Sitting of 19 March 1991

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

    Antares
    Mr. Foulkes: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what is his current estimate for completion of the report of the naval inquiry into the sinking of the fishing boat Antares.
    The Minister of State for the Armed Forces (Mr. Archie Hamilton): The naval board of inquiry into the Antares incident was completed in December. Departmental consideration of the board of inquiry report has not yet been completed, but I will make a summary of its findings available to the House in due course.
    Mr. Foulkes: Can the Minister give an assurance to the House that the report, and his publication of it, will not shirk from any admission of responsibility for the sinking of the Antares? Will he also confirm that there are no technical reasons why the Clyde reporting scheme, which is proving successful, should not be extended to other fishing areas around our coasts? Since there are no technical reasons why it could not be extended, will he agree now to that extension so as to ensure that another Antares-type tragedy does not take place?
    Mr. Hamilton: On the first question, I can certainly assure the hon. Gentleman that the Royal Navy will not shirk responsibility for the incident. That is not really the purpose of the board of inquiry, which is to find out precisely what happened in terms of the actions of the submarine. The hon. Gentleman should have no fear whatsoever on that account. On the second question, there are no technical reasons that I know of why the reporting system covering the Clyde should not be extended. We want to see how the Clyde scheme works out, and then we shall certainly look into whether it should be extended further.
    Mr. Bill Walker: Is my hon. Friend aware that the Clyde fishermen find the new scheme to their advantage and welcome it? Like the hon. Member for Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley (Mr. Foulkes), I believe that the scheme should be extended wherever practicable. Fishermen on the west coast of Scotland would appreciate that move by the Ministry of Defence if it were possible.
    Mr. Hamilton: I am well aware of my hon. Friend's views on that subject and I am grateful for his remarks. The only point that I would make is on the question of our
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    nuclear deterrent submarines; we do not want it to become clear to the general public when they are transiting out. That is one of the problems with extending the scheme, but we shall consider it.
    Mr. Kennedy: Following the Antares disaster, as the Minister said, a scheme has been implemented for the Clyde. He will be aware from contacts that I had earlier today with his private office, which has been very helpful, that there was a near-disaster yesterday off the north of Skye. The incident was similar to what happened to the Antares—a submarine almost destroyed a fishing boat—but mercifully there was no loss of life. Can the Minister give details of that incident and the application of lessons learnt from the Antares disaster in the context of the Minch?
    Mr. Hamilton: We should be very careful not to confuse the two issues. What happened on 18 March was not a near-disaster. A Royal Navy submarine, while making a surface transit near to the Raasay range, passed within 80 to 100 yards of the vessel Swyn-Y-Mor. The incident took place in daylight; the submarine had the fishing vessel in sight at all times and took appropriate evasive action as soon as it became apparent that a close pass was likely. Although the submarine tried to raise the fishing vessel on VHF, it did not receive a reply until after the incident had occurred. There was no physical contact between the two vessels or with the trawler's gear.

    Tankbusters
    Mr. Marlow: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what lessons have been learned in the Gulf with regard to the relative merits of tanks and helicopters as tankbusters.
    The Minister of State for Defence Procurement (Mr. Alan Clark): We are considering the outcome of the campaign and the lessons to be drawn from it, but it is too early to set out definitive conclusions.
    Mr. Marlow: Had my hon. Friend been a tank commander in the Gulf, and if he could use his considerable imagination to visualise circumstances whereby, as in any future war, the enemy might have had more overhead cover and concealment, would he have been more fearful of an enemy in Apache. helicopters or in Challenger tanks?
    Mr. Clark: Both those arms are essential in the pattern of deployment in the future. There are two teams in the Ministry of Defence studying all the lessons. I have little doubt that they will conclude that both helicopters and battle tanks are needed in any future deployment.
    Mr. Rogers: Notwithstanding the relative merits of tanks and helicopters, they are not much use unless they are procured. Does the Minister intend to buy new tanks off the shelf, or will he stop dithering and place an order for the new Challenger and the EH 101?
    Mr. Clark: As for the main battle tank, I share the House's devotion to the subject and I hope that the decision will not be delayed too long. The EH101 has nothing to do with the land battle—as the hon. Gentleman's researcher might have told him, it is a naval weapon.

    The Gulf
    Mr. Jacques Arnold: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement on the future deployment of British forces in the Gulf.
    The Secretary of State for Defence (Mr. Tom King): Security arrangements in the Gulf are primarily for the states of the region. We are ready to play our part if asked, but we do not envisage the permanent stationing of British ground forces in the area.
    Mr. Arnold: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the achievement of our armed services in the Gulf during the past seven months will rank among the greatest campaigns in the history of the British armed forces? Does he also agree that the manner in which the campaign was planned and executed can be judged by the low level of casualties sustained by the British forces? Now that our service men are returning from the Gulf, will he give an assessment of the dangers of a delay of that return which may arise from the chaos and bloodshed now occurring in Iraq?
    Mr. King: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his tribute to what was a remarkable team effort by all the armed forces and by those who supported them in industry and in the country as a whole. We are now moving very quickly towards the withdrawal of our forces. They are coming home at the rate of about 1,000 a day and they are certainly receiving a very warm welcome. We intend to proceed with the withdrawal, subject to satisfactory progress in terms of the ceasefire.
    Mr. Alfred Morris: In what circumstances does the Minister envisage that hostilities against Iraq could be resumed?
    Mr. King: The suspension of hostilities has occurred only recently. Clearly, we are watching developments very carefully. We want to see peace and security in the area—that was part of our objective in going there. At the moment, we do not see any circumstances in which we should become involved again.
    Mr. Cyril D. Townsend: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the coming together in Damascus of eight Arab members of the coalition to produce defence plans for the Gulf gets the defence of the region off to a good start, while recognising the need for Britain to have maritime and air forces there? Can my right hon. Friend tell us anything about the future stockpiling of heavy equipment?
    Mr. King: My hon. Friend is right to draw attention to the success of the Damascus meeting and of the communiqué which recognised the role that could be played by Egyptian and Syrian forces as the nucleus for security in the area. We have certainly made clear our willingness to play our part and we are in close discussion with our allies and friends in the area to consider the most helpful way to do that—[Interruption.]
    Mr. Speaker: Order. I appeal to the House to listen to Defence questions as they are very important.

    Nuclear Submarines
    Mr. Andrew F. Bennett: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what exchanges of information have taken place with the United States of America Government about systems for, and experience in, decommissioning of nuclear-powered submarines.
    Mr. Alan Clark: There is a regular exchange of information between the United States and United Kingdom Governments under the 1958 mutual defence agreement and we are generally aware of each other's views.
    Mr. Bennett: Does the Minister agree that an important principle of parliamentary government is that Ministers do not mislead the House? Can he therefore explain how Ministers continue to tell us confidently the cost of the Trident programme when it appears that neither Britain nor the United States knows what the cost of decommissioning a nuclear submarine would be? As they do not know how to do it, how can Ministers tell us how much it costs?
    Mr. Clark: Decommissioning is not included in the costs of acquisition. The hon. Gentleman may be confusing decommissioning with disposal. Decommissioning is a recognised procedure which involves removing the fuel and various ancillary items to make the vessel relatively safe so that it can be stored afloat until its fate is decided.
    Mr. Wilkinson: Can my hon. Friend tell the House what exchanges took place between the United Kingdom and United States Governments about the British "Options for Change" exercise whereby the number of Royal Navy nuclear attack submarines is to be substantially reduced, what the United States advised about the reduction of our capability in that area and whether advice was sought from the United States on the disposal of hulls?
    Mr. Clark: Advice from the United States was not sought on the disposal of hulls. We are perfectly capable of making decisions independently. Reductions in future deployment under the "Options for Change" scheme are a matter for consultation with all our NATO allies, including the United States.
    Mr. Boyes: Is not it incredible that, after all this time, the Government still cannot come up with a solution acceptable to the British people for the decommissioning of nuclear submarines? Such a solution clearly excludes dumping at sea, which is the worst possible option. It is clear that there has been no new thinking from the Government, although a range of options have been researched by the Opposition. All that we get is a faltering Minister in a vacillating Government led by a tired and dithering Prime Minister.
    Mr. Clark: Who is the hon. Gentleman to claim to speak for the British people? I am wholly unaware of any concern being expressed to me by any member of the British public about the disposal of nuclear submarines. Neither I nor my Department has had a single letter about that in the past year.

    The Gulf
    Mr. Cran: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what further progress has been made in his Department's review of Britain's defence commitments; and what lessons have been learned as a result of the Gulf war.
    Mr. Tom King: We believe that there is scope for changing our defence arrangements following the collapse of the Warsaw pact and the unification of Germany. Some initial decisions have already been announced, but the final size and shape of our armed forces will need to take account of our consultations with NATO and our allies, the security position in Europe and with the Soviet Union, and progress on arms control. We shall also need to take account of the lessons learnt in the Gulf.
    Mr. Cran: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the most important lesson of the Gulf war is that the United Kingdom must hold unto itself the decision on when to commit its armed forces? Will he further agree that if we had been part of a common defence arrangement in Europe we would probably not have been able to make a contribution to collective security?
    Mr. King: I certainly believe, as the lessons of the Gulf have shown, in the importance of having allies with whom we can work closely, and in the benefits of a coalition in such circumstances. I also strongly support the need for us to have the power to act and, first, to be able to take the decision to act. The other important aspect, which I know that my hon. Friend will support, is to have the power to act and to have forces able to act and to make such a valuable contribution.
    Mr. Menzies Campbell: Does the Secretary of State agree that the commitment of the United Kingdom must depend on the nature of the threat that it may have to meet? In that regard, does he share my concern that the Soviet Union launched more submarines last year than in the previous year and there are reports that it has now placed 10,000 tanks east of the Ural mountains, apparently to frustrate the effects of the conventional arms reduction treaty? Will due account be taken of those factors in assessing the commitments of the United Kingdom?
    Mr. King: The hon. and learned Gentleman will have noticed that that point is precisely one of the aspects with which I dealt in relation to the progress of arms control. One of our concerns is the number of Soviet tanks transferred from the Soviet army to the Soviet navy, putting them outside the remit of present arms control and leading to a situation in which, as is well known, the Soviet navy now has more tanks than the British Army. We have raised those issues. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister raised them very directly on his recent visit to Moscow. That is precisely why we have not ratified the conventional forces reduction in Europe treaty.
    Mr. Onslow: Will my right hon. Friend assure the House that, whatever reviews take place, his Department will not lose sight of the importance of our reserve forces and especially of the Territorial Army?
    Mr. King: I very much agree with my right hon. Fnend. I refer the House to my statement last July, in which I said:
    "The volunteer reserves continue to play a key role, and we wish to consider the appropriate numbers for the future,
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    having regard to our needs and realistic levels of recruitment and retention."—[Official Report, 25 July 1990; Vol. 177 c. 472.]
    The whole House recognises the valuable role that the reserves and the volunteer reserves have played as recently as in the Gulf campaign. That underlines the importance of the role that they can play.
    Mr. O'Neill: What other out-of-area threats do the Government envisage having to meet? How relevant would armoured divisions be in such circumstances? Following the destruction of the fourth largest army in the world—the Iraqi army—few countries, surely, could pose a threat equal to that posed by Iraq in the recent past.
    Mr. King: It is incredible that the hon. Gentleman—the Opposition Front-Bench spokesman—should conclude that we shall not be forced to face any further armoured threat in the world. The lesson to be drawn from the Gulf and, indeed, from the very fact of the difference between that threat and the threat that we faced in the Falklands, is that we must be prepared for the unexpected and able to make our contribution, whatever shape the threat may take.

    Ministry Houses
    Sir David Mitchell: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what assessment he has made of the adequacy of the arrangements for temporarily leasing empty MOD houses to local authorities to assist in their duty to provide accommodation for the homeless; how many houses on the MOD estate at Barton Stacey have been empty for more than six months; and what percentage of the estate this represents.
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence Procurement (Mr. Kenneth Carlisle): I am generally satisfied that the arrangements for temporarily leasing empty MOD houses to local authorities are adequate. We currently have more than 600 properties on lease throughout the United Kingdom, and we have recently offered a further 700 properties for leasing to 13 separate authorities, including Test Valley borough council in my hon. Friend's constituency. Sixteen houses on the MOD estates at Barton Stacey have been empty for more than six months, representing 12 per cent. of the MOD estate. Of those 16 properties, 11 are in the process of being sold.
    Sir David Mitchell: I do not share my hon. Friend's satisfaction with the information that he has given. On 4 February, 20 per cent of the houses on the MOD estate were vacant, while the borough council's figure was 1 per cent. Will my hon. Friend overhaul the whole system of management, which is at present inadequate?
    Mr. Carlisle: Where houses are not needed, we sell the surplus; however, we require a management margin of 9 per cent. As my hon. Friend knows, we cannot keep a waiting list for Army families, who move around every two months, whereas local authorities can build up substantial waiting lists.

    The Gulf
    Mr. Nellist: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement about the timetable for withdrawal of British troops from the Gulf.
    Mr. Tom King: British forces are now being progressively withdrawn from the Gulf. In the next two weeks, further ships, 7th Armoured Brigade Group and the bulk of the RAF combat aircraft will return. The precise timing of the return of other units will depend on progress on the ceasefire and other factors.
    Mr. Nellist: In an earlier answer, the Secretary of State told us that troops were returning at a rate of about 1,000 per day, so their return should be complete by about the end of April. What is the Government's view of the insurrection now taking place in Iraq, especially in the north and the south-west? Is it the same as the view of the United States Government which, according to a report in The Guardian last week, seems to boil down to "Better the devil you know than a weak coalition or a new strong man", or do the Government welcome the fact that the people of Iraq are dealing with their own problems and trying to fight for democracy?
    Mr. King: The government of Iraq, and the choice of who should govern, are matters for the people of Iraq.
    Mr. Bellingham: As some of the forces are already returning from Iraq, will my right hon. Friend find time today to pay a further tribute to the three squadrons from RAF Marham in west Norfolk who played a superb role in the conflict? Will he also reflect on the fact that if the hon. Member for Coventry, South-East (Mr. Nellist) had had his way there would have been no British forces in the Gulf to withdraw?
    Mr. King: I note that the hon. Member for Coventry, South-East (Mr. Nellist) has changed the thrust of his questions. My hon. Friend is right—the liberation of Kuwait would not have been achieved without the determination of the Government and the coalition to ensure that in the final analysis, if peaceful means and diplomacy could not prevail, we were prepared to use force. I join my hon. Friend in paying tribute not only to RAF Marham, whose forces and units made an outstanding contribution, but to all our forces and to the coalition forces for the part that they played in using the force that was necessary.
    Dr. Reid: Last Saturday in Devon the Secretary of State said that the priority was to get the troops home and give them the welcome and thanks that they deserved. Does he accept that many of the young men and women returning home face an uncertain and insecure future because of possible cuts in armed services numbers as a result of "Options for Change"? Does he agree that the thanks and welcome that they deserve is a Government guarantee that adequate retraining will be provided for those who may face re-entry into civilian life? Does the Secretary of State accept that the existing 28 days pre-release training is woefully inadequate and is it not time that he gave the armed services a real vote of confidence by announcing plans to augment the already meagre measures for retraining?
    Mr. King: I understand entirely the hon. Gentleman's point about the need to give reassurance and confidence to our armed forces after the part that they have played. I am interested that the hon. Gentleman chooses to ask that question from the Opposition Front Bench. Whatever changes we may think modest and possible within the
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    changed security environment are as nothing compared with the changes that the Opposition would impose if their defence cuts were ever implemented.
    Mr. Brazier: Does my right hon. Friend agree that although it is a high priority to bring as many of our service men as possible home as quickly as we can from the Gulf, where they have done such a splendid job, the situation in the Gulf is likely to remain unstable for a very long time, even if the shooting stops, because of the many different, powerful and, in many cases, unpleasant groups there, so the Government will have to consider maintaining a presence in the Gulf for a very long time?
    Mr. King: Whatever the longer-term future may hold, the immediate present is very uncertain. We are monitoring the situation and making it clear that the completion of our withdrawal will depend on a satisfactory agreement being reached on a formal ceasefire. We have not yet achieved all our objectives, but in the longer term we shall keep the issue to which my hon. Friend referred under review. We do not envisage having ground forces in the area, but I have already said that we shall have a naval presence there and that we shall wish to keep in very close defence contact with our friends and allies in the area.

    Service Men (Personal Lives)
    Mr. Campbell-Savours: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what aspects of the personal life of service men are taken into account in matters of recruitment and dismissal from employment in Her Majesty's forces.
    Mr. Archie Hamilton: The armed forces seek recruits whose personal qualities are such that they will ensure that the high standards of our professional, volunteer services are maintained. Applicants must demonstrate that they are able to integrate within the services and cope with the rigours of service life. Service personnel who commit offences against the services discipline Acts, or who are judged unsuitable for service life, may be dismissed or discharged.
    Mr. Campbell-Savours: Do the Minister and his colleagues remember the case of Miss X in my constituency who was dismissed for her alleged sexual preferences? In so far as Miss X has repeatedly denied those allegations—as, indeed, has her boy friend—can a full inquiry be held into what actually happened, as it seems clear to me that a grave injustice has been done?
    Mr. Hamilton: I think that the best thing that the hon. Gentleman can do is to write to me about the case, as I have no intimate knowledge of it. If he does so, we shall certainly look into it.
    Mr. Mans: In relation to recruitment and retention in the services, will my hon. Friend comment on the sending of soldiers under the age of 18 into combat zones?
    Mr. Hamilton: It has always been the practice of the armed forces to send people who are fully trained into combat. It is quite possible for people under the age of 18 to be fully trained. We should not sent them into combat unless they were.

    The Gulf
    Mr. Terry Fields: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will enumerate the financial costs of deployment of British armed forces in the Gulf up to the end of the Gulf war.
    Mr. Tom King: As so far assessed, the additional costs of the Gulf conflict are about £1·75 billion. The eventual costs will be significantly higher—possibly up to £3 billion, spread over several years. I am discussing the provision for those additional costs which fall in 1991–92 with my right hon. and learned Friend the Chief Secretary to the Treasury. Implications for defence spending from 1992–93 will be considered in the normal way later this year.
    Mr. Fields: The figures show the Secretary of State's obvious influence in Cabinet when arguing for such sums of money to remove the obscenity of Saddam Hussein from Kuwait. Will he now use that same influence to remove from British society the obscenities of homelessness, poverty and hospital waiting lists and to enable pensioners and others on income support not to have to pay the poll tax—or are those simply areas of collateral damage and thus insignificant?
    Mr. King: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, at least for the first part of his question. It was the first time that I have heard him pay tribute to the work of our forces or recognise the need for us to take the action that we did for the liberation of Kuwait. The other issues obviously go a little wide of the question.
    Mr. Tim Smith: What progress has my right hon. Friend made in obtaining contributions from overseas towards the cost of the war?
    Mr. King: My right hon. and learned Friend the Chief Secretary has been the most active in that area. We have received significant contributions, amounting to in excess of £1·25 billion, and we hope for further contributions from our allies who very much appreciate our contribution to the liberation of Kuwait and the costs involved.
    Mr. Tony Banks: We could have saved even more money by not fighting the war at all. One of the best ways of guaranteeing that we do not get into such wars is to ensure that unpleasant people such as Saddam Hussein are not given arms by western nations. For future reference, will the Secretary of State tell us what support he is giving to President Bush, who said that there will be a moratorium on arms exports to the middle east? Will he give an assurance in the House that we shall not, under any circumstances, authorise any arms exports to anyone in the middle east from now on?
    Mr. King: That is a particularly silly supplementary question—but well above the hon. Gentleman's usual standard. He knows perfectly well—he has been told this on a number of occasions—that we have strict licensing requirements for the export of arms. He knows perfectly well that we have not sold arms to Iraq for a number of years, for precisely the reason that he has in mind. He also knows perfectly well that some of the arms that we have sold, especially to Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman and the United Arab Emirates, helped in the campaign to liberate Kuwait.

    Relocation Projects
    Mr. Holt: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many man hours have so far been spent by Ministry of Defence officials in evaluating relocation projects within his Department; and if he will make a statement.
    Mr. Kenneth Carlisle: Since 1979 my Department has evaluated, or is evaluating, 25 separate relocation projects involving nearly 25,000 posts. Those studies have involved many areas of the Department, although most of the detailed work is done at local level. No central record is kept of the man hours involved in this work.
    Mr. Holt: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that reply and especially for the details of the number of relocation exercises that have been considered in the past 10 years. Apart from being considered, how many of those projects have reached fruition and how many people have been relocated?
    Mr. Carlisle: About 2,500 people have already moved and we are looking at a number of other projects. A further 6,500 people are expected to move by 1995 and nearly 2,000 are under review for movement thereafter.
    Mr. Frank Cook: How long will it take to give the constituents of Stockton a clear idea about the relocation of the directorate general of the defence quality assurance unit from Woolwich to Stockton?
    Mr. Carlisle: I am delighted to see the hon. Gentleman in his place again in good health. I am fully aware of his interest in Stockton, as well as that of my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton, South (Mr. Devlin), both of whom brought an all-party delegation to see me. I am aware of the claims of the north-east to be the new home of the quality assurance organisation, but I shall not make any decision until our studies are complete, which I expect to be soon. We have a public duty to ensure that every relocation is truly cost effective.

    The Gulf
    Mr. Adley: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what lessons his Department has learnt from the Gulf war.
    Mr. Archie Hamilton: We are considering the outcome of the campaign and the conclusions to be drawn from it, but it is too early to say how the results of the work might be made public.
    Mr. Adley: Having listened to the exchanges of the past half hour, my hon. Friend will understand why I have decided to change my supplementary question somewhat. Does he agree that the views expressed by not only Labour Back-Benchers but Opposition Front-Bench spokesmen make it clear that, if by any awful mischance, Britain ever found itself dependent on Ministers in a Labour Government for the defence of the realm, it would be wise at least to order a large supply of white flags?
    Mr. Hamilton: There is no doubt whatever that if, by some misfortune, the Labour party won the next election, our defence capability would be reduced drastically. In the light of recent experience, that would be a great mistake.
    Mr. Strang: Does the Minister accept that whatever lessons are to be learnt from the Gulf, they will not alter

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    the main priority of our defence budget, which is to maintain the defence of these islands? In that context, will he reaffirm the Government's commitment to the important role that the European fighter aircraft will play as a defensive conventional war plane? Will he take every opportunity in the years ahead to urge the continued support of the three other European partners in the project?
    Mr. Hamilton: We shall continue to urge our European partners to support the EFA. Our commitment to it is total. There can be no question about that. Not only conventional weapons have an important role; nuclear weapons have also done much to defend Europe in the past. They should continue to do so and Britain should continue to have its own independent deterrent. I am sad that so many people on the Opposition Benches believe that we should negotiate it away.

    "Options for Change"
    Mr. Ian Bruce: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement on the implications for south Dorset of the "Options for Change" review.
    Mr. Archie Hamilton: We are examining the scope for rationalising a wide range of defence support activities. No decisions affecting south Dorset have yet been taken.
    Mr. Bruce: I thank my hon. Friend for that answer. Does he agree that the armed forces are masters of the diversionary tactic? Does he agree that when Ministers ask for reductions, they are offered relocations and collocations? Will he consider all the jobs in south Dorset and realise that he is being conned? If he wants reductions, he should examine the parts of the armed forces where reductions are needed rather than the parts that he has already decided that he intends to keep. Is he aware that the cost of moving some parts to other areas will be enormous?
    Mr. Hamilton: We are looking at a wide range of defence real estate across the country. It is true that in south Dorset there are significant amounts of defence estate. We must consider that in common with everything else. I repeat that no decisions have yet been taken. [Interruption.]
    Mr. Speaker: Order. Will the hon. and learned Member for Perth and Kinross (Sir N. Fairbairn) come into the Chamber so that we can perhaps get on with Question Time?
    Mr. O'Neill: When considering the implications for south Dorset, will the Minister of State also remember that there are other naval bases as well as that at Portland, which seems to be the subject of consideration under the "Options for Change" process? Does he agree that it is desirable to conduct the process openly, rather than its being the subject of rumours and leaks which cause unnecessary anxiety to the communities involved? Will he include Rosyth with Portland when he says that no decisions have been taken and no conclusions reached on closures?
    Mr. Hamilton: That is why, when people came to see me about Rosyth, I assured them that we were considering all the naval bases and naval support across the board. That confirms what I have been saying to people who are
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    worried about Rosyth. There is no singling out of Rosyth. We are considering naval support across the board. [Interruption.]
    Mr. Speaker: Order. I ask hon. Members to listen to the last few minutes of Defence Questions.

    The Gulf
    Mr. Wilshire: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement on the current military situation in the Gulf.
    Mr. Tom King: Following the defeat of the Iraqi army in Kuwait, the coalition suspended offensive combat operations, subject to clearly laid down conditions. These included the immediate return of our prisoners of war and of the remains of those who lost their lives. In advance of any agreement on a final ceasefire, coalition forces have been clearing the battlefield; naval forces have been continuing their mine-clearing operations; and air forces have been maintaining defensive air patrols. At the same time, we have begun the phased withdrawal of some of our forces.
    Mr. Wilshire: Does my right hon. Friend agree that Saddam Hussein's barbaric use of force against his own people proves that he still cannot be trusted? In the circumstances, does he also agree that there can be no lasting peace in the middle east until the coalition forces have satisfied themselves that there are no chemical or biological weapons left in Iraq?
    Mr. King: I certainly accept that we cannot trust Saddam Hussein. We have made that very clear and by the use of force we have now liberated Kuwait. I assure my hon. Friend that the importance of eliminating Saddam Hussein's nuclear, biological and chemical capability is something to which we attach the greatest importance.
    Mr. Tom Clarke: Did the Secretary of State see the excellent but disturbing report by Charles Wheeler on "Newsnight" last night? Does he agree that the oppression of Palestinians in Kuwait is totally unacceptable? Does he agree that any oppression in Kuwait is completely unacceptable and that that was not the reason for the presence of British troops in the Gulf?
    Mr. King: In response to an earlier question, I paid tribute to the role of our reservists in the Gulf and their ready willingness to play their part in that important conflict. I should like to welcome back my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Dr. Goodson-Wickes) and thank him for the contribution that he made, like many of his colleagues, who so gladly responded to the call for reservists.
    To answer the hon. Gentleman's question, when I was in Kuwait I made the strongest representations to the Kuwaiti Government about the need to ensure justice and fairness for all the people in the area. I said that we went to liberate Kuwait, to free it from intolerance and cruelty, and that we do not want intolerance and cruelty perpetuated there in any way.

    USAF Fairford
    Mr. Simon Coombs: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what information he has about the future use of USAF Fairford.
    Mr. Archie Hamilton: The temporary deployment of United States B52 aircraft to RAF Fairford in support of Operation Desert Storm has now ended. The station remains available to the United States air force as a standby facility. In the short term, United States tanker and transport aircraft may continue to use RAF Fairford in support of the withdrawal of United States forces from the Gulf region.
    Mr. Coombs: My hon. Friend will be well aware of the excellent contribution made by USAF Fairford to the allied effort in the Gulf. He may also be aware that this has generated considerable uncertainty in the vicinity of the base. Will he undertake to discuss with our allies in the United States the future of the base so as to be able to make a clear statement of intent for the longer-term future?
    Mr. Hamilton: We are in discussions with the United States air force about this, but current plans are that it should continue as a standby base and be used for exercises. I do not think that it will go beyond that.

    Contracts
    Mr. Martyn Jones: To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what percentage of contracts awarded by the Ministry of Defence go to British-owned companies.
    Mr. Alan Clark: The Ministry of Defence does not maintain contract statistics on the basis of the ownership of companies but by the location where the majority of the work is to be undertaken. Taking into account our share of international collaborative programmes, around 90 per cent. of the defence equipment budget is spent with companies in the United Kingdom.
    Mr. Jones: Should not we spend 100 per cent. of our money in this country, bearing in mind the fact that we are in a recession created by the effect of eleven and a half years of Tory misrule on the economy and the fact that we have the biggest-ever balance of payments deficit? Will he make efforts to do so in the future?
    Mr. Clark: I reject that argument. The figure of 90 per cent. represents an excellent tribute to the competitiveness of British industry. My Department searches constantly for the best value for money in weapons procurement. That is our obligation to the hon. Gentleman's constituents who pay their taxes and to the whole of the public. We look for value for money by objective criteria and, as I say, it testifies to the competitiveness of British industry that it managed to reach the 90 per cent. total.
    Mr. Batiste: Does my right hon. Friend agree that British defence companies need clearly defined time scales against which to commit their expenditure? In that context, when will he be in a position to announce the decision for the replacement of the Chieftain tank, bearing in mind the outstanding performance of the Challenger tank in the Gulf war?
    Mr. Clark: It is perfectly true that not only did the Challenger tank perform extremely well, but the whole support operation provided by the manufacturers was of the highest quality. I hope that a decision on the replacement of the Chieftain will not be delayed too long.

  PRIME MINISTER

    Engagements
    Mr. Trotter: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 March.
    The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major): This morning I presided at a meeting of the Cabinet and had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be having further meetings later today. This evening, I hope to have an audience of Her Majesty the Queen.
    Mr. Trotter: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that when he visited the Gulf he heard the Challenger 1 tank had performed very well and that the Vickers work force gave stalwart support to the Army before and during the conflict? Does he agree that the new Challenger 2 is designed specifically for the British Army's requirements and that it meets them? Will those factors be given due recognition and is he aware of the need for an early order if Vickers is to maintain its manufacturing capability and win export orders for this world-beater?
    The Prime Minister: Yes, I confirm what my hon. Friend says. The performance of the Challenger 1 tank in the Gulf was quite outstanding. Before we reach a decision on the replacement—on a Challenger 2 tank—we must analyse the lessons that we learnt in the Gulf. I hope that that will soon be done and then we shall move speedily to a decision.
    Mr. Kinnock: Does the Prime Minister recall saying recently:
    "Michael's claim of taking education from the poll tax and putting it into central education has … the disadvantage that it has to be paid for elsewhere, either in more borrowing, more taxation, or pre-empting money that would otherwise go to the health service"?
    Is that still the Prime Minister's view?
    The Prime Minister: Government services have to be paid for, from whatever pocket they may come, and that is still the case.
    Mr. Kinnock: I know all about that—[Interruption.]—but from the way the Government are behaving, one wonders whether they know all about that, too. Will the Prime Minister now answer my question? Does he still take the view that he enunciated a short time ago, or does he now agree with Michael? If he does not, is he still dithering in between?
    The Prime Minister: I am glad to hear the right hon. Gentleman confirm that he knows that local government services have to be paid for. I just wish that he would tell some of his hon. Friends that—[HON. MEMBERS: "Answer."] The right hon. Gentleman will have all his answers by the end of this week.
    Dr. Goodson-Wickes: Does my right hon. Friend accept that my appalling voting record over the past few months is no reflection on my wholehearted support for him and the Government?
    On a more serious note, does my right hon. Friend agree that the united voice that went out from the House in support of our troops on the ground in the Gulf was of

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    immeasurable help to them and that that, combined with the unsurpassed military leadership under which we served, led to the magnificent military outcome?
    The Prime Minister: I agree entirely with my hon. Friend. I think that I echo the views of the whole House in saying that in recent weeks my hon. Friend has been in the right place. We welcome him back to the House—to the place which is his by right.
    Mr. Ashdown: If the Prime Minister will not recall his own words, will he recall the words of his predecessor, who, speaking in the House on 15 November for a Government in which he was Chancellor of the Exchequer, said that transferring education expenditure to central Government would result in huge tax increases and in a reduction in local services? Does the right hon. Gentleman still agree with his right hon. Friend?
    The Prime Minister: There are many things about which I am in wholehearted agreement with my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher). Those things include clear opposition to proportional representation and a reluctance to do deals with the right hon. Gentleman.
    Mr. Simon Burns: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 March.
    The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Burns: Is my right hon. Friend aware that more than 12,000 of my constituents travel by British Rail from Chelmsford to Liverpool Street every day? Does he accept that although the service has improved somewhat in the past few years, it still leaves a great deal to be desired? Can he reassure my constituents that the current record levels of investment in British Rail will continue, so that services may be improved further?
    The Prime Minister: I sympathise with my hon. Friend. I know that the views of his constituents are shared by my constituents and by the constituents of many other hon. Members. The Government's investment priority is to ensure that all routes are brought up to the high standard that commuters have a right to expect. That is, and has been, our policy.
    Mr. Mullin: Will the Prime Minister take this opportunity to welcome the release of the six innocent men who were convicted of the Birmingham pub bombings? Does he agree that if confidence in our judicial system is to be restored it will be necessary for someone above the rank of police sergeant to take responsibility for the recent series of disasters?
    The Prime Minister: No one in the House either now or at any time in the past, would have wished to see innocent men gaoled. As the convictions were insecure, it is entirely right that the gentlemen to whom the hon. Member referred have now been released. The whole House will be pleased about that. Clearly, we need to look at procedures. The royal commission on the criminal justice system will report speedily and comprehensively.
    Mr. David Nicholson: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 March.
    The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Nicholson: My right hon. Friend will recall personal tax rates of up to 98 per cent., a standard rate of 35 per cent. and weird taxes such as selective employment tax. However deep our party's hostility to those taxes might have been, no one doubted that they had to be collected and that they had to be paid. Is my right hon. Friend aware that my constituents in Taunton, where the community charge has been collected efficiently, are of the opinion that until the House changes tax measures, public authorities will have a duty to collect taxes and individuals, including hon. Members, will have a duty to pay them?
    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Everyone has a duty to uphold the law as passed by the House. That is particularly true of hon. Members. Those who seek to make the law should never break the law.
    Mr. Andrew F. Bennett: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 March.
    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Bennett: Does the Prime Minister agree that an important principle of British public life is that when the Ministers or other senior public figures make grave errors of judgment they resign? In doing so, they restore confidence in their office and they salvage a little of their reputation. Will the Prime Minister draw that principle to the attention of Lord Chief Justice Lane?
    The Prime Minister: I shall certainly not draw that to the attention of Lord Chief Justice Lane. I believe that he applied the facts of the case as he saw them; hindsight knowledge is never an attractive thing.
    Mr. Barry Field: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 March.
    The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Field: Recognising the long hours worked during the Gulf war by my right hon. Friend and the distinguished service—[Interruption.]
    Mr. Speaker: Order. This takes up a lot of time.
    Mr. Field:—and the distinguished service given by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Dr. Goodson-Wickes), may I invite them both to partake of the invigorating political air of the Isle of Wight during the Easter recess, where they will observe that the Conservative borough councils of South Wight and Medina have transferred all their housing stock to housing associations, making the Isle of Wight a unique county?
    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend makes a tempting offer. If I may deal with the underlying concern of his point, to paraphrase Mr. Samuel Clemens, reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Dr. Goodson-Wickes) and I would welcome my hon. Friend's invitation.
    Mr. Salmond: Will the Prime Minister confirm that he told his Back Benchers yesterday that the Achilles heel of the poll tax was its uncollectability? Will he therefore acknowledge that the campaign of resistance to the tax has

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    been a key factor in sinking his predecessor's flagship? When the Government make their statement on Thursday, will it contain any form of apology to the people of Scotland for the additional year under which we have suffered from this iniquitous tax?
    The Prime Minister: I will confirm no such thing and if the hon. Gentleman played any part in any campaign of disobedience, he has no right to be in the House.
    Mr. Haselhurst: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 March.
    The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Haselhurst: Does my right hon. Friend accept that London commuters generally will welcome the increased emphasis that the Government are putting on the quality of service in rail transport? As the Stansted airport rail link starts, from today, to place heavier burdens on the infrastructure of the West Anglia line, can commuters there hope that their interests will not be subordinated to the interests of airline travellers?
    The Prime Minister: As my hon. Friend knows, improvement in quality is very much the objective of the Government's policies and of British Rail. He will know that modern rolling stock has been provided for the Stansted express and is intended to provide both fast and frequent services to the newly expanded airport. I shall draw my hon. Friend's concerns about normal commuter services on the West Anglia line to the attention of my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Transport.
    Mr. LofthouseTo ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 March.
    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Gentleman to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Lofthouse: Will the Prime Minister tell us why he recently said that the poll tax would prove to be enduring and would be a vast improvement on the rates? As he appears rapidly to have changed his mind, does he expect the right hon. Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher) to change hers, too?
    The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman will find the answers to all those questions on Thursday.
    Mr. Bowis: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 March.
    The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Bowis: Has my right hon. Friend had time to read the editorials pointing out that if Wandsworth had received the same amount of Government grant as neighbouring Lambeth, it could have put a cheque in the post to every charge payer? Does he agree that the lesson to be drawn from that is that whatever system of local government finance we have, the only one worth voting for is one run by Conservative councils?
    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend makes a valid point——
    Mr. Meale: No, he does not.
    The Prime Minister: Yes, he does. Lambeth received almost £300 a head more in external grant than Wandsworth, yet most Wandsworth residents seem to think that they get better services than do the residents of neighbouring Lambeth. The reason is clear: Lambeth is a Labour council and that is why the service is so expensive and so rotten.
    Mr. Clelland: Although I fully appreciate the need to review defence procurement policy following the Gulf conflict, does the Prime Minister agree that that would affect only the size of the order for main battle tanks, not necessarily the manufacturer which will provide them? Will he therefore have a word with the Secretary of State for Defence with a view to making an early announcement that the order will go to a British manufacturer, Vickers Defence Systems?
    The Prime Minister: I understand the hon. Gentleman's point and we shall seek to learn all the lessons possible from the Gulf conflict. As soon as it is concluded, we shall endeavour to reach an early decision. I hope that there will be no unnecessary delay.
    Mr. Nelson: Will my right hon. Friend find time to reaffirm the Government's strong commitment to defence? Does he agree that one reason why our armed forces did the job in the Gulf was that, over the past 10 years, the Conservative Government have voted and spent the necessary money for the right equipment and training, while the Opposition parties have constantly called for disarmament and defence cuts?
    The Prime Minister: I happily reaffirm that. Defence remains a matter of intense importance to this side of the House and, in case there is any doubt, I should make it clear that that includes nuclear defence.

WAYS AND MEANS

  Budget Statement
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Before I call the Chancellor of the Exchequer, it may be for the convenience of hon. Members if I remind them that, at the end of the Chancellor's speech, copies of the Budget resolutions will be available to hon. Members in the Vote Office.
  3.30 pm
  The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr. Norman Lamont): Like, I suspect, most Chancellors, I have found the preparation of this, my first Budget, very exciting. As usual, I have read a huge amount of speculation in the press over the past few weeks about the contents of the Budget. I have also learnt a number of interesting things. For example, I was surprised to read last Wednesday that I am almost as well known as Desert Orchid—and I have not yet run in the Gold Cup.
  Actually, Desert Orchid and I have much in common: we are both greys; vast sums of money ride on our performance; the Opposition hope we will fall at the first fence; and we are both carrying too much weight. The crucial difference is that Chancellors are never favourites.
  I have had the advantage of serving at the Treasury under two Chancellors: my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, who last year delivered a notable Budget for savers, and before that my right hon. Friend the Member for Blaby (Mr. Lawson). If I may make a personal observation, working for my right hon. Friend the Member for Blaby was always stimulating and exciting, and I am extremely grateful for his encouragement over the years. My admiration and respect for him remain undimmed.[ Interruption.]
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I know that this is an exciting day in the House, but perhaps we should try to behave like the mother of all Parliaments.
  Mr. Lamont: I intend to carry forward my predecessor's work. My central economic aim is to bring inflation down and keep it down. Beyond that, my objective is to encourage enterprise by creating a broadly based tax system that allows markets to do their job with the minimum of distortion and Government interference.
  Although there is no scope this year for an overall reduction in taxes, my Budget today will include measures to help business through the recession in the short term and to encourage it to invest for the longer term. It will provide assistance for families. It will also further the process of tax reform and make some radical changes in the tax system.
  As usual, I shall begin with a review of the economic situation and prospects. I shall then deal with monetary policy and public finances. Finally, I shall present my tax proposals.
  The "Financial Statement and Budget Report", together with a number of press releases filling out the details of my proposals, will be available from the Vote Office as soon as I have sat down.

ECONOMIC SITUATION AND PROSPECTS
I refer first to international developments. The past year has brought recession to a number of major industrial countries including the United States, Canada and Australia. Growth in Germany has been sustained by reunification; but elsewhere in Europe, activity has slowed and industrial production has fallen in recent months in Spain, Italy and France. In five of the seven leading industrial nations, industrial output is now lower than it was a year ago.
The basic cause is the same everywhere: very rapid growth in the industrialised world during the 1980s led to the re-emergence of inflationary pressures. A period of slower growth was needed to stop inflation taking hold again.
In the autumn, the slowdown was magnified by the Gulf crisis. Business and consumer confidence were badly dented, first, by the uncertainties and the sharp rise in oil prices that followed the invasion of Kuwait, and then the prospect of war. Travel and tourism were especially hard-hit.
Mercifully, the war was brief and the outcome successful. Confidence is recovering and that will strengthen the economic upturn when the time comes; and the fall in oil prices has already improved the outlook for inflation.
So although 1991 as a whole will show little growth in the seven major economies—a ½ per cent. increase in industrial production compared to 5¾ per cent. in 1988—the slowdown is unlikely to last long. Inflation is already moderating in those countries that are in recession, and activity should start to recover later this year in north America, helped by continued expansion in Germany and Japan.
In the United Kingdom, the recession came after eight years of growth averaging 3 per cent. a year. This sustained growth bred confidence and that in turn led to a quite unprecedented rise in borrowing. Personal borrowing increased by nearly 40 per cent. in 1988 alone, to reach £54 billion—and a new record for the ratio of debt to income. This produced a sharp drop in the personal saving ratio, which coincided with a massive boom in investment by companies.
In itself, the rise of investment—nearly 80 per cent. between 1981 and 1989—was welcome, but the economy could not go on expanding at that rate. Some firms and individuals became over-extended and we saw a deterioration in the current account and a wholly unwelcome rise in inflation.
It is easy, with the benefit of hindsight, to say that policy should have been tighter; and, once the problem became clear, policy was indeed tightened. We ran a large budget surplus. Interest rates were raised, and they had to stay high until there were unmistakable signs that excess demand pressure had been removed. That took longer than we—or outside commentators—expected, and the delay meant that the adjustment, when it came, was all the sharper.
Since the middle of last year, individuals and companies have been taking steps to reduce their borrowing. Consumer spending has fallen back, and the saving ratio has risen sharply to 10·8 per cent. Firms have found it hard going. Profits have weakened, caught in the pincer of low turnover and rising costs, and the burden of debt taken on in the late 1980s has proved a heavy one.
It is not surprising, therefore, that business investment has fallen from the heights of 1989 and early 1990. Stocks are now being reduced, and companies are making strenuous efforts to cut costs. That has led to a sharp increase in unemployment during recent months, although there are welcome signs that firms are continuing to invest in skills and training. I expect output in 1991 as a whole to be about 2 per cent. less than in 1990. Much of that fall, of course, has already happened. It is largely behind us and, as I shall be explaining in a moment, the resumption of growth should not be long delayed.
The process of retrenchment has been painful, as it always is, but it has been necessary and is now producing results. The current account deficit has improved sharply—especially the balance on manufactures—even though world trade has been weak. Imports have fallen. while exports in some sectors, notably cars, have continued to grow strongly—testimony to the fact that industry is immeasurably better placed today than it was 10 years ago.
No one can doubt that inflation is on the way down. There has already been a fall of 2 percentage points since the peak last October, and there is widespread agreement that the fall in inflation will continue through 1991 and into 1992.
The prospects are now better than they appeared at the time of the autumn statement. The February survey by the Confederation of British Industry showed that the balance of firms expecting to increase prices was at its lowest level ever. The forecast published today, taking account of the effect of the Budget measures, is for inflation to fall to an average of 4 per cent. in the last quarter of this year and below 4 per cent. in the first half of 1992. The prospect, therefore, is that we will narrow the inflation gap with Europe remarkably quickly.
In the mid-1980s, we did get inflation briefly below 4 per cent., and we saw the advantages that followed. We are about to do so again, and again we will reap the benefits. Lower inflation, and the lower interest rates that go with it, will be a powerful force for recovery.
One of the lessons that I have learnt from years of grappling with economic statistics is that it is difficult to be certain about the past, let alone about the future. It is always especially difficult to predict the timing of turning points in the economy. However, there are good reasons to expect that the recovery will begin around the middle of this year, although initially it may be slow.
As we found 10 years ago, confidence revives as inflation comes down. This time, the ending of the Gulf war will give the revival an added boost. Just as falling consumer spending contributed to the onset of recession, so returning consumer confidence is likely to lead the recovery. At the same time, the reduction of stocks is likely to slow and the United Kingdom will benefit from the upturn in the United States and elsewhere in the world.
As a result, I expect output to stabilise in the next few months and then to increase by about 2 per cent. between the first half of this year and the first half of 1992. Looking further ahead, our projections show growth of about 3 per cent. a year as the economy recovers further.
The easing of demand pressures has already brought a marked improvement in our current account. As the House will have noticed, there can be lags not just between policies and their effects, but between the effects in the real world and their appearance in the official statistics. As a result of the recent revisions of the figures for invisible imports and exports, the current account deficit for last
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year is now estimated at under £13 billion, £2 billion less than forecast at the time of last year's Budget. This year, I expect the deficit to be halved to £6 billion, about 1 per cent. of national income.
Regrettably, unemployment is likely to go on rising for a while yet, even after the recovery has started. How far and how fast it rises will depend, in part, on the speed with which pay settlements come down—and come down they must, eventually, to the levels prevailing in other ERM countries. There is no escape route through devaluation, and firms know this.
Fortunately, a sharp fall in inflation is in prospect, and the reforms that we have introduced over the past decade have led to more pay flexibility. Some firms have already deferred pay settlements or agreed pay pauses. The more firms that follow their lead, the sooner we can reverse the trend in unemployment, and start creating jobs again.
To sum up, the prospect for the year ahead is for an end to the recession, growth of about 2 per cent. in the 12 months to the first half of 1992, and inflation below 4 per cent. This does not seem to me an umpromising outlook.
For the longer term, there is every reason to be optimistic about the United Kingdom in the 1990s. Recessions are always painful, but they are an inescapable feature of market economies—and they are temporary. Longer-term growth depends on having a thriving competitive private sector. That we now have, thanks to the reforms of the past 10 years.
If I may confess it, I do not believe in miracles, but I do believe that the right policies, courageously and consistently applied year by year, can produce a transformation in an economy, and that is what happened in the 1980s.
So now we can build on real achievements: a record number of new businesses, faster growth in manufacturing productivity than in any major industrialised country, and faster growth in investment than in any of those countries except Japan. These achievements have helped us over the past seven years to maintain our share of world trade, after 30 years of decline. They made the 1980s the first decade since the war when the United Kingdom grew faster than Germany and France.

MONETARY POLICY
There is one proviso—and it is a crucial one. We must get inflation down, and this time we must keep it down. The overriding lesson of the past few years is that the battle against inflation is never won. It is fatally easy to miss the warning signs, and hard decisions have few friends.
The costs of even a temporary reverse are high. Squeezing out inflation means high interest rates, frustrated hopes, bankruptcies and lost jobs.
But the costs of living with inflation are even higher—as those who remember the 1970s know only too well. Inflation makes our industry uncompetitive; it destroys savings; it creates uncertainty and strife; and a high rate of inflation can quickly get out of control. High rates of inflation are never stable.
Frankly, after the experience of recent years, it surprises me how many people are urging me to let up on inflation. It may not seem much of a threat for the next six or 12 months, but I am concerned with the year after that and with the rest of the decade.
The Government's decision to join the exchange rate mechanism last October provides a more secure

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framework for combating inflation in the future. That is its real significance. Linking sterling to other currencies with a proven track record of low inflation will be an added discipline on monetary policy.
We committed ourselves to that discipline after lengthy debate, and our decision was widely supported on both sides of the House, and in the country at large. The time has now come to apply ourselves wholeheartedly to the task of making our membership a success.
So far, it has been. Sterling has traded comfortably within its band during a difficult period. The sterling index is much where it was just before ERM entry, and our patient approach has meant that recent reductions in interest rates have been well received by the markets. They have recognised that they are consistent with our ERM obligations, as well as fully justified by the domestic economy.
Our entry into the ERM means that I have had to reassess the role of domestic indicators in guiding monetary policy. It should go without saying that interest rates will be set to honour our commitment to stay within the ERM band, but there is still a most important role for domestic monetary targets. All the major countries within the ERM take the same view.
Over the past year, M0—the narrow measure of money—has continued to provide timely evidence of monetary developments. Its annual rate of growth has been on a downward trend since last May. Since August, it has been within its target range of 1 to 5 per cent. For the year ahead, I propose to set a new, slightly lower target range of 0 to 4 per cent. That is consistent with my determination to exert further downward pressure on inflation. I shall also continue to watch closely other indicators of monetary conditions, especially M4—the measure of broad money—and asset prices.
There should be no sustained conflict between domestic monetary indicators and our ERM obligations. By far the best way of minimising the risk that conflicts will arise in the future is to build up credibility within the ERM. The policies that are necessary to defeat inflation and to sustain the exchange rate are the same.
For the time being, I have no plans to move to a narrow ERM band. That remains, of course, our longer-term intention, but the timing of the move must depend on the progress we make in reducing inflation.

PUBLIC FINANCE AND FISCAL POLICY
I come now to the public sector finances.
Over the 1980s, my predecessors transformed our public finances and made them the envy of fellow Finance Ministers throughout the world. They first reduced and then eliminated our budget deficit, and in the last three years they repaid £26 billion of debt. The ratio of public sector debt to gross domestic product has been reduced from 50 per cent. in 1979 to under 30 per cent. now, to the benefit of this and future generations.
I am not going to fritter that legacy away. The firm control of public expenditure remains at the centre of our strategy. I will continue to aim for budget balance in the medium term. It is a simple rule, which is well understood and requires the Government to finance their spending honestly.
Our entry into the ERM does not alter the requirement for fiscal policy to buttress monetary policy and play its part in curbing inflation; so sound public finances will remain central to our strategy for the 1990s.
However, it is one of the more reliable laws of economics—not that there are so many—that the budget balance varies markedly over the economic cycle. When activity is growing strongly, tax revenues rise relative to income, and lower unemployment brings lower social security payments. We saw this in operation in the late 1980s when we ran large budget surpluses.
Those forces go into reverse when the economy slows down. That is why the Budget surplus has shrunk over the past two years, and why we are now likely to see the temporary re-emergence of a public sector borrowing requirement.
Those cyclical swings in the budget balance can play a useful role in offsetting the swings in private sector borrowing, and in stabilising the economy. They come about automatically, without the need for difficult judgments about the state of the economy. It is entirely consistent with the medium-term approach that I have already outlined to tolerate those swings in the fiscal position, but I am not persuaded of the case for going beyond that.
In 1990–91, the Government's finances have been affected both by the onset of the recession and by the Gulf war. However, as a result of the assistance we have received from our allies, the net effect of the war on the PSBR has not been as great as we feared. The outturn on the public expenditure planning total is expected to be a little lower than we forecast in the autumn statement. Overall, despite the war, I expect to achieve a further debt repayment this year of approaching £1 billion.
For the year ahead, I judge that a deficit of £8 billion can fairly reflect the strength of cyclical influences. For the same reason, I think it will be right to tolerate a somewhat larger deficit in 1992–93, for it takes time for the effects of lower activity to feed through fully on to revenue. The most notable is corporation tax, which is both highly sensitive to the economic cycle and paid in arrears.
Those deficits will disappear once output has returned to normal levels—just as the surpluses of the late 1980s did. Prudence dictates that I base my fiscal plans on a gradual recovery in output to its long-term trend. This implies a correspondingly gradual return to budget balance, but in practice the speed with which this happens will depend on the exact course of the upturn.
To summarise: for the year ahead, I am budgeting for a PSBR of £8 billion, 1¼ per cent. of GDP, and I expect a somewhat larger deficit in the following year. These deficits reflect the effect of lower activity on the public finances and are fully consistent with the aim of a balanced budget over the economic cycle.
In order to hold to this prudent fiscal stance, my Budget today will have a broadly neutral effect in the coming year, but will produce a modest increase in revenue in 1992–93.

BUSINESS TAXATION
I now turn to my tax proposals. In preparing this part of my speech I have been guided by great Finance Ministers of the past—first, by Gladstone, whose advice on delivering tax proposals to the House of Commons was:
"Get up your figures thoroughly … and then give them out as if the whole House was interested".
Secondly, I have perhaps been influenced by Colbert, the French Finance Minister, who said:
"The art of taxation consists in so plucking the goose as to obtain the largest possible amount of feathers with the smallest possible amount of hissing".
In framing my tax proposals, I have also sought to address a number of the concerns which have been put to me and to carry foward the process of tax reform initiated by my predecessors. Above all, I have produced a Budget for business. I therefore begin with business taxation.
In this country, there are 50,000 large companies paying the main rate of corporation tax, nearly 1 million other companies and 3 million unincorporated businesses. many of them very small, employing a handful of people at most. We should never forget those firms. My measures are designed to benefit businesses in each of those categories.
I have been particularly concerned about businesses which are experiencing cash flow problems, often made worse by late-paying customers. I shall therefore be announcing measures which should give immediate help to businesses' liquidity.
My first proposals concern the value added tax regime. For 18 years, ever since VAT was introduced, the rule has been that businesses become liable for VAT when they send out bills, not when they are paid, so some traders end up paying VAT even though their customers never pay them. In his Budget last year, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister introduced an entirely new system for giving traders relief on bad debts. That comes into effect on 1 April and extends relief to all bad debts which are at least two years old.
Many business organisations have complained to me that that waiting period is too long. I now propose to reduce it from two years to one. This will enable businesses to claim relief next year on the bad debts that they incurred in 1990–91 and 1989–90. The new scheme will boost businesses' cash flow next year by some £340 million.
Actually, for the smallest firms, the problem of reclaiming VAT on bad debts need not arise in the first place because they can use the cash accounting scheme. That allows smaller firms to pay no VAT at all until they receive payment from their customers. Well over 100,000 traders are already using the scheme, but we estimate that a further 300,000 could do so. Customs and Excise will therefore be taking steps to publicise the cash accounting scheme more widely.
There is another aspect of the VAT regime which I know causes concern—the operation of the serious misdeclaration penalty, which came into effect last April. There have been widespread complaints that the automatic penalty that it imposes—30 per cent. of the tax wrongly declared—is too severe and unfair to those who make minor mistakes.
I accept that the penalty in its current form is an unnecessarily blunt instrument. We will therefore undertake a thorough review so that the SMP system can be reformed in the 1992 Finance Bill. I have also asked Customs to make some immediate changes to the rules,
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giving traders more time to put mistakes right themselves without incurring a penalty. I do not wish to pre-empt the review but, while it takes place, I am reducing the rate of penalty from 30 per cent. to 20 per cent.
Accounting for VAT can be an onerous duty for small traders. When VAT was introduced, we exempted firms with the lowest turnovers from registration. Since then, the registration threshold has been indexed.
European Community constraints have meant that, in the past, we have not been able to increase the threshold by more than the rate of inflation. At the end of last year, however, we pressed the case with the Commission to increase the VAT threshold. It responded very positively, and I therefore feel able to go far beyond indexation and to increase the turnover limit for registration by no less than 40 per cent. to £35,000, taking it to its highest level in real terms since the introduction of VAT in 1973. This will benefit up to 150,000 traders. The cost of raising this threshold will be £25 million in the first year, rising to £40 million in 1993–94.
I have two further deregulatory measures to announce, which will benefit very small businesses. At present, all employers have to pay over the pay-as-you-earn and national insurance contributions that they collect from their employees 14 days after the end of each month, but the burden of collection falls unevenly. Large firms are amply compensated for the trouble and cost of collecting the tax by the benefits of holding the money for this period, but small employers are not.
I have a proposal that will reduce the burden on some 700,000 smaller employers. From May onwards, employers making PAYE and national insurance payments of less than £400 each month will pay quarterly, not monthly. This will reduce the administrative burden on firms and help their cash flow, at a one-off cost to the Exchequer of £210 million.
I have one further measure to announce to help very small businesses account for tax. Last year, for the first time, businesses with a turnover below £10,000 were allowed to send the Inland Revenue a simple three-line statement instead of detailed business accounts. This is an important deregulatory measure which cuts out time-consuming paper work for up to 1 million people. From April 1992, I propose to raise the £10,000 limit, so as to allow up to ½ million more people to benefit.
There is a case for making a more radical simplification of the taxation of the self-employed. The Inland Revenue will shortly be publishing a consultative document containing our proposals.
I am concerned that the system of income tax appeals can sometimes operate unfairly, in particular because there is no provision for the award of costs. My noble and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor and I want to deal with criticisms by the Council on Tribunals about the absence of proper rules for hearing tax appeals. We shall be publishing a consultative paper which will include proposals about the award of costs where either party has acted unreasonably.
I have one proposal to limit the impact of capital gains tax on entrepreneurs and on our growing venture capital industry. I have in mind particularly those who may give up safe managerial positions to set out on the risky road of running their own business. For those people, the possibility of a large capital gains tax charge can be a deterrent. I have considered whether it would be suitable

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and sensible to introduce specific rules for venture capital, but I have concluded that that would be extremely difficult.
However, one way in which we can help business men and women to reap the rewards of their efforts is to improve the relief available to them when they retire and have to realise the asset that they have created. That is why I propose to reduce the qualifying age for capital gains tax retirement relief from 60 to 55, and to raise the limits on it. From today, the first £150,000 of capital gains and half of the next £450,000 will be exempt from capital gains tax. This will be a powerful incentive to entrepreneurs to start new businesses.
I have one other important change relating to capital gains tax on small businesses. Under existing law, only companies can offset their trading losses against their capital gains. I propose to give unincorporated businesses similar treatment. This will help small businesses if they wish to sell off assets to help themselves through a difficult period.
In addition to the measures that I have announced for small business, I wish to propose some changes to corporation tax. In his Budget last year, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister raised the profit limits that govern the corporation tax rates paid by smaller companies. He increased the ceiling below which single companies pay corporation tax at 25 per cent. from £150,000 to £200,000, and the upper limit above which they pay the full rate from £750,000 to £1 million.
I propose this year to raise the limits again by a quarter. That means a total increase of 150 per cent. in three years. As a result, companies will need to be earning profits of more than £250,000 before they are liable to pay more than 25 per cent. Companies will not have to pay the full rate of corporation tax until their profits reach £1,250,000 a year. This will benefit 30,000 companies.
In 1984, my right hon. Friend the Member for Blaby made a radical reform of corporation tax. In his time as Chancellor, the main rate of corporation tax was reduced in stages from 52 per cent. to 35 per cent., thus boosting companies' post-tax profits, encouraging profitable investment at home and overseas and increasing the incentive for overseas firms to invest in Britain.
I believe that the philosophy behind his reforms—to widen the tax base, but to reduce the rates—was the right one. It is a policy that has been welcomed by industry. It allows business men, and not Governments, to decide how much to invest and in what to invest. It set the pattern for similar reforms in many countries throughout the world and ushered in an increase in investment of 50 per cent. between 1984 and 1990.
I propose today to take a further step in that direction. Corporation tax rates have remained unchanged at 35 per cent. since 1986, but since then the basic rate of income tax has been reduced from 30p to 25p and the top rate from 60p to 40p. I believe that the time has come to cut the main rate of corporation tax again.
However, I am also aware that cutting the rate of corporation tax only helps companies that are making a profit. Many businesses that have prospered in recent years have moved into loss this year. A cut in corporation tax does not help them and nor, in some cases, do existing arrangements for the carry-back of losses.
I am taking two measures to improve company cash flow. I am cutting by 1 per cent. to 34 per cent. the main rate of corporation tax, applied retrospectively to profits
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earned in the financial year 1990. This will give an immediate boost to the cash flow of companies that were profitable in the year just ending. It will benefit not only companies paying at the main rate, but the 30,000 other companies with profits between the lower and upper profits limits.
To help profitable companies that have just moved into loss, I propose to extend the carry-back period for trading losses from one year to three. That means that more companies making losses will qualify for tax rebates in 1992–93—valued at £250 million—which will help them to carry on through this difficult period.
My main concern in this Budget is to encourage profitable firms to go on investing in Britain's future. The best way in which to do that is to increase still further the post-tax return on successful investment projects. For that reason, I am cutting the main rate of corporation tax on profits earned in the 1991 financial year by two percentage points, to 33 per cent.
The two reductions in the main rate, from 35 to 33 per cent, will together cost £380 million in 1991–92 and £830 million in 1992–93. They will give us the lowest rate among our major competitors—lower than that of the United States, and the lowest in the European Community.

