment meets the undertaking given to the House during the Report stage that consideration would be given to the Amendment numbered there 177A. That amendment, it will be recalled, sought to place upon water authorities and internal drainage boards the obligation to consult the Nature Conservancy Council before undertaking or giving permission to others to undertake any schemes, operations or activities which might affect the special interest of any land which had been notified to the water authorities or the internal drainage boards as being of special scientific interest.
The effect of this amendment will be to require water authorities and internal drainage boards to consult the Nature Conservancy Council before carrying out any work or operations when it appears to them that those works or operations might be likely to destroy or damage any of the flora, fauna, geological or physiographical features which were of special interest and which led to the notification of an area by the Nature Conservancy Council as being of special scientific interest. May I digress slightly to tell the noble Baroness that I had a nice physiographical feature up my sleeve to illustrate this point. It was of course the Avon Gorge.
The amendment also recognises, as did the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, that such consultations may not be possible where emergency operations are involved. It relieves the water authorities and internal drainage boards from the prior consultation requirement but does place upon them the obligation to notify the Nature Conservancy Council as soon as is practicable after the work has started.
Thus I think it will be seen that we are not placing any unreasonable barriers in the way of the water authorities or the internal drainage boards in the discharge of their functions. We are ensuring however that where there is a need for consultation it shall take place and the Nature Conservancy Council will be fully aware of the operations which could affect areas of scientific interest.
In moving this amendment I must make clear to your Lordships that unlike water authorities, internal drainage boards are relatively small organisations lacking the administrative facilities of the former. Fears have been expressed that subsection (6) may impose quite considerable problems on internal drainage boards and I wish to make it clear to your Lordships that the intention is that the boards will do their best to discharge this new responsibility. My Lords, I beg to move.
Lord Renton: My Lords, I should like to welcome this amendment which has been moved by my noble friend. I am familiar with this part of the world; namely, Huntingdonshire, both the Fens and the clay-land there. We have a great mixture of water authorities: internal drainage boards, the Middle Level, the Great Ouse Water Authority and so on—which are now to be superseded by the Anglian Water Authority.
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There have been some most unfortunate cases of the water table being lowered, sometimes for good agricultural reasons and sometimes merely to stop flooding, which have had very bad effects on the flora and fauna. Indeed, the swallowtail butterfly was completely excluded from one of its favourite reserves in the Fens simply because the water table was lowered rather carelessly and has never been restored. The vegetation upon which the swallowtail butterfly there depended was destroyed. It has never returned. So these things can matter very much. I am sure that what my noble friend has said will be borne in mind. Let us hope that this new clause will produce the results which he hopes.
Baroness White: My Lords, I apologise to the House for not having had time to consult about this proposed new clause. In general one welcomes it but, with the noble Lord, Lord Renton, one cannot help having some apprehensions about the internal drainage boards in particular. As the noble Earl, Lord Avon, rightly said, sometimes they are not particularly strongly staffed. I am concerned about some of the things which happen at the instance of internal drainage boards who, for reasons which seem to them to be right and proper, straighten out, canalise banks, cut down trees and shrubs, and so on.
I am assuming that in line 2 on page 10 of the Marshalled List the word "them" is the water authority or the drainage board. If one has to rely upon the drainage board to know what damage they might be doing, it seems to me to be a rather shaky safeguard. I may be wrong about this, and I see that my noble friend Lord Melchett is getting impatient. It is just that I have had brought to my notice in the last few days some quite appallingly damaging things which have been done by certain internal drainage boards. I should like to be reassured that this new clause will do all that is required of it.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I am sure that my noble friend is right: that it will not do all that is required. Despite the new clause, we shall still see sites of special scientific interest being destroyed by water authorities and internal drainage boards. What we need is better protection for those sites in Part II of the Bill. Having said that, I think that the Government's new clause goes as far as it can in laying duties on water authorities and internal drainage boards to take account of the sites. As I was the one who introduced the amendment, I think first at Committee stage, I am very grateful to the Government for what they have done.
The answer to the worry expressed both by the noble Earl, Lord Avon, and by my noble friend and others about the capacity of internal drainage boards is that this provision in legislation will give an opportunity to local interests to make representations to internal drainage boards about their activities and sites which they should be careful of. The cases which were brought to my attention and why I first put down the amendment were in the Broads and in the Broads area. The Norfolk Naturalist Trust and the regional office of the Nature Conservancy Council have been very closely involved in a number of cases where internal drainage boards have done things to the detriment of farmers and tenant farmers—on the Norfolk Naturalist Trust's own reserves in one instance.

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The problem at the moment is that there is nothing in legislation which says that an internal drainage board needs to take any notice of or even listen to the representations which those sorts of other local interests will make to them. This new clause certainly puts that right.
It will be very warmly welcomed by people working on the ground locally, whether they are staff of the Nature Conservancy Council or of voluntary organisations. It will not protect all sites of special scientific interest but it does go a long way towards meeting a particularly acute problem, which had led to some very serious cases of destruction, really, as the noble Lord, Lord Renton said, through ignorance, or because people were not thinking about it, which is all the more upsetting, I suppose. I hope that this will at least make sure that such cases will not occur in the future. I should like to thank the noble Earl and the Government for tabling this amendment.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I made very long opening remarks and I do not intend to take it any further. I think the noble Baroness will have been satisfied with what the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, has said. We had a delicate balance to strike here, and we hope that we have done so.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 35 [Schemes under Agriculture Act 1970]:
5.1 p.m.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 83:
Transpose Clause 35 to after Clause 37.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is another technical amendment to re-order the clauses. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 38 [Notification of agricultural operations on moor and heath in National Parks]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 84 and 85:
Page 35, line 32, leave out ("or forestry operation appearing") and insert ("operation or any forestry operation which (in either case) appears").
Page 35, line 34, after ("and") insert ("is").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, with the permission of the House, I will speak to Amendments Nos. 84 and 85 together. These are drafting amendments and I beg to move them en bloc.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 86:
Page 36, line 30, leave out ("Part") and insert ("section").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is another drafting amendment. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 39 [Grants and loans for purposes of National Parks]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 87:
Page 37, line 5, leave out from beginning to ("shall") in line 6
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and insert ("A county planning authority shall so exercise their powers under subsection (2) as to").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I have already spoken to this with Amendment No. 81. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 41 [Extension of power to appoint wardens]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 88 and 89:
Transpose Clause 41 to after Clause 43.
Clause 42 [Amendment of Agriculture (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1944]:
Transpose Clause 42 to after Clause 43.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, these again are technical amendments to re-order the clauses. I beg to move Amendments Nos. 88 and 89 en bloc.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Clause 46 [Duty to keep definitive map and statement under continuous review]:
The Earl of Caithness The Earl of Caithness moved Amendment No. 90:
Page 40, line 38, at end insert ("except that during a period of seven years beginning with the commencement date nothing shall require a surveying authority to show as a right of way, or a highway of particular description, any right of way in regard to which evidence has been discovered under sub-paragraphs (c)(ii) and (iii) of this subsection such that an alteration has been made to the definitive map, and the authority are convinced that such enjoyment by the public of the right of way was in consequence of the inclusion of the right of way in the definitive map").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, we return here to the complex question of footpaths. The simple aim of this amendment is to give an owner a period of seven years' grace to appeal to the appropriate authority where a right of way is wrongly mapped and has been so used for a period of more than 20 years.
To summarise, as I understand it, the view of the Government is that where there is good evidence that an error was made either by wrongly mapping a path or by giving it too high a status, then, first, the individual prejudiced in title can protect himself from use giving rise to a presumption of dedication by undertaking two actions. He should erect a sign inconsistent with dedication and submit his evidence to the surveying authority. At this point, the existence of the public right is "called into question" and future use does not prejudice the position.
Secondly, no statement has been made on whether an authority may open up or demand to be opened up a path or way for use—breaches of walls, replacing of stiles with gates, et cetera. It is the Government's view that if good evidence is available then authorities will stay their hand and make a new style Definitive Map (Amendment) Order instead.
Thirdly, there is a clear distinction between the evidential provisions of the map and the common law position. The mapping of a path is conclusive only that there was a public right of way at the "relevant date", that is when the map gained force. For that to be translated into a common law presumption of dedication, there must be use. Without use, the new

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good evidence of error will override the map. The Government have argued previously that it would be too difficult to determine whether such use began with the definitive map or not, or continued because of the map, or would have occurred in any case.
I am sorry to have gone back on the history, but I thought it was important to set our amendment in context. The amendment moved at this stage is directed to the last point that I mentioned. We have argued that inspectors could sort out such evidence, which would generally be fairly recent in date, with witnesses available. It is no more difficult, it seems, than decisions that they at present face on older paths. In any case, we have once again limited it to a seven-year period of grace.
The aim of the amendment at this stage is, first, to have the above summary of the Government's position read into the record and confirmed, so to speak. It is, secondly, to clarify beyond doubt the position in certain potential cases and to seek assurances that the Government will look at the position afresh (and act expeditiously) if the law turns out to be, or many cases come to light, of the expiration of 20-year periods causing prejudice.
The final questions I wish to ask are these: Where a county comes under the new proposals for individual map orders, it can readily respond to a conflict of, say, bridleway status, mapped with stiles. Does the same Government view that features should not be considered obstructions while status was under discussion hold where old-style reviews continue? Secondly, if the courts should hold, say, that the evidential provisions do prejudice against correction of errors in any way, will the Government reconsider their position, as this breaches their principle of evidence being decisive? Thirdly, will the Government issue circular advice, as many difficult conflicts are awaiting the outcome of this Bill? It would be very helpful to the countryside if farmers were not to be faced with "28 days to remove obstruction" letters from local authorities who, understandably, fail to grasp the rather complex situation.
I am sorry to have taken up so much time at this stage, but I should be grateful if the Government could answer the points I have made. I beg to move.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I will not attempt to answer the noble Earl's questions on this amendment, but maybe I could say a word about the amendment itself. I was not able to go along with similar, or although I think rather wider, amendments which the noble Earl moved at, I believe, Committee stage, and certainly at Report stage, and I still have some major worries about this amendment. I certainly agree with him when he says, as I understood him to say, that the inclusion of a path on a definitive map by mistake should not, by itself, be a good reason for its remaining on definitive maps in the future. But I do think that 20 years of use of a path by the public should be something which can be taken into account and should not be automatically dismissed in the way that I think the noble Earl's amendment would do. That seems to me to be a rather different matter from having an automatic presumption that, just because something was on a definitive map in the past, it
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will continue to be so. For example, I would suggest that if a landowner or occupier has resisted the use of a path on a definitive map by complaining about it and objecting, then that resistance would be capable of being taken into account in evidence when the matter was being decided.
I think I am right in saving that the noble Earl and his noble friends objected when I attempted to move an amendment at a previous stage to put some restriction on the evidence which could be brought forward when something was going to be added to a map, as opposed to deletion. That did not find very much favour with noble Lords opposite, and indeed I have had a letter from the noble Lord, Lord Bellwin, reiterating the argument quite strongly, and I have not put down an amendment on that point. I think that at least as a quid pro quo the noble Earl should accept the fact that the 20 years' use must be able to be taken into account even though something has been entered into a map in error. The existing provisions of the Bill really are reasonably fair to all parties. I hope the noble Earl, if he gets satisfactory answers to his questions, or even if he does not, will withdraw this amendment.
Lord Bellwin: My Lords, I believe I dealt with the issues raised by this amendment in my response to the amendment moved in Committee. I said on that occasion that I did not want to appear unsympathetic to the problems of the farmers and landowners whose interests may have been prejudiced through the inclusion of a way on the definitive map in error. However, this amendment would curtail the application of the common and statute law regarding the implied or presumed dedication of public rights of passage overland following a long period of uninterrupted use.
I said then, and repeat now, that the curtailment of this long established principle that the public can acquire a right of way over land whatever the origins of the initial use is not a matter to be taken lightly. I therefore cannot support the amendment. Authorities would also be faced with the additional difficulty of ascertaining with any degree of certainty that the use of the way stemmed from its inclusion in the definitive map and statement.
However, perhaps I can help my noble friend if I try to answer specifically the points he made by saying this. He wanted some assurance that the Government will look at the position afresh in the event of many cases of prejudice coming to light, and I say to him gladly, yes, that will be so. Then he said that features should not be considered obstructions if there are status reviews. To that I would say that the existence of features as obstructions would be for the courts to decide, but I would hope that no action would be taken by highway authorities until the status of a path was decided.
Then my noble friend asked whether, if the courts decide that evidential provisions do prejudice correction of errors, the Government will reconsider the position, and to that I say, Yes. Finally he asked whether we would give circular advice, and to that also I say, Yes. I hope, therefore, that my noble friend will agree that at least we are trying to be helpful, and perhaps will withdraw the amendment.
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, to that I say, yes; but before I do so may I mention a point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Melchett? A point I did not mention today but which I did mention at Report stage was that some farmers have waited for well over 20 years for a definitive map review without putting forward their case. Now I think you will find that they will put forward their case. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
5.13 p.m.
Lord Bellwin Lord Bellwin moved Amendment No. 91:
Page 41, line 16, at end insert—
("(4A) Any person may apply to the authority for an order under subsection (2) which makes such modifications as appear to the authority to be requisite in consequence of the occurrence of one or more events falling within paragraph (b) or (c) of subsection (3); and the provisions of Schedule (Applications for certain orders under Part III) shall have effect as to the making and determination of applications under this subsection.").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, with this amendment I wish also to speak to Amendment No. 127. Your Lordships will recollect the undertaking that I gave on Report to reconsider, in the light of the decision on transfer of jurisdiction to local authorities, the whole question of a right of appeal to the Secretary of State on the refusal of an authority to entertain a claim for a definitive map order. We accept that the public should be enabled to apply for an order and enjoy a right of appeal to my right honourable friend the Secretary of State against the refusal to make an order. Our proposals are embodied in these two amendments. A few words of explanation on certain features of the proposals will, I am sure, be welcome.
An obvious problem with giving to the public a statutory right to apply for an order, without a formal procedure for doing so, is that it could lead to frivolous and unsubstantiated applications. We concluded therefore that to protect authorities from frivolous applications a formal procedure such as is provided for in the amendment was essential. That a person takes the time and trouble to produce the necessary evidence and plan is a clear indication that the claim is not frivolous, and that his application merits serious consideration. The requirement to inform the landowner has been included to enable the authority to be notified of any relevant information he has available that would assist them in coming to the right decision.
The arrangement does not apply to orders for the reclassification of roads used as public paths. These have been excluded for the simple reason that authorities have a duty under the provisions of Clause 47 to review their roads used as public paths and produce orders to reclassify them as either byways open to all traffic, bridleways or footpaths. This does not mean that persons will be prevented from bringing to the notice of the authority relevant evidence, merely that they will be unable to apply for an order. They will in any event be able to object to the order if dissatisfied with a particular proposal. Similarly there is no specific need for the arrangement to encompass the map and statement that authorities will be obliged to prepare under Clause 48(2) for former county borough areas, since the modification of that map and statement will take place under Clause 46(2).
The last point I should like to mention concerns the right of an applicant, if after 12 months the authority has failed to reach a decision on his application, to ask my right honourable friend the Secretary of State to intervene on his behalf by directing the authority to determine the application by a certain date. The provision has been included in the hope that it will assist the smooth transition from the present procedure. I think it is generally recognised that, in the early years of the new system at least, a backlog of applications could build up.
That the conclusive evidential effect of definitive maps and statements is without prejudice to the existence of higher rights will help to alleviate the situation, since there will no longer be the same pressure to submit applications. None the less, authorities could easily be inundated with applications to the extent that they will need extra time to enable them to cope. This provision would give them that time and thus prevent authorities, conscious of the pressures upon them, from giving insufficiently careful consideration to applications. Obviously we are hopeful that the vast majority of applications will be determined within the 12 months and that, where they are not, the applicant will only come to my right honourable friend the Secretary of State as a last resort after exhausting all other avenues with the authority. My Lords, I felt that it was proper that I should give some explanation in this way. I beg to move.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I think that basically these are two amendments which we should want to welcome and thank the Government for, but there are two points of concern. The first one, which the noble Lord mentioned very briefly in describing some of the new things that would be introduced, is in Amendment No. 127, in paragraph 2, on page 16 of the Marshalled List. It is the requirement for members of the public to give notice of an application to all owners and occupiers of land affected. That does seem to me to be an impossible burden to place on members of the public. First of all, as I understand it, they have no way of finding out who all the owners and occupiers would be. It may be that in some cases it would be an extraordinarily onerous burden. It is not one which is placed on landowners who are wanting to delete a path on a map; there is no requirement for them to inform all members of the public who use the path, or even all representatives of the public or users' groups in the area. I should have thought that the interests of landowners or occupiers would be adequately served by the requirement to serve notice of an order on them; they will be given notice before an order is made, and I should have thought that also to require notice of an application would really be an impossible burden. It may be that this simply means that paragraph 2(2) will always operate, and that, after reasonable enquiry has been made, it will be found not to be practicable to ascertain the name and address of every owner and occupier and this requirement simply will not operate. In that case there does not seem to be much point in having it in. I would not necessarily expect the Government to give an answer now, but they may like to look at the point before the Bill goes to another place.

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The other point of concern—and I simply mention it because again I think that it is something which another place will have to look at—is that the form of application, the scale of map, the notice to be given to the landowner and the certificate of this having been done will all be prescribed by regulations. But, if the authority concerned subsequently decides to make an order or is told to make an order by the Secretary of State, that order and the associated notices will not have to be in the prescribed form. It seems to me that, if the form of application and all the other things will have to be in a prescribed form, then the making of the order should really be in the same form. It would be simpler for everybody, including, presumably, the authority.
I simply raise those two points and leave them with the noble Lord. If he wants to write to me about them I would be interested, but I am sure that this is something which people in another place will want to continue to discuss. Having made those two points, I should like to say that I am very grateful to the noble Lord for producing this amendment.
Lord Beaumont of Whitley: My Lords, this is one of the most important matters in the Bill and it is indeed a matter of gratification that the Government have seen fit to meet the wishes of your Lordships' House on this matter. We are very grateful to them for the trouble that they have taken and for including this provision. I am sure that it is an enormous improvement and that if it had not been put in there would have been a very real sense of justified grievance on the part of a great many people in the countryside. This amendment has gone a long way to rectify that situation and we are very grateful indeed.
Lord Bellwin: My Lords, I would just like to say that we shall consider carefully what the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, has said. I shall write to the noble Lord. If anything is to be done, it will obviously have to be done in another place. However, I can tell him that the matter will be considered very carefully. I should like to thank him and the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont of Whitley, for welcoming the amendment.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 52 [Orders creating, extinguishing or diverting public rights of way]:
Lord Bellwin Lord Bellwin moved Amendment No. 92:
Transpose Clause 52 to after Clause 55.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 92. This amendment and Amendment No. 98 are further technical amendments to re-order the clauses. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Jacques): My Lords, Amendments Nos. 93 to 97 are printed in the wrong place on the Marshalled List and will be called later. Therefore, I call Amendment No. 98.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 98:
Transpose Clause 53 to after Clause 56.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 98. We have just spoken to this amendment.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
5.25 p.m.
Lord Stanley of Alderley Lord Stanley of Alderley moved Amendment No. 99:
After Clause 53, insert the following new clause:
("Prevention of Sheep Worrying
.—(1) If, in a case not falling within subsection (2), any person without lawful authority permits a dog to be present in a field or enclosure not exceeding 25 hectares containing sheep or lambs, he shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding £200.
(2) Subsection (2) shall not apply to

(a) any person acting with the permission of the owner or occupier of the field or enclosure;

(b) any person acting in the belief that he would have the consent of the owner or occupier of the land if the owner or occupier knew of his doing it and the circumstances of it;

(c) any person on a right of way so long as the dog is—

(i) on a lead of reasonable length; or

(ii) under close control;

(d) any blind person; or

(e) any constable acting in the exercise of his duty.

(3) In any proceedings under subsection (1) it shall be a defence to show that the defendant had made every effort to follow the line of the right of way but had been unable to do so.").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 99. I apologise to your Lordships for putting this amendment down yet again when I had led the House to believe that I was going to press it on Report. I shall, therefore, not weary your Lordships by explaining the purpose of the amendment, but I hope your Lordships will agree that I have now got a tidier, and, I hope, better amendment by redrafting it. In particular, I have put a limit of 25 hectares on the enclosure and altered the word "allow" to "permit".
At Report I think that I found myself in a similar position to the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, who had to amend his Deer Bill because it would have had unforeseen repercussions on country sports. Like the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, it was not and, indeed, is not my intention for this amendment to have such an effect. I have, therefore, used the same words as your Lordships' and parliamentary draftsmen approved in the Deer Bill to solve this problem. I hope that when the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, reads this he will have some quiet amusement at my discomfiture.
My last point is to reply to the criticism of my noble friend Lord Renton and, I think, my noble friend Lord Waldegrave, who stated at Report that my amendment was unnecessary. As I said then and repeat now I would much prefer complete legislation on dogs as suggested in Dogs in Society. I cannot get such legislation and I do not think that your Lordships can either, so I must continue with this piecemeal approach which, despite what my noble friends say, will, and indeed has, drawn the public's attention and I hope the Government's attention to the terrible things that dogs do to sheep particularly when two months in lamb. If my amendment does only that, I shall be, for the moment, content. I beg to move.
Viscount Massereene and Ferrard: My Lords, I should like to support the amendment because I supported my noble friend's last amendment on this

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question at the Report stage. The only slight criticism that I have is that it might be hard for the dog owner to know whether he was in a field under or indeed over 25 hectares. He could hardly go round with a tape measure! However, I support the basis of the amendment and especially at this time of year when a great number of lambs are being aborted through the presence of dogs not necessarily chasing sheep but frightening them.
Lord Gibson-Watt: My Lords, before my noble friend replies to the amendment I should like to say that although I normally support the amendments which my noble friend Lord Stanley of Alderley proposes, on this occasion I am not entirely happy about the amendment. I say that to him as somebody who has had a long experience of living in a sheep breeding area and who breeds sheep himself.
I think that the situation is probably more difficult in areas where there are large numbers of footpaths and areas which are near big cities where there are more dogs. I fully accept that there is a problem there. However, in the type of outlying district where I live when we have damage to sheep the person who owns the dog is always found. We had a case last year. A lady had a dog which killed about six of our sheep. We found out whose dog it was, we went and saw the lady and said, "Would you be kind enough to remove this dog because if you do not we shall take you to court". The lady took the dog away to areas where there were no sheep and we have not had any trouble since that time.
There is no doubt about it, in some areas the problem is very much worse than in others. I do not know what the Government's answer will be to this question. I think that this Bill is a Bill of balances of interests and I think that throughout Government Ministers have acted in an admirable way in trying to balance the very many interests in the countryside and the interests of the many users of it. I am only saying to my noble friend that I think that on this occasion he is taking the weight rather too far on one side. I always speak for the farmers and I fully understand and sympathise with the intention behind the amendment, but I am not entirely happy with its scope.
Lord Renton: My Lords, I, too, am opposed to the amendment and in spite of what my noble friend Lord Stanley has said I still maintain that the present law provides adequate protection. It is very effective and heavy penalties can be imposed—indeed, dogs which have caused trouble can be destroyed if the court so orders. In any event let us suppose that my noble friend has a case for further legislation on this matter. I could not advise him—if it falls upon me to advise him—that this particular method of legislation would do. For example, if we look at subsection (2)(b) we find that it says:
"any person acting in the belief that he would have the consent of the owner or occupier of the land if the owner or occupier knew of his doing it and the circumstances of it".
In those circumstances he would be all right. But this is a strange hypothetical question. One does not know whether the test which the court would have to apply is the subjective test, so far as it could be
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ascertained, as to what was in the person's mind, or the objective test of what a reasonable person might be thought to have had in his mind in those particular circumstances. I can imagine this kind of issue going right up to the House of Lords. It is a very difficult and a very unusual provision.
I join with my noble friend Lord Massereene when he drew attention to the possible difficulty over 25 hectares. I am afraid that in East Anglia we are still using the expression "acre" more frequently, and those of us who were not very recently at school might easily have quite a mental problem converting acres into hectares. However, that is something which in the course of time and which as generations come along may well be overcome, but I must confess that it would be a difficulty that faces me.
I do not know whether it has occurred to my noble friend Lord Stanley that there would, for example, be a problem as regards gun dogs, unless they were on a lead. Speaking for myself, I have never yet seen a gundog molest sheep or lambs. There may be rare cases of it, but from long experience I have never seen it happen. There is also the question of whether or not a dog is under close control. That may prove to be very difficult. Let us take, for example, the case of a farmer who is trying out a new sheepdog and that sheepdog strays on to a neighbour's land where there happen to be sheep; however experienced the shepherd or the farmer concerned may be, is he said to be not exercising close control if, when training his dog, he finds for a moment that the young sheepdog gets out of hand? All kinds of problems arise; one's experience and imagination would lead one to others. Therefore, with deep respect for my noble friend's motives, I do not think that this amendment will do.
Earl Peel: My Lords, in supporting the noble Lord, Lord Renton, as I do, I am curious to ask the noble Lord, Lord Stanley, why we have a restriction of 25 hectares in this amendment. Do sheep not go into fields of more than 25 hectares?
The Earl of Onslow: My Lords, I should like to raise one or two matters. I have seen sheep being worried on moorland areas. Why should this protection just extend to areas of under 25 hectares? The other point worth mentioning is the field sports' point of view. If hounds, which are normally extremely well-disciplined, go across the corner of a person's field, this amendment will allow people of evil intent to bring prosecutions which probably would not normally be brought by the owner. It seems to me to be too widespread.
A further point worth raising is that if you are out shooting and you shoot a bird into a neighbour's field, I believe that you are entitled to pick up that bird, provided that you leave your gun behind. If you send a runner into a field where there are sheep, you will be committing an offence. I do not think that that is a satisfactory state of affairs. I certainly agree with your Lordships that in certain areas there is a major problem of sheep-worrying. Only the other day I heard of a responsible person whose pet lurcher was caught worrying sheep and he was put down that very afternoon. The majority of responsible people have their dogs put down if they are caught worrying

55
sheep. I do not have sheep, but if I had sheep and I saw a dog worrying sheep on my land, I would not hesitate to shoot the dog there and then if I could do so. As it stands, I think that the law is adequate and satisfactory.
Lord Burton: My Lords, perhaps I could reply to my noble friends Lord Renton and Lord Onslow. They both referred to the position of gundogs. I think that they both omitted to take into account subsection (2)(a) and (b), which both refer to the consent of the owner. If a gundog is there without the consent of the owner or the occupier, I would suggest that it is as bad a vandal as any other dog. This would also apply to the sheepdog situation.
Noble Lords have said that they think that the protection is adequate. I think I am right in saying that 6,000 sheep are killed by dogs every year. On that basis I do not think that the law is adequate. Even if this amendment is not adequate, I am sorry to see 25 hectares in the amendment; I would rather it had been more. In spite of that, the amendment is a step in the right direction and I hope that my noble friends on the Front Bench will at least support it.
Lord de Clifford: My Lords, I, too, should like to support the noble Lord who has moved this amendment. I think that it is eminently reasonable. When you live in the country, with rights of way crossing your land, it is very difficult to make quite sure that dogs do not worry sheep: they do. The noble Lord who said that he lives in the country and does not get dogs belonging to people from the towns worrying sheep amazes me, because in my area we do. I do not think that there is very much wrong with this amendment. Your Lordships wholeheartedly supported a similar amendment when it was last moved, and I think that my noble friend has done exactly what was wanted and has tried to meet the points raised on that occasion. I hope that your Lordships will support this amendment.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, when we debated this subject previously I made it quite clear on behalf of the Government that we were entirely sympathetic to the intention of protecting sheep and lambs from dog-worrying. That remains the case, but I should like to reiterate it at the start of my remarks.
Briefly I should like to explain—as I have done in the past, although I do not think that noble Lords have taken the point—that we believe there is enough legislation to cover this measure. The Interdepartmental Working Party on Dogs, which looked into this matter between 1974 and 1976, considered whether the existing law should be altered so as to help the farmer faced with a problem of livestock-worrying. It considered the effects of various Acts, including the Dog (Protection of Livestock) Act 1953, which already makes it an offence for persons to allow dogs to worry livestock, and in particular Section 9 of the Animals Act 1971, which enables farmers to defend their livestock against dogs which worry or which are about to worry livestock. The working party concluded that that section gave farmers adequate powers to defend livestock against dog attacks. I have those two pieces
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of legislation before me, and I hope that noble Lords who are in doubt will study them.
Although the noble Lord's previous amendment on dogs attracted a fair amount of support in the debate during the Report stage, both my noble friends Lord Renton, who has already spoken this time, and Lord Waldegrave added that they had lately seen prosecutions against dogs under this legislation, and I think that my noble friend Lord Renton used the words, "it was pretty effective". That is the situation as it stands at the moment. Frankly, that is where the Government would prefer it to rest.
My noble friend Lord Stanley has worked very hard to get an amendment which is satisfactory to everyone, but from listening to the debate just now, it seems that it is an extremely difficult thing to do. I also had one or two points for clarification, but needless to say my noble friend Lord Renton pre-empted me. One was whether subsection (2)(b) is too subjective an interpretation; the other was whether in paragraph (c) the terms "of reasonable length" and "under close control" beg too many questions and have no precise meaning. I say to my noble friend Lord Stanley that obviously this piece of legislation will be subject to very close scrutiny in the other place should it be passed in this House tonight, and I am sure that it will not come back to us exactly as we send it to them. Therefore, I wonder whether he would wish to press it.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, that seems to me to be a strong argument in favour of the noble Lord, Lord Stanley, pressing his amendment. It obviously needs some further expert attention in drafting. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Stanley, will not feel that that is rude of me, but I have accepted all my amendments that have needed redrafting by the Government when they have been put in the Bill. Obviously this amendment would need redrafting too, but I think that the noble Lord, Lord Stanley, and his advisers have done a good job of it.
I am astonished at the opposition to it. At Committee stage when this amendment was moved I was the only person in your Lordships' House who had any objection to it at all. No one else raised a single point against it at Committee stage. I apologise, except the Government. I was assuming that all of us would accept that the Government were opposed to sensible Back-Bench amendments whether from their own side or this one. The noble Baroness, Lady Elliot, made a passionate speech about the problems of dogs attacking and worrying sheep. I felt embarrassed in getting up and making one or two minor points against the amendment. There was absolute unanimity, apart from the Government Front Bench and myself, in favour of the amendment. Now it appears that people have got less enthusiastic.
The noble Lord, Lord Gibson-Watt, said that it was a question of striking a balance. Between what? He did not tell us. He simply said that he had had some worries about the amendment. It seems to me that the amendment strikes a perfectly reasonable balance between the rights of people walking in the countryside, with which much of Part III of the Bill is rightly concerned, the rights of people to maintain public rights of way and to have them signposted, and so on, which are all covered in the Bill, and here we

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talk about the rights of people who have sheep not to have them worried by dogs, and not to have the fear that those using public rights of way will not control their dogs and will have dogs in the countryside that will worry sheep. That seems to me to be striking a reasonable balance between the people using rights of way and their rights, and the rights of farmers.
My original worry was that the amendment placed unreasonable restrictions on people using public rights of way. The noble Lord has gone all the way he possibly could have done to meet my point. I am probably responsible, among others, for the 25 hectares creeping in. There needed to be some definition of field or enclosure. Twenty-five hectares may well not be the right thing, but at least we have the principle that there should be some definition there. I am quite happy with it.
Noble Lords have mentioned gundogs and hounds. First, gundogs should be under close control. A properly trained gundog, whether it is on somebody else's land retrieving a dead bird or the land where the person was shooting, should be under close control. If it is chasing sheep and lambs, then clearly the owner should be liable to prosecution. It would be monstrous if there was some exclusion for people with gundogs.
The noble Earl is saying to me that they are. I do not accept that. There is an area which is not covered by existing law and which needs to be. May I finish the point about gundogs or hounds. The amendment says that where somebody is acting with the permission of the owner or occupier then they are all right. That would surely cover any legitimate shoot or hunt. As I understand the practice in the countryside certainly nobody around me would dream of retrieving birds on my land, and where people were shooting on my land I would not have them retrieve on my neighbour's land without clearing it with the keeper, or owner, or farmer. I should have thought that that was standard practice in the countryside.
To go on to what the existing law does not cover, the amendment says that people have to keep dogs under close control or on a lead of reasonable length when walking down a public footpath. If you do not do that at the moment, you are not necessarily committing an offence. The dog has actually to be worrying sheep, or about to worry sheep. I, as a walker and dog-owner, see no objection to people using public rights of way in the country in a reasonably sized enclosure where there are sheep or lambs, but having an obligation on them to keep their dog under close control, or on a lead. That is a higher duty than to stop it worrying sheep, and would make prosecutions easier to bring.
I am a farmer as well as a walker and dog owner. I know that this is a problem that particularly concerns farmers. I do not keep sheep, and to that extent I do not have an interest in the amendment, but nobody could be a Minister in Northern Ireland for 2½ years without knowing that there are farmers in areas like that who find the problems of the worrying by dogs of sheep one of the most annoying, aggravating and concerning of all of the agricultural problems they have to put up with. It would greatly strengthen the position of walkers in the countryside as well as sheep farmers if a reasonable amendment of this sort was put in the Bill. If it needs tidying up in the drafting, that
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can be done in another place with Government advice. I hope that the noble Lord will press his amendment.
5.45 p.m.
Baroness Elliot of Harwood: My Lords, mention has been made of my speech. The problems are very difficult and very bad. I supported the last amendment that the noble Lord, Lord Stanley, moved and I intend to support this one. Gundogs are not a problem because as the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, said, they are under control, or should be. They nearly always are. I have never lost any lambs or sheep with retrievers. It is the dogs that are excited and enjoying themselves rushing about in the open without any control that are the danger. They really are a danger.
I am surprised that my noble friend on the Front Bench says that there is legislation which covers all this. All I can say is that it cannot be used very much since we have been told, and I have been told too, that 6,000 sheep are killed each year. It is far too many. If the legislation that we have today allows that to happen, then surely there ought to be something more powerful to stop this. I do not know whether this particular amendment is exactly right, but it is the only amendment down that deals with this matter, and I shall support it.
Lord Beaumont of Whitley: My Lords, I too should like to support this amendment. It does something useful and strengthens the law. The Government have said that the law is satisfactory as it is. It is not quite satisfactory enough in the situation of what I might call dogs loitering with intent. There is a need for strengthening the law there, and this is a reasonable amendment. I just have one major reservation. Despite what the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, said, I do not think that this in fact covers the case of hounds. In fact there was one moment when I thought this was probably an amendment secretly backed by the noble Lord, Lord Houghton.
It seems to me that 22 couple of the Beaufort could well lead the noble Duke, the Duke of Beaufort, in for a fine of some £8,800 at any given moment, and this is a point which ought to be looked at. It may be that subsection (2)(b) covers the situation, but it does not always happen these days that the master of a pack of hounds can ensure that his hounds only run over the land where he believes that he would have the consent of the owner or occupier. He can, of course, keep his own followers and horses off it, but he cannot necessarily stop hounds in time. There would seem to be a serious point here which should be looked at before such a clause went into legislation. Nevertheless, it is a good amendment and in principle it should be supported.
Lord Houghton of Sowerby: My Lords, although this Bill permits dogs to pursue otters as long as they do not kill them, I am nevertheless not in favour of dogs being allowed to pursue sheep. That inconsistency between the wild animal and the farmer's pet I leave with your Lordships to ponder. This problem arises because two successive Governments have not really grasped the nettle on the problem of dogs in society. This is part of it.