SUPPLY SIDE
The 1980s were years of remarkable progress in our economy, but even more striking was the change in attitudes. The crucial importance of the market is now widely accepted in this country, and even more widely accepted in the House. There is a much greater acknowledgement of the fact that market forces and competition play a vital part in shaping our economy. That remarkable change in ideas and attitudes is the lasting legacy and achievement of my right hon. Friend the Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher).
My right hon. Friend recognised that the key to a better performance by the economy in the long term lay in improving the supply side; and, over the past decade, that has been the aim of our tax policy, trade union and labour market reform, our competition policy, deregulation and privatisation. But, if the United Kingdom economy is to perform to its full potential, we still need a more flexible labour market and a better-skilled work force. I have a number of further measures to announce to that end.
If wages are inflexible, the burden of recession falls disproportionately on jobs: it is the only way for employers to cut costs. There is a considerable prize if we can get pay to take some of the strain. In 1987, we introduced a new tax relief to get profit-related pay off the ground. There are now about 1,250 such schemes in total, involving nearly 300,000 employees; but there can and should be many more, so I propose to make the scheme more attractive.
At present, half an employee's profit-related pay is tax-free. From 1 April, PRP will be free of all tax up to the present limits. It is worth up to a full £1,000 to a basic-rate taxpayer. For some, that could be worth as much as 6p off the income tax rate.
There is another way in which employees can and should enjoy a stake in the companies for which they work—through becoming shareholders in them. Employee share schemes have made a great deal of progress over the past 10 years. By the end of March last year, 2¼ million employees had benefited from shares or options worth

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more than £6·5 billion. Too often, however, employee share schemes have been directed solely at highly paid company executives. I believe strongly that valuable benefits of this kind should be extended to the whole work force.
I have given serious consideration to limiting executive share schemes solely to companies with all-employee schemes in place, but I have instead decided to rely on the carrot rather than the stick. From January next year, the price of shares under executive options may be set at a modest discount of up to 15 per cent. of the shares' market value if—but only if the company has an all-employee share scheme.
I also propose to increase substantially the limits on individual participation in approved all-employee share schemes, and to allow companies tax relief on the costs that they incur in setting up approved employee share schemes and statutory employee share ownership plans.
Another aspect of the supply side that needs improvement is training. A well-trained labour force is an important element in any firm's success. Employers know that and are acting on it. The 1990 labour force survey shows an 85 per cent. increase in the number of employees receiving job-related training since 1984. Despite the recession, the last CBI trends survey reported that over 75 per cent. of employers expected to spend at least as much on training in the next 12 months as they had last year and 29 per cent. expected to spend even more.
However, more and more individuals are also choosing to take responsibility for their own training. Employers can get relief on the training they provide as a normal business expense, yet at present the tax system generally gives no relief to an individual who decides to pay for training to improve his or her skills.
That cannot be right. If we want a better trained, more flexible work force, we should encourage people who want to help themselves. I propose to do just that. I am introducing a tax relief for the fees paid by an individual for training towards most national vocational qualifications and their Scottish equivalents. From April 1992, basic rate tax will be deducted automatically from the fees for qualifying courses, so non-taxpayers will benefit as well as taxpayers. Among those who stand to gain are women wishing to get back to work after having children.

OTHER BUSINESS MEASURES
Many hon. Members have pressed the case for helping two specific industries this year: shipping and films. While I sympathise with their aims, I have to say that there is a limit to the extent to which we can—or should—bend the tax regime to meet the special needs of any particular industry.
The Gulf hostilities have reminded us of the important contribution which our Merchant Navy can make to our defence. I recognise that there is a strategic case for measures to encourage shipping companies to draw their crews from seamen in the United Kingdom, who would be willing and able to serve in time of war. Towards this end, I propose a further relaxation of the rules giving tax relief to seafarers working mainly overseas. This will mean that more seafarers will be exempt from United Kingdom tax on their overseas earnings.
The film industry makes an important contribution to entertainment and culture in this country. The industry has put forward a number of proposals, but having studied
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these carefully, I am afraid I cannot accept them. However, I remain sympathetic, and if it has any alternative proposals that it wishes to put to me over the coming year, I will very happily consider them.
I know that the tax treatment of foreign exchange gains and losses causes difficulties for many businesses. This is one of the most complex and intractable areas of the tax code. Our 1989 consultative document elicited a valuable response but no consensus on the way forward. I am publishing today a further document setting out my specific proposals for reform, which I trust will bring greater rationality to this very important and complex area of the tax system.
I have also to correct one defect in the law affecting building societies. In a recent judgment, the House of Lords concluded that regulations covering the 1986 composite rate transitional provisions for building societies were technically invalid. If I were to take no action about this, there would be a windfall gain to building societies—not their depositors—of £250 million, distributed arbitrarily according to their accounting dates in 1985–86. I have therefore decided to include legislation in the Finance Bill to establish, as the Government and Parliament intended, that interest and dividends paid by societies in these transitional periods may be taxed at 1985–86 rates.

TRUSTS
I turn now to trusts. In 1988, as Financial Secretary, I announced a review of their tax treatment. Today, I am publishing a consultative document on possible changes to the income tax and capital gains tax regime of United Kingdom resident trusts. My proposals include an alternative structure of tax rates, which would bring the treatment of trusts more into line with the treatment of individuals. They would also help to streamline the administration of trusts, saving work for trustees and their advisers.
We have also been reviewing the tax treatment of non-resident trusts. This raises an important issue of principle. In recent years, the use of non-resident trusts as a means of avoiding capital gains tax has increased. I do not think that it is right for a relatively small number of wealthy people to shift very large assets into offshore trusts simply in order to avoid United Kingdom tax. Such people have already benefited from the reductions in the higher rate of income tax. I therefore propose to introduce measures to counter this tax avoidance and to prevent a revenue loss of up to £100 million in a full year.

CHARITIES
I turn now to charities. While people's real incomes have risen by over a third since 1979, charitable giving has more than doubled, partly as a result of the measures taken by my predecessors to encourage more giving. Tax reliefs for charities are now worth at least £800 million a year. Today I have some modest improvements to announce to the tax regime for charities.
I have two measures that should boost giving by businesses. The first is a new relief from income and corporation tax to encourage business gifts of equipment to schools and to other educational establishments.
The second concerns the gift aid scheme introduced last year. This allows companies and individuals to get tax

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relief on cash donations to charities up to a limit of £5 million a year, under the gift aid scheme. Company groups have found that the division of this upper limit between them prevents them from donating as much as they would like. To overcome this problem, I propose to abolish the limit altogether from today. In recent years, there has been a remarkable increase in corporate donations to charities. I hope that this further measure will encourage companies to give even more.
I also propose to adjust some existing VAT reliefs for charities and to ease the conditions for the relief from car tax for vehicles leased to disabled people.

SPORT AND THE ARTS
I now come to a proposal to benefit both sport and the arts. Last year, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minster reduced pool betting duty, on the condition that the benefit was passed to the Football Trust. Following the success of that measure, a proposal has been put to me by one of the pools promoters for a new foundation for both sport and the arts.
League football benefited from last year's Budget measure, and racing benefits from the horse racing betting levy. This new foundation is intended to provide assistance to other sports and to the arts. It will be financed by contributions collected by the pools promoters along with the weekly pools betting stakes, and should raise some £40 million a year.
On the understanding that all the main pools companies agree to participate and that the full amount would be passed on to a new trust established on satisfactory terms, I would be willing to reduce pool betting duty a final time—from 40 per cent. to 37½ per cent. These arrangements would be subject to a review in four years' time. They should make a further £20 million a year available—giving £60 million a year in total—to the foundation in order to support both sport and the arts.

EXCISE DUTIES
I now come to excise duties. First, I propose to raise the duties on alcoholic drinks to maintain their real value. That means that the duties will rise from 6 o'clock tonight by 9·3 per cent.—in line with the increase in the retail prices index in the year to December 1990. That will put about 2p on a pint of beer, 9p on a bottle of wine and around 56p on a bottle of spirits.
I will also be legislating to change the basis on which beer is taxed. The existing system of taxing the so-called "worts" was introduced by my predecessor, Mr. Gladstone. It will now be replaced by one in which the end product, the beer itself, is taxed. The new system will relate the duty more closely to the alcoholic strength of the beer—with a higher tax levied on strong lagers than on low alcohol beers.
I propose increasing all tobacco duties by 15 per cent.—well above the rate of inflation. This will add about 16p to the price of a packet of 20 king size cigarettes, and, I regret to say, around 8p to a packet of small cigars.
There are strong health arguments for a big duty increase on tobacco. In recent years, the duty has fallen in real terms, and cigarette consumption, having declined in the early 1980s, has since begun to turn up again. Raising the duty will help to counter this unwelcome trend.
The motor car imposes large costs on others in the form of pollution and congestion. I have decided therefore to increase the duties on petrol and DERV by 15 per cent, giving the private motorist a strong incentive to choose more fuel-efficient vehicles, and ensuring that those who pollute most, pay most. This is fully in line with the policy set out last year in the Government's White Paper on the environment.
A litre of leaded petrol will rise by nearly 4p, a litre of unleaded by about 3p and a litre of diesel by just over 3p. The tax differential between leaded and unleaded will increase, giving a further boost to the take-up of unleaded. I propose to freeze vehicle excise duty for private cars and light vehicles at £100, for the sixth year running, and also to freeze VED for all heavy goods vehicles.

BENEFITS IN KIND
Many motorists do not own their own cars but drive those provided by their employers. The scales for taxing the private use of company cars have been substantially increased in recent Budgets, but many employers continue to pay their employees in cars rather than in money. I propose to increase the car scales again this year by 20 per cent. This increase will yield £190 million in 1991–92and £250 million in 1992–93.
If people are paid in kind, there is no reason why they should be taxed more lightly than people paid in cash, yet our present system also gives employers an incentive to provide employees with cars rather than cash. Under our present arrangements, they avoid making any contribution to the national insurance fund on the benefit that the employee receives from private use of a car.
I propose that company cars and fuel should now become liable for national insurance contributions, assessed according to the scale charges used for taxation. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Social Security will introduce a Bill to that end. Employers will pay at the main rate, but there will be no change for employees.
Employers' national insurance contributions on cars and fuel will yield an extra £610 million a year of contributions. This will reduce an anomaly in the national insurance contributions system, making it more neutral between different kinds of payment, and will widen the national insurance contributions base.
These new arrangements will take effect from April, but contributions will be collected annually in arrears, so employers will not be asked to pay their first contribution until June 1992. They are already familiar with the scale charges used for the tax so they should be able to make the necessary calculations with the minimum of extra work. They are already familiar with the scale charges.
I turn now to what I regard as one of the greatest scourges of modern life. I refer to the mobile telephone. I propose to bring the benefit of car phones into income tax and to simplify the tax treatment of mobile phones by introducing a standard charge on the private use of such phones provided by an employer. Tax will be paid of £200 for each phone for 1991–92. I hope that, as a result of this measure, restaurants will be quieter and the roads will be safer.

SAVING
I have already drawn attention to the imbalance between savings and investment and its effects in the late 1980s. As companies found more and more opportunities to invest, we needed more savings; but instead, the saving ratio fell. In successive Budgets, my predecessors introduced new tax incentives to save. Many forms of saving now enjoy a highly privileged tax position.
Last year in particular, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister announced a new scheme, the tax-exempt special savings account. TESSA has proved a spectacular success since it arrived on the savings scene nearly three months ago, and has encouraged the savings habit among ordinary taxpayers. Already, over 1·illion people have opened accounts.
My right hon. Friend also announced in his Budget last year the abolition of composite rate tax. From 6 April, non-taxpayers will no longer have to pay tax on their accounts with banks and building societies. These are far-reaching reforms, which need time to settle down and take effect, so this is not the year to disturb the regime that we have just put in place, or to risk causing confusion with further schemes. My main concern has been to consolidate the system that we already have, although I have some modest changes to announce.
I propose to raise the capital gains annual exempt amount to £5,500 and the inheritance tax threshold to £140,000 this year in line with inflation.
National Savings continue to play an important role, particularly for small savers. This summer, I propose to introduce a new National Savings children's bond for children under 16. There will also be a new issue of fixed-interest savings certificates, with a maximum investment of £5,000 compared with £1,000 on the last issue. Other changes to National Savings products will be set out in a press release issued today.
I am also removing the restrictions on friendly societies writing tax-exempt life insurance policies for children, and increasing the limit on premiums for their tax-exempt policies generally from £150 to £200.
Personal equity plans remain an important means of promoting direct share ownership. Since their introduction in 1987, about 1·2 million PEPs have been taken out, and over £3 billion has been invested. I have some further changes to announce.
First, I in tend to allow investment in European Community, as well as United Kingdom, shares both for individuals and for unit and investment trusts. Second, to promote the development of single-company PEPs, I propose to allow investors to put up to £3,000 a year in a single-company PEP, as well as up to £6,000 a year, as now, in a general plan. This will allow total investments of £9,000 a year.
While single-company PEPs are available to any investor, I believe that they provide a natural home for shares acquired under employee share schemes. I therefore propose to allow shares acquired under approved all-employee share schemes to be transferred directly into the company PEP, with no charge to capital gains tax.
Employee share schemes and PEPs have encouraged individuals to become shareholders, but many people have bought their first shares in big offers, mainly privatisations. The first of these to catch the public's imagination
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was British Telecom. The Government currently still own some 48 per cent. of the shares, and I can announce today that I intend to sell part of this holding in the coming year.
Privatisations have been a great success. The next step is to encourage people to invest in shares more generally. One problem is that, to the small investor, the stock market can seem remote, intimidating and somewhat expensive. The development of a genuine retail market for shares in high streets up and down the country would be highly desirable.
To give this the boost it deserves, the Government are considering a change in the way in which they market privatisations. For future large flotations, I am today inviting proposals from the private sector for arrangements to distribute shares directly to the public through high street retail networks.
I hope that there will be proposals both from financial institutions—banks or building societies—and from companies outside the financial sector. If satisfactory proposals can be developed in time, I will consider using such a high-street network in the sale of British Telecom shares.
Such a high street network could be used for primary issues, not only by the Government but by private sector companies and, in the longer term, it could provide a cheap and accessible way for individuals to buy and sell in the secondary market.

MORTGAGE INTEREST RELIEF
The measures that I have just announced will encourage people to save, but there is another side to the story, for the fall in the saving ratio at the end of the 1980s was a result not of a fall in gross savings so much as an increase in borrowing, particularly mortgage borrowing.
In part, that reflected the remarkable increase in home ownership over the last decade. That has been, and remains, a key objective of policy for the Government. A less desirable development, however, was the dramatic boom in house prices during the late 1980s, which fuelled borrowing and helped boost inflation. Many first-time buyers found prices rising much faster than their incomes. We need to do all we can to ensure that, when recovery comes, it is not accompanied by another bout of house price inflation, with the unwelcome consequences that that would have for inflation and interest rates.
I propose to leave the ceiling for mortgage interest relief unchanged at £30,000, but from 6 April 1991 I propose that, relief should be allowed only at the basic rate. That will yield £220 million in 1991–92 on the basis of current interest rates, and £420 million in 1992–93.
I recognise that some people have arranged their affairs on the assumption that higher rate relief will continue. Therefore, to reduce the amount of extra tax they have to pay, I propose to increase the starting point for higher rate tax from £20,700 to £23,700, £1,000 more than required to match inflation. That will keep the number of higher rate payers broadly stable and mean that a married man will not become liable to higher rate tax until his earnings rise to nearly £29,000.
My objective is to reduce the tax subsidy to borrowing without significantly increasing the average tax burden on higher rate taxpayers. Taking those changes with the changes to the personal allowances that I am about to

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announce, the typical increase in liability for a higher rate taxpayer with a £30,000 mortgage will be only around £1 a week.
Of course, the main determinant of the cost of a mortgage is not tax relief, but interest rates. For a higher rate taxpayer with a £50,000 mortgage, the fall in the typical mortgage rate that has already taken place since last autumn fully offsets the change that I am making to mortgage interest relief.

INCOME TAXES
I now come to income tax. Income tax is never welcome, but paying tax unexpectedly is even less so. That is the position facing employees who were working in Kuwait and Iraq at the time the Gulf crisis began. They may now become liable to pay United Kingdom tax on their foreign earnings which they had expected to be exempt. I propose that employees who had intended to work in Kuwait or Iraq for a year or more but were forced to return home earlier by the crisis should not be taxed on their foreign earnings.
I have no changes to make to either the basic rate or the higher rate of income tax. Our objective remains to move towards a basic rate of 20p, but I cannot make further progress towards it this year. Our priority must be to reduce taxes on business.
I propose this year to uprate the personal allowance in line with inflation. It will rise by £290 to £3,295. The personal allowance for the over-65s will increase by £350 to £4,020, and for those aged 75 and over by £360 to £4,180. The married couple's allowances for the elderly will also be increased in line with inflation, from £2,145 and £2,185 to £2,355 and £2,395. The income limit for the allowances for the elderly will increase by £1,200 to £13,500.
However, I am not proposing to increase the married couple's allowance for couples under 65 or the allowances that are linked to it. They will stay at £1,720.
I know that there is a widespread view in the House and in the country that more should be done to help families with children. I propose to use the resources released by not increasing the married couple's allowance for that purpose.
There are some, I know, who advocate the reintroduction of child tax allowances. I have looked at that option carefully, but I am clear—especially following the introduction of independent taxation—that it would not be an effective way of channelling resources to those who need them. A better way of directing help straight into the pockets of mothers, whether they choose to work or not, is child benefit. It goes to all families—to the children of non-taxpayers as well as the children of taxpayers.
I therefore propose to increase child benefit from 7 October by £1 a week for the first eligible child in each family, and by 25p a week for other children. These rises come on top of the increase announced by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Social Security last autumn, which will be paid from 8 April. This means that, in October this year, a benefit of £9·25 a week will be payable for the first child, and £7·50 for each subsequent child.
We will ensure that the increases benefit not only taxpayers but the very poorest families—those on income support and family credit. These increases will help 6·8 million families, and 12·3 million children. I should add
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that the Government have decided that the new levels of child benefit will be uprated in line with inflation next April and in subsequent years.

CENTRAL AND LOCAL TAXATION
The measures that I have announced today maintain a responsible fiscal policy, while giving help to industry and families. They also include some important reforms to the tax system. However, my Budget would not be complete if it did not address one other issue, which has attracted a certain amount of attention recently.
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment will be annoucing very soon the conclusions of our review of local government. I do not propose to anticipate his statement, but there is one announcement I want to make today.
In January, we announced a £1 billion package to reduce the community charge for more than half of all charge payers. Since then, I have been considering whether the impact of local expenditure on the local taxpayer is too great for any system of local taxation to bear.
I have concluded that local taxes are being asked to bear too large a burden, and that the level of the community charge is still too high. However, if local taxes are to fall, and if the standard of local services is to be maintained, taxes elsewhere must rise.
I propose, therefore, to make a substantial switch from local taxation to central taxation. This will amount to about £4¼ billion in the coming financial year—1991–92—and will reduce the net yield of local taxation to about £7 billion. This large reduction in local taxation will take it to a level that the Government believe should be sustainable in the longer term.
We shall introduce a Bill in the next few days to authorise payments of extra grant to local authorities, and to ensure that community charge payers will reap the full benefit in reduced charges in the coming year—1991–92. The money will not be available to increase local authority spending. Domestic rate bills in Northern Ireland will be reduced as well.
The Bill will also ensure that charge payers do not have to start paying their charges until the new and lower charges have been introduced. Later today, my right hon. Friend the Lord President of the Council will make a statement about the arrangements for the Bill. The switch requires a substantial increase in central taxation. I have decided that this should be achieved by raising indirect taxes—that is to say, taxes on spending.
I am proposing, therefore, from 1 April to increase the standard rate of value added tax by two and a half percentage points to 17½ per cent. VAT is a broadly based tax which falls on consumers rather than producers. Since much consumer spending is zero-rated, it bears less heavily on poorer households than on the better-off, so raising VAT is not only an efficient but also a fair way to raise the necessary finance; and raising taxes on spending rather than taxes on income will be better for savings, and consistent with our strategy for tax reform, first set down by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Surrey, East (Sir G. Howe) in his 1979 Budget.
Raising VAT will increase some prices, but the reduction in the community charge will more than offset that effect, so the switch will actually reduce the retail prices index. As a result of these changes, the community charges recently announced in England, Wales and Scotland will be cut by £140. On average, the headline

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charge will be reduced from about £390 to about £250 in both England and Scotland, and from about £260 to about £120 in Wales, while the amounts people actually have to pay, after allowing for relief and benefits, will fall I o under £175 in Great Britain. The charge in Shetland will fall to under £1.

PERORATION
The measures I have announced are designed to meet the three main requirements of any Budget. First, they represent sound finance, and contribute to a firm counter-inflationary policy. My predecessors transformed public finances in the 1980s; my proposals will keep us on track to balance the budget over the 1990s. Secondly, they respond to the economic needs of the moment. I have cut taxes on business, both this year and next, to help it to weather the recession and take advantage of the upturn later in the year. Thirdly, they continue the reform of the tax system to improve the working of the economy in the longer term. In addition, in a year when resources are tight, I have been able to give additional help to families with children. Finally, I have made a decisive reduction in the burden of local taxation across the country, and cut community charges in the coming year by £140.
This Budget is good for business, good for families, good for charge payers and good for the country. I commend it to the House.

PERORATION

  PROVISIONAL COLLECTION OF TAXES
  Motion made, and Question,
  That, pursuant to section 5 of the Provisional Collection of Taxes Act 1968, provisional statutory effect shall be given to the following motions:—

  (a) Spirits (motion No. 2);

  (b) Beer (rate of duty) (motion No. 3);

  (c) Wine and made-wine (motion No. 5);

  (d) Cider (motion No. 6);

  (e) Tobacco products (motion No. 7);

  (f) Hydrocarbon oil (motion No. 8);

  (g) Vehicles excise duty (rates) (motion No. 9);

  (h) Vehicles excise duty (exemptions: 1) (motion No.10); and

  (i) Value added tax (penalty for serious misdeclaration) (motion No. 15).—[ Mr. Norman Lamont]

  put forthwith, pursuant to Standing Order No. 50 (Ways and Means Motions), and agreed to.

Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

  AMENDMENT OF THE LAW
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  That it is expedient to amend the law with respect to the National Debt and the public revenue and to make further provision in connection with finance; but this Resolution does not extend to the making of any amendment with respect to value added tax so as to provide—

  (a) for zero-rating or exempting any supply;

  (b) for refunding any amount of tax, otherwise than by virtue of goods or services supplied to one person being treated for the purposes of section 14(3) of the Value Added Tax Act 1983 as supplied to another person;

  (c) for varying the rate of that tax otherwise than in relation to all supplies and importations; or

  (d) for relief other than relief applying to goods of whatever description or services of whatever description.—[Mr. Norman Lamont.]

  [Relevant document: European Community document No. 4433/91 on the Annual Economic Report 1990–91.]
  4.49 pm
  Mr. Neil Kinnock: As is customary and traditional, I begin by congratulating the Chancellor of the Exchequer on the way in which he delivered his Budget speech. My congratulations are even warmer than they would otherwise have been because he has provided us with what must be the biggest climb-down in modern political history. After two years of wasting £10 billion on the misery, injustice and inefficiency of the poll tax, we find the Government backing off that which was, but less than a year ago, their flagship. There will, however, be less rejoicing over the fact that the right hon. Gentleman proposes to collect more in VAT; despite his protestations, that is not a fair way to collect additional taxation. By definition, the tax is regressive—for people on average incomes and low incomes.—[HON. MEMBERS: "No, it is not."] Oh yes it is. It takes a disproportionate amount from those on average and lower incomes, and everybody knows it.
  Not content with a debate over whether we were to have a head tax or a granny tax or a bedroom tax, the right hon. Gentleman introduces a system of raising taxation to pay for local government services which will tax even children's sweets. It is hard to imagine a tax with a broader scoop—and all to try to bail the Government out of the stupidity of the poll tax mess that they have created.
  That is not to mention all the disasters that will be inflicted—this is not an overstatement—on the cash flow of local government as it tries to cope with an entirely different system of providing the revenue to pay for local services. We shall watch the system and examine it in close detail, and we shall be amazed if the Chancellor gets from the British public the response that he seeks. They hated the poll tax and they will hate this con just as much.
  There are elements in the Budget that we have cause to welcome. As my right hon. Friends remarked during the speech, there will be dancing in the streets of Islwyn, Sparkbrook and Monklands, East in the wake of the imposition of taxes on mobile phones—which the Chancellor described as attacking what he called one of the greatest scourges of modern times. He must have a peculiar perspective; when he said that I imagined he was about to deal with all the iniquities of the poll tax.

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  Nevertheless, there is much agreement on, for instance, the assistance to be given to small businesses. We called last year for the VAT relief on bad debts of more than a year, and we give it all the warmer a welcome for that. Raising the VAT threshold to £35,000 for small businesses is also welcome. The Opposition have joined small businesses and many Conservative Members in urging that. The simplification and reduction of small firms' corporation tax liabilities are sensible.
  The only problem with the other changes that the Chancellor proposes to make in the corporation tax of firms of a variety of sizes is that, although they certainly need relief because of the difficulties that they have experienced in recent years—it amounts to £380 million this year, says the Chancellor, and £800 million in future years—we must make the point that if the Chancellor had such resources they could have been better used on capital allowances which would in turn encourage the movement of more investment into manufacturing industry. That point will be the subject of further debate between the two sides of the House.
  We warmly welcome the announced limitation of mortgage tax relief to the basic rate of income tax. That has been our policy for several years now, and the Chancellor—inadvertently, I am sure—has made our job much easier when we form the Government after the next general election.
  By way of a final immediate response to the Budget I must mention the changes announced in respect of child benefit. Judging from the hype, I had thought that the right hon. Gentleman would perform another spectacular somersault in this area and that he would roll back the years of the former Prime Minister and previous Chancellors during which the value of child benefit was significantly reduced. I had expected from a family man some understanding of just how significant child benefit is to large numbers of families on average and below average incomes. Instead we are given the postponed payment of an extra £1 for the first child and 25p for other children. I wonder that the right hon. Gentleman had the gall to come and announce 25p. He must have some idea, even on his income, of the expenses involved in bringing up children. His failure to recognise what those expenses mean for working families and families without jobs shows a contempt for their interests.
  To restore child benefit to its level when the Government froze it, the Government would have had to increase it by £2·30 for children other than the first child and by £1·30 for the first child. Their failure to do that shows that they are continuing their bias of 12 years' standing against people on modest incomes and in favour of the best-off people in the country.
  This is the Chancellor's first Budget and it is also the first since Britain became an exchange rate mechanism economy. This Budget is presented just 21 months before the completion of the single market in the European Community. It is also being presented in a recession. Given those dominating factors, it was only reasonable to expect that the Chancellor would deal with them directly in the Budget. We expected him to face up squarely to the challenges posed by the conditions that our economy faces. He did not. Instead, he dodged; he gave us a short-term Budget—a tinkering Budget. It will not stop
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  the slump. It will not help to build strength for the future. It will do nothing to enhance the competitiveness of British industry.
  As the completion of the single market draws nearer, we see in the economies of our competitors economic growth and investment performance that vastly exceed those of this country, under this Government. The Chancellor spoke of recession everywhere, but let us put that into perspective. In Italy, growth is running at 2·4 per cent. and investment at 4·1 per cent. In France, growth is at 2 per cent. and investment at 3 per cent. In Germany, growth is running at 4·8 per cent. and investment at 5 per cent. In Britain, after 12 years under this Government, growth is minus 2 per cent. and overall investment is minus 3·4 per cent. In a country that used to be the workshop of the world, manufacturing investment essential to any future success of our economy is falling by 15 per cent. year on year. Yesterday's figures on manufacturing output showed a fall of 8 per cent. this year.
  The Chancellor should have made a statement of shame about such figures and such a performance. Nothing like that is occurring in any comparable economy. Other countries are building up their economies in the approach to 1992 whereas the Government are running down the British economy. The Budget will not help to get Britain back to the growth or investment levels of our competitors before the single market is completed.
  Last week, the Prime Minister said that he wants Britain to be
  "where we belong, at the very heart of Europe".
  It is a commendable aspiration, which is shared by many of us. The trouble is that, after these Tory years, we shall be not at the heart of Europe, where we belong, but at the tail of Europe, where the Government have put us. The Budget will not stop that occurring.
  In the wake of the Budget, unemployment will continue to rise, firms will continue to close and businesses will continue to fail. The cut in interest rates that we expect today, before the end of the week or some time next week, should help to mitigate all the pressure of the slump. However, although the cut is necessary and welcome, it will not be enough to stop the recession spreading and deepening. The damage that the Government's policies have done to the economy, to industry and to services is so deep and wide that the effects of a slump made in Downing street will continue for a long time to come.
  In Britain now, 3,000 jobs are being lost and a hundred businesses fail every day. But industries and firms that go out of production today are unlikely to reappear tomorrow. There is a permanent loss of industrial capacity. Since the second world war, Britain has been through that experience only once before—in the last Tory slump, less than 10 years ago.
  The Chancellor said that recessions are always painful. Our only experience of recessions is under Governments whom he supports. It is no accident. The genuine worldwide slump in the wake of oil price rises in the mid-1970s hit every industrial country—indeed, every country. It is more than a coincidence that the only two other recessions that we have experienced since 1945 have been under Conservative Governments. The difference between the last recession and this one is that this time the Government's policies are even killing off the survivors. Companies that managed to pull through the last recession have been unable to beat this one, and enterprises formed and built since the last recession have been wiped out.

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  Firms of all sizes are burdened by debt, including so-called distress borrowing, which now runs at over £20 billion—some say as much as £25 billion. Companies are borrowing to survive, not for investment, development or expansion. Redundancy notices and bankruptcy lists are not confined to the so-called old or traditional industries, but have affected electronics and aerospace, machine tools and textiles, software, construction and engineering industries. Well-managed, progressive and forward-looking companies are going down. Unemployment is gripping the south and the midlands, just as it is going up, yet again, in Scotland, Wales and the north of England.
  So many of the people who are victims of the recession were promised an economic miracle. The Government encouraged them to borrow and spend and told them that they were part of an "enterprise society". Those people testify daily to the fact that they have been deceived and betrayed by a Government for which many of them voted.
  In his economic survey this afternoon—his Budget retrospective—the Chancellor hardly gave a word or a thought to those people or to their jobs, industries or futures. If he had made a n extensive reference to them and their difficulties, he would have had to say how deep the recession really was and where it came from. If he had done that, he would have had to condemn the ex-Chancellor, his right hon. Friend the Prime Minister.
  That is not simply my judgment. An experienced commentator recently reported:
  "The Chancellor … is …tightly boxed in by factors not so much of his own making, but that of his predecessor—and his predecessor but one".
  That was said by the right hon. Member for Chingford (Mr. Tebbit), who was reporting—and no doubt earning a few bob in the course of doing so—in the Daily Express. No one could describe him as unfavourable to the Prime Minister because he was among the first to say that the present Prime Minister was the most natural successor to the right hon. Member for Finchley (Mrs. Thatcher).
  I suppose that the Chancellor, the Prime Minister and the rest of the Government would like to be remembered as the people who took on rising inflation and pushed it down, but there are two big blemishes in their record. First, they brought the inflation in the first place. Secondly, the very same policies that they used to squeeze demand and inflation are also the policies that are crushing firms, industries and jobs. If the Government want to claim credit for combating inflation, they must also take the blame for causing the slump. No one else deserves the blame.
  The right hon. Member for Shropshire, North (Mr. Biffen) said two weeks ago:
  "After 12 years in office there are no Conservative alibis".
  That is certainly true, but it is also true that, if the Government were to have more time in power, they would continue to do the same thing. They would eventually float the economy out of a slump simply by relying on a rise in credit-financed consumption, and would try to tackle the resulting inflationary pressures in the economy with high interest rates. They have no other policies for a recovery; as they have shown before. That would push up prices, debts and wage claims, push down investment and output and wipe out industrial capacity, yet again. They have done that not just once in the past decade, but twice. They have not changed their policies, and they have still not learnt.
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  Last night I watched the "Panorama" programme—I suspect that many other hon. Members also watched it—on the slump and the way in which it is spreading. I saw the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry say that he was certain that
  "industry is poised to respond to a growth in demand".
  How can he say that? It did not happen last time. When the Government's policies wiped out 20 per cent. of Britain's manufacturing capacity in the early 1980s and then let credit rip in the mid-1980s, British industry could not respond to the rise in demand. The result was, as the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry should understand, that Britain had its first ever deficit in manufactured trade, a huge balance of trade deficit and then, of course, a gigantic balance of payments deficit—so big that it remains at the figure that the Chancellor gave us this afternoon, despite two years of pressing deflationary policy. We still have a balance of payments deficit that would have been utterly unacceptable in any previous period—although in previous periods our economy never had the benefit of North sea oil and self-sufficiency.
  Yet again today the Chancellor did nothing to stop history repeating itself as tragedy. There is no strategy to this Budget—merely expediency. There is no effort in this Budget—or in any other of the Government's policies—to help to create an environment in which productive industry can thrive and become more competitive.
  There was no sign—not so much as a hint—of any significant policy for promoting industrial investment in research and development and technology transfer. The best that we got was a way—a welcome way—of trying to help companies that have hit particular difficulties as a result of the Government's policies. There was no commitment to—and certainly no practical means were proposed for—maintaining macro-economic stability. In 12 years the Government have never managed to achieve the sustained low interest rates that are essential to that. The only way in which they have ever got inflation down is by throttling the economy with high interest rates—the opposite of stability.
  In 12 years, the other critical ingredients of competitiveness and of combating inflation—sustained improvements in the transport system, training and education—have never been afforded the necessary priority by the Government. They were certainly given scant attention today. It appears that education—the cause of great anxiety among parents, the public and industry—is now made into a poll tax plaything, and the cuts go on. Let me give an example. Last week, 17 Conservative-controlled local education authorities announced £54 million-worth of additional cuts in education—the only reason being that they wanted to try to stay within the limits set down by the Government, who are supposed to have education close to their heart.
  Now, if the Government have their way, education is to be balkanised into a tangle of opted-out schools and underfunded colleges as the chaotic experiments of the 1980s are extended into the 1990s. Now we know what the Prime Minister really meant when he told The Times a few weeks ago that, although education was "closest to his heart", his thoughts were not yet "fully worked up".
  "I approach this issue,"
  said the right hon. Gentleman,
  "with an instinct that something needs to be done and we are trying to determine exactly what it is."

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  While the Prime Minister is "trying to determine" exactly what he wants for education—while the Prime Minister is dithering—millions of other British people with children approaching school age and of school and college age are worrying. Industrialists and potential employers are urging a new scale of provision and performance and investment in education. All are looking at our neighbours who are making the proper investment in education and training so that their people reap the rewards of new skills and their economies reap the rewards of extra strength and competitiveness.
  The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster seems to think this funny. He is going to have to explain how it is that, after 12 years of Tory Government, Britain still has skill shortages in the middle of a deep slump. He will have to explain why numerous industrialists and employers—people who are his political allies—hotly condemn the Government's absolutely miserable record over all these years. From this Government and in this Budget, we get no commitment comparable to that made in our neighbouring competitive countries. There never will be that commitment.
  In 12 years of power, with £100 billion-worth of oil revenues, £62 billion-worth of assets sales and the highest tax burden in British history, the Government have never made the necessary investment. Just last week, we heard the Prime Minister say:
  "We have been going in a particular direction for 12 years and we shall continue to go in that direction".
  I suppose that that was intended to reassure the Finchley matriarch and her remaining followers. The Prime Minister's words are a warning to all those who, during these 12 years, have been engulfed by spreading poverty. It is a warning to the victims—those who have had security and success snatched from them by unemployment, high interest rates, business failure and high mortgage rates. It is the victims of industrial decline, and decay in the essential community and welfare services, who should be warned. The Prime Minister's words are a warning that the Government, who are
  "going in the same direction"
  as they have been for the past 12 years, will take Britain and the British people further behind.
  In the depth of recession, we needed a Budget to build out of recession. We needed a Budget that helped to lay foundations for future economic strength. Instead, we got a Budget from a Government who will not learn from their own failures and—even worse—will not learn from the success of others. The British people know that that is true. They know, too, that this Government ruled over the wasted decade of the 1980s. When the Government call the general election and give them the chance, the British people will stop them wasting the 1990s.
  5.16 pm
  Mr. John Biffen: The Leader of the Opposition has an enviable record as a Welsh rugby union coach, but as I watched him at the Dispatch Box this afternoon it was more in the discipline of cricket that I judged him. He resembled nothing so much as the batsman who had found that the wicket had turned overnight. He has discovered—and it is much to his distress—that the Conservative party does not intend to limp across the election battlefield with the ball and chain of the
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  community charge. To the right hon. Gentleman's discomfort, the Conservative party has taken a radical way out of the dilemma and met the challenge.
  Mr. John Lee: We have shot his fox.
  Mr. Biffen: I do not think that the Leader of the Opposition has ever been on a horse in his life—and if he has been on a horse, he has certainly never been hunting, so we can now return to the more relevant analogy afforded by the cricket field to describe the proposals for changes in the financing of local government.
  The right hon. Gentleman showed his irritation because the debate has shown the striking reality that so much of local government is conducted at the behest and under the control of central Government. From my study of the life of Aneurin Bevan I have always judged that to be the case. It was Aneurin Bevan who told the story of his pilgrimage from the meanest local authority in Monmouthshire up to Westminster—always looking to discover where the reality of power lay. I say that for the benefit of Welsh Labour Members, who know in their hearts that it is true.
  What has been adduced today is an attempt to bring about a better balance between the forces of finance and authority. Anyone who has any doubts about where authority has always sought to be in this matter need only think of Shirley Williams who, as Secretary of State for Education and Science, tried to require universal comprehensive education throughout England and Wales. That is an indication of the underlying realities.
  The Chancellor's remarks about the future financing of local authorities will form the basis of a very relevant debate, and I believe that the balance of judgment will conclude that wise decisions have been made. Given the way in which the judgment has been presented, one could suppose that it involves a hypothecated increase in value added tax for the replacement of the community charge or part thereof. Of course, that cannot be so—it is merely the point at which the debate opens. We are talking about the use of the wider resources of central Government taxation for the financing of local authorities, not about any particular aspect of central Government taxation.
  Mr. Kevin Barron: Why did the right hon. Gentleman serve in a Government who reduced the percentage of money provided for local government by central Government?
  Mr. Biffen: I am happy to answer that question at once. It was——
  Mr. George Foulkes: A mistake.
  Mr. Biffen: Yes, it was a mistake. I am prepared to appear before any audience with the hon. Gentleman: I will plead my mistakes and he will plead his certainty, and I know who will get the vote.
  The issue of the public sector borrowing requirement has returned to our Budget debate after an absence of some time. I feel no joy at it once again being part of the Budget debate, but I accept that, with the general state of the economic cycle, it is reasonable to budget for a certain amount of borrowing. That also places a restraint on our rhetoric about and our objectives for income tax. From now on income tax, with other central Government taxation, will have to bear its responsibility in the financing of local government. That does not mean that we

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  cannot have as our objective an income tax rate of 20p in the pound, but it will be a considerably more difficult objective to secure, and our rhetoric must adjust to that.
  I wish to touch on just two or three points because many other hon. Members wish to take the great debate forward. I do not pretend that there is a great theme running through my speech. I cannot deny my initial appreciation that the right hon. Member for Islwyn (Mr. Kinnock) should be so discomforted about the replacement of the community charge.
  My right hon. Friend the Chancellor rightly laid great emphasis on the need for a business revival. I declare an interest, and my business interests are listed in the Register of Members' Interests. I hope that when the Finance Bill goes into Committee, some thought will be given to the current levels of investment allowances. I did not hear that matter feature in my right hon. Friend's speech, but I hope that it is not out of his mind.
  I do not think that any hon. Member expected interest rates to feature in my right hon. Friend's statement. I can remember Budgets, even from this Government, which concealed interest rate changes. I see the author of one—my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Surrey, East (Sir G. Howe)—sitting not so far from me. There have been other diversions this afternoon, but continuing and substantial reductions in interest rates would be most advantageous of all to the business community.
  It is obvious that we are under the shadow of a general election. We should not be too sensitive about that—it is expected that we should so react. I have noted a certain reticence by Opposition spokesmen. I do not say that the Labour party has a hidden agenda, but there are certain aspects of the development of economic policy that it would prefer to elaborate beyond the electoral chasm——
  Mr. Allan Rogers: What are they?
  Mr. Biffen: It is a process of education—a sharing of knowledge with the hon. Gentleman. I have a document——
  Mr. Kinnock: It is the 1979 manifesto.
  Mr. Biffen: I assure the right hon. Gentleman that it is much better than that. It comes from the Institute for Public and Policy Research—a recently furbished intellectual hothouse that is part of the redesigning of the Labour party to make it fit for alliance with the Liberal Democrats. It is presided over by Lady Blackstone and Lord Donoughue, the aristocrats of Labour. They have commissioned a Mr. John Grieve-Smith who worked in the economic section of the Cabinet Office arid the Treasury—what a lineage.
  With that background, the document has been presented by that body, which moves so closely with the Leader of the Opposition and his Front Bench——
  Mr. Derek Foster: No, it does not.
  Mr. Biffen: The hon. Gentleman should not deny it—that would upset Lord Donoughue's day.
  The Times said:
  "A report by the Institute for Public and Policy Research says that … Britain's entry into the exchange rate mechanism has made the case for a co-ordinated pay strategy even more urgent … Mr. Grieve-Smith says that the government must reach agreement on pay policy with the CBI and the TUC not as a short-term expedient but as part of a long-term strategy for economic management."
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  Well, there are none like the old ones. Those of us who recollect the 1960s and 1970s will feel a certain nostalgia about that.
  I hope that I am giving a little good-natured guidance to the Leader of the Opposition. I promise him that I will be a better friend to him than most of those who sit around and about him. I want to know why those distinguished academics were scooped out of the Treasury and put under the wing of Lady Blackstone. The process is intellectual beyond belief. It is dotty. They want the TUC to carry out an incomes policy backed by Government statute. Yet only 38 per cent. of employees belong to trade unions. There has been a remarkable fall of about 25 per cent. in the unionised work force since 1979. The very forces which could not deliver in the 1960s and 1970s are being invoked now by the intelligentsia who flank the Leader of the Opposition. This time, they offer the prospect of success from an even more rickety machine.
  I tell the Leader of the Opposition that that is not part of the hidden agenda—it will be part of the open debate at the coming election. There will be a growing interest, especially among the Liberal Democrats, to know where the right hon. Gentleman stands on these issues. He has had a comparatively easy time with endless good-natured discourse across all the affairs of the nation and the world without ever having to reveal very much. I must tell him that his salad days are over. We are approaching an election and a debate, and I look forward to that.
  Several Hon. Members rose——
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Harold Walker): Order. A large number of hon. Members who have sat through the debate so far want to take part. Brief speeches would be appreciated.
  5.27 pm
  Mr. Stuart Bell: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for calling me so early in the debate.
  My right hon. Friend the Member for Islwyn (Mr. Kinnock) was right to draw the attention of the House to the fact that 3,000 jobs are being lost and 100 businesses being liquidated every day. That contrasts with the Chancellor's speech, which lasted one and a quarter hours, but did not once use the word "unemployment". The right hon. Gentleman said that his Budget was intended to assist business to recover from the recession in the short term and to invest in the long term. The Government have had 12 years to provide such a Budget, but they have not done so, and they did not do so today.
  We hear a great deal from the Tory party about recessions being due to economic cycles. We know all about the cycles of the Tory party. We can go back to Anthony Eden in 1957, who introduced a Budget in the April that reduced income tax by half a crown, and another in the autumn, after an election, that increased it. We can go back to the great dash for growth by Anthony Barber in the early 1970s, which gave us the inflation that Labour inherited in 1974.
  The Chancellor heaped great praise on his predecessor, the right hon. Member for Blaby (Mr. Lawson). He talked of economic miracles. He was proud of the fact that there were economic miracles. At the Dispatch Box, he read press cuttings from Germany, the United States and Japan showing how Britain was having an economic miracle. Today, we have had some of the truth from the new

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  Chancellor of the Exchequer who said that he did not believe in miracles. It has taken us 12 years to get such an admission.
  The Chancellor said that inflation would be down to about 4 per cent. in the autumn, and no doubt there is a plan to bring interest rates down as well so that by the autumn they are about 10 per cent. We see how the Government and the Chancellor have lost control of the economy, to such an extent that the Chancellor was unable today to announce a reduction in interest rates. We will have to wait until tomorrow in this three-instalment plan—the Budget today, a cut in interest rates tomorrow and the abolition of the poll tax on Thursday. It is not surprising that the Prime Minister is tired. I have every sympathy with him. To have to preside over such a week must be trying for him.
  We know all about the cycles of this Government. The first cycle from 1979–81 gave us inflation of 21·9 per cent. We have been here before. In 1981–83, unemployment was 3 million. Again, we have been here before. We see the simple equation between high interest rates, lowering inflation and unemployment. Again, the unemployed are taking the full strain. Only recently, Barclays bank announced 4,000 lay-offs countrywide, and the Midland bank announced 5,000 lay-offs during the year. Years ago, joining the bank meant a job for life. That is no longer the case. One of the consequences of the past 12 years of Thatcherism has been the end of the security of a job for life in the service industry, just as happened in the early days in manufacturing industry.
  Those of us who try to speak early in the Budget debate each year have argued all along that the consequences of a single club policy would be high interest rates. We said that jobs would be destroyed, and jobs have been destroyed. We said that firms would be destroyed, and firms have been destroyed. We said that tax receipts would be reduced, and we have seen that again in today's Budget. We said that social security payments would be increased, and we have seen that again in today's Budget.
  It is hardly surprising that falling receipts and rising social security payments mean that the public sector surplus, of which the Government were so proud for so long, is now on the increase, and we have a PSBR of £8 billion. The Chancellor did not tell us from the Dispatch Box what the PSBR was forecast to be in the year ahead. No doubt that again is a consequence of the fact that we shall have to wait until Thursday to discover the true consequences of the abolition of the poll tax.
  Opposition Members have consistently said that squeezing inflation out of the economy cannot be the only goal of an economic policy. There has been no industrial strategy, no training strategy and no planning for the future. All we have had is the encouragement of a never-never land of gearing and credit which reminds me of Oscar Wilde who, when he died in Paris, said that he was dying as he had lived—beyond his means.
  The British consumer has, for the past 12 years under the Tory Government, been living beyond his means, encouraged by a Government who do not believe in planning, in intervention or in steering the economy towards manufacturing. On the one hand, they said that the citizen must cut excess borrowing and spending, but on
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  the other they encouraged him to borrow more and to spend more, to live for today as if there were no tomorrow. Such a policy can clearly be described as short-termism.
  The medium-term financial strategy, the Government's great strength in the early years, their great policy on which everything was based, gave us short-termism. We have heard nothing today about soft landings. We have had a variety of definitions of a recession. One was that a recession occurs when economic growth falls for two quarters in succession. Dr. John Bridge, chief executive of the Northern Development company, has described it as negative growth. I prefer the more mundane and earthly description of a former President of the United States, President Truman, who said:
  "It's a recession when the man next door loses his job. It's a slump when you lose yours."
  There is no prospect, Mr. Deputy Speaker, of you losing your job, but we can see clearly where the Government have taken us.
  Between 1979 and 1981, Teesside lost so many jobs that the unemployed could have filled Ayresoine Park football stadium twice over. As my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition said, the recession is in the south and in the midlands, but it is creeping into the north. We have seen that over the past few weeks. British Steel has told the public on Teesside that it will be shedding 360 jobs in the next financial year. The unions claim that the figure is more likely to be between 500 and 600. Smaller firms are going into liquidation–50 jobs here and another 50 jobs there.
  The Chancellor said today that the car industry was growing in strength, but Minories is closing a garage with a loss of 25 jobs. Even ICI, the great provider of work in our area, is introducing local working arrangements which will reduce jobs. This is a recession by 1,000 cuts.
  Mr. Richard Holt: The hon. Gentleman likes to give the downside on Teesside, but perhaps he would like to give the upbeat side with the number of new jobs that have been provided by MTM, a growing and expanding chemical company. Our local chamber of commerce has said that the real problem is that we will not have enough skilled people in future rather than a shortage now. I understand that the hon. Gentleman has unemployment problems in his constituency, but my constituency has not, and that is in Teesside as well.
  Mr. Bell: I anticipated the hon. Gentleman's question, and I have the unemployment statistics for his constituency of Langbaurgh, where 4,532 people, or 6 per cent. of the work force, are out of work. In Stockton, South, another constituency close to mine, 4,507 people, or 10 per cent. of the work force, are out of work. The hon. Gentleman might soon have to address the question of those 4,532 people who are out of work. When he says that there is a shortage of skills, he must ask who, after 12 years of a Tory Government, is responsible for that. I shall be glad to give him the Labour party's programme, worked out by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Monklands, East (Mr. Smith), which shows clearly the Labour party's training policy so that those skills will be provided in future.
  The Chancellor mentioned some benefit to football last season and some new scheme for sport in his Budget today. He reminded me somewhat of the super-sub who had been brought on to the field with only 10 minutes to go, whose aim was to score the spectacular goal. There he

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  was, hovering on the touchline. There he was down by the corner flag. There he was afraid to be caught offside. There he was running away from the ball—anywhere but where the action was.
  This is the Chancellor's first Budget but it may well be his last. We have had a one-club policy, and it may be that we shall have a one-term Chancellor. He was timid and unimaginative. He did not produce a Budget for jobs or for people. He has lost control of the economy. As I said, he could not even tell us whether interest rates would be reduced tomorrow. He will be relieved of his job as soon as the referee blows the whistle and ends the game, when we have a general election. Then, and only then, will he and the rest of his team be put out of their misery.
  5.39 pm
  Mr. David Knox: In the Budget debate last year I followed the hon. Member for Middlesbrough (Mr. Bell) and it is my good fortune to do so again today. The factual bases of the hon. Gentleman's speeches are usually accurate, but I detected two inaccuracies today. First, he said that the Chancellor did not refer to unemployment, when he did. Secondly, he suggested that R. A. Butler had reduced income tax by 2s 6d in the pound in 1955; in fact, it was only 6d, which is a fifth of 2s 6cl. We tend to forget those values now that we are on a different system.
  I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Chancellor on his Budget—the first, I hope, of many. His two predecessors set high standards with their Budget speeches which were well constructed, to the point and commendably brief, and my right hon. Friend maintained those standards.
  At this stage in a Parliament it is inevitable that the Budget will be judged on its likely electoral consequences rather than on its economic consequences. My right hon. Friend got it right on both scores. It is an extraordinarily good Budget.
  I agree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Shropshire, North (Mr. Biffen) about the increased proportion of local government expenditure which is to be met in future by central Government. That is long overdue. Taxes raised locally have been contributing far too much to local government revenue for too long, because most of the real decisions about local government expenditure are taken in the House rather than locally.
  The reduction of £140 in the poll tax—I call it the poll tax although I appreciate that my right hon. and hon. Friends on the Treasury Bench have to use the term "community charge"—will be very welcome in my constituency, as it will be throughout the country.
  It is unpleasant that VAT will have to go up by 2·5 per cent. to finance the reduction in the poll tax. The Labour party has been criticising the Government for some time because too much local government expenditure has been met locally. rf it is to beinet centrally; the tonsequence is that it has to be paid for, either by increasing taxation or by reducing expenditure on other things. The Opposition outburst when my right hon. Friend the Chancellor announced the 2·5 per cent. increase in VAT suggested to me that they were dodging the task of facing the real issues and the hard decisions that have to be taken by any Government.
  Mr. William Ross rose——
  Mr. Knox: I am not giving way—Mr. Deputy Speaker asked us to be brief.
  I welcome the changes announced concerning child benefit. The initial changes are small but, most important, the Chancellor intimated that child benefit will be index-linked to inflation from next year. Some of us have been very concerned about child benefit for some time. We are delighted that in future we shall not have to rebel against the Government to show our opposition to their failure to uprate it.
  I also welcome the changes in company taxation. We need only consider the state of industry to realise the necessity for a better cash flow if much of industry is to survive. Therefore, it is particularly important that the Chancellor should have proposed changes in corporation tax, an increase in the VAT threshold and the other measures. Those should be helpful in strengthening our industrial base.
  On the general state of the economy, a year ago the main economic problems facing the country were inflation and the balance of payments. Now the problem that looms above all others is the recession, although the balance of payments is still a cause for concern. As a result of Government policies over the past couple of years, inflation has been largely brought under control. It has fallen in recent months and it is likely to fall to about 4 per cent. by the end of the year, as my right hon. Friend the Chancellor pointed out.
  Unfortunately, the policies of high interest rates and tight credit that have been so successful in curbing inflation are the same policies that have forced us into recession. Output is falling, profits are falling, investment is falling and, alas, unemployment is rising. That is not a happy position, and action must be taken to reverse those trends. There is urgency about it because of the time lag between taking action and the action becoming effective.
  The economy desperately needs the stimulation to growth which only lower interest rates can bring. I welcome the action that the Chancellor has already taken in that respect. I urge him to continue the process over coming months. Lower interest rates are essential if we are to avoid a more serious recession than that of 1980–82 when the manufacturing sector was particularly hard hit; already there are signs that it is being badly affected again.
  I often wonder if the importance of manufacturing industry is fully appreciated. Obviously, it has to try to meet the domestic demand for manufactured goods and to keep imports to a minimum, but it is also important in relation to our export performance. Government figures show that, whereas about 80 per cent. of manufactured output is internationally tradeable, only about 20 per cent. of the service sector is, sp if we are to have a healthy international payments position we must have a strong competitive manufacturing sector.
  Alas, the recent history of manufacturing gives little cause for comfort. Between December 1973 and December 1990—a period of 17 years—output in manufacturing industry rose by only 3·5 per cent. The House will note that that period covers the terms of office of the last Labour Government and of the present Conservative Government. There is, therefore, no party political capital to be made from that poor performance.
  It is worth recalling that the increase of about 3·5 per cent. in manufacturing output in the last 17 years compares with an increase of about 70 per cent. in the

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  previous 17 years. Of course, that sorry tale is not just the fault of the Government. The conduct of management and of trade unions has left a great deal to be desired.
  The Government can and must contribute to the strength of the manufacturing sector, particularly by improving the economic environment in which it operates. In that respect, as I mentioned earlier, lower interest rates are essential for three main reasons. First, they would help to increase demand for goods produced by manufacturing industry. Secondly, they would encourage higher investment in new plant and machinery, which would improve efficiency and increase capacity. Thirdly, they would ensure that the owners of capital received a higher return from investment in manufacturing industry than from fixed-interest securities.
  I mentioned earlier that we still have a balance of payments problem, although it is less serious than it was a year ago. It is pleasing to note that the figures for 1990 showed that the deficit had declined by a third compared with the previous year. But we must remember that economic growth has been held back in the past year. When that happens, the balance of payments tends to improve. The great worry is that when the economy starts to expand again, the deficit will increase once more. When we consider that we have been in deficit to a fairly substantial extent over the last four years, the worry is that we shall face very large deficits again in a year or two.
  The only conclusion to be drawn is that there is something fundamentally wrong with the exchange rate of sterling and that an adjustment is needed. We are now in the exchange rate mechanism of the European monetary system. Membership of the ERM is important and stable exchange rates are important for the manufacturing sector in particular. I believe in the disciplinary effect on inflation of British membership of the ERM, and I have no desire to undermine our membership, but it would be strange if we had got the value of sterling right when we joined—indeed, it seems that we did not. I believe an early adjustment should be made, but it should be made clear that it is a one-off adjustment, so that we in no way undermine the disciplinary effects of membership of the exchange rate mechanism. It should be made clear to foreigners, and to those who are worried about confidence in sterling, that it is a one-off move and that we strongly believe in the discipline of the ERM.
  I believe that it is very important that we should be in the exchange rate mechanism, but at the correct level for sterling, because in that way the current account of our balance of payments can be in balance over the years. It also provides price stability to importers and exporters and anti-inflationary discipline. Moreover, if we adjusted the value of sterling within the mechanism on a one-off basis it would be possible to lower interest rates because it would not be necessary to keep them at their present high level to maintain the present value of sterling.
  5.50 pm
  Dr. David Owen: The House has listened to what will probably be viewed as the first social market budget. I wish that it had been produced by a Social Democrat Chancellor, but since the Conservative
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  party seems to be joining the Christian Democrats, perhaps we may agree that we are now witnessing social market economics in this country.
  The social priorities spelled out in the Budget are welcome and totally new for this Government. They have not been demonstrated for eleven and a half years. For example, the emphasis upon mortgage tax relief being confined to the standard rate taxpayer is thoroughly welcome and socially correct.
  The decision to increase child benefit by 12 per cent.—after its real value has fallen during the past eleven and a half years—although modest, is extremely welcome and seems to mark a major shift in social priorities because the Chancellor accompanied it with a commitment that child benefit would go up in line with inflation in future, as with all other basic benefits. We welcome that strongly.
  The third social element in the Budget which is extremely important is the 15 per cent. increase on cigarettes, which are a killer drug and have been treated with kid gloves for far too long by this Government. That is the right social priority, as was the courageous decision to increase petrol by 15 per cent. because, in social terms, cars are an expensive element in the transport infrastructure.
  I would not welcome those social changes were they not also accompanied by some worthwhile changes on the supply side of the economy, aimed at improving efficiency and competitiveness of the market economy, which is necessary for a social market to operate effectively, as one cannot finance some of the social concerns unless the market is operating efficiently.
  That leads me to the crucial test of the Budget—has the Chancellor played fast and loose with inflation and with consumer spending? I acquit him of the charge of doing so. People will say that this is an election Budget, and the decks are certainly cleared for an election in June, October or next year, but given the circumstances, it is not an electoral-bribing budget. It is not as irresponsible as some of the Budgets that the right hon. Member for Blaby (Mr. Lawson) triggered off, particularly before the 1987 election, which caused a flagrant consumer boom. However, the Budget will have its electoral payback, because I would not be surprised if the international market were not prepared for a substantial cut now in interest rates. That is also the core priority.
  By emphasising business, the Chancellor has chosen the right medium-term priority. My only anxiety is that by relaxing corporation tax and reducing it—although in many ways that is welcome, especially as it will give extra liquidity to companies that are being severely squeezed, which will get worse in the next few months—the corporate sector will act as it has so often done before when there has been a little relaxation, and will take the pressure off the wages front.
  I only hope that it does not do so, because the one fundamental that must come from the squeeze is a permanent reduction in our tendency to pay ourselves more than we earn. If we are to stay within the exchange rate mechanism—especially at present exchange rates—unit costs have to be reduced, and our competitiveness has to improve. That means wage increases at a level of 4 or 5 per cent. That is why I also welcome the incentives for more profit-related pay, which also has a social market connotation. That is also why I welcome the principle of shares for all employees and the carrot to introduce that. I welcome the Chancellor's implicit statement that he

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  would not hesitate to use the stick to introduce that—and he may well have to carry that out. It has been scandalous that top executives have given themselves share options at attractive rates but have not provided similar options throughout the firm. Again, that is another welcome switch towards the social market economy.
  The fundamental requirement is to be bold over interest rates. If I was Chancellor, I would give the world a little time to absorb this Budget. Because of the changes in local government financing, it is more complex than it appears at first sight, but when the world has absorbed it, people will realise that the Chancellor has not taken risks with the economy, and he will be fully justified in taking 1 per cent. off interest rates now and a further I per cent.—perhaps in two tranches of 0·5 per cent.—during the next few weeks. If there are risks to be taken on the back of this Budget, it is urgent that that should be done by cutting interest rates quickly. For a variety of reasons, it was not easy to reduce interest rates in the late autumn last year and in the early part of this year, although the situation demanded and necessitated it. Now the room has been found for a substantial cut.
  As regards the ingenious—in my view, wholly correct—massive shift in local government finance, people who think that this is a boring Budget have not yet realised the full impact of that shift. The Budget will transform local government finance and it is high time that that happened. The crucial decision by the Chancellor—which any Chancellor would make given the total mess that local government finance is in—was to raise compensating revenue by a mechanism that he knows will deliver it, by raising value added tax by 2·5 per cent. That was the right way to claw back that money.
  In my judgment, increasing VAT was right in any case, as our VAT rate has been well below the average in the European Community. Although it is not necessary that everyone has exactly the same VAT rate for the proper functioning of a European common internal market, it is a distortion if there are marked discrepancies. Therefore, it was logical and inevitable that we would raise our VAT rates. Doing so at this time, with inflation decreasing fast for other reasons, is wise. It has the added advantage that the poll tax fed through to the retail prices index in a dramatic fashion, and the Chancellor has assured us that the increase in VAT will be covered by the cuts in poll tax.
  The next logical step, which I imagine will be announced in the next few days, is to take three elements out of local government finances. The first two are the fire service and the police, both of which are carefully monitored and are effectively agency-run by local government at the moment, with the Home Office operating strict manpower controls, and also inspectorates. The third element has to be education. That has already been advocated by the Social Democrat party to the Secretary of State for the Environment's present review. Increasingly, SDP policy seems to be followed by the Government with a rapidity exceeding that of the Labour party.
  If education comes out of local government spending—as is right—it will not be as much of a centralising measure as some people imagine, because of the greater degree of self-management in schools. It is also extremely important that that change is accompanied by a considerable strengthening of Her Majesty's inspectorate of schools. Also. a greater measure of independence, radicalism and toughness on education policy will have to
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  be brought into the inspectorate. I hope that the inspectorate will not continue as a mutual support agency for the Department of Education and Science. If it had a measure of outside independence, such as through the Audit Commission, it would be greatly improved.
  Such a change would alter the whole structure of local government. It is logical that there should be single-tier authorities, but they should be flexible. They do not automatically have to be the same—the units of local government vary in different parts of the United Kingdom, with considerable benefit. That would lead to the question of how to raise the money. We and the Liberal Democrats would prefer a local income tax as the way of raising the revenue for the smaller number of local government services.
  I believe that as far as possible local government should raise the revenue for the services that it provides with the exception of the needs element, with the extra provided by central Government to compensate for areas of low pay, where people cannot raise all the revenue themselves.
  I should prefer a local income tax, but it seems that there will be a property tax. I urge the Front Benches of the Labour and Conservative parties to get together, at least informally, to introduce a property tax that they could both support. After the fiasco of the poll tax, a new property tax should not be introduced which would be subject to massive change.
  Before people think about that with mock horror, they should remember that there was a moment when the Government were about to change the state earnings-related pension scheme. However, they drew back from that idea—prudently, in my view. There are a few matters which must stick across the political divide and which must not be subject to massive change before a general election. State pensions is one such matter, and the basic structure of tax is another.
  It is no good the Government introducing a new property tax that is not supported. Therefore, although the Conservatives may want the element of head tax to be built into the property tax, because it means that they should not have to eat so many of their words on the poll tax, I beg the Government not to introduce it. It is clear that the Labour party will not support it, and neither shall we. Not many people believe that it would be a sensible way of introducing a property tax.
  The Government should opt for the pure property tax without the add-on factor, which is merely a face-saving device. It will not lose them much, as they have had to eat nearly every word about the poll tax. They will not be able to recoup everything by this extra add-on. Definite benefits will accrue to a political party that admits that it has made a complete foul-up and has changed its policy.
  I say that without any particular interest. I and my party attacked the poll tax from the moment it was introduced. It was the wrong tax. It was unfair, and it was an administrative nightmare. It seems that it will fall because of its administrative costs and because of the inability to collect it rather than because of any other factor. However, it also deserved to fall because of its unfairness.
  The Budget matches the difficult and strained circumstances. Nobody can be certain that we shall come out of this recession in the rather optimistic time scale mentioned by the Chancellor. Much will depend on the international economy, for which the signs are reasonably optimistic. There seems to be an upturn in the United