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I always feel from long experience that, when Governments say that something is not necessary and the lawyers say that it is unworkable, that is the time seriously to consider putting it in the Bill. The reason is that if the Government are stuck with amendments they do not want, they have great difficulty in getting them out again. They have to give very plausible reasons for taking amendments out of a Bill that have been put there by the will of the House. I believe the Bill would be stronger with the amendment. Obviously it would not cover all the problems associated with dogs worrying sheep, and those who live in moorland areas know well that the main problem arises from stray dogs or gangs of dogs going around in groups doing enormous damage, and it is extremely difficult to identify the owners. Nevertheless, if the noble Lord, Lord Stanley, feels in a stubborn frame of mind, I will certainly support him.
Lord Middleton: The trouble, my Lords, is that it is not the existing legislation that is at fault but its enforcement, and in my view the existing legislation is adequate. I am a farmer, I have had sheep worried and I have been desperately worried about it, but the amendment is too complicated and I do not agree with my noble friend Lord Stanley that legislation should be passed simply to bring something to the attention of the public. If every time we wanted to bring something to the notice of the public we legislated about it, we should be legislating eternally, even more than we are at present.
Viscount Thurso: My Lords, it would be a mistake to let this debate pass without making clear the one real point here, and that is that you do not have to have a case of worrying to have a case of damage to sheep. If you have a field full of heavily pregnant ewes and people are regularly going for walks through that field with their dogs, the dogs need run only a short distance towards the sheep to make the sheep run. If the dogs are then called back and return to their owners, those dogs have in no way attempted to worry the sheep. But if heavily pregnant ewes are constantly being made to run, eventually some of them will abort, and that is distressing to the sheep and damaging to the farmer. Therefore, it seems only reasonable that people walking through fields should be enjoined to take the precaution of having their dogs closely under control. To worry a sheep, a dog must lay a fang on it or attempt to do so. The amendment would cope with the situation where a dog was not attempting to lay a fang on sheep but was merely rushing around in play and was not under proper control.
Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge: My Lords, I support the amendment but there seem to be problems with subsection (2)(b), which does not seem to have any point. The point of the first provision, roughly speaking, is that if you walk across a farm with a dog without permission, you are liable to be fined £200 if, over the edge of the hill, there are some sheep. That is severe but I am in favour of it; people should not walk about farms with dogs not under control. However, subsection (2)(b) seems pointless because I could say, "I did not think the farmer would mind. I have often
60
been through that field". One can visualise the sort of argument that is likely to be adduced under that provision, which spoils the strength of the amendment.
Lord Mowbray and Stourton: My Lords, on balance I believe my noble friend Lord Renton got it right when he said that the legislation of the land is reasonably adequate. The noble Lord, Lord Donaldson, made a sensible point; subsection (2)(b) is the nub of the amendment and we must remember that we are here not talking about moorland but about people walking across farmland and fields, and when we are discussing farmland, as we are in this case, the law is moderately adequate. We are relying in the Bill on voluntary effort more than compulsion and I believe the Bill as drafted covers what is here concerning us. In the country, generally speaking, one knows the people with dogs, and we are not speaking of the situation on the edges of towns where there might live hundreds of thousands of people.
Several noble Lords: Yes, we are.
Lord Mowbray and Stourton: I do not think we are, my Lords. We ate legislating basically for the countryside. In any case, on the edges of towns sheep are not necessarily the best form of stock.
Several noble Lords: Oh?
Lord Mowbray and Stourton: I do not think they are, my Lords, and in my view the Bill is adequate as it is.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, perhaps I may have permission to take up the point made by the noble Viscount, Lord Thurso. If sheep were chased, the owner of the dog would be liable. The dog does not have to bite the sheep. If it were proven that they were aborting because the dog went off course, the owner would be liable.
Viscount Thurso: My Lords, my point was that a dog need only gambol around in a field full of sheep and the sheep will run, because that is their natural reaction.
Lord Stanley of Alderley: My Lords, in answering some of the points that have been made, I should like to make it clear first that this is obviously a nonparty matter, and even the agricultural lobby—the "mafia", as I believe we are called by the noble Lord, Lord Houghton—are somewhat divided on it, which I am sure will please him. To answer the point made by my noble friend Lord Avon, probably on this occasion he needs driving mirrors. If he thinks the law is working correctly, then I would support the remarks of my noble friend Lady Eliot of Harwood; 6,000 dead is not a very good record. Added to that, as the noble Viscount, Lord Thurso, said, damage is not in death but in abortion and malpresentation at birth. I have experienced a great deal of that, and it is heartbreaking.
My noble friend Lord Massereene and Ferrard asked how we should know it was, and my noble friend Lord Peel wondered why it should be 25 hectares. I am afraid that figure was taken out of the hat. It could not be larger because one would not

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want to stop a dog walking in a national park, and that could happen, as the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, pointed out. My noble friend Lord Gibson-Watt—I am always fearful of talking about him because he was my first company commander and I felt I was getting one of those dressing-downs I got rather a long time ago—should note that the outlying areas such as those in which he lives are not really covered because I suspect they would be over 25 hectares. I would add—perhaps I should not say this—that sometimes magistrates do not take the same view as his obviously enlightened magistrates did.
My noble friend Lord Renton thought the amendment was weak or unnecessary. Others felt it was too strong. If that is the case, it must be about right. My noble friend then pulled my drafting to bits, particularly the drafting of subsection (2)(b), and the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson, made the same complaint. I can only tell the House that that provision was taken from the Deer Act. I hate to embarrass the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, but if the drafting is wrong in the Deer Act, then I suggest we haul that measure back to the House for the sixth or seventh time and redraft it; I am sure Lord Northfield would be delighted to do that. I could not do any better than Lord Northfield, who I think will confirm that the Parliamentary draftsman was responsible for the provision in his measure.
As for gundogs, my noble friend Lord Onslow was right to say that they would be covered by subsection (2)(b) or (2)(c)(ii). We must remember, as several noble Lords have pointed out, that this is a preventive measure. It is really the first time we have introduced preventive provisions and, after all, it is no good shooting the dog after it has been responsible for half the ewes aborting. As for hounds, if hounds do harm to my sheep or my neighbour's sheep they must be liable, no "ifs" or "buts". I do not stop hounds coming over my land and I do not wish to do so, but if they injure my sheep, they must suffer the penalty, just like someone's poodle. If hounds do no harm, having gone into the field of a very objectionable farmer—I do not know whether such a farmer exists; but let us suppose that he does—the farmer can take the owner of the hounds to court, and then it is up to the bench. Have we no trust in the bench? If the hounds have done no harm, nothing will happen to them. The owner might be fined three quid. At the moment, if hounds go through a field that is owned by a farmer who does not want them, it is up to the farmer to prosecute the hunt under existing law.
I shall not delay the House any further. I make no bones about it, I have to admit that I have blinkers on so far as sheep are concerned. I think that anyone who is a shepherd and who likes sheep becomes obsessed with them. Perhaps I am obsessed, but I make no apology for that. I would say to your Lordships that this is an instance where your Lordships' spirit is willing, but your flesh today is very weak.
Lord Dulverton: My Lords, before the noble Lord sits down—
Noble Lords: Order, Order!
6.1 p.m.
On Question, Whether the said amendment (No. 99) shall be agreed to?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 70; Not-Contents, 88.

CONTENTS

Ailesbury, M.

Jacques, L.

Airedale, L.

Jeger, B.

Amherst, E.

Killearn, L.

Ardwick, L.

Kinloss, Ly.

Avebury, L.

Listowel, E.

Aylestone, L.

Llewelyn Davies of Hastoe, B.

Beaumont of Whitley, L.

Lloyd of Kilgerran, L.

Broadbridge, L.

Loudoun, C.

Brockway, L.

Lovell-Davis, L.

Brooks of Tremorfa, L.

McGregor of Durris, L.

Bruce of Donington, L.

Mais, L.

Caithness, E.

Melchett, L.

Chitnis, L.

Mersey, V.

Collison, L.

Mishcon, L.

Craigavon, V.

Northfield, L.

David, B.

Ross of Marnock, L.

Davies of Leek, L.

St. Davids, V.

de Clifford, L.

Sefton of Garston, L.

Donaldson of Kingsbridge, L.

Segal, L.

Elliot of Harwood, B.

Shinwell, L.

Elwyn-Jones, L.

Spens, L.

Gaitskell, B.

Stamp, L.

George-Brown, L.

Stanley of Alderley, L.—[Teller.]

Goronwy-Roberts, L.

Gregson, L.

Stedman, B.

Hale, L.

Stone, L.

Halsbury, E.

Swansea, L.

Hampton, L.

Terrington, L.

Hanworth, V.

Teviot, L.

Harris of Greenwich, L.

Thurso, V.

Henley, L.

Tryon, L.

Hooson, L.

Underhill, L.

Houghton of Sowerby, L.—[Teller.]

Wells-Pestell, L.

Whaddon, L.

Hunt, L.

Winterbottom, L.

Hylton-Foster, B.

Wynford, L.

NOT-CONTENTS

Alexander of Tunis, E.

Grimston of Westbury, L.

Allerton, L.

Hailsham of Saint Marylebone, L.

Auckland, L.

Avon, E.

Halifax, E.

Balerno, L.

Harmar-Nicholls, L.

Balfour of Inchrye, L.

Home of the Hirsel, L.

Bellwin, L.

Hornsby-Smith, B.

Belstead, L.

Kemsley, V.

Boyd of Merton, V.

Kilmany, L.

Bridgeman, V.

Lauderdale, E.

Brougham and Vaux, L.

Long, V.

Campbell of Croy, L.

Lyell, L.

Chelwood, L.

Mackay of Clashfern, L.

Cockfield, L.

Mackintosh of Halifax, V.

Colville of Culross, V.

Macleod of Borve, B.

Colwyn, L.

Mancroft, L.

Craigton, L.

Mansfield, E.

Cranbrook, E.

Margadale, L.

Cullen of Ashbourne, L.

Middleton, L.

De La Warr, E.

Morris, L.

Denham, L.—[Teller.]

Mottistone, L.

Digby, L.

Mowbray and Stourton, L.

Drumalbyn, L.

Murton of Lindisfarne, L.

Dulverton, L.

Noel-Buxton, L.

Dundee, E.

Northchurch, B.

Ellenborough, L.

Nugent of Guildford, L.

Ferrers, E.

Onslow, E.

Fortescue, E.

Orkney, E.

Fraser of Kilmorack, L.

Peel, E.

Gainford, L.

Penrhyn, L.

Gibson-Watt, L.

Portland, D.

Greenway, L.

Reigate, L.

Gridley, L.

Renton, L.

63

Romney, E.

Strathspey, L.

Runciman of Doxford, V.

Swinfen, L.

St. Aldwyn, E.

Swinton, E.

Salisbury, M.

Trefgarne, L.

Salmon, L.

Trenchard, V.

Saltoun, Ly.

Trumpington, B.

Sandys, L.—[Teller.]

Vaux of Harrowden, L.

Selsdon, L.

Vickers, B.

Sempill, Ly.

Vivian, L.

Skelmersdale, L.

Westbury, L.

Soames, L.

Willoughby de Broke, L.

Strathclyde, L.

Resolved in the negative, and amendment disagreed to accordingly.
6.10 p.m.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 100:
After Clause 54, insert the following new clause:
("Regulation of traffic on public rights of way
. The Road Traffic Regulation Act 1967 shall have effect in relation to any footpath, bridleway or byway open to all traffic as if—

(a) any reference to traffic included a reference to foot passengers and persons driving, riding or leading horses or other animals of draught or burden; and

(b) any reference in section 1(3A) or 12 to foot passengers included a reference to such persons as aforesaid.").

The noble Earl said: My Lords, the possible control of equestrian traffic by means of traffic regulation orders has been debated on three previous occasions in this House during the past six months. Provisions were initially included in the Local Government, Planning and Land (No. 1) Bill. When the matter was debated at Report stage on Bill No. 2 on 30th October last, my noble friend Lord Bellwin said that we were inclined to the view that equestrian traffic ought to be brought within the scope of traffic regulations, but that we wished to hear any counter-arguments and to have the matter debated at greater length before bringing forward an alternative clause. We consider that debates have now taken place on this subject in both Committee and at Report on this Bill, and the extension of the traffic regulation order powers in the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1967 to cover equestrian traffic has the support of the Rights of Way Review Committee, chaired by Mr. Michael Spicer.
We have therefore decided to table this amendment to correct this long-standing anomaly. In view of the nature and scope of this Bill we have been obliged to restrict the application of this amendment to footpaths, bridleways and byways open to all traffic, and we have not included any amendments to the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1972. A futher tidying up of the legislation, to put equestrian traffic fully on all fours (if noble Lords will excuse the pun) with pedestrians and vehicles, will be left to a more suitable legislative opportunity. Our amendment will have a similar effect to the proposed amendments to the 1967 Act which were included in the Local Government, Planning and Land (No. 1) Bill, and in Amendment No. 555C which was moved by my noble friend Lord Stanley during Committee.
I think it is generally accepted that public rights of way can become virtually impassable to path-users after very wet weather or excessive use, and the amendment will, among other things, enable highway authorities to prohibit or restrict horses for periods up to three months under Section 12(1) of the 1967 Act to
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prevent further damage to the right of way and to enable it to recover. When considering making temporary orders highway authorities are required to have regard to the existence of alternative routes suitable for the traffic which would be affected by the order, and they are required to comply with the notification procedures laid down in Schedule 3 to the 1967 Act. There are no appeal procedures for temporary orders under Section 12, but there are such procedures for permanent orders made under Section 1. My Lords, I beg to move.
Lord Stanley of Alderley: My Lords, I should like to thank my noble friend for tabling this amendment. I hope he will not think I am ungracious when I say that I am surprised he has changed his mind in view of the way he treated me earlier on in relation to this amendment.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 55 [Ploughing of public rights of way]:
Lord Stanley of Alderley Lord Stanley of Alderley moved Amendment No. 101:
Page 47, line 22, after ("(4))") insert ("after the words "A person" there shall be inserted the words "without reasonable excuse",").
The noble Lord said: This was a point raised on Report by my noble friend Lord Monk Bretton, and your Lordships will find the details in col. 633, on 16th March; but unfortunately we did not get an answer. The point here is that the addition of these words "without reasonable excuse" would allow a farmer latitude should he be prevented from restoring a footpath because of, say, illness or, perhaps, to quote a particularly unpleasant example which comes easily to mind today, the outbreak of disease, such as foot and mouth. I would remind your Lordships that the onus of proof is of course on the farmer to prove that he was unable to restore the path. I beg to move.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I thought that we had a fairly good discussion on this and came to the conclusion that what we had come up with was in fact reasonable. This amendment would mean that a farmer would have a defence for failing to comply with the restoration requirements as set out in subsection (4) of Section 134 of the Highways Act, as amended by Clause 55(3) of this Bill, if he had a reasonable excuse for not complying with them. Clause 55(3)(b) provides one exception to the requirement to restore within three weeks; namely, exceptional weather conditions. This amendment would have the effect of broadening the exception to cover any "reasonable excuse".
The term "reasonable excuse" is obviously capable of a very wide interpretation. When we debated this issue during Report stage I think some noble Lords expressed doubt about even the term "exceptional weather conditions", and also other exceptions to the three-week restoration requirement. We considered that that exception was reasonable, but do not believe that it should be broadened any further. There would be no end to the excuses which a farmer might produce to justify his not restoring the path within three weeks, and it would mean that the restoration requirements would in effect be unenforceable.