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  States economy, but there is considerable concern about the Federal Republic of Germany. The costs of bringing the east German economy into balance with that of the Federal Republic are considerable.
  It is necessary to live within the disciplines of the exchange rate mechanism. That is why I believe that any talk of using a realignment of currencies as a way of devaluing would be a major mistake. Therefore, I do not quite share the views of the hon. Member for Staffordshire, Moorlands (Mr. Knox). I believe that the exchange rate mechanism is a flexible mechanism which allows member countries to change their exchange rate if they get out of kilter with the rest of their economic management.
  That is why I still retain a considerable scepticism about a fixed exchange rate system that is a single currency. I wish that we would stop using the term "single currency", because people equate it with a common currency. For the European Community, a common currency is a thoroughly desirable development, but a fixed exchange rate system in the European Community is open to serious objection. It would be rare for the 12 members of the Community to be able to live within a fixed exchange rate system and to accept that draconian discipline. Bretton Woods was never a fixed exchange rate system. One had the freedom to choose to devalue, even if with considerable difficulty.
  I do not want it to be easy to change the exchange rate system. An exchange rate system that is too flexible allows politicians to escape some of the necessary internal disciplines. The ERM is an effective and rather subtle discipline within which we can live. There will come a time when we should opt for the narrow band. At the moment, the odds are against that because, if we did, there would be a tendency to revalue upwards, or at least the risk of doing so. The pound is not so competitive that we can afford to disadvantage ourselves further at this stage. I should go for the narrow band, but not quite yet.
  There are considerable uncertainties elsewhere in the Budget, but the Chancellor has made some worthwhile judgments, not least in freezing the married tax allowance to give him greater freedom in future reform. My main objection is that he has not been generous enough with child benefit. To catch up the 12 per cent. deficit, it will be necessary—next year and the year after—not just to inflation-proof child benefit, but to increase it.
  All the statistics still show that poverty is confined mostly to families which have many children under the age of 16. We need to do more for them, because, even though value added tax—because of its zero rating of many key items—is not as regressive as the Leader of the Opposition tried to make out, nor is it a progressive tax, we need contervailing balances, one of which would be a generous child benefit system.
  6.6 pm
  Sir Anthony Grant: I find myself in the pleasant position of agreeing broadly with nearly all that the right hon. Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Dr. Owen) said. I am pleased that the SDP embraces some of the ideas that I recommended a quarter of a century ago, but I shall refer to that later.
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  I was interested to hear the hon. Member for Middlesbrough (Mr. Bell) quote Oscar Wilde. I was reminded that, as Oscar Wilde was dying in Paris, the last thing he did was turn and look at the wallpaper in his dingy hotel and say, "One of us has got to go". That is probably the Government's attitude—one can relate Oscar Wilde to the community charge, and the wallpaper to the Government. I think that the wallpaper—the Government—will survive without the community charge.
  Since I entered the House many years ago, I have been a strong advocate of three main issues—small firms, wider share ownership and the need to switch from direct to indirect taxation. Therefore, I can safely say that I am as pleased with this Budget as I was with last year's.
  I shall deal first with small firms. There is no doubt that they have suffered probably more than the rest of industry, because they have been less able to bear the difficulties of the recession. Therefore, I welcome the concessions made on corporation tax and on the collection of bad debts.
  I should like to draw attention to one point in particular., I have lost count of the number of times that I have leapt up when Treasury Ministers were answering questions and asked whether they would please do something to raise the level at which VAT is imposed on small firms. It was far too low. It was ludicrous that somebody whose earnings were just within the £20,000 rate and who was struggling to get work should have to go through all the pantomime and suffer the rigours of the draconian Customs and Excise. I can say with absolute delight that the Chancellor has done the right thing. It will be welcomed not only by me, but by many small and growing firms.
  I referred earlier to wider share ownership. With that as with small firms, when I was an enthusiast 100 years ago, no one was interested. The Government were not especially interested, and the Opposition did not want to know. Small firms and wider share ownership are now fashionable, and I am delighted. There is more joy in heaven …
  With the late Maurice Macmillan and others, I was a founder member of the wider share ownership movement before I came to the House. We strongly advocated employee share schemes and we produced many schemes. As the right hon. Member for Devonport emphasised, the schemes were not intended to be only for top cosseted directors and high executives of large public companies. We intended the idea to spread down to the work force, and our dream was that the man who worked on the factory floor would, instead of reading the Daily Mirror or a comic, ask for the Financial Times.
  We have not quite reached that stage, but the Chancellor has taken a step in the right direction. Share ownership will spread. As with the spread of ownership of property, the spread of ownership of shares is a bulwark against dictatorship and the intruding powers of the state.
  We also advocated that there should be an easier system through which people could acquire shares. Nobody is more fond of the stock exchange and of stockbrokers than I am. They are a marvellous professional body, but they are not and never have been geared to the needs of the very small investor. Such investors cannot afford stockbrokers, because they are too expensive. Other methods had to be found. The unit trust movement and, to an extent, investment trusts were a start in that direction. We advocated what I believe to be necessary—that we should enable people to buy shares over the counter in high street

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  shops. The Chancellor must have looked at some of our ideas of 25 years ago. We are delighted that he has taken them on board after all this time.
  I warn my right hon. Friend that strong pressure will have to be brought to bear. The stock exchange and financial institutions are not geared to our ideas. If the Chancellor and his team can show determination that there should be an opportunity for people to go into shops—not necessarily Woolworth—and banks in the high street to acquire small blocks of shares, there will be a dramatic spread of share ownership. I welcome the measures that my right hon. Friend has proposed.
  I am sorry to keep saying, "I told you so," but I have been in the House for quite a long time, and it is 25 years since I first recommended that teachers' salaries should be a charge on the Exchequer. I did so because teachers' salaries are negotiated nationally. They are the biggest item of local authority education expenditure, and by statute since 1944, the Secretary of State for Education and Science has had a duty to maintain a supply of teachers. That was never taken seriously. It was frowned upon by bureaucrats and other Pooh-Bahs in county councils and education authorities, so nothing was done. We do not know yet, but such a change may be announced on Wednesday or Thursday.
  I agree strongly with the right hon. Member for Devonport that one should not give the impression that the necessary switch from local to national finance can be carried out painlessly. There is no such thing as a free lunch, and there is no such thing as free education, free health, free police or free fire services. It all has to be paid for. I am glad that those services are being paid for by an increase in VAT.
  The Government came to office determined that there should be a switch from direct to indirect taxation. We advocated that switch because direct tax—income tax—is a tax on work, which everyone has to do, on effort and on initiative. Indirect taxation, whether VAT or the old purchase tax, is a tax on spending. If people desire to be thrifty and to control their own spending, indirect taxation is the right choice. A shift has been necessary, arid the Budget contains a further shift, which is right.
  We are in recession. I have said several times in the House how much I hate the interest rate policy. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, when he was Chancellor, heard me pontificating on the subject. He always responded courteously and thoughtfully, although he did not always agree with me. I hate high interest rates, because they afflict the people who are least able to bear them. They benefit the haves, but they severely hurt the have-nots.
  There are two sectors in the have-nots. Small firms have to borrow. No firm ever developed unless it borrowed, and one cannot get an industry going without borrowing. That is why I disagree so strongly with the sanctimonious puritans who hint that borrowing is wicked. Of course it is not. The same is true of home owners. How many people ever bought a house without borrowing? Only a handful of rich people could do that. Most home owners and most small firms have to borrow money, so I reject the puritanism that says that borrowing is wrong. People who have to borrow have been the most heavily hit.
  All Governments—and perhaps Conservative Governments more than others—suffer from a disease that I call accountantitis. The disease operates as follows. If a firm overstretches itself, accountants are called in. The
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  accountant sorts out the books and says, "I have cleared everything. There is nought on both sides of the ledger." Suddenly, no one is making shoes, ships or boots. A country can suffer from the same danger if the clamps are put on too ferociously.
  As I interpret the Budget, in macro-economic terms, it is intended in the recession to get Britain and British industry on the move again. It is a Budget for business, and that is why it has my wholehearted support. Provided that it is accompanied by a steady reduction in interest rates, there will be a steady reduction in inflation. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister's forecast last year that there would be a steady trend downwards of inflation which would lead to a steady trend downwards of interest rates will come true. If the Budget, which is a step in the right direction, is later accompanied by a steady reduction in interest rates, the confidence so necessary if our country is to thrive in the 1990s, and which my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister wants so much, will be achieved.
  6.17 pm
  Mrs. Alice Mahon: I wish that I could agree with the hon. Member for Cambridgeshire, South-West (Sir. A. Grant). I wish that it was a Budget for manufacturing industry and for industry as a whole. I am afraid that the Budget will go down in history as the poll tax Budget. Given the great hardship caused to millions by the poll tax, given the Prime Minister's and the Chancellor's support for it, and given the fact that the Prime Minister now says that the tax is uncollectable, it would have been nice to see proposals for reparations for the victims of that tax in the Budget. However, the Prime Minister and the Chancellor will no doubt plead that they were only obeying orders for the past five years.
  The Budget has not addressed the real problems facing the country. Commenting on the task facing the Chancellor this week, The Sunday Times said:
  "The economy is in the middle of what could be the deepest recession since the war. Unemployment has been rising for a year and is heading back towards 3 million. Company failures are at record levels. Many of the high-flying business successes of the 1980s have crashed spectacularly. Company profits have slumped. Young people given positive encouragement by the Government to buy their own homes, have found their dream has turned into a nightmare. Inflation remains unacceptably high … Interest rates are 13 per cent."
  I make no apology for quoting at such length from a newspaper which normally supports the Government and is often reluctant to criticise Government policy. We should consider the Budget in the context of that damning indictment of the present state of the economy.
  The fact that the country is in the deepest recession since the last war is nowhere more evident than in my constituency—and, no doubt, those of many of my hon. Friends. In the past few months, job losses have averaged 210 per month; in the travel-to-work area of my constituency and the neighbouring constituency of Calder Valley, more than 3,000 jobs have been lost in the past 12 months—good, highly skilled jobs that will not be easily brought back. In almost every instance, the employers who had to announce job losses or factory closures blamed the Government's policies, especially those that have led to high interest rates.
  People should be reminded constantly that the present Prime Minister—as Chancellor and as a Treasury Minister—and the present Chancellor are responsible for the scale of the present recession, and for the mess in which we now

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  find ourselves. I do not accept the Chancellor's argument that we should blame high wage increases. The Government always fall back on that argument, but the public are increasingly aware of the identity of the guilty people—guilty men, in this case.
  I am sorry that the Prime Minister has left the Chamber, because last week I received a letter from a constituent—an employer—that was addressed to him.
  The letter began:
  "Dear Mr. Prime Minister, THIS COUNTRY IS GOING DOWN THE DRAIN."
  It continued:
  "In 1983 due to the recession, I was in the unfortunate position of being made redundant from a large Machine Tool Manufacturer in Halifax, as the Company ceased to manufacture in the U.K.
  Due to difficulty in finding employment, I decided to form my own company and therefore capitalise on the skills which I had acquired through working for 22 years in the machine tool industry. I would like to think that this was a successful move and until recently I employed 25 people".
  The letter went on to describe the success of the venture, and how hard the staff had worked. It continued:
  "I along with many other small companies am facing difficult financial times and possible bankruptcy.
  When will someone in government realise that without a manufacturing base Britain's economy cannot and will not survive. After all, we cannot become a nation of shopkeepers relying solely on banking and the service industries. Without a manufacturing base, the import situation becomes more predominant which in turn increases the balance of payment problems.
  Over the past few months, I have been trying to widen my customer base, but have constantly been met by a doom and gloom syndrome from the major manufacturers in industry as many companies are on short time and are facing forced redundancy programmes or even closure.
  Someone in your government made a statement in the recent past that with regard to inflation 'If it isn't hurting it isn't working', well Mr. Prime Minister it definitely is hurting, because more and more people are not working, not if I may comment, the best way to cure inflation."
  We have had 11 years of Tory misrule, and have been warned many times that we would find ourselves in our present position. In 1985, the House of Lords produced an excellent report on overseas trade which warned of the consequence of neglecting manufacturing industry. I quoted from that report at some length in my first speech in the House. The report stated:
  "Cheaper money would lead to more investment. The Government should have more regard to the needs of industry as a borrower when they take a view on interest rates."
  It seems that that plea has been completely ignored.
  Many other warnings and recommendations have been ignored over the years. Earlier this year, the CBI president, Sir Brian Corby, launched a fierce attack on the Government's economic policies, accusing them of interest rate overkill. He also warned that high electricity prices would deal a savage blow to major manufacturers; none the less, prices have been increased excessively.
  The newly privatised water companies have also increased their bills. Yorkshire Water has introduced an increase of 12·7 per cent., 3 per cent. more than inflation. That has proved very damaging to industry, especially the textile industry. I make no apology for mentioning the industries which operate in my area. Textile production requires the use of a good deal of water, and the increased costs have helped to damage the chances that the industry might have had of making a recovery.
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  Although the small amount of assistance that the Budget will give to businesses may help a little on the margins, the Chancellor's speculations that it would achieve anything dramatic were, in my view, wildly optimistic. It will do nothing to help the crippled house building and construction industries, or to help young people who are desperate to learn a skill. Recently, I told the House about a 17-year-old in my constituency who had been made redundant twice. In the local paper, he pleaded for the chance to become a joiner. That is a skill that we shall need in the future. I hope that there will be a happy ending for that young man because of the publicity given to his case, but thousands like him have been neglected and thrown on the scrap heap by the Government. The Budget does nothing to address training needs, and I know that my hon. Friends will have more to say about that.
  The Government have not yet responded to the latest disturbing report from the House of Lords. Entitled, "Innovation in Manufacturing Industry", the report told the Government what they should be doing. It pointed out that there was
  "no net investment in manufacturing industry during the 1980s",
  and that
  "if market forces alone are to determine the course of events it is conceivable we will end up with no significant British owned manufacturing industry in the U.K."
  The same report found that the United Kingdom was the only country in which gross domestic expenditure on research and development had declined as a percentage of gross domestic product between 1981 and 1989, and that that decline had been largely the result of a reduction in Government support for research and development.
  Such a serious and irresponsible neglect of research and development during the oil-rich years is unforgivable. The Government have thrown away the chance to invest in this country's future with the ease and abandon of Mississippi gamblers, without showing any remorse—certainly the Chancellor's complacent Budget speech showed none.
  When hon. Members raised the recession and the consequent problems in their areas with Ministers, as I did recently, the response was a deliberate misquotation of a CBI report on Yorkshire and Humberside. That was an attempt to cover up the Government's neglect of the manfacturing industry. I have a copy of the report. The Minister concerned clung to the straw provided by the observation:
  "Against the national trend, business optimism actually fell by less in January. On balance though respondents were still heavily pessimistic about the business situation compared with a year ago."
  The Minister seemed to think that that allowed people to feel proud of how well their areas were doing. That is nonsense—Orwellian doublespeak of the worst order.
  The same report said that the food, drink and tobacco industries were not doing too badly; but the Chancellor now proposes to increase VAT by 2·5 per cent., which will harm some of those industries. It will hit the largest factory in my constituency—Nestle, previously Rowntree Mackintosh—which has been very successful. In the United Kingdom, manufacturers of chocolate and sugar confectionery and chocolate-coated biscuits pay the standard rate of VAT, while all other foods are zero-rated. They are therefore already at a disadvantage. Surely a KitKat is part and parcel of a snack meal nowadays, and

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  I do not believe that VAT should be charged. The proposed increase will make it more difficult for successful companies to compete and to sell.
  The Budget contains no measures to help the low paid, and only a pittance for recipients of child benefit to be paid in October. Anyone who has studied the subject of child benefit, or has read any of the excellent reports from the Child Poverty Action Group, will know that child benefit constitutes investment in the next generation. It will benefit future generations. The Government have behaved disgracefully, first by freezing child benefit and then by increasing it by only a small amount. It is ludicrous to suggest that VAT is a fair form of taxation. Like the poll tax, it takes no account of income and is deeply regressive. Everyone pays the same amount of VAT.
  The Budget is timid and lacks vision, reflecting the leadership of the Conservative party, and I am certain that it will be the present Chancellor's first and last Budget.
  6.30 pm
  Mr. Richard Page: The two-inch or three-inch wadge of Treasury notes, briefing papers, departmental press releases and other documents provided by the Vote Office to flesh out the Budget fills me with apprehension about taking part in the first day's debate on the Budget. In the middle of that wadge of papers there may be a statement that would destroy the raison d'étre for my speech. However, the Budget sends a clear message that the Government are their own Government, with their own style, that they are interested in enterprise and that they are pointing the way towards economic recovery.
  I do not intend to indulge in speculation about the community charge. I want to see how it is to be reformed before passing any verdict. Nevertheless, the Chancellor's statement appears effectively to have shot the Opposition's fox. To judge from their faces, they did not welcome it with smiles and glee. They seemed to be extremely miserable. The Budget statement appears to be a substantial stride in the right direction and it ought to ensure that the Conservative party forms the Government after the election.
  I intend to confine my remarks to businesses, particularly small businesses, and to consider the effect that the Budget will have on investment in manufacturing and research and development and on our attempts to defeat what is now called short-termisim. The move towards helping businesses is most welcome. It proves that the Government want to support and encourage small businesses. I hope that as a result of the Budget businesses will invest more in manufacturing and in research and development. That is the basis on which this country will go forward.
  The Budget gives the lie to all those newspaper pundits who said that it would be a dull and boring Budget and that very little would come out of it. Indeed, it has been one of the most exciting and complex Budgets ever presented. It will be some time before all its ramifications are appreciated by the pundits. Over the years, the Government have set an excellent example by promoting the interests of small businesses. The Budget solidly reinforces their commitment.
  The Chancellor mentioned a formidable list of items. To go through each one in detail would be unfair and would take up too much of the time at my disposal, but the
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  problem of bad debts has been recognised. In the past, if people did not pay their debts, small businesses still had to pay VAT on whatever had been sold. It is a significant improvement that that liability has been reduced to one year.
  Cash accounting schemes are to be promoted. Small businesses—particularly small small businesses—do not keep fully up to date with the latest management methods. People have their noses too near to the grindstone and are too busy working away to worry about intricate financial opportunities. I am delighted, therefore, that Customs and Excise is to introduce a promotional scheme to increase the number of firms using the scheme from 100,000 to 300,000.
  The Chancellor has announced that the VAT threshold is to be increased to £35,000. If I could be given £1 for every minute of debating time in the House during which I have pleaded with the Treasury to argue strongly that the European Community ought to increase the threshold, I should retire a very rich man. I am delighted that my right hon. Friend has been able to persuade the Community of the rightness of his argument. Many small businesses will be delighted at what he has achieved. It is a sensible proposal. It cannot make economic sense for Customs and Excise to run around trying to collect VAT from companies with turnovers between £20,000 and £25,000. The proposal is very much a step in the right direction. The same is true of PAYE collection. Quarterly collections will save Customs and Excise and in turn the Treasury high administration costs.
  The easing of corporation tax will provide substantial support for both large and small businesses. Entrepreneurs will be encouraged by the capital gains tax proposals. The fact that the amount of relief is to be increased if they decide to come out of a business is also to be welcomed.
  When further national assets are disposed of, I hope that use will be made of retail outlets in the high street. I hope that share shops will be set up so that people will be able to buy small numbers of shares through such outlets without having to flog up to the stock exchange and work their way through that expensive system. Small is beautiful. That could be a means by which people would be able to use the local marketplace to move into share ownership.
  My right hon. Friend has done a magnificent job for the small business sector. He has presented an excellent Budget in tight circumstances. However, I intend to amplify the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Staffordshire, Moorlands (Mr. Knox) who pleaded for more investment in manufacturing and in research and development. This country's manufacturing base will provide for our future growth and development. To those who wave the service sector flag vigorously, I say, "Well done—good luck to you." However, we must never forget that 80 per cent. of our manufactures can be exported, compared with only 20 per cent. of the service sector.
  In view of the limited time at my disposal, I must resist the impulse to repeat, word for word, all that I have said in the past four years about the need to invest in manufacturing and to defeat short-termism. However, we must not run away from the fact that as a percentage of our gross national product we, among all the G7 countries, invest the least in manufacturing. Is it a coincidence that Japan invests 50 per cent. more than the average invested by all the G7 countries? Furthermore, is it a coincidence that Japan has a balance of trade surplus, low inflation and low interest rates?

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  Our manufacturing investment has increased in the past few years. but the message of the past year or so is that it is tailing off. I sincerely hope that those who make the decisions about manufacturing investment will reverse that trend and invest money in the future of this country. The same is true of investment in research and development. The Government invests just as much as our competitor countries in research and development, but our companies do not match that investment. The arguments relate to short-termism. Financial institutions are obsessed with league tables, percentage returns and the failure of any company to hold its position, which means that its stock is automatically sold and it is at risk from a predatory attack.
  I hope that the Budget will encourage our manufacturing industries and the companies which create the wealth of this country to take a longer-term view and to start to invest in our future. The past has not been encouraging for them. I do not often quote from newspapers, but I agree with the words of David Smith in The Sunday Times earlier this month, when he stated:
  "The well-publicised manufacturing revival of the later 1980s was from far too small a base and failed to keep pace with the much stronger rise in consumer demand."
  That has to be reversed and investment made—only in that way can we stay ahead and provide the services that the Conservatives, as a caring Government, would like to provide for this country.
  In conclusion, my right hon. Friend the Chancellor has made a substantial commitment to business, and especially to small business. He has given relief to companies to help with cash flow problems. It is up to companies to use that. I hope that the financial institutions will not be too long in providing the same sort of support and encouragement. As I have said, the Budget sends a clear message to the country—that the Government are their own Government. They have their own style. They are interested in enterprise and in business, and point the way to recovery for the future.
  6.40 pm
  Mr. Simon Hughes: People will have wanted above all to hear announcements from the Chancellor about two things in today's Budget—the poll tax and income tax. They have certainly heard something new about the first, but have not yet heard anything new about the second. People also wanted to hear that interest rates would come down. I guess that they will come down pretty soon, and the economy will not recover until they do——
  Mr. Bell: That may be as soon as tomorrow.
  Mr. Hughes: As the hon. Member for Middlesbrough (Mr. Bell) rightly says, that may be as soon as tomorrow. A reduction in interest rates is the precondition for many of the other things that everybody wishes to see.
  Many things were not in the Budget which should have been. My hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith) will address those issues more widely tomorrow. The money allocated to education is a minimal concession that does not go in the right direction. Money should have been put back into training, instead of
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  massive cuts being made that affect especially inner-city areas all over the country. Money should also have been announced for public transport.
  Of course, there were some good things in the Budget. I refer to the rightful extra taxation on alcohol and tobacco, the second because it is bad for our health. There were also the rightful decisions to reduce mortgage interest tax relief for higher-rate tax payers, and to increase the amount of child benefit and index it in the future, which should have been done in the past.
  Above all, there is one thing that the Budget was and one thing that it was not. The hon. Member for Halifax (Mrs. Mahon) said that it was the "poll-tax Budget". The hon. Lady did not get it quite right. This was the "end-of-the-poll-tax Budget" or the "after-the-poll-tax Budget". It was a blue Budget, because it was an electorally populist Budget, but it was also a red Budget—red with embarrassment about the poll tax mistakes of the past.
  The hon. Member for Hertfordshire, South-West (Mr. Page) used one word many times in his speech"short-termism". I normally accuse the Government of short-termism, but on this occasion I applaud them for this one exception. If ever there was a short-term tax, it must be the poll tax. It will probably turn out to be the most short-term tax in British history. Within a year of its existence in England and Wales, and within two years of its introduction in Scotland, the Government realised that it needed to go. The electors of Ribble Valley, and my hon. Friend the Member for Ribble Valley (Mr. Carr), made certain of that.
  Mr. Paul Boateng: Where is the hon. Gentleman?
  Mr. Hughes: The hon. Gentleman asks where my hon. Friend is. He is here now. He was in his place throughout the Budget statement. He will be a Member of the House throughout this Parliament and, I am sure, for many Parliaments to come. Any hon. Member who can bring down the poll tax deserves to be re-elected until he decides to retire.
  The one thing that the Budget was not was a green Budget, although the Government hinted that it would be. They said that there would be all sorts of green things in it, but that was a hollow sham. In terms of the environment, it was a grey Budget, because that was the one missing subject. It was hardly mentioned. The Budget confirms even more clearly than the White Paper produced by the Department of the Environment last year that that Department regularly loses its battle with the Treasury.
  In his Budget statement last year, the then Chancellor—now the Prime Minister—claimed that one of the objectives of the Government's economic policy was to enable this country to take the opportunities of the 1990s. One of those opportunities is to deal with the environmental problems in this country and far beyond our seas. However, even the pale green policies in last autumn's Green Paper have not been followed through. The White Paper last autumn foreshadowed a series of measures to introduce new economic instruments. This Budget was the first opportunity—the unique opportunity—to do that. It was the test of the Government's green commitment—and a test which the Government have failed.

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  Where were the environmental measures in the Budget? Yes, there was the 15 per cent. on excise duty on fuel. There was an additional almost 1p differential between unleaded and diesel, and leaded fuel. Yes, there was the additional and very much delayed disadvantage to company car owners, which should have been introduced some time ago. However, that was all.
  There was deafening silence on a charge to make polluters pay and on the use of market mechanisms as a means of controlling pollution. There was deafening silence on ensuring that new economic measures would be brought into the centre of this country's environmental policy.
  We have proposed—this has been proposed in other European countries also—a pollution-added tax on activities that create pollution, with grants and subsidies to those whose activities are environmentally friendly. On transport, there should have been tax incentives for catalytic converters. The Government should have graduated vehicle excise duty to ensure that fuel-efficient cars attract less tax. The Government could have introduced zero VAT ratings for energy-efficient appliances, such as some heating appliances and home insulation materials. They could have reduced stamp duty for conservation measures in the home.
  The Chancellor could have done many things in this Budget if he was committed to the environment as well as to the economy. However, there were only one or two environmental sweeteners in it—a little bit of green wrapping around one or two proposals, but there was nothing green at its centre. The Chancellor had the opportunity; he did not take it, so he failed. We shall have to await a different Government, a more committed Government——
  Mr. Ian McCartney: A Labour Government.
  Mr. Hughes: No, certainly not a Labour Government, if we are talking about environmental issues. We must await a different Government to ensure that we have a Budget that combines economic and environmentally sound policies. Sadly, we have not seen such policies today, and the Labour party could not provide them either.
  6.47 pm
  Mr. John Lee: One learns that it is unwise to give instant reactions to any Budget and one must be even more circumspect than normal with this Budget. However, the one thing that must be clear to the whole House is that we have today seen act I of "The Abolition of the Poll Tax". I hope that we shall see act II on Thursday.
  Today's substantial shift from local to central taxation paves the way for the abolition of the poll tax and its replacement with what I hope will be a more sensitive and intelligent property-based tax, which would be well received in my constituency of Pendle and, I suspect, in Ribble Valley also. In a lighter vein, may I suggest that if the poll tax is abolished, the Government should consider announcing a public holiday to celebrate that event. Perhaps we would see street parties and people waving and cheering up and down the country.
  In a more serious vein, however, the Budget must be judged primarily as a backdrop to further reductions in interest rates. This essentially broadly neutral Budget can
  210
  only have helped in that regard. I would not be so cavalier as the right hon. Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Dr. Owen) but the Budget should pave the way for further step-by-step reductions.
  Among the detailed measures in the Budget, I particularly welcome the measures to help the liquidity of businesses, including the changes in the VAT regulations and the delayed payment of PAYE and national insurance and the reductions in corporation tax rates. I also welcome the new personal training allowance and the measures to encourage further investment by employees in their own firms.
  I was delighted that measures were announced to tackle tax avoidance through overseas trusts. They were long overdue. I also welcome the limiting of mortgage tax relief to the basic rather than the higher rates of taxation. While we all believe in owner-occupancy, one must question the huge amounts given over the years in tax relief to home owners, which contrast with the relative lack of investment in manufacturing industry. I was particularly disappointed in the lack of specific measures to help manufacturing industry.
  Too many investment portfolios have become ossified by high rates of capital gains tax. Surely it is time to consider restoring the differential between short-term and long-term capital gains. Perhaps short-term capital gains should be taxed at the top rates and long-term capital gains at reduced rates.
  I was particularly disappointed that there was no announcement in today's Budget about a national lottery, which has widespread support in the House. Useful as the football trusts will be, they will provide only petty cash compared to the amount that a properly constructed, organised and Government-backed national lottery could produce. I hope that before too long the Government will bite the bullet and announce a national lottery.
  I wonder whether the introduction of the treatment of mobile phones as benefits in kind is worth all the administrative effort.
  In conclusion, I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his first Budget. He compared himself with Desert Orchid. Desert Orchid recently fell in his last race. I regard my right hon. Friend's contribution as——
  Mr. Eric Martlew: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. The hon. Gentleman is misleading the House. Desert Orchid came third.
  Mr. Lee: In any case, Desert Orchid certainly did not win the race, whereas my right hon. Friend's Budget will unquestionably help us to move to victory in the coming general election.
  6.52 pm
  Mr. David Madel: I am conscious that I must get a move on. I welcome the content and delivery of my right hon. Friend the Chancellor's speech. I am delighted with the change in philosophy on child benefit, which will be increased. I am delighted with what I think will be the introduction of share shops in Britain, which will make it much easier for the man in the street to buy shares.
  The hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) mentioned the 10 per cent. car tax. I went some way with him but we should remember that on 1 January 1993 all new cars throughout the EC will have to

  211
  have catalytic converters fitted by law. That will raise the price of cars to the man in the street, so there is a case for getting rid of the 10 per cent. car tax next year to take account of the increase, brought about by necessary environmental change.
  I strongly support my right hon. Friend's announcement about changing the financing of local government. To increase VAT and reduce community charge bills is the correct way to do it. Naturally, I hope that my right hon. Friend will soon be able to follow up his measures with a reduction in interest rates.
  I am glad to see that the vehicle excise duty has been frozen again. If there is to be any change in that, it should certainly favour smaller cars, which use less fuel. I welcome the reduction in corporation tax for businesses, which will make it easier for companies to improve their cash flow and bring about a tax system that will encourage business to invest more in equipment, research and development, and training, for we look to the manufacturing base to finance future prosperity. After all, we are in the business of changing from a net exporter of oil and a net importer of manufactured goods to a net importer of oil and, I hope, a net exporter of manufactured goods.
  I am also delighted that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer has tilted his business policy to encouraging British industry to be absolutely ready by way of training and investment for the single market in 1992 which will be upon us so soon.
  In his Budget speech last year the then Chancellor said:
  "growth should return in 1991 towards its sustainable rate of around 2.75 per cent."—[Official Report, 20 March 1990; Vol. 169, c. 1013.]
  I appreciate that there is a temporary standstill, but, from what my right hon. Friend said in his Budget last year and from what was said this afternoon, it is hoped that we shall resume growth later this year and, thereby, begin to reverse the unwelcome increase in unemployment. As I said, in the 1990s we shall see a transformation of the economy in Britain and we simply must be more conscious of the need to improve our manufacturing base.
  I also welcome the tax changes on training. I have a specific point to make on the new benefits that employees will be able to claim as tax relief. As I understand it, the fees to the providers of the education or training will attract tax relief. Will that also apply to examination
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  certification fees the travel, subsistence and accommodation costs incurred when people go for training and the cost of books and equipment? There has been a welcome change to encourage employees to better themselves by going in for more training. I welcome what my right hon. Friend the Chancellor announced this afternoon, but I hope that it will be an all-embracing change that will mean that individuals who take the trouble to retrain themselves can claim tax relief on the costs which are inevitable if one retrains, as manufacturing industry changes and greater opportunities arise.
  Of course, there is an important role for the public sector in what my right hon. Friend the Chancellor rightly referred to as his anti-recession, anti-inflation Budget. In the public sector we need more performance-related pay and more locally determined pay and conditions. The public sector must adapt and bring in the best practices of industry in the way in which it settles pay and conditions. There is not yet enough performance-related pay in the public sector. There is no reason why the public sector should not quickly adopt the best practice in industry throughout Britain.
  The public services include the much-improved services that have been announced for retraining unemployed people. Several changes have been made in the past 10 years in the way in which we manage our training and employment services. I hope that the training and enterprise councils, which are organised on a county basis, will be effective in delivering quality training at the local level. It is only by responding to the needs of local industry and satisfying its training needs that we shall be ready to take advantage of the single market and improve the quality of goods in Britain and the quality of training of those who produce them.
  The measures in the Budget need time to take effect. His measures on business taxation and corporation tax, his change in philosophy in child benefit and his reorganisation of local government finance all need time. There is absolutely no need to rush to the country and ask for a mandate. The Chancellor of the Exchequer needs at least 12 months for the wise, progressive and imaginative proposals in his Budget to take effect and to take root in the country. When he has given us a second Budget we can go and talk nicely and politely to the electorate and, I am sure, enter a fourth term of office.
  Debate adjourned.—[ Mr. Neil Hamilton.]
  Debate to be resumed tomorrow.

Business of the House
6.59 pm
The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. John MacGregor): The House will have heard my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer announce in his Budget statement that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment would introduce legislation shortly to authorise payments of extra grants to local authorities and to ensure that community charge payers will reap the full benefit.
I thought that it would be for the convenience of the House—[Interruption.] —I am sure that it would be for the convenience of the House and more generally if I made a short business statement about the arrangements for handling the Bill.
In view of the urgent nature of this legislation, the Bill will be published on Thursday. It will be proposed that all stages of the Bill are taken on Tuesday 26 March and are preceded by a timetable motion to achieve this.
Dr. John Cunningham: This is an act of sheer desperation on the part of the Conservative Government, an act of panic—the Government taking action which truly merits the hackneyed phrase of the Tory party: "throwing money at the problem".
Will the Leader of the House make it clear that it is the Government's intention to introduce a guillotine to force this Bill through the House next week, and that proper debate on the use of between £4 billion and £5 billion of taxpayers' money is to be curtailed to suit the convenience of the Tory party and the Government? Is it not already clear that this one-off, desperate measure will mean that the poll tax will stay in place for many people? This is not an abolition of the poll tax Bill; it is a buying-off of opposition to the poll tax Bill.
I make it clear that there can be no guarantee in advance that the Labour party will give an easy passage to this legislation or support it in the Lobbies.
Mr. MacGregor: The hon. Member for Copeland (Dr. Cunningham) will know from the Chancellor's statement that this follows the Chancellor's conclusion that local taxes are being asked to bear too large a burden and that the level of the community charge is still too high. That was the clear explanation in the Chancellor's speech.
I can confirm that there will be a timetable motion. The reason for that is that I believe that both local authorities and all community charge payers will wish the House to pass the legislation swiftly to ensure that the arrangements can be put in place and that Parliament will have completed its work before we rise for the Easter recess. It will enable the arrangements to be put in place. That is very much what local authorities would wish and certainly what community charge payers would wish. That is why we are doing it.
I have noted that the hon. Member for Copeland indicates that the Labour party will fight this tooth and nail——
Mr. Paul Boateng: He did not say that.
Mr. MacGregor: All right, they are not going to fight it tooth and nail, but they are going to go on opposing—I am not exactly clear what they are doing. Let me put it this way. The Bill will be published on Thursday. I hope that, when the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues see the Bill,
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they will realise that it is very much in the interests of community charge payers, and that it is therefore desirable that the Bill gets through as quickly as possible.
Once the Bill is published, it will be part of the Budget debate, so it will be possible to debate the issues involved, since it is part of the Budget statement, on Thursday and on Monday as well as throughout Tuesday. That is plenty of time for the House, and I therefore think that the motion that I have proposed is a sensible one.
Several Hon. Members rose——
Mr. Speaker: Order. I must remind hon. Members that we are now in private business time. [ Interruption.] Well, we are, and the statement is a very narrow one.
Mr. David Harris: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the only desperation is on the part of Opposition Members who see their foxes shot, not least their allegation that the Government have been dithering? What on earth are they complaining about?
Mr. MacGregor: I agree with my hon. Friend. After due consideration, we have come to conclusions, and we are now taking decisive action. That is the right thing to do.
Mr. A. J. Beith: Will the Bill to which the Leader of the House has referred affect England, Scotland and Wales, and will statements be made to the House by the Ministers concerned?
Can the Leader of the House tell us of any previous occasions, and if so when, on which a significant piece of local government and tax legislation was forced through the House of Commons on a guillotine motion in one day?
Can the Leader of the House tell us whether, having had to throw money on the scale of billions into the hole that the Government have created with the poll tax, he is now prepared to throw democracy out of the window at the same time?
Mr. MacGregor: The Bill will cover England, Scotland and Wales, and it will be clear, as I say, when it is published on Thursday. That will give plenty of time for the House to consider the Bill. I am advised that the Bill is a short one and that there will therefore be enough time for it to be fully considered before we come to debate it specifically on Tuesday.
There is at least one precedent: the Finance (Income Tax Reliefs) Bill, which went through in one day on Thursday 17 November 1977. I seem to recall that the party of the hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith) was participating in a pact round about that time, but it went through in one straight day.
Mr. Peter Viggers: Is my right hon. Friend aware that his statement today will be very enthusiastically welcomed in areas such as Gosport, which has a modest rateable value and where therefore the impact of the community charge was quite heavy? Is he also aware that, between the Budget statement and this business statement, there was a most successful meeting between the Chancellor of the Exchequer and Conservative Members upstairs, and that perhaps the warm welcome for the Budget is the reason why the Labour party is so upset?
Mr. MacGregor: I am sure that my hon Friend is absolutely right on the second point. On the first point, I am sure that not only is it to the advantage of the

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community charge payers of Gosport that we get this Bill through quickly, as we propose, but also that they will benefit from the community charge reduction scheme.
Several Hon. Members rose——
Mr. Speaker: Order. I ask hon. Members not to make points that might legitimately be made during the course of debate, or party political points. For the convenience of the House, this is a statement about this new Bill; we should confine our questions to that.
Rev. Martin Smyth: I welcome the statement, because it reflects the fact that the Secretary of State for the Environment has paid attention to the contributions of my hon. Friends the Members for Londonderry, East (Mr. Ross) and for Antrim, South (Mr. Forsythe). Will this Bill therefore include the welcome news of the Chancellor for the ratepayers of Northern Ireland, or must we wait until another occasion? It would be a scandal if it were not included in the Bill.
Mr. MacGregor: The important point is what the Chancellor said in his statement—that domestic rate bills in Northern Ireland will be reduced as well.
Mr. David Wilshire: Will my right hon. Friend comment on the Labour party's reaction to his statement? Does he agree that their behaviour——
Mr. Speaker: Order. That is just what I hoped hon. Members would not do. Ask about the business statement, please.
Mr. Wilshire: That is precisely what I was doing. We have a business statement, and we must consider the response to it. Opposition Members are reacting to my right hon. Friend's sensible suggestion like a bunch of headless chickens. They are clutching at anything because they are desperate to prevent us doing precisely what they asked us to do. What is all the fuss about?
Mr. MacGregor: I agree with my hon. Friend. I am surprised at their reaction because I have announced that we intend to proceed with the Bill in a way that is convenient not only for the House but for local authorities and many others. They want to know the timetable applying to my right hon. Friend's statement in relation to the Bill. That is all I have announced and I believe that it will be for the convenience of all and will be widely supported.
Mr. Dafydd Wigley: Does the Leader of the House accept that the organisation of, and financial arrangements for, the poll tax differ in England, Scotland and Wales? Given the time constraint on the debate on Tuesday, will he give an assurance that the Secretary of State for Wales will make a statement on Thursday about the implications of the changes that are the background to the financial change that we shall discuss on Tuesday?
Mr. MacGregor: My statement tonight is purely about the business handling of the Bill: it is not about the wider background or about anything to do with the community charge more generally. I am tonight simply talking about the arrangements for carrying the Bill through.
Several Hon. Members rose——
Mr. Speaker: Order. It might be for the convenience of the House if I remind hon. Members that the Leader of the House has already said that the issues will be debatable during the passage of the Bill. I think that I shall have to take into account, when I come to draw up my list of hon. Members who wish to participate in that debate, those who are raising issues now.
Mr. Bill Walker: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that the narrow Bill in question will be designed specifically to ensure that Scottish community charge payers, among others, will get the benefits of the transfer from community charge to value added tax, which I recommended in my paper—[Interruption.]—on the subject?
Mr. MacGregor: I am sure that my hon. Friend will try to catch your eye, Mr. Speaker, in the debate, but I confirm that that is what the Bill is about.
Mr. David Blunkett: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that for the last 12 years Opposition Members have pressed the Government not to withdraw the billions of pounds in resources that have been taken out of local services? So we are the last to be churlish about putting money back in that direction.
Earlier in the day, your Deputy in the Chair, Mr. Speaker, called this the mother of Parliaments. To push through a Bill in one day, curtailing debate on issues as complicated as how local authorities will deal with the consequences of the community charge reduction scheme, the rebate scheme and the administrative costs and chaos that will result—the residents of the borough of Wandsworth will end up with no bill at all in the coming year for the provision of local services—is unacceptable, especially on such matters of major national importance.
Mr. MacGregor: I cannot comment on the first part of that supplementary question, which is a matter for another debate. The Bill does not relate to all the points to which the hon. Gentleman latterly referred. It is a straightforward, simple Bill to fulfil what the Chancellor talked about this afternoon. That is why the time that we are giving to it, as well as the time that will be available during the Budget debates to deal with it, is adequate.
Mr. David Shaw: Will my right hon. Friend give an assurance that there will be enough time to discuss the Bill next Tuesday, bearing in mind the fact that, according to my calculations, it will benefit tens of millions of people, and that the only people who will be worse off are single-person households who spend at least £5,000 a year on VAT-able goods and services and double-person households who spend at least £10,000 a year on such items? In other words, a great contribution towards the community charge reductions will be paid by foreign visitors, tourists and wealthy people. Are Opposition Members proposing that those people should be supported?
Mr. MacGregor: Without going into the details, I am sure that my hon. Friend is right that large numbers of people will benefit from the Bill and will wish to see it proceeding through Parliament as quickly as possible, given that it is short and that the issues are straightforward. Not only should they have that benefit, but local authorities should have the opportunity to know exactly where they stand, so that they can make their

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planning arrangements before the financial year begins. There are clearly many reasons in favour of the procedure that I have put to the House.
Mr. Dick Douglas: Is the Leader of the House, as something of an exiled Scot, aware that Scotland was used as a guinea pig for the poll tax? We had it a year ahead of any other part of the United Kingdom. Is it not a trifle bizarre that the Bill which we shall debate next week and which will be pushed through expeditiously will absolve some payments in Northern Ireland, in terms of impact of rates, when the people there have never had the poll tax? Although we in Scotland will have had it for nearly three years, we shall receive only the same type of compensation as will be awarded to charge payers in England and Wales.
Mr. MacGregor: I do not think that any points relating to the procedure or the business statement arise out of that supplementary question.
Mr. Cecil Franks: Is my right hon. Friend aware that his proposals and suggested timetable are warmly welcomed by his hon. Friends, especially as they show at long last the Government's determination to get to grips with local government spending, which has got totally out of control? Is he further aware that his proposals will be welcomed nowhere more than in the county of Cumbria, where the county council showed its total lack of ability to control expenditure, in that, with a £302 million budget, it set its spending £1,000 below the capping level?
Mr. MacGregor: My hon. Friend has given good reasons to support the procedure that I am recommending to the House and that we hope to follow next week.
Mr. Robert Sheldon: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there is no precedent for acting in the way that he proposes? Almost immediately after hearing the Budget statement, the Leader of the House tells us that a panic measure is afoot and that we are to look at the whole of local government finance in one day. When that issue was last looked at, it took several years. There was supposed to be "nothing ruled in, nothing ruled out", with a full discussion and examination of all the issues. That is now being telescoped into one day's debate. It is scandalous.
Mr. MacGregor: I am surprised at the right hon. Gentleman, who is normally very fair about matters of this type and considers them carefully. He is suggesting that the Bill is about the whole area of local government finance and is one of the outcomes of the community charge review. The Chancellor made it clear this afternoon that that was not the case. He said:
"My right hon. Friend :the Secretary of State for the Environment will be announcing very soon the conclusions of our review of local government."
The Bill is about the Chancellor's statement this afternoon that local taxes are being asked to bear too large a burden. It is about that one issue. I am beginning to think, from the way Opposition Members are reacting, that they are rattled—[Interruption.] We shall be interested to see their reaction to the Bill and hear sustained and detailed objections sufficient to show that the proposal that I am announcing is not reasonable.
Miss Emma Nicholson: Does my right hon. Friend agree that, in the past six months, the methods of tax collecting for local government and matters concerned with the duties of local authorities and the ability of people to pay for them have been exhaustively discussed, in a way that they have never been discussed before? Does he further agree that many of those debates have been called by Her Majesty's Opposition when the utter emptiness of the arguments have been matched only by the emptiness of the Opposition Benches? My right hon. Friend's timetabling on this occasion is totally correct.
Mr. MacGregor: I agree with my hon. Friend.
Mr. Peter Shore: This is not the time to speak about the merits or demerits of the Bill, but it is certainly the time to speak about the Government's proposals to handle—or, rather, mishandle—its passage. No local government finance measure has ever been treated in such an extraordinarily abrupt and dictatorial way. The Leader of the House is inflicting on us nothing short of contempt. He is using procedures which the House has used in the past to deal with grave national crises simply to rescue himself from the serious political crisis in which the Tories find themselves.
Mr. MacGregor: That is simply not the case. I am merely announcing how we intend to proceed with the Bill to which my right hon. Friend the Chancellor referred. As next week is the last week before the Easter recess, it must be for the convenience of the House to have this information. Of course, I shall make the normal business statement on Thursday. On that occasion, I shall announce the rest of the business for next week and, I hope, some of the business for the week of our return. Clearly, it will be to the advantage of all those affected by the Bill that it should be proceeded with expeditiously, so that the legislation may be in place before the start of the financial year. That is why we are taking these steps.
Mr. Ian Bruce: May I support Opposition Members, particularly those from Wales and Scotland, who are quite rightly calling for three Bills? This measure is intended to ensure that local taxpayers will pay less. Surely it would be only fair to equalise percentages among taxpayers in Scotland, in England and in Wales. My constituents will probably have their community charge reduced by at least £200, while those in Scottish and Welsh constituencies will get a reduction of only about £100.
Mr. MacGregor: My hon. Friend raises a wider point that he may wish to deploy on another occasion. My right hon. Friend the Chancellor, in his Budget statement, made clear what the Bill will achieve and what the community charge reduction will be. As the change will apply throughout the country, one Bill is the right way to proceed.
Mr. Ken Eastham: While the Opposition readily welcomed the Government's proposal, I put it to the Leader of the House that, in view of the agony in which the Government now find themselves, they ought to explain the position of the thousands of people who are at present in the process of being prosecuted. Will the prosecutions be suspended as a result of this legislation?
Mr. MacGregor: The hon. Gentleman must know perfectly well that this Bill relates to next year: my right hon. Friend the Chancellor made that clear. Throughout the country, there is condemnation of those who have refused to pay the community charge this year.
Mr. Roger Knapman: Does my right hon. Friend believe that those hon. Members who so far have not paid any part of their community charge may be tempted by this announcment to do so?
Mr. MacGregor: I think that I made the position clear a moment ago.
Mr. Robert Wareing: Now the the Tory flagship has proved to be about as watertight as the Titanic, will the Leader of the House tell us what we are entitled to know? What will the title of the Bill be, how many clauses will it have, and will the timetable motion be taken between 3.30 pm and 7 pm on Tuesday? Is this House to be asked to deal with an entire Bill on local government finance between 7 o'clock and the end of the parliamentary day? What is proposed is for party convenience rather than for parliamentary convenience.
Mr. MacGregor: Actually, it is for the convenience of the wider public. The Bill will be introduced tomorrow, and will be published on Thursday. We shall also publish a timetable motion this week. The detail of the proposal will then be clear.
Several Hon. Members rose——
Mr. Speaker: Order. As I have already said, we are eating into private business time. I shall allow questions on the business statement to continue for a further seven minutes.
Mr. D. N. Campbell-Savours: The Government will not buy off the British electorate with this money. People are not stupid; they know what is going on. Throughout the north-west of England, where people's anger will not be abated by this announcement, there will be much concern. People will still be faced with poll tax bills on average of more than £250. The Leader of the House quoted a precedent for what is to be done on Tuesday. Can he confirm that the 1977 legislation was not guillotined?
Mr. MacGregor: In his opening comments, the hon. Gentleman strayed very wide of the business statement. The Bill to which he referred went through in one day. We believe that, in the interests of the wider public, including the hon. Gentleman's constituents, it is right that this Bill should complete its passage next week.
Mr. Harry Ewing: Does the Leader of the House realise that, even at this late stage, there is such a thing as credibility in politics? If the right hon. Gentleman ever had any credibility, he has done his best tonight to shed it. His handling of this measure is an absolute affront to the House of Commons. It was he who extended the length of the Easter recess. Now he has the nerve to tell hon. Members that, while they are about to have an extra week's holiday, the Government intend to guillotine legislation that will have a vital effect on every person in this country.
The Leader of the House and his hon. and right hon. Friends are pathetic sights. Having queued up to obey a three-line Whip by going through the Lobbies to introduce
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the poll tax and, thereby, punish the people of this country, they will queue up to obey a three-line Whip on Tuesday by going through the Lobby in support of legislation to get rid of it. This is sheer political opportunism, for which the British electorate will not easily forgive the Government.
Mr. MacGregor: I refute the hon. Gentleman's charge. I am slightly sorry that he made it. I have tried to make it clear that the purpose of trying to get this Bill through next week, irrespective of the Easter recess, is to enable all the necessary procedures to be put in place before the beginning of the financial year. There is no connection with the extra week in the Easter recess.
Mr. Harry Cohen: Will this Bill be amendable? It will get rid of only one third of the poll tax bills of Londoners next year. Some hon. Members, including myself, would like to get rid of the other two thirds. Indeed, we should like to see the Bill do away with the whole poll tax system. Will it be possible to amend the legislation in that way?
Mr. MacGregor: The Bill is about the issue which I have described and to which my right hon. Friend the Chancellor referred this afternoon. If the House should so decide, this measure, like any other, may be amended.
Mr. John Battle: Can the Leader of the House confirm that, today, he sent the chief executives of all local authorities a message that they should suspend the dispatch of all poll tax bills? Can he confirm that local authorities will be reimbursed for the chaos caused by something whose purpose was to convenience the Government? Or will he tell us that, having ridden roughshod over local authorities for the past 12 years, the Government are about to ride roughshod over Parliament?
Mr. MacGregor: That is not really a matter for me. It does not relate to the business statement. While I cannot go into details, I can say that I understand that local authorities will be reimbursed for their administrative costs.
Mr. Peter L. Pike: The Government are taking the unprecedented step of guillotining a Bill before it has been published. Is it their intention to go even further and curtail the democratic rights not only of this House but of another place to debate the Bill? The Government seem to be intent on setting new precedents and devising new ways of negating democracy.
Mr. MacGregor: For reasons that I have already explained, it is desirable that we get the Bill through both Houses of Parliament before the Easter recess. We hope that it will be possible to have all the stages completed next week. The reason for my making this statement tonight is that everyone should know what is proposed.
Mr. Bruce Grocott: In a business statement lasting a mere two or three minutes, the Leader of the House has demeaned both his office and himself. [Interruption.] We can take very easily the sneers and jeers of the right hon. Gentleman's hon. Friends, who will have to jump through a hoop willingly, just as they jumped through a hoop in the opposite direction in the last two or three years. The job of the Leader of the House is to protect the interests of its Members.

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I wish to put to the right hon. Gentleman two questions that so far he has been totally unable to answer. First, is there any precedent for a Bill of this sort being guillotined and taken through in a day? Second—the simplest of all questions—will the right hon. Gentleman tell us, with the benefit of his inside Cabinet knowledge, what the Bill's title is?
Mr. MacGregor: I am sorry that the hon. Gentleman made that last point. As Leader of the House, I am doing what I have been frequently urged to do—keeping the House informed as early as possible of arrangements proposed for the recess and for everything else.
I do not quite know how a Bill of this sort would be defined, so I cannot answer the hon. Gentleman's first question—purely in relation to the guillotine, that is. As for his second question, it is surely right to follow the usual process, which is that, when the Bill is introduced, its title will become known.
Dr. Cunningham: Does not the Leader of the House owe the hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith) and the House an apology? Was not his answer about precedents for this Bill dishonest? Should not he now apologise for misleading the House when he said that there were precedents for Bills being treated in this way, because clearly there are none? Is it not clear that the Conservatives' flagship is being not so much abandoned as deliberately scuttled by all the Conservative Members who went through the Lobbies and voted for it? And will not people seeing hospitals closed, waiting lists for operations lengthened and schools crumbling be astonished that, although money is not available for those problems, £4·5 billion can be found to buy off opposition to the poll lax?
As the Leader of the House wants proper consideration of this Bill, why did he not tell us what it is called and how many clauses are in it? If he does not have a name for the Bill, I will suggest one: the Save the Tories' Skin Bill.
Mr. MacGregor: I hope, Mr. Speaker, that you will forgive me for straying into the hon. Gentleman's point of policy substance, but it is important to stress that what my right hon. Friend announced today was a change in financing arrangements, not a change in overall public expenditure.
As for precedents, for the avoidance of all doubt I reiterate that the precedent to which I referred when I responded earlier was one of many cases of all stages of Bills being taken in one day. [HON. MEMBERS: "They were not guillotined."] I have already explained, and will say again, just to make the position absolutely clear, that it is very much for the convenience of community charge payers, and especially for local authorities, that the arrangements should be put in place as quickly as possible after the start of the financial year. That is why we believe it important that the Bill should get through next week, and it is why we have decided to follow the procedure that I have outlined.
I have also stressed that I understand that this is to be a short Bill which the whole House will see on Thursday. There will be opportunities to refer to it on Thursday and on Monday as well as throughout its stages on Tuesday.
Several Hon. Members: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker——
Mr. Speaker: I call Mr. Lawrence.
Mr. Ivan Lawrence: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Surely the House is entitled to know that this Bill is to be called the Labour (Shooting of Fox) (No. 1) Bill?
Several Hon. Members rose——
Mr. Speaker: Order. I will take some points of order, but the House must bear in mind other hon. Members' time, into which we are now eating.
Mr. Beith: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. A few moments ago you said, and the Leader of the House repeated it—perhaps trying to acquire the authority of the fact that you said it—that it will be possible for us to debate the contents of this Bill on Thursday and on Monday. That will not help Members who speak in the debate tomorrow, but there is a more important point than that.
Those of us with experience of Bills such as the poll tax legislation know that their details are explored only by way of amendment. You will recall, Mr. Speaker, that Conservative Members tabled amendments to the poll tax legislation which had great bearing on the problems that have since arisen. As I understand it—you will correct me if I am wrong—it will not be possible to table amendments to this Bill before we know its name, before it is published or, unless there is a special motion, before Second Reading; so it will not be possible to table amendments exploring the details of the Bill, or for Members to seek answers from Ministers on those details——
Mr. Speaker: Order. I never said that. If the hon. Gentleman was listening carefully, he will know that it was the Leader of the House who said it. What I said was that we can discuss this matter in business questions on Thursday——
Mr. Beith: Ah. Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. I understand that it will not be possible to refer to amendments to the Bill during proceedings on the Budget on Friday, Thursday or Monday, and that only the time allocated by the Leader of the House will be available for amendments, some of which may not even be considered. Am I right in that assumption?
Mr. Speaker: Quite right—everybody knows that.
Several Hon. Members rose——
Mr. Speaker: Order. We are eating into private business time.
Mr. Max Madden: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. It is evident that it is the Government who have placed you and the House in this difficulty. It is quite clear that there is no precedent for a major Bill of this sort being timetabled, so may I urge you——
Mr. Speaker: Order. What is the point of order for me?
Mr. Madden: May I urge you to urge the Government not to proceed with a guillotine motion, and to allow a second day for debate on this Bill?
Mr. Speaker: These are patently matters for the usual channels, not for the Chair.
Several Hon. Members rose——
Mr. Speaker: Well, Mrs. Fyfe.
Mrs. Maria Fyfe: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. It is not clear from what the Leader of the House said whether a Scottish Office Minister will be present for the debate to answer questions about the impact on Scotland.
Mr. John Maxton: Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. Will you now extend questions to the Leader of the House for at least another quarter of an hour——
Mr. Speaker: No, I will not—[HON. MEMBERS: "Why not?"] Because Scottish Members have been called.
Mr. Maxton: Further to that point of order——
Mr. Speaker: Sit down, please. The hon. Gentleman would be the first to complain if his time were taken up by points of order of this kind.
Mr. Maxton: Nonsense.
Mrs. Margaret Ewing: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. You kindly referred to the fact that there was a need for the usual channels to negotiate aspects of the legislation. I wonder whether you, as protector of the House, can extract from the Leader of the House agreement to a meeting with representatives of all parties in the House before the business statement on Thursday.
Mr. Speaker: I am sure that that sensible suggestion will have been heard. Now we will proceed——
Several Hon. Members rose——
Mr. Speaker: Order. I will call two more hon. Members and then proceed with the British Railways Bill.
Mr. Alan Meale: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I am sad that you did not take up the suggestion of my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow, Cathcart (Mr. Maxton) about extending business questions slightly——
Mr. Speaker: Order. I have already made my position clear. I have an obligation to protect the business of the House and other hon. Members who want to speak.
Mr. Bob Cryer: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. As a guillotine has already been announced—unusually for a Bill—my point of order relates to the selection of amendments. You might be tempted to select only amendments that might fit into the pattern of the guillotine. It would help to show that some shred of democratic procedure is still left in the House—after these proposals by the Government—if you made it clear that you will not select amendments purely on the basis of the Government's allocation of time, but that you will select them in such a way that the House can see the range of amendments that could have been discussed had we been given the time.
Mr. Speaker: I assure the House that, in that respect, I shall do my duty.
The Clerk will now proceed to read the title of the private Bill set down for consideration this day.
Several Hon. Members: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker: I call Sir Patrick McNair-Wilson.
Several Hon. Members rose——

British Railways Bill
Order for Second Reading read.
7.39 pm
Sir Patrick McNair-Wilson: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
Several Hon. Members rose——
Mr. Speaker: Order. I must ask hon. Members to resume their seats.
Mr. Dave Nellist: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, on this Bill.
Mr. Speaker: On this Bill? All right.
Mr. Nellist: I am grateful to you, Mr. Speaker, as there was an obvious danger of at least two Opposition Members ending up with laryngitis before too long.
Will you confirm, Mr. Speaker, that the phrase, "business of the House" does not include private business such as the British Railways Bill? By definition, it is a Bill which affects a small section of the community, so it should not take precedence over a matter that affects the whole community. As you were railroaded or steamrollered by the Leader of the House, who bounced you into the position that you have held for the past 40 minutes, would it not be more appropriate if the business of the whole community—the poll tax—had a full hearing in place of that private business?
Mr. Speaker: Top marks for ingenuity, but the hon. Gentleman knows that we must get on with the Bill, which we should have started to discuss at 7 o'clock. It is only fair to those Members who have an interest in it.
Sir Patrick McNair-Wilson: I was endeavouring to say that the works in the Bill are designed to add to the capacity and improve the safety and reliability of the railway system. The shift to rail implicit in the schemes is good for the relief of congestion, for the environment and, ultimately, for the taxpayer. In many areas, British Rail is currently investing substantially in growth. It is perhaps worth remembering that the electrification of the east coast main line to Newcastle, Edinburgh and Carstairs which will take place in July this year will bring Edinburgh within four hours of London for the first time.
The Networker project is designed to bring more capacity on routes around London, particularly in Kent, with the first Networker 465 due to be delivered in September this year.
As for the channel tunnel link, it is fair to say that the expenditure of f1·4 billion on channel tunnel trains, stations, depots and track upgrading for 1993 is currently in hand. A massive investment in the regional railways is taking place so that all diesel trains that are over 30 years old can be replaced by 1992.
In the longer term, projects such as the InterCity 250 will reduce journey times to the north-west, the west midlands and Strathclyde and on the crossrail link in London.
Dr. Norman A. Godman: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for showing his characteristic courtesy in giving way. He mentioned improvements in the service to Strathclyde. As a Strathclyde Member, may I ask what confidence he has

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that improvements will take place in the next year or so? I receive many complaints, particularly from business men and women passengers, that the service along the west coast of Scotland and England into Euston is massively inferior to the service between Edinburgh Waverley and London King's Cross.
Sir Patrick McNair-Wilson: I prefaced my remarks with "in the longer term". My earlier comments related to events that will happen this year and changes that will take place soon. I assure the hon. Gentleman that his remarks will be passed on to the chairman of British Rail, so he will be aware of the concern of the hon. Gentleman and his constituents about the services provided in that region. I have no doubt that the point will be carefully noted.
Mr. A. J. Beith: Before the hon. Gentleman leaves the issue of Anglo-Scottish services, may I say that many of us who have been keen to support the measures that he outlined a moment ago are worried that the undertaking that was given to us about the restoration of sleeper and overnight services was not maintained.
The hon. Gentleman referred to the new chairman of British Rail and those of us who are most concerned—my hon. Friend the Member for Roxburgh and Berwickshire (Mr. Kirkwood) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale (Sir D. Steel)—were especially grateful that the chairman has agreed to reconsider the matter. However, we attach importance to undertakings that are given when private Bills go through the House and wish to ensure that they are followed up as far as is humanly possible.
Sir Patrick McNair-Wilson: I understand that the hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith) and his colleagues met the chairman of British Rail on 27 February and that an early response to his comments will be given to him. That is as far as I can go this evening, but I hope that it will satisfy the hon. Gentleman.
The Bill represents works in the shorter term and most of the projects command general support. There have been four petitioners against the Bill and the board hopes that it will be able to reach agreements with at least two of them before the Bill goes before a Select Committee.
The Bill follows the usual format for Bills of this type. Part I—clauses 1 to 4—is in line with past practice. Clause 1 deals with the short title; clause 2 deals with interpretation; clause 3 deals with incorporation of general enactments; and clause 4 deals with the application of part I of the Compulsory Purchase Act 1965.
Part II deals with the details of the works to be undertaken. Those are important because they allow British Rail to meet the increasing demand, both for additional passenger services and for freight services. I stress again that the transfer from road to rail is in everyone's interest. I shall outline the most important works, but if hon. Members have additional queries on matters to which I do not refer, I shall try to seek clarification for them.
It may be interesting to point out that many of the works are reinstatements of older works. Work No. 1 is the reinstatement of a chord line, half a mile long, at Guide Bridge in Greater Manchester. It will handle trainloads of stone for the construction industry and take them to various terminals north of Manchester. That will allow trains to run via Ashton Moss instead of the present route via Ashburys, which is undulating with severe curves. I
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know that the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Mr. Bennett) is interested in that matter, but he is, unfortunately, not in his place.
Work No. 2 is a similar reinstatement of a curve at Edge Hill, Liverpool, to allow coal trains from Gladstone Dock to reach Fiddler's Ferry power station without the need to reverse at Edge Hill, saving time and fuel through improved efficiency.
Work No. 3 is the restoration of the rail link between St. Helens and St. Helens Junction on the Liverpool to Manchester railway. The line is now used in part as a freight siding and its restoration will allow the introduction of a new passenger service between St. Helens and Warrington, with a possible subsequent extension to Ellesmere Port. The proposal has the backing of the Merseyside passenger transport executive and will contribute to the relief of traffic congestion in the area.
Work No. 4 is a temporary diversion of the railway at Bingley to allow the construction of a bridge for the new Airedale trunk road. Works No. 5 and 6 allow the construction of two extra tracks on the western approach to Leeds station to handle the increasing number of passenger trains planned for the future with the West Yorkshire passenger transport executive. The scheme will help to improve reliability and relieve congestion in West Yorkshire.
Work No. 7 is to some extent connected with the future channel tunnel project. It provides for the closure of Willesborough level crossing at Ashford—a very busy crossing on the line to Dover and the channel tunnel—where delays to traffic are already severe. A new footbridge will be provided for pedestrians, and the nearby Crow Corner bridge will be widened to take the extra road traffic.
Work No. 8 involves a chord line at Clarborough near Gainsborough, which will allow coal trains from Immingham to reach Cottam power station direct, avoiding the need to run to Retford and reverse direction there.
Work No. 9 involves a long siding at Sherburn in Elmet, between Pontefract and York, to carry trains of gypsum from the Drax power station to the works of British Gypsum Limited. The flue gas desulphurisation plant at Drax produces gypsum as a by-product, and the link allows the heavy traffic to pass by rail rather than by heavy lorry.
Other works are related to the replacement of various levels crossings, and other clauses in the Bill relate to provision for underpinning buildings, dealing with surface water, agreements with highway authorities and so on. Two changes deal with level crossings over private roads, and provide for the normal penalties for disregarding flashing red lights that would apply if the crossings were over public roads. Clause 30 deals, among other things, with the extension of platforms at Strood station in Kent to allow longer Networker trains to be run, to increase capacity and reduce overcrowding on the busy north Kent route from Charing Cross and Cannon Street.
I realise that some hon. Members may be concerned about the works that relate to the moving of coal. Concerns have been expressed about the movement of imported coal, but that is clearly not a matter for British Rail. British Rail is in the business of moving goods and passengers, and I hope that the House will agree that it is far preferable for any product that has to be moved to be moved by rail rather than road. I hope that the House will

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welcome the works that are proposed, which are modest and which will help to build on the shift from roads to railways.
The Bill is one of a number of measures—I have had the honour of being involved in many of them over the past 10 years—and I hope that the House will allow it to go to a Select Committee because it represents an essential building block for British Rail in its continuing attempt to build a more effective and reliable service. I hope that the difficulties of the past winter are behind us. The general thrust of the board's policy is to improve its facilities and its service to passengers and freight users, and the Bill is an essential part of that process.
7.52 pm
Dr. Norman A. Godman: I have a deal of sympathy for the Bill and I listened carefully to the speech of the hon. Member for New Forest (Sir P. McNair-Wilson).
I want to refer to the Anglo-Scottish service. The hon. Gentleman courteously gave way twice. The first intervention concerned the sleeper service. In particular, concern was expressed about the trains stopping in Berwick-upon-Tweed. Two hon. Members use the service—the hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith) and my hon. Friend the Member for East Lothian (Mr. Home Robertson).
I speak as a long-term supporter of British Rail. As someone who travels between Glasgow Central and London Euston, I can speak as a consumer. As one who occasionally travels down by train, but—regrettably, the hon. Member for New Forest may say—much more frequently travels on the shuttle service between Glasgow airport and London Heathrow, I think that unquestionably the most civilised way to travel between the two cities is by train. There is no argument about that. It is much better to travel by train than to go through a crowded Heathrow and undertake the dreadful journey from there to Westminster tube station.
There has to be some equality as between the service that runs down the west coast of Scotland and the one that runs between Edinburgh Waverley and King's Cross. For a start, I think that I am right in saying that the Edinburgh Waverley to King's Cross service is much more frequent than the Glasgow Central to Euston run. Moreover, the latter is often served by old rolling stock. Two weeks ago, my wife and I went to board the Royal Scot leaving Euston for Glasgow at 10.25 am. Given that it is supposed to be the premier train of the daily service, the rolling stock was a disgrace. The buffet service, too, was nothing short of scandalous. If British Rail is to attract passengers—particularly business passengers and tourists—we shall need not only improved travelling times between Scotland and London but improvements in on-board services offered to passengers.
As a supporter—albeit a mildly critical one—of British Rail, I hope that the company will note what I am saying, because, as I said, rail is the better mode of passenger transport between Scotland and the south-east of England. Given that passengers are to be incarcerated for more than five hours, it is nothing short of disgraceful when, on
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boarding a train at Glasgow Central, they are told that the buffet service is off or that no restaurant facilities are available.
Improvements are therefore required in addition to these welcome, if somewhat modest, changes and the promise of long-term changes. The hon. Member for New Forest talked about the 250 service, for example. If the train provides the kind of service that I should like to see, many Scots will be keen to travel on it.
Journey times need to be improved, as does the quality of service on board. I do not criticise the staff, who are extremely friendly and courteous, but they must be given the best facilities and resources to help them in their dealings with passengers.
If such criticisms were taken on board, I genuinely believe that there would be an increase in passenger travel on the Anglo-Scottish service.
7.57 pm
Mr. Peter Snape: I want to make three extremely brief points about the Bill. The first—touched on by the hon. Member for New Forest (Sir P. McNair-Wilson), who moved the Second Reading in his customary able manner—concerns the moving of imported coal. Like other hon. Members, I am conscious of the contentious nature of any proposals to import coal into the United Kingdom. However, as the hon. Gentleman said, if imported coal is to be moved—and, once it is imported, it has to be moved—it is best moved by rail.
The proposals for the two chord lines at Edge Hill and Clarborough on the west and east coast respectively will keep a considerable number of heavy lorry movements off our roads. Moreover, I need hardly remind the House that if the Bill were defeated because of an objection to the moving of imported coal by rail, the coal could be moved by lorry without any reference whatever to our procedures. It is only because of our somewhat archaic way of dealing with British railways matters that we are discussing the proposals.
Secondly, I wish to record my pleasure about the restoration of the link between St. Helens and St. Helens Junction. It will provide a connection for Warrington, as well as connections for Birmingham and the west of England. If the extension goes ahead, there will be connections at Helsby for Chester and at Ellesmere Port for the electrified line serving the Wirral area. I am sure that the Merseyside passenger transport executive feels that such works will benefit the area.
My third point relates to the building of the chord line at Guide Bridge. My hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish (Mr. Bennett) has previouusly raised that matter. We appear to be in some danger of causing further inconvenience to my hon. Friend's constituents. I hope that the hon. Member for New Forest will relay our concerns to British Rail. A number of years ago, the track was reduced to a single line just south-west of Denton station,and it stretches as far as Heaton Norris junction. The current proposals will result in an increased number of heavy trains having to wait before they can enter the single line section. Some 20 years ago there were four tracks between Denton and Heaton Norris junction, but now there is just one. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will

229 understand the problem of congestion that could and is so easily caused, especially at night when so many freight train movements take place.
Having made those three points, I welcome the Bill on behalf of the Opposition. I wish it a fair passage through the House.
8.1 pm
The Minister for Roads and Traffic (Mr. Christopher Chope): The Government have considered the Bill and have no objection in principle to the powers sought by the railways board. We have no points outstanding as a Department. I hope that the House will give the Bill a Second Reading and allow it to proceed to Committee for detailed consideration in the usual way. I understand that there are four petitions against it.
8.2 pm
Sir Patrick McNair-Wilson: With the leave of the House, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I shall deal first with the points raised by the hon. Member for Greenock and Port Glasgow (Dr. Godman). I know Glasgow well as my father was a doctor there. The InterCity 250 service is designed ultimately to take 30 minutes off the journey time to London and to provide the sort of benefits to which the hon. Gentleman referred. The hon. Gentleman will be aware that, sadly, the time scale for the project does not envisage completion until 1994. I assure him that the project is on time.
The hon. Member for West Bromwich, East (Mr. Snape) and I have discussed railway Bills for a number of years. I welcome his support and his acknowledgement of the point about the movement of imported coal, on this occasion, and generally about trying to get freight off the roads. He properly raised the question of the chord line at Guide Bridge and the worries that that is causing the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Mr. Bennett). I have drawn the matter to the attention of the railways board, which was not entirely aware of the congestion. As of this evening, the matter will be re-examined. I hope that that reassures both hon. Members that the matter is now firmly under consideration.
I welcome the support of my hon. Friend the Minister. I hope that the House will allow the Bill to go to the Committee.
Question put and agreed to.
Bill accordingly read a Second time and committed.

House of Commons (Accommodation)
Motion made and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Neil Hamilton.]
8.4 pm
Mrs. Edwina Currie: I am glad to have this opportunity to raise the issue of House of Commons accommodation, with particular reference to phase 2 of the proposals before us. I made a new year's eve resolution. I gave a number of hours of thought to various matters, and then I came up with my resolution—to do whatever I could about the appalling conditions in which I and many others work in this House. It would have been a little selfish simply to demand that I be moved to something better, so I took the issue on board and did some research. I was absolutely amazed at what I found.
We have a little more time than usual for an Adjournment debate, so I shall begin by explaining that my office is in Commons court. It was built in the 1970s when my right hon. and noble Friend Lord Joseph was in charge, and I am told that that is why the lifts are so slow. I have to share my room, as do most of my colleagues. I share it with my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport (Mr. Viggers). Previously, I shared it with my hon. Friend the Member for Derby, North (Mr. Knight) until his appointment to the Whips' Office. I am told that he has considerable affection for the room and remembers it with pleasure.
I remember that room only in that I have been there for a very long time. I occupied it from 1983 to 1986 and from January 1989 to now—some five years of my life. I know every inch of that room, every knobble on the wall and every door knob. I know it far too well.
The first problem with the room is that it is not very big. According to the recent space audit, its official size is 12 sq m. It is a room for two, which gives me 6 sq m. We must also take into account the fact that a substantial amount of the room is taken up with two desks, three chairs, a bookcase, a cupboard and the various other implements and paraphernalia of two working colleagues. That does not leave a great deal of room.
My hon. Friend the Member for Derby, North and I made our point about the room at Christmas 1985 when we held a drinks party. We managed to get 22 people into the room, although most were standing on each other's shoulders and a number had their heads touching the ceiling. However, by the end of the drinks party we felt that we had made our point.
I want to give the House some idea of what that 6 sq m—precious little space—means. It is, of course, illegal and runs counter to the Health and Safety Executive rules, of which I am sure my hon. Friend the Minister is aware. I made some inquiries and discovered that one of the buildings on the nearby site that might be available to us all in some dim and distant future, well into the next century, is Canon row police station. Indeed, some of its accommodation is already used by staff of the House. It was built in 1902 and still includes the police cells, which I understand are of some historical significance. Each prisoner had not 6 sq m but 7 sq m in those police cells, so perhaps we would all be better housed if we made use of them.
The only advantage of my little room—almost my nun's cell—is that it is air conditioned, which I find helpful as I am an asthmatic. Of course, it is necessary that it

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should be air conditioned because it has no other form of ventilation. It is an internal room with no windows and no natural light. In fact, it is a store cupboard, and it should be used as such. It should never, at any time, have been allocated for use by working people, and especially not by hon. Members. It should never have been permitted to be used by anybody. I suspect that it would not even be useful or appropriate for a photocopying machine or any machine that emitted vapours, and it is utterly unsuitable for humankind. To be absolutely honest, I suspect that I have one of the worst rooms in the Palace, although it has the advantage of being close to the Chamber, and I appreciate that.
I understand that in the recent space audit ordered by the Services Committee, it was established that some 230 hon. Members needed to be rehoused to ensure that each had a respectable, albeit small, room of their own. One third of hon. Members stand to be rehoused somehow. That does not include any further Members of the other place. I gather that most of them expressed no interest in acquiring any accommodation. That needs to be borne in mind. One third of hon. Members are inadequately housed and have to work in the sort of conditions that I have described—conditions that would be regarded with astonishment and disgust by our constituents.
The appalling conditions here make our work difficult. For example, yesterday I had two meetings with people from outside the House. One meeting included four constituents who wanted to join me in lobbying the Minister for Public Transport about improvement of our rail facilities in south Derbyshire. We had a successful meeting, but there was no way I could get them into my room. It would have been inappropriate and discourteous of me to ask my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport to move out so that two of them could come in. We tried to book a Committee Room but found, inevitably, that they were all booked—for some frightfully important meetings on the politics of other nations, I gather.
Mr. David Shaw: I do not know whther my hon. Friend has been able to ascertain why some of the small Committee Rooms are booked, but in the past year it has come to my attention that they have sometimes been booked for taking Members' photographs for television companies, or by outside companies and organisations with private Bills. The result is that my constituents have not been able to meet me in relative comfort because, as my hon. Friend points out, all hon. Members have rooms which are completely unsuitable for such meetings.
Mrs. Currie: I take my hon. Friend's point entirely. The fact is that there just are not enough rooms of any kind here. I suspect that many are occupied by extremely worthy Officers of the House, Departments, and so on.
To continue with yesterday's saga, our pre-meeting was eventually held in their Lordships' House, over tea in the Pugin Room. It is not easy mixing eclairs with plans and maps—they got in everyone's way and we ended up with sticky maps. The de-briefing had to take place much later in a corridor in Marsham street, waiting for taxis in the rain. It was a thoroughly unsatisfactory situation. How on earth are we to look after our constituents, or anyone else we might want to see, if the rooms are too small to get them into?
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I had another meeting, in connection with tonight's Adjournment debate, with three distinguished gentlemen all of whom have had a finger in the pie that I am describing. I made them come to my room because that seemed the easiest way of making my point. One sat at my hon. Friend's desk, who fortunately was not there, one sat in the armchair and one sat on a footstool. Again, there was simply no room for the plans or drawings. Had we wished to use anything as elaborate as visual aids, such as slides or an overhead projector, it would have been impossible. One of us would have had to go into the corridor. None of that is conducive to intelligent conversation. With respect to the officials whom I met last night, I must say that in the circumstances they did rather well.
Added to all that, my marvellous secretary is stuck in another building. She shares a room, and her working conditions are Dickensian—absolutely antediluvian. There is no room for me to house a research assistant, should I wish to have one, so I have to resist all entreaties from the marvellous keen young people who would love to come to work for me or many other hon. Members. It is a good job we do not have the same leeway as the United States Congress, which I visited in 1989, where Congress members are restricted to no more than 17 assistants. If we introduced such a rule in this place, it would really put the cat among the pigeons.
It is tempting to believe—I am looking at my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing and Planning as I say this—that there is a conspiracy abroad to ensure that Back-Bench Members are prevented from doing their job properly. However, as my hon. Friend has spent a long time on the Back Benches, I am sure that he is not a party to it and that he will try to disabuse me of such a traitorous notion when he replies.
What can be done about this? Various efforts were made in the 1970s. For example, Norman Shaw North, where my secretary works, was occupied by the House in 1975 and much of it was restored to a respectable standard. Norman Shaw South was used by us from 1979. At about the same time, a great deal of work went into drawing up a scheme for the whole of the Whitehall, Bridge street, Canon row site—known as the Casson Conder proposal. It would have cost more than £100 million at 1979 prices and was rightly abandoned as almost one of the first things that the new Government did on taking office in 1979.
The trouble is that not much has happened since. There has been a great deal of talk and consultation, but precious little in the way of results. Throughout the 1980s, all that we managed to acquire was space for 30 secretaries, but not a scrap extra for hon. Members. In a Palace where about 2,000 people work, that is pathetic and I for one am losing patience.
I will go through some of the schemes. When the Casson Conder scheme was abandoned in 1979, the Department of the Environment commissioned three separate reports, one after the other, all designed to discover whether it was possible to marry private money and private effort with public money and public effort, and whether that would do the trick.
At last, in 1984, the phase 1 design brief was produced. Why it should take five years to get from a decision to a design brief I do not know, but I am not asking my hon. Friend the Minister to explain all the past decisions for which he does not have responsibility—I am simply

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putting on record the mess that we have had until now. The contractor is Faircloughs and I gather that the cost of the scheme will be at least £30 million. It will house 60 Members and 100 secretaries. It should have been ready in 1990, but it was not.
Mr. David Shaw: Has it occurred to my hon. Friend that there is an imbalance between the number of Members and the number of secretaries? She said earlier that her secretary is in a separate building. My secretary is four floors beneath where I operate. That makes it impossible for there to he any computer networking whereby her computer can be connected to my computer or for us to be connected by any modern electronic work facilities. Is that not inconvenient for hon. Members and will not even the new building, costing what it does, perpetuate the existing shortcomings?
Mrs. Currie: We could probably have a long debate—and perhaps we will when my hon. Friend catches your eye, Mr. Speaker—about exactly what services should be available to Members. I think that we should have access to faxes and computer links. We should have closed circuit television. We should have a dish on the roof, and I have said so, so that we can receive the television services that our constituents receive. We should have a cable system, and the quicker the better. This place is still in the 19th century.
While I am complaining, I should add one word of considerable gratitude to whomever it was—it may have been the hon. Member for Ogmore (Mr. Powell)—who stole half the gents' loo in the Library Corridor and turned it into a nice ladies' room. The ladies of this House are extremely grateful.
Miss Emma Nicholson: Will my hon. Friend alert my hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Mr. Shaw) to the fact that the electronic mail system is not dependent on which floor one's secretary happens to be on or underneath? As a sexist comment, I would rather the two were reversed in any case.
Mrs. Currie: It depends whether one has a male secretary or a female secretary.
Mr. Ray Powell: I should like to correct the hon. Lady about the ladies' toilet. I was not aware that the gentlemen's toilets in the Library Corridor were to be halved until I returned from a break. With all due respect to lady Members, there are not so many lady Members as male Members. If they were to walk the other way down the corridor, there is a ladies' room that I did not know about until I was invited in to see it. It has a bathroom, a shower and a lovely lounge, as well as toilets, and it is only about 10 yards from the corner where the extra facilities have been provided, so I think they are surplus to requirements.
Mrs. Currie: Presumably the hon. Member for Ogmore was taken into that ladies' room by one of his hon. Friends. In fact, it is the Labour ladies' room, and we are only there when we are absolutely desperate. I am pleased that the subject has aroused such interest.
The most irritating thing that struck any lady Member coming to the House for the first time was that the door to the loo in the Library Corridor—the closest one to the Chamber going the usual way—had on it "Members only". There are many stories of lady Members going in
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there and retreating in great embarrassment; of course, one or two did not retreat in embarrassment. However, the doors are now marked, "Lady Members only" and "Gentlemen Members only". Lady Members, at least on the Conservative side, regard that as a tremendous victory.
I have already mentioned that my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport shares the room that I am complaining about. He has put himself on record as saying that ladies need more room than gentlemen. I think that I should refer the hon. Member for Ogmore to my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport, who clearly knows more about the matter than I do.
To return to the design brief produced for phase 1 in 1984, we have seen the building and it looks magnificent. I gather that it has cost some £30 million and that it should have been ready in 1990. I was informed by the Clerk to the Select Committee that it would be ready during the summer recess this year. I asked about it again yesterday. The Department of the Environment assured me that it would be ready in October 1991. Occasionally we see the figure of a workman passing backwards and forwards in front of a naked light bulb. Sure as heck, it does not look ready to me. Perhaps my hon. Friend can enlighten us as to when that building will be handed over. Indeed, will it be before not the next general election but the one after? We would regard that, too, as a considerable victory.
In the interim, Canon row police station has been modestly refurbished, and in 1989 it was made available for 30 Members' secretaries. That is it. There was no other change during the whole of the 1980s, and there was no improvement in accommodation for Members.
In May 1989 things began to move at a slightly faster pace. The New Building Sub-Committee of the Select Committee on House of Commons (Services) appointed the architect, Michael Hopkins, to advise on the development of phase 2—that is, Bridge street, Palace chambers and St. Stephen's house. That is still only part of the site. There is another third, which is still a dump, before we get to Richmond house.
Mr. Hopkins had no sooner started work than the Department of Transport and London Underground announced, in July 1989, the extension to the Jubilee line, the replacement and modernisation of Westminster tube station with the new interchange for the Jubilee, District and Circle lines, and the digging up of the whole of Parliament square. When one thinks of the security problems of digging up Parliament square, one's heart turns over.
Quite rightly, hon. Members let out a howl of rage and the Services Committee and various other committees responded with equal anger. London Underground backed off, saying that digging up the centre of the square would no longer be necessary and that the new proposals would be £10 million cheaper. In its report of 14 February 1991, the Services Committee said at paragraph 13:
"We are particularly pleased that London Underground now accepts that there is no need to use Parliament Square as a work-site, although we are surprised that the engineering solution now put forward was not investigated at a much earlier stage."
I would put it differently—it is a pity London Underground did not think of that in the first place, because we have had another year's delay while London Underground and everyone else have been flapping around, trying to work out how not to dig up the centre of Parliament square when they did not need to.

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We find that two new private Bills are required to ensure that development of the Jubilee line can take place. I understand that those Bills are in Committee. I am on record already as being highly critical of the whole private Bill procedure in respect of docks, ports and railways. The procedure is a leftover not from the 19th century but from the 18th century.
I am privileged to have been selected to sit in Committee on the Planning and Compensation Bill. Back in the 18th century, the way promoters got private Bills through was to bribe everyone. That might have worked then, but—naturally—compensation clauses have no such role now and will have no such effect. The point is that we should not have to go through private Bill procedures which take years, which keep hon. Members in Committee for hours and days and months and years, and which end up subsidising the legal profession.
My hon. Friend the Member for Tatton (Mr. Hamilton), who is sitting on the Front Bench, chaired one private Bill Committee for two and a half years and grew grey in the service of the House. [Interruption.] It had nothing to do with his constituency—it was connected with King's Cross. The whole system is barmy, so I welcome the efforts of the Leader of the House, under pressure from many hon. Members on both sides, to get shot of the whole procedure and to use the planning system instead.
Although the private Bills in relation to London Transport are expected to complete their passage through the House, with Royal Assent expected in the summer of 1992, which is not very long given the saga of private Bill procedure, the architects for phase 2 have not yet been commissioned, and the whole complicated scheme is still at the feasibility study stage.
The Services Committee promised in September 1990 that the architects' brief would be ready for Easter—that is, next week—but we see no sign of it. I hope that the hon. Member for Ogmore will catch your eye, Mr. Speaker. He certainly has my permission to do so. We should like to know where the brief is and when it will be produced.
What we shall have on Thursday of this week is an exhibition, based on Mr. Hopkins' suggestions. The House will have an opportunity to examine them. I think that I have seen them. Certainly I saw quite a lot of interesting drawings and computer printouts last night. I hope that I have not broken any protocols of the House, but in order to speak with a little knowledge on the subject I took the opportunity to see Mr. Hopkins.
From what I saw, the proposals are splendid, and I hope that no one raises any spurious objections to them. I hope that no one comes up with something which is thought essential. It reminds me of the way we used to build hospitals, or end up not building them. Everyone was invited to make a contribution, plans were produced, everyone was invited to comment and all the comments were taken on board. Of course, they were always contradictory, so we had to go back and produce more briefs, more feasibility studies and more space audits, and there was more delay.
Mr. David Shaw: My hon. Friend has referred to various plans and ideas, and the developments of the past 10 years, which have provided new accommodation for just 30 secretaries and none for Members. Will she
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consider what might have happened if the management of the House of Commons had been different and if we had had a chief executive, a proposal now being talked of? A chief executive would have had drive, energy and purpose, and his or her sole raison d'être would have been to ensure that the interests of Members were better looked after from an administrative point of view.
Mrs. Currie: I could not agree more. In fact, as I look at you, Mr. Speaker, with your experience and service to this House, it occurs to me that, much as we all regret your retirement at the end of this Parliament, you would be ideal as the chief executive. I agree with my hon. Friend that someone has to do it—someone who knows how the place works, and has a commitment and an affection for it and for all its foibles and quirks, someone who has in his head a brain and in his heart some sense. I commend that suggestion to the House.
However, it is not merely a question of delays at Services Committee level. There is a gap between the Property Services Agency, the Department of the Environment, our asperations and the Treasury. I understand that only £20 million is provided each year for all work on parliamentary buildings, for the entire Palace of Westminster—this magnificent national masterpiece.
Phase 2 will cost £60 million, which is believed to be phased over about three years and means a doubling of the budget. I understand that the DOE has not yet told the Treasury officially about that expenditure and will have to do so to get approval in principle to start design work. We are only a year away from Royal Assent and we have yet to tell the Treasury. I asked a question yesterday and was told that my hon. Friend the Minister, or one of his colleagues on the Front Bench, will write to the Chief Secretary to the Treasury "any time now". Really—when and when can we expect some sort of reply?
That means that no real action is possible until 1992. According to the Committee, demolition and re-build will take three years, although London Underground said—it was quoted in the Select Committee report of 14 February 1991—that it would take 53 months from Royal Assent. So it will be 1995 at the earliest before this additional accommodation will become available—12 years after I entered the House.
Mr. Ian Bruce: I wonder whether my hon. Friend has thought about the possibility that a good, economic way to ensure that less staff want to take up accommodation within the Palace of Westminster would be to tell hon. Members that they could either have an office for their staff in London or be given a higher allowance to accommodate their staff elsewhere? In South Dorset I pay for an office for two people out of my allowance and I have to pay extra for my telephone bills because I use the private telephone there rather than the free telephone service here. My hon. Friend might like to expand on that interesting idea.
Mrs. Currie: I do not wish to set out rules for the way in which colleagues on either side of the House work. My system, in a large constituency, is that four staff work for me. One of them must be here, because so many telephone calls come here, this is one of our addresses and there has to be someone here to open the mail. If I may give my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, South (Mr. Bruce) a clue, in the weeks after I left the Government I received what might be called a rather enlarged postbag. We used to get

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three postbags a day and it took eight hours to open the letters. We had to bring someone else in—a research assistant who works for another colleague—and pay him, on an hourly basis, to open them. It only occurred to us afterwards that we should have saved all the stamps. Much of that sort of mail comes here and it would be a burden on the Post Office staff if it had to be sent elsewhere.
Of the three other people who work for me, one works at her home in London and two work in my constituency. I keep them all incredibly busy.
I wish that the allowance would be increased and I have expressed that wish in the House. It is appalling that we are obliged to pay our staff pathetically low rates, whether here or in our constituencies, because we would otherwise have to subsidise their pay substantially out of our own pockets.
Mr. David Shaw: One of the questions that seems to follow from that is that, while we might all want to restrict staff in central London—a policy suggested by Governments in the past and by the Greater London council in its day—considering the amount of legislation that passes through the House, which now amounts to about 40 Bills a year, together with European legislation, is it not reasonable that we might begin to approach the staff level that Congressmen employ, although we would be a long way short of that? Sooner or later each of us will need to have some sort of legislative assistant, who will probably spend a large amount of time helping us to keep track of the details of European legislation.
Mrs. Currie: I invite my hon. Friend to join us tomorrow in European Standing Committee A, where we deal with an extraordinary range of subjects week by week—European Standing Committee B meets at the same time—as he would find that his point is well made. If we are to keep up with all that, as many of us sincerely try to do, a little help must be on the cards at some stage. However, I always find that when I take on a research assistant I end up doing a lot of the work, especially if it is a young person. I end up looking after them, rather than them looking after me, so I have tended to reject that approach.
Since we have a fair amount of time for this Adjournment debate, I am more than content for colleagues from both sides of the House to comment if they wish to catch your eye at some stage, Mr. Speaker. We may as well use this opportunity to make the arguments that we want to make. We do not often get such a chance, and I for one am making the most of it.
Mr. David Nicholson: I am sorry that I missed the earlier part of my hon. Friend's speech. While I have been in the Chamber, she has been talking about accommodation for Members and the staff we employ. Are there not two other aspects to that debate? Since we have time, they should be explored further.
First, hon. Members receive a fair number of visitors from our constituencies or elsewhere. At present, we have to meet them in Central Lobby. Sometimes we can take them into some of the corridors. If we are lucky, we can buy them a cup of tea or coffee downstairs in the cafeteria. Accommodation, especially for confidential talks with constituents or visitors, is very limited. If 40 hon. Members each decided to give one constituent a drink in the Pugin Room or coffee in the cafeteria, that would be it—they would be packed. My hon. Friend should perhaps explore that subject.
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The second matter that my hon. Friend might care to explore—as an indication of my admiration for her, may I say that I am sure that this must have occurred to her—is that, from time to time, hon. Members have to give television interviews, perhaps on days such as today when we have heard the Budget statement. At the moment we usually have to stand on one of the greens—Palace green, College green or outside the Queen Elizabeth II conference centre. Our lives have been affected by security measures taken since January and the outbreak of the war in the Gulf. Yet we are sitting ducks for terrorist attack, or any other attack, while we are giving television interviews. Should not the plans that we are making for accommodation in the House take account of hon. Members' security when giving television interviews? Would my hon. Friend care to develop that issue?
Mrs. Currie: May I answer my hon. Friend in reverse order? I agree that it is not an affectation or a conceit to ask that accommodation be made availble which is suitable for television studios. We are often required to give interviews—typically, one is asked to do so at some stage every week—and it is not merely Ministers but also Back Benchers. We think that that is a good idea. My hon. Friend's argument about security was well made. The studios available for such interviews are tiny—much too small for group discussions and only suitable for head-to-camera commentary. That is not satisfactory.
In his first comment, my hon. Friend reiterated what I said in my earliest remarks today. Perhaps he may like to do as I do: I show our rooms to those constituents whom I trust most deeply and especially local journalists whom I trust absolutely, and never again do they believe that we do not work hard. From then on they believe that we work in the most diabolical conditions, and they tend to admire us that much more whenever we manage to get anything done for them which requires us to sit down and write a letter, dictate a draft, or whatever.
Mr. David Hinchliffe: We do work in diabolical conditions, and I concur with the hon. Lady's central point. The essence of her argument is about the new building and the need for expansion. Is not the key issue the use of existing premises? I spent three and a half years—courtesy of my hon. Friend the Member for Ogmore (Mr. Powell)—in the Cloisters. I recently escaped and now share a room with another Member, which is positive luxury. I question the way in which the House has organised itself around bars and restaurants, of which I believe we have 21, or probably more. Do we need them? Would it not make more appropriate use of the establishment to convert the bars and restaurants into offices for hon. Members? Like the hon. lady, I regularly take my constituents down to the Cloisters for them to see the appalling conditions in which we work. They do not believe the conditions in which I worked for three and a half years. Should we not examine our use of existing premises before we consider the new proposals?
Mrs. Currie: I have known the hon. Gentleman for a long time and have had many late-night debates with him. We have 23 bars and restaurants. He will understand if I say with great affection that if I want to find him, I know where to look. Because of the way we work, we need facilities for refreshments—literally for refreshment even if it is beans on toast or whatever the Prime Minister eats these days, because we are here at strange hours. It would

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not be safe for my colleagues—such as my hon. Friend the Member for Torridge and Devon, West (Miss Nicholson)—to wander the streets around Victoria at 2 am to find something to eat. We might find more than we bargained for. We must have facilities on the premises.
When I first entered the House I, too, had a desk in the Cloisters, which I shared with 15 colleagues. What bothered me most was the absolute lack of privacy. Although I trusted my colleagues, I was bothered by the fact that on my wedding anniversary, which is on 1 July, when my husband sent me a bouquet of red roses the gossip columnists immediately wanted to know who had sent me roses. They were not satisfied with the explanation that it was a chap to whom I had been married for rather a long time. That is what lack of privacy does.
On a serious point, the wise space audit carried out by the Services Committee produced a response from only about 10 per cent. of hon. Members. Most of us bear some responsibility for our poor accommodation because we tend not to moan about it at the right time or in the right way. I have undertaken a lot of correspondence about that and I hope that my points have been taken seriously.
Mr. David Shaw rose——
Mrs. Currie: I have been speaking for 40 minutes and I should like to make some progress.
This debate is on phase 2 accommodation and I should like to concentrate a little more on that. Phase 1 will provide space for 60 hon. Members and 100 secretaries. I am not sure about phase 2 because it depends on the feasibility study.
I contrast phase 2 with a building that is under construction in my constituency. The Toyota motor corporation announced in January 1989 that it was looking for a site. It made a decision in April 1989 and then obtained planning permission and compulsory purchase orders. A public inquiry took place and work started on the site in June 1990. At the end of October this year—not "perhaps", but for certain—the building will be finished and handed over to the company by Laing, the contractor. That is just two and a half years from decision to completion. The factory will cost £200 million, not £20 million or £60 million. The entire project will cost about £700 million, which is more than 10 times the cost of phase 2, but it will be completed in half the time. If there is an argument for the abolition of the Property Services Agency, that is it. If a company from overseas, which has never been to this country before, can build a new factory to time—in fact, slightly ahead of time—I fail to see why we, with our familiarity with and knowledge of every nook and cranny of these buildings, should take so long.
It never used to matter that we had no accommodation. Hon. Members would attend to their private concerns in the morning, stroll in for Question Time at half-past two and perhaps even do a little debating before toddling off to their clubs in the evening. One or two colleagues probably still do that. In those days, there were very few letters to deal with. Constituents were delighted to see the Member of Parliament about once a year, when the town band and the mayor in a top-hat would turn up at the railway halt to welcome him on his annual visit—it was always a he—but it is no longer like that, especially since the advent of television in the House.
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I do not serve a handful of electors—I serve 83,000, covering an area of 120 square miles of south Derbyshire. I receive about 200 letters and other items of mail a week—that is in a normal week, when I am not busy doing something controversial. Most of my constituents have a telephone and use it, and many—more every week—have a fax and use that too. They all expect and deserve prompt, courteous and efficient responses and methods of handling what they want me to do—and so long as I represent the people of south Derbyshire, they will get it.
Please, could I have some more room in which to do my job properly, and as quickly as possible?
8.45 pm
Mr. Ray Powell: It is a pleasure to reply to the hon. Member for Derbyshire, South (Mrs. Currie). Clearly, she has been better briefed by the civil servants than I, as the Chairman of the New Building Sub-Committee, have been. I shall take that up with them in due course. I hope that there has been no briefing over and above what the Services Committee has already received, because you for one, Mr. Speaker, would soon be telling members of Select Committees that they should not disclose information until it has been reported to the House. The hon. Lady was no doubt able to acquire much information as a result of her experience as a Minister. I am reluctant to put egg on her face—to coin a phrase—but her criticism is unjustified, especially when one considers the history of the new building in phase 1, in particular, and the distinguished Members who served on the Committee to get it established.
The hon. Lady was elected to the House in 1983 and was a PPS to the Secretary of State for Education and Science in 1985–86, with all the perks that that might have afforded her. After three years in the House, she became Under-Secretary of State for Social Security in 1986. No doubt she then had spacious accommodation and plenty of secretaries and plenty of help to open her sacks of letters.
Mrs. Currie: The only privilege or perk of being PPS to Lord Joseph was the honour of serving such a marvellous and distinguished man of whom I am very fond. Our rooms were no better. As for my time as a Minister, my room was then in the Star Chamber. The only advantage was that I did not have to share it, but it was roughly the same size as the room that I have now.
Mr. Powell: That remark surprises me. I have been to most Ministers' rooms in the House and they seem spacious to me. The hon. Lady must have been very unsuccessful in the allocation of accommodation.
Mr. Bob Cryer: She is an ex-Minister.
Mr. Powell: Yes, she is an ex-Minister. The hon. Lady has especially overlooked the problems of Back Benchers. She is now born again as a Back Bencher and she has found out the difficulties that we face. As a Back Bencher myself, I face them.
The hon. Lady referred to the delays. I do not know whether she is listening. She opened this Adjournment debate and I should have thought that she would be interested to hear the answers to the problems. Perhaps she knows them already. When she referred to the delays, she, above all, should have recognised the service of hon. Members who have served on the New Building

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Sub-Committee. A design brief for phase I was accepted in 1984 under the excellent chairmanship of the late John Silkin, who spent many hours on the design brief and who had to cope with the difficulties of negotiating the funding of the project with Ministers. As an ex-Minister, the hon. Lady will know that getting the funding, even for Parliament itself, is far more difficult than designing the building or getting it built.
In November 1987, the New Building Sub-Committee was set up. I put on record my appreciation of all the hon. Members who constantly attended meetings not once every three months, or once every month, but every Tuesday. The purpose of the exercise was to get on with the building. All hon. Members who have served on the Sub-Committee since 1987 have been regular attenders despite their other onerous duties. Some of them, for example, have been Whips. Recognition of their devotion to the project and to the development of phase 2 should be placed on the record. I have had the privilege to be the Chairman of the Committee. Only as a result of the efforts of the Committee shall we see phase 1 being developed and allocated to hon. Members this summer. Hon. Members will be given accommodation there when we return in October after the summer recess. That is undoubtedly wholly due to the efforts that members of the Sub-Committee have put into the project.
The Sub-Committee has produced four reports since 1987. The first deals with the reasons for the delay on phase 1. I am rather surprised to find that the hon. Lady was not in the Chamber during the debate on that report to make the comments that she has made now. Perhaps she was busy then as a Minister. We have twice presented reports to the House on the Jubilee line proposal, which delayed the development of phase 2 and could have delayed further development of phase 1. We presented the fourth report on the phase 2 proposals.
You, Mr. Speaker, and the Commission engaged Sir Robin Ibbs who produced an excellent report for the House on all accommodation. I put on record the fact that Sir Robin enjoyed the job. However, although he enjoyed coming to the House and making his report, he was not paid for his services. Sir Robin is a busy man. He gave his time and energy to prepare the report, with the help of all the staff in the House, and it will be useful as a source of reference not only for the New Building Sub-Committee, but for other Committees of the House. I am sure that everyone in the House would want to pay tribute to him and to his committee for their efforts.
I am aware that the Minister for Housing and Planning may reply to the debate and I do not want to take the ground from under him. However, I want to explain what I think the next steps should be.
Mr. Don Dixon: The Minister was a member of the Committee.
Mr. Powell: Yes, the Minister was a member of the Committee.
I fully understand the hon. Lady's impatience with the slow rate of progress to date—indeed, I and my colleagues fully share that impatience. I hope that we can now make more rapid progress. Most hon. Members will be aware that phase I will open during the forthcoming summer recess. The infuriating delays that have bedevilled the work on site now seem to be over. We can look forward to moving into a splendid building. It will provide 160 extra
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desks for hon. Members and their staff. There will be new catering facilities, major new accommodation for the Library and much more besides. Many new offices for Members will be provided within the Palace as a result of other hon. Members moving into phase 1. I understand that about 95 places will become available within the accommodation of the House.
You will recall, Mr. Speaker, the time when we discovered that there were 25 rooms above your spacious accommodation in the Speaker's House. They will become available as a result of your inquisitiveness to find out what was going on above your head.
Mrs. Currie: My ears are pricking. Are we given to understand that the rooms above the Speaker's House will be available to hon. Members? If so, may I put my name down?
Mr. Dixon: Yes to the first question, no to the second.
Mr. Powell: My hon. Friend the Member for Jarrow (Mr. Dixon) said that the answer to the first question was yes and the answer to the second was no. The Accommodation and Administration Sub-Committee examined the matter and said that the accommodation should be only for hon. Members because it was above the Speaker's House. You, Mr. Speaker, would not want a cabaret going on upstairs while you where trying to sleep. The rooms were found and the New Building Sub-Committee, the Accommodation and Administration Sub-Committee and the Select Committee on House of Commons (Services) made arrangements to provide access to them. They will eventually come on stream for new hon. Members.
The problems were not only finding the rooms and organising the space audit, which the Committee pressurised everyone to complete. Thanks to the Serjeant at Arms and his staff, the accommodation audit was carried out, although it took some months. It may interest the hon. Lady to know that it is the first space audit of the Palace of Westminster since it was built. At least our weekly meetings are turning up much accommodation that might otherwise have been overlooked.
As for phase 2, much has been happening behind the scenes. In two reports to the House over the past 12 months, the Services Committee has described complicated negotiations with London Underground Limited about the future of the Bridge street site. That has taken up much of the Committee's time since the Government presented the Jubilee line scheme two years ago. The latest proposals represent an excellent deal for the House. The plan to dig up Parliament square and use it as a work site for five years has been dropped, largely because of pressure from the New Building Sub-Committee. The Government have promised that funds will be forthcoming for a concrete raft to separate the London Underground works from the parliamentary works.
That crucial decision will enable us to erect a high-quality building, shielded from the noise and vibration of the tube trains that make working in the existing buildings so unpleasant. I used to share an office in St. Stephen's house with my hon. Friend the Member for Jarrow; it was all right when the trains were not moving, but once they started we had to move with them, even if we were writing at the time. The design of the phase

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2 building will no doubt benefit from the fact that the architect Michael Hopkins will be responsible for it, and also for that of the new tube station.
Having been initially blown off course by the rather half-baked proposals of London Underground, we are now in a position to co-operate with the company in the development of a finer building than would otherwise have been possible. Perhaps the two-year delay will benefit Parliament: the building above the concrete raft will include five floors which will stretch right across the raft, rather than the original design around the perimeter of Bridge street.
Over the past 12 months, the New Building Sub-Committee has been very active. We have commissioned the first thorough survey of parliamentary accommodation—the so-called audit—which consists of a computerised data base that will enable future accommodation to be planned on a rational and objective basis. The space audit has told us how much space we currently have, how it is to be used and how much of the present accommodation is unfit for its purpose.
The hon. Member for Derbyshire, South mentioned the Cloisters. I spent some time there. A number of hon. Members who were elected in 1979 were allocated no desks and no offices—not even any space in the Cloisters. We were left to wander the corridors. I remember, Mr. Speaker, asking your predecessor, in 1980, to implement the shops and factories Acts. He said that, although hon. Members passed Acts of Parliament, the law did not cover them. We could not demand the implementation of the law for the benefit of Members of Parliament or their secretaries, because we are a law unto ourselves. We had to beg or borrow a space, sometimes using the desks that were available in the Library and sometimes finding that no desk or chair was available even there.
When I was responsible for allocating accommodation to Labour Members, I offered a desk in the Oratory Room to a new Member in 1987. I told him that it could give him a great deal of publicity, because Charles I's death warrant had been signed in that room. He might appear on the front page of his local newspaper. "May I see the room?" he asked. "Of course," I replied, and I took him down to see it. "Very nice," he said. "I accept; thank you very much." Accordingly, he moved in and was given the expected publicity. He showed me the story on the front page of his local paper, explaining how he had been allocated a space in that historic room. What he did not realise was that three other hon. Members would be joining him in a week or two. He would come to regret having accepted the offer. Thankfully, things are changing now, and it is to be hoped that in the not-too-distant future there will be accommodation for all hon. Members.
I have written to all hon. Members asking for their views on which extra facilities are most acutely needed in the phase 2 building. I have received replies from just under 10 per cent. of my colleagues.
We have also received bids for accommodation from the various organisations and departments represented in the House. On the basis of all that information we have put together a package of proposals for phase 2. The Services Committee will announce its decision in a report to the House which we hope will be published shortly after the Easter recess. You would not expect me, Mr. Speaker, to
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divulge the contents of a Select Committee's report in advance of its publication. I can only say, wait and see. If, however, our proposals are adopted, we shall be able to achieve the Services Committee's target so that by the time phase 2 is completed, every hon. Member who wants an office shall have one and the overall standard of accommodation for Members of Parliament and their staff will be greatly increased. We hope that then we shall be able to demolish unsightly temporary accommodation such as Portakabins and find new uses for what is at present unsuitable accommodation within the estate. Moreover, we hope to be able to accept the great majority of the bids for phase 2 accommodation.
On Thursday of this week we are to hold an exhibition in Committee Room 7 from 11 am to 5 pm. It will not publicise the Services Committee's final recommendations because they have not yet been reported to the House, but the exhibition will display the current thinking of our architects and give some idea of what might be available in phase 2. The architects ought to be given credit for the advice that they have given not only on phase 2 but on phase 1. If hon. Members take the trouble on Thursday to visit the exhibition, I am sure that they will be suitably impressed. We hope that as many Members of Parliament and staff of the House as possible will see the exhibition.
Once the Services Committee has reported, it will be up to the Government to ensure that progress is maintained. We hope for early acceptance by the Treasury that funding should be made available for phase 2. Our architects can then begin the design work in earnest. Construction work could begin as soon as the London Underground Bill receives Royal Assent—possibly in about 12 months' time. If the political will of Ministers is there for phase 2, it could be completed within three or four years. My Sub-Committee will do its best to ensure that that timetable is achieved.
I could speak at length, but I realise that other hon. Members want to take part in the debate. The chances are that they will want another debate on this important subject. It is an emotive one for those without accommodation. The members of the Services Committee and I are sympathetic. Those of us who now have an office of our own have not always enjoyed one. We appreciate, therefore, the restrictions imposed on certain Members and their staff and believe that proper accommodation ought to be provided for them. It should be possible for them to hold committee meetings in their offices, at which four or five other people could be accommodated. Their secretaries ought to be able to work alongside them. Members ought not to have to walk two or three miles to contact their secretaries. It is high time that Parliament spent money on designing a building in which appropriate facilities are made available for Members of Parliament.
I should like a swimming pool to be provided, as well as accommodation for school children when they visit the House. That would enable us to educate youngsters about parliamentary democracy. Such accommodation is willingly provided in other countries. Other Parliaments pay for visits by school children. Facilities are made available for them so that they can listen to debates. It is essential that this Parliament should provide similar facilities.
The aim of the New Building Sub-Committee and of hon. Members on the Service Committee is, with the

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blessing of your Commission, Mr. Speaker, to make progress on the design of phase 2 and to provide accommodation for hon. Members.
9.9 pm
Mr. David Shaw: I am grateful to the hon. Member for Ogmore (Mr. Powell) for speaking in this interesting debate, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South (Mrs. Currie) on obtaining it. The hon. Gentleman made a relevant point when he said that, in due course, every hon. Member should have an office, our visitors should be better treated and we should have the facility of Committee Rooms in which we can hold meetings. Those three things would go a long way towards ensuring that the House and its Members are pre-eminent in the world in terms of debate and in maintaining our leadership of many years as the mother of Parliaments and as one of the leading Parliaments, if not the leading one, of the world.
However, we must focus on whether the hon. Gentleman's objectives will be met and consider what pressure we must keep up to ensure that they are met. In the short time that I have been a Member of the House, I have learnt that, unless we keep up the pressure, bureaucracy all too often gets in the way and the administrative procedures ensure either that things do not happen or that objectives take an unduly long period to achieve.
I was elected after working in business and industry, and although I acknowledge that one wants to embrace and quickly take on board many of our traditions that go back hundreds of years, the tradition of poor facilities is not one that we should maintain. It has had its day. There was a time when it was a bit of a joke. There was a time when one could go to one's constituents and say, with a bit of a laugh, "Aren't the conditions that we work in appalling? Aren't you fortunate that we can deal with your mail, get answers out of Ministers for you and have the arrangements for all that?" There were times when hon. Members were proud of the fact that they could use a desk in the Library and did not need a secretary because they could write all their constituency mail by hand.
However, those times are in the past. We live in a competitive world and in a market economy, although not all hon. Members welcome that. In this competitive world, other Parliaments might begin to compete with the mother of Parliaments in the skills of debate and in terms of what facilities they can offer their Members. We need to stay on top of the many issues that need discussion today. This Parliament over the years has discussed issues that relate to many countries. I remind hon. Members of the debates on the Gulf and of the amount of information that was needed when making decisions about weaponry and equipment. All hon. Members suddenly wanted to get to grips with that information.
We also encounter pressures from the media. Because of what is happening in the world today, we are instantly required to be experts on a wide variety of subjects. The days when one could lock oneself away and be an expert only on health or on defence or on any other individual subject have now gone. We must ensure that we have access to a lot of information, and to that end we need not only technology and its facilities available in our own offices, but better facilities for our staff, who should also have access to that information.
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It is annoying to find that, although Government Departments issue press releases almost daily on various subjects that interest me or my constituents, I do not yet have the facilities to search a database and to find out what information was released today or yesterday. Instead, one has to telephone the Department and check with the civil servants. That means delay and an inconvenience that is compounded when one has only a limited number of staff and has to carry out much of the research oneself.
However, all those facilities are increasingly available to the outside companies that lobby us. It is infuriating to attend a lobbying company function and to find that its staff are much more on top of the subject and have much more information at their fingertips than is available to hon. Members. When I go to meetings, I want to be able to ask my secretary or a member of my staff to press the buttons on the machine and obtain access to all the relevant information to ensure that I am properly briefed, as I would be if I were in business. When I was in business, information was made available in one way or another.
When I visit colleagues with whom I used to work when I was in business and see their offices and the facilities which my former employers now provide for their staff, I am appalled at how the House of Commons is falling behind day by day and minute by minute in an environment where the electronic age is pushing everything in the outside world that much further forward and at a much faster pace. We must keep up and get on top. If not, the fears of my colleagues that the European Parliament and other parliaments in Europe will move ahead will be realised, because other parliaments will be able to move information and databases forward.
Mrs. Currie: Will my hon. Friend join me in putting on record our appreciation of the House of Commons Library, and its research assistants and staff? They are absolutely first class. Will he add the press to his list of outside organisations that are much better informed on a day-to-day basis than we are? Does he agree that it is astonishing that the most efficient way of finding out what is going on in our constituencies is to phone our local newspapers?
Mr. Shaw: I could not agree more with my hon. Friend on the latter point. It is particularly frustrating when a media organisation gets on the telephone to one and says, "Please can we have a quote on … " It may be some subject on which the Ministry has just made the latest announcement or, dare I say, leaked what is to be announced later in the day. One does not have a clue that the announcement was even to be made. There is nothing on a televison screen to tell us.
The other frustrating thing is that, when we are over here in the main Parliament building, we cannot contact our offices except by telephone. We have secretaries working away typing letters, and it would be wonderful if we could go to a computer screen in the Library and go through our secretaries' work on a link line to our offices, which are some yards away. That would be especially useful when voting is taking place.
I also agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South about the House of Commons Library. We have tremendous access to information and support from the House of Commons Library, but is that resource being used in a sensible way? If I step back and look at the matter almost as a management consultant would, I notice

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that we have some talented people in the Library who should often be used for intellectual research and the product of the research rather than for our mundane inquiries. Sometimes such people have to deal with our mundane inquiries because we do not have access in our offices to basic computer searching facilities to enable us to search databases ourselves.
The office programme should be designed to enable us to compete with the outside business world, the people who lobby us, the media, and the European Parliament. We must keep the British Parliament ahead of the field. We want this Parliament to continue to be a centre for intellectual debate which is ahead of the field and the rest of the world.
In the few years that I have been in Parliament, I have had visitors from the eastern bloc, several Soviet republics and the United States. They were all full of admiration for the intellectual debate which goes on in this Parliament and the way in which we have stayed ahead of the field over the years. But they would be shocked if they knew that we were likely to fall behind them as they developed. They will have the advantage of developing with all the new technology. They will take on all the latest facilities. They will ensure that any new buildings in their Parliaments are wired with the latest optical fibres and other technologies which will enable them to keep ahead. It is important that we should keep ahead in intellectual debate.
We should keep ahead in representing democracy and in making sure that Parliament does more to encourage visitors. A number of hon. Members have mentioned schoolchildren and others visiting the Palace of Westminster. It is essential that we have adequate facilities and that we can offer people refreshments. Visitors from my local disabled groups have come to Westminster. I was quite impressed by our facilities for the disabled, but there are no facilities for giving a cup of tea afterwards to people who have gone around the House of Commons in their wheelchairs. Here they are, having struggled round the building and enjoyed their visit, unable to sit down and have refreshments at the end.
Nor do we have enough Committee or other rooms in which to meet people when we cannot leave the House because of debates. We must have more meeting facilities.
As a new Member, I have been rather fortunate in securing an office in Norman Shaw, North, because it is one of our better buildings and has better office provision. Yet the carpets are a little dowdy, there is dust and goodness knows how many little bugs which have been floating around for years, and one feels that there has never been a breath of fresh air in the building for some time. The paintwork is not regularly renewed. It does not give the impression of being a working environment in a modern age.
There is also a tremendous waste of space which will have to be addressed at some stage: neither the corridors nor the arrangement of the building are very modern. There is also a central courtyard which is a total waste of space. It may be that the outside of the building must be preserved for architectural reasons, but there are many buildings in the City of London whose centres have been modernised; the offices are open-plan, and an atrium and airy, light spaces have been introduced. The natural
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lighting in the Norman Shaw, North offices is appalling, and we rely on neon lighting which in many offices today might be questioned as being bad for the eyes.
When I read of office stress and strain and all the other conditions which are being investigated these days by the private sector, I feel that our staff are getting a raw deal, because it will be a long time before we can offer them the sort of health protection that is offered by the private sector. We must address these subjects. We cannot go on having debates and discussions like this in the year 2000 and beyond. It is just not good enough to continue for that length of time without doing something about these things.
I have mentioned in outline information facilities and access to databases, networking systems and other such things. We must accept the truth of the old saying "Information is power". I am not a great one for the conspiracy theory, but it has been suggested to me that it applies here—that it suits the Government to keep hon. Members in the dark, to keep them away from some of the information facilities and to deny them access to some of the modern technology which will enable us to get up speed and be able to compete with Government and Ministers on what is happening in the world outside, and will ensure that questions and debate in the Chamber are of the highest possible standard and quality.
I would suggest to any Minister who might be tempted down that path that it is in the interests of us all, whether in government or out of it, to have the highest possible standard of debate in the Chamber, to make sure that, when foreign visitors come here, they will still feel that the British Parliament is the leading parliament in the world and will continue to be so.
That is why we must make sure that we have complete access to all the information facilities now available, whether commercial, Government or departmental databases. The most modern facilities should be available in the offices of the future that hon. Members will occupy.
The internal mail facilities in this building need examining. It is wonderful for us to have at our disposal the services of the great British Post Office. All the traditions of that great institution are brought to bear as our mail is cared for. I understand that certain aspects of Mr. Speaker's mail receive special attention, but we are hidebound with tradition, even in such modern matters as the mail, and a special stamp must be affixed to all envelopes that appear on the Members' letter board. I accept that many of these facilities have style and have existed for many years.
When I visit a friend in Congress in the United States, I see that his mail is delivered each morning to his personal letter box at the door of his office. His secretary does not have to queue at the Congress post office for his letters. Our secretaries make a detour—it can take up to 20 minutes—going to our post office and queueing for our mail. Consider the time, not just in money, wasted by our secretaries undertaking such activities, when they should be answering queries from our constituents and dealing with administrative and other matters. I urge the authorities of the House to examine our internal mail arrangements, at least in the hope that the mail can be delivered directly to our secretaries' desks and offices.
We must review the maintenance and decoration of public buildings, new and old, in an aggressive way. The trouble with Government accounting, for the schools and hospitals in our constituencies and so on—I speak as an accountant who worked in the private sector, and my