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However, if the farming and path-user interests can get together and reach agreement on a restoration formula which is acceptable to both sides and is likely to be enforceable, we would of course be willing to consider substituting it for what we have provided in Clause 55. This is a very sensitive subject, and I very much hope that my noble friend will not feel that he has to press this amendment.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I agree with the noble Earl in that last sentiment. The provision in the Bill for "exceptional weather conditions" is a completely new one. There has not been that sort of let-out from the obligations to restore a footpath up until now, and I really think that to go a great deal further and be a great deal vaguer, as the noble Earl, Lord Avon, has said, and to put these words in, would make the position totally unenforceable. It seems to me that this is not quite right yet, and to that extent I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Stanley. For myself, I hope the footpath-users, the NFU and the other interests—the local authorities—will have another look at this in Mr. Michael Spicer's committee or elsewhere. I really do think that the right approach is to have an obligation to restore the footpath the day it is ploughed, with, then, some exceptions allowing for weather or other exceptional circumstances, like the one that the noble Lord, Lord Stanley, suggested, of the outbreak of disease.
I think that if the farming interests could agree to the reinstatement on the day of ploughing, then it would be possible to get a more sensible package of exceptions for exceptional weather or other exceptional circumstances; but while there is the "restoration within three weeks" provision, I think that is already on the verge of being unenforceable and this would make it totally so—and it is unacceptable to the local authorities, let alone to users of footpaths or bridleways. I would echo what the noble Earl, Lord Avon, has said, that the various interests might get together and have another look at this. I do not think there is very much between the different groups, and if they looked at it in a little more detail I think an acceptable formula could be hammered out. I hope the noble Lord, Lord Stanley, will not press this amendment for the moment.
Lord Stanley of Alderley: My Lords, I am pleased to have had this discussion. There seems to be an agreement here that we have not quite got it right, and I wonder whether my noble friend on the Front Bench could give some assurance by nodding his head that it would be looked at again, perhaps in another place. We have tried to get the right words, but I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, that they are not quite right, and I think it wants looking at again.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I think my noble friend will see that I said, if I may paraphrase my own words, that if the farming and path-user interests could get together we would of course be willing to consider it again. I hope that will satisfy my noble friend.
Lord Stanley of Alderley: My Lords, I thank my noble friend very much. I beg leave to withdraw this amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 57 [Decision by appointee of Secretary of State]:
Lord Bellwin Lord Bellwin moved Amendment No. 102:
Leave out Clause 57.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, on this occasion I should like to speak also to a series of amendments: Nos. 102, 128, 129, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 140, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150, 151, 152, 153, 153A, 154, 155, 156, 157, 161 and 167.
The amendments that the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, moved on Report in relation to the transfer of jurisdiction to local authorities for the determination of disputed rights of way matters also significantly changed the procedure for the making and determination of the relevant orders. Because we were primarily concerned with matters of principle, the necessity for, and consequences of, these procedural changes in the context of the continued involvement of my right honourable friend the Secretary of State in rights of way matters were never debated.
The effect of the noble Lord's amendments and, for that matter, the Bill is such that in future both public path and definitive map orders would at the outset be "proposed to be made" and only made after the order, albeit in draft form, had been publicised and any objections or representations considered. We believe that this procedure is relevant only in the situation in which the same authority determines the proposal. That situation no longer prevails.
The associated procedure is, in our view, not appropriate in the circumstances where the responsibility for the determination of disputes resides with my right honourable friend the Secretary of State and is also inconsistent with the procedure that applies across a wide range of Planning and Highways Act orders. The effect of the Government's amendments as far as public path orders are concerned is to restore the status quo and whereby the authority having first decided that a path should be created, diverted or extinguished make the necessary order to give effect to that decision. That order is subject to confirmation by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State on being challenged. They also apply a comparable procedure to definitive map orders.
In our view there is no apparent justification for departing in the case of public path orders from a procedure that has worked perfectly well for 30 years and is understood by the public. We have also taken the opportunity in the additional time available since Report to give further consideration to other aspects of the Spicer Committee's proposals for publicising orders. The particular proposals that we have been able to implement are embodied in the amendments. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 62 [Financial provisions]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 103:
Page 51, line 12, leave out ("or other").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I have already spoken to this amendment. It is consequential. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Jacques): My Lords, we now return to Amendment No. 93, which is an amendment to Clause 64.
Clause 64 [Minor amendments]:
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 93:
Page 52, line I, after ("11") insert ("(1)").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is a purely drafting amendment to clarify the subsection of the 1949 Act to which this clause refers. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 94 to 96:
Page 52, line 7, at end insert—
("(3A) In section 2(8) of the 1968 Act (publicity and information services) for the words from "encouraging" onwards there shall be substituted the words "informing persons resorting to the countryside of their rights and obligations.").
Page 52, line 8, leave out ("the 1968") and insert ("that")
Page 52, line 10, leave out ("and") and insert ("(4A)").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, these are drafting amendments. I beg to move them en bloc.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 104:
Page 52, line 13, leave out ("Parts II and III of").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this amendment meets the suggestion made at an earlier stage by my noble friend Lord Stanley of Alderley that Ministers and public bodies should have regard to the economic and social needs of rural areas in all their actions under the Bill. I beg to move.
Lord Stanley of Alderley: My Lords, I should like to thank my noble friend. He has given me two amendments and I am sure that he would be hurt if I did not thank him.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 105:
Page 52, leave out lines 20 to 30.
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is consequential. I have already spoken to it. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreeed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 97:
Page 52, leave out lines 31 to 35.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 66 [Short title, commencement and extent]:
6.26 p.m.
Lord Stanley of Alderley Lord Stanley of Alderley moved Amendment No. 106:
Page 53, line 12, leave out from ("the") to end of line 13 and insert ("Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I think there has been a mistake in so far as the amendment should read "Countryside and Wildlife Act" and not "Wildlife and Countryside Act". I am sorry to stop the "rat race" for a minute, but I have a word to say on this. I would have tabled this amendment at the beginning of the Committee stage but, having listened to your Lordships since Christmas, I am now forced so to do because I have come to realise, far more than at the start of the Bill, that you cannot have wildlife without countryside. It is that point which has been brought home to me so forcefully in all these debates, and particularly those on habitat preservation, on moorland conservation and on sites of special scientific interest. It is for that reason that I should like to see the Title of the Bill changed to put "Countryside" first.
There is another reason. Although we all agree in what we want and where we want to go in the management of the countryside, we differ as to method. The Bill is leaving this House resting on voluntary methods—which, to my mind, is correct—with no hint of backup powers. This may sound an easy and platitudinous attitude; and your Lordships, particularly noble Lords opposite, may think that I am raising the victory flag; but I ask your Lordships not to take such a view; because it has been made clear to me by such of my noble friends as Lord Craigton and Lord Buxton (who is not here) and by noble Lords opposite—Lord Melchett, Lord Winstanley, Lord Donaldson and the noble Baroness, Lady David—that my voluntary approach, unfortunately for me, carries great responsibility. Farmers will have to behave with the utmost responsibility. To put it in agricultural words, "the buck stops with us".
I am prepared to accept this responsibility and to put my head on the block, on one condition. It is that when one of my fellow farmers ruins an SSSI or behaves irresponsibly, the media or the extreme conservationists or merely those who would like compulsory powers will consider quietly and fairly whether the alternative philosophy would have been any more effective. I know that your Lordships will take such an attitude; and that when we make mistakes, as inevitably we will—and I am talking about farmers—you will bear this in mind. I hope you will also bear in mind that we are privileged to start with a very substantial credit balance for living and working in the most beautiful countryside in the world, made by the Almighty but with very—and I repeat "very"—considerable help from farmers, not only in the past but also today and, I truly believe, tomorrow.
Therefore I hope that all Members of this House will be able to agree with the philosophy behind my amendment, although I am convinced that the spoilsports of the parliamentary draftsmen will advise my noble friend on the Front Bench not to accept it. I beg to move.
Viscount Massereene and Ferrard: My Lords, I should like to point out to my noble friend Lord Stanley that he said that one cannot have any wildlife without the countryside. Of course there is an abundance of wildlife in the oceans of the world. I should like to make that point just to correct him.
Lord Renton: My Lords, on this occasion, I most seriously and enthusiastically support my noble friend Lord Stanley. It is much more felicitous that the Bill should be known as the Countryside and Wildlife Act. Also, it will be abbreviated in due course, in the jargon of Whitehall. It will become known either as the WCA or the CWA. For myself, I prefer the latter.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I do not think that our parliamentary draftsmen could be in any way called spoilsports. They have worked very hard to make sure that we can have half the sport that we are having. I was interested in my noble friend's philosophical argument and, frankly, can find very little against it. I personally saw this amendment in one form this morning at 11.30; in another form at 1.30 and in its final form about half an hour before we began this afternoon. That is really my case. It is a little bit late.
After these prolonged debates it is tempting to start afresh with a new Title to the Bill. Perhaps a change of Title might serve as camouflage and reduce the number of amendments which the Bill might otherwise attract in another place. On balance, however, I should be reluctant to see the Title changed. The Bill has already become well-known in its present guise and I am sure that people are already aware of the importance of the Bill in relation to countryside matters. The Title also reflects the order of the clauses in the Bill and is consistent with the contents. At this late stage, I cannot ask my noble friend to do more than not press the amendment; but his suggestion will be on record, and it can be debated further.
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, I disagree with my noble friend Lord Stanley that it was wrong drafting. I think it was wrong printing. It was drafted correctly. The list of amendments that I picked up on Friday showed that the amendment was put down in the form that we intended.
The second point is that it would be a great benefit in the countryside in trying to interpret and explain this piece of legislation when it becomes an Act if its Title was "Countryside and Wildlife". I have no doubt that it is a fine point that we are trying to get across. It would certainly benefit me—wearing my hat as a chartered surveyor—in going out and talking to owners, occupiers and farmers, in that the full meaning of the Act could be put across more easily if it were entitled "Countryside and Wildlife", rather than "Wildlife and Countryside".
Lord Hunt: My Lords, I should like to say from this elevated position—and suffering as I am from altitude sickness, and lack of acclimatisation—that I entirely agree with both the logic and the spirit of this amendment.
Lord Craigton: My Lords, I think this Bill is about wildlife living in the countryside and I prefer the "WCA".
Baroness David: My Lords, we are absolutely delighted to hear what the noble Lord, Lord Stanley, said and that really habitats as well as wildlife are at long last being recognised as important. We are delighted to hear the responsible attitude that he is going to take. We just hope that all the farmers do so. At this late stage of the Bill, it would cause great confusion if the Title were changed. Such a lot has been going on over the months and months during which we seem to have been dealing with it. I think that we will be against the change.
Lord Stanley of Alderley: My Lords, I thought that I would get that reception. I hope that the Parliamentary draftsmen will not think ill of me if I call them spoilsports. I am sure that they would take it in the spirit that I meant it. By and large, I have achieved what I wanted to achieve: to point out that we as farmers realise our responsibilities in the countryside. I am sure that your Lordships will appreciate the point I made. The last matter that I shall raise on this Bill is one of agreement between us all about the philosophy behind it. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 107:
Page 53, line 14, leave out ("This") and insert ("The following provisions of this Act, namely—
Part II, except sections 29, 30, 31, 35 and 43;
sections 53 to 56 and 58; and
Part IV, except section 64(1) and (3) and section 65(1) so far as relating to Part II of Schedule 15,
shall come into force on the expiration of the period of one month beginning with the passing of this Act.
(2A) The remaining provisions of this").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, it may be convenient if I speak also to Amendments Nos. 158, 159, 160, 163, 164 and 165 to Schedule 15. These amendments meet the point raised by my noble friend Lord Renton at an earlier stage that it would be convenient if as many as possible of the provisions in the Bill could be brought into effect without the need for commencement orders. It may prove possible to provide for even more provisions to be treated in the same way and, if so, the Government will take appropriate action in another place. I beg to move.
Lord Renton: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for moving this amendment and accepting the principle that as much of the Bill and as many of the provisions as possible should be brought in together at an early stage. His amendments go further and are bolder than the one that I moved in the first place. For that also I am grateful. I only hope that his good example will be followed by other Ministers.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I have looked at this amendment twice and each time thought it meant different things. Am I right in assuming that Part I—and Part III for that matter—will be brought in by order and that they are not going to come into effect within a month of the passing of the Act? If that interpretation is correct, why is not Part I being

71
brought into force immediately? Of all the provisions in the Bill, those in Part I—anyhow, almost all of them—are the obvious candidates for being brought in immediately. In a number of other parts of the Bill—in Part III—there are changes involving local authorities and order-making powers. Part II has voluntary codes of practice. I should have thought that Part I ought to have been brought into effect immediately, though maybe there are one or two aspects that could not be.
As I read the amendment, Part I—and, for that matter, Part III—will be brought into force by order-making power later. I could not understand why Part I had been omitted. I thought from memory, although I have not had the opportunity to check, that the noble Lord, Lord Renton, particularly wanted Part I in his amendment. I see the noble Lord is shaking his head. I remember saying that it seemed to me that Part I could be brought in to force straight away.
Lord Renton: My Lords, if the noble Lord will allow me, that was not so. I picked out particular clauses, but I did not mention Part I, as such, for bringing into operation especially early.
Lord Melchett: Well, my Lords, I was wrong about that. I certainly thought that Part I should be brought into effect straight away. I cannot see any reason why it should not be so. I cannot see the reasons for delay on other parts of the Bill applying to Part I. I do not know whether the noble Earl is able to confirm that I am right and give me an explanation. If he is not, then maybe he would write to me.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I am not able to satisfy the noble Lord, but I take his point. The amendment was produced at the very last minute; at one stage we did not think that we could get it through in time. I shall look into what he has said. I would remind him that I did say that it might be possible to provide for more provisions to be treated in the same way, and we shall look into this and see why Part I is not.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers moved Amendment No. 108:
Page 53, line 22, after ("31") insert ("(Restoration where order under s. 29 is contravened)").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this amendment is consequential on Amendment No. 77. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Schedule 1 [Birds which are protected by special penalties]:
6.40 p.m.
Lord Burton Lord Burton moved Amendment No. 109:
Page 54, leave out line 37 and insert—

("Harrier, Marsh

Circus aeruginosus

Harrier, Montagu's

Circus pypargus

Harrier, Pallid

Circus maerourus").

The noble Lord said: My Lords, I am afraid that when I moved this amendment on Report I must have been somewhat incoherent, for while I thought I had said "osprey's egg" I found in the Official Report
72
that I had said "ostrich egg". I withdrew the amendment on Report to give the Government a further chance of looking at this proposal. It has also given me an opportunity to look at what was said. I think we were perhaps somewhat misled, for we were told that licences would be issued for serious damage being done by this bird to game or other birds. But that is not the case, for as long as these birds remain on Schedule 1 it is extremely unlikely that one would get a licence. The hen harrier is increasing very rapidly, as we heard from all sides of the House. Twenty years ago it was perhaps a rare bird. But now it is steadily increasing its range, and though it may not yet be very numerous in all parts of England it is very numerous all over the likely parts of Scotland, and I believe it has established itself very strongly in Wales. In the North of England, too, it is also fairly prevalent. To leave this bird on Schedule 1 can only bring the whole of Schedule 1 into contempt. It is lowering the whole tone, where there are rare birds, to put this bird which, without having any protection, has been increasing rapidly, on to it. I cannot see why. Perhaps my noble friend can tell me why they have suddenly decided this bird not having been protected before, that it is now necessary to protect it.
This amendment does not in fact remove the harrier from protection. It only removes it from the sections which give it special protection. I therefore suggest that this amendment is not only for the good of the countryside but for the good of bird protection in itself. I therefore commend this amendment to your Lordships and I beg to move.
Earl Peel: My Lords, I should like very much to support my noble friend on this. We have heard figures from both sides of the House on the hen harrier and I do not know which to believe. I can only speak from my own experience and, having spoken to people in Scotland, the North-West of England and Wales, there is no doubt at all that the hen harrier is on the increase. This is a problematical bird, particularly with game birds. I think at times that one tends to forget the importance of the commercialism of game shooting and the benefit thereof to the countryside. I do not think there is any doubt whatever that if the hen harrier savaged fish farms or livestock it would certainly not be on the Schedule 1, Part I, list. I do not know whether my noble friend is going to press this amendment, but I would sincerely hope the Government would watch this bird very carefully in the future, whether through binoculars or not, and, as the noble Earl, Lord Swinton, said, perhaps if the bird were shot it would keep it in the air more often! It is a destroyer, and I hope the Government will keep an eye on it in the future.
Lord Melchett: We have had, my Lords, debates on this during Committee and Report stages. There seemed to be a fair consensus, particularly at the Committee stage when we had a very full debate on it, that the Bill was right. I think I heard the noble Lord, Lord Burton, suggest that the Bill introduces some change in status; but as I understand it that is not the case. The hen harrier is a Schedule 1 bird at the moment and the Bill merely maintains its position as such. The population has been relatively low for

73
quite a long time—something between 500 and 800 pairs is the information that I have. It may be slightly on the increase, but it is a very slow increase and certainly not on anything like the scale of the sparrow hawk, which has been taken off Schedule 1 of the Bill, I think mistakenly, although of course it is still protected.
At the Committee stage, when I think I am right in saying that the noble Lord, Lord Burton, was not here—he will correct me if I am wrong—I reported on the fact that a considerable amount of research was currently being done into the hen harrier and its effect on the grouse populations. I said that the sensible course, as I saw it, was to wait for the result of that research before coming to any different conclusion from the existing position.
I spent the weekend reading some information which had come my way about the diet of marsh harriers, which we have hunting over the land which I farm. I had assumed from watching them that their prey consisted entirely of pheasant chicks but it appears from people who have looked at the remains around the nests that that is not the case at all and the prey, as with many birds of prey, is very opportunistic. It includes a number of rats, mice and other small rodents. The bird species seem to be mainly starlings, with a number of other small birds. Undoubtedly the odd pheasant chick is taken, but this demonstrated to me how wrong my personal observation could be when set against a careful scientific inquiry.
The information which I have on hen harrier predation on grouse tends to show—this was from research conducted in the early 1970s—that the amount of grouse available to be hunted was not in fact affected by the harrier population and that the harrier predation was extremely small. A number of other species were taken as well as grouse, but some grouse—a very small number indeed—were taken and the population as a whole, in areas where there were hen harriers hunting and where there were not, clearly was not affected by their presence. That is what scientific research shows, and I suggest that your Lordships should take some note of it.
The research to which I have referred, which was published in 1978, also said that in the area where the research was conducted there had been complete stability of harrier populations. They had not fluctuated in the way that birds of prey who are dependent on small mammals very often do fluctuate. The explanation was that there are a number of other small birds—not grouse or grouse chicks—which seem to make up the bulk of the hen harriers' diet. There does not seem to me to be any justification whatsoever for removing this bird from Schedule 1, and that seems to have been the consensus of your Lordships on the two previous occasions when we have discussed it. I hope the Government will continue to resist it.
Viscount Massereene and Ferrard: My Lords, I cannot support my noble friend on this: I support what the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, has just said. T have hen harriers on my property in Scotland and the extraordinary thing is—I have a few grouse and plenty of golden eagles and peregrines—that the grouse population remains completely static, exactly the same. I have seen hen harriers kill oyster catchers, for instance,
74
and quite a lot of other birds. I agree that on a heavily-stocked grouse moor they can be a nuisance and they will kill grouse and it might actually even affect a grouse drive if the hen harrier suddenly appeared. If that happened, it might make the grouse go in divers directions.
Twenty years ago the hen harrier was an extremely rare bird on my estate. We certainly have more now but that has been due to the protection that they have had. I was rather surprised when my noble friend behind me said that he was surprised the hen harrier was on the protected list in Schedule 1. It always has been protected, or at least it has been protected for the last 20 years; so I am afraid I cannot support my noble friend.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I have listened carefully to my noble friend, but I am still of the opinion, I am afraid, that this amendment is not justified. Studies have estimated that the British population of the species to be in the region of 500 pairs. This figure was derived from a consideration of the distribution of hen harriers as shown in the Atlas of Breeding Birds in Britain and Ireland, prepared by the British Trust for Ornithology from nationwide reports and on a detailed study of densities of hen harriers in a few study areas, which represented a sample of suitable habitat from optimum to poor. By combining these two types of research, the statisticians among your Lordships will recognise that extrapolation can provide estimates than can reasonably be relied on.
The species is listed on Annex 1 of the Birds Directive as there are only about 2,500 pairs in Western Europe. We have a special responsibility, as our population has partly recovered from particularly low levels and may be holding its own. Unfortunately, there is some evidence of further declines in the last few years. In Orkney, for example, there has been a 10 per cent. drop in females and a 33 per cent. drop in males. The species have disappeared from the Kielder Forest area and almost disappeared from Galloway. I also have some comments to make about research which has recently been carried out, but I shall not take up the time of the House as the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, has covered that ground.
The advisory committees and the NCC have considered this species very carefully and several times. I hope that by my remarks your Lordships will realise that the Government have looked at the position very carefully. They remain adamant that it more than justifies the special protection which has been given. So far as my noble friend Lord Peel is concerned, I do not think it is necessary for me to say that I will undertake to keep the position under review, because it is quite apparent that it is being kept very closely under review. I hope that my noble friend will take that in the spirit in which it is meant, and I trust that my noble friend Lord Burton will not wish to press this amendment.
Lord Burton: My Lords, I may have been wrong about the schedule. I am not so good at the papers; perhaps I may be in the field. It is not the case that there has been only a slow increase; there has been a very rapid increase in these birds. If they were to continue like this, I should be very concerned about

75
the few remaining partridges that we have. To say that predation is not very large on grouse leads only to further incredulity of what is alleged to be scientific research. We see it happening all the time. We know that they are predators and we also know what damage they do.
My noble friend who has property in Mull says that they do not do any harm, but one would have great difficulty in finding them in Mull. There are very few grouse. These birds terrify the other birds and there is nothing which will clear a hill of grouse more quickly. They scare the grouse even quicker than an eagle. If the wind is in a certain direction, the whole lot will disappear for miles downwind. The Government say that there are only 500 pairs, but we discussed this on Report. The noble Lord, Lord Donaldson, told us that there could be no counting without someone coming round and telling you that he was going to count on your ground. We have already had it. But there are large areas where there has been no counting, and the allegation of 500 pairs gives rise to even more incredulity about what we have been told.
We were told that they have disappeared from Kielder and Galloway. Why is that? It is because the trees are now too big and they cannot scavenge across the old ploughed ground where they were getting birds before. I know that the noble Lord lives in London and has to take advice from these people, but he should be very careful about the advice that he is getting. This is what frightens a number of us on this side. A lot of this advice is quite inaccurate and we are not at all happy with it. That is why we are frightened that we will get not licences to do what we know is necessary for protection. I know that the Government have cohorts outside and, if I am not getting any support from the other side, there is not much point in pressing the amendment. Therefore, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Schedule 2 [Birds which may be killed or taken]:
[Amendment No. 110 not moved.]
6.54 p.m.
Lord Burton Lord Burton moved Amendment No. 111:
Page 56, line 30, at end insert—

("Goosander

Mergus merganzer").