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remarks apply to all Government buildings, including the Palace of Westminster—is that proper provision is not made for maintenance and depreciation because we do so much on a cash accounting rather than on an accruals accounting basis. The result is that, when the time comes for cash to be spent on maintenance and repairs, we discover that there is something better to spend it on, that the country cannot afford it, or that public expenditure is too tight at that time for the money to be spent in that way.
Our public buildings must be regularly decorated. Curtains in our offices should be taken down at least annually and properly cleaned to remove the dust and modern bugs that scientists seem to be discovering almost weekly. Only by those means shall we ensure that we and our staff work in a healthy environment. That may lead us in the future to be more efficient and productive. It will also help to keep this place in the forefront of the world's parliament buildings.
9.27 pm
Mr. David Harris: I am happy to speak after my hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Mr. Shaw), and I begin where he left off, on the important issue of the general appearance of this place. Hon. Members will not forget their first visit to this building. I was a young lad up from the west country who sat in the public gallery and looked round in wonderment. My local MP asked me to join him for tea, but I was too shy to accept. I was left with the impression of a building in marvellous condition. I speak of the time not long after it was rebuilt following the blitz. The stairways, for example, were in excellent condition, whereas my hon. Friend the Member for Dover was right to say that it is now in places decidedly grotty.
This debate provides a valuable opportunity for those who care deeply about this building and institution—of course, the institution is wider than the building—to review the state of affairs here, and we are grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South (Mrs. Currie) for initiating the debate. I am particularly grateful to the hon. Member for Ogmore (Mr. Powell), the Chairman of the New Building Sub-Committee, for the difficult work that the Committee does. I thank him for bringing us up to date on the plans for stage 2. We hope that the opening of stage 1 is imminent.
We can all be critical. My hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South was critical of the length of time that it takes to get anything done in this place. The parliamentary estate—what a horrible expression—is one of the most sensitive areas in the whole of London. No one knows better than you, Mr. Speaker, that nobody can do anything here without consulting many people. A great number of people are involved in the work, and many bodies outside—not least, English Heritage—are very concerned about any alteration, however small. There are all sorts of restraints and contraints on the work of improving the lot of the thousands of people who work—indeed, almost live—in these buildings.
One thinks, above all, of the malevolent influence and attitude of the Treasury from time to time. I am sure that you, Mr. Speaker, like me, remember the very ambitious plans that were produced many years ago for the site we are now discussing. I think that the building was called the bird-cage because of its aviary-type top. We all remember how, one Budget day, the Chancellor of the Exchequer
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killed that project at a stroke. The Government of the day had to cut public expenditure, and the bad conditions in which Members of Parliament had to work continued.
Tributes have been paid to the many people who have done their best to improve our conditions. I crave your indulgence, Mr. Speaker, to pay a tribute—one with which the House will want to be associated—to my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Surrey, East (Sir G. Howe), who, in his year or so as Leader of the House of Commons, did his utmost to improve conditions. I had the pleasure of being my right hon. and learned Friend's Parliamentary Private Secretary. Having made that very swift transition one July day from the Foreign Office to this building, the Leader of the House decided, in his usual thorough manner, to go on a very extensive tour. We went to Old Palace Yard and to St. Stephen's house, which is still rattled by the trains. I have fond memories of the reaction of the hon. Member for Ogmore. My right hon. and learned Friend was absolutely shocked at the conditions in which some members of our staff, particularly secretaries, work. The conditions really are appalling. Perhaps I may enter a plea for my secretary, who still works in St. Stephen's house. I hope that she will get accommodation in phase 1 of the new building, which should open after the summer recess. I do not make any special plea for myself.
Harsh words have been said about conditions in the Cloisters. When I became a Member of Parliament I asked that I should be allowed to go to the Cloisters. I have spent 27 or 28 years here. The first 19 years were spent in the Press Gallery, and for the remainder, after service in the European Parliament, I have been a Member. Having decided that I wanted to go to the Cloisters, I sought out the good Miss Frampton, who will be remembered well, and put my request to her. The request was granted. Of course, that place would not be everybody's choice. Unlike my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South, I was not sent red roses.
I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Torridge and Devon, West (Miss Nicholson), who also has a desk in the Cloisters, will bear me out when I say that they have one merit above all others—their convenience for getting to the Chamber. One could hardly be nearer the Chamber. Admittedly, other Members sometimes speak rather loudly—not, I hasten to add, my hon. Friend the Member for Torridge and Devon, West, whose desk is two down from mine—and there is certainly no privacy, but the place has a certain charm and I should be happy to spend the rest of my parliamentary life there.
The new building will relieve some of the pressure for space, so I make a plea that when it comes into service we be given a little more space in the Cloisters, which are after all no more than a converted corridor. Given a little more space, I shall be perfectly happy to stay there.
Hon. Members have mentioned other people who work in this building and the conditions in which they have their being—our secretaries, for instance. I should like to mention the Press Gallery. The number of journalists working there has exploded in recent years, because of the televising of the House, local radio and the general growth of the lobby. Numbers have increased dramatically since I arrived in the gallery in 1961. It has tripled in size, and that has put pressure on press refreshment facilities and especially on the writing rooms. People are jammed in, and

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their position has not been eased by the advent of the new technology which was much lauded by my hon. Friend the Member for Dover.
Speaking of my hon. Friend the Member for Dover, I should add that databases, computers and all the machines that I have no intention of ever mastering are doubtless important to some hon. Members. The fact is that we all want something different from the House of Commons and the services that it provides. So I was glad to read in the third report of the Select Committee on House of Commons (Services), prepared by the Sub-Committee presided over by the hon. Member for Ogmore, the following sentence. Referring to the space audit about which the hon. Member for Ogmore enlightened us, it said:
"We are not seeking to establish a single uniform standard of accommodation."
That is right and proper. We all want different sorts of accommodation. Many of us are perfectly happy in the Cloisters; others have different requirements.
My hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South is one of those who need more space, privacy and staff. No doubt she has research assistants. I do not want one—they are anathema to me. But I am not criticising my hon. Friend——
Mrs. Currie: I hear what my hon. Friend says and I agree with it, apart from two points. First, there ought to be some minimum standards here which are at least related to the laws that affect the rest of the nation. Secondly, I should like not just more room and space but a window.
Mr. Harris: I am sure that my hon. Friend will have a window, if not more space. She is right of course. The Select Committee report went on to say:
"We do however think it desirable to establish a basic minimum standard which, if approved by the House, could become the bench mark for future planning"—
the very point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South.
I treasure the memory of my former colleague, Enoch Powell, sitting at a desk in the Library answering his correspondence with a dipped pen. Some colleagues still do that and there should be a place for it. Perhaps some of them use fountain or ball-point pen—a method eschewed by my former colleague. Equally, there should be a place for the needs and aspirations of Members. For example, my hon. Friend the Member for Dover is into computers, word processors and all that fancy equipment in a big way. The House should try to accommodate Members' different styles of working.
One of the fascinating aspects of this place is that there is no set way to approach the remarkable job of being a Member of Parliament. No one, thank goodness, has tried to produce a manual on it. We all work differently, according to our upbringing, training and constituencies. The pressure on Members varies according to whether we are full time—I do not criticise those who are not. The strength of the House is its diversity, but that produces problems for those who manage and run it.
During my five years as a Member of the European Parliament, my colleagues and I had offices that we refused to occupy because we felt that the Mayor of Strasbourg, Pierre Pflimlin, was attemping to cement the European Parliament to Strasbourg. A great building was
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constructed there, without parliamentary approval, and made available to us. The offices contained a shower and a couch and were quite palatial, but I was there for only one week a month. My office would have made most Members of this House green with envy, but I hope that we shall never reach that position here.
I not only cherish the memory of Enoch Powell working in the Library, but when I go there I delight in seeing some of my colleagues still working there—often by choice—because that is the way it should be. We do not want uniformity but better standards, especially for our staff and those of our colleagues who require them. We want better facilities for the many people who serve the House and work in it, perhaps not directly for Members of Parliament.
Some Opposition Members have made the case on behalf of the catering staff. They have described the conditions in which they must work and the paucity of their rest facilities. They work terrifically long hours, especially when the House sits late, and deserve proper facilities.
The debate has been well worth while. I hope that it will spur on all those who have been wrestling with the accommodation problem for many years to make even greater efforts. My hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South is right to say that we should make faster progress, but we are getting there. Some of us are happy to be self-sacrificing and say, "You have your fine office. We are content with ours in the crowded Cloisters".
9.43 pm
Miss Emma Nicholson: It is difficult for Parliament to get it right, not only because of the differing needs and views expressed by my hon. Friends the Members for St. Ives (Mr. Harris), who sits in front of me in the Cloisters, and for Derbyshire, South (Mrs. Currie), but also because it is a question of housing. It is perhaps appropriate that my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing and Planning will answer the debate. I say that quite seriously. I was recently in Romania, where, as we know, the dictator, the Parliament and all the authorities built themselves truly massive palaces, which would doubtless fulfil all the requirements of the endless reports that have been produced about services in this place. But when I went to Romania, I was ashamed that the people had not turned all the palaces into houses for the poor immediately after the revolution. In terms of civilisation and care of our own people, we are a million miles from Romania. Nevertheless, I believe that there is a point to be made.
I understand that we are already the most expensive Parliament in the world, and we sit the longest hours by far. The next Parliament down the list sits only half the hours that we do and the next one down, half the hours again. We are enormously expensive in terms of staff. I have worked in many areas of the world, in many different offices and in countries with different cultures and styles of economy. Never in my life have I been as well looked after personally as I am here. In my working experience, the service that we receive from all the staff, with their different responsibilities, titles and tasks, is truly unique.
There is simply nothing like it anywhere else. We talk about Congress. The messengers in Congress are youngsters—dressed up and running around. I am amazed that they ever arrive. Presumably it is only their keenness

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and enthusiasm that get them there. How far removed they are from the stately dignity of our highly intelligent badge messengers. When one hears our messengers talking about the very framework of the building, as they do each morning, one realises their great knowledge and love of the Palace of Westminster.
The hon. Member for Ogmore (Mr. Powell) referred to catering facilities. Never in my life have I been able to walk into any one of a number of restaurants and cafeterias at my place of work at 3 am and get the sort of breakfast I want.
This is a truly remarkable place. Would that all the library facilities in the United Kingdom could match the level of service that we are offered. I am proud that I can sit in the Library and do my work on behalf of my constituents. The facilities are truly remarkable, not just because of the intelligence of those who serve us from behind the counters, but because of the enormously varied service that they provide, ranging from providing us with daily or weekly papers to bringing to us any book that we care to name. The service is unique in the United Kingdom.
My hon. Friend the Member for St. Ives referred to our desks in the Cloisters, but failed to mention one important point. It is true that we sit in a passage and that it is sometimes difficult. The police walk through, reminding us to vote, and that is a helpful service, but everyone else also seems to walk through, including secretaries and colleagues. Nevertheless, it is an extraordinary feeling when one looks up at the vaulted ceiling in the middle of the night and remembers that, with the exception of Westminster hall, the Cloisters are perhaps the oldest part of the House—the passageway through which Princess Elizabeth walked when she was concerned about the possibility of her sister executing her. This is an historic place, of truly great proportions both physically and because of its uniqueness.
I heartily support and praise the way in which the building has been adapted in an extraordinary variety of ways to meet some of the needs of a modern Member of Parliament. In the Cloisters, my hon. Friend and I have no privacy for our telephone calls. My desk is still labelled "Enoch Powell". I sometimes wonder exactly who I am. I took out the "Iain Macleod" label. It was a toss-up as to which eminent former Member of Parliament I should attempt to copy. Perhaps it was Mr. Macleod, who I knew the better of the two, and whose philosophy I probably share.
It is tough that we cannot have a private telephone conversation. It is difficult to have a tiny desk that cannot hope to contain the amount of mail that pours to us through the Post Office three, four or five times a day. However, in that old Cloisters, that historic place, there is the knowledge that we are just part of a long procession of Members of Parliament serving the United Kingdom.
Mrs. Currie: I am intrigued by the fact that my hon. Friend's desk in the Cloisters has Enoch Powell's name on it. Her experience is similar to that of my hon. Friend the Member for Epping Forest (Mr. Norris), who was at school with me in Liverpool. On one occasion he found that the schooldesk that he was sitting at had carved on its lid the name "Arthur Askey".
Does my hon. Friend think that perhaps the appalling working conditions in the Cloisters could be one reason why that distinguished gentleman Mr. Powell was driven
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to work in the Library? It is certainly something that drove me to work in the Library. Unfortunately, there are nowhere near enough desks in the Library to accommodate colleagues who find that they cannot work in peace or concentrate in places such as the Cloisters, which is a corridor and a public thoroughfare.
Miss Nicholson: There is a benefit in working in such a cramped environment—the sense of comradeship and community. We are all battling against the same difficulties of volume in the modern world. [Interruption.] Over and above that, it enables us to concentrate in such environments as this Chamber at the moment, when hon. Members are attempting to thwart my speech. They are talking despite the importance of the topic. In a word, it teaches one concentration—and that art is highly prized in commerce and industry outside this place.
I wonder whether we are aware—despite, or perhaps because of, the slowness of change—how much conditions have imnproved in this place over the past 25 years. I understand that before my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Mr. Heath) became Prime Minister, the only stamped envelopes that Members of Parliament were allowed to use were for destinations within the Greater London area. Those with constituencies in Cornwall or Devon had to pay for their postage.
Lest that sounds trivial to the electorate, I shall remind the House of an interesting statistic. Some 30 years ago, before this place became engulfed in such a volume of mail, the general public wrote to their Members of Parliament only a fraction of the number of times that they do now. Then, only 3 per cent. of the electorate wrote to their Members of Parliament in any one year; now, the figure has risen to 63 per cent. That explains why we have such great difficulty in coping with the volume of mail. That is not my imagination; it is actuality. Alas, it is the fault of our good friend the word processor, on which my hon. Friend the Member for St. Ives commented when he responded to the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Mr. Shaw).
However we view the problem, we must come back to the central question of cost. This is a very expensive Palace of Westminster. We demand and acquire more services. We are looked after better and better and at greater and greater expense. The high cost of running the mother of Parliaments has put hon. Members off the sensible and sane plans which have been brought before the House but not implemented.
Cost is one of the real difficulties, and I believe that there should be some self-discipline and budgetary control in the mother of Parliaments. If we are to indulge ourselves by providing more accommodation for hon. Members or their staff—I heartily endorse the latter—there is a case for our looking more closely at our high expenditure. I hope that that will lead my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House to examine with a much fiercer eye the number of hours we work. Is it honestly necessary for the mother of Parliaments to sit so much longer than Congress which, alas, has so much more regard, resources and responsibility than we have?
I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will suggest to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House that, while it is splendid that he should look at ways of enlarging our comfort and ease, we should look at how the budget balances and try to restrict some of our already large expenses.

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Other things matter as well. Health and safety have already been mentioned. It is a fact that, while others honour our health and safety legislation, the House of Commons does not have to do so. We pass the legislation, but we do not honour it. That is not a meritorious attitude. If we pass such legislation, we should honour it. I did not find it at all surprising that the first major case of salmonella which was egg-induced arose in the other place.
When one sees the desperately limited facilities that are available to the catering staff, one is astounded at the high-quality food and drink that they manage to turn out. The high standard they achieve is very creditable, given the difficulties under which they work.
I love to go downstairs and sit in the Members' cafeteria. The engraving on the wall there shows that it is very little different from what it was 200 or 300 years ago. It is fascinating to see the similarity, but the sensitivity with which we approach food today and the safety that we require surely mean that we should give our catering staff a better place in which to work than they have at the moment.
Facilities for the disabled is a subject that is close to all our hearts. I am fortunate enough to be chairman of ADAPT. It took us a long time to work out what ADAPT could be made to mean because we needed the word so very badly. It stands for Access for Disabled People to Arts Premises Today. It is the child of the Carnegie trust—that great trust which is perhaps the grandfather of all trusts in the United Kingdom. It was founded by Andrew Carnegie, who went to the United States of America and made his fortune in steel and railways. He set up an enormous trust in the United States and then came back and set up a more modest trust in Scotland. Out of his generosity came the building of most of our libraries, not the most modern ones but the Victorian libraries in all areas of the United Kingdom.
The Carnegie trust has not rested on those achievements. It is one of the quietest, most effective and largest trusts for good. It works on the same lines as the Rowntree trust and similar trusts. It created the body of which I have the honour to be chairman——
It being Ten o'clock, the motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put.
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[ Mr. Boswell.]
Miss Nicholson: Half the board of ADAPT is composed of people with profound disabilities. It makes decisions affecting arts premises and public libraries. What do we mean by arts premises? We mean cinemas, theatres, museums and all sorts of places where the public go for entertainment.
It is an appalling thing to say, but the only way for a disabled person in, for example, London to have a good night out with dignity is to stay at home in front of the television set. Therefore, the advisory committee of ADAPT had much work to do. Our task is to provide grant aid to stimulate the adaptation of cinemas, theatres, picture galleries, and public libraries as quickly and effectively as we can, by putting in induction loops for those with problems of hearing, by helping with Braille signing for those who are blind, and by putting in ramps and mechanisms for people whose main form of
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locomotion is not their legs but a pair of wheels. In that way, we help disabled people to have a happy night out with dignity. That is the function of ADAPT.
Like many hon. Members, I am involved in many charitable endeavours. All of us are in different ways as Members of Parliament. Many people ask me to be patron or chairman of voluntary bodies. I have accepted as many as possible, on the basis that when something is important we can have an occasional meeting here. In the case of ADAPT, having meetings here is a non-starter. Despite the best efforts of all our courteous, efficient staff, it is not possible to have even quarterly committee meetings here if most of the members of a committee are heavily disabled.
I know the difficulties of dealing with grade 1, treble-starred, listed buildings, or unique buildings such as the Palace of Westminster, but is it proper that the mother of Parliaments cannot without enormous problems welcome someone in a wheelchair? If someone in a wheelchair is coming here, the Member who has invited that person has to say, "Do not come to St. Stephen's entrance."
People in wheelchairs cannot come in by the normal way. They can come in without going through security. Because they are in wheelchairs they have to go round the back, to the entrance used by post office vans. Such people have to be met personally by the Member who has invited them. They have to be escorted to the lift and up to the principal floor as if they were criminals. Last week, 13 people died on the M4; a number were injured and some of them may end up in wheelchairs. Those people will suddenly realise that, as far as Parliament is concerned, they are on the other side of the fence, they are different. We ensure that that difference shows.
I have had to give up holding ADAPT board meetings in the mother of Parliaments, despite the fact that in our first year of office we have raised and spent more than £1 million on adapting buildings all around the United Kingdom. It is not open to me to adapt Parliament or to offer handicapped people an honest and honourable way in.
I believe most strongly that the mother of Parliaments should not discriminate. Our colour, background or physical and mental ability should not stop us from coming here and meeting our Member for Parliament. It should not stop disabled people from attending an ordinary meeting, even taking into consideration the problems that the rest of us face when meeting our constituents in the mother of Parliaments; yet it does.
Last week, the ADAPT board and I met representatives of the Royal Albert hall. I invited them here. We have offered the Royal Albert hall a rolling programme to alter the hall so that it can never again be said that it has 6,000 seats and only four places for wheelchairs. That is a great project to undertake, but what has happened? Because we had our meeting here, one of our brave ADAPT board members had to come here. We met in Committee Room 17, and to my humiliation, because of the enormous number of chairs there, our committee member had such difficulty getting in and out that she was seen not as the fascinating, interesting and highly intellectual woman that she is, but as an invalid—as someone different, someone in a wheelchair.
I know that the mother of Parliaments will always be imperfect in many ways, and perhaps it is for her imperfections that those of us who are fortunate enough to

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be Members of this place love her so dearly. It is an honour and a joy for all of us to work here. I love the Palace of Westminster, and I believe that we all do.
None the less—with a proper bow both to modernity, as it is represented by the enormously hard-working hon. Member for Derbyshire, South, and to historic associations, in the different ability to work under pressure, demonstrated so superbly to me every day by my nearest colleague in the Cloisters, the hon. Member for St. Ives—please may we make enough progress to be able to offer a meeting so that a disabled person in a wheelchair may come here with dignity, or to offer our staff somewhere to work with a little privacy and greater comfort? We are fortunate to work here. Let us try to do a little better and to tackle with haste and urgency the problem highlighted by this debate.
Mr. Cryer: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. As you are aware, I applied for a second Adjournment debate and the Department of the Environment agreed to provide a Minister, providing that the first debate was concluded. The matter is quite clear.
My subject was the poll tax, which was very appropriate in view of the announcement today. In my view, although it was clearly in order, the Tory Whips have deliberately brought in speakers to spin out time and to prevent a debate on the poll tax.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Miss Betty Boothroyd): As the hon. Gentleman has so rightly said, the debate that we are proceeding with is perfectly in order.
10.8 pm
The Minister for Housing and Planning (Sir George Young): We have had a useful debate, initiated by my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South (Mrs. Currie), in which hon. Members from both sides of the House have taken part.
Today's proceedings have covered two parliamentary institutions—first, the Budget and then a debate about the fabric of Parliament itself. Both debates have been about money and about priorities.
My hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South fulfilled her new year's resolution to take up the question of accommodation, not just for hon. Members but for their staff and others who work in the building. The House is grateful to her for the opportunity to debate a subject which has not been debated since December 1988. The debate has been wide ranging and some of the subjects raised do not fall within my responsibility—for example, questions of food, the hours during which Parliament sits, the mail and many others.
Some of the issues raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South are covered by the New Building Sub-Committee and we are grateful to the hon. Member for Ogmore (Mr. Powell) for bringing the House up to date on the Sub-Committee's deliberations and the progress that it has made towards phase 2, about which my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South feels strongly—and rightly so.
During the debate, the difference of approach of many hon. Members towards their work has become clear. My hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Mr. Shaw) is clearly plugged into every new device of information technology, whereas my hon. Friend the Member for St. Ives (Mr.
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Harris) is perfectly happy to work in the Cloisters. As many hon. Members have said, it is important not to impose a standard form of working.
When I recently returned to the Whips' Office and took with me my electric letter opener, an answering machine and a desktop printer, one or two members of the office regarded it all as highly dangerous. They regard a propelling pencil as a concession to technology and believe that one should go no further. We must remember that hon. Members discharge their obligations in different ways and we must respect their different approaches.
I was interested in the intervention of my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, South (Mr. Bruce) who said that it might be easier if hon. Members were given the opportunity to—as it were—opt out. They could forgo their claim to accommodation in this building either for themselves or for their secretaries, or both, in return for an enhanced allowance which would enable them to provide accommodation in their constituencies. Since I entered the House, one of the changes that I have noticed is in the number of hon. Members who have a highly developed operation in their constituencies. The allowances do not always cover that—telephone calls and other overheads must be met out of the allowance whereas, if the Members were based here, those costs would be covered by the House. I was interested in the idea that there could be a trade-off—perhaps we need not provide so much accommodation in the Palace at great cost if more Members were prepared to relocate their operations outside. However, that is not a matter for the Government. It is a personal observation from someone who has no secretary here and who makes very few claims on the facilities.
I endorse the kind words—which were echoed by many other hon. Members—of my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South in commending the many people who have worked so hard to improve the facilities available to hon. Members and to their staff. The hon. Member for Ogmore and his colleagues on the New Building Sub-Committee have laboured for many hours on behalf of colleagues to secure improvements. It was suggested that hon. Members themselves have a role to play in organising themselves and the premises more effectively.
I remember the approach taken by Walter Harrison, who used to put a note on the desks of those whom he suspected did not use them frequently, saying, "Please ring my office at once." If no telephone call had been made within a few days, that desk was confiscated and allocated to someone who would make better use of it. I think that it was his successor, the hon. Member for Wakefield (Mr. Hinchliffe), who said that we should consider how we operate in the House and how to make better use of existing facilities.
The right hon. Member for Salford, East (Mr. Orme) and his colleagues on the Accommodation and Administration Sub-Committee are another hard-working group. I understand that it was the right hon. Gentleman—with active encouragement from my hon. Friend the Member for Billericay (Mrs. Gorman)—who secured the transformation in the Library corridor, which was referred to at the beginning of the debate. Part of a Members' cloakroom was converted for use by lady Members. The Sub-Committee has many other achievements to its name and has contributed significantly to improvements in

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accommodation. Its achievements often go unsung except when it has the temerity to seek to make changes that involve man's best friend.
Another role is played by staff, such as Committee Clerks, the Serjeant at Arms Department and the Parliamentary Works Office. All of them have a role to play in maintaining our facilities and in putting forward proposals for better facilities.
Considerable strides have been made in the past 10 years. None the less, my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South was right to point out that Members, their staff and the staff of the House often have to work in less than satisfactory conditions. I have noticed how many Ministers who have rooms here have allocated their rooms to their secretaries because they are ashamed of the facilities that those secretaries would otherwise have. That is a clear comment on priorities and expectations.
Hon. Members can and do make their views known, and they have been doing that for the past two hours. Staff do not have the same opportunity. It is right to pay tribute to their contribution to the running of the House, often in trying circumstances, and to their forbearance. I assure them that their needs are being taken fully into account in the development plans.
One cannot accuse the House of not having given careful thought to its needs and one cannot accuse Governments of either party of rushing into solutions. The first mention of using Bridge street as a site for hon. Members was in a debate in March 1960. Lord John Hope, the Minister of Works, announced:
"The Government have decided to apply for designation for Government development of the area bounded by Bridge Street, Whitehall, New Scotland Yard and the Embankment."
He then said prophetically:
"As the House knows, that is bound to take a bit of time".
He was proved wrong when he said:
"I believe hon. Members, on the whole, would feel that it is not a good thing for Members to go over to Bridge Street."—[Official Report, 31 March 1960; Vol. 620, c. 1527–28.]
It was seen as suitable for those who did not need to be on the spot. Even though the perspective has changed, the need to maximise the number of Members' offices within the Palace is still the aim of the House.
Barbara Castle, now Lady Castle, led for the Opposition in that debate. The only hon. Member who spoke then who is still in the House is the right hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn). Rab Butler closed the debate as Leader of the House. He mentioned that there were only 124 Members' secretaries' desks and that there was no waiting list. As a Minister, he announced that he had ordered an extra 25 filing cabinets for Members. In a plebiscite for the Stokes committee, only 295 Members said that they wanted a desk. A Minister had recently said that one telephone per desk was over-egging the pudding. In addition to the Bridge street site, a number of other schemes were also under consideration. There was a suggestion that the Palace should be completed as Barry had intended by entirely enclosing New Palace Yard with an extension from the Clock Tower to the St. Stephen's entrance. There was a proposal to use the roof spaces and to infill the courtyards.
As a result of that debate, in the 1960s and the 1970s, the north and south Upper Committee Corridors, the Star Chamber Court block and the tea room block in
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Commons Court have all been used to provide additional accommodation. The Barry extension, surrounding New Palace Yard, proved too controversial.
There were major acquisitions in the 1970s, such as Norman Shaw North and South, which accommodates almost 150 Members, the Library and 200 secretaries' desks. The development of Bridge street has been less encouraging. A number of plans have come to naught, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South and other hon. Members referred. The House will recall the design with which Spence and Webster won the competition for a new parliamentary building, which was abandoned in 1976. There were plans by Sir William Holford in the early 1960s, by Sir Leslie Martin for the whole of the Whitehall area in the mid-1960s and the Casson Conder comprehensive proposals which were abandoned in 1979, as my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South said.
Although 1979 saw the cancellation of the then latest scheme for improving accommodation for Members and staff, and was the cause of more delay, it could in retrospect be seen as a watershed. Instead of large-scale developments causing major demands on the public purse, we have gone forward since then in smaller bites. As a result, we have achieved more in the 1980s on the site than in the whole of the previous 20 years.
It may be appropriate to mention the important role played by my right hon. Friend the Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine). He achieved that sea change in 1979, and pushed through phase 1 of the redevelopment. It is appropriate that he is back at the Department to do the same for phase 2.
The first of the recent major improvements was 1 Canon row, occupied in summer 1989. Although it was refurbished only for short-term use pending redevelopment as part of the Bridge street project, it none the less provided some worthwhile gains, accommodating 30 Members' secretaries, providing training accommodation for the Official Report and bringing together the staff of the Parliamentary Works Office. Better police accommodation has been provided, as—most recently—has an improved gymnasium, for which tribute should be paid to my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, West (Sir J. Spicer).
There were also consequential gains in the Palace. The leader of the Liberal Democrats—who do not seem to be represented in this debate—gained a much larger suite of offices, and additional Members' offices were built on the official corridor, off the Strangers' Gallery and on the ground floor—about 10 in all. That may not seem a lot, but it is at least significant.
My hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South rightly mentioned the progress—and lack of progress—with Bridge street phase 1. The contract was let in May 1987 and work started in the following month for completion in May 1990. The new accommodation should have been available for occupation at the end of the summer recess last year, but it is a matter of history that that did not happen. The Services Committee commented that the lack of progress was
"a sorry commentary on the state of the building industry",
and I tend to share that view, but there will be other occasions for a post mortem; perhaps tonight we can look forward.
The fine building that emerged from the scaffolding is now clearly visible. I do not know whether my hon. Friend

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has been around the building, but it is well worth a visit. I was enormously impressed by the way in which the work had been carried out and by the high standard of finish. It will, I think, be a very attractive proposition for hon. Members who locate there.
It is equally obvious that the work is now coming to an end. The main contractors' senior managers have said that the contract will be completed by Easter, which is less than two weeks away. There is still some major snagging work to be completed and a good deal of effort is going into that. I hope that on this occasion the House will not he disappointed.
I know that the New Building Sub-Committee is keeping a close eye on developments. It will visit the site shortly after Easter to confirm that the forecast has been fulfilled, as will I. If the target is achieved, moves into the building will start at the time of the spring bank holiday, and should be completed by the end of the summer recess. The building will provide accommodation for 100 Members' secretaries and 60 Members, a cafeteria seating 150 for the use of both Members and staff, a Library for all those north of Bridge street and residences for senior staff, as well as overnight sleeping accommodation.
The benefits, however, will be enjoyed not only by those who move into the new building. There will be less overcrowding in existing Members' offices, less pressure on the catering facilities in the Palace, improved Library facilities and better offices for staff. My hon. Friend the Member for St. Ives suggested that there might be less congestion in the Cloisters. That is a matter for the usual channels, but I am sure that his suggestions will be taken on board.
The vacated residences of the Serjeant at Arms, the Deputy Serjeant and the Speaker's Secretary are all to become Members' offices. It will also be possible to bring into use the derelict area above the Speaker's Secretary's residence, which will mean further gains for Members. Following phase I and the consequentials, 112 secretaries and 127 Members will gain desks. My hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South, will need to put her case as persuasively as she can to my right hon. Friend the Chief Whip, whose responsibility this is—patronage: that is real power! Even those who do not succeed in obtaining one of the new rooms should at least find that their existing rooms are less crowded. Those changes should all be completed early in the new year.
Not only will Members gain; particular attention has been paid to the Refreshment Department, which was mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Torridge and Devon, West (Miss Nicholson). It is acknowledged that there is a serious problem there. Additional accommodation has been allocated on the ground floor of the Palace: that will be used for lockers and changing rooms this year, while long-term plans are developed in conjunction with the Catering Sub-Committee. The Administration Department will also gain significantly more space this year in Dean's Yard to help overcome the present shortage.
My hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South expressed concern about the speed at which phase 2 has been developed. Hon. Members in all parts of the House agree that the accommodation ought to be provided quickly. The Services Committee produced its report—"New Parliamentary Building (Phase 2). The Next Steps"—which we debated about two years ago. The report recommended that consultants should be appointed to
262
carry out preliminary design work on New Palace Chambers, to identify suitable uses for Nos. 1 and 2 Bridge street and to undertake a feasibility study of the proposed Bridge street subway.
Following a fee-bidding exercise, Michael Hopkins and Partners was appointed in 1989. Both the House and the Department have appointed an eminent architect. My hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South perhaps knows the cutlery factory that the company designed for David Mellor—not my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Putney (Mr. Mellor)—at Hathersage. It won a Royal Institute of British Architects Award in 1989. Already we have firm evidence of Mr. Hopkins's foresight. In addition to undertaking the three particular studies, he was asked whether he could undertake a sharp, short look at the total site. That proved invaluable when, shortly afterwards, London Underground announced its intention to extend the Jubilee line with a new station on the phase 2 site.
The phase 2 site is the last opportunity to provide purpose-made accommodation in a new building close to the House. It is important, therefore, to know in detail what is needed. I am sure that the hon. Member for Ogmore listened to what my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South said about facilities for the disabled. In addition to what can be supplied in phase 2, I understand that further improvements are about to be put to the Accommodation and Administration Sub-Committee to improve facilities in the Palace.
It was agreed that the Sub-Committee should undertake what has become known as the space audit. It looked at existing accommodation—particularly offices—to assess both the needs and the shortfall. It involved a thorough review of all the existing accommodation. It is the first time that there has been a qualitative and quantitative assessment. It found that between 210 and 230 offices were needed for Members and for an equivalent number of staff.
It would be wrong to prejudge the views of the Services Committee on the proposals, but I understand that they have been generally well received. These recommendations, together with bids from departments of the House, form the basis of the proposed brief which will be available for hon. Members to consider on 21 March in Committee Room 7. I urge all hon. Members to visit the room. Initially, only about 60 hon. Members responded to the request made by the hon. Member for Ogmore for proposals.
What is the next step? The Services Committee will produce a final brief soon after the Easter recess. That is obviously another important stage. Then we shall have in place the site, the architect and the requirement, after which we shall be able to put forward a coherent set of proposals to the Treasury. We shall be seeking agreement in principle to funds amounting to some £60 million. At a time when we are urging everyone to provide value for money and to look carefully at public expenditure proposals, the House must apply the same criterion to its own proposals.
Much design work still needs to be done. The House will want to see the design proposals and to form a view. We must also consult the Royal Fine Art Commission at the appropriate stage and seek planning approval. A rough estimate suggests that another 18 months to two years' design work is necessary and that the construction period could take three or four years. I know that my hon.

263
Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South will say that that is a long period, but I am confident that she will still be in the House at the end of the construction period.
One has to remember that this development is a little different from the construction of a new car factory in her constituency. Apart from its being a large development, it is a difficult site technically. It is the last remaining site to be developed in the sensitive Westminster-Whitehall area. It provides a backdrop to an internationally famous sight. It is crucial that we get it right, not just for the benefit of the House in functional terms but so that we can show that
264
this country can produce late 20th century architecture that is worthy of the site. We want it to be something that we can show to the world.
This has been a most helpful debate at an important stage in the timing of phase 2. As a Department of the Environment Minister, I have found it helpful to gauge the feeling of the House. Moreover, the hon. Member for Ogmore has had the opportunity to put his toe in the water and feel the temperature. I conclude by thanking my hon. Friend the Member for Derbyshire, South and colleagues in all parts of the House for a most constructive and helpful debate.
Question put and agreed to.
Adjourned accordingly at twenty-nine minutes past Ten o'clock.

ENVIRONMENT

  Business Rate Arrears
  Mr. Ron Brown
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many companies are currently in arrears in payment of the business rate in 1990–91; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Key
  This information is not available. However by 31 December 1990, charging authorities in England had collected 76 per cent. of their estimated non-domestic rate income for 1990–91. My Department, which is responsible for collecting non-domestic rates in respect of hereditaments entered on the central rating list, has now collected the whole of the amount payable for 1990–91.

  Loan Charges
  Mr. Nellist
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what is his estimate of the loan charge proportion of each pound of rent charged by each local authority in the last available financial year; and what are the regional and national averages.

  Mr. Yeo
  I cannot strictly say what proportion of rent is attributable to loan charges because local housing authorities also have other sources of income, particularly that of housing revenue account subsidy. Nevertheless, I have today placed in the Library a copy of a table showing, for each local authority, the proportion of rental income and subsidy spent on loan charges.

  Wakefield
  Mr. Hinchliffe
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what representations he has received from Wakefield metropolitan district council with regard to the difficulties facing the authority in attempting to collect standard community charge payments from individuals who do not have the financial resources to make such payments.

  Mr. Key
  I am not aware of any representations having been made by the council, although officials in my Department meet on a regular basis officers from Wakefield metropolitan district council in the group with which matters of this kind are discussed with the local authority associations.

  Rents-to-Mortgages Scheme
  Mr. Walden
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment when a rents-to-mortgages scheme for the new town tenants at Milton Keynes will come into operation.

  Mr. Yeo
  Milton Keynes development corporation is today writing to its tenants inviting them to consider 48
  buying their homes under rents to mortgages. Sales will be completed before the transfer of the corporation's housing stock to new landlords.

  I warmly welcome this further opportunity for new town tenants at Milton Keynes to own their homes.

  Community Charge
  Mr. Nellist
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what is the average poll tax for 1990–91 in England and Wales; how many people are registered for the poll tax; and how much extra central Government finance would be necessary for the average poll tax to be reduced by(a) 10 per cent., (b) 25 per cent., (c) 50 per cent., (d) 75 per cent. and (e) 100 per cent.

  Mr. Key
  [holding answer 15 March 1991]: In 1990–91 there are 36 million charge payers in England and the average community charge is £357. Authorities have budgeted to raise £10·2 billion from the charge net of community charge benefits and transitional relief grant. This can be reduced without any extra central Government finance if authorities control their expenditure and improve their efficiency.

  Information for Wales is a matter for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales.

  Departmental Publicity
  Mr. Kirkwood
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will publish in the Official Report a list of all documents, advertisements, promotion or events undertaken by his Department to publicise elements of his Department's work, showing the cost in each case for each year since 1987, including the budget for 1991–92.

  Mr. Heseltine
  [holding answer 15 March 1991]: I refer the hon. Member to the reply which I gave to the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent, Central (Mr. Fisher) on 12 December 1990, Official Report, column 442. The outturn for 1990–91 is not yet available and the budget for 1991–92 has not yet been finalised. A list of each item which has contributed to the publicity programmes could be compiled only at disproportionate cost.

  Environmental Protection Act 1990
  Mr. Burns
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment when he expects to publish a timetable for implementation of the Environmental Protection Act 1990; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Portillo
  [pursuant to the reply, 28 November 1990, c. 404]: My right hon. Friend has today laid before the House the Litter Etc (Transitional Provisions) Regulations 1991.

  These provide that, where an authority has assigned its street cleaning work to its own work force or DSO under part I of the Local Government Act 1988, and it needs to undertake additional work to comply with the duties imposed on it by the Environmental Protection Act, the authority will be able to assign that additional work to the DSO, provided that it is accounted for separately from the work originally assigned to the DSO. If the cost of the additional work carried out between 1 April and 30 September 1991 is more than 20 per cent. of the cost of the work originally assigned to the DSO over that period, the

  49
  authority will be required to expose its street cleaning services to further competition in accordance with the following timetable:

  Date by which work first had to be exposed to competition

  Date by which work has to be retendered

  1 August 1989

  1 October 1992

  1 January 1990

  1 January 1992

  1 August 1990

  1 August 1993

  Where an authority has assigned street cleaning services to an independent contractor it will be taken as complying with the duties imposed by the Environmental Protection Act if it can demonstrate that it has used its best endeavours to negotiate any necessary variations in the contract with the contractor concerned, but he is either not prepared to agree such variations or is prepared to do so only on unreasonable terms.

  The regulations also contain provisions relating to the transfer of highway cleaning responsibilities from county to district councils under the Environmental Protection Act. They allow district councils to assign such work to their DSO, provided that they account for it separately and that they first use their best endeavours to enter into an agreement with any contractor who previously carried out this work under contract with the county council. They also facilitate the making of works contracts between district councils to which this responsibility has been transferred and the authorities who were carrying it out before 1 April 1991.

  The regulations apply also to Scotland and Wales except that regulations 5 and 6 dealing with the transfer of highway cleaning responsibilities from county to district councils are not applicable in Scotland.

  Community Charge
  Mr. Speed
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list the community charge figures declared by each district in England for the forthcoming year in ascending values.

  Mr. Heseltine
  [pursuant to the reply, 18 March 1991, Official Report, column 40]: As my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer told the House today in his Budget speech, the Government are providing £4·3 billion of extra grant to local authorities in Great Britain in 1991–92 to permit a major reduction in community charges.

  Accordingly, my right hon. Friends the Secretaries of State for Scotland and for Wales and I shall shortly be introducing a Bill which, on enactment, will mean that the community charges which authorities have set for 1991–92 will be replaced by new lower charges. Each new charge will be £140 lower than the one it replaced, or zero in those cases where the original charge was less than £140. The Bill will suspend the liability of charge payers to pay any 1991–92 charges until a charge bill has been received reflecting the reduced charges.

  The community charge reduction scheme will continue to help those who would still face large increases over their previous rate bills. Although the total help that will need to be given through this scheme will be much reduced by the lower charges announced today, I expect that, together with the effect of community charge and other benefits, it will mean that the average charge actually paid in England will be less than £170.
  50
  The Bill will also require grants to be paid to charging authorities in England and Wales, and to local authorities in Scotland. It is our intention that the grants paid under these provisions should provide full compensation for the community charge income forgone and should also fully reimburse authorities for their reasonable additional administrative costs as a result of the reduction in charges. I also intend in England to advance the distribution of the non-domestic rates pool to offset the inevitable cash flow losses which authorities will incur as a result of this measure. Broadly similar funding arrangements are intended for Scotland and for Wales.

  All this means that where authorities have already issued their charge bills for 1991–92–which many have already done—they will need after the Bill's enactment to issue fresh bills reflecting the new lower charges. Until fresh bills are issued authorities may think it best not to enforce payment from their charge payers. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales and I propose to amend the regulations on the community charge demand notice slightly to provide the basis for the new bills, but we believe not in ways that would result in significant changes to authorities' computing arrangements. Where authorities have not yet issued their bills, they may think it right to suspend action until bills complying with the new arrangements can be issued.

  My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland will be advising Scottish authorities about the details for billing and collecting charges.

ATTORNEY-GENERAL

  Mortgage Repossessions
  Mrs. Clwyd
  To ask the Attorney-General how many court actions relating to mortgage repossessions there were in Cardiff county court in each year since 1979.

  The Attorney-General
  The number of mortgage actions for possession entered and orders made for possession in Cardiff county court in each year since 1986, the first year for which figures are available, are shown in the table.

  Number of mortgage possession actions entered

  Number of mortgage possession orders made

  1986

  518

  358

  1987

  750

  327

  1988

  685

  262

  1989

  622

  295

  1990

  973

  630

ENERGY

  Independent Generation
  Mr. Martyn Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Energy if he will list, stating size, fuel and ownership, all the independent generating projects of which his Department is aware.

  Mr. Heathcoat-Amory
  My Department is aware of 20 proposed major independent electricity generating projects which have been made public. The following is the information requested by the hon. Member:
  51

  Promoter/Consortium

  Location

  Estimated output (MW)

  Fuel

  Barking Power Ltd.

  Barking, London

  1,000

  Gas

  East Midlands Electricity plc/British Coal Corporation

  Bilsthorpe

  150

  Coal

  Berisford Bristar plc

  Brigg, South Humberside

  240

  Gas

  British Nuclear Fuels plc

  Calder Hall, Sellafield

  160

  Gas

  Corby Power Ltd.

  Corby, South Humberside

  350

  Gas

  Coryton Cogen Ltd.

  Coryton, Essex

  460

  Gas

  Deeside Power Development Co. Ltd.

  Deeside, Clywd

  450

  Gas

  MetroPower Ltd.

  Greenwich, London

  370

  Gas

  Energy Resources Ltd.

  Keadby, Humberside

  720

  Gas

  MetroPower Ltd.

  Lots Road, Chelsea, London

  370

  Gas

  Forth Energy Ltd.

  Newcastle

  150

  Gas

  Texaco Ltd./Mission Energy

  Pembroke, Dyfed, (Angle Bay)

  1,100–1,280

  Gas

  Peterborough Power Ltd.

  Peterborough

  355

  Gas

  Lakeland Power

  Roosecote, Cumbria

  235

  Gas

  Rugby Power Co. Ltd.

  Rugby, Warwickshire

  380

  Gas

  Kelt (UK) Ltd.

  Ryedale (Claypit Plantation)

  50–60

  Gas

  Sheffield Heat & Power

  Sheffield

  160

  Gas

  Shell UK Exploration Ltd.

  Shellhaven, Essex

  524

  Gas

  Neptune Consortium

  Teesside

  1,050

  Gas

  Tesside Power Ltd.

  Wilton, Cleveland

  1,725

  Gas

  Energy Efficiency
  Mr. Colvin
  To ask the Secretary of State for Energy which of his Ministers has been given responsibility for energy use by his Department; and what is his brief regarding energy efficiency.

  Mr. Wakeham
  I chair the ministerial group on energy efficiency which is composed of a Minister from each major Government Department. My hon. Friend the Member for Wells (Mr. Heathcoat-Amory) represents the Department of Energy.

  Each Minister on the group is expected to take forward the energy efficiency campaign on the Government estate and secure 15 per cent. annual savings in their Department's energy bill by 1995–96. In addition, all Ministers on the group have agreed to consider how energy efficiency can be incorporated into their Department's policy and publicity initiatives. The group intends to promote and raise awareness of energy efficiency in all sectors of the economy.

  My hon. Friend and I also have specific responsibility for the work of the Energy Efficiency Office within the Department of Energy, which has the following main objectives:

  (i) to encourage consumers and buildings professionals to take action which will lead to improved energy efficiency, by stimulating their interest and providing them with specific and authoritative guidance on what can be achieved;

  (ii) to stimulate the development and application of energy management skills and techniques;

  (iii) to tackle market barriers such as the obstacles to public sector use of private sector expertise, and the inability of some low-income householders to raise funds and manage projects;

  (iv) to help develop technical standards.

  (v) to help the energy efficiency industry develop, and encourage it and the energy suppliers to develop and market goods and services which help consumers improve their energy efficiency;

  (vi) to promote combined heat and power where it is cost effective.

  Electricity Privatisation
  Dr. Kim Howells
  To ask the Secretary of State for Energy what estimates were made, in preparing for privatisation of the electricity generating companies, of the 52
  average costs per tonne or equivalent (a) of transporting coal (i) by road and (ii) by rail from ports to power stations, (b) by tranche of coal supplied by British Coal to power stations, (c) of heavy fuel oil supplied to power stations, (d) of orimulsion supplied to power stations and (e) of imported coal by country of origin.

  Mr. Heathcoat-Amory
  Fuel procurement is a commercial matter for the companies concerned. All material information relating to the companies is included in the prospectus, a copy of which is in the Library of the House.

  Electricity Transit
  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Energy (i) what discussions he has had with organisations representing electricity consumers in the United Kingdom concerning the principle of third-party access prior to his negotiations with his EC counterparts on the EC's proposed regulation on electricity cross-border transit;

  (2) when he next expects to meet his EC counterparts regarding third-party access to electricity grids; and what considerations underlie his policy in these negotiations;

  (3) what consultations he has had with the chairmen of the regional electricity distribution companies, generating companies and Gridco, regarding the principle of third-party access in negotiations with the European Commission.

  Mr. Heathcoat-Amory
  The directive on electricity transit was adopted by the Energy Council on 29 October 1990 and is to be implemented by 1 July 1991. Third-party access would go much further in contributing to an open and competitive market in electricity. The Commission has established two consultative committees to advise on third-party access: a member states committee and a parallel professional committee which includes the chairman of NGC and representatives from the generators and large consumers. My right hon. Friend will consider with his colleagues in the Energy Council any proposals which the Commission may bring forward.

TRANSPORT

  Buttermere Valley (Parking)
  Mr. Campbell-Savours
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what recent representations he has received about the decision of Cumbria county council to restrict parking in the Buttermere valley; and what response he intends to make.

  Mr. Chope
  Including those that the hon. Member has sent me, the Department has received 16 separate representations about this matter. I understand that my right hon. Friend Secretary of State for the Environment has received a similar number.

  As I indicated in my previous reply on 11 March, this is essentially a local highways issue well within the management responsibilities of the county council as the locally elected highway authority.

  I shall arrange for all representations received to be passed to the county council for its information and action as it considers necessary.

  Energy Efficiency
  Mr. Colvin
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport which of his Ministers has been given responsibility for energy use by his Department; and what is his brief regarding energy efficiency.

  Mr. McLoughlin
  I am the Minister within the Department of Transport responsible for promoting energy efficiency and I represent the Department on the ministerial group on energy efficiency.

  My brief is to see that the Department meets the Government's target of a 3 per cent. annual saving in energy costs on its estate through to 1995–96, and to ensure that the Department promotes greater energy efficiency in its policy and publicity initiatives.

  International Leisure Group
  Mr. Blunkett
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport (1) at what point his Department was in a position to warn passengers of the problems they faced in relation to the financial difficulties confronting the International Leisure Group; and if he will make a statement;

  (2) when his Department became aware of the financial difficulties facing Air Europe; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. McLoughlin
  It is the responsibility of the Civil Aviation Authority to monitor the financial fitness of air carriers and air travel organisers. The Department of Transport was kept informed of the position as it developed and of the attempts to maintain trading. To have made public statements about the companies' financial affairs while there was still a serious prospect of rescue would simply have precipitated the crisis.

  Mr. Fearn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he has met the chairman of the Civil Aviation Authority to discuss Air Europe.

  Mr. McLoughlin
  The Civil Aviation Authority has kept my right hon. and learned Friend informed of developments concerning Air Europe.

  Cyclists (Crash Helmets)
  Mr. Austin Mitchell
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport whether the Government are currently considering any proposals to make the wearing of crash helmets by cyclists compulsory.

  Mr. Chope
  No, but we do advise cyclists to wear safety helmets.

  Mr. Austin Mitchell
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what statistics he has regarding the beneficial effects of the wearing of crash helmets by cyclists in the prevention of serious head injuries.

  Mr. Chope
  The standard road injury accident report provides no information on cyclist crash helmets, but hospital-based research suggests that if those seriously injured had worn helmets 11 per cent. would have been uninjured and 18 per cent. would have been only slightly injured.

  BR Rolling Stock
  Mr. Fearn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport when he last met the chairman of British Rail to discuss the performance of British Rail rolling stock during the recent severe weather; and what the results of that meeting were.

  Mr. Freeman
  Yesterday. British Rail has been carrying out a review of the railway's performance during the recent snow and it plans to announce the results shortly.

  M54
  Mr. Gill
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport in respect of the M54 in Shropshire what was the original cost, the cost of subsequent repairs and the lowest tender for the orginial construction to have been in tarmacadam rather than concrete.

  Mr. Chope
  The original construction cost was £26,248,992. Had the lowest tenders for blacktop construction been accepted the extra cost would have been £881,883.

  Repair costs to date including those programmed for 1990–91 total £5,303,500. The latter includes bridgeworks and covers part of the Staffordshire section for which Shropshire county council is responsible.

  Offshore Standby Vessels
  Dr. Godman
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will list the names of all standby vessels currently certificated engaged in the offshore oil and gas industries, the year of build and the date of the last survey of each vessel.

  Mr. McLoughlin
  I am placing in the Library a list of the names of all standby vessels currently certificated engaged in the offshore oil and gas industries, the year of build and the date of the last survey of each vessel.

  Motorway Driving
  Mr. Hinchliffe
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what steps he is taking to improve lane discipline in motorway driving.

  Mr. Chope
  My Department continues to attach high importance to improving standards of motorway driving.
  55
  As part of the "Safety on the Move" campaign we shall be mounting a fresh publicity initiative later this year about safe motorway driving practice, including lane discipline. This will complement the major police national motorway campaign to be launched in July, aimed at improving motorway driving standards. We have also commissioned research to investigate driver behaviour on motorways to help explore the further scope for improving safety and traffic flows on those roads.

  Headlight Dazzle
  Mr. Hinchliffe
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what steps he is taking to warn motorists of the danger of headlight dazzle.

  Mr. Chope
  The "Highway Code" advises drivers to dip their headlamps when meeting other vehicles or road users and before they dazzle the driver of a vehicle travelling in the same direction in front of them. The code emphasises that badly adjusted headlamps can dazzle road users and lead to accidents.

  Dazzle is also reduced if headlamps are correctly aimed on the vehicle. As I announced last year, the Department is introducing stricter arrangements for checking that new vehicles come off the production line with correctly aimed headlamps. We are also introducing a stricter check of headlamps aim into the MOT test.

  A12
  Mr. David Porter
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will make a statement on progress to date on upgrading the A12 from Ipswich to Great Yarmouth including dualling and bypasses.

  Mr. Chope
  The proposals to upgrade the A 12 in Norfolk and Suffolk have been split into seven schemes. The Gorleston relief road is the most advanced with construction work scheduled to start on 5 April 1991. A preferred route for the Lowestoft relief road, extending the route southward to the Kessingland bypass, was announced on 9 November 1990 and the normal design and statutory procedures are now in hand. We expect to announce preferred routes for all the remaining schemes by 1993 and anticipate that the whole programme of improvements will be completed by the end of the decade.

PRIME MINISTER

  Camden
  Mr. Dobson
  To ask the Prime Minister, pursuant to his oral answer to the hon. Member for Hendon, South (Mr. Marshall) of 21 February,Official Report, column 434, what place is occupied by Camden in the list of authorities with (a) the highest community charge, net of safety net, (b) the worst education results and (c) the largest rent arrears; and if he will make a statement.

  The Prime Minister
  After it had been capped, reducing its charge by £34, Camden set a community charge of £500 in 1990–91, the third highest in England. After allowing for the effect of the safety net, Camden's charge after capping is £425, the 27th highest in England.

  Camden took over responsibility for education in April 1990. Before that it was part of the Inner London
  56
  education authority which, despite the highest spending per pupil in England, ranked 91st out of 96 local education authorities in terms of education results.

  As at 31 March 1990, Camden had arrears of rent of £7·45 million, representing approximately 18 per cent. of the rent roll, the 10th highest level in England.

  Engagements
  Mr. Harry Greenway
  To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 19 March.

  The Prime Minister
  This morning I presided at a meeting of the Cabinet and had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall be having further meetings later today. This evening I hope to have an audience of Her Majesty the Queen.

EDUCATION AND SCIENCE

  Books
  Mr. Fearn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science (1) what assessment he has made concerning the availability of books for the national curriculum;

  (2) how many representations he has received concerning the availability of books for the national curriculum.

  Mr. Eggar
  The latest report from Her Majesty's senior chief inspector of schools says that most classrooms are adequately provided with books. But some schools will need to offer a wider range of books if they are to meet the full requirements of the national curriculum. That is why the Government are deploying specific grant to support £15 million expenditure on books for the national curriculum in the financial year 1991–92. My right hon. and learned Friend and I meet representatives of the educational publishers from time to time and over the last year have also received six letters about the availability of books from schools and members of the public.

  Primary Pupils (Testing)
  Mr. Fearn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science how many representations he has received concerning primary testing in schools.

  Mr. Eggar
  Since 1 January this year the Department has received 187 letters from hon. Members and the general public, specifically concerned with the testing of primary school pupils.

  CTC/CCTA Funding Agreement
  Mr. Fatchett
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science what guidance or undertakings have been issued, in the event of the provisions of section 105(5) of the Education Reform Act 1988 and paragraph 24A(iv) of the model city technology college/Central Computer and Telecommunications Agency funding agreement being brought into operation on termination of a CTC/CCTA funding agreement, with respect to limitations on the percentage of the then market value of the relevant assets to be repaid to him.

  Mr. Eggar
  None.

  School Governors
  Mr. Fatchett
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science if he will make a statement on his future plans for the training of school governors.

  Mr. Fallon
  Legal responsibility for the training of school governors rests with local education authorities, which plan in the light of local needs. This work is encouraged through central grants which will have supported some £17 million of expenditure in the three years to 1992. Grants are expected to continue at least at the same level in 1992–93. The Department will also continue to provide written information and advice to all governors free of charge, including a personal copy of the guide to the law which is regularly updated, and to support and subsidise the production of nationally available training materials.

  Mr. Fatchett
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science whether he has carried out any review of the effectiveness of expenditure under the education support grants for training of school governors; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Fallon
  In seeking approval for further instalments of central grant support all LEAs have since 1989 had to report on progress towards their school governor training targets. A survey by the National Foundation for Educational Research in summer 1990 showed that almost all governors had been offered training and over two thirds had attended training sessions. Her Majesty's inspectors of schools published a report in October 1989 on the early experiences of school governor training in a number of LEAs. A further HMI review is now under way and its findings will be published in the early autumn.

  Nuclear Structure Facility
  Mr. Butler
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science what information he has as to whether the nuclear structure facility will be subject to peer review before any final decision is made on its future.

  Mr. Alan Howarth
  At its meeting on 13 March, the Science and Engineering Research Council confirmed its decision to close the nuclear structure facility at its Daresbury laboratory, probably at the beginning of 1993. In reaching this decision the council took full account of the views of its Nuclear Physics Board as well as the representations it had received from the scientific community.

  Mr. Butler
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science if he will be represented at the Nuclear Physics European Collaboration Committee meeting in Ruthin in the week beginning 18 March in connection with discussion on the future of the nuclear structure facility at Daresbury.

  Mr. Alan Howarth
  My right hon. and learned Friend has no plans to be represented at this meeting.

  Birmingham City Action Team
  Mr. Terry Davis
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science how many meetings of Birmingham city action team were held in 1990; and how many meetings have been held in the current year.
  58
  Mr. Alan Howarth
  The Birmingham city action team meets approximately once a month. It had 10 meetings in 1990 and has had four meetings in the first three months of 1991.

  Nursery Schools
  Mrs. Mahon
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science what is the spending for each local education authority in ranking order for the provision of nursery school places for the last year that figures are available.

  Mr. Eggar
  [holding answer 18 March 1991]: The last year for which expenditure on nursery schools was collected separately was 1986–87. For later years, authorities' returns of expenditure do not identify separate figures for nursery and primary schools.

  The table shows school-based recurrent spending on nursery schools. The figures do not include expenditure on nursery classes in primary schools.

  Net institutional expenditure1 in nursery schools 1986–872

  LEA

  £000

  ILEA

  7,623

  Lancashire

  2,481

  Birmingham

  1,987

  Durham

  1,917

  Staffordshire

  1,676

  Avon

  1,628

  Berkshire

  1,516

  Humberside

  1,481

  Hertfordshire

  1,337

  Salford

  1,166

  Bedfordshire

  1,021

  Derbyshire

  938

  Manchester

  929

  Newcastle upon Tyne

  862

  Sheffield

  744

  Sunderland

  715

  Rochdale

  666

  Stockport

  633

  Bradford

  611

  Cumbria

  591

  Cambridgeshire

  554

  Liverpool

  548

  Walsall

  541

  Cheshire

  525

  Nottinghamshire

  514

  Ealing

  512

  Brent

  491

  South Tyneside

  475

  Warwickshire

  456

  Wolverhampton

  438

  Dudley

  435

  Bolton

  434

  Kirklees

  422

  Northamptonshire

  386

  Oxfordshire

  385

  Surrey

  355

  Coventry

  345

  Barnet

  344

  Wakefield

  341

  Croydon

  339

  Tameside

  327

  Buckinghamshire

  325

  Waltham Forest

  290

  North Yorkshire

  243

  Norfolk

  244

  Lincolnshire

  240

  West Sussex

  230

  Wirral

  230

  Rotherham

  230

  North Tyneside

  219

  59

  LEA

  £000

  Northumberland

  213

  Leeds

  211

  Kingston upon Thames

  208

  Sandwell

  205

  East Sussex

  199

  Sefton

  195

  Essex

  184

  Sutton

  169

  Devon

  158

  Hampshire

  157

  Haringey

  157

  Wigan

  154

  Bury

  142

  Bexley

  124

  Barnsley

  112

  Shropshire

  111

  Suffolk

  103

  Cornwall

  94

  Calderdale

  90

  Cleveland

  90

  Hillingdon

  81

  Kent

  63

  St. Helens

  60

  Gateshead

  55

  Merton

  53

  Richmond upon Thames

  45

  Leicestershire

  31

  Somerset

  7

  Barking and Dagenham

  0

  Bromley

  0

  Enfield

  0

  Harrow

  0

  Havering

  0

  Hounslow

  0

  Redbridge

  0

  Solihull

  0

  Knowsley

  0

  Oldham

  0

  TrafTord

  0

  Doncaster

  0

  Dorset

  0

  Gloucestershire

  0

  Hereford and Worcester

  0

  Isle of Wight

  0

  Wiltshire

  0

  Newham

  n/a

  Notes:

  1 Net institutional spending includes the cost of salaries and wages, premises and certain supplies and services. The cost of central administration and of financing of capital expenditure is not included.

  2 The figures are taken from authorities' expenditure returns to Government.

  Mrs. Mahon
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science if he will publish the number of nursery school places made available by each local education authority in ranking order for the last year for which figures are available.

  Mr. Eggar
  [holding answer 18 March 1991]: Information on the number of nursery places is not available centrally. The number of pupils in maintained nursery schools in each local education authority in rank order as at January 1990 is given in the table. This excludes pupils in nursery classes in maintained primary schools.

  Number of pupils in maintained nursery schools in rank order January 1990

  Number on roll

  1. Inner London

  4,187

  2. Lancashire

  3,397

  3. Durham

  2,519

  4. Birmingham

  2,371

  60

  Number on roll

  5. Berkshire

  2,119

  6. Staffordshire

  1,916

  7. Avon

  1,685

  8. Hertfordshire

  1,633

  9. Derbyshire

  1,549

  10. Bedfordshire

  1,356

  11. Humberside

  1,007

  12. Sunderland

  996

  13. Newham

  965

  14. Rochdale

  922

  15. Salford

  900

  16. Cumbria

  881

  17. Oxfordshire

  870

  18. Cheshire

  839

  19. South Tyneside

  827

  20. Wolverhampton

  820

  21. Stockport

  816

  22. Walsall

  780

  23. Warwickshire

  758

  24. Sheffield

  692

  25. Newcastle-upon-Tyne

  689

  26. Cambridgeshire

  669

  27. Nottinghamshire

  658

  28. Kirklees

  619

  29. Northamptonshire

  597

  30. Ealing

  572

  31. Liverpool

  533

  32. Barnet

  527

  33. Manchester

  521

  34. Buckinghamshire

  519

  35. Bradford

  518

  36. Bolton

  507

  37. Wakefield

  469

  38. West Sussex

  455

  39. Croydon

  432

  40. Coventry

  426

  41. Surrey

  410

  42. Norfolk

  399

  43. Rotherham

  357

  44. Hampshire

  338

  45. North Yorkshire

  334

  46. Tameside

  328

  47. Waltham Forest

  325

  48. Sefton

  319

  49. Dudley

  310

  50. Wirral

  308

  51. Leeds

  299

  52. Lincolnshire

  299

  53. East Sussex

  298

  54. North Tyneside

  292

  55. Devon

  276

  56. Brent

  267

  57. Essex

  252

  58. Haringey

  245

  59. Sutton

  240

  60. Kingston upon Thames

  233

  61. Sandwell

  209

  62. Bexley

  180

  63. Barnsley

  177

  64. Wigan

  170

  65. Shropshire

  162

  66. Bury

  162

  67. Cleveland

  156

  68. Northumberland

  147

  69. Hillingdon

  120

  70. Cornwall

  118

  71. Suffolk

  97

  72. Kent

  80

  73. St. Helens

  75

  74. Gateshead

  68

  75. Richmond upon Thames

  62

  76. Leicestershire

  50

  77. Isle of Wight

  0

  78. Barking

  0

  79. Calderdale

  0

  80. Harrow

  0

  81. Hounslow

  0

  61

  Number on roll

  82. Isles of Scilly

  0

  83. Redbridge

  0

  84. Bromley

  0

  85. Doncaster

  0

  86. Somerset

  0

  87. Dorset

  0

  88. Gloucestershire

  0

  89. Enfield

  0

  90. Trafford

  0

  91. Havering

  0

  92. Solihull

  0

  93. Oldham

  0

  94. Merton

  0

  95. Hereford and Worcester

  0

  96. Wiltshire

  0

  97. Knowsley

  0

  England

  51,678

  Note:

  (i) Includes full time and part time pupils

  (ii) Zeros indicate authorities with no nursery schools.