The noble Lord said: My Lords, with this amendment I should like to speak to Amendment No. 112. These amendments deal with goosanders and merganzers. On Report, I had support from all sides of the House and I withdrew the amendment because I thought that the Government ought to have a further investigation into this matter. Unfortunately, I believe that my noble friend went to Edinburgh University where he had a fairly restricted report. Had he gone to Stirling University, he would probably have had a very different answer.
These birds are hosts to various kinds of worm. Apart from the eye-fluke worm, they are also hosts to the tapeworm and the red or spiruid worm, as well as others. If your Lordships look at the map, you will find that throughout Scotland there are a number of
76
loch na mealls—"beasties" or parasites of the loch—my Gaelic is not very good. Apparently, there are a number of lochs which are already polluted with these worms and parasites. What happens is that these birds are hosts to these worms and they pass the eggs through their droppings, which are then eaten by snails or small plankton—type little "beasties", which are in turn eaten by the fish.
The eye-fluke worm works on the eyes of the fish. It works through its body after it has been eaten, till it gets to the eyes and, when the eyes are damaged and the fish is swimming near the surface, it is very easy for the birds to re-catch these fish so that the cycle goes on increasingly. These red worms are very nasty if they get into human beings. Smoking a fish does not cook it and, by taking from the wild a fish that has been smoked, human beings can very readily pick up these worms.
These birds, also, were rare in the 1940s, but they have steadily increased and I think I am right in saying—I may have made a mistake the last time—that they have not been on the protected list up till now. So we are getting a change this time and I do not know why, because they, too, have increased enormously. They are now very common in Scotland. Off the island of Gigha, you can see as many as 2,000 on one raft. This is quite an amazing sight, but it is not the total population. It just shows the density that we are getting. They are steadily increasing, and I therefore feel that there is no need to put them on the protected list.
My noble friend on the Front Bench may say that we can get licences, but the licensing situation is most unsatisfactory. It is increasing bureaucracy and it seems quite unnecessary. The fishing interests—the Association of District Fishery Boards and so on—felt quite secure and happy about the licensing situation, but after listening to various debates on Report I am most unhappy about it. I think my noble friend told us that it is very unlikely that a whole watershed would get a licence. These birds fly up and down the river and, if you want to control them properly, you must have a large section of the river under control at one time. My Lords, I beg to move.
Lord Gibson-Watt: My Lords, I should like to support my noble friend Lord Burton. I think that the Government Front Bench have made a mistake over the goosander. The goosander is a pest. In fact, it is a greater pest in Scotland than it is in my part of the world. One of the things to remember about the goosander is that it is a very prolific breeder. Last year, I saw a brood of over 20. Therefore, the size of the population will grow very much if this bird is protected. I believe that the Government have taken this step with the goosander as a result of the EEC directive. If I am wrong, I should like to be corrected; but I very much support the amendment of my noble friend Lord Burton.
The Earl of Avon: My Lords, the goosander is undoubtedly fond of salmon, but there is no confusion in the Government's mind on this. If I may echo the words of the my noble friend Lord Gibson-Watt: Yes, it is because of the European Community. In terms of Europe, it is a rare bird. There are estimated to

77
be 1,000 to 1,500 pairs in Britain, which is about 85 per cent. of the total population. We are therefore under a duty to ensure that any killing is strictly controlled and only allowed to protect fisheries and fish farms from severe damage. It is not a nationwide species, as my noble friend Lord Burton said when he moved the amendment, and it does not do damage in many areas where it is found. That is why we have decided that the proper method of control under the Bill is by issuing licences and not, as the amendment would provide, by listing it as a national pest.
The merganzer is mainly a salt water bird. It, like the goosander, is partial to young salmon but, except at certain short periods as the smelts are waiting in the estuaries before going out to sea, it does not take many. It is not quite so rare as the goosander but we still have about 2,000 breeding pairs, and in European terms we have a duty to protect and conserve it.
We are clear therefore that with our new licensing arrangements the proper course is to take this species off the national pest list and provide that fisheries should take control measures under a specific licence. As with the goosander, the policies to be adopted will be referred to the advisory body under the Bill, the Nature Conservancy Council.
With this explanation, I hope that my noble friend will not wish to press the amendment to have them put down as a pest but will realise that the situation of the birds, as he has emphasised very clearly in his own speech this evening, will enable the Nature Conservancy Council to keep the matter closely under review.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, perhaps I may say from this side of the House—I do not want to say very much because I do not think that anything new has emerged since we discussed this matter at Report—that now, as then, we entirely agree with what the Government have said about this amendment.
Lord Burton: My Lords, once again I have to say that the Government's advisers are wrong. There are 2,000 goosanders on one raft, yet the Government say that the total population of Europe is only 2,000 pairs. I cannot believe that half of them are on that raft. My noble friend says that they are not nationwide. It depends which nation he is referring to. The whole of Scotland has merganzers and goosanders. They may not be found throughout the United Kingdom as a whole. This information is extremely "dicey". We want to look very carefully at the composition of these bird protection lists as drawn up by the Secretary of State's advisory committee. People are protecting injurious birds for no apparently good reason.
I am very loth to withdraw this amendment, but probably I would lose it in a Division. Therefore, I had better not waste the time of your Lordships' House.
Viscount Massereene and Ferrard: My Lords, I agree with my noble friend that in Scotland there are apparently great numbers of merganzers and goosanders. I understood him to say that he saw a raft of 2,000 goosanders off the island of Gigha. It would be extremely interesting to know how my noble friend counted them. It must have taken a long time.
Lord Burton: My Lords, may I, by leave, reply to my noble friend's question. The goosanders are on the island of Gigha, which is off the West Coast of Scotland. They were counted by bird experts, not by me. Some of the very people who are supposed to be giving figures counted them, so they cannot be right in all respects. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 112 and 113 not moved.]
Schedule 5 [Other animals which are protected]:
7.4 p.m.
The Earl of Cranbrook The Earl of Cranbrook moved Amendment No. 114:
Page 59, line 29, at end insert—

("Adder

Vipera berus

In respect of section 9(3) only").

The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 114. With it I should like to take Amendments Nos. 115 to 120. These amendments have the effect of giving a very limited degree of protection to all those native British reptiles and amphibians which are not already strictly protected under Clause 9, taken with Schedule 5. Therefore, unlike the noble Lord, Lord Burton, I am seeking to increase the degree of protection given to species under the Bill.
At the Report stage I moved a similar set of amendments, to which the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, replied that he had asked the advisory body—that is to say, the Nature Conservancy Council—to review the species which had been listed in my amendment. I refer to the Official Report for 10th March, col. 215. I believe that adequate information is already available, particularly information which has been provided by the voluntary body, the British Herpetological Society. I believe that this information is sufficient to confirm a decline in the natural range and in the occurrence of these amphibians and reptiles within Great Britain. This is confirmed by a letter which the noble Earl, Lord Avon, has very kindly written to me. He wrote on 27th March confirming that the Nature Conservancy Council, while examining the evidence that is presently available, is in fact satisfied that this evidence does indicate a decline in the distribution of these animal species.
Further research, such as the research which is carried out to establish the possibly controversial numbers and ranges of birds of prey in this country, is excessively expensive. It involves a large number of research students and research associates and undoubtedly would cost a lot of money. If the information that is available is already adequate and if this information has been provided at no cost by a voluntary body, I believe that in general this information should be considered to be adequate to act upon.
To a great extent the decline which has been documented must be attributed to loss of habitat. It is of course this loss of habitat which a great many of the provisions of the Bill seek to remedy. However, as I have stressed on previous occasions during the progress of the Bill through your Lordships' House, amphibians and reptiles also suffer from direct exploitation by man. Amphibians and reptiles are being collected for sale, largely for the educational market and to a lesser extent for the pet trade. There is no doubt that the

79
commercial trade in these species also involves importation. It is because a large proportion of these animals which come into trade in this country are imported that a situation of imponderables arises.
I have been informed, and I have as a result stated in this House, that most Council of Europe states already protect most of their amphibians and reptiles. I find it somewhat difficult myself to conduct the research to support this in detail because in the different member States of the Council of Europe there is a variety of agencies and legislative bodies which are concerned with the protection of species or the protection of habitats. For instance, whereas in many States it may be of national concern—as it is in our own—in Italy conservation is regulated by provincial assemblies. There is therefore quite a range of provincial regulations which differ somewhat in their impact.
None the less, I am convinced that in failing to protect the great majority if not all of our amphibian and reptile species, the United Kingdom would be in a minority among the Council of Europe members. Moreover, in a number of instances—I would cite in particular the Republic of Ireland and France—more stringent regulations have quite recently been, or are about to be, introduced as a consequence of the ratification of the Berne Convention.
The effect of stricter protection in other European nations which are at present supplying the market in this country is not yet known. I consider that it is essential to be prepared for all eventualities, and in particular to be prepared for a reduction or a drying-up of the available supplies of these animals coming on to the commercial market from existing sources in Europe. I consider that there is a primary need to monitor the trade in those amphibians and reptiles which do occur in our own country. I consider that information on trade is also essential to anticipate future protective legislation which may need to be more strict.
It is this sort of information which the advisory body, the Nature Conservancy Council, will be required to seek at the request of the noble Earl. I believe that it will be a most important item in the evidence for the Nature Conservancy Council in drawing up their assessment of current threats to our native populations. Within the framework of the Bill before us my amendments imply in fact no immediate changes to present practices, except that commercial dealings will require a licence, which I imagine will be comparatively simple to give and will not involve great expense. In return, it will provide invaluable information. On present evidence I believe that the control of commercial transactions is an appropriate level of protection for the species listed and I believe that the incorporation of my amendments in this Bill would make a future assessment of the need for stricter protection that much easier to obtain.
I hope that my noble friend on the Front Bench will feel that the advice I have given is at least as useful in making up his mind as the advice that the Nature Conservancy Council would be able to give and I hope he will be able to accept my amendment. I beg to move.
Lord Craigton: My Lords, with the exception of the adder, we would all welcome the presence of these little creatures in our gardens and on our land, if only because they are of true benefit to man in reducing the pest population. Where they are in danger of extinction it is because man or progress is destroying, or has destroyed, those features of the areas where they live that they must have if they are to survive and breed. Let us put these little reptiles and amphibians in the Bill now and if—which I doubt—later scientific advice is given to the Minister that we are wrong in relation to any of them, they can be taken out in Committee in another place. I support my noble friend.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Cranbrook for raising this, which of course he did at Report stage as well, and I am grateful to him for the information which his unique knowledge has given the House. When he said that he hoped I would consider that his advice was as good as that of the Nature Conservancy Council, I would merely say, far be it from me to draw the comparison. All I would tell him is that of course the Nature Conservancy Council is the body which officially advises the Minister and not—possibly with regret—my noble friend. He seeks to afford a measure of control over the trade in those reptiles and amphibians which are found on the British mainland, and that of course is a thoroughly creditable intention. But I am told that the Nature Conservancy Council have examined such evidence as is at present available and, while they are satisfied, as my noble friend Lord Cranbrook quite correctly says, that there appears to be a decline in the distribution of the species concerned, they are not yet in a position to advise my right honourable friend the Secretary of State as to what conservation measures, if any, would be appropriate in relation to the species which are listed by my noble friend.
The fact is that the Government wished to have this advice before acting and I am sure that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State would, as Clause 26(4) obliges him to do, consult these people once the Bill is enacted. These are people who are not just scientists and conservationists; they are people who might be affected by the proposal to make the the trade in these species subject to licence.
The amendment is in fact technically defective in so far as it refers to subsection (3) of Clause 9 as opposed to subsection (4), but I would not rest my argument on that. I merely hope that my noble friend will see fit to withdraw his amendment because, if the advice is such that conservation measures are necessary, I feel quite certain that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State will—if I may repeat the words that I used during Report stage—not hesitate to consider it favourably.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, we have supported the noble Earl, Lord Cranbrook on these amendments, all the way through the passage of the Bill, and I should like to see this amendment in the Bill. Obviously if the subsection number is incorrect it could be changed in another place. My worry would be that, while the list does not appear all that long, it is a fairly significant change, in that it would be the first time that something had been added to the schedule in respect of a particular

81
section only. I thought that the noble Earl was very perceptive in seeing that that was a way of meeting the problem which he has brought up right through the passage of the Bill, and my worry would be that this might not be done in another place. I think it would be better to put this in while the Bill is in your Lordships' House and then, if it needed to be taken out or altered after the NCC had time to consider it, it could be altered in another place. Because it is something that has run right through our debates and we have spent a very long time on this Bill, it seems to me that at Third Reading it is fair for the House to come to a decision one way or another. It is not as if the NCC and a number of other people have not had time to consider all these points.
This is really all that remains of something that we saw as of fundamental importance but it was clear that we were not going to get the Government to agree to it, although I think they should have done. That was the reverse listing of mammals, reptiles and amphibians so that those groups would have been in the same position as birds; all of them would have been automatically protected except for the ones that needed to be listed either on a pest schedule or on a schedule which allowed people to kill them, for sporting or other reasons. That is what I think should have been done for reptiles and amphibians like these as well as for mammals, but it was not done. We have had to settle for second best in the case of mammals in the very valuable amendments to the Badgers Act but we have not managed to do anything for the species which the noble Earl has listed, and I think we should. There is a real problem, and the noble Earl has produced the evidence time and time again to demonstrate the nature of the problem. Personally, I should like to see these amendments in the Bill.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I should not wish to abuse the laws of procedure but, with permission, I should like to say just one thing. The whole way through this Bill we have relied upon the advice of the Nature Conservancy Council. It has always been said that we should rely upon their advice. Here is the one case where the Nature Conservancy Council have in fact not said that this should be done and have said that they would wish for time before they give such advice. It really seems quite extraordinary that the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, should nevertheless wish to disregard that decision so that we push the change into the Bill ourselves. If the Nature Conservancy Council give this advice then of course my right honourable friend will take it, but he is obliged to consult other people as well, and that he will do.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I would be happy to agree with what the noble Earl has just said if he would agree to take the advice of the Nature Conservancy Council about how sites of special scientific interest should be protected.
Lord Beaumont of Whitley: My Lords, I think the noble Earl the Minister is slightly mixing up two things. It is an entirely different case whether one follows, or does not follow, the advice of the Nature Conservancy Council by not going as far as they want
82
in protecting a species, and another matter entirely when it is a question of wanting to go further than the Nature Conservancy Council wants. I certainly would not want—and I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, would not want—at any stage to go against the advice of the Nature Conservancy Council were they advising the protection of something. That is not to say that we do not sometimes want to go further than they do. The reason for that is a fairly good one. It is that the Nature Conservancy Council, in order to preserve their reputation have, quite rightly, got to be absolutely certain that the advice that they give in regard to protection is 100 per cent. justified. There are enough critics of the NCC about to ensure that the council cannot afford at any time to go out on a limb and say, "We recommend that this or that species should be conserved", when they do not have sufficient evidence. Parliament can, and should occasionally, go further than that, because it should be able to deal with a case like this while we are producing this important Bill. This is a case where not to put these species on a protected list would not give any benefit to anyone but to put them on would obviously do some good, even though we are not quite certain exactly how much good it would do. I suggest there is no good reason not to put them on such a list and that there are some quite good reasons to put them on; therefore we should do so.
The Earl of Cranbrook: My Lords, there is a technical point. The noble Earl has drawn my attention to the fact that I have failed to check the proofs of my amendments adequately. In fact, I was seeking to invoke the provisions of Clause 9(4) only. I think my noble friend on the Front Bench realised this and he spoke to the amendment as if I had been doing what I intended to do; there was very clearly no misunderstanding. Despite the slip, your Lordships' House understood very clearly, because I made it absolutely clear and I think the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, understood very clearly that I intended to invoke subsection (4); that is, only the control of sale. Following up the words of the noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, I stress the fact that by controlling the sale, by monitoring what is happening to these animals, not only do we anticipate a disadvantageous or even dangerous situation which renders them more vulnerable, which may occur through legislation in other countries over which we have no control; we protect them in advance of what may occur if the inflow of imported animals dries up. At the same time, by this very minor level of protection we provide the very information which the scientific authority will require in order to be able to make the assessment that it is required to make on the instructions of the noble Earl. Without adequate information on the trade in these animals, it is impossible to discover what pressure mankind is putting on the amphibians and the reptiles of this country.
The final point is that throughout this series of amendments I have been seeking to demonstrate as a fact what the Government have asserted; that is, that this Bill can invoke a degree of protection which is not total, which is not all-encompassing, which can accommodate both the needs of the species and also the needs of human kind in living with these animals. On the understanding that there is a misprint in the amendment

83
as proposed and that in all cases they refer to Clause 9(4), I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Aylestone): My Lords, the noble Earl has spoken to Amendments Nos. 115 to 120. Is the noble Earl pressing them?
The Earl of Cranbrook: My Lords, I am moving them all.
The Earl of Cranbrook The Earl of Cranbrook moved Amendments Nos. 115 to 120:
Page 59, line 43, at end insert—

("Frog, Common

Rana temporaria

In respect of section 9(3) only")

line 45, at end insert—

("Lizard, Viviparous

Lacerta vivipara

In respect of section 9(3) only")

Page 60, line 4, at end insert—

("Newt, Palmate

Triturus helveticus

In respect of section 9(3) only

Newt, Smooth

Triturus vulgaris

In respect of section 9(3) only")

line 8, at end insert—

("Slow-worm

Anguis fragilis

In respect of section 9(3) only")

line 12, at end insert—

("Snake, Grass

Natrix helvetica

In respect of section 9(3) only")

line 15, at end insert—

("Toad, Common

Bufo bufo

In respect of section 9(3) only").

On Question, amendments agreed to.
Schedule 7 [Amendments of the 1963, 1970 and 1973 Acts]:
Lord Northfield Lord Northfield moved Amendment No. 121:
Page 61, line 11, leave out ("was") and insert ("had been").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 121 which is wrongly attributed to Lord Mottistone and should be in my name. The first of these amendments, No. 121, I move on the grounds of clarity in drafting and consistency in drafting. We are here dealing with an exception, as is set out on page 61 at the top of Schedule 7. With regard to clarity, I submit to the Minister that it is proper to say that the mercy killing which is being provided for here should be allowed in the case where the animal—the deer, in this case—had been so seriously injured when he arrived on the scene to do this mercy killing that his act of mercy was laudable and could be allowed. In other words, it should be clearly stated that it was antecedent that the animal had been so injured.
With regard to consistency, I would refer the noble Earl to another part of the Bill, Clause 10, which also is dealing with exceptions exactly as the schedule is dealing with exceptions. In Clause 10(2)(b), at the top of page 12 at line 5, we read:
"the taking of any such animal if he shows that the animal had been disabled otherwise than by his unlawful act".
So we have need for clarity, and, I submit, need for consistency. This is the precise wording used in another part of the Bill in exactly similar circumstances.
84
Therefore, I feel sure the amendment will be acceptable to the Government. I beg to move.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Northfield, has been a persistent person with regard to getting the wording of this right, and being, a helpful kind of fellow I will be happy to go along with the amendment.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Northfield Lord Northfield moved Amendment No. 122:
Page 62, line 45, leave out ("that land") and insert ("the land on which the action is taken").
The noble Lord said: My Lords, in moving this amendment, I would direct the noble Earl's attention to the possibility of confusion at the bottom of page 62. Here we are dealing with the definition of an authorised person. When one reaches sub-paragraph (d) there is a very great risk of confusion. I would read from the beginning of paragraph (6)(d)—
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, may I interrupt the noble Lord because it might save him some time. I was going to say that I would agree to accept this amendment and the following one, if he would wish to put them, without explaining the details.
Lord Northfield: My Lords, as I had not been warned of this happy change of circumstance I was about to explain, but I see I have no need to do so. I am most grateful to the noble Earl. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Northfield Lord Northfield moved Amendment No. 123:
Page 62, line 46, leave out ("such a person") and insert ("a person having that right").
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers moved Amendment No. 124:
Page 63, line 39, leave out ("a site") and insert ("an area").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is a drafting amendment to ensure consistency. I beg to move.
Lord Melchett: My Lords, I wonder whether this gives me an opportunity to ask the noble Earl or the Government if they have reached any conclusion about the terminology of sites of special scientific interest. I imagine they are now getting keener on "areas of special scientific interest", which somebody pointed out to me today will produce ASSIs. At Report stage the noble Earl, Lord Avon, said that he would look at the point to see whether we could simplify the terminology. I wonder whether he or the Government collectively have come to any conclusion. If they have, it would be nice to hear it. I was hoping that when the Bill was reprinted it would have got rid of "sites of special scientific interest" in the side title, but it did not. I hope one of the noble Earls might be able to tell me about some happy conclusion to their deliberations.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, it certainly gives the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, the opportunity of asking the

85
question. It is not a particularly helpful question to ask, but I can tell him that we are still considering the point.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers moved Amendment No. 125:
Page 63, line 40, after ("under") insert ("section 23 of the said Act of 1949 or").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is a technical amendment which will doubtless give the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, an opportunity to ask some other question. However, failing that, I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Earl Ferrers Earl Ferrers moved Amendment No. 126:
Page 65, line 8, at end insert—
("(4) After subsection (3) of that section there shall be inserted the following subsection—
"(4) The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and the Secretary of State shall from time to time consult with the Nature Conservancy Council as to the exercise of their functions under subsection (1)(e) above; and neither of them shall grant a licence of any description unless he has been advised by the Council as to the circumstances in which, in the Council's opinion, licences of that description should be granted."").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, this amendment seeks to achieve consistency between the Badgers Act as amended on Report and the other parts of the Bill relating to the issue of licences to kill or take protected animals. The effect will be to require that the Nature Conservancy Council be consulted before licences to take or kill badgers, to prevent serious damage to land, crops, poultry or other forms of property, are granted by my right honourable friend the Minister of Agriculture, or my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Scotland. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 127:
After Schedule 12, insert the following new schedule
("APPLICATIONS FOR CERTAIN ORDERS UNDER PART III
Form of applications
1. An application shall be made in the prescribed form and shall be accompanied by—

(a) a map drawn to the prescribed scale and showing the way or ways to which the application relates; and

(b) copies of any documentary evidence (including statements of witnesses) which the applicant wishes to adduce in support of the application.

Notice of applications
2.—(1) Subject to sub-paragraph (2), the applicant shall serve a notice stating that the application has been made on every owner and occupier of any land to which the application relates.
(2) If, after reasonable inquiry has been made, the authority are satisfied that it is not practicable to ascertain the name or address of an owner or occupier of any land to which the application relates, the notice required to be served on him by sub-paragraph (1) may be served by addressing it to him by the description "owner" or "occupier" of the land (describing it) and by affixing it to some conspicuous object or objects on the land.
(3) When the requirements of this paragraph have been complied with, the applicant shall certify that fact to the authority.
(4) Every notice or certificate under this paragraph shall be in the prescribed form.
Determination by authority
3.—(1) As soon as reasonably practicable after receiving a certificate under paragraph 2(3), the authority shall—

(a) investigate the matters stated in the application; and

(b) after consulting with every local authority whose area includes the land to which the application relates, decide whether to make or not to make the orders to which the application relates.

(2) If the authority have not determined the application within twelve months of their receiving a certificate under paragraph 2(3), then, on the applicant making representations to the Secretary of State, the Secretary of State may, after consulting with the authority, direct the authority to determine the application before the expiration of such period as may be specified in the direction.
(3) As soon as practicable after determining the application, the authority shall give notice of their decision by serving a copy of it on the applicant and any person on whom notice of the application was required to be served under paragraph 2(1).
Appeal against a decision not to make an order
4.—(1) Where the authority decide not to make an order, the applicant may, at any time within 28 days after service on him of notice of the decision, serve notice of appeal against that decision on the Secretary of State and the authority.
(2) If on considering the appeal the Secretary of State considers that an order should be made, he shall give to the authority such directions as appear to him necessary for the purpose.
Interpretation
5.—(1) In this Schedule—
"application" means an application under section 46 (4A);
"local authority" means a district council, the Greater London Council, a parish or community council or the parish meeting of a parish not having a separate parish council;
"prescribed" means prescribed by regulations made by the Secretary of State.
(2) Regulations under this Schedule shall be made by statutory instrument which shall be subject to annulment in pursuance of a resolution of either House of Parliament.").
The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 127. This amendment was spoken to with Amendment No. 91.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Schedule 13 [Procedure in connection with certain orders under Part III]:
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Aylestone): My Lords, the next amendment is No. 128. I think that is was spoken to with a series of amendments.
The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 128 to 157:
Page 92, line 26, at end insert—
("Coming into operation
1A. An order shall not take effect until confirmed either by the authority or the Secretary of State under paragraph 5 or by the Secretary of State under paragraph 6.").
Page 92, line 27, leave out ("draft").
Page 92, line 28, leave out from beginning to end of line 35 and insert ("On making an order, the authority shall give notice—

(a) describing the general effect of the order and stating that it has been made and requires confirmation;

(b) naming a place in the area in which the land to the order relates is situated where a copy of the order may be inspected free of charge, and copies thereof may be obtained at a reasonable charge, at all reasonable hours; and").

Page 92, line 39, leave out ("draft").
Page 92, line 43, leave out ("draft").
Page 93, line 10, leave out ("draft order; and") and insert ("order;
( ) at council offices in the locality of the land to which the order relates; and").
Page 93, leave out lines 13 to 19 and insert—
("(3) The Secretary of State may, in any particular case, direct that it shall not be necessary to comply with sub-paragraph (2)(b)(i); but if he so directs in the case of any land, then in addition to publication the notice shall be addressed to "The owners and any occupiers" of the land (describing it) and a copy or copies of the notice shall be affixed to some conspicuous object or objects on the land.
(3A) The notice required to be displayed by sub-paragraph (2)(c)(i) at the ends of so much of any way as is affected by the order shall be accompanied by a plan showing the general effect of the order so far as it relates to that way.".
Page 93, line 24, leave out ("draft").
Page 93, line 43, leave out ("a draft") and insert ("an").
Page 94, line 5, leave out ("draft").
Page 94,line 8, leave out ("a draft") and insert ("an").
Page 94, line 9, leave out ("not one but two draft") and insert ("two separate").
Page 94, line 10, leave out ("prepared") and insert ("made").
Page 94, line 16, at beginning insert ("(1)").
Page 94, line 16, leave out from ("may") to end of line 17 and insert—
("(a) confirm the order without modification; or
(b) if they require any modification to be made, submit the order to the Secretary of State for confirmation by him.
(2) Where an order is submitted to the Secretary of State under sub-paragraph (1), the Secretary of State may confirm the order with or without modifications.").
line 20, leave out from ("shall") to end of line 29 and insert ("submit the order to the Secretary of State for confirmation by him.
(2) Where an order is submitted to the Secretary of State under sub-paragraph (1), the Secretary of State shall either—

(a) cause a local inquiry to be held; or

(b) afford any person by whom a representation or objection has been duly made and not withdrawn an opportunity of being heard by a person appointed by the Secretary of State for the purpose.

(3) On considering any representations or objections duly made and the report of the person appointed to hold the inquiry or hear representations or objections, the Secretary of State may confirm the order with or without modifications.").
Page 94, line 30, leave out ("make") and insert ("confirm")
Page 94, line 31, leave out from beginning to ("so") in line 32 and insert ("The Secretary of State shall not confirm an order with modifications")
Page 94, line 33, leave out ("draft")
Page 94, line 34, leave out ("draft")
Page 94, line 37, leave out ("draft")
Page 94, line 40, leave out ("authority") and insert ("Secretary of State")
Page 94, line 41, leave out ("them requisite of their") and insert ("him requisite of his")
Page 94, line 46, leave out from ("made") to end of line 3 on page 95 and insert—
("(b) hold a local inquiry or afford any person by whom any representation or objection has been duly made and not withdrawn an opportunity of being heard by a person appointed by the Secretary of State for the purpose; and
(c) consider the report of the person appointed to hold the inquiry or to hear representations or objections.")
Page 95, line 3, at end insert—
("Local inquiries
7A. The provisions of subsections (2) to (5) of section 250 of the Local Government Act 1972 (which relate to the giving of evidence at, and defraying the cost of, local inquiries) shall apply in relation to any inquiry held under paragraph 5, 6 or 7 as they apply in relation to a local inquiry which a Minister causes to be held under subsection (1) of that section.
Appointment of inspectors
7B.—(1) A decision under paragraph 5, 6 or 7 shall, except in such classes of case as may for the time being be prescribed or as may be specified in directions given by the Secretary of
88
State, be made by a person appointed by Secretary of State for the purpose instead of by the Secretary of State; and a decision made by a person so appointed shall be treated as a decision of the Secretary of State.
(2) The Secretary of State may, if he thinks fit, direct that a decision which, by virtue of sub-paragraph (1) and apart from this sub-paragraph, falls to be made by a person appointed by the Secretary of State shall instead be made by the Secretary of State; and a direction under this sub-paragraph shall state the reasons for which it is given and shall be served on the person, if any, so appointed the authority and any person by whom a representation or objection has been duly made and not withdrawn.
(3) Where the Secretary of State has appointed a person to make a decision under paragraph 5, 6 or 7 the Secretary of State may, at any time before the making of the decision, appoint another person to make it instead of the person first appointed to make it.
(4) Where by virtue of sub-paragraph (2) or (3) a particular design falls to be made by the Secretary of State or any other person instead of the person first appointed to make it, anything done or in relation to the latter shall be treated as having been done by or in relation to the former.
(5) Regulations under this paragraph may provide for the giving of publicity to any directions given by the Secretary of State under this paragraph.")
Page 94, line 4, leave out from beginning to ("the") in line 5 and insert—
("Notice of final decisions on orders
8.—(1) As soon as practicable after a decision to confirm an order is made or, in the case of a decision by the Secretary of State, as soon as practicable after receiving notice of his decision ").
Page 95, leave out lines 7 to 11 and insert—
("(a) describing the general effect of the order as confirmed and stating that it has been confirmed (with or without modification) and the date on which it took effect; and
(b) naming a place in the area in which the land to which the order relates is situated where a copy of the order as confirmed may be inspected free of charge, and copies thereof may be obtained at a reasonable charge, at all reasonable hours.")
Page 94, line 12, leave out ("this paragraph") and insert ("sub-paragraph (1)").
Page 94, line 20, at end insert—
("(3) As soon as practicable after a decision not to confirm an order or, in the case of a decision by the Secretary of State, as soon as practicable after receiving notice of his decision, the authority shall give notice of the decision by serving a copy of it on any persons on whom notices were required to be served under paragraph 2(2)(b) or (3).").
Page 94, line 38, at end insert—
(""council offices" means offices or buildings acquired or provided by the authority or by a local authority;").
Schedule 14 [Orders creating, extinguishing or diverting public rights of way]:
Leave out Schedule 14 and insert the following new Schedule—

SCHEDULE 14

  ORDERS CREATING, EXTINGUISHING OR DIVERTING FOOTPATHS OR BRIDLEWAYS
  The Town and Country Planning Act 1971
  1.—(1) In sub-paragraph (1)(b) of paragraph 1 of Schedule 20 to the Town and Country Planning Act 1971 procedure in connection with orders relating to footpaths and bridleways, after the word "charge" there shall be inserted the words "and copies thereof may be obtained at a reasonable charge".
  (2) In sub-paragraph (2) of that paragraph—

  (a) in head (a) the words "in the London Gazette and" shall be omitted;

  (b) at the end of head (b) there shall be inserted the words—

  "(iv) such other bodies as may be prescribed or as the authority may consider appropriate; and"; and
  (c) for head (c) there shall be substituted the following head—
  "(c) by causing a copy of the notice to be displayed in a prominent position—

  89

  (i) at the ends of so much of any footpath or bridle-way as is to be stopped up, diverted or extinguished by the order;

  (ii) at council offices in the locality of the land to which the order relates; and

  (iii) at such other places as the authority may consider appropriate".

  (3) At the end of sub-paragraph (3) of that paragraph there shall be inserted the words "and" 'council offices' means offices or buildings acquired or provided by a council".
  (4) After sub-paragraph (4) of that paragraph there shall be inserted the following sub-paragraph—
  "(5) The notice required to be displayed by sub-paragraph (2)(c)(i) of this paragraph at the ends of so much of any way as is affected by the order shall be accompanied by a plan showing the general effect of the order so far as it relates to that way."
  2. After paragraph 3 of that Schedule there shall be inserted the following paragraph—
  "3A.—(1) A decision under paragraph 3 of this Schedule shall, except in such classes of case as may for the time being be prescribed or as may be specified in directions given by the Secretary of State, be made by a person appointed by the Secretary of State for the purpose instead of by the Secretary of State; and a decision made by a person so appointed shall be treated as a decision of the Secretary of State.
  (2) The Secretary of State may, if he thinks fit, direct that a decision which, by virtue of sub-paragraph (1) of this paragraph and apart from this sub-paragraph, falls to be made by a person appointed by the Secretary of State shall instead be made by the Secretary of State; and a direction under this sub-paragraph shall state the reasons for which it is given and shall be served on the person, if any, so appointed, the authority and any person by whom a representation or objection has been duly made and not withdrawn.
  (3) Where the Secretary of State has appointed a person to make a decision under paragraph 3 of this Schedule the Secretary of State may, at any time before the making of the decision, appoint another person to make it instead of the person first appointed to make it.
  (4) Where by virtue of sub-paragraph (2) or (3) of this paragraph a particular decision falls to be made by the Secretary of State or any other person instead of the person first appointed to make it, anything done by or in relation to the latter shall be treated as having been done by or in relation to the former.
  (5) Regulations under this Act may provide for the giving of publicity to any directions given by the Secretary of State under this paragraph."
  3. In paragraph 6 of that Schedule—

  (a) for the words "a copy thereof" there shall be substituted the words "a copy of the order";

  (b) after the words "free of charge" there shall be inserted the words "and copies thereof may be obtained at a reasonable charge"; and

  (c) in head (b) for the words "a like notice" there shall be substituted the words "like notices" and for the words "the notice" there shall be substituted the words "the notices".

  The Highways Act 1980
  4.—(1) In sub-paragraphs (1)(b) and (2)(b) of paragraph 1 of Schedule 6 to the Highways Act 1980 (procedure as to certain orders relating to footpaths and bridleways) after the words "free of charge" there shall be inserted the words "and copies thereof may be obtained at a reasonable charge".
  (2) For sub-paragraph (3) of that paragraph there shall be substituted the following sub-paragraph—
  "(3) The notices to be given under sub-paragraph (1) or (2) above shall be given—

  (a) by publication in at least one local newspaper circulating in the area in which the land to which the order relates is situated;

  (b) by serving a like notice on—

  (i) every owner, occupier and lessee (except tenants for a month or any period less than a month and statutory tenants within the meaning of the Rent (Agriculture) Act 1976 or the Rent Act 1977) of any of that land;

  90

  (ii) every council, the council of every parish or community council, and the parish meeting of every parish not having a separate parish council, being a council, parish or community whose area includes any of that land;

  (iii) such other bodies as may be prescribed or as the authority or, as the case may be, the Secretary of State may consider appropriate; and

  (c) by causing a copy of the notice to be displayed in a prominent position—

  (i) at the ends of so much of any footpath or bridleway as is created, stopped up or diverted by the order;

  (ii) at council offices in the locality of the land to which the order relates; and

  (iii) in such other places as the authority or, as the case may be, the Secretary of State may consider appropriate."