NATIONAL FINANCE

  Value Added Tax
  Mr. French
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what would be the required level of value added tax if the amount of tax levied through the community charge were collected through the VAT system.

  Mrs. Gillian Shephard
  I refer my hon. Friend to the reply given to my hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge (Mr. Shersby) on 13 March at columns 553–54.

  Mr. Gregory
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is his estimate of the additional revenue that would be generated by raising to 25 per cent. the VAT rate on those products which were historically subject to a 25 per cent. purchase tax levy.

  Mrs. Gillian Shephard
  Around £5 billion at 1990–91 levels of expenditure.

  Company Cars
  Mr. Wigley
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what representations he has received on the basis of environmental considerations concerning the cost of subsidies by the Exchequer towards the costs of company cars; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Maude
  I have received a number of such representations.

  Interest Rates
  Mr. Lawson
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will provide a table showing for each year from 1979 to 1991 to date, the average real short-term interest rate in(a) the United Kingdom and (b) the Group of Seven as a whole, measuring the real United Kingdom interest rate in each case on the basis of the underlying rate of inflation.

  Mr. Norman Lamont
  Following is the information:62

  Per cent.

  Year

  United Kingdom

  G7

  1979

  1·2

  0·0

  1980

  -0·1

  0·1

  1981

  2·1

  3·6

  1982

  3·6

  4·5

  1983

  4·9

  4·6

  1984

  5·3

  5·0

  1985

  6·9

  4·6

  1986

  7·4

  4·9

  1987

  6·0

  3·8

  1988

  5·7

  3·8

  1989

  7·8

  4·5

  1990

  7·1

  4·3

  Sources:

  OECD, CSO and national sources.

  Inflation
  Mr. Lawson
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will provide a table for each year from 1970 to 1990 inclusive, showing(a) the average underlying rate of inflation in the United Kingdom, (b) the average rate of inflation in the United States and (c) the amount by which underlying United Kingdom inflation exceeds United States inflation.

  Mr. Norman Lamont
  There are various ways of measuring underlying inflation. The following table shows the United Kingdom figures as measured by the RPI excluding mortgage interest payments and the community charge/rates. These figures are available only from 1976.

  Average annual increase in consumer prices

  United Kingdom1 Per cent.

  United States of America Per cent.

  Difference Per cent.

  1976

  16·9

  5·7

  11·2

  1977

  16·0

  6·5

  9·5

  1978

  8·5

  7·6

  0·9

  1979

  12·5

  11·3

  1·2

  1980

  16·7

  13·5

  3·2

  1981

  11·7

  10·3

  1·4

  1982

  8·3

  6·1

  2·2

  1983

  5·1

  3·2

  1·9

  1984

  4·4

  4·3

  0·1

  1985

  5·0

  3·5

  1·5

  1986

  3·3

  1·9

  1·4

  1987

  3·5

  3·7

  -0·2

  1988

  4·4

  4·1

  0·3

  1989

  5·7

  4·8

  0·9

  1990

  7·2

  5·4

  1·8

  1 All items RPI excluding mortgage interest payments and community charge/rates.

  Mr. Lawson
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what was the average annual underlying rate of United Kingdom inflation for the periods(a) from July 1983 to October 1989 inclusive, (b) from July 1984 to October 1990 inclusive, (c) from July 1985 to October 1991 inclusive, using as a proxy for October 1991 the forecast for the fourth quarter of 1991 published in the 1991 FSBR, adjusted to provide a forecast for the underlying rate, and (d) from July 1985 to the latest available month, inclusive.

  Mr. Norman Lamont
  The average the RPI excluding mortgage interest community charge was:

  (i) 4·4 per cent. between July 198 inclusive;

  (ii) 4·4 per cent. between July 198 inclusive;

  63

  (iii) 4·8 per cent. between July 1985 and January 1991 inclusive.

  No forecast is published for underlying inflation.

  Public Sector Borrowing
  Mr. Lawson
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what was the total public sector borrowing requirement for(a) the period from June 1979 to June 1983 inclusive, (b) the period from July 1983 to October 1989 inclusive and (c) the period from November 1989 to the latest available month, inclusive.

  Mr. Norman Lamont
  The figures are as follows:

  £ million

  (a) June 1979 to June 1983

  40·5

  (b) July 1983 to October 1989

  4·6

  (c) November 1989 to February 1991

  -8·3

WALES

  Special Schools
  Mr. Wigley
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales how the weighting accorded to the number of statemented pupils on the rolls of special schools is expected to influence the integration of pupils with special educational needs into ordinary schools.

  Sir Wyn Roberts
  The Education Act 1981 places a duty on local education authorities to secure that children with statements are educated in ordinary schools, subject to certain conditions. Wherever a child with a statement is placed, it is the responsibility of the LEA to ensure that the special educational provision specified in the statement is made and to allocate resources accordingly.

  Toxic Waste
  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales if he will list the ports in Wales currently registered for the import of toxic waste and the amount of such waste imported, by port, for the last available year; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Nicholas Bennett
  There is no requirement for ports to be registered for the importation of waste. The following amounts of hazardous waste were imported through ports in Wales for the year to March 1991: 156 tonnes through Holyhead, 1,346 tonnes through Newport and 5 tonnes through Swansea.

  Perinatal Mortality
  Mr. Alan W. Williams
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what was the perinatal mortality rate for the years 1986–87 to the present for (1) West Wales general hospital, Carmarthen, (2) Withybush hospital, Haverfordwest., (3) Singleton hospital, Swansea, (4) Morriston hospital and (5) Wales; and what information he has on comparable figures for Great Britain.

  Mr. Nicholas Bennett
  Perinatal mortality rates on a hospital basis are not available centrally.

  Data from the registration system which are routinely published on an area of residence basis are reproduced in the following table with equivalent rates for Great Britain.
  64

  Perinatal Mortality Rates1

  Area of mother's usual residence2

  1986

  1987

  1988

  1989

  Great Britain

  9·6

  8·9

  8·7

  8·4

  Wales

  10·3

  9·2

  8·6

  8·3

  District Health Authority Area

  East Dyfed

  12·5

  10·1

  9·1

  9·5

  Pembrokeshire

  38·0

  38·2

  313·4

  38·9

  West Glamorgan

  10·1

  9·5

  8·4

  7·6

  Source: Office of Population Censuses and Surveys

  1 Rates are perinatal deaths (stillbirths and deaths within the first week after birth) per 1,000 total (live and still) births.

  2 Not necessarily the area of delivery or death.

  3 Care should be taken in interpretation of these rates calculated from fewer than 20 events.

  Equal Opportunities
  Mrs. Clwyd
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales how many and what percentage of officers in each grade, 1 to 7, and overall in his Department are women.

  Mr. David Hunt
  I refer the hon. Lady to the reply that I gave to the hon. and learned Member for Leicester, West (Mr. Janner) on 7 March 1991 at columns 233–34.

  Air Pollution
  Mrs. Clwyd
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales if he has any plans to operate air pollution monitoring sites in Wales on behalf of the Government in respect of carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, atmospheric hydrocarbon, trace germs, atmospheric chemistry and multi-element sites; and if he will list other monitoring by independent organisations.

  Mr. Nicholas Bennett
  The coverage and density of the United Kingdom monitoring networks for airborne pollutants is kept under continual review. We are now planning to expand the network, as announced in the White Paper, "This Common Inheritance". As a first step we propose an improved urban system which will monitor carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides and a range of atmospheric hydrocarbons, and will include a site in Wales.

  There is no centrally maintained list of monitoring by independent organisations.

  Housing Association Consultancy and Advisory Service
  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales how many draft reports by HACAS in respect of Corlan Housing Association were presented to Tai Cymru before the final version; and what was the final fee paid to HACAS.

  Mr. Nicholas Bennett
  I will ask the chairman of Tai Cymru to write to the hon. Gentleman.

  Rehabilitation Seating
  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what consultations he has had with the chairman of the Welsh Health Common Services health auhority regarding(a) waiting lists, (b) funding requirements and (c) the method of transfer payment appropriate from 1 April, for rehabilitation seating provided by the rehabilitation engineering unit at Rookwood hospital.
  65
  Mr. Nicholas Bennett
  None. Management and financial responsibility for the rehabilitation engineering unit rests with the South Glamorgan health authority.

  South Glamorgan Hospitals
  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales (1) what consideration he gave, prior to his approval of South Glamorgan health authority's proposals to transfer services provided at Glan Ely hospital to the Prince of Wales hospital at Rhydlafar to(a) the capacity of the foul drains at the Prince of Wales hospital to accept sluicings from the disposable bed pan mashing equipment currently used at Glan Ely hospital and (b) the cross-infection risk between geriatric and non-geriatric patients in physiotherapy and occupational therapy departments;

  (2) what consideration he gave, prior to his approval of South Glamorgan health authority's proposals to transfer services provided at the children's ENT hospital, Ely, to the University Hospital of Wales, to (i) the recent medical audit report on the relative costs of children's ENT operations at the children's ENT hospital, Ely, and (ii) the involuntary departures of the unit general manager, chief nursing officer, chief finance officer and chief personnel officer from the University Hospital of Wales.

  Mr. Nicholas Bennett
  The considerations given to the authority's proposals are set out in the decision letter issued on 7 March.

  Changes in senior personnel at University Hospital of Wales are a matter for South Glamorgan health authority, which advises that a number of staff are moving as part of an agreed programme to strengthen financial and clinical management as the authority prepares for the NHS changes in April.

  I regret that the hon. Gentleman has used parliamentary privilege to make careless, unfounded insinuations against public officials. I hope that in future he will ensure that any statements he makes have been verified.

  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales if he will visit Glan Ely hospital and St. David's hospital, Cardiff.

  Mr. Nicholas Bennett
  At present, neither my right hon. Friend nor I have any plans to visit these hospitals.

  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales if he will visit the children's ward at Prince of Wales hospital, Rhydlafar.

  Mr. Nicholas Bennett
  I visited the ward on 15 March.

SOCIAL SECURITY

  Maternity Provision
  Ms. Richardson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what is the cost per annum of Britain's current maternity provision; and what this figure is as a percentage of the national payroll.

  Mr. Jack
  The total estimated cost of financial provision for maternity in the 1990–91 year is £395 million made up as follows:

  £million

  Statutory Maternity Pay

  340

  State Maternity Allowance

  34

  Social Fund Maternity payments

  21

  66
  In addition, there are costs to industry resulting from the right of those women employees who meet the relevant qualifying conditions to return to work after maternity absence. It is difficult to estimate these costs, but they may reasonably be expected to be in the range £200 million to £300 million per annum.

  It is estimated that the cost to industry and the state is in the range 0·17 to 0·2 per cent. of total labour costs over the economy as a whole which are running at well over £300 billion.

  Occupational Pensions
  Mr. Andrew Bowden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what plans he has to increase the £35 disregard in income from occupational pensions above which unemployment benefit is reduced for people over the age of 55 years.

  Mr. Jack
  We have no plans to increase the disregard.

  Mr. Andrew Bowden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what is the real-term value of the £35 disregard on income from occupational pensions above which unemployment benefit is abated for people over the age of 55 years in relation to its level in 1981.

  Mr. Jack
  If the disregard had been increased in line with the RPI at January 1991 it would be £61·50.

  Disability Working Allowance
  Mr. Hannam
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security (1) if he will give details of the functions to be assessed by the functional test on the disability working allowance; and which disability organisations he has consulted regarding the details of the test;

  (2) whether his Department has drafted details of the functional test on the disability working allowance.

  Mr. Scott
  The test of functional disability for the disability working allowance—DWA—will be based upon the method of assessing disability developed by the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys for its survey of disabled people in Great Britain. Research is currently under way to ensure that the test, which will use claimants' own assessment of their abilities, works satisfactorily. Very early indications are that a large majority of disabled people are happy to complete a self-assessment form similar to the one we have in mind for DWA. The research should be completed in April 1991.

  Our proposals were developed in the light of discussions between officials and representatives of a number of disability organisations and other experts in the field.

  Pensions
  Mr. Bernie Grant
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what plans he has to reach a social security agreement with Caribbean countries to enable those retiring there to receive annual increments to their old age pension.

  Mr. Jack
  The United Kingdom has a reciprocal social security agreement with Jamaica which provides for the payment of annual pension increases. Negotiations for an agreement with Barbados are nearly complete. This will provide for future pension increases to be paid after the agreement comes into force. We have no plans to negotiate agreements with any of the other Caribbean countries.
  67
  Mr. Bernie Grant
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will list those countries which have a reciprocal agreement with Britain which ensures that retired people who are entitled to a British pension receive an annual increase.

  Mr. Jack
  The United Kingdom has reciprocal social security agreements, providing for the payment of annual pension increases, with the following countries:

  Austria

  Jamaica

  Belgium

  Jersey

  Bermuda

  Luxembourg

  Cyprus

  Malta

  Finland

  Mauritius

  France

  Netherlands

  Germany

  Philippines

  Gibraltar

  Portugal

  Guernsey

  Spain

  Iceland

  Sweden

  Ireland

  Switzerland

  Isle of Man

  Turkey

  Israel

  United States of America

  Italy

  Yugoslavia

  Pension increases are also paid to pensioners living in Sark by virtue of a provision of the Social Security (Persons Abroad) Regulations 1975.

  Darnley Estate, Glasgow
  Mr. Dunnachie
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will make a statement on the visit by the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Fylde (Mr. Jack), to Darnley housing estate in Glasgow on 1 March and on the conditions and problems he encountered there.

  Mr. Jack
  The Darnley housing estate was one of a number of locations visited within the catchment area of the Glasgow Southside social security office. These brief visits provided a useful insight into the social and economic conditions being faced by those receiving various forms of benefits from this well-run local office.

  Care Home Trusts
  Mr. Hinchliffe
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what guidance he has given to local adjudication officers dealing with claims for income support to enable them to determine whether or not a local authority has placed the claimants in a care home trust.

  Miss Widdecombe
  Eligibility for income support is defined by regulations and is available in respect of fees, up to certain limits, to residents of registered residential care homes and in certain other types of homes. Independent ajudication officers receive guidance on the interpretation of the regulations by the chief adjudication officer in the "Adjudication Officers Guide", a copy of which is available in the Library.

  Correspondence
  Mr. Winnick
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security when the hon. Member for Walsall, North will receive a reply to his letter of 12 February concerning Mr. Walker.

  Mr. Scott
  I have replied to the hon. Member today.

  Social Fund
  Dr. Twinn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will publish the 1991–92 discretionary social fund budget, giving details of the allocations that will be made to each of the district offices.

  Mr. Scott
  The 1991–92 gross budget for the discretionary part of the social fund will be £227·7 million, comprising £160 million for loans and £67·7 million for community care grants. In accordance with the Department's published commitment to move to a formal cash limit on the discretionary part of the fund, agreement has been reached with the Treasury that, with effect from the start of the financial year, it will be subject to a formal cash limit of £100 million net. I have placed a list of all district office allocations in the Library.

  Mr. Sumberg
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many payments were made from the social fund in 1988–89 and 1989–90 analysed by type of payment.

  Mr. Scott
  [pursuant to his reply, 5 March 1991, c. 124]: I regret that the answer given was incomplete. The full answer should have been:
  Payments were as follows:

  thousands

  1988–89

  1989–90

  Maternity payments

  170

  175

  Funeral payments

  40

  45

  Community care grants

  155

  230

  Budget loans

  505

  580

  Crisis loans

  380

  450

  Cold weather payments

  1

  45

  It should be noted that the figures for payments in 1988–89 given in the recent social security departmental report—Cm. 1514—were incorrect; the figures given above should be substituted. Arrangements have been made for a correction slip to be produced. This will be inserted in remaining HMSO stocks of the departmental report and sent to all known purchasers. Copies will also be sent to the Vote Office and Printed Paper Office.

HOME DEPARTMENT

  Broadcasting
  Mr. Simon Hughes
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department when the EC directive on transfrontier broadcasting will be incorporated into the United Kingdom law.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Article 25 of the directive requires member states to bring into force the laws, regulations and administrative provisions necessary to implement its provisions not later than 3 October 1991. We shall comply with this requirement. To the extent that new statutory powers are necessary for this purpose these were included in the Broadcasting Act 1990.

  Mr. Simon Hughes
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what consultations he has held with the Advertising Standards Authority regarding the EC directive on transfrontier broadcasting.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  The Home Office consulted a wide range of advertising interests about the relevant provisions
  69
  of the EC directive while it was under negotiation, but since television advertising is not within the remit of the Advertising Standards Authority it was not appropriate to include the authority in these consultations.

  Circuses
  Mr. Fearn
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he plans to introduce legislation concerning the treatment of animals in circuses.

  Mrs. Rumbold
  Circus animals are protected by the Protection of Animals Act 1911 as well as the Performing Animals (Regulation) Act 1925. These Acts together provide for, among other things, the registration of trainers, the inspection of premises by local authorities and the prosecution of anyone who causes any animal unnecessary suffering. This gives circus animals both general and specific protection and we have no plans for further legislation.

  Animals (Scientific Procedures)
  Mr. Ron Davies
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many members of his Department's inspectorate of scientific procedures on living animals on 31 December 1990 were based in(a) England, (b) Scotland and (c) Wales.

  Mrs. Rumbold
  These figures are routinely given in the "Statistics of Scientific Procedures on Living Animals Great Britain"—table 28 in 1989: Cm. 1152. On 31 December 1990, there were 19 members of the Home Office animals (scientific procedures) inspectorate in post. Sixteen inspectors were based in London and the regional offices in England; and three in the office in Scotland. There is no office in Wales.

  Mr. Ron Davies
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make it his policy to publish annually the number of designated places for scientific procedures on living animals in each of(a) England, (b) Scotland and (c) Wales.

  Mrs. Rumbold
  Statistics on the number of certificates of designation issued each year under section 6 of the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986, and of the number of such certificates in force in Great Britain, are published annually in the "Statistics of Scientific Procedures on Living Animals"—table 29 in 1989: Cm 1152—and in chapter 2 of the annual reports of the Animal Procedures Committee. There are no plans to disaggregate this information on a more localised basis.

  Mr. Gale
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) if his Department has evaluated or will evaluate the number of additional animals, by species, that will be used in medical research in order to meet the regulatory requirements for the licensing of new human medical products imposed by EC draft directive (III 9026/90/Rev 1) if implemented;

  (2) if his Department has evaluated or will evaluate the number of additional animals, by species, that will be used in medical research in order to meet the regulatory requirements for the licensing of new veterinary products imposed by EC draft directive (III 9026/90/Rev 1) if implemented.

  Mrs. Rumbold
  The task of the Home Office is to license and regulate scientific procedures on living animals under 70
  the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986. My right hon. Friend is not in a position to estimate in advance the number of project licences which may be sought, or the number of procedures authorised by those licences which may be carried out, for any particular purpose.

  Animal Cruelty
  Mr. Sillars
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what representations he has received from the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals about the case for new legislation to prevent those convicted of cruelty to animals being able lawfully to own domestic pets.

  Mrs. Rumbold
  We have recently received a letter giving notice that the society will be seeking a mandatory ban on keeping animals in future for those convicted of certain types of offences of cruelty to animals. I understand that such a ban might well go beyond disqualifying offenders from keeping domestic pets.

  Trevi Group
  Mr. Sheerman
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what was the cost of United Kingdom involvement in the Trevi Group in each of the last three years.

  Mr. Kenneth Baker
  The information could be obtained only at a disproportionate cost.

  Mr. Sheerman
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department when the Trevi Group will produce a policy paper for public discussion on the interpretation of police practices in the EC.

  Mr. Kenneth Baker
  There are no such proposals. The purpose of Trevi is to develop practical police co-operation among European Community member states. A range of measures currently under consideration in Trevi is outlined in the programme of action approved in Dublin on 15 June 1990, a copy of which is in the Library.

  Siobhan McKane
  Ms. Richardson
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will change the category of Siobhan McKane from A to B; and if he will make a statement.

  Mrs. Rumbold
  Siobhan McKane has been placed temporarily in category A in the light of the offence with which she is charged. This categorisation will be kept under review. No prisoner is held in category A for any longer than is considered necessary.

  Bedding Material
  Mr. Ashley
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many children under the age of five years have been involved in fires due to bedding material in each year since 1980; and what proportion of the children died as a result of the fires.

  Mr. John Patten
  The readily available information is shown in the table.
  71

  Children aged under 5 injured in accidental dwelling fires attended by local authority fire brigades, where the material first ignited was bedding1 1981–89 (United Kingdom)

  Year

  Number of casualties

  Percentage of casualties leading to death

  Fatal

  Non-fatal

  Total

  1981

  6

  45

  51

  12

  1982

  9

  55

  64

  14

  1983

  5

  67

  72

  7

  1984

  5

  90

  95

  5

  1985

  10

  77

  87

  11

  1986

  14

  86

  100

  14

  1987

  16

  86

  102

  16

  1988

  10

  73

  83

  12

  1989

  12

  97

  109

  11

  1 Bedding is defined as all bedding on the bed including mattress covers, but not beds or mattresses or cases where the electrical insulation of an electric blanket first ignited.

  Source: Home Office Fire Statistics.

  Foreign Prisoners
  Mr. David Porter
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many and what percentage of the whole prison population convicted of drugs and related offences at 1 February were foreign nationals; and if he will make a statement.

  Mrs. Rumbold
  The latest information which is readily available centrally relates to sentenced prisoners, excluding fine defaulters, on 30 June 1990 convicted of drugs offences. Of 3,160 such prisoners about 1,260–40 per cent.—were recorded as foreign nationals; nationality was not recorded for some 80–3 per cent.

  We are planning to publicise abroad the long prison sentences which drug smugglers can expect on conviction in this country in the hope that this may dissuade some foreign nationals from bringing drugs into the United Kingdom.

  Mr. David Porter
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, from the convicted prison population on 1 February, what were the total numbers and percentages of the whole of(a) non-British EC nationals and (b) non-EC nationals.

  Mrs. Rumbold
  The latest information which is readily available centrally relates to sentenced prisoners, excluding fine defaulters on 30 June 1990. Of 34,880 such prisoners about 630–1·8 per cent.—were recorded as non-British EC nationals and about 2,540–7·3 per cent.—were recorded as non-EC nationals; nationality was not recorded for some 2,600–7·4 per cent. Around 420 of the EC nationals were recorded as nationals of the Republic of

  Numbers of passengers refused leave to enter at Heathrow by nationality and month, 1990

  Geographical region/Nationality

  Jan

  Feb

  Mar

  Apr

  May

  Jun

  Jul

  Aug

  Sep

  Oct

  Nov

  Dec

  Total

  European Community

  Belgium

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Denmark

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  3—

  France

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  3—

  Germany1

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  3—

  Greece

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  3—

  Italy

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  3—

  Luxembourg

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  72
  Ireland, but the information is not completely reliable because it depends upon information provided by the prisoner.

  Mr. David Porter
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) if he will make it his policy to return to country of origin all convicted foreign nationals in prisons unless there are compelling reasons to hold them in the United Kingdom; and if he will make a statement;

  (2) if he will bring forward a scheme for automatic repatriation of convicted drugs offenders who are non-British nationals with a lifetime ban on return to the United Kingdom.

  Mr. John Patten
  Arrangements already exist under the Council of Europe convention on the transfer of sentenced persons, to which most European countries, the United States of America and Canada are party, for the repatriation of prisoners to complete custodial sentences in their own countries. We expect to be in a position before long to join the Commonwealth scheme which will provide for prisoners to be transferred between the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth countries which may join the scheme. However, repatriations under these and any other international arrangements to which we may subscribe under the Repatriation of Prisoners Act 1984 require the consent of the prisoner and of both governments concerned.

  The Immigration Act 1971 provides powers to deport those subject to immigration control who are convicted of criminal offences in this country. In particular, the courts may recommend deportation in addition to imposing a term of imprisonment. A deportation order, once made, bars re-entry to the United Kingdom for as long as it remains in force.

  The Gulf
  Mr. Ron Brown
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what representations he has received from the International Communist party about the arrest of any of its members during an anti-Gulf war demonstration in London on 27 January; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  None. There were no arrests.

  Immigration
  Mr. Darling
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many persons, by nationality, were refused entry to the United Kingdom at(a) Heathrow, (b) Gatwick and (c) Dover in each month in 1990.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  [holding answer 12 March 1991]: The available information is given in the tables. Not all the passengers have been removed from the United Kingdom.
  73

  Geographical region/Nationality

  Jan

  Feb

  Mar

  Apr

  May

  Jun

  Jul

  Aug

  Sep

  Oct

  Nov

  Dec

  Total

  Netherlands

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  3—

  Portugal

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  5

  2—

  2—

  14

  Spain

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Western Europe (excluding EC)

  Austria

  2—

  2—

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  32

  Cyprus

  8

  13

  7

  2—

  5

  10

  7

  6

  13

  15

  8

  2—

  99

  Finland

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  22

  Malta

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  3—

  Norway

  6

  —

  2—

  2—

  6

  2—

  2—

  2—

  7

  5

  2—

  —

  36

  Sweden

  8

  7

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  7

  8

  2—

  —

  57

  Switzerland

  2—

  7

  2—

  2—

  —

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  7

  —

  35

  Turkey

  50

  40

  33

  22

  15

  25

  24

  17

  19

  15

  15

  20

  295

  Yugoslavia

  41

  28

  38

  39

  22

  26

  43

  37

  31

  40

  24

  34

  403

  Eastern Europe

  Bulgaria

  —

  13

  2—

  2—

  —

  9

  2—

  5

  2—

  5

  —

  2—

  41

  Czechoslovakia

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  7

  —

  22

  G.D.R.

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Hungary

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  9

  10

  10

  42

  Poland

  2—

  10

  7

  6

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  47

  Romania

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  13

  USSR

  7

  2—

  2—

  2—

  13

  —

  19

  8

  10

  8

  10

  10

  91

  Americas

  Argentina

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  29

  Barbados

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  20

  Brazil

  26

  40

  55

  34

  33

  40

  23

  38

  31

  42

  33

  38

  433

  Canada

  8

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  6

  7

  5

  10

  7

  9

  6

  70

  Chile

  —

  —

  5

  2—

  —

  5

  7

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  30

  Colombia

  10

  9

  22

  31

  25

  17

  24

  16

  11

  19

  21

  23

  228

  Cuba

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Guyana

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  6

  2—

  2—

  —

  6

  11

  6

  5

  46

  Jamaica

  32

  27

  33

  28

  31

  29

  30

  26

  35

  41

  10

  7

  329

  Mexico

  2—

  —

  5

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  5

  2—

  26

  Peru

  12

  5

  2—

  5

  6

  5

  2—

  2—

  6

  5

  6

  2—

  61

  Trinidad & Tobago

  7

  9

  7

  6

  8

  2—

  9

  2—

  14

  11

  5

  8

  92

  USA

  57

  41

  43

  51

  35

  32

  38

  31

  39

  43

  34

  30

  474

  Uruguay

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Venezuela

  2—

  2—

  2—

  6

  2—

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  9

  38

  Africa

  Algeria

  148

  139

  153

  9

  15

  5

  17

  11

  8

  7

  7

  6

  525

  Egypt

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  27

  Ethiopia

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  8

  5

  5

  5

  8

  38

  Ghana

  29

  23

  17

  16

  19

  25

  21

  24

  32

  21

  15

  34

  276

  Kenya

  13

  11

  16

  16

  13

  14

  16

  9

  16

  20

  17

  13

  174

  Libya

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  6

  2—

  2—

  2—

  6

  2—

  —

  2—

  26

  Mauritius

  16

  11

  13

  13

  9

  12

  12

  14

  9

  14

  15

  9

  147

  Morocco

  27

  30

  59

  15

  12

  12

  18

  15

  14

  13

  6

  12

  233

  Nigeria

  46

  37

  35

  29

  24

  33

  46

  33

  42

  59

  64

  80

  528

  Sierra Leone

  6

  8

  2—

  5

  6

  2—

  2—

  12

  6

  2—

  5

  12

  74

  Somalia

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  5

  5

  2—

  2—

  6

  —

  33

  South Africa

  18

  22

  26

  22

  18

  17

  16

  22

  21

  12

  15

  11

  220

  Sudan

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  3—

  Tanzania

  10

  2—

  8

  6

  5

  2—

  7

  2—

  9

  2—

  8

  6

  72

  Tunisia

  8

  15

  16

  7

  9

  11

  5

  5

  2—

  5

  8

  8

  99

  Uganda

  2—

  7

  19

  18

  18

  21

  12

  17

  21

  18

  14

  23

  190

  Zambia

  9

  7

  8

  9

  9

  6

  5

  2—

  2—

  10

  6

  7

  83

  Zimbabwe

  7

  9

  5

  8

  10

  15

  12

  14

  6

  8

  9

  17

  120

  Asia

  Indian sub-continent

  Bangladesh

  25

  24

  11

  27

  26

  25

  16

  28

  29

  26

  19

  54

  310

  India

  35

  18

  49

  19

  40

  38

  32

  31

  32

  26

  20

  27

  367

  Pakistan

  19

  17

  26

  13

  20

  24

  47

  20

  34

  30

  14

  22

  286

  Middle East

  Iran

  25

  13

  18

  6

  24

  39

  48

  26

  38

  30

  16

  38

  321

  Iraq

  2—

  —

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  9

  22

  2—

  2—

  2—

  53

  Israel

  6

  2—

  8

  6

  9

  5

  2—

  10

  9

  2—

  2—

  2—

  72

  Jordan

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  20

  Kuwait

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Lebanon

  —

  6

  8

  8

  6

  5

  2—

  2—

  8

  11

  11

  7

  78

  Saudi Arabia

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  14

  Syria

  13

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  42

  74 75

  Geographical region/Nationality

  Jan

  Feb

  Mar

  Apr

  May

  Jun

  Jul

  Aug

  Sep

  Oct

  Nov

  Dec

  Total

  Remainder of Asia

  China

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  10

  —

  10

  —

  2—

  7

  5

  41

  Indonesia

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  13

  21

  Japan

  12

  6

  12

  8

  6

  12

  2—

  5

  6

  7

  2—

  2—

  86

  Malaysia

  10

  29

  17

  42

  34

  33

  20

  30

  35

  24

  28

  51

  353

  Philippines

  2—

  12

  8

  2—

  10

  6

  7

  9

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  70

  Singapore

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  6

  2—

  6

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  36

  Sri Lanka

  9

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  8

  2—

  5

  5

  12

  58

  Thailand

  2—

  5

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  10

  2—

  —

  —

  28

  Hong Kong BDTC

  2—

  6

  8

  10

  9

  11

  8

  13

  10

  6

  9

  6

  99

  Australasia

  Australia

  10

  2—

  16

  5

  11

  10

  5

  12

  8

  2—

  9

  2—

  97

  New Zealand

  5

  6

  7

  2—

  14

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  7

  6

  2—

  61

  British Overseas Citizens

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  6

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  28

  Other countries not specified elsewhere

  40

  34

  55

  36

  29

  52

  65

  55

  62

  56

  43

  48

  575

  Stateless

  17

  17

  23

  22

  23

  31

  32

  24

  15

  21

  28

  35

  288

  All nationalities

  886

  815

  953

  658

  691

  759

  810

  740

  818

  794

  678

  832

  9,434

  1 Unified Germany from 3 October 1990.

  2—Between 1 and 4.

  3—Between 1 and 9.

  Numbers of passengers refused leave to enter at Gatwick by nationality and month, 1990

  Geographical region/Nationality

  Jan

  Feb

  Mar

  Apr

  May

  Jun

  Jul

  Aug

  Sep

  Oct

  Nov

  Dec

  Total

  European Community

  Belgium

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  3—

  Denmark

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  France

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Germany1

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  3—

  Greece

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Italy

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Luxembourg

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Netherlands

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Portugal

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  3—

  Spain

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  3—

  Western Europe (excluding EC)

  Austria

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  24

  Cyprus

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Finland

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Malta

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Norway

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  12

  Sweden

  6

  2—

  2—

  —

  7

  2—

  5

  2—

  —

  6

  5

  2—

  37

  Switzerland

  2—

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  5

  —

  2—

  22

  Turkey

  10

  2—

  2—

  9

  5

  5

  7

  10

  11

  14

  27

  11

  116

  Yugoslavia

  7

  9

  18

  14

  22

  20

  14

  10

  12

  21

  23

  13

  183

  Eastern Europe

  Bulgaria

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Czechoslovakia

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  3—

  G.D.R.

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Hungary

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  3—

  Poland

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  3—

  Romania

  —

  —

  —

  —.

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  3—

  USSR

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  3—

  Americas

  Argentina

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  13

  Barbados

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  12

  Brazil

  6

  2—

  8

  5

  13

  5

  2—

  9

  8

  10

  9

  2—

  85

  Canada

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  25

  Chile

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  14

  Colombia

  9

  2—

  8

  11

  21

  9

  14

  2—

  2—

  11

  13

  13

  117

  Cuba

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  3—

  Cuyana

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  10

  Jamaica

  16

  21

  19

  12

  21

  16

  15

  6

  19

  23

  50

  41

  259

  Mexico

  6

  2—

  6

  —

  2—

  9

  6

  5

  8

  7

  2—

  6

  64

  Peru

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  22

  Trinidad & Tobago

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  15

  76 77

  Geographical region/Nationality

  Jan

  Feb

  Mar

  Apr

  May

  Jun

  Jul

  Aug

  Sep

  Oct

  Nov

  Dec

  Total

  USA

  50

  33

  47

  40

  49

  40

  47

  31

  50

  65

  38

  32

  522

  Uruguay

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  3—

  Venezuela

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  3—

  Africa

  Algeria

  7

  2—

  12

  6

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  39

  Egypt

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  3—

  Ethiopia

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  3—

  Ghana

  20

  2—

  11

  18

  16

  13

  7

  14

  10

  7

  8

  15

  141

  Kenya

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  6

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  16

  Libya

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  3—

  Mauritius

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  17

  Morocco

  32

  15

  63

  13

  2—

  2—

  9

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  11

  164

  Nigeria

  18

  13

  20

  21

  30

  14

  21

  30

  36

  46

  39

  46

  334

  Sierra Leone

  13

  6

  2—

  9

  11

  10

  18

  19

  15

  35

  13

  24

  177

  Somalia

  19

  7

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  36

  South Africa

  8

  5

  18

  7

  9

  8

  13

  12

  7

  10

  8

  5

  110

  Sudan

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Tanzania

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  10

  Tunisia

  7

  5

  10

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  33

  Uganda

  22

  26

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  62

  Zambia

  10

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  31

  Zimbabwe

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  9

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  7

  2—

  2—

  34

  Asia

  Indian sub-continent

  Bangladesh

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  3—

  India

  2—

  5

  2—

  17

  5

  2—

  2—

  12

  8

  7

  2—

  9

  76

  Pakistan

  5

  15

  2—

  2—

  5

  7

  9

  17

  19

  17

  16

  16

  131

  Middle East

  Iran

  5

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  7

  2—

  7

  9

  7

  2—

  12

  59

  Iraq

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  5

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  11

  Israel

  9

  2—

  5

  6

  8

  5

  7

  12

  5

  10

  6

  7

  84

  Jordan

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Kuwait

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Lebanon

  2—

  12

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  25

  Saudi Arabia

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Syria

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  3—

  Remainder of Asia

  China

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  10

  2—

  20

  Indonesia

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  3—

  Japan

  13

  2—

  2—

  5

  7

  7

  2—

  11

  7

  2—

  2—

  6

  72

  Malaysia

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  9

  6

  7

  13

  2—

  2—

  52

  Philippines

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  19

  2—

  10

  7

  9

  2—

  2—

  11

  68

  Singapore

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  3—

  Sri Lanka

  2—

  9

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  8

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  41

  Thailand

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  3—.

  Hong Kong BDTC

  5

  6

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  5

  2—

  5

  2—

  8

  43

  Australasia

  Australia

  6

  5

  2—

  5

  2—

  5

  2—

  8

  7

  12

  5

  6

  69

  New Zealand

  2—

  2—

  10

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  2—

  2—

  40

  British Overseas Citizens

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  5

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  18

  Other countries not specified elsewhere

  32

  9

  26

  25

  29

  43

  28

  21

  25

  35

  33

  34

  340

  Stateless

  6

  7

  13

  16

  16

  13

  13

  12

  27

  21

  17

  32

  193

  All nationalities

  395

  271

  353

  280

  367

  290

  324

  327

  361

  450

  390

  408

  4,216

  1 Unified Germany from 3 October 1990.

  2—Between 1 and 4.

  3—Between 1 and 9.

  Numbers of passengers refused leave to enter al Dover by nationality and month, 1990

  Geographical region/Nationality

  Jan

  Feb

  Mar

  Apr

  May

  Jun

  Jul

  Aug

  Sep

  Oct

  Nov

  Dec

  Total

  European Community

  Belgium

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  3—

  Denmark

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  France

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  13

  Germany1

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  3—

  78 79

  Geographical region/Nationality

  Jan

  Feb

  Mar

  Apr

  May

  Jun

  Jul

  Aug

  Sep

  Oct

  Nov

  Dec

  Total

  Greece

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Italy

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Luxembourg

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Netherlands

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  19

  Portugal

  5

  5

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  5

  —

  —

  2—

  21

  Spain

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  3—

  Western Europe (excluding EC)

  Austria

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  2—

  2—

  6

  2—

  2—

  2—

  31

  Cyprus

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  14

  Finland

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  3—

  Malta

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Norway

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  3—

  Sweden

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  26

  Switzerland

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  22

  Turkey

  2—

  2—

  2—

  6

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  7

  7

  11

  52

  Yugoslavia

  15

  19

  18

  19

  30

  13

  34

  22

  22

  14

  12

  8

  226

  Eastern Europe

  Bulgaria

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  6

  15

  Czechoslovakia

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  6

  34

  14

  7

  75

  G.D.R.

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  34

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  43

  Hungary

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  19

  10

  6

  47

  Poland

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  23

  Romania

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  3—

  USSR

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  5

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  16

  Americas

  Argentina

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  7

  2—

  2—

  24

  Barbados

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Brazil

  9

  16

  7

  16

  24

  22

  19

  10

  19

  35

  23

  21

  221

  Canada

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  2—

  27

  Chile

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  5

  2—

  5

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  18

  Colombia

  17

  19

  16

  31

  23

  53

  19

  34

  10

  28

  10

  7

  267

  Cuba

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Guyana

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  3—

  Jamaica

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  10

  Mexico

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  5

  6

  8

  2—

  2—

  38

  Peru

  2—

  2—

  5

  2—

  5

  2—

  2—

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  36

  Trinidad & Tobago

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  USA

  13

  2—

  9

  14

  19

  21

  16

  24

  27

  28

  22

  12

  207

  Uruguay

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  3—

  Venezuela

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  3—

  Africa

  Algeria

  74

  56

  46

  2—

  11

  13

  2—

  2—

  2—

  10

  9

  8

  222

  Egypt

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Ethiopia

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Ghana

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  6

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  24

  Kenya

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  3—

  Libya

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Mauritius

  6

  2—

  2—

  5

  2—

  7

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  9

  51

  Morocco

  28

  19

  17

  7

  6

  2—

  9

  10

  10

  2—

  2—

  2—

  118

  Nigeria

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  35

  Sierra Leone

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  17

  Somalia

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  South Africa

  6

  11

  15

  15

  9

  11

  18

  15

  14

  18

  16

  12

  160

  Sudan

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  3—

  Tanzania

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Tunisia

  2—

  2—

  6

  2—

  —

  2—

  8

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  34

  Uganda

  —

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  17

  Zambia

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  3—

  Zimbabwe

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Indian sub-continent

  Bangladesh

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  India

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  6

  17

  Pakistan

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  5

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  13

  Middle East

  Iran

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Iraq

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Israel

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  2—

  6

  10

  2—

  7

  9

  2—

  54

  Jordan

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  3—

  Kuwait

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Lebanon

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  3—

  80 81

  Geographical region/Nationality

  Jan

  Feb

  Mar

  Apr

  May

  Jun

  Jul

  Aug

  Sep

  Oct

  Nov

  Dec

  Total

  Saudi Arabia

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Syria

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Remainder of Asia

  China

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  5

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  3—

  Indonesia

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Japan

  2—

  2—

  2—

  5

  2—

  5

  6

  9

  7

  7

  —

  2—

  51

  Malaysia

  2—

  8

  6

  16

  43

  34

  20

  11

  40

  24

  5

  18

  226

  Philippines

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  Singapore

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  10

  Sri Lanka

  2—.

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  2—

  3—

  Thailand

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  —

  —

  —

  3—

  Hong Kong BDTC

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  2—

  21

  2—

  8

  10

  11

  2—

  2—

  72

  Australasia

  Australia

  —

  —

  —

  2—

  6

  7

  5

  2—

  8

  8

  5

  2—

  50

  New Zealand

  2—

  —

  —

  2—

  2—

  2

  5

  2—

  2—

  2—

  —

  2—

  20

  British Overseas Citizens

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  5

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  5

  Other countries not specified elsewhere

  9

  17

  18

  21

  51

  25

  12

  18

  24

  12

  12

  17

  236

  Stateless

  28

  42

  5

  51

  57

  46

  53

  47

  49

  55

  63

  73

  569

  All nationalities

  253

  263

  214

  275

  378

  340

  311

  322

  321

  389

  278

  286

  3,630

  1 Unified Germany from 3 October 1990.

  2—Between 1 and 4.

  3—Between 1 and 9.

HEALTH

  Food Safety
  Mr. Flynn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will place in the Library details of written representations received on(a) food safety and food hygiene, and (b) hygiene training in relation to the Food Safety Act 1990.

  Mr. Dorrell
  All regulations and codes of practice made under the Food Safety Act 1990 have been published in draft form for consultation with interested parties. We have received large numbers of responses to these consultation exercises. It is not normally our practice to make public details of the responses received. A list of organisations which responded to last year's consultation exercise on hygiene training for food handlers has been placed in the Library.

  West Suffolk District Health Authority
  Sir Eldon Griffiths
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what funds have been made available to West Suffolk district health authority in each of the past five financial years; what approximate percentage of these new resources has been used for hospital services; what are the numbers of medical and other NHS staff employed in hospitals in the area in each of the last five years; and how many patients have been treated.

  Mr. Dorrell
  Information about funds made available to individual district health authorities is held centrally only in terms of expenditure. Details of total expenditure on hospital and community health services—HCHS—in West Suffolk district health authority and of the percentage used for hospital services are as follows:82

  Total revenue and capital expenditure

  Revenue expenditure

  Capital expenditure £000 cash

  Total

  Hospital services as a percentage of total

  £ cash

  £ cash

  1985–86

  33,173

  82·97

  3,469

  1986–87

  36,121

  82·91

  3,008

  1987–88

  40,215

  79·44

  1,796

  1988–89

  44,974

  79·29

  2,503

  1989–90

  49,164

  79·14

  2,619

  Staff Numbers

  The numbers of medical and other NHS staff employed in hospitals in the West Suffolk area are given in the table. Figures given are for whole-time equivalents, as at 30 September each year. Numbers of staff at senior doctor level, for example, consultants, employed in hospitals in the West Suffolk area are not held centrally since the contracts for these staff are held by the East Anglian regional health authority. My hon. Friend may wish to contact Sir Colin Walker for district-level information.

  West Suffolk DHA—Hospital Junior Medical Staff

  Year

  Number

  1985

  74·8

  1986

  77·4

  1987

  70·3

  1988

  76·5

  1989

  73·0

  Figures exclude all locum staff.

  East Anglian RHA—Hospital Senior Medical Staff

  Year

  Number

  1985

  517·6

  1986

  561·7

  1987

  518·4

  1988

  586·7

  1989

  612·0

  83
  Figures exclude all locum staff.

  West Suffolk DHA—NHS Hospital based Non-Medical Staff

  Year

  Number

  1985

  2,580

  1986

  2,580

  1987

  2,640

  1988

  2,640

  1989

  2,700

  Figures include nursing and midwifery agency staff.

  Number of patients treated

  The information requested is as follows:

  Finished hospital stays: West Suffolk health authority

  Year

  Discharges and deaths

  1985

  25,426

  1986

  25,503

  1987–88

  26,401

  1988–89

  27,046

  Year

  Finished consultant episodes

  1988–89

  31,904

  1989–90

  33,942

  Pharmaceutical Companies (Sponsorship)
  Mr. Grylls
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what is his policy towards initiatives by a family health services authority in seeking financial sponsorship from pharmaceutical companies for updates of its local formulary for general practitioners at the same time as it is asking the companies for information about their products for possible inclusion in the formulary; and if he will make a statement.

  Mrs. Virginia Bottomley
  We would not expect family health services authorities (FHSAs) to seek sponsorship

  Perinatal mortality, 2Northern Region, 1989

  Total births

  Perinatal deaths

  Perinatal rate

  Tyne and Wear

  14,569

  146

  10·0

  Gateshead

  2,600

  34

  13·1

  Newcastle upon Tyne

  3,504

  29

  8·3

  North Tyneside

  2,377

  22

  9·3

  South Tyneside

  2,043

  19

  19·3

  Sunderland

  4,045

  42

  10·4

  Cleveland

  8,015

  73

  9·1

  Hartlepool

  1,297

  10

  17·7

  Langbaurgh on Tees

  1,950

  21

  10·8

  Middlesbrough

  2,245

  21

  9·4

  Stockton on Tees

  2,523

  21

  8·3

  Cumbria

  5,819

  46

  7·9

  Allerdale

  1,083

  16

  114·8

  Barrow in Furness

  1,003

  7

  17·0

  Carlisle

  1,291

  7

  15·4

  Copeland

  1,001

  5

  15·0

  Eden

  494

  3

  16·1

  South Lakeland

  947

  8

  18·4

  Durham

  7,397

  64

  8·7

  84
  from pharmaceutical companies for locally produced formularies. We are aware that there was a suggestion of this in the area of the hon. Member's constituency, but the relevant FHSA has since made clear that it is not seeking financial support.

  Electoral Statistics
  Mr. Colvin
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will publish in the Official Report the number of electors in each parish, town and city council ward in the county of Hampshire.

  Mr. Dorrell
  Returns containing numbers on the 1991 electoral registers in Hampshire are still being processed by the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys. An analysis of local government electors by county and district will be published in "OPCS Monitor EL 91/1" at the end of April. An analysis of parliamentary electors by constituency will be placed in the Library by 10 May and published in "Electoral Statistics 1991"—Series EL No. 18—by the end of July. This year, to facilitate the work of the parliamentary boundary commissions, an analysis of parliamentary electors is being prepared by ward. These figures will be placed in the Library as soon as practicable after 10 May.

  Perinatal Mortality
  Mr. Campbell-Savours
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what is the rate per thousand of perinatal deaths for each district within the county of Cumbria;

  (2) what is the average rate per thousand for perinatal deaths for those districts which comprise the Northern region.

  Mr. Dorrell
  The overall perinatal death rate for the northern region is 9·2. The table gives the number of births, perinatal deaths and the perinatal death rate for each component district. It also includes the arithmetic average of these rates, unadjusted for the number of births.
  85

  Total births

  Perinatal deaths

  Perinatal rate

  Chester le Street

  622

  5

  18·0

  Darlington

  1,352

  12

  18·9

  Derwentside

  1,008

  12

  111·9

  Durham

  882

  10

  111·3

  Easington

  1,322

  9

  16·8

  Sedgefield

  1,127

  6

  15·3

  Teesdale

  269

  2

  17·4

  Wear Valley

  815

  8

  19·8

  Northumberland

  3,497

  33

  9·4

  Alnwick

  321

  3

  19·3

  Berwick upon Tweed

  284

  0

  10

  Blyth Valley

  1,005

  10

  110·0

  Castle Morpeth

  481

  4

  18·3

  Tyneside

  655

  6

  19·2

  Wansbeck

  751

  10

  113·3

  1 Denotes a rate of less than 20 events.

  2 Number of deaths 0–6 days plus stillbirths per 1,000 total births.

  The arithmetic average of these rates is 8·7.

  Mr. Campbell-Savours
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what information his Department has collected on the factors which account for the disparity in statistics covering the rate per thousand perinatal deaths for Allerdale district and other districts in the Northern region.

  Mr. Dorrell
  This is a matter for the regional health authority in the first instance. The hon. Member may wish to contact the chairman of the Northern regional health authority, Mr. Peter Carr. Clinicians in the northern region have operated a very successful perinatal mortality survey on a voluntary basis for the last 10 years, and an annual report of their findings is published each year by the authority. In addition, the RHA is to undertake a more detailed analysis to look for any local clustering of deaths using data now available for the period 1981–90.

  In the meantime the hon. Member will be pleased to note that although the perinatal figures for Allerdale were disappointing in 1989, they were based on a relatively small sample and the figures for West Cumbria as a whole for the three years 1987–89 show a perinatal mortality rate of 7·7 per thousand population compared with a national average of 8·7 per thousand and a Northern regional average of 8·9 per thousand.

  AIDS
  Mr. Fearn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what funds the Government will be making available in the coming financial year for research into AIDS.

  Mrs. Virginia Bottomley
  Subject to parliamentary approval the following sums will be available for AIDS research in 1991–92:

  £

  Medical Research Council

  12,800,000

  Other research councils (Economic and Social Research Council; Agricultural and Fisheries Research Council; Scientific and Engineering Research Council; Natural Environment Research Council)

  2,549,000

  Department of Health

  632,000

  Health Education Council

  804,000

  National Institute of Biological Standards and Control

  517,000

  Public Health Laboratory Service

  404,000

  86

  £

  Scottish Office of Home and Health

  88,000

  Overseas Development Administration (estimated expenditure)

  528,000

  Cot Deaths
  Mr. Ashley
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what has been the incidence of sudden infant death syndrome in each year since 1982.

  Mrs. Virginia Bottomley
  The information is shown in the table.

  Number of infant deaths with any mention of sudden infant death1 on the death certificate, and rate per 1.000 livebirths England and Wales 1982–89

  Number

  Rate per 1,000 livebirths

  Males

  Females

  Persons

  Males

  Females

  Persons

  1982

  822

  510

  1,332

  2·6

  1·7

  2·1

  1983

  827

  488

  1,315

  2·6

  1·6

  2·1

  1984

  716

  526

  1,242

  2·2

  1·7

  2·0

  1985

  787

  514

  1,301

  2·3

  1·6

  2·0

  1986

  945

  559

  1,504

  2·8

  1·7

  2·3

  1987

  918

  610

  1,528

  2·6

  1·8

  2·2

  1988

  991

  602

  1,593

  2·8

  1·8

  2·3

  1989

  811

  515

  1,326

  2·3

  1·5

  1·9

  1 Includes "cot death" or similar term

  Mr. Ashley
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health when he expects(a) to receive and (b) to publish the report of the group of independent experts asked in March 1990 to investigate the claim that the emission of toxic gases from fungal growth on cot mattresses can be a cause of cot death; what form the inquiry took; and if he will make a statement.

  Mrs. Virginia Bottomley
  The report of the working group of independent experts set up by the chief medical officer has been given to him and will be published shortly. The form of inquiry is explained in the report.

  Mr. Ashley
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if any blood tests done on babies which suffered sudden infant death syndrome show an elevated level of arsenic, antimony or phosphorous.

  Mrs. Virginia Bottomley
  There are no reports of elevated blood levels of any of these chemicals from
  87
  pathologists who have carried out post-mortem examinations on infants who suffered from sudden infant death syndrome—SIDS. Such tests would be done only if specifically indicated.

  We are aware that an independent researcher has reported that blood tests in three infants who suffered SIDS had antimony levels above the background levels measured by his laboratory in 100 healthy infants. As the normal range of blood antimony levels in infants is uncertain, it is not possible to say whether these findings are clinically significant.

  This matter is considered in the report of the expert working group which will be published shortly.

  Prescriptions (Fraud)
  Mr. David Porter
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) if he will make a statement on the steps his Department takes to prevent fraud when patients do not take all items on a multi-itemed general practitioner-written prescription;

  (2) what information he has on the incidence of prescription-based fraud in the past five years; and if he will make a statement.

  Mrs. Virginia Bottomley
  Checking procedures undertaken by the Department to prevent prescription fraud are not made public. Cases of suspected prescription-based fraud are referred by the Prescription Pricing Authority to the Family Health Services Authority for investigation. No centrally held information is available on the number of established cases of fraud.

  Achondroplasia
  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what guidelines he has issued to district health authorities concerning charging for fixators for achondroplasiac children from outside their area.

  Mr. Dorrell
  No specific guidelines have been issued on this matter. From 1 April, health authorities wishing to purchase limb lengthening for achondroplasiac children will be able to arrange contracts for this operation with hospitals or other units providing this service. General guidance on the purchase of services from 1 April to meet the health needs of local populations has been issued to health authorities.

  Senior Citizens
  Mr. Sillars
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what definition of senior citizen the Government use in respect of guidance issued to local authorities and other bodies.

  Miss Widdecombe
  I have been asked to reply.

  The Government do not issue guidance of this kind. Local authorities are best placed to decide such a definition for themselves, according to local circumstances and the purpose for which it is required.

OVERSEAS DEVELOPMENT

  Sudan
  Mr. Alton
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what representations are being made to the Sudanese Government to facilitate the 88
  transport of further food aid to rebel-held areas; and what account has been taken of problems arising at the advent of the rainy season in southern Sudan.

  Mrs. Chalker
  We take every opportunity to urge the Government of Sudan to facilitate the provision of relief supplies to the south of the country. The European Community issued a declaration on 7 February. The United Nations Assistant Secretary General, Mr. James Jonah, made representations on 18 February.

  The United Nations co-ordinated Operation Lifeline Sudan takes into account the difficulties of transporting relief supplies in southern Sudan where it is recognised that conditions deteriorate in the rainy season.

  Malaysia
  Mrs. Clwyd
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how much aid has been offered under the aid and trade provision for the Pergau project in Malaysia; and whether any appraisal measures additional to the regular appraisal procedure were carried out for this project.

  Mrs. Chalker
  We have offered to support from the aid and trade provision a soft loan of up to £308 million for eligible United Kingdom and other EC goods and services for this project. This compares with our original aid and trade provision offer in 1989 of a grant of up to £68·25 million as part of a mixed credit for eligible United Kingdom and other EC goods and services costing an estimated £195 million. The soft loan, like the originally proposed mixed credit, will have a grant element of 35 per cent. of the value of eligible goods and services provided. In accordance with our normal procedures a full appraisal of the project was undertaken.

TRADE AND INDUSTRY

  Minors (Financial Institutions)
  Mr. Sillars
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what proposals he has to make unlawful the soliciting of minors for business by financial institutions and companies.

  Mr. Leigh
  The Government intend, as soon as legislative time is available, to amend the Consumer Credit Act 1974 to tighten up the prohibition on the sending of credit circulars to minors. It also proposes to make regulations requiring persons licensed under the Act to take reasonable precautions to ensure that minors are not included on mailing lists for credit circulars.

  Retention of Title
  Mr. David Nicholson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what representations he has received regarding the adequacy of the law on retention of title in the light of successor companies inheriting goods from an insolvent company which the latter has not paid for; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Redwood
  I have received a few representations about the adequacy of the law on retention of title, but only one referring to the circumstances described in the question. In general, the Government are satisfied that the law on retention of title clauses is effective.

  Chambers of Commerce
  Mr. Barry Field
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what support his Department plans to provide to assist the development strategy of the Association of British Chambers of Commerce.

  Mr. Leigh
  I announced on 4 October 1990 that I would offer chambers of commerce support towards the implementation of their strategy, as set out in "Effective Business Support: a UK Strategy", to strengthen the ability of the chambers' movement to provide a consistent, quality assured and comprehensive service for members throughout the United Kingdom by the end of 1994. This support, at a cost of £1·2 million over four years, will involve meeting up to 50 per cent. of the salary costs of an extra member of staff in some 30 chambers for a maximum of two years. Additionally I have offered the Association of British Chambers of Commerce up to £130,000 to help with the costs of establishing an electronic information network.

  Parliamentary approval for this service will be sought in the 1991–92 main estimates for the Department of Trade and Industry--class IV, vote 2. Pending that approval, urgent expenditure estimated at £31,000 will be met by repayable advances from the Contingencies Fund.

  Task Force Expenditure
  Ms. Harman
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if he will list the expenditure of each task force set up by his Department for the year 1989–90.

  Mr. Leigh
  On the basis that this question relates to inner city task forces, I refer the hon. Member to the answer given by my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment to the hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Banks) on 23 January 1991 at columns 195–96. I have nothing to add.

DEFENCE

  The Gulf
  Ms. Short
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will provide his best available estimate of the number of casualties suffered by(a) Iraqi civilians, (b) Iraqi forces, (c) Kuwaiti civilians and (d) coalition forces.

  Mr. Archie Hamilton
  Her Majesty's Government are not in a position to provide an overall estimate of the number of people killed during the Gulf conflict. A total of 25 British service men were killed in action.

  Mr. O'Neill
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what was the approximate distance and direction travelled by the 1st Armoured Division after 23 February.

  Mr. Archie Hamilton
  From its assembly area south of the Iraq-Saudi Arabian border, the ground campaign to liberate Kuwait took 1st (British) Armoured Division northwards on a course roughly parallel to but west of the Wadi al Batin, then east to a position just north of Kuwait city. In all, the division covered a distance of some 350 km.

  Mr. O'Neill
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement on the operations of the 1st Armoured Division undertaken to re-take Kuwait.
  90
  Mr. Archie Hamilton
  The 1st (British) Armoured Division played a significant role in the allied operation to liberate Kuwait. The division proper went into battle late in the afternoon of Monday 25 February when it engaged elements of an Iraqi armoured division. The speed and success of this operation was typical of land engagements in Desert Storm. By the early hours of 27 February, the Iraqi troops had been rendered ineffective and around 200 tanks, 100 armoured personnel carriers and 100 guns had been captured or destroyed and some 6,000 prisoners of war had been taken. The skill, courage and speed with which the division achieved its objectives are an achievement of which all involved can feel justly proud.

  "Options for Change"
  Mr. Latham
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence whether he will make a statement on the future of the departmental review known as "Options for Change", following the Gulf war.

  Mr. Barry Field
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what plans he has to revise "Options for Change" in the light of the Gulf war and the suppression of the Baltic states.

  Mr. McAllion
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will review defence strategy in the light of the experience from the Gulf war.

  Mr. Tom King
  I hope it will be possible to publish the annual defence White Paper before the summer recess and in this to make clear the way ahead on 'Options for Change'.

  Main Battle Tank
  Mr. Batiste
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence when he will announce a decision on the competition for the replacement of the Chieftain tank.

  Mr. Alan Clark
  I hope that a decision on the equipment for our future main battle tank will not have to be delayed too long.

  Mr. Clelland
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make it his policy to award the contract for new battle tanks to Vickers Defence Systems and Challenger 2.

  Mr. Alan Clark
  No decision on the equipment for our future main battle tank fleet has yet been taken.

  Arms Sales
  Mr. Win Griffiths
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement about the role of his Department in the sale of arms abroad; and what information he has about where arms have been sold in the last three years.

  Mr. Alan Clark
  The Defence Export Services Organisation exists within my Department to assist United Kingdom defence industries to promote and sell their equipment abroad. Statistics of British defence exports by broad geographic region are set out in volume 2 of the annual Statement on the Defence Estimates.

  Trident
  Mr. Cryer
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement on the current cost of the Trident nuclear weapons programme.
  91
  Mr. Alan Clark
  I refer the hon. Gentleman to the answer given by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence on 12 February at column 383.

  Ministry Houses
  Mr. Ashton
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many houses owned by the Ministry of Defence are standing empty.

  Mr. Archie Hamilton
  As at 31 December 1990, the latest date for which figures are available, 10,760 MOD-owned houses and fiats were vacant. Many of these properties were either undergoing or awaiting major maintenance work or modernisation, some were already allotted to service families who were due to move in shortly and others were being considered for disposal. In addition, 1,701 dwellings were in the process of being sold.