  (3) After that sub-paragraph there shall be inserted the following sub-paragraphs—
  "(3A) In sub-paragraph (3) above "council" means a county council, a district council, the Greater London Council or a London borough council and "council offices" means offices or buildings acquired or provided by a council.
  (3B) The Secretary of State may, in any particular case, direct that is shall not be necessary to comply with subparagraph (3)(b)(i) above; but if he so directs in the case of any land, then in addition to publication the notice shall be addressed to "The owners and occupiers" of the land (describing it) and a copy or copies of the notice shall be affixed to some conspicuous object or objects on the land.
  (3C) The notice required to be displayed by sub-paragraph (3)(c)(i) above at the ends of so much of any way as is affected by the order shall be accompanied by a plan showing the general effect of the order as made so far as it relates to that way.".
  5. After paragraph 2 of that Schedule there shall be inserted the following paragraph—
  "2A.—(1) A decision under paragraph 2 above shall, except in such classes of case as may for the time being be prescribed or as may be specified in directions given by the Secretary of State, be made by a person appointed by the Secretary of State for the purpose instead of by the Secretary of State; and a decision made by a person so appointed shall be treated as a decision of the Secretary of State.
  (2) The Secretary of State may, if he thinks fit, direct that a decision which, by virtue of sub-paragraph (1) above and apart from this sub-paragraph, falls to be made by a person appointed by the Secretary of State shall instead be made by the Secretary of State; and a direction under this sub-paragraph shall state the reasons for which it is given and shall be served on the person, if any, so appointed, the authority and any person by whom a representation or objection has been duly made and not withdrawn.
  (3) Where the Secretary of State has appointed a person to make a decision under paragraph 2 above the Secretary of State may, at any time before the making of the decision, appoint another person to make it instead of the person first appointed to make it.
  (4) Where by virtue of sub-paragraph (2) or (3) above a particular decision falls to be made by the Secretary of State or any other person instead of the person first appointed to make it, anything done by or in relation to the latter shall be treated as having been done by or in relation to the former.
  (5) Provision may be made by regulations of the Secretary of State for the giving of publicity to any directions given by the Secretary of State under this paragraph."
  6. In paragraph 4 of that Schedule after the words "free of charge" there shall be inserted the words "and copies thereof may be obtained at a reasonable charge" and for heads (a) and (b) there shall be substituted the following heads—

  "(a) service a like notice and a copy of the order as confirmed or made on any persons on whom notices were required to be served under paragraph 1(3), (3B) or (4) above; and

  (b) cause like notices to be displayed in the like manner as the notices caused to be displayed under paragraph 1(3) above;".

  Supplemental
  7.—(1) The amendments made by the foregoing provisions of this Schedule shall not apply in relation to any order if it was made or a draft thereof was prepared, or a notice relating to it was given under paragraph 1 of the relevant Schedule, before the commencement date.
  (2) Any references in this paragraph to Schedule 6 to the Highways Act 1980 includes a reference to that Schedule as applied by paragraph 3 of the provisions of Part I of Schedule 3 to the 1968 Act which relate to the Acquisition of Land (Authorisation Procedure) Act 1946.").
  The noble Earl said: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Bellwin spoke to Amendment No. 128. I beg to move Amendments Nos. 128 to 157 en bloc.
  The Deputy Speaker: My Lords, I should point out that there is a slight difference in Amendment No. 143 which says:
  "Page 94, line 20, leave out from"
  and it should say, "first shall". The word "first" should be inserted. With that insertion, the Question is that Amendments Nos. 128 to 157 be agreed to.
  On Question, amendments agreed to.
  Schedule 15 [Enactments repealed]:
  The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 158 to 165:
  Page 101, line 15, at end insert—

  PART I

    ENACTMENTS REPEALED ONE MONTH AFTER THE PASSING OF THIS ACT
    Chapter

    Short title

    Extent of repeal

    12, 13 & 14 Geo. 6. c. 97.

    The National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949.

    Section 23.

    1968 c. 41.

    The Countryside Act 1968.

    Section 14.

    In section 15(1) the words "which is not for the time being managed as a nature reserve but".

    1971 c. 78.

    The Town and Country Planning Act 1971.

    In Schedule 20, in paragraph 1(2)(a) the words "in the London Gazette and".

    1973 c. 37

    The Water Act 1973.

    In section 22(3) the words "not being land managed as a nature reserve".

    1973 c. 54.

    The Nature Conservancy Council Act 1973.

    Section 3.

    1980 c. 66.

    The Highways Act 1980.

    In section 134, subsection (3) and in subsection (5) the words "(3) or".

    In section 135(1), the words "6 or" and "6 weeks or".

PART II

  ENACTMENTS REPEALED AS FROM A DAY TO BE APPOINTED")
  Page 101 lines 15, column 3, leave out line 18.
  Page 101 lines 15, column 3, leave out lines 35 to 39.
  Page 101, line 40, column 3, leave out from ("3") to ("Parts") in line 44.
  Page 102, line 4, column 3, leave out from first ("and") to end of line 6.
  Page 102, line 4, column 3, leave out lines 2 to 6.
  Page 102, line 4, column 3, leave out lines 9 to 12.
  Page 102, line 4, column 3, leave out line 13.
  The noble Earl said: My Lords, I spoke to Amendments Nos. 158 to 160 with Amendment No. 107. Amendments Nos. 161 and 162 were spoken to with Amendment No. 102. I spoke to Amendments Nos. 163 to 165 with Amendment No. 107. With your Lordships' permission, I would like to move Amendments Nos. 158 to 165 en bloc.
  On Question, amendments agreed to.
  The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 166:
  Page 102, line 13, column 3, at end insert ("In section 5(3) the words from the beginning to "save as aforesaid."").
  The noble Earl said: My Lords, this is a technical amendment. I beg to move.
  On Question, amendment agreed to.
  The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendments Nos. 167 and 168:
  Page 102, line 37, leave out from beginning to end of line 28 on page 103.
  Page 102, line 5, leave out ("mammals") and insert ("animals").
  The noble Earl said: My Lords, I have already spoken to Amendments Nos. 167 and 168. I beg to move these amendments en bloc.
  On Question, amendments agreed to.
  The Earl of Avon The Earl of Avon moved Amendment No. 169:
  Line 6, leave out ("the Badgers Act 1973").
  The noble Earl said: My Lords, I beg to move Amendment No. 169. This is a drafting amendment to remove a duplication in the title. I beg to move.
  On Question, amendment agreed to.
  An amendment (privilege) made.
  7.32 p.m.
  The Earl of Avon: My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill do now pass and. with your Lordships' indulgence, I will speak for just a few minutes. There had been expectations that the Bill would arouse considerable interest during its passage through this House but I do not think that anyone anticipated the records which it must have broken. Despite the lengthy consultations which preceded the introduction of the Bill, very many improvements have been made after much expert advice, couplied with first-hand knowledge from all sides.
  The Bill will make many desirable changes and extensions to the law on wildlife and the countryside, as well as providing the right framework for conservation for many years to come. We have often referred during the debates to the extent to which conservation can and must depend, not only on voluntary groups but even more on the goodwill of landowners and farmers. I should like now to thank noble Lords on all sides who took part in the debates, for the goodwill that they have shown in expressing their concern about these matters, always patiently and courteously. I should like to assure them that on those occasions when the Government seemed less amenable than

  93
  many noble Lords had hoped, that was not because their views were disregarded, but because we had already extensively considered similar points which were raised during consultation on the Bill. I say that especially in view of the many eloquent speeches which we have enjoyed, particularly from the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, who has been untiring in his efforts and impressed the whole House by his grasp of every aspect of the Bill; he has been ably supported by the noble Baroness, Lady David, and also in the earlier stages, by the noble Lord, Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge, until he withdrew to the higher reaches of the House. The noble Lord, Lord Beaumont, has led a persuasive team from the Liberal Benches; there has been expert advice on a variety of subjects from my noble friends behind me. As virtually all of them have spoken, I hope they will forgive me if I do not name them now individually.
  I should like, at this point, as I have been asked on a number of occasions whether Clause 3 of the Bill will affect existing bird sanctuaries, to make it absolutely clear that the Government have no intention whatever of disturbing the present status of existing sanctuaries by the provisions of this Bill. Our intention is simply to facilitate the creation of further areas of protection.
  The Government have made a major innovation in the Bill by empowering the Secretary of State to requite that landowners and farmers on selected very important and vulnerable areas of special scientific interest should no longer be allowed to carry out certain agricultural activities without giving notice of their intentions. We have, however, made it clear that we are not prepared to take sweeping measures to impose a statutory requirement on owners involved in the large areas of land covered by the nearly 4,000 sites of special scientific interest at present notified by the Nature Conservancy Council, which, of course, many noble Lords suggested. I hope that our reasons for that are now understood. We do not believe that such restrictions would assist the cause of conservation. We have, however, made improvements to the notification system by the NCC and provided for a Government code of practice. It is our believe that voluntary agreements, with payments as necessary, are the best means of obtaining the co-operation of farmers in carrying out the work which is needed to conserve areas of special interest.
  Our conviction that voluntary agreements are the surest way of conserving that which ought to be conserved, also led us to resist the various amendments which were put down to provide compulsory powers in respect of moorland in national parks.
  The Government in no way dispute that some areas, particularly in Exmoor, have been under threat, but we firmly believe that it would have been counter-productive to have written compulsory back-up powers into the Bill. The arrangements for moorland notification orders, coupled with the new powers of county planning authorities to enter into management agreements, should suffice to ensure that the critical areas of moorland are conserved, which is what we all want.
  The point has been made repeatedly that the success of conservation work will depend to a large extent on the funds which are available and, especially, on the amount of money which is available to the Nature Conservancy Council. The House will appreciate
  94
  the point that the Government are not able to provide more funds in the present economic circumstances. However, the Bill does allow for expansion when the climate is right.
  Another major cause of concern to some noble Lords has been the proposed licensing system. I believe the Bill now makes it clear that agricultural departments will issue licences speedily, whenever this is necessary, and that they will consult the Nature Conservancy Council about the circumstances in which licences might be issued. I hope that we have also laid to rest any fears that the defence that action is necessary in order to prevent serious damage, might be a loophole in the licensing system. It is our view that it will not.
  The Government are concerned that the law should be enforced and the Bill incorporates many provisions which will improve enforcement.
  The Bill includes provisions concerning registration and ringing of captive birds, search warrant powers and other powers of entry, and some increased penalties. During the Bill's passage through this House we have agreed to higher penalties and to a statutory role for the Nature Conservancy Council in assisting enforcement. The Government have indicated their intention to restrict ports of entry for some or all live specimens of endangered species. I do not think that we have overlooked any realistic means of improving enforcement of the Bill's provisions.
  Turning now to the public rights of way provision in Part III of the Bill, there have been three issues which have been the subject of particular controversy. On the major one, the proposal to transfer to local authorities powers to determine opposed definitive map and public path orders, the Government still do not believe that it represented an outrage to natural justice as has been alleged, and we do not feel that a lack of trust in local authorities is justified. However, we acknowledge that we were defeated on this issue and we accept the decision of this House.
  Our proposals on evidential provisions also attracted widespread opposition, but we gave careful consideration to all the representations, and our decision, which was warmly welcomed, to change them in Committee, does I think demonstrate that we do pay due regard to alternative proposals, and where we are convinced by the opposing arguments we are prepared to make the necessary change. There have been disagreements on points of detail concerning the new arrangements for definitive maps, but our proposals have been generally welcomed and we certainly hope that the new arrangements will work in practice much better than the present time-consuming procedure.
  The Bill has grown in scope during its passage. For instance, the Government have agreed to accept a package on badgers, seals and deer. There is, of course, a further opportunity for changes in another place. I have in mind the Government's continuing consultations regarding marine nature reserves and, perhaps, I should here commend the efforts of many noble Lords from all sides in this respect. I believe that the Bill is now ready to go to another place.
  We have been able to draw on a great fund of knowledge in this House and I especially recall contributions from my noble friend Lord Craigton, although I am sorry that we could not always agree on what should be done about bats! The noble Lord, Lord Kilbracken,

  95
  who unfortunately cannot be here today, contributed greatly to our knowledge of birds and my noble friend Lord Cranbrook right up to the last minute provided ample information and advice about other wild creatures and plants. The noble Lord, Lord Winstanley, and my noble friend Lord Chelwood helped us greatly on matters concerning the Countryside Commission and the Nature Conservancy Council and, of course, my noble friend Lord Sandford spoke with authority on the difficulties of conserving moorland in national parks.
  Here, too, we welcomed the advice of the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, although I am sorry that we could not go along with his views. Throughout the debates we have been able to rely on my noble friend Lord Stanley and the noble Earl, Lord Caithness, and the noble Lord, Lord Middleton, to explain the interest of landowner and farmer alike. The contributions of the noble Viscount, Lord Hanworth, have been invaluable in relation to rights of way matters. I hope that those other noble Lords who have made such valuable contributions will forgive me if I do not mention them by name, if only in the interests of time.
  Finally, I should also like to turn to my colleagues on the Front Bench who have so ably helped me in fielding the various questions, some of a very complicated and different nature. I believe that the Bill will promote the interests of all who are concerned with the countryside, including those who depend on the land for their living, as well as those who enjoy visiting the countryside. I am sure that it will prove its value for many years to come.
  Moved, That the Bill do now pass.—(The Earl of Avon.)
  7.44 p.m.
  Lord Melchett: My Lords, I should like very much to thank the noble Earl, Lord Avon, for what he said about me and to reciprocate by saying that I think at times I have been in a happier position than he has in that I have had some rather easier briefs to defend than he has had. However, his unfailing courtesy to all of us on this side of the House—in all parties, new and old—and to his noble friends behind him has enabled us to get through an extraordinarily heavy burden of work—with Chief Whips and others glaring or smiling, depending on how things were going—with, I think, remarkably good speed. We are very grateful indeed to him and to all the noble Lords on the Front Bench opposite who have helped him.
  I should also like to thank those behind me, particularly my noble friend Lord Kilbracken, who could not be here today, and my noble friends Lord Houghton, Lord Underhill, Lord Fletcher, and Lady White, who have spoken extremely briefly and concisely but always to the point and with great effect. I should also like to thank my noble friend Lady David, without whom I could not have carried out my task on this Bill, and my noble friend Lord Donaldson who, as the noble Earl has said, halfway through went a long way behind us and has now disappeared, which I daresay is not altogether insignificant!
  Briefly, I think it would be useful to put on record some of the things that we have achieved in our long deliberations on the Bill. I start where the noble Earl
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  left off, at Part III: the ploughing provisions; the provisions in the Bill which reverse the case of Suffolk v. Mason; the provision for appeals when a claim is made that something should be added to or deleted from a definitive map and the authority refuses; and, of course, particularly the decision about the Secretary of State's jurisdiction, which the noble Earl himself mentioned—and I was delighted to hear the terms in which he mentioned it—which I am sure will be widely welcomed. Those were significant changes. Although we still hope that something on greenlanes will emerge from the Spicer Committee and that another place will deal rather more fairly in looking at the balance between path users and farmers with bulls on footpaths than did your Lordships' House, nevertheless, I think it is fair to say that Part III is now in a state which will receive a very wide welcome. I am only sorry that it did not manage to include something for those farmers with sheep who are worried about the actions of dogs in their areas.
  Turning to Part I of the Bill, I think that we have improved the Bill as far as the balance between bird conservation and aviculture is concerned. The plants clauses in the Bill now make sense and are enforceable, which I do not think was the case when the Bill was introduced. With support from all sides of the House, we have introduced minor restrictions on crossbows and air guns, very minor in the case of air guns where we are really restating the existing law. I was personally delighted with the Badgers Act amendments. Badgers are a hobby-horse of mine and my noble friend Lord Houghton, and the change is something that both of us warmly welcome. I hope that the Minister. Mr. Monro, will accept the credit which I think is due to him personally in the manner in which he pointed the way to those amendments, as well as my noble friend Lord Houghton, who has taken such an interest in this Bill.
  The restriction on ports of entry brought forth an extremely valuable assurance which the noble Earl was able to give us during the passage of the Bill. Probably most significantly in Part I we have managed to make clear that Clauses 4 and 10, which deal with the emergency action which farmers and landowners can take, are designed for that purpose. The wording now makes that clear. As the Bill was introduced, conservationists felt that Clause 15 made the whole of Part I of no value at all and would have represented a major step backwards, particularly as far as Protection of Birds Acts legislation is concerned since the 1950s. I think that we have now reached an acceptable compromise and the Ministry of Agriculture will receive advice from the Nature Conservancy Council. It does not mean that they have to act on that advice. I wish it did, but it does not. We were not able to go that far. At least we have some acknowledgement in the Bill that licences to kill creatures have to be rather more specific than licences to photograph newts, or something of that sort.
  In Part II we have included some recognition of the rights of the disabled in the countryside, which is appropriate in this year; the provisions for wardens have been included and there have been some important amendments concerning water authorities and internal drainage boards; the marine nature reserve amendments, which the noble Earl, Lord Avon, mentioned, which

  97
  I hope will not be altered too much in another place if the Government are able to complete their consultations in time, which frankly I would be surprised at, but maybe they will; and of course the amendments which relate, as it were, to trying to bring agricultural interests and conservation interest rather closer together in looking at the role of ADAS; and the amendment which the noble Lord, Lord Sandford, moved, and which seemed to me to be important.
  Finally, in case there is any misunderstanding about the changes which have been made to the Bill, I should like to make the point that we on this side of the House have not seen very much point in pressing party points in this Bill. There are a number of points of party policy on this side of the House on which we have not put down amendments, particularly concerning animal welfare and field sports, all of which it clearly would have been in order to table in this House. We, my noble friend Lord Houghton, who feels very strongly and for many years has campaigned very strongly on these matters, and other noble friends involved, felt that the sensible thing to do in your Lordships' House (where there is a very large majority on the Government side in Divisions on party political points) was to pursue points where there was all-party support. Anybody looking at the Division Lists will see that on every single amendment that has been pressed there have been some votes from all parts of the House, even those we have lost and certainly all those that we have won.
  We have not, therefore, pursued party policy. In some respects that is a pity because there are a number of important issues that therefore have not been discussed. I daresay that noble Lords opposite, in particular some on the Front Bench, will say thank goodness for that. But I would not like people to feel that the Bill has left your Lordships' House with an exhaustive discussion of all the issues that could have been discussed. We have deliberately tried to concentrate on, and draft, amendments that would be acceptable to at least some noble Lords opposite and to other parties on this side of the House, and to Cross-Benchers.
  Finally, I should like to say a word about sites of special scientific interest—about habitat protection. The whole of Part I of the Bill is of not very much use without some effective protection of wildlife habitats. The question of compulsion keeps being raised here. We have not in this area, as in others, pursued the amendments which this party thinks would be sensible to protect wildlife habitats, such as extension of planning control over agriculture and forestry. We did not press that to a Division, for example. We again tried to support amendments moved by noble Lords opposite which we thought would gain support from all sides of the House. Those amendments did not do anything to compel farmers or landowners to protect such sites. All they were designed to do was to compel farmers and landowners to give notice before they destroyed those sites.
  The issue of compulsion versus voluntary procedures has got extremely confused, particularly as we now have a Government voluntary code of practice written into a statute, which seems at least one contradiction in terms if not about three in one. I do not believe that the voluntary code will work. I am convinced it is a recipe for disaster. It will be a disaster for farmers
  98
  because inevitably the code itself will be broken. Not everyone will give notice, and the people who will get the blame then will be farmers and landowners. It will be a disaster for farmers because SSSIs will continue to be damaged and destroyed.
  If 30 per cent. were damaged and destroyed in a single county last year, I cannot believe that anybody seriously expects a voluntary code to thwart that process next year, and again farmers and landowners will get the blame for that. Of course, this approach will be a disaster for sites of' special scientific interest, for wildlife habitats and for wildlife that depends on them, because they will not be protected at all. We shall not even be given any advance warning about their destruction. We do not have anything in the Bill which would protect them.
  The noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, said that we should pay more attention to what the Government's statutory advisers, the Nature Conservancy Council, have to say. On the whole, we have paid very close attention to them. This is the one area where the Government have totally ignored their advice, and their advice is that without some adequate protection for these sites we shall see massive extinctions of British wild animals and insects and birds before the end of this century.
  That is what the Government's statutory advisers say about the Bill as it stands. I cannot believe that that is acceptable to anyone in this House when they think about it, and certainly not to the country as a whole where there is tremendous concern about this. I hope that that countrywide concern will be reflected in the steps another place take in looking at that part of the Bill. But I think that our work on it has been worthwhile, and I reiterate my thanks to the noble Earl, Lord Avon, and his colleagues for the considerate way they have dealt with our amendments, and particularly to their staff and advisers who have had to deal with an enormous amount of work and in a relatively short space of time. We are very grateful indeed to all of them. I hope that, when the Bill comes back from another place, apart from the one or two improvements I have mentioned, we do not have to go through too long a string of amendments.
  7.55 p.m.
  Lord Beaumont of Whitley: My Lords, your Lordships' House is much given to self-congratulation at all moments of the day or night on its progress through Bills, and how helpful everyone has been. It is not always justified, but with this Bill it really has been. This Bill has done a tremendous amount. What is more, it has not been the work of just a few people, but it has been the hard work of a large number of people in many parts of the House. Because there are so many I shall not weary your Lordships by going through a list, except that I am, in private affection as in duty, bound to thank my noble friends Lord Winstanley, Lord Foot and Lord Avebury, for their great help during the passage of this Bill, and I suppose to a certain extent my noble Scottish friends for stimulation, if nothing else.
  I should just like to mention two other Members of your Lordships' House. First, I think that Lord Melchett's knowledge and understanding of the Bill has impressed everybody. In fact there were times when he clearly knew more about it than the Government

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  Front Bench, and possibly even the civil servants' box. In addition to that, there has been the work of the noble Earl, Lord Avon. All the Members of the Government Bench who have dealt with it have been understanding and helpful and able, but the noble Earl, Lord Avon, joins my private pantheon of, I think it is now, five Ministers who in the course of my 13 years in your Lordships' House, I regard as models of what Ministers answering questions and dealing with Bills should be. It is a bit early. He may lose his place, but certainly on this Bill he has done wonders, not only for the Bill but also to help your Lordships' House to get the best out of itself and out of its speakers in dealing with it.
  As noble Lords have said, this has not been a party Bill. It has sometimes been a Lobby Bill. Lobbies oppose each other. There have been quite a lot of moments when we have come together, but I have always thought of that song in the musical, "The Farmers and the Cowboys should be Friends", where they all dance round in circles and then, if I remember rightly, the whole thing breaks up the next day and they all go back to shooting each other. The farmers and conservers have in fact worked quite well together during large parts of the passage of this Bill, and probably can do so even more in the future.
  Speaking as a conserver, of course one understands the farmers' point of view, particularly if one takes the view that certainly I take, that the pressure is far too much economically on farmers, and that there should be a different kind of agricultural set-up which would not put the pressure so much in their efforts on getting the last little bit of food out of the ground. I hope that they understand the conservers' point of view, which is the very strong one that what we are defending so often is irreparable. The things we are trying to stop being abolished, if they are abolished, will never come back again. That is the urgency on our side. If we have sometimes seemed to them to be a little too pressing, I hope that they will accept that that is the reason.
  I have only one point of substance to make, and that is very much the same as the last point that the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, made. It is the back-up position of compulsion on sites of special scientific interest. That particular point of view has been defeated, but in its defeat there have been widespread discussions, and well reported discussions, of what is actually happening in the countryside. We take what the farmers have been saying very seriously, and we know that obviously as a result of this Bill there will be a large amount of improvement in the lamentable situation that has been occurring over the last few years.
  But we must say that it really is the last chance, or the last chance but one, for the conservation of British wildlife in a countryside and agriculture which is putting increasing pressures on the very existence of a great deal of wildlife. We hope that this is going to work. We hope that what the Government have said is right, and that the voluntary agreements will actually stand up, and the rate of decline will not only slow down but stop. This is the last opportunity for the voluntary agreements to work, and about that there is enough agreement in all parts of your Lordships' House, in all parties and in all interest groups. If it does not work
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  this time, another Government will have to do something much stronger, and I believe that many of your Lordships agree with that. In the meantime, we have done a job of which we can be proud and we are sending a better Bill to another place.
  8.1 p.m.
  Lord Craigton: My Lords, I wish briefly to add the thanks of CoEnCo and all conservationists for the help we have received on to the Bill, especially from the Government Front Bench; they have their own problems and I know they have their own colleagues to deal with and will have to get the Bill through another place: I have been very conscious of how far they have bent over backwards to meet us. I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, who, in co-ordinating his linked committee of CoEnCo, has been able to express not only his own views but those of all the conservation bodies in this country, and to that extent your Lordships have benefited.
  I have two regrets. One is about the SSSIs, and I shall not say anything about that, and the other is that, so far as bats are concerned, the Bill leaves this House in a faulty and unfinished state. Things have come to my notice that I did not know, even on Report. For instance, last week, 120 scientists representing 16 European countries held a symposium about bats and came down with exactly those arguments that we tried to put over as to why they should be further protected. In addition, the Dutch Nature Conservancy Act of 15th November 1967—I have just discovered this—carries out exactly what we wanted to do regarding bats in households, and carries it out in the way we proposed. I hope that when the Bill reaches another place something will be done to clear up the business of bats living in householders' roofs. Apart from that, I wish again to thank all concerned for the help that has been given.
  8.3 p.m.
  Lord Chelwood: My Lords, I welcomed the Second Reading and now I welcome the Third Reading even more, and I join the tributes that have been paid to both Front Benches. I recall my noble friend Lord Avon complaining at one point that he was being sniped at from behind as well as in front, and that was true at one stage. However, he came through it unscathed and smiling. Likewise, the Opposition Front Bench has been as well informed as it has been constructive.
  I have two major reservations, however, about the Bill, and I appreciate this opportunity to mention them briefly. The first is about habitat protection. Where Clauses 28 and 29 are concerned, I share the serious doubts that have been expressed about the effectiveness of the voluntary code, even with the back-up of designation orders, and I have two reasons for saying that. The first is that we do not yet know whether all owners or occupiers of all SSSIs will be expected under the code to inform the NCC if they wish to do something contrary to the advice they have received. That is absolutely essential if it is to work. It would rectify the absurd situation in which only those who want capital grants for improvements now have to inform the NCC or even ADAS of their plans. How can anyone justify that?

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  As for the wider countryside, which includes the SSSIs, the Government have still not fulfilled their clear promise to give ADAS definite responsibility for promoting nature conservation, as recommended in the Strutt Report and accepted by the Government and by the previous Administration, and the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, referred to that. ADAS lost what responsibilities they had in this connection when the need for prior notification of applications for grant aid was ended last summer, and I hope my noble friend can reassure me on both those related points.
  My second reason for doubts about the habitat protection measures is related to the designation orders. I shall not join in the numbers game—it would not help to do so—but I would like an assurance from the Government that it is not intended to impose any arbitrary limits on the use of them. Will my noble friend confirm that where a valuable site is eligible for a designation order, there will be no hesitation in making one to counter a known or potential threat, even though, as we know, the ultimate safeguard must rest on whether there are sufficient resources or not? Given those assurances, the accelerating and wholly unacceptable rate of habitats loss, which really cannot be questioned, should be brought under control and we shall all be in the conservation business together, which is what everybody wants. If, however, in a year or two that can be shown not to be the case, the Government will be bound to amend the law and think again.
  A point which has not yet been touched on is the Nature Conservancy Council's resources. As noble Lords know, I am a member of the council; our vice-chairman would have liked to have been here to make this speech, but cannot be, and I shall be as brief as I can in summing this up. As legislators, we are sometimes fairly accused of passing laws without ensuring the resources to make them effective, and I fear that today we are falling into that very trap. The NCC is the principal agency responsible for making the Bill work. We have extended the protection of the law to more plants and animals and therefore the need for licensing and the necessary monitoring. We have given the NCC new responsibilities for the birds and animals advisory committees; we have given them new enforcement functions; we have given them the heavy task of advising all owners and occupiers of SSSIs anew about the scientific interest of their land and, an entirely new requirement, the activities which might damage that land, a suggestion which I made on Second Reading and which I am glad to see in the Bill; and—and this is by no means the whole list—we have given the NCC a brand new and major role in setting up marine nature reserves, something which I, like most noble Lords, warmly welcome.
  I know the NCC are happy to take on those extra statutory duties, but they are seriously and rightly worried, as our chairman has told the understanding Secretary of State, that their over-stretched resources simply cannot be stretched any further. I feel it right at this stage that Parliament should know that that is the case. In spite of the strictest economies we have been able to make, including cutting our staff by 13 per cent., we are in a position where we cannot see the future clearly. Out of our annual grant of under £10½ million—the equivalent of the cost of a pint of
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  milk per day per head of population—we can afford only 5p in the pound for the critically important need for land grants and agreements. More than half our grant has to go on salaries and superannuation. Under the Financial Memorandum it is suggested that the extra cost to the council of making management agreements and acquiring land for habitat protection
  "might be of the order of £600,000 to £700,000 on average per year".
  That will be a real help, but the figure can be only a guess and it takes no account, as I see it, of any of the other duties which I have described. Thus, the NCC is not sitting on its hands hoping to win the pools, or something like that; we are actively pursuing the idea of commercial sponsorship for nature conservation, for which we have high hopes. We are trying to eliminate any remaining duplication with the work of the voluntary bodies and anyone else, and so on, but I shall not go into further detail about that. Something is going to snap before long unless full account is taken of what I have said, and I have no doubt it will be. I do not expect an answer today from the Government Front Bench, but I ask my noble friend to take what I have said into careful account, and I thought that when introducing the Third Reading he dropped a strong hint that that would be the case.
  The Bill will set the framework for nature conservation for the next decade or so. It is not in any way party political. I should deplore it if the Government were to use their influence in another place to reject the carefully thought out and fully debated amendments that we have passed. The Bill also puts Britain firmly back again in the forefront of those countries that are determined to carry out their national and international obligations, a position from which we were definitely beginning to slip. It will give untold pleasure to millions of people who enjoy and care about the countryside and its wildlife.
  8.9 p.m.
  Lord Hunt: My Lords, I feel that everything that ought to be said has been said The only omission I feel it right for me to make good is the fact that nothing has been said from this single Back Bench, and I shall be very brief because, as I explained at an earlier stage, I am still unacclimatised to and suffering from lack of breath at this altitude. I think it should be said from this new Bench that we are as appreciative as all other noble Lords who have expressed themselves grateful for the absolutely magnificant work done by the Government Front Bench and indeed by the Opposition Front Benches in getting the Bill through its various stages, through its long, weary progress.
  However, I think it only right that once again I should voice my lack of confidence, my doubts about the future. If I am any prophet, I would say that in the next four or five years the Government of the day will be constrained to bring in reserve powers in regard to the protection of both SSSIs and moorland in certain critical areas. I am talking not of areas where there is a very great deal of moorland left, but areas where very little is left, where the moorlands have shrunk to a critical level. The whole pattern

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  of the past shows that what I fear is likely to be the pattern for the future. However, nothing that I have said should detract from my admiration of the way in which may people, leaving out myself, have worked to get the Bill into better shape before it goes to the other place.
  8.11 p.m.
  Viscount Massereene and Ferrard: My Lords, I should like to back up the plea of my noble friend Lord Chelwood that the Government ensure that the NCC receive the financial resources necessary to carry out the provisions of this Bill. I also wish to raise a point about SSSIs on tracts of hill country, where there are a great deal of flora and fauna, especially fauna. Will the Government ensure that when they are designating an SSSE they do not force the landowner, or the farmer, to grant too much access? It is of course human disturbance that destroys the fauna in these wild areas. I should like to stress that point, and I hope that the Government will take note of it.
  I must not sit down before congratulating my noble friend Lord Avon on the most remarkable and absolutely adept way in which he has presented the Bill. His achievement is the more amazing because this is the first time that he has presented a Bill. He has really been thrown in at the deep end, since this is a major Bill, but he has done extraordinarily well. I must also congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Melchett. He is really amazing and I cannot understand how he has any voice left. He must have been burning the midnight oil. He has shown a remarkable knowledge of wildlife and the countryside in general that I never realised he possessed, and I am really lost in admiration of his performance.
  The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, I, too, should like to thank my noble friend Lord Avon and all his colleagues for the time that they have spent in dealing with very difficult and complicated points. I feel that the Bill would have been a better one and a different one had more finance been available. The Bill has shown up the deficiencies of some farmers and of the NCC, but let us hope that they will work much more closely together from now on. I know that every effort will be made by the famers, who are aware of their responsibilities. I know, too, that the National Farmers' Union will make every endeavour to get across to the farmers the points about the care that they must take with the countryside, and I have no doubt that the NCC will reciprocate.
  8.14 p.m.
  The Earl of Avon: My Lords, first, I should like to thank all noble Lords for their kind comments about me and my colleagues on the Front Bench. The noble Lord, Lord Melchett, said how lucky it was that party points had not been pursued, but once or twice during the course of the debate I rather wished that I had had a party whipped in behind me. All kinds of facetious thoughts have gone through my mind. Being an ignorant Londoner, I thought of my favourite Yorkshire grouse being invaded by capercaillie, and that
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  alone had me in shivers. But I have learnt a great deal as a result of our discussions on the Bill.
  I should like to take a minute or so to answer one or two points which my noble friend Lord Chelwood made. First, with regard to the Strutt Report, the Government have endorsed the central recommendation of the report that ADAS should devote more resources to advising farmers on conservation matters as they bear on the service's basic role of helping to improve agricultural efficiency. Training schemes have already been set up to achieve that end, and more will be done as resources allow. The new arrangements for the capital grants scheme—that is, the ending of prior approval—will allow ADAS officers to devote more time for the conservation role.
  The Government recognise that additional tasks will devolve upon the NCC as a result of the passage of the Bill through this House. Of course, one must add that in the present economic climate it is not possible for me to say that more money will be made available for the NCC's annual grant. However, I am sure that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for the Environment will take these additional tasks into account when considering the NCC's future level of grant. I should like to add that my right honourable friend has shown himself very aware in the area of conservation, more specifically in a recent speech on building. I am sure that the NCC can look forward to a fair share of the monies available to the Secretary of State himself and that those moneys will in turn be as substantial as the Secretary of State is able to obtain.
  I was asked about arbitrary limits on SSSIs. The figure of 30 or 40 was plucked entirely out of the air at a press conference, and there is no such limit on the number of special sites that might be designated. I was asked about the voluntary code. It will clearly enjoin all landowners on SSSIs—not only those who have a MAFF grant—to inform the NCC of damaging
  operations.
  In closing I should like to pay my tribute to the staff and advisers who have backed us up during the passage of the Bill and who have worked very long hours. Most of them live in Bristol, and no doubt they are delighted to hear that I might continue speaking with the result that they will be unable to catch their last train. Much has been said about the SSSIs. I should like to close by saying: Give the voluntary code a good chance! I believe that the very fact it is so urgent that the habitat should be protected will enhance the prospects of the voluntary code's success.
  On Question, Bill passed, and sent to the Commons.

  Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) (Scotland) Bill
  Brought from the Commons, read 1a; and to be printed.
  British Railways Victoria Bill [H.L.]
  Bill committed to an Unopposed Bill Committee.
  YELLOWLEES INQUIRY: VISIT OF MR. N. J. B. EVANS
  YELLOWLEES INQUIRY: VISIT OF MR. N. J. B. EVANS
  THE "NEW SMOKING SURVEY"
  THE "NEW SMOKING SURVEY"
  NIGERIA: DEBTS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM
  NIGERIA: DEBTS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM
  NIGERIA: DEFENCE EXPENDITURE
  NIGERIA: DEFENCE EXPENDITURE
  ZIMBABWEAN MAIZE: DISTRIBUTION AID
  ZIMBABWEAN MAIZE: DISTRIBUTION AID
  CIDER: EEC REGULATIONS
  CIDER: EEC REGULATIONS
  COMPUTER CENTRES: VULNERABILITY
  COMPUTER CENTRES: VULNERABILITY