  UN Peacekeeping Force
  Mr. Grocott
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence whether he has any plans to make a British contribution to any United Nations peacekeeping force.

  Mr. Archie Hamilton
  The arrangements for the security of the Gulf states are primarily a matter for the states of the region themselves. Any proposal for a United Nations peacekeeping or observer role would need to be considered carefully by the Security Council in the light of the wishes of the nations concerned.

  Nuclear Test Veterans
  Mr. Vaz
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a further statement on compensation to nuclear test veterans.

  Mr. Archie Hamilton
  I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Paisley, South (Mr. McMaster) on Friday 22 February 1991 at column 319.

  Gulf Victory Parade
  Mr. Jessel
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement on the participation of the armed services in the proposed victory parade.

  Mr. Archie Hamilton
  Arrangements to mark our involvement in the Gulf conflict remain under consideration. An announcement will be made shortly.

  Tornado
  Mr. Stern
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many export orders now exist for variants of the Tornado.

  Mr. Alan Clark
  My Department continues to receive inquiries relating to the potential future sale of Tornado aircraft. My hon. Friend will, of course, be aware that it has been the consistent policy of successive Administrations not to comment on individual defence exports or prospects.

  Defence Establishments
  Mr. Trimble
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence whether he intends to alter the regional balance of defence establishments.
  92
  Mr. Archie Hamilton
  I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave the hon. Member for Alyn and Deeside (Mr. Jones) on 11 February 1991 at column 324.

  Nuclear Weapons
  Mr. O'Neill
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what consideration has been given to British participation in international negotiations on reductions in short-range nuclear weapons.

  Mr. Archie Hamilton
  As was noted in the London declaration, negotiations on the reductions of short-range nuclear forces will be bilateral between the United States and Soviet Union. In conjunction with other NATO allies concerned, the United Kingdom will play an active part in the preparations for the negotiations.

  Ceremonial Troops
  Mr. Harry Greenway
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence whether he has any plans to cut the budget for ceremonial troops and horses; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Archie Hamilton
  All areas of the Army are being considered under "Options for Change", but we are not yet in a position to take final decisions.

  RAF Married Quarters
  Sir John Hunt
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence when he now expects to be in a position to commence the disposal of the officers' married quarters at RAF Biggin Hill.

  Mr. Archie Hamilton
  It is our intention to commence sale soon after the RAF has vacated the site, currently planned for early 1993.

  Sir John Hunt
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence whether sufficient married quarters accommodation will be available in Greater London to meet the expected demand when the RAF service families return from their postings in Germany.

  Mr. Archie Hamilton
  Very few, if any, personnel returning from Germany are likely to be posted to London and the position with regard to availability of accommodation therefore remains as I explained to my hon. Friend on 20 November 1990,Official Report, column 79.

  Radiation
  Mr. Ashley
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence whether his Department is investigating the merits of a compensation scheme for radiation-linked disease similar to the scheme operated by British Nuclear Fuels.

  Mr. Kenneth Carlisle
  Yes.

FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS

  Arms Reduction
  Mr. Fearn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what assessment he has made of the likelihood of ratification of the CFE and START treaties.
  93
  Mr. Lennox-Boyd
  It is difficult to assess the prospects for ratification of the CFE treaty while key issues concerning its implementation by the Soviet Union remain unresolved. These issues were set out in my hon. and learned Friend the Minister of State's answer of 15 March to the hon. Member for Clackmannan (Mr. O'Neill). The CFE treaty will not enter into force until it has been ratified by all 22 signatories. We hope that a START treaty can be signed later this year. Ratification will be a matter for the two Governments concerned.

  Mr. Fearn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what representations Her Majesty's Government have made to the Soviet Union concerning the CFE and START treaties.

  Mr. Lennox-Boyd
  We have made a number of representations to the Soviet Union about proper implementation of the CFE treaty. These include representations by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister during his visit to Moscow on 5 March, and at ministerial and senior official level, bilaterally and jointly with our allies. The START treaty is a bilateral one between the US and USSR and we understand discussions are continuing.

  India
  Mr. Fearn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what recent reports he has received from Her Majesty's high commissioner in India about the political situation in that country.

  Mr. Lennox-Boyd
  We receive regular reports from our high commissioner in New Delhi about the political situation in India.

  Cartagena Convention
  Mr. Malcolm Bruce
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether Her Majesty's Government will be represented at the forthcoming meeting of the Cartagena convention in Kingston, Jamaica.

  Mr. Lennox-Boyd
  Yes.

  Germany
  Mr. Fearn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs when he last met representatives of the German Government; and what was discussed.

  Mr. Lennox-Boyd
  My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs met Chancellor Kohl, Herr Genscher and other German Ministers in Bonn during the Anglo-German summit on 11 March. They had excellent discussions on a wide range of topics including the Gulf, the Soviet Union and eastern Europe and issues affecting the European Community and the NATO alliance.

  Kuwait
  Mr. Fearn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what discussions his Department has had with Kuwait's ambassador in London concerning the rebuilding programme in that country.
  94
  Mr. Lennox-Boyd
  We have brought to the attention of the Kuwaiti ambassador the range of experience and capabilities available from British industry to assist in the reconstruction of Kuwait. Similar action has been taken by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary with senior members of the Kuwaiti Government.

  Yugoslavia
  Mr. Fearn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what reports he has received from Her Majesty's ambassador in Yugoslavia about civil unrest in that country.

  Mr. Lennox-Boyd
  Her Majesty's ambassador at Belgrade reports regularly on all aspects of Yugoslav politics.

  Soviet Union
  Mr. Fearn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs whether he will detail plans for financial aid to the Soviet Union.

  Mr. Lennox-Boyd
  We have no plans to provide financial aid to the Soviet Union. With our EC partners we have agreed to provide £177 million in food assistance and £350 million as a credit for food purchases. We also aim to offer technical assistance from our know-how fund, to the sum of £20 million over two years.

  European Common Defence Policy
  Mr. Favell
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the intergovernmental conferences' discussions about a common defence policy.

  Mr. Lennox-Boyd
  There are a range of views among our partners on whether the Twelve should take on a defence role. In our view European defence, although it must become increasingly self-sufficient, will continue to depend on the alliance and the north American role. We do not believe that the common foreign and security policy of the Twelve should be expanded to include defence.

  Indonesia and East Timor
  Mr. Nellist
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will list and number the resolutions of the United Nations General Assembly and Security Council which relate to Indonesia and East Timor; if he will summarise their demands and indicate the action Britain took when the voting occurred; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Lennox-Boyd
  United Nations Security Council resolution 384 of 22 December 1975 deplored the armed Indonesian intervention in East Timor. United Nations Security Council resolution 389 of 22 April 1976 confirmed the right of the East Timorese to self-determination and called on the Indonesians to withdraw. The United Kingdom supported both resolutions.

  With most European Community partners, the United Kingdom abstained on resolutions in the fourth committee on East Timor between 1976 and 1982.

  United Nations General Assembly resolution No. 37/30 of 1982 invited the United Nations Secretary General to encourage a bilateral settlement and initiate discussions with the parties concerned.
  95
  The United Kingdom has welcomed the United Nations Secretary-General's initiative, which began in 1982, to promote contacts between Indonesia and Portugal to achieve a just settlement.

  Tibetan Refugees
  Mr. Wallace
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will detail the nature and extent of any assistance extended by Her Majesty's Government to Tibetan refugees since May 1979; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Lennox-Boyd
  Tibetan refugees in the United Kingdom are treated in exactly the same way as any other refugees in this country. Our assistance to refugees overseas is channelled through the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. In the financial year 1989–90 we contributed £19·1 million to the UNHCR.

  (a)

  (b)

  (c)

  (d)

  (e)

  Total

  Northern Ireland

  Great Britain

  Republic of Ireland

  Other EC

  Elsewhere

  Full-time

  Part-time

  Full-time

  Part-time

  Full-time

  Part-time

  Full-time

  Part-time

  Full-time

  Part-time

  Full-time

  Part-time

  Belfast

  534

  16

  67

  —

  71

  —

  11

  6

  —

  —

  689

  16

  Coleraine

  1,896

  428

  327

  4

  526

  30

  119

  1

  49

  —

  2,917

  463

  Jordanstown

  4,116

  3,186

  92

  2

  400

  42

  43

  2

  79

  8

  4,730

  3,240

  Magee

  651

  566

  41

  —

  158

  118

  10

  1

  9

  —

  869

  685

  Total

  7,197

  4,196

  527

  6

  1,155

  190

  178

  4

  148

  8

  9,205

  4,404

  Farm Effluent
  Mr. Beggs
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what educational facilities on environmentally safe methods for disposal of farm effluent are available to farmers.

  Mr. Hanky
  The Department of Agriculture for Northern Ireland uses a wide range of extension education methods. These include meetings, demonstrations, farm walks, radio and television broadcasts, press articles, booklets, leaflets, advisory letters, agricultural shows, training courses and individual advice.

  ACE Schemes
  Mr. John D. Taylor
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland which action for community employment schemes are being supported in the Portavogie district of the Ards peninsula.

  Mr. Needham
  There are currently no ACE schemes based in the Portavogie district. However, I understand that an ACE scheme, Donaghadee community workforce, plans to establish an out-centre in Portavogie later this year.

  Fish Processing
  Mr. John D. Taylor
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many fish processing plants there are in Northern Ireland; and how many of these plants comply with the EC hygiene regulations due in 1992.

NORTHERN IRELAND

  Wildlife Investigation Scheme
  Mr. Clifford Forsythe
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland when he intends to adopt in Northern Ireland a scheme along the lines of the wildlife investigation scheme in England, Scotland and Wales.

  Mr. Hanley
  It is intended to have a wildlife incident investigation scheme introduced in Northern Ireland later this year. This will be similar to a scheme in operation in other parts of the United Kingdom.

  New University of Ulster
  Mr. William Ross
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will publish a table to show the number of students on each campus of the new university of Ulster who are from(a) Northern Ireland, (b) Great Britain, (c) the Irish Republic, (d) other EC countries and (e) elsewhere, or as much of such information as is available.

  Dr. Mawhinney
  The information is as follows for the 1990–91 academic year:

  Mr. Hanley
  There are some 30 main fish processing plants in Northern Ireland. Most are likely to need some improvements in order to comply fully with the proposed directive.

  Marenco Ltd.
  Mr. John D. Taylor
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland when Marenco Ltd. was incorporated as a limited company; when the company's annual returns were last lodged with the companies office; to what years did these returns refer; and what is the last record in the companies office of sale of shares in Marenco Ltd. by Queen's university, Belfast, and by QUBIS Ltd.

  Mr. Needham
  [holding answer 18 March 1991]: The information about this company and its annual returns is held by the Registrar of Companies for Northern Ireland at 64 Chichester street, Belfast and is available to the public during office hours. Records of sales of shares in a company are held on the company's registrar of shareholdings which can be inspected at the company's registered office.

AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD

  Salmonella Enteriditis
  Mr. Simon Hughes
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food to what factors he attributes the increase in cases of salmonella enteriditis and PT4 over the past 12 months; what steps he plans to take to reverse this trend; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Maclean
  Reported isolations of salmonella enteriditis in poultry flocks increased by about I per cent. in 1990 compared with 1989. The increase is likely to reflect the level of bacteriological monitoring which increased in 1989 when compulsory testing was introduced. For broiler breeder flocks in particular, the introduction of compulsory monitoring through the hatchery in October 1989 led to a substantial increase in the number of reported isolations of salmonella enteriditis. For laying flocks producing eggs for human consumption, there was a reduction of 38 per cent. in reports of salmonella entertidis between 1989 and 1990.

  The Government's policy on control of salmonella was explained in the reply given to my hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Mr. Gill) on 14 January.

  Veterinary Investigation Centre
  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what consultations he has entered into with farmers' unions and professional organisations prior to his decision to close the veterinary investigation centre in Bangor, north Wales; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Maclean
  The review of the veterinary investigation service which my right hon. Friend the Minister commissioned was an internal review. Initial discussions were held with the trade unions and during the period of the review views were submitted from a number of interested parties, including the British Veterinary Association and the National Farmers Unions. These views were carefully considered before any final decisions were taken.

  We believe that the implementation of these recommendations of the review team will result in significant improvements in the quality, efficiency and cost-effectiveness of the veterinary investigation service. This is important if we are to have a VI service which is well equipped to meet our national needs over the years ahead.

  Fallen Animals
  Mr. Ron Davies
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what records he keeps concerning the location of sites used for the burial or other disposal of farm animals which die or are destroyed as a result of the outbreak of notifiable disease; and whether any constraints are placed on the subsequent use of such sites.

  Mr. Maclean
  My Department records the location of premises where outbreaks of certain notifiable diseases, such as foot and mouth disease, which require the compulsory slaughter of animals, occur. It also keeps information on anthrax outbreaks, including the method of disposal of carcases and burial sites.

  It is illegal to dig up any buried carcase, except under licence from this Department, but if a burial pit is
  98
  uncovered accidentally, the local divisional veterinary officer will make arrangements for the safe removal and disposal of the remains.

  Bovine Somatotropin
  Mr. Pawsey
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if it is possible for BST-free milk to be identified at point of sale.

  Mr. Maclean
  No. All cows milk contains BST in minute but variable quantities.

  Fishing Nets
  Mr. Austin Mitchell
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what information he has on the mortalities caused to sea birds by synthetic gill nets.

  Mr. Curry
  Our local sea fisheries inspectorate staff report on significant bird mortalities arising from fishing operations. I have received no such reports of incidents since the winter of 1988, when some 500 birds were reported killed, until February this year when some dead birds were found on a Cornwall beach in plastic bags and their deaths were claimed to be caused by monofilament gill nets but have not been substantiated as such. There is little evidence to suggest that these nets are threatening the survival of any species.

  Mr. David Clark
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture Fisheries and Food, further to his answer to the hon. Member for South Shields of 14 December 1990,Official Report, column 540, whether he now intends to support the proposed EC regulation 3094/86 to ban driftnets over 2·5 km in length; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Gummer
  The proposed addition to regulation 3094/86 to ban the use of drift nets over 2·5 km in length and four other separate measures contained in the proposed 11th amendment package are being examined in the working group for their scientific and legal basis, practical effect, operational feasibility and enforceability. Recommendations to the Council of Ministers from the working group on the proposal have not yet been made.

  Mr. Austin Mitchell
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what criteria are used to determine whether synthetic gill nets may be used in areas of high marine wildlife value.

  Mr. Curry
  No. Regulations governing the use of these nets are imposed as byelaws by either the sea fisheries committees or the National Rivers Authority (NRA) within the 3-mile coastal zone. My own scientists and sea fisheries inspectorate are also active in monitoring the use of these nets and incidental catches. On the evidence available to us these nets are not endangering any species and can serve fish conservation because of their high degree of selectivity.

  Mr. Austin Mitchell
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food whether he has consulted the Nature Conservancy Council over the use of synthetic gill nets and their effect on marine wildlife.

  Mr. Curry
  For fisheries conservation and management purposes these nets are already subject in many inshore areas to local restrictions imposed as byelaws by either sea
  99
  fisheries committees or the National Rivers Authority. Our current scientific advice is that gill nets, when set properly, can be beneficial in fish conservation terms through their high selectivity.

  Hunts
  Mr. Meale
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what representations have been made to him by hunts in the New Forest regarding the recording of their activities by video camera.

  Mr. Curry
  No such representations have been received.

  Mr. Meale
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if any advice has been given to Forestry Commission keepers in the New Forest regarding the use of video cameras to record the activities of local hunts.

  Mr. Curry
  The Forestry Commission's keepers in the New Forest have been advised that the use of video cameras by members of the public lawfully on commission land is permitted under the commission's byelaws, provided that such use does not cause annoyance to any other person.

  Meat Inspection Charges
  Mr. Gill
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will make a statement on progress on the implementation of harmonised meat inspection charges in other European Community member states.

  Mr. Maclean
  No. This question is properly the concern of the other European Community member states and of the European Commission.

  Mr. Gill
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what guidance he intends to give to local authorities about implementation of the new meat inspection charges.

  Mr. Maclean
  Guidance on the implementation of the new meat inspection charges has already been given to local authorities in the form of a circular, FSH 3/90, issued in December. I am arranging for a copy of this circular to be placed in the Library of the House.

  We will also be issuing shortly to local authority associations and the main trade associations a brief guide to the appeals procedure provided for in the regulations.

  Pesticide Residues
  Dr. David Clark
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will list the number of samples of food analysed since 1988 by his pesticide residue monitoring programme which have exceeded the levels set in the Pesticide (Maximum Residue Levels in Food) Regulations 1988, giving the name of the pesticide in each case; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Gummer
  The full results of monitoring for pesticide residues in food were published in September 1990 in the "Report of the Working Party on Pesticide Residues 1988–89." A copy of the report is available in the Library of the House.

  Dr. David Clark
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will list the numbers of 100
  prosecutions made in each year since 1988 which have been taken as a result of the maximum pesticide residue levels in food having been exceeded; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Gummer
  No prosecutions have been taken under the Pesticides (Maximum Residue Levels in Food) Regulations 1988, but one consignment of Chinese rabbit has been refused entry into the United Kingdom because it was found to contain residues in excess of United Kingdom limits.

  Where residues above United Kingdom or international maximum residue levels have been found in monitoring, action has been taken as described in the "Report of the Working Party on Pesticide Residues 1988–89." A copy of the report is available in the Library of the House.

  Fisheries Conservation
  Dr. David Clark
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will list the EC technical conservation measures he intends to support at the forthcoming EC Fisheries Council; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Gummer
  The agenda has not yet been settled. My hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary intends to press for action in particular to improve the selectivity of nets to reduce discards of fish and improve the conservation of key fish stocks of interest to our fishermen.

  Mr. David Porter
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (1) when he expects to make an interim assessment of the 1991 fishing catch restrictions; amd what comparison he will make of such an assessment with other EC countries;

  (2) if he will make a statement on the work his Department is doing now in preparation for the 1992 plans to reduce fishing effort in advance of information on the effectiveness of the 1991 measures and in advance of the views of the European Commissioner.

  Mr. Curry
  The effects of the 1991 restrictions will be assessed by the advisory committee on fisheries management, which includes representatives of other member states, when it meets in November. Decisions on 1992 will not be taken until the Council of Ministers meets at the end of the year.

  Beam Trawling
  Mr. David Clark
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what assessment he has made of the effects of beam trawling on the ocean environment; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Gummer
  It is apparent from the research to date that beam trawling can cause significant transient disturbance of the seabed. However, it is not clear whether long-term damage results and further work is being done in this area in which United Kingdom scientists will participate. The many benthic species respond differently to disturbance of the seabed and while some may suffer other thrive. When the further work has been done, the impact on benthic species and maintenance of sustainable use of our renewable marine resources will be considered.

SCOTLAND

  Housing
  Mr. Sillars
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will show, for each constituency in Glasgow or other convenient sub-city defined area, the amount of central Government housing repairs grants in the private sector for each year from 1980 to 1990 or the latest convenient date; and if he will express each constituency's or sub-area's expenditure as a percentage of the whole city total.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  This information is not available centrally.

  Mr. Sillars
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will publish figures showing the capital allocation allowed to Glasgow district council for its public sector housing stock in each year from 1978 to 1989, using 1978 as the base for expressing all subsequent years in real terms.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  Gross housing capital allocations issued to Glasgow district council for investment in its own stock for each year from 1978–79 to 1988–89 are set out in the table. The figures incorporate any supplementary allocations made during the year and are expressed in 1978–79 prices.

  City of Glasgow District Council Gross HRA Capital Allocations (1978–79 prices)

  Year

  (£m)

  1978–79

  54·6

  1979–80

  52·7

  1980–81

  45·3

  1981–82

  40·1

  1982–83

  35·8

  1983–84

  38·3

  1984–85

  26·2

  1985–86

  30·9

  1986–87

  34·5

  1987–88

  41·3

  1988–89

  40·6

  Mr. Sillars
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will publish a table showing the housing stock held by Glasgow district council in each year from 1978 to 1989.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  The information supplied by Glasgow district council for each year from 1979 onwards at 31 March is set out in the table. A comparable figure for 1978 is not available.

  Glasgow district council local authority stock

  Year

  Stock

  1979

  180,209

  1980

  180,974

  1981

  177,141

  1982

  176,500

  1983

  173,673

  1984

  171,640

  1985

  170,548

  1986

  171,554

  1987

  169,548

  1988

  166,429

  1989

  161,019

  Mr. Sillars
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will publish a table showing the number of sheltered 102
  house completions by district councils, housing associations and purely private sector development, in the period 1978 to 1989, and if he will show the figures by district council area.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  Information on housebuilding by user category is not available for the years prior to 1986 and could be extracted only at disproportionate cost. I will write to the hon. Member to advise him of the information available for subsequent years.

  Mr. Sillars
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will publish a table showing the amount of Government grant in real terms, taking 1978 as the base year, provided to Glasgow district council for private sector housing repairs and maintenance grants for each year from 1978 to 1990; and if he will also express Glasgow's share as a percentage of the Scottish allocation.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  Gross housing capital allocations to Glasgow district council for investment in private sector housing for each year from 1978–79 to 1989–90, expressed in 1978–79 prices and also as a percentage of the total Scottish allocation, are set out in the table. The figures for 1987–88 to 1989–90 include additional resources made available to deal with the backlog of pre-1984 improvement and repairs grants. Apart from these additional resources, the council is free to use the capital allocations for any investment in private sector housing according to local priorities.

  City of Glasgow district council Non-HRA gross capital allocations (1978–79 prices)

  Year

  £ million

  Percentage share

  1978–79

  12·4

  24·7

  1979–80

  11·5

  27·5

  1980–81

  12·4

  26·6

  1981–82

  12·8

  24·5

  1982–83

  17·0

  26·8

  1983–84

  117·1

  30·5

  1084–85

  45·2

  50·0

  1985–86

  21·0

  34·4

  1986–87

  21·1

  34·2

  1987–88

  26·5

  35·5

  1988–89

  23·2

  32·1

  1989–90

  23·4

  33·8

  1 Special arrangements applied in 1983–84 when authorities were allowed to exceed the allocation subject to certain conditions.

  Mr. Sillars
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will publish for each district council area in Scotland the number of private and public sector house completions respectively in the period 1974 to 1989.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  Tables giving details on house completions from 1978 to 1989 have been placed in the House Library.

  Comparable information for the years 1974–77 is not available.

  Dr. Godman
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland how many local authority dwellings(a) were vacant and available for letting on 1 April 1989 and (b) became available for letting between 1 April 1989 and 31 March 1990, by way of (i) new build, (ii) acquisition, modernisation or conversion and (iii) other means in (1) Inverclyde district council area, (2) Strathclyde and (3) Scotland as a whole.
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  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  [Holding Answer 18 March 1991]: Information on vacant local authority dwellings is collected at 31 March each year. The numbers of such dwellings available for letting at 31 March 1989 were published in table 10 of Statistical Bulletin HSU No. 13. Table 15 of Statistical Bulletin HSU No. 17 gives comparable figures for 1990. Copies of these bulletins are available in the House Library.

  No reliable information is held centrally on the number of houses which became available for letting over the period in question.

  Fire Advisory Pannel
  Mr. Ken Hargreaves
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland how many members serve on the fire advisory panel for Scotland; and how many of those members are also members of the Society of Fire Safety Engineers.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  There is no separate fire advisory panel for Scotland, but the Scottish Office is represented by an official on the Department of the Environment's panel.

  Health Board Chairmen
  Mr. Galbraith
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will list the six chairmen of health boards who are continuing in office until 1992 or 1993 and give for each their profession.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  The health board chairmen whose current term of office runs until 1992 or 1993 and their professions are:
  Chairman Health Board Profession

  Chairman

  Health Board

  Profession

  Mr. W. S. Fyfe OBE

  Ayrshire and Arran

  Company Chairman and Management Consultant

  Dr. D. H. Pringle CBE

  Borders

  Applied Scientist and Businessman (retired)

  Mr. J. A. Mclntyre OBE JP

  Dumfries and Galloway

  Farmer

  Mrs. J. I. D. Isbister

  Forth Valley

  Mental Welfare Commissioner

  Mr. J. Kyle CBE

  Grampian

  Consultant Surgeon (retired)

  Mrs. F. B. Grains

  Shetland

  Housewife

  Channel Tunnel Rail Services
  Mr. Sillars
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what discussions he has had with British Rail about the location of a freight terminal offering trunk rail services to the channel tunnel.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  Regular contact is maintained with British Rail by both Scottish Office Ministers and officials. Such contacts cover a wide range of topics concerning rail services in Scotland, including the possible location of a Scottish terminal for channel tunnel freight traffic.

  Geriatric Psychiatric Services
  Mr. Sillars
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what provision exists for geriatric psychiatric services in the south side of Glasgow; and what are the present waiting lists.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  There are 466 long-term care beds at Leverdale hospital and 90 long-term care beds at the Southern general hospital for geriatric psychiatry patients. On 13 march the waiting list for long-term psychogeriatric care was 11.

  There are two psychogeriatric day hospitals providing a total of 40 places. The waiting list for day beds was 14 on 13 March.

  In addition, there are outpatient clinics and the area is served by four community psychiatric nurses for the elderly.

  Inverclyde Initiative
  Dr. Godman
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland, pursuant to his answer to the hon. Member for Greenock and Port Glasgow of 6 March,Official Report, column 219, how the figure of the number of jobs created as a result of the period of operation of the Inverclyde initiative was calculated; and if he will list these jobs, by occupational classification.

  Mr. Allan Stewart
  The figure is based on information provided to the Inverclyde Initiative by the companies it assisted and its own records of placements under the training and employment grants scheme. The figures were checked to exclude any element of double counting.

  The occupational classification of these jobs is not available.

  Dr. Godman
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland, pursuant to his answer to the hon. Member for Greenock and Port Glasgow of 6 March,Offical Report, column 219, if he will indicate how the figure of jobs created, the figure of existing jobs secured and the figure of new jobs forecast by companies as a result of the establishment of the Inverclyde enterprise zone were arrived at; and if he will list these jobs by occupational classification.

  Mr. Allan Stewart
  The figures are based on information provided to the Inverclyde Initiative by the companies it assisted to locate in the zone and its own records of placements under the training and employment grants scheme. The figures were checked to exclude any element of double counting.

  The occupational classification of these jobs is not available.

  Skye Bridge
  Mr. Wilson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what information he has on the number of short listed companies which retain an active interest in the Skye bridge project; and if he will make a statement.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  The Scottish Office Environment Department's roads directorate, in consultation with Highland regional council, is in the final stages of negotiation of a preliminary concession agreement for the Skye bridge. An announcement will be made shortly.

  Fishing Vessels
  Mr. Austin Mitchell
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what steps he is taking to enforce the requirement in fishing vessel licences that fishing vessels fishing between ICES IV (North Sea) and VI (West of Scotland) have to call in.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  Information on vessel movements is collected from a variety of sources including air and sea surveillance and is compared with records of vessels which have reported in. Where sufficient evidence exists to show that a vessel has crossed the 4 deg. west line without reporting in, the case is referred to the prosecuting authorities.

  Mr. Austin Mitchell
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland whether he still requires fishing vessels crossing the 4 deg. line to call in; and when enforcement policy for this requirement was last changed.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  The requirement for fishing vessels holding North sea and west of Scotland white fish or herring licences to report by radio when crossing the 4 deg. west line was introduced in March 1989 and remains in force. The reporting-in requirement continues to be vigorously enforced.

  Historic Buildings Council for Scotland
  Mr. Wilson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will make a statement on the functioning of the Historical Buildings Council for Scotland.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  The Historic Buildings Council for Scotland has the statutory responsibility for advising my right hon. Friend on the discharge of certain of his powers in relation to listed buildings, most notably the making of historic building repair grants. The council's terms of reference, membership and activities over the years since 1953 when it was set up are set out in its annual reports, which are laid before both Houses of Parliament.

  My right hon. Friend is grateful for the sound advice which the council provides.

  Ambulances
  Mr. Wilson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what proportion of emergency and urgent patients in the Largs area have been required to travel in single-manned ambulances in each of the past three years; and if he has any proposals to reduce this figure.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  Figures have not been collected routinely by the Scottish ambulance service on the number of emergency and urgent journeys undertaken by single-manned ambulances. However, the practice of single-manning is undesirable and over the years I have increased the resources for the Scottish ambulance service. For the coming year I have given an additional £2 million to be specifically targeted at a reduction in the number of single-manned ambulances.

  Argyll and Clyde Health Board
  Dr. Godman
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland (1) how many paramedical staff were employed by the Argyll and Clyde health board in(a) 1979, (b) 1986 and (c) 1990;
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  (2) how many consultants were employed in hospitals within the Argyll and Clyde health board in (a) 1979, (b) 1986 and (c) 1990;

  (3) how many nursing staff were employed in the Argyll and Clyde health board in (a) 1979, (b) 1986 and (c) 1990;

  (4) how many ancillary staff were employed by the Argyll and Clyde health board in (a) 1979, (b) 1986 and (c)

  Mr Michael Forsyth
  [holding answer 18 March 1991]:The number of whole-time equivalent staff for each year ending 30 September is set out in the following table.

  Year

  WTE

  Paramedical Staff

  1979

  210·8

  1986

  260·1

  1990

  307·4

  Hospital Consultants

  1979

  90·0

  1986

  106·8

  1990

  129·9

  Nursing Staff

  1979

  4,371·5

  1986

  4,695·6

  1990

  4,775·8

  Ancillary Staff

  1979

  2,115·9

  1986

  1,739·1

  1990

  1,349·6

  Forestry Commission
  Dr. David Clark
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will make a statement about his plans for privatisation of the organisation of the Forestry Commission.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  [holding answer 18 March 1991]: The plans for the internal reorganisation of the Forestry Commission announced by my right hon. Friend on 6 March, columns 220–21, do not involve privatisation.

  Tree Planting
  Mr. Maclennan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what area of land was planted with trees in 1990 under grant-aided schemes; what proportion represented the restocking of felled woodland; and what proportion represented planting of land not formerly under trees.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  [holding answer 18 March 1991]In the year ended 31 December 1990, the Forestry Commission grant-aided some 22,700 hectares of tree planting, including planting carried out under the farm woodland scheme. Of this total, 31 per cent. comprised restocking and 69 per cent. new planting.

  Mr. Maclennan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what area of land was planted by the Forestry Commission in 1990; what proportion represented the restocking of felled woodland; and what proportion represented planting of land not formerly under trees.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  [holding answer 18 March 1991]In the year ended 31 December 1990, the Forestry Commission carried out some 11,100 hectares of planting, 65 per cent. of which was restocking and 35 per cent. new planting.

  Mr. Maclennan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what area of land was planted in 1990 under the
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  woodland grant scheme; what proportion represented the restocking of felled woodland; and what proportion represented a carry forward into the woodland grant scheme from a former dedication scheme or forestry grant scheme.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  [holding answer 18 March 1991]: In the year ended 31 December 1990, the Forestry Commission grant-aided 15,900 hectares of planting under the woodland grant scheme, of which 34 per cent. was for the restocking of felled woodland. Some 3,000 hectares of new planting were also grant-aided under that scheme in association with the farm woodland scheme.

  The commission's records do not show what proportions of these areas of planting were previously included in a dedication scheme or in the forestry grant scheme.

  Student Loans
  Mr. Worthington
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what is the total number of students attending all designated courses for all student loans who are potentially eligible for student loans in Scotland.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  [holding answer 18 March 1991]: It is estimated that some 70,000 students domiciled in Scotland are eligible for a loan in the academic year 1990–91. The estimate may be revised as further data become available.

  Loan-bearing courses do not require designation if they are at institutions receiving support from public funds. The Secretary of State may designate as loan-bearing
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  courses of higher education at other institutions under regulation 4 of the Education (Student Loans) Regulations 1990.

  State Hospital, Carstairs
  Mr. Worthington
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland how many mentally ill patients at the state hospital at Carstairs, who have not committed offences, come from each health board region in Scotland.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  [holding answer 18 March 1991]: Information on patients who have not been convicted of any criminal offence is as follows:

  Number

  Argyll and Clyde

  7

  Ayr and Arran

  —

  Borders

  1

  Dumfries and Galloway

  —

  Fife

  2

  Forth Valley

  2

  Grampian

  2

  Greater Glasgow

  9

  Highland

  3

  Lanarkshire

  —

  Lothian

  12

  Orkney

  —

  Shetland

  —

  Tayside

  4

  Western Isles

  —

  42

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

Iraq and Coalition Prisoners
Lord Campbell of Croy Lord Campbell of Croy asked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether all coalition prisoners of war and Kuwaiti hostages held by Iraq have been released.
The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (The Earl of Caithness): My Lords, we are not in a position to speak for other coalition governments. Several thousand Kuwaitis are still detained, but all United Kingdom personnel have now been accounted for.
Lord Campbell of Croy: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that reply. Can he give any indication as to when coalition, as opposed to British, servicemen and women will be accounted for? As regards Kuwaitis, will the Government and the coalition continue to hold senior Iraqi prisoners until the International Committee of the Red Cross has completed thorough investigations?
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, to reply to my noble friend's first question, I do not know when that will be. Regarding his second question, we do not believe that prisoners of war should be used as bargaining chips. We have a unilateral obligation under the third Geneva Convention to repatriate Iraqi prisoners of war without delay.
Lord Mellish: My Lords, is the noble Earl aware that I, like many in this country, am absolutely delighted that we have wiped the floor with Iraq and all it stands for? However, will the Government make a statement about why a wretched man like Saddam Hussein, who is the biggest liar in the world, is allowed to continue in office, to prattle on in the way that he does and to continue to do whatever he is doing to Kuwaiti prisoners? What do the Government propose to do about him?
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, that is up to the Iraqi people.
Lord Cledwyn of Penrhos: My Lords, is there not a very strong case for setting up a United Nations inquiry into the violation of human rights in Kuwait in particular? Furthermore, can the noble Earl say whether Her Majesty's Government have received the report by Amnesty International into the position of Palestinians and other Arab nationals in Kuwait and the allegations that are being made of arrests and torture of those Palestinians? Can he say what is the reaction of Her Majesty's Government to those allegations?
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, I take note of the noble Lord's first point. With regard to the treatment of people in Kuwait, and in particular the returnees, we understand the Kuwaiti authorities' determination to restore law and order and central services as a first step and also their wish to screen all returnees carefully. However, we have reminded them of the international declaration on human rights which states that everyone has the right to return to his own country.
Viscount Mountgarret: My Lords, if I heard my noble friend aright, he said that all British personnel have been accounted for. Would it be appropriate to ask my noble friend to pass the good wishes and thanks of your Lordships' House to those who have managed to keep track of our personnel in these difficult times? It must have been a mammoth task. Does my noble friend agree that they ought to be congratulated?
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, I am most grateful to my noble friend. I shall pass on his remarks to my right honourable friend the Secretary of State.
Lord Molloy: My Lords, to follow up the important point made by my noble friend the Leader of the Opposition, would it not also be possible for the United Nations to examine precisely what is going on now in Iraq bearing in mind that the overwhelming majority of people in Iraq have no more time for Saddam Hussein than most of us in this House?
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, the noble Lord has a point. The difficulty is getting access to places where one is not welcome.
Lord Mayhew: My Lords, does the noble Earl agree that it is most unsatisfactory that we should not know how many hostages and prisoners of war of the coalition are held and how many have been released? What form of pressure is being applied? Is action being taken jointly or separately by individual countries?
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, each coalition partner has made its own representations to the Iraqis. I cannot speak for other coalition partners.
Lord Dean of Beswick: My Lords, bearing in mind that Saddam Hussein has broken every undertaking that he has given, what gives the Government any optimism that he will carry out the undertakings in the ceasefire agreement? If Saddam Hussein does not do so and continues to behave as at present, how do the Government propose to deal with the problem? It is clear that they are dealing with a man who only understands force.
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, the noble Lord has raised an interesting question. However, it is wide of that on the Order Paper.
Lord Elton: My Lords, my noble friend suggests that members of the coalition are pursuing their nationals' interests individually. Can he assure the House that the coalition will act in concert until all its

519
objectives have been secured, including the repatriation of all who have been taken prisoner or otherwise abducted from their homelands?
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, I can reassure my noble friend that the coalition is strong and firm.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, can the noble Earl say what will happen in the case of the Iraqi prisoners of war who do not wish to return to Iraq?
The Earl of Caithness: My Lords, that will be a matter for the appropriate authorities, and the ICRC in particular.

Secondary Legislation: Policy
2.43 p.m.
Lord Campbell of Alloway: My Lords, I ask this Question at the request of my noble friend Lord Renton, whose voice has disappeared, although he has not.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will cease to use secondary legislation to amend Acts of Parliament and ensure that no power to do so will be given to Ministers in government Bills from now onwards.
The Lord Chancellor (Lord Mackay of Clashfern): My Lords, I am sure I speak for all noble Lords when I express the hope that the voice of the noble Lord, Lord Renton, will speedily return. In reply to the Question, the exercise of powers under secondary legislation to amend Acts of Parliament can on occasion be a useful means of effecting consequential amendments or repeals of an entirely subsidiary character without the need to require Parliament to consider yet further primary legislation. The Government will continue to propose such powers where they seem appropriate.
Lord Campbell of Alloway: My Lords, I thank my noble and learned friend for his reply. Is he aware that, for example, the Highways Act 1980, which had a Henry VIII clause to enable amendment by statutory instrument, was so amended and was the subject of considerable concern? Is he further aware that this point was raised on the New Roads and Street Works Bill? Does he agree that it would be appropriate to knock Henry VIII on the head, so to speak, and put an end to these rather tedious and time-consuming discussions about that type of clause?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I am doubtful whether doing anything to Henry VIII's head would be likely to obviate time-consuming discussion. One of the consequences of not having such power is that time would have to be taken up with what I described in the principal Answer as dealing with consequential amendments or repeals of an entirely subsidiary character. Obviously this is a power which has to be given with discretion. I am sure that Parliament will
520
use discretion in giving such powers and, when given, that they will be used with discretion by the Minister to whom they are committed.
Lord Mishcon: My Lords, I join from these Benches in the good wishes to the noble Lord, Lord Renton, and offer them also to the other noble Lords who wish to participate in this Question. Is the noble and learned Lord not covered with some shame at the fact that the Bill which he is sponsoring and which will be dealt with this afternoon contains 92 regulations to be dealt with by resolutions, as subordinate legislation, of which only 12 are affirmative resolutions?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, noble Lords may not be surprised to hear that I am not all covered with shame. I believe that the powers given in the BIll that we shall be discussing further this afternoon are entirely appropriate. I am willing to discuss each and all of them in the context in which they have been given with a view to reaching the right answer.
Lord Rippon of Hexham: My Lords, bearing in mind the increasing use of Henry VIII clauses—which not least has been pointed to in legislation introduced by my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor —will the Government give consideration to setting up—as happens, for example, in Australia—a Select Committee to scrutinise legislation and report on the extent to which it involves constitutional issues or excessive use of delegated powers?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I believe that the question of what powers are appropriate in relation to a specific Bill is best considered in the context of that Bill. At the moment I see no advantage in having the kind of remit to which my noble friend has referred. I believe that these discussions can be useful in the context of particular Bills but, on the whole, that the Government's proposals in this connection have been found by Parliament to be justified.
Earl Russell: My Lords, I am glad that the noble and learned Lord used the word "occasionally" in his Answer. Has he remarked that the noble Lord, Lord Renton, in his Question has taken a much more fundamentalist attitude than the Donoughmore Committee, which distinguished between the use and abuse of those clauses? Does he agree that their more frequent abuse might lead to a denial that they have any legitimate use?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, the phrase that I used in the principal Answer was "on occasion". Obviously very good things can be abused. I do not believe that the mere possibility of abuse is necessarily an argument against not having these powers. If that were a good argument it would apply to a great number of things from which a good deal of enjoyment and utility has been obtained.
Lord Airedale: My Lords, can the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor at least assure the House that instruments of the kind that we are discussing will be introduced by the affirmative

521
procedure so that at least a Minister has to stand at the Dispatch Box and justify what he proposes rather than slipping it in under the negative procedure?
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, it is difficult to make generalisations about that. In a discussion on a similar matter in a Bill introduced in a previous Session I agreed that in the circumstances of that Bill a power of this kind should be subject to the affirmative resolution. However, there may well be more important matters for parliamentary attention than some of the instruments effecting consequential amendments or repeals which these powers are designed to introduce.

Vasectomies
2.50 p.m.
Lord Blyth Lord Blyth asked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they will take steps to discourage the vasectomy operation in view of the possible harmful effects in the long term.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Social Security (Lord Henley): No, my Lords. The decision as to whether or not a vasectomy should be performed in any particular case is one for the patient and doctor concerned, taking full account of all the clinical issues involved. The patient is entitled to have sufficient information on which to make a balanced judgment. It is for the doctor, as part of the counselling process, to decide what risks, if any, the patient should be warned of and the terms in which any warning should be given.
Lord Blyth: My Lords, I thank my noble friend the Minister for that reply. Is my noble friend satisfied that men are given adequate advice and counselling before they take this pretty serious step? Does my noble friend consider that the advice and counselling that men are given is as good as that given to women when they attend family planning clinics? I believe it is accepted that women receive extremely good advice from the clinics.
Lord Henley: My Lords, we are satisfied that men are being given adequate advice. Obviously risks may exist, however small, in any operation. Similarly, there may be risks for a woman in a pregnancy which might result from a man not having this operation. In the end the decision whether or not to have the operation must be for the patient concerned to take after receiving advice from his doctor.
Baroness Robson of Kiddington: My Lords, will the Minister inform the House of the comparative dangers of a man undergoing vasectomy and a woman over 35 continuing to take the pill or having a sterilisation operation? Does the Minister agree that if two partners decide not to have children that should be a joint responsibility?
Lord Henley: My Lords, the noble Baroness is quite correct. This should be a joint decision and the wife or partner of the man concerned should be offered some counselling. However, the final decision on the
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operation must be for the man to take. I accept the point made by the noble Baroness that the risks in pregnancy for a woman over 35 would be greater than those arising from a vasectomy. Risks are involved in any pregnancy, as the noble Baroness will be aware. Fortunately, however, mortality in pregnancy has fallen dramatically over the past 30 years. I cannot give the comparative figures requested by the noble Baroness. I also accept that there are some risks in taking the contraceptive pill, but they are small risks and individual women take those risks into account.
Lord Mason of Barnsley: My Lords, as far as I am aware, my potency is as good as ever and I have no need for a vasectomy. However, will the Minister answer the Question on the Order Paper: what are the harmful effects of the vasectomy operation?
Lord Henley: My Lords, as I have said, there will always be some small risk involved in any surgical operation. There is some research from America which indicates that there is a possible causal link between vasectomy and prostatic cancer. We shall examine that evidence to see whether there is any substance to it. Some research has also been carried out in West Lothian as regards an increased level of testicular cancer. However, doubt has been cast on the reliability of that evidence.
Lord Winstanley: My Lords, is not the Minister aware that this suggested possible link between a vasectomy and subsequent prostatic cancer is based on entirely speculative evidence and has not been confirmed by authorities in this country? If there is evidence of harmful effects from this comparatively minor operation, whether in the short or long-term, should not the chief medical officer of the department inform general practitioners of that fact? As he has not taken that step, am I entitled to assume that there are no such dangers? If that is the case, is it not regrettable that a question of this kind should appear on our Order Paper, thus causing unnecessary anxiety to a great many people?
Lord Henley: My Lords, the noble Lord makes the point that I sought to make. Research has been conducted in America and in West Lothian. I said, in effect, that we did not think much of the research carried out in West Lothian because only a small group was considered and there was no suitable control group. We shall reconsider the study carried out in America, but the researchers themselves acknowledge that more research is needed.
Lord Ennals: My Lords, I welcome what the Minister said about the importance of counselling. However, he appeared to refer only to medical advice. Does he not agree that there are important psychological factors involved in this operation which should be taken into consideration by both men and women when taking this decision?
Lord Henley: My Lords, I certainly hope that everyone takes such factors into consideration before having the operation.

Worker Participation: EC Proposal
2.55 p.m.
Lord Clinton-Davis Lord Clinton-Davis asked Her Majesty's Government:
What is their current policy concerning the provisions in the draft EC statute for European companies relating to worker consultation and participation.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Employment (Viscount Ullswater): My Lords, the Government are opposed to these provisions because they fail to take account of the United Kingdom's successful voluntary employee involvement arrangements.
Lord Clinton-Davis: My Lords, is the Minister aware that by no means all major United Kingdom companies have worker consultation or participation? Is the view that the Minister has just expressed representative of all Conservative parliamentary groups?
Viscount Ullswater: My Lords, the Government and industry favour a voluntary system. The United Kingdom's voluntary system has strength, variety and flexibility. The compulsory provisions on worker participation in the draft EC statute for European companies are unnecessary and damaging. British industry would agree with that. As regards the second supplementary question of the noble Lord, I am aware that some Members of the European Parliament have expressed their own opinion on the matter.
Lord Boyd-Carpenter: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that many of us view with considerable concern this attempt by the European authorities to intervene in an area which we manage perfectly well for ourselves?
Viscount Ullswater: My Lords, I agree with my noble friend that the voluntary system has treated us well. It enables companies to devise the systems best suited to their circumstances. We recognise that no law could do that.
Lord Rochester: My Lords, do the Government endorse paragraph 94 of the report of the European Communities Select Committee of this House on the draft statute in which the committee agreed with the section of the social charter which states in relation to worker participation
"Information, consultation and participation must be developed along appropriate lines, taking account of the practices in force in the various Member States"?
Viscount Ullswater: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for referring to the report of the Select Committee of your Lordships' House. It is not just the Government's opinion that the provisions in the draft statute should not be accepted. The Select Committee's report also expressed that view. Having said that, the Government are firmly committed to employee involvement. I wish to make that quite clear. It has been made absolutely clear—should there be any doubt—by the Government's booklet People and
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Companies published late in 1989. I must repeat that it is the compulsory basis of the worker participation proposals of the statute which is unacceptable.
Baroness Seear: My Lords, does the Minister not agree that a number of companies make no effort at all in this field and have no intention of doing anything? While one might agree with the Government in refusing an overall system, the opportunity to choose between a number of systems and to require that something should be done could well improve British industrial relations. Those relations are far from perfect.
Viscount Ullswater: My Lords, I do not agree with the noble Baroness if the choice is between compulsory schemes.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, I agree with the observations made by the noble Lord, Lord Boyd-Carpenter, on the desirability of the United Kingdom making its own legislation covering its own affairs. However, is it not true that a consultation within German industry under the statute of that country has been largely responsible for Germany's good economic performance? Should not we in this country put workers' consultation firmly on the statute book through our own legislation?
Viscount Ullswater: My Lords, it is up to each nation and national government to implement the laws that suit the country. The Government's consultations held in 1988–1989 showed that the employers and employer organisations were overwhelmingly against the Commission's proposal.
Lord Mellish: My Lords, have the unions said anything about the matter and if so what?
Viscount Ullswater: My Lords, I believe that the TUC gave evidence to the House of Lords Select Committee. Its witnesses were the only ones who approved the proposals in some measure.
The Viscount of Oxfuird: My Lords, is my noble friend aware of the total quality management programme which has been supported for some considerable time by the Department of Trade and Industry? The essence of the programme insists on worker participation at all levels in decision making.
Viscount Ullswater: My Lords, yes, and my noble friend has reinforced my comments. The Government are wholly committed to employee involvement and participation. People and Companies published in late 1989 said of the practice that it was,
"the foundation of good business practice and therefore…an essential element in the pursuit of prosperity and of secure employment".
Lord Clinton-Davis: My Lords, it is right, is it not, that the Conservative group in the European Parliament does not share the Minister's complacency about the success of the British approach and is asking for a more open mind to be shown by the Government? How can the Minister assert, as did his noble friend Lord Boyd-Carpenter, that the British system is so overwhelmingly successful when the so-called British economic miracle dissipated so

525
quickly? How can the Government assert that they have nothing to learn from the German, French, Dutch and Scandinavian systems which appear to work successfully in marked contrast to the British system?
Viscount Ullswater: My Lords, I thought that I had made clear the fact that it is up to each nation and national government to pursue the policies that suit them. The European Parliament made a number of recommendations that would make the Commission's proposal on worker participation even more far reaching. The Government are against those proposals, as my original Answer made clear. However, that poses a problem for the Commission because it is not clear whether it will incorporate any of the proposed amendments in the revised text now being prepared.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, the Minister's reply indicates that he is strongly in favour of companies encouraging worker participation. As he dislikes compulsion, can he say what kind of sweeteners and incentives the Government are prepared to give? A few tax concessions might give the virtuous companies some reward.
Viscount Ullswater: My Lords, a number of participation schemes favour the employee. I have in mind the share option scheme.

Business
3.3 p.m.
Lord Denham: My Lords, it may be for the convenience of the House to know that the Committee stage of the Child Support Bill will be adjourned at about 7.30 p.m. for about one hour and that during this adjournment the Pneumoconiosis etc. (Workers' Compensation) (Payment of Claims) (Amendment) Regulations 1991 and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (Immunities and Privileges) Order 1991 will be taken.

Business of the House: Debates, 20th and 27th March
The Lord Privy Seal (Lord Waddington): My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.
Moved, That the debates on the Motions in the names of the Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge and the Lord Hooson set down for tomorrow shall be limited to 3 hours and 2 hours respectively; that the debates on the Motions in the names of the Baroness Turner of Camden and the Lord Dean of Beswick set down for 27th March shall be limited to 3 hours and 2 hours respectively; and that Standing Order 35 and paragraphs 10 to 13 of the Rules for the Conduct of Short Debates shall apply to all four debates.—(Lord Waddington.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

Consolidated Fund (No. 2) Bill
The Minister of State, Department of Trade and Industry (Lord Hesketh):My Lords, I beg to move that the Bill be now read a second time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a second time. —(Lord Hesketh.)
On Question, Bill read a second time.
Then, Standing Order No. 44 having been dispensed with (pursuant to Resolution of 18th March), Committee negatived. Bill read a third time, and passed.

Child Support Bill [H.L.]
3.6 p.m.
The Lord Chancellor: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now again resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
Moved, That the House do now again resolve itself into Committee.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES in the Chair.]
Clause 22 [Failure to comply with obligations imposed by Section 5]:
[Amendments Nos. 40 and 41 not moved.]
Earl Russell Earl Russell moved Amendment No. 42:
Page 16, line 28, leave out ("such amount") and insert ("5 per cent. of the sum specified in paragraph (2) (c) of column (2) of Part 1 of Schedule 2 to the Income Support (General) Regulations 1987 or by such smaller amount.").
The noble Earl said: I shall speak also to Amendment No. 43. Amendment No. 42 deals with the amount of the proposed disentitlement to benefit and Amendment No. 43 deals with the duration. I shall deal first with Amendment No. 43. It relates to a provision in the Bill to which the Social Security Advisory Committee has called attention. Being a scholarly body the committee has wisely avoided the use of the word "unprecedented". However, it has said that it is not aware of any precedent for a disentitlement to benefit which is indefinite in duration. That is a considerable power to put into the hands of the Government. It is a degree of discretion which in the past this Chamber has resisted conferring. I understand that the entitlement could well be for life and there is nothing to stop it being so.
I should be grateful if in reply either my noble kinsman or the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor could spell out the Government's thinking on the duration of a disentitlement to benefit. With reference to the exchanges made in respect of the Question asked today by the noble Lord, Lord Renton, can they say why the Government have not thought it proper to put the provision in the Bill? The disentitlement to benefit, the reduced benefit direction, is one of the key points in Amendment No. 42.
Once again the Bill bears no indication whatever of how great the benefit is to be. I understand that under the terms of the Bill it would be possible for the reduction to be 99.5 per cent. It is only from other

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sources that we learn that the Government's intention is a reduction of 20 per cent. That is not contained in the Bill and I should like to know why. I wish to draw attention to the fact that since the proposal is not in the Bill it could be varied by future Governments without coming back to this Chamber for a Vote.
The noble and learned Lord may remember his exchanges with the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale, during discussions on the Courts and Legal Services Bill relating to a clause which gave the Lord Chancellor for the time being power to vary the level of a fine. For practical purposes the reduced benefit direction is in some way analogous to a fine. It is a penalty imposed by force of law and a deprivation of part of a subsistent benefit. It is a proposal which the Committee should view with misgivings if the Government come before us with proposals to vary a deprivation of this significance without the leave of the House.
I should like also to know how the Government arrived at the figure of 20 per cent. Is that a figure plucked out of the air or has any reasoning led them to choose it? It seems to me, as it did to the Social Security Advisory Committee, that £7.35 per week is a considerable sum to come out of income support, which is in any case a subsistence benefit. Such a deprivation risks lowering the income of the mother below the level of subsistence. As there is such a thing as a household income, I do not understand how it is possible to lower the mother's income below subsistence level without in the process penalising the child. Therefore, I wonder whether such a deprivation infringes the principle of the White Paper that children come first. I beg to move.
Lord Henley: These amendments seek to limit the amount and period of a reduction in benefit arising from failure to co-operate—and I stress that that is the reason for the reduction—in obtaining maintenance without good cause. The amount would he limited to 5 per cent. of the personal allowance payable to a lone parent who is under the age of 18; that is, at present, £28.80 per week. I note that my noble kinsman, who has sometimes objected to those lower rates of income support, has accepted that figure. Five per cent. of £28.80 is £1.45. The period would be limited to a maximum of six weeks. The overall effect of this amendment would be that a caring parent would lose about £10 in total, which undermines the intention of the benefit reduction. I fear that it would also increase the risk of collusion between parents in order to avoid paying maintenance. The absent parent could buy off the caring parent by offering her £11 if she agrees not to give his details to the child support agency. Therefore, both parents would gain financially and the ultimate loser would be the taxpayer.
We believe it right that the caring parent should think carefully about the advantages of maintenance to her children. It would provide a regular income, which can be of considerable help if she wishes to return to work and, of course, for caring parents on family credit or disability working allowance, there is an immediate advantage as the first £15 of any
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maintenance will be disregarded. Where a caring parent has good cause she will be exempt from the requirement to co-operate.
I have said already that, where we are satisfied on the evidence available to us that there has been a history of violence or that there is a well-founded fear that seeking maintenance will put the caring parent or child at risk of violence, then that will be counted as good cause. However, we do not believe that it is enough for the caring parent to say that there is or has been a threat of violence. It is perfectly reasonable to explore fully with her her reasons for fearing violence and to ask her to provide evidence, as I said last week when we debated these matters.
It is important also to bear in mind that the caring parent will have three opportunities to explain her reasons if she does not wish to co-operate: at the initial discussion with a child support officer; to an adjudication officer if the case is referred to him; and finally, to an appeal tribunal if needed.
In relation to the objectives of the clause, I hope that I have made clear that we are trying to be as fair and reasonable as possible to the caring parent.
The noble Earl asks about the amount and duration which we are considering and he mentioned the figure of up to 20 per cent. which was put forward in the White Paper. We are considering very carefully what should be the level in the event of the caring parent having no good cause not to co-operate. As I said, those must be set out in regulations. It is a very difficult issue and we need to achieve the right sort of balance to encourage the parent to think about her responsibilities and the benefits of maintenance to the child. As I stressed earlier, we must consider the risks of potential collusion between the caring parent and the liable relative—in effect, the father buying off the mother.
As I indicated earlier, this amendment does not achieve the right balance. A total loss to the caring parent of £10 is far too low. I have listened to comments made and shall continue to do so before coming forward with a figure. However, we believe that this amendment sets the level of loss—£10—too low and I hope that my noble kinsman will withdraw his amendment.
3.15 p.m.
Earl Russell: I am not entirely satisfied with that reply. I have not been told why the Government do not think it proper to specify the amount in the Bill. My noble kinsman spoke about the level of disentitlement and said, "We are considering it very carefully". Throughout that speech was the assumption that the department makes the law; but that is not the case. Parliament makes the law. I do not understand why the department believes that it is entitled to fix a matter of this importance—a matter of considerable principle in this Chamber—without coming before Parliament and receiving its approval.
Lord Henley: I made it clear that these matters would be covered by regulations which must come before Parliament and which require parliamentary approval.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: Can the noble Lord tell us when we shall see the regulations and whether that will be before the Bill is passed? The noble Earl raises a very important point.
Lord Henley: I cannot give the noble and learned Lord that assurance. Before the Bill leaves this place, we hope to put before it both the amount and the duration. Therefore, we shall be able to let the noble and learned Lord know what we are minded to do.
Lord Mishcon: Does the Minister realise the unhappy position in which Parliament is placed by his very courteous but, nevertheless, unsatisfactory reply? What will happen when a regulation comes before Parliament? It will contain a percentage which will be the maximum percentage of the reduction, and there will be a specified period which will be the maximum specified period. If Parliament believes that to be slightly too harsh or too moderate, it cannot amend. Therefore, either the whole regulation must be thrown out or we are left in a completely unsatisfactory position.
That position would be entirely different if the Minister—and he will forgive me using this expression —had the courage now to bring before Parliament what the department has in mind. Surely after consideration of so much detail in this Bill, it is not too much to ask that a department makes up its mind on the issue of what it believes to be just by way of a percentage reduction and period. If Parliament has that information now, it can do something about it. If it does not, then it is at the mercy of the department, as are the people concerned.
Lord Henley: As I said, we are considering these matters very carefully but we have not decided on what figures to bring forward. I do not believe that it would be right for those figures to be written on the face of the Bill because those figures may need changing at a later stage and, as the noble Lord knows, primary legislation can be a very slow process by which to achieve those changes.
We feel that it is right that that information should be contained in regulations. As I said, before the Bill leaves this Chamber I hope to give some idea of what the department has in mind as regards percentage and duration. I should have thought that that assurance from the Dispatch Box would be sufficient on this occasion.
Lord Mishcon: In his reply the Minister has been as helpful as he can be. He is obviously governed by a decision on policy which I do not understand. However, when he says, "before the Bill leaves this place", does he mean that we will receive the information before Third Reading? If so, we shall be able to deal with the matter by way of amendment at Third Reading. If it only came forward on Third Reading we would not be able to do anything at all.
Lord Henley: I certainly give the noble Lord the assurance he seeks. We will bring forward the information before Third Reading, and will advise the noble Lord of the figures we are minded to bring into the regulations. I do not promise that we will provide
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figures on the face of the Bill. It is a matter that is right for regulations. However, we hope to have the figures for percentage and duration before Third Reading.
Lord Coleraine: If I am right in thinking that the adjudication officer acts judicially and that he will have before him a written report from the child support officer, which will merely state that the mother has failed to provide the information specified or that she has misled the support agency and specifies how she has done so, could my noble friend say by what criteria the adjudication officer will determine the amount of reduction in benefit that is to be made?
Lord Henley: It is not for the adjudication officer nor the child support officer to decide on the amount of reduction. They must decide whether or not deductions should be made. The child support officer will ask the caring parent to explain why she does not wish to co-operate. If, for example, she says that she has a fear of violence, it will be first for the child support officer and later for the adjudication officer, on the evidence before them, to decide whether they accept her word. If they believe that there is no good cause for her refusing to co-operate then the benefit sanction, at whatever figure is agreed, will come into operation.
Lord Coleraine: Perhaps my noble friend misunderstood me. I believe he said that it was not for the adjudication officer to fix the amount of reduction in benefit. As I read subsections (5) and (6) of Clause 22, the adjudication officer is to give a "reduced benefit direction". That means,
"a direction that the amount payable by way of any relevant benefit…be reduced by such amount…as may he specified in the direction".
If the only information before the adjudication officer is that the mother has been unco-operative, I do not understand by what criteria an adjudication officer can fix the amount of reduced benefit.
Lord Henley: The adjudication officer is informed that the mother is not being co-operative. The caring parent—that is, the mother—can come back to the adjudication officer and make her own representation as to whether or not she has any evidence. The burden of proof rests upon the claimant. However, that burden is not to prove beyond reasonable doubt. The matter will be decided on the balance of probabilities and whether or not she is believed by the adjudication officer.
Lord Coleraine: Surely the mother is not producing evidence at all. She is merely making written representations.
Lord Henley: The mother makes representations to both the child support officer and later the adjudication officer. It is for them to decide whether or not they believe her. The onus of proof is upon the caring parent, and the adjudication officer must decide whether or not he believes her.
Lord Prys-Davies: Perhaps the Minister can clear up this point. If the adjudication officer decides to

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issue a reduced benefit direction, I believe he has no discretion as to the amount to allow or disallow. Is that correct?
Lord Henley: I have slightly misled the Committee. The adjudication officer can decide to go up to the specified amount. The question of evidence, with which my noble friend was concerned, must still be considered. It is a matter for the claimant to prove —the burden of proof is upon her—that she has fear of violence or whatever the reason might be.
Earl Russell: I ask leave to withdraw the phrase, "without parliamentary approval". It was perhaps a little metaphorical. The noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, kindly explained what I was getting at.
However, I do not understand why my noble kinsman is entitled to come before the Committee and ask us to approve something when he has not yet decided what it is going to be. In addition, my noble kinsman has not answered what was an equally important point in the proposal of this amendment, that the 20 per cent. reduction is lowering the income of the mother, and therefore the child, to below subsistence level. That is thoroughly unsatisfactory. It is a matter to which we shall have to return. Failing any further understanding between us, for the time being I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 43 and 44 not moved.]
Lord Henley Lord Henley moved Amendment No. 45:
Page 16, line 31, at end insert:
("( ) A reduced benefit direction may only be given if the amount of the relevant benefit which is to be reduced has been determined.").
The noble Lord said: I spoke to this amendment with Amendment No. 20. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
[Amendments Nos. 46 and 47 not moved.]
Lord Meston Lord Meston moved Amendment No. 48:
Page 16, line 43, at end insert:
("( ) Where a person has made and is pursuing an appeal against the giving of a reduced benefit direction, that direction shall not come into effect pending the determinations of her appeal.").
The noble Lord said: The purpose of Amendment No. 48 is self-evident. I shall not waste time or words on it. It inserts a provision that benefit shall not be lost while an appeal is pending. I beg to move.
Lord Henley: This amendment seeks to delay the implementation of a decision to reduce benefit in cases where a caring parent has, without good cause, refused to co-operate in obtaining maintenance and has appealed against this decision. The benefit reduction would not come into effect until the appeal had been heard, and also, of course, would depend on the appeal tribunal confirming the original decision to reduce benefit.
The first thing that needs to be said is that, before lodging an appeal, the caring parent would have had two opportunities to present her case that she had a good cause not to co-operate. The effect of the amendment would be contrary to existing practice in
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all other areas of social security benefits. It will also be contrary to the practice which will be used for all other appeals which will arise from decisions taken by the child support agency. The existing practice is that, irrespective of whether an appeal is lodged, the original decision is implemented. If an appeal is lodged and is successful, then the original decision is overturned and the appellant is refunded any benefit due. That is how we intend the appeal mechanism to operate with benefit reduction, so if the appeal tribunal agrees with the caring parent that she did have good cause not to co-operate, then she will be refunded all the benefit she has lost.
There is another powerful argument against the amendment. There will inevitably be a gap between lodging an appeal and the appeal being heard. Many caring parents subject to a benefit reduction will be tempted to postpone the effect of the penalty by appealing, whatever the merits of their case. That could result in a significant increase in work for appeal tribunals, leading to longer delays and more expense. And, of course, some caring parents will leave benefit before the appeal is heard, and will therefore escape a benefit reduction completely.
In the light of those explanations I hope that the noble Lord will not feel it necessary to press the amendment.
Earl Russell: Before my noble friend replies perhaps I may say that I follow my noble kinsman's reasoning regarding the appeal and the refund. However, pending the refund has my noble kinsman given any thought to what the caring parent and child are to live on in the meantime?
Lord Henley: They are living on benefit with the appropriate benefit reduction.
3.30 p.m.
Earl Russell: It may be here that my noble kinsman can give me an answer to the question I asked him before. Does he think that the mother and child can live on that amount?
Lord Henley: We have never said that income support rates are at the absolute subsistence level. I believe that they can live on that amount. As my noble kinsman knows well, there is no reduction for the child. It is only as regards the caring parent's personal amount for income support that any reduction is proposed.
Lord Meston: I am somewhat disappointed by the Minister's answer although I see the force of some of his arguments. Surely the answer to the point that those who wish to put off the reduction can prolong an appeal without merit is to provide for a strict timetable for the appeal procedure. That is a matter I wish to think about further and I may come back with a refined amendment at Report stage. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
On Question Whether Clause 22, as amended, shall stand part of the Bill?
Earl Russell: I owe an apology to the Committee for the fact that it is going to hear a good deal of my voice before the day is out. That is partly because the noble Lords, Lord Henderson of Brompton and Lord Carter, are both away ill. I am sure that the Committee will join with me in wishing them a quick and happy recovery. I can also promise the Committee that I shall not spend as much time on any amendment as I propose to spend on this Motion.
This matter is one of the two or three key issues of the whole Bill. The effect of rejecting this clause would be to remove from the Bill the power to give the parent who does not name the father of the child reduced benefit. It would deprive the Government of the sanction to enforce the requirement to name the father. It would have the effect, as I confess I hope that it would, of removing the element of compulsion from the Bill. I accept what the Government have said: the taxpayer has an interest in this. I am a taxpayer myself and I care about that interest. It can only be pursued in ways which are defensible in principle and above all workable in practice. It is my contention that the system of compulsion being set up under the Bill is neither.
I become more and more unhappy about the principle of disentitlement to benefit. Whatever my noble kinsman may have said, this is a subsistence benefit. I am not convinced by the argument that it is possible to live on 20 per cent. of it. The right social security benefit is part of the nexus of obligations which make up citizenship. It goes with the obligation to pay taxes and the right to vote. For a long time it has been a basic principle of English law that allegiance carries with it the right to protection. In this day and age I do not think that we can interpret the right to protection as meaning simply the right to protection from violent crime or external aggression. It also means protection from deprivation.
I do not see any good reason for depriving people of benefit to the point where they get below subsistence level. The motto that should be enshrined on the Secretary of State's desk is, "Don't let poor Nellie starve." That is clearly not the Government's position. I have been asking about this for some time. I asked in the course of the discussion of the Social Security Bill last year; I asked during the debate on the restart order which we dealt with recently; and I asked through correspondence before moving this amendment. I asked whether the Government will spell out under what circumstances and principles they feel justified in disentitling people to benefit.
The noble and learned Lord answered my letter with typical courtesy and promptitude. I am extremely grateful to him. He confined his answer to the issues of this Bill. In order to join issue, I want to know the Government's general answer to the question: what makes them think they are entitled to deprive people of social security benefits and under what circumstances?
I shall not pursue the issue any further now because it is not necessary to agree with that argument to vote against the clause. It is enough to believe that the system which it sets up is entirely unworkable. One of the major doubts about the clause is how many
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mothers are likely to be affected and what proportion of single mothers are likely to refuse to name the father. The Social Security Advisory Committee, going, so far as I can see, on information from the department, estimated a very low figure of 8,000 to 12,000 mothers. If that is all, then I do not see that it is worth setting up such a cumbrous and expensive machinery with 4,700 additional civil servants to achieve that effect.
Some Members of the Committee may have heard the speech of my noble friend Lord McGregor of Durris on the 13th of this month. He drew attention to research, on which the Bill is based, by professors Bradshaw and Millar which is as yet unpublished. Extracts from that research were published in The Times on Monday 11th March. It gave a figure of 20 per cent. of mothers likely to refuse to name the father. That is a figure of a very different order. It is important to know who is right. That is why I so strongly agree with the regret expressed by my noble friend Lord McGregor of Durris that that research has not been published and therefore we cannot check the grounds on which it is based.
We have here a difference of philosophies. The Government, acting on free market beliefs, assume that people will behave in an economically rational manner if they are to suffer a financial penalty through not naming the father. I doubt that. In areas of both sexual and parental emotions, people are often moved by other things a great deal more than they are by financial motives. We have a case here of free market theorists missing so much. We have the prospect of depriving large numbers of mothers of a large part of their benefit. I cannot see how that can happen without the children suffering.
We should think about the circumstances in which a mother may refuse to comply. It may be because of pride. It is not possible for two people to live with and love each other without learning, or thinking that they have learned—for our purposes it does not matter which—a good deal about the other person. There may be things which make them feel that they never want to meet each other again but which to an adjudication officer would not appear good cause.
Let us consider a case which is within my memory; namely, someone who took his pet rabbit, put it in the tumble drier and switched on. When he got the rabbit out it was dead. If one had suffered a fatal attraction for someone capable of doing that kind of thing, one might feel that one would never wish to have contact with him again. I very much doubt whether that would appear to be good cause to an adjudication officer operating under this Bill.
We must take care of pride. The pride of a single mother is very important. It is essential to her ability to carry on operating. If you set out to break that, you may end by weakening the bond between parent and child.
The other possible reason is fear. We have been told that where there is external proof of domestic violence, that is likely to be regarded as good cause. I welcome that, but it is not spelt out. I wish it were. There are many cases of violence which do not leave a visible mark, least of all when some time has elapsed

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afterwards. With no external proof, there is nothing for it but to take the woman's word. The effect of the provision that the Government offer here is to give every woman who is the victim of domestic violence an incentive to call in the police immediately in order to have a witness. The effect of that will be the breaking of a great many marriages which might otherwise have been saved. I would regret that.
There is also the example of the woman who cannot comply, because she does not know who the father is. I do not understand how the Government propose to deal with that situation. Nor do I understand how the Government propose to deal with a woman who says that she does not know who the father is, because it seems to me that the woman who asserts that she does not know who the father is cannot be legally traversable. One may prove that A, B and C might have been the father, but without a Big Brother of positively Orwellian proportions one cannot prove that X, Y and Z cannot have been the father. So it seems to me that the woman need only say that she does not know who the father is for the whole of this provision to become inoperative.
There is the further possibility that the woman may say, like the famous extract which appeared in This England in 1959, "Oh, I don't know him well enough to know his surname". When I ask a great many of the people I teach to get in touch with each other by surnames they simply do not know who I am talking about. So we may be left with a child support agency having to deal with a statement something like this: "Oh, it was someone called Dave who I met at a party given by Chris somewhere in Wood Green". I really do not see how the unfortunate child support agency is to follow that up. I do not see how justice can be done.
There is also the possibility of the mother, in sheer mischief, naming the wrong person. That has happened in the past when such requirements have been in the law. By the leave of the right reverend Prelates I should like to tell a story of a precedent in the 1620s. Several women in the diocese of Bangor who became single parents were required to name the father. They named the bishop. Unfortunately, the morals of the then Bishop of Bangor were such that he had acquired the nickname of "My Lord Bang-Whore". It was therefore quite impossible for him to clear his name. I think we have here a potential for a very great deal of mischief. If it works as the Government suppose—which I do not suppose it will —then the very minimum effect will be, as the Social Security Advisory Committee said, quite unacceptable stress and hardship both for the mother and the child.
It does not matter in the end whether one thinks that this is, or is not, a good requirement in principle. It cannot be done. I should have thought that in this week of all weeks the Government would realise that Parliament has had enough of trying to use legislation to enforce impossible requirements.
3.45 p.m.
Lord Houghton of Sowerby: No one would believe that a clause of this kind could have any acceptable part in the Bill. I do hope that the Committee will not allow it to stay in. Nobody seeing the glossy covers of the so-called White Paper showing the happy faces of children dancing and playing about could possibly imagine that at the back of it this unacceptable face of child support is embodied in a Bill which is to implement the recommendations in the White Paper.
I could believe that this and subsequent clauses come almost straight from Romania. I cannot believe that they come from any but one source in this Government, and that is the former Prime Minister. I do not believe that any other member of the Government would be the inspiration behind such an authoritarian measure as we are now discussing.
I do not know whether your Lordships have had experience of the personal, social and economic problems lying in the background of this area of human affairs. Happily I have been free of it, but for 10 years during the war I was broadcasting on these and similar problems in our social life. As a Member of the House of Commons for 25 years I was frequently coming up against the grievous personal crises in the lives of quite decent people from a breakdown in their emotional lives.
Can we really imagine—I hope that we can—what may lie behind a breakdown in the relationship which gives rise to the need for a Bill of this kind? Human emotions are a mystery. Why do these relations break down? Can anyone tell us why? Sometimes not even the people involved in them can do that. Is it not asking too much of an applicant, or a person who wishes not to be personally involved in procedures against her former partner, to put her hand to a document which authorises bureaucracy to go in pursuit? To suggest that people—mostly women—will find themselves deprived of some of the social support provided under the social security Acts in default of giving their name to such action is quite outrageous. It is negative child support. It is a deprivation of child support if the penalty for not assenting to the pursuit of the other partner is to be a loss of child support in cash under the social security arrangements. Therefore, I feel that the clause is a blot on the Bill. I sincerely hope that the Committee will not allow it to stay in.
There is a better way. The lack of feeling, the lack of understanding and the proliferation of regulations which the Bill permits the Secretary of State to introduce are really quite unacceptable. The power given to the Secretary of State to make regulations of a punitive nature, reaching far into the personal lives of individuals, is something we cannot stand for. I sincerely hope that, come what may, this clause will never stand in the legislation of this country. It is not desirable for your Lordships to be associated with it. Let the other place, if it feels electorally qualified, keep in these provisions, or put them in. Do not let us be an accomplice in this outrageous legislation to intrude into the lives of people who are already miserable, who have already suffered a great deal and who have probably had their lives ruined by their own mistakes

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or their faults of judgment in linking up with other people. I profoundly hope that we shall not allow this clause to stand part of the Bill.
Lord Mishcon: The noble Earl, Lord Russell, had the privilege of addressing the Minister as his noble kinsman. I do not have that privilege; but, with the permission of Members of the Committee, I shall quote a noble kinsman of mine. I refer to the prophet Micah who possibly had some words which could be addressed to the Committee at present. He said:
"What doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly and to love mercy".
I think that that is an appropriate thought to bear in mind when looking at the clause which is now before us.
I do not propose to repeat the arguments which were advanced so eloquently by the two previous speakers. However, I should like to ask this question: who will be penalised? The income support and the family credit are used to keep the little household going. That is added to by the maintenance for the child. If anything is deducted from what we all agree is a meagre sum which goes into the household, who suffers? Is it the mother who suffers by depriving herself of food so that the child can eat despite the deduction, or is it the child whom we are trying to help by way of this Bill?
As I said, I shall not repeat the arguments which have already been put forward. However, I invite Members of the Committee to throw out this clause for more than the latter reason. If we are to give the Secretary of State power to make this reduction, possibly because—this is the main example which has been put forward—a mother declines to mention the name of the father, one would have thought that before such a power was given to penalise the right to penalise would be closely defined in language which the Committee could support. The words at issue are, "without good cause".
If I remember correctly, the White Paper gave some examples of what could be termed as being "without good cause". We were told—and I remember the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor saying this—that these words would be defined in regulations and that we would know when the regulations were issued what ought to move the minds of those who have to take these decisions as being "without good cause". I ventured to ask the noble and learned Lord whether it was possible to specify what those words meant and what ought to guide the officials. I asked why such a definition was not included in primary legislation when it could be spelt out in secondary legislation. The noble and learned Lord answered me perfectly fairly, as is his usual custom. He said that it was difficult to amend primary legislation and that it was easier to amend regulations. He said that one did not wish to have in the statute fixed words which may need to be amended at a later stage.
I understand that that principle may apply to formulas in the Bill—for example, the value of the pound and the change in social conditions over the years—but, as regards the words "without good
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cause", is it likely that a criterion will arise in future months and years which cannot be forecast at this time?
If we are asked to pass this clause—I hope that Members of the Committee will decide that that is not our decision —can we possibly do so without knowing what a regulation will say about the guidance to be given to an official and before we know why he decides that the person concerned has not complied with the request for information without having good cause for such non-compliance?
Is it not sufficient that what we do is to say to ourselves, "In passing this Bill our primary objective is not to help the Department of Social Security to save money. Our primary consideration is not to save money for the Treasury; the paramount consideration governing our thoughts"—as it governed our thoughts as regards the Children Act and matrimonial legislation—"is the welfare of the child". How can we in conscience deprive the child, even indirectly, by introducing a penalising measure in respect of someone who does not answer a question, be it as to the fatherhood of the child or anything else, put by an official having a jurisdiction to operate within the words "without good cause" which are completely vague? It is with good cause that we throw out this clause of the Bill.
Lord Coleraine: I entirely share the wish of the Government to rectify what is clearly an abuse of the social security system. It cannot be right for the single mother to refuse to name the parent of her illegitimate child so that the state, rather than the parent who is probably working, bears the cost of the maintenance. That means that the maintenance is paid by the taxpayer. Therefore, in principle I would not in any sense object to penalisation of such a mother.
We are being asked to reduce the benefit which would go to the child or which would go to the family for the benefit of the child. It is curious that the figure which has been chosen for the reduction of benefit is 20 per cent. of the weekly personal allowance of an adult. It also happens, by chance or by design, to be the amount of the family premium. I cannot believe that to take away the family premium of £7.35 can do anything but remove support for the children, which is what the Bill seeks to achieve.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: I am also very worried about this clause for the reasons which have already been given. I should like to point out to noble Lords on the opposite side of the Committee that we must be very careful as regards what we do in this respect. I instance the imposition of the poll tax as being a salutary lesson from which we should learn and which should persuade us to be very careful when we introduce a new provision without having properly considered its effects. I fear that the effects of this clause have not been properly considered.
In my view the Bill was not conceived in a reasonable manner. It was not conceived with the object of putting the child first; it was conceived with the object of saving money for the Treasury. I believe

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that it was conceived on the basis that, having had the pleasure, fathers should suffer the pain. That is not a good way to prepare such a Bill.
When the press hear about some of the hardship cases which will arise in the future they will be made the subject of headlines. The press may believe that there are good reasons for the mother not naming the father, although the officer making the assessment may not be of the same opinion. If the press then find out that the mother and child are being deprived of sustenance despite those good reasons, the headlines in the newspapers will be just as bad for the Government and for the Bill as were those in regard to the poll tax and its collection. Therefore I hope that we shall be careful before passing the Bill with this clause in it. It is a minefield. I say that advisedly. We have had the experience of letting through ill-considered legislation. I say that in all conscience and with the utmost goodwill to Members opposite. We do not want a repeat.
Before I sit down I return to the point I raised on Clause 5. We were unable fully to debate it last Thursday and we cannot fully debate it now. I raised the subject of the so-called virgin birth. The Government have not said that they will ban virgin births. They have not said that they disagree with the system, but under this clause we could be creating two types of family: one family which has had the intervention of a man in the birth of a child who could be deprived of benefit for certain reasons; and another type of family which, because a man did not intervene, would be entitled to benefit under all circumstances. I urge the Minister to consider that point, because it will have to be considered in due course. We cannot have two types of mother and child: the one which under all circumstances will be entitled to state benefit and the other which may not be entitled to state benefit. I urge the Government to consider that point. If the Government will not withdraw the clause I hope that the Committee will vote against it.
4 p.m.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: The formidable difficulties which the clause raises are becoming ever more apparent. Human backgrounds are such that the circumstances can be infinitely different. The Government would do well to withdraw the clause at this stage and give very much more thought to the problems which are becoming apparent.
So far as the mother is concerned, there are two different situations, although one can shade off to the other. The first is where the mother knows who the father is but does not wish to say. In such a case it seems reasonable to say to the mother, "You are claiming a benefit. You are claiming it ultimately from the taxpayers who have their own children to support. It may be that you have good cause to refuse to name the father". One can think of cases—some of which have been mentioned—such as incest, child abuse, in certain circumstances wife battering, and others. That is one situation. The mother may have good cause, but
540
that must be weighed against the fact that she is claiming a benefit and thereby depriving taxpayers and seeking to place the burden on other parents.
The other case is where the mother does not know who the father is. That again can arise in two situations: she may genuinely not know the identity of the father in a promiscuous encounter, or she may have had sexual intercourse with several men at the relevant time and not know which is the father. Those cases raise different considerations. In the second case, if the mother names the man there is a medical procedure nowadays by way of blood testing in which the technique has developed so far that a named individual can be virtually excluded.
What seems transcendent here is that the question of "good cause" in those infinitely divergent circumstances is one which should be determined by a court and not by an official of the department. That problem, on a more general basis, is awaiting consideration on Report when the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, will put forward again the amendment which he rightly withdrew owing to the lateness of the hour on the last occasion we considered the Bill. That is the general issue. This matter vindicates a great deal of what the noble Lord said last Thursday. Even if one does not give the courts and officialdom a concurrent jurisdiction the issue (good cause for refusing to name the father) is essentially one for a court of law.
The unfortunate woman whose hopes of a happy marriage have been frustrated is surely entitled to go before a bench of magistrates which is impersonal but which can consider her situation in all its infinite diversity from the point of view of fellow human beings. I do not mean to say that officials of the department are heartless—far from it but that is how they will appear to a woman if she receives an adverse answer. She is entitled to go before a court of law. If she there receives an adverse answer, at least she will have had the decision made made by her fellow citizens.
Baroness Faithfull: I should like to ask my noble friend the Minister a question. We have been talking about the woman and the child all the time. What about the father or the alleged father, following what the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale, said? If there is a dispute between the mother and the father over the child, it may be the father who disputes the point. That is a matter we have not touched upon. What is the Government's attitude to that position?
Secondly, I find the whole situation we are arguing this afternoon difficult because we do not know what we are arguing about. Amendment No. 47, which was not moved, provided:
"The Secretary of State shall issue guidance, in the form of a code of practice, to child support officers and other officers".
As my noble friend the Minister said, the regulations have not yet been published, so we do not know what we are talking about. Therefore I find it difficult to decide what to do. I could not vote for the clause as it stands.
Lord Henley: We are talking about the benefit sanction of making a reduction in the mother's personal allowance and only that allowance. I should

541
make clear, particularly to my noble friend Lord Coleraine, that this would not affect the family premium, nor the lone parent premium nor the allowance for children. We are talking purely about a sanction against the mother, by making a reduction in her personal allowance when she refuses to co-operate.
Lord Coleraine: I am grateful to my noble friend for giving way. I did not suggest that anything was taken away from the family premium, merely that it was a strange coincidence that the amount being taken away from the single person's allowance —and it is the same whether the person is an adult or under 18 happens to be the amount of the family premium. It may as well be the family premium.
Lord Henley: That is not the case. As I was going on to say in response to my noble friend Lady Faithfull and as I said earlier in response to the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, we have not yet decided on the duration of the sanction or the level of the amount. I gave the assurance that we would bring forward the figures at some point before the Bill left this House.
Income support is not a subsistence benefit, as my noble kinsman Lord Russell stated. There is scope for a sanction in this case. Anyway, the carer has the option of electing to co-operate and therefore avoiding the reduction. She only loses if she refuses to co-operate and there is no good cause. I shall come to the matter of no good cause later. I say briefly to the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, that we have agreed to consult on the definition of "no good cause", and we envisage the matter going to the Social Security Advisory Committee.
Lord Mishcon: Will the noble Lord forgive me for intervening? I promise not to do so again unless I have to. If the amount and the phrase "good cause" will be decided later—the noble Lord was fair and said that it will be decided before Third Reading—would it not be sensible for the Government to accept the withdrawal of the clause at this stage? Then, before Third Reading, the Minister could give the House the Government's considered view as to the amount and duration as well as their definition, following consultation, of "good cause". The House could then consider in the light of that information whether the clause should be brought back at Third Reading. Is that not the obvious course to take?
Lord Henley: I do not believe that the House would have the power to do that. I have no intention of withdrawing the clause at the moment: it is surely just as legitimate to leave it in the Bill. If the noble Lord is not satisfied with the assurances that I bring forward before Third Reading, he may seek to remove the clause at that time. However, it would be wrong to remove it now. I shall return to "good cause" later.
My noble kinsman also asked about deductions from other benefits. He implied that it was wrong on any occasion to make reductions in benefit. There are various occasions when we insist on a reduction in benefit and most people agree that that is right. I cite one—the voluntary unemployment deduction. Someone who becomes voluntarily unemployed loses
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entitlement to unemployment benefit. If he refuses actively to seek work, he will find that his income support is reduced by 40 per cent. or 20 per cent., depending on the circumstances. Most people would accept it as right that those who are not prepared to work and refuse to do so should not be entitled to the same benefits as those who do work.
Earl Russell: Perhaps I may save my noble kinsman a little time. I am aware of the list of cases but I ask whether there is any general principle which governs them.
4.15 p.m.
Lord Henley: I am trying to give the justification for that example, and I have done so. It is right that those who refuse to work should not be entitled to the same benefits as those who are unable to work. Similarly, as we are trying to make clear on this occasion, for those who refuse to co-operate without good cause there should be a benefit sanction. As the noble Earl knows, already most caring parents are prepared to co-operate with the department to obtain maintenance for their children as they recognise that it is right, proper and in the interests of the children to do so. We expect that the reduction that is, this benefit sanction—will only be needed in a small number of cases. I would be the first to admit that the benefit savings will be insignificant, but there is no question of penalising someone who has good reason not to co-operate.
We do not wish to reduce the benefit of a caring parent unless we feel we have no option. The caring parent who feels unable to co-operate will have three separate opportunities to make her case. After discussion with the child support officer and the adjudication officer, the matter will end by going before the social security appeal tribunal. That tribunal is independent of the Department of Social Security: it will re-examine the matter. In that case, the caring parent has ample opportunity to put her case.
Various Members of the Committee have raised in different ways—whether in regard to virgin births or promiscuity—the question of whether the caring parent knows the name of the father. The question of knowledge is not relevant; it is whether she is prepared to co-operate. If she genuinely does not know the name of the liable relative, whatever the means by which he became the liable relative, she will obviously be unable to give his name. She will be expected to give as much information as she can in order to give the child support agency as much information to go on as possible. In response to my noble friend Lady Faithfull, perhaps I may make it quite clear that obviously disputes over establishing paternity are a matter for the courts.
That brings me to evidence. We touched on the matter when we spoke of violence and what kind of evidence the caring parent would have to provide to prove the violence. The same would apply to whether corroboration was needed of the claim that she had no knowledge of the identity of the father. Our adjudication officers already have guidance on corroboration of a claimant's own evidence. It is

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based on the commissioner's decision. I believe that the case has been published and I am prepared to make details available to Members of the Committee by placing them in the Library, if the Committee so wishes.
Among the main points that the commissioner made in the decision to which I have referred is that, first, the burden of proof will rest on the claimant. She is not bound to prove whatever it is beyond all reasonable doubt. She is entitled to be believed if, when considering the evidence as a whole, the balance of probability is in her favour. There is no rule of English law that corroboration of the claimant's evidence is necessary. She is also entitled to be believed unless her evidence is self-contradictory or contains something inherently improbable, or something in the claimant's demeanour does not inspire confidence in her truthfulness. However, it is seldom safe to reject evidence solely for the last reason. If these provisions are satisfied, the claimant's own evidence should be accepted. Lastly, if evidence is rejected on any of the grounds stated above, then the adjudicating authority should identify in reasonable detail the grounds for such rejection.
I hope that I have satisfied Members of the Committee as to the necessity for the sanction. It is clear to me that imposing an obligation is meaningless unless there is some sanction in the event of that obligation not being fulfilled. Removing the sanction would mean that caring parents could, possibly with the connivance of the other parent, decide to let the absent parent off scot free and allow the taxpayer to foot the bill, knowing that there is nothing that the agency can do about it. That cannot be right, and I urge the Committee to reject the arguments of my noble kinsman and to agree that Clause 22 should stand part of this Bill.
Earl Russell: I am deeply grateful for the support I have received from every quarter of the Committee. I am deeply grateful to my noble kinsman for the care, courtesy, and thoroughness of his answer. I cannot say that I am entirely satisfied. I agree with the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Faithfull, and the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, about the impropriety of asking us to approve matters which are not decided.
I am not convinced that income support is not a subsistence benefit. I am not convinced in particular by my noble kinsman's argument that we can distinguish between the money going to the mother and the money going to the child. You do not divide a weekly packet of butter into one small part which is for the child and another which is for the mother. If there is less butter, there is less for both of them.
There are other causes we have not touched on. There is, for example, the possibility that where the father's name is revealed he will be in danger of violence from the woman's brothers. Such things have happened. Where we are dealing with cases where the woman genuinely does not know the adjudication officer acting on behalf of the Government risks the suspicion that he may be judge and party in his own cause.
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Finally, every attempt to come between women and their reproductive functions, from the Infanticide Act 1624 onwards, has led to failure. This will be no exception. I oppose the Motion that the clause stand part of the Bill.
4.22 p.m.
On Question, Whether Clause 22, as amended, shall stand part of the Bill?
Their Lordships divided: Contents, 106; Not-Contents, 110.

Division No. 1

CONTENTS

Aldington, L.

Lindsey and Abingdon, E.

Alexander of Tunis, E.

Long, V.

Allenby of Megiddo, V.

Lurgan, L.

Ampthill, L.

Lytton, E.

Arran, E.

McAlpine of West Green, L.

Astor, V.

Mackay of Clashfern, L.

Belhaven and Stenton, L.

Mancroft, L.

Bessborough, E.

Margadale, L.

Birdwood, L.

Merrivale, L.

Blatch, B.

Mersey, V.

Blyth, L.

Middleton, L.

Brabazon of Tara,L.

Monteagle of Brandon, L.

Brougham and Vaux, L.

Mottistone, L.

Butterworth, L.

Mountgarret, V.

Caithness, E.

Munster, E.

Caldecote, V.

Nelson, E.

Campbell of Alloway, L.

Newall, L.

Campbell of Croy, L.

Norfolk, D.

Carnegy of Lour, B.

Norrie, L.

Carnock, L.

Northbourne, L.

Cavendish of Furness, L.

Nugent of Guildford, L.

Clanwilliam, E.

Orr-Ewing, L.

Colnbrook, L.

Oxfuird, V.

Cottesloe, L.

Platt of Writtle, B.

Cox, B.

Quinton, L.

Davidson, V. [Teller.]

Radnor, E.

Denham, L. [Teller.]

Rankeillour, L.

Downshire, M

Renwick, L.

Elibank, L.

Richardson, L.

Elton, L.

Rodney, L.

Erne, E.

Selborne, E.

Ferrers, E.

Shannon, E.

Fortescue, E.

Sharples, B.

Fraser of Carmyllie, L.

Skelmersdale, L.

Fraser of Kilmorack, L.

Soulsby of Swaffham Prior, L.

Gainford, L.

Sterling of Plaistow, L.

Geddes, L.

Strathclyde, L.

Grimston of Westbury, L

Strathmore and Kinghorne, E.

Grimthorpe, L.

Strathspey, L.

Hailsham of

Sudeley, L.

Saint Marylebone, L.

Swinfen, L.

Halsbury, E.

Terrington, L.

Hardinge of Penshurst,

Teviot, L.

Harmsworth, L.

Thomas of Gwydir, L.

Haslam, L.

Trefgarne, L.

Henley, L.

Trumpington, B.

Hesketh, L.

Ullswater, V.

Hood, V.

Vaux of Harrowden, L.

Hooper, B.

Waddington, L.

Howe, E.

Wade of Chorlton, L.

Johnston of Rockport, L.

Westbury, L.

Kinnaird, L.

Wise, L.

Knollys, V.

Wynford, L.

Lauderdale, E.

NOT-CONTENTS

Acton, L.

Banks, L.

Addington, L.

Birk, B.

Airedale, L.

Blackstone, B.

Alport, L.

Bonham-Carter, L.

Annan, L.

Boston of Faversham, L.

Ardwick, L.

Bottomley, L.

Aylestone, L.

Broadbridge, L.

Bancroft, L.

Campbell of Eskan, L.

545

Carmichael of Kelvingrove, L.

Lockwood, B.

Cledwyn of Penrhos, L.

Longford, E.

Clinton-Davis, L.

Lovell-Davis, L.

Cocks of Hartcliffe, L.

McGregor of Durris, L.

Coleraine, L.

McIntosh of Haringey, L.

Dacre of Glanton, L.

Mackie of Benshie, L.

David, B.

Mais, L.

Dean of Beswick, L.

Mason of Barnsley, L.

Donaldson of Kingsbridge, L.

Meston, L.

Dormand of Easington, L.

Milner of Leeds, L.

Ellenborough, L.

Mishcon,L.

Elliot of Harwood, B.

Molloy, L.

Ennals, L.

Monkswell, L.

Ezra, L.

Morris of Castle Morris, L.

Faithfull, B.

Mulley, L.

Falkland, V.

Murray of Epping Forest, L.

Fisher of Rednal, B.

Nicol, B.

Flowers, L.

Ogmore, L

Gallacher, L.

Pitt of Hampstead, L.

Galpern, L.

Prys-Davies, L.

Gladwyn, L.

Richard, L.

Glenamara, L.

Ritchie of Dundee, L.

Graham of Edmonton, L. [Teller.]

Rochester, L.

Greenway, L.

Russell, E. [Teller.]

Gregson, L.

Sainsbury, L.

Gridley, L.

Saltoun of Abernethy, Ly.

Hampton, L.

Shepherd, L.

Hanworth, V.

Simon of Glaisdale, L.

Harris of Greenwich, L.

Stallard, L.

Hayter, L.

Stedman, B.

Hollis of Heigham, B.

Stoddart of Swindon, L.

Houghton of Sowerby, L.

Strabolgi, L.

Hughes, L.

Taylor of Blackburn, L.

Hunt, L.

Thomson of Monifieth, L.

Hutchinson of Lullington, L.

Tordoff, L.

Hylton-Foster, B.

Turner of Camden, B.

Irvine of Lairg, L.

Underhill, L.

Jeger, B.

Varley, L.

Jenkins of Putney, L.

Wallace of Coslany, L

John-Mackie, L.

Walston, L.

Kilbracken, L.

Wilberforce, L.

Kilmarnock, L.

Williams of Elvel, L.

Kinloss, Ly.

Wilson of Rievaulx, L.

Kirkhill, L.

Winchilsea and Nottingham, E.

Listowel, E.

Winstanley, L.

Llewelyn-Davies of Hastoe, B.

Young of Dartington, L.

Lloyd-George of Dwyfor, E.

Resolved in the negative, and Clause 22, as amended, disagreed to accordingly.
Clause 6 [Right of child in Scotland to apply for assessment]:
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 50:
Page 4, line 30, at end insert ("or the absent parent").
The noble and learned Lord said: With this Amendment No. 50 I should like to speak also to Amendments Nos. 51 and 52. Clause 6 enables a child who is a qualifying child in Scotland to apply for the voluntary facilities provided by the Secretary of State for Social Security in circumstances where no application has been made by the person who has care of the child. Amendment No. 50 seeks to amend Clause 6(1) to reflect the fact that under Clause 3(1) either the person who has care of the child or the absent parent is entitled to apply for an assessment. If the absent parent has applied it will be unnecessary for the child to do so.
I now turn to Clause 6(5) which lays a duty on the person with care of a child to provide, so far as that person reasonably can, information as set out in the subsection to enable the absent parent to be traced, the amount of maintenance to be assessed, and that
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maintenance to be recovered. Amendment No. 51 extends that duty to the child making the application and to the absent parent.
The amendment is intended to deal with the practical point that since the person with care has not elected to apply for maintenance herself she may perhaps be reluctant to provide information to the Secretary of State when the child applies under Clause 6. However, a child who has been sufficiently motivated to seek maintenance on his own behalf may have useful information to impart. Moreover, there will frequently be cases where the absent parent, when traced, will readily provide such information. The amendment accordingly extends the duty to provide information to the child making the application and to the absent parent.
The Committee may wish to note that there is no sanction or penalty for non-compliance with this duty. To attach any financial penalty would be inappropriate. However, we believe that the majority of people will comply with the law and having the duty set out on the face of the Bill also provides authority for the child support officers in conducting their inquiries. Amendment No. 52 is consequential upon acceptance of Amendment No. 51. I beg to move Amendment No. 50.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale Lord Simon of Glaisdale moved Amendment No. 50A:
Page 4, line 31, leave out subsection (2).
The noble and learned Lord said: I need hardly say, since this is a Scottish provision, that this is a distinctly probing amendment. The subsection which I am questioning refers to Clause 5 and excludes subsection (1) in the circumstances of Clause 5. Clause 5 is the clause, the Committee will remember, which enables the Secretary of State to take over, in effect, the rights of the caring mother where she has claimed social security benefit and enables him to pursue the absent father by various means and through various procedures.
Obviously subsection (2) excludes subsection (1) in those circumstances and I take it that the reason is that subsection (1), and indeed the remaining provisions of the clause as it now is, operate to allow a child in Scotland to initiate proceedings which in England and Wales can be pursued only by the mother.
That being so, presumably subsection (2) is there to prevent people taking advantage of the provision of Scottish law referred to; to obviate, to sidestep, the set of provisions and safeguards of Clause 5. If I am right in that—as I hope I am so far; it does not require much knowledge of Scottish law—there seems to me rather a good deal of repetition of the earlier provisions of the Bill, particularly in subsections (5) and (7). I put down the amendment only to question how far those provisions are necessary by way of repetition. I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: I am grateful to my noble and learned friend Lord Simon of Glaisdale for raising this point. This matter has come up only recently and it seems to me that there is a good deal of substance in the question whether we need subsection (2) at all. If

547
my noble and learned friend will be prepared to leave it with me I should like to have a little time to consider it and I shall then let him know what I have concluded. I see considerable force in what he said.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: I am extremely grateful to my noble and learned friend. In those circumstances, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Mishcon; Before leave is granted I should like from these Benches to say how much we appreciate the contributions made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale, which are often so useful, especially in regard to the language and the constitutional position of the statute.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendments Nos. 51 and 52:
Page 5, line 2, after ("child") insert (", the absent parent and the child concerned").
Page 5, line 2, leave out ("that person") and insert ("they").
The noble and learned Lord said: I have just spoken to these amendments with Amendment No. 50. I beg to move.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 53:
Page 5, line 11, leave out ("in particular").
The noble and learned Lord said: I spoke to this amendment with Amendment No. 13. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Baroness David moved Baroness David moved Amendment No. 53A:
Leave out Clause 6 and insert the following new clause:
("Right of child to apply for assessment
(1) A child, where the Secretary of State is satisfied that the child has sufficient understanding, may apply to the Secretary of State for maintenance assessment to be made with respect to him if no such application has been made by a person who is, with respect to that child, a person with care.
(2) Subsection (1) does not apply in any case where section 5 applies.
(3) Where a maintenance assessment has been made in response to an application under this section the Secretary of State may, if the person with care, the absent parent with respect to whom the assessment was made or the child concerned applies to him under this subsection, arrange for—

(a) the collection of the child support maintenance payable in accordance with the assessment;

(b) the enforcement of the obligation to pay child support maintenance in accordance with the assessment.

(4) Where the application under subsection (3) for the enforcement of the obligation mentioned in subsection (3) (b) authorises the Secretary of State to take steps to enforce that obligation whenever he considers it necessary to do so, the Secretary of State may act accordingly.
(5) Where a child has asked the Secretary of State to proceed under this section, the person with care of the child shall, so far as that person reasonably can—

(a) give the Secretary of State such information as the Secretary of State considers necessary to enable—

(i) the absent parent to be traced (where that is necessary);

(ii) the amount of child support maintenance payable by the absent parent; and

548

(b) in particular, comply with any regulations made by the Secretary of State for the purposes of this subsection as to the categories of information that he requires.

(6) The child who has made the application (hut not the person having care of him) may at any time request the Secretary of State to cease acting under this section (but subject to any regulations made under subsection (8)).
(7) The obligation to provide information which is imposed by subsection (5)—

(a) shall not apply in such circumstances as may be prescribed by the Secretary of State; and

(b) may, in such circumstances as may be so prescribed, be waived by the Secretary of State.

(8) The Secretary of State may by regulations make such incidental, supplemental or transitional provision as he thinks appropriate with respect to cases in which he is requested to cease to act under this section.").
The noble Baroness said: Clause 6 as it stands retains the existing right of boys aged 14 and girls aged 12 in Scotland to make their own applications for maintenance if their parent does not. This amendment extends this right to all mature children in Great Britain. It uses the formula of "sufficient understanding" used in the Children Act to determine when a court can accept applications from children.
I do not know how the noble and learned Lord can defend a situation in Scotland not applying to England. I shall also be interested if he can tell the Committee why this occurred in the first place. There seems to me no logical reason why children in England and Wales should be unable to make such applications, or for retaining the discriminatory age-based rights of Scotland.
It is obviously sensible for children to have this right. For example, there may be circumstances where a mother who is not on welfare benefit, and so cannot be bullied by the threat of a reduction, refuses to pursue a father for maintenance out of pride or hatred when the children need or want this form of support. I am sure that there could be other situations.
At Second Reading my noble friend Lord Mishcon drew the attention of the noble and learned Lord to that point. He said:
"In Clause 6 there is a provision that in Scotland the right of a child to make its own application is to continue. I ask a question, and it may be that my ignorance may be shown up when I receive the answer. For the benefit of the whole House I ask: has that provision worked well in Scotland? Is it used very often in Scotland? If that right of a child is to apply in Scotland, should it not be available in England and Wales as well?"—[Official Report, 25/2/91; col. 783.]
The noble and learned Lord did not answer my noble friend's question when he replied to the debate. Therefore I shall be very interested to hear the response to that question as well as to the amendment. I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: In proposing a structure such as we have in this Bill it is right to have regard to the underlying law in the two jurisdictions. For reasons of history, and for other good reasons, there are a number of distinctions between the system of law operating in England and Wales and that which operates in Scotland. There are fairly deep differences, not of principle but in the way in which matters are approached.
In England and Wales there is no tradition of minor children being allowed to seek their own maintenance

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from the courts. That has always been done on their behalf by their parent, guardian or custodian. The Bill is not intended to disrupt the structures of family law more than is strictly necessary. Therefore the Bill's provisions concerning who may apply for an order in England and Wales mirror the substance of existing provisions and traditions in England and Wales. For similar reasons the provisions dealing with Scotland mirror the existing and traditional right of children to apply for aliment when the children become minors—in the case of girls when they reach the age of 12 and in the case of boys when they reach 14. That is the traditional Scottish distinction. Up to that time they are regarded as having no right to sue. Once they become minors they have a right to sue.
To provide the answer for which the noble Lord has had to wait for some time, children in Scotland seldom exercise that right before they have entered further education, although it would be wrong to deprive children in Scotland of that traditional right. It is not intended that the child support scheme should cover children in further education, so the existing right of children to apply, including that of 18 year-olds in England and Wales, will be preserved in those circumstances. Therefore, where it is important the two situations are the same.
As drafted the noble Baroness's amendment would enable any child to seek child support maintenance even where he was not a "qualifying child" within the meaning of Clause 2. That is the present Scottish law: a child is entitled to maintenance irrespective of conditions, such as that the family has broken up (although in reality he would only use the court in such circumstances).
As I mentioned earlier in the debates on amendments to Clause 2, the Bill has been deliberately crafted to apply only to certain categories of children. One requirement is that the parent be absent, because otherwise the state would be interfering in family life to an unprecedented and unwarrantable extent. Another requirement is that the child should be living with a person who has care of him. Those conditions apply both in Scotland and in England and Wales. That is because it may not always be appropriate for a parent to be automatically liable for supporting a child who has chosen to leave home and live independently, perhaps despite the parent's willingness to continue to accommodate and care for the child within the parental home. The noble Baroness's amendment does not reflect those conditions.
It is also important to note that the phraseology which the noble Baroness has used, which is of very distinguished parentage having come from the Children Act, was used in that Act in respect of the right to make representations. The present Clause 6 relating to Scotland is much more specific about which children are old enough to be able themselves to apply for maintenance. Those children who are not pupils, that is to say, girls under the age of 12 or boys under the age of 14, cannot apply under the Scottish system. For such a provision it is very important to have a clear definition of who may apply because one does not wish to have to entertain an application in order
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to ascertain whether an application can be entertained, which would be necessary under the noble Baroness's method of working.
The distinction follows a general principle of Scots law that a pupil has no legal personality and that for most purposes actions must be brought on such a child's behalf by its parent as tutor. Replacing that with a general criterion of whether the Secretary of State believes a particular child to be of sufficient understanding to make the application would be to depart from those principles of Scots law which, as I have said, we think it right to replicate in this scheme as it affects Scotland. We are attempting to take the distinct systems in the two jurisdictions and apply to them the general principles of the scheme, taking proper account of the underlying system.
I fear that for the reasons which I have given the noble Baroness's amendment would not be acceptable. I understand perfectly the reason for her putting it forward, and that has given me an opportunity to answer the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, at Second Reading. I believe that the answer was squeezed out because in answering the debate on Second Reading I found myself exceeding to a considerable extent what I considered to be a reasonable time. I hope that in the light of that explanation the noble Baroness will feel able to withdraw her amendment.
4.45 p.m.
Lord Mishcon: After expressing my thanks for the answer that the noble and learned Lord has given to the question that I posed at Second Reading, I hope that he and other Members of the Committee will forgive me if I introduce a wider issue so that we can deal with it once and for all.
The real issue which has been raised by my noble friend Lady David is this. There is a provision in Scots law. When we have an opportunity to look at our own law and to make fresh law, would it be sensible to see whether Scotland, or indeed any other country, has a different provision of which we can take advantage? Where we continue the life of a provision of Scots law, ought we not to ask ourselves whether it is not sensible, if we approve of what we have given to Scotland—and presumably we do because we have continued it—to look at our own law, to see whether with advantage we could borrow from Scots law? We have often done so and the fewer distinctions there are between the law on either side of the Border the better. It is absurd to wander over a border of a united kingdom and find that different laws apply, particularly when they relate to people's rights.
One has thought of questions of divorce law, which one need not go into at this moment although we may have to go into them hereafter in this Chamber. So we should look at the advantage or disadvantage of the Scottish provision.
The noble and learned Lord has explained that in Scotland the provision is used mainly by children in further education whereas it is not used often by younger children. I have in mind, and I have no doubt that my noble friend Lady David had in mind, the example of a household in which the mother

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unfortunately drinks heavily and is largely incapable of making any sensible application. As a result nobody makes the application, but there happens to be an extremely intelligent child who thinks, "I have to make it, and I am going to make it". There is also the case of the mother who is too ill to make the application but the child is sufficiently mature to make it.
Under our present provisions, unless complicated arrangements such as guardianship come to the fore, there is a gap. Is that not a lacuna which it would be sensible to fill? What harm would it do if the Scottish law were to be applicable here in the same way that we are saying that it shall continue for the purposes of this legislation?
I believe that my noble friend Lady David will agree with me, but if she does not I know that she will say so. The noble and learned Lord has given an answer as to the difference between Scottish law and English law and on the traditional backgrounds. Should my noble friend decide in the circumstances to withdraw the amendment at this stage, would the noble and learned Lord feel that, arising out of it, it would be a good thing to consider the advantages of making the provisions of Scots law similar to those of England and Wales so as to allow even the occasional case of a child who otherwise would not be able to apply?
I certainly do not ask the noble and learned Lord for an answer now as to whether he is or is not in favour but I wonder whether he would consider that suggestion and possibly between now and Report stage give some intimation to the noble Baroness, Lady David, and perhaps write to me and other noble Lords who happen to be interested. One would then know whether a useful purpose could be served by either the Government or these Benches tabling an amendment which could be discussed.
The Lord Chancellor: One has to remember that this will be only a part of the two distinct systems of law. One does not want to make a legal system unnecessarily complicated. Therefore the rules of the English system should generally prevail in relating this particular Bill to the English system. This is not a general law reform measure. For example, if it were thought right that Scottish minors should have rights which would be replicated in England, that would be a much more general question than relating it to the structure of this particular Bill. Certainly the qualification for suing which I mentioned would look very odd to English eyes. The ages of 12 for girls and 14 for boys, if suddenly put into an English provision, would, I imagine, raise some quite remarkable comment. However that is and has been the Scottish law for a long time.
Consideration has been given by the Scottish Law Commission to the general law in this area. Therefore, if one were to make a change of the kind indicated by the noble Lord, I should have thought that it would be in a more general context than the context of this Bill. However, I am perfectly willing to consider whether anything should be done about this. I think it rather unlikely that I should feel that the scope for it was
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sufficient to make it wise to have a fairly elaborate and rather exceptional looking structure. We have plenty of complaints about the size of the statute book. With some of those complaints I have some sympathy. Unless the matter were to have some substantial practical benefit, I doubt whether it would be worth while.
Lord Mishcon: If the noble and learned Lord and other Members will forgive me, perhaps I may add just one comment. He himself raised the question of the right of a child to make representations and to be consulted, a matter which was completely unknown to English law before he so sensibly put that reform into the Children Bill. We have deviated from our law in order to give children rights. It may be that in 1991 children mature at an earlier age than when I was a child—certainly I was referred to as immature for quite a long time and I am sure correctly so. On that note perhaps we should all like to take advantage of the noble and learned Lord's offer but it is for my noble friend Lady David to decide what to do with her amendment.
Baroness David: I thank the noble and learned Lord for his very full answer to my amendment. I also thank my noble friend for his support. I am perfectly prepared to believe that my amendment is flawed and that it could be made very much better.
I still have anxieties about children being in a different position in the two countries, which, after all, are very close. The United Kingdom is a small place. I am surprised that the noble and learned Lord said that children seldom exercise this right before they get to the further education stage and that therefore he thought it worth while to keep the provision. However, he said that he would look at the matter and think about it and, in the light of that offer, I thank him and beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 6, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 7 [Role of the courts with respect to maintenance for children.]
Lord Simon of Glaisdale Lord Simon of Glaisdale moved Amendment No. 53B:
Page 5, line 37, leave out ("and absent parent").
The noble and learned Lord said: This is a slightly disingenuous attempt to take advantage of a possible ambiguity in order to ask a question which has been asked before but which I believe it would be useful to have answered now before we come to the anfractuosities of Schedule 1. The question is: how does wife maintenance, mother maintenance what the White Paper calls spousal maintenance—fit in with child maintenance as dealt with in this Bill?
First of all, my excuse is that the sentence reads:
"maintenance…in relation to the child and absent parent concerned".
I certainly interpret those words as meaning an order for the maintenance of a child by his absent father. I do not know why the draftsman did not use that terminology. Perhaps it could be considered. It seems to me more direct and simple. It obviates the possible ambiguity on which I seized; namely, the maintenance order in relation to the absent parent. Certainly I

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would not interpret the words in that way but it is a possible reading and to some extent it is borne out by ambiguities in the definition of "maintenance order" in the later definition clause, which refers back to a further provision in this clause.
The maintenance orders set out are not entirely related to child maintenance. However, taking advantage of that possible—I do not think probable —ambiguity, I ask my noble and learned friend to elucidate the relationship between spousal maintenance and child maintenance. He was good enough last week to refer me as a typical example to Example 3 on page 12 of Volume One of the White Paper. My recollection is that that case related to a mother with two young children who were both under six—one was over five and the other was two or three. She was not working. The computation of the maintenance for the children was £46 for both of them, leaving the father with twice as much. However, nothing at all was allowed for the wife's maintenance—the spousal maintenance. One can easily envisage circumstances where it would be most unjust to leave the mother in that situation with almost no maintenance for herself. It is true there is an element for the caring mother who has young children and cannot work, but on the whole her means would not only be necessarily exiguous but also exiguous compared with those of the father.
Let us suppose we are considering the case of a battered wife who is separated from her husband. That is not a typical case but it should not be disregarded. The noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, referred to this matter in another connection last week. However, a more usual case would be where the parties had separated in their early 20s. Such a case is typical of the problems we have to examine. A mother in such a case may have lost her first attraction for her husband and passion has cooled. She is perhaps run-down in health as a result of child bearing and her husband finds someone more attractive to live with. In those circumstances—without going as far as the case of a battered wife—I should have thought there should be an element of spousal maintenance. However, if that is the case, all the calculations in Example 3, Example 5 and the subsequent examples, are thrown out completely. I hope that my noble and learned friend can help the Committee in that respect. I beg to move.
5 p.m.
The Lord Chancellor: We have used the phrase "absent parent" generally throughout the Bill. To use the phrase "absent father" or "the child's father" in these circumstances might not be consistent with the rest of the Bill. It certainly might give cause to those who have the concerns that the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart of Swindon—
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: If I used the phrase "absent father" it was a slip of the tongue. I meant to say "absent parent"; in other words, the Bill could refer to a maintenance order as an order for the maintenance of the child by the absent parent. I apologise to my noble and learned friend and to the Committee if I referred to an "absent father".
The Lord Chancellor: I may have made a mistake here. Certainly we need to make sure that the jurisdiction of the court is maintained as regards other maintenance of the child. In other words, if this amendment were accepted, it would have an undesirable effect.
As regards spousal maintenance, it is clear under Clause 7(9) that a maintenance order is an:
"order which requires the making or securing of periodical payments to or for the benefit of the child".
Spousal maintenance is not covered by the Bill. There is nothing in the Bill which prejudices the right of the spouse to maintenance. As regards the example that my noble and learned friend mentioned, the spousal maintenance would be taken out of what was left to the father once the child's maintenance had been settled. As my noble and learned friend said, the element for the child includes an element for the caring parent because of the cost that is involved in providing care for the child. To that extent that amount which is part of the child's maintenance is intended to take account of the circumstance that the caring parent is providing care for the child. The caring parent would be entitled to spousal maintenance for herself in many cases. The Bill does not attempt to deal with that. That would be an obligation in respect of the money which is left free to the absent parent after his obligations in respect of the children are ascertained.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: I wish to clear up the minor point of the definition of a maintenance order in Clause 7(9). The subsection concerns any child. I do not adopt the possible interpretation that I suggested with regard to the previous subsection, but the argument is left open as it is arguable that a maintenance order does not necessarily concern a child. Many of the maintenance orders made under paragraphs (a) to (f) of the subsection are spousal maintenance orders. However, I am afraid we still do not know how spousal maintenance will affect child maintenance, particularly as regards the two examples that I mentioned of a brutal husband and a philandering husband. Presumably an order for spousal maintenance would be made in such cases. However, as I have said, if that is the case, I cannot see how any of the computations in any of the examples —and, in so far as I understood them, the formulae in Schedule 1—canpossibly work out as planned. I hope my noble and learned friend will find it possible to answer that query, at any rate when we discuss Schedule 1. As the point is rather a bogus one of interpretation, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 54 and 55 not moved.]
Clause 7 agreed to.
Clause 8 [Agreements about maintenance]:
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 56:
Page 7, line 6, leave out ("a maintenance") and insert ("any").
The noble and learned Lord said: This is a drafting amendment to enable paragraph (a) of subsection (5) to work. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 8, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 9 [Maintenance Assessments]:
[Amendments Nos. 57 and 58 not moved.]
Lord Stoddart of Swindon Lord Stoddart of Swindon moved Amendment No. 59:
Page 7, line 20, at end insert:
("(2A) The Secretary of State shall by regulations make provision for the calculation of exempt income.
(2B) The regulations shall in particular make provision for—

(a) the cost of maintaining contact with a child;

(b) outstanding debts;

(c) legal costs;

(d) tax and other liabilities of self employed people;

(e) cost of travel to work;

(f) contributions to pension schemes;

(g) obligations arising from personal guarantees; and

(h) life insurance where the children and former partner are beneficiaries.").

The noble Lord said: In moving this amendment it may be for the convenience of the Committee if speak also to Amendment No. 66. Clause 9(2) states:
"The amount of child support maintenance to be fixed by any maintenance assessment shall be determined in accordance with the provisions of Part I of Schedule 1".
However, Schedule 1 contains no detail as regards what matters should be considered when the maintenance assessment is made. In particular, there is no hint of what exempt income may include. There are references to regulations which are to be made and to prescribed amounts but to nothing else.
The purpose of the amendment is to ensure that the Secretary of State shall by regulations make provision for the calculation of exempt income. The regulations shall address the cost of remaining in contact with the child and other essential issues such as debts and insurances. The cost of access can be high. Staying in contact with the child appears to have been ignored in the White Paper and unfortunately in the Bill. Members of the Committee will understand that satisfactory and well conducted access is generally expensive and may involve large bills for transport and accommodation. Furthermore, because time may be at a premium, expensive convenience foods may be required.
Families Need Fathers, the society representing non-custodial parents, has given me the following information. Parents who have regular weekend contact and some evening contact during the week find that children cost almost as much as if they were there all the time. The cost of housing, clothing, books, toys and holidays are virtually the same because the child needs two of everything. However, the so-called absent parent is at a considerable disadvantage. Even if he has the child for three or four days he does not qualify for child benefit, one parent benefit or family credit. He will almost certainly have problems in obtaining an additional personal income tax allowance. It is therefore essential that proper allowance is made for the cost of access.
Two examples given to me illustrate the cost of access. Mr. A lives in Gloucestershire. In 1984 his wife walked out with their two children and moved to London. His legal debts are £60,000 and they are still rising. He estimates that the cost of staying in contact with his children fortnightly and for half the holidays
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is £4,400 per annum. Mr. B is an unmarried father living in York. His partner walked out and moved to Manchester. He estimates that the cost of staying in contact with his young daughter fortnightly and for half the holidays is £2,500 per annum. Such cases are repeated many times throughout the country. The costs are high and account should be taken of them in the Bill.
Outstanding debts may have been incurred during marriage or cohabitation. As I have shown, they could be heavy and the sole responsibility of the liable parent. Indeed, such costs may have been responsible for the original break-up of the family. Legal costs may also be heavy associated with the divorce. Self-employed people may have liabilities that are not suffered by people in employment. They should also have consideration.
There are also the costs of travel to work: these can be extremely high. The cost of a season ticket from Reading to London, not a great distance, or from Reading to Swindon is in excess of £2,000 per annum. That is paid from taxed income. Again, high expenses may be incurred.
Additional items are listed in the amendment; for instance, compulsory contributions to pension funds which could be as high as 8 or 9 per cent. Members of another place pay 9 per cent. of their salaries in pension costs; it is a not inconsiderable sum. There are also life insurance contributions. It may well be that one of the parents continues to pay premiums for the protection of his or her children and perhaps the former partner. All such matters must be taken into account. I shall be interested to hear the Government's reply.
Amendment No. 66 carries on from the point that I made in relation to Amendment No. 59. My intention is to ensure that the cost of maintaining contact with the child is included in the formula as a clearly identifiable item. Unfortunately the amendment may be defective because I omitted to table another amendment which would have made sense of it. Nevertheless, the intention remains the same. It is to ensure that contributing or absent parents—call them what you will—have their legitimate expenses taken into account, in particular the expenses involved in keeping in contact with their children. I beg to move.
5.15 p.m.
Lord Prys-Davies: I support the amendment moved by my noble friend Lord Stoddart. The purpose of both amendments is to ensure that the expenditure specified within them will be included in the calculation of exempt income. The Bill is silent on the expenditure which is to be protected as exempt income, except that housing costs are singled out. The guidance will be contained in the regulations made under paragraph 5(2) of Schedule 1 by the Secretary of State.
In paragraph 5.8 the White Paper states that the exempt income will include the parents' own "day to day living expenses". What is meant by that phrase? Unless it is defined in the Bill to include specified matters, we fear that exempt income will be construed

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narrowly. My noble friend has drawn particular attention to two items. First, the cost of maintaining contact with the child is referred to in Amendments Nos. 59 and 66. That stands in a class of its own, because the expenditure can be said to be for the direct benefit of the child. If contact is not maintained, damage and injury can be caused to the child as well as to the absent parent. As my noble friend indicated, it can be an item of heavy expenditure. It may cover accommodation and travelling expenses. The child may be living in a distant part of the country or staying with the absent parent for two or three days a week. I believe that that justifies reference being made in the regulations.
The second item referred to by my noble friend that I wish to reinforce is the need to include an insurance premium. If the absent parent has a life insurance policy which is held in trust for the children, or for the former partner and the children, and if that parent is under a duty to pay the premium by virtue of the settlement package or of an undertaking given to the court, that should he included in the regulations.
Unless one stipulates in the regulations the items that are to be covered we fear that exempt income will be construed narrowly. Therefore, if the adjudicating officer is to have regard to the real situation, he must have regard to the existing needs and obligations of the absent parent. If they are ignored, the adjudicating officer will not be having regard to the real situation and a great deal of hardship may ensue.
Earl Russell: I should like very briefly to speak to Amendments Nos. 63 to 69 which are grouped with this amendment and some of which are in my name.
What concerns us about these amendments is that in taking account of income we should be dealing with disposable income. In many cases that is not the same as paper income. We are concerned with the actual amount of money available after necessary deductions. Amendment No. 63 deals with the question of access. We agree with the Government that in this Bill access should not be linked generally with maintenance. On the other hand, there will be cases where access takes place. We do not wish the absent parent to be put in a position where, by paying maintenance, he is deprived of the necessary money to pay the fares which will enable him to have access to his child. That would rather contradict the objectives of the Bill.
Another amendment deals with the costs of travelling to work. That is extremely expensive for many people and there is a risk that an anomaly will be created. Let us take the case of two people, one of whom has gone to the expense of buying a London house which will be allowable under the formula; the other has chosen, as some people do nowadays, to commute from Swindon, Grantham, Doncaster, or wherever, which will not be allowable under the formula. Therefore, because of a decision originally designed to save money the latter person will suffer severely under the formula.
Another amendment draws attention to the costs of child care. There will be situations, particularly where there is a second family, in which those costs will create considerable pressure. I agree with the White Paper that it would be a great pity if, by removing one
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family from benefits, the second family is then put onto them. That would defeat the object of the exercise.
I shall not speak to Amendments Nos. 68 and 69 which deal with community charge benefit. I shall give the Government the benefit of the doubt and hope that those amendments are unnecessary.
Lord Henley: These amendments aim to deal with details of the maintenance calculation, the principles of which are set out in Schedule 1. The noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, has suggested a long list of items for Clause 9 which the Secretary of State is to provide by regulations to be included in exempt income. The other items concern Schedule 1 but the basic issues are the same. I should state that the amendment may have considerable cost implications.
I do not believe that including such a list of possible items of expenditure is putting the interests of the child first. Exempt income has first charge on the parent's income. It is deducted from the total of his or her net income before any consideration is given to maintenance. I can assure the Committee that net income will mean exempt income after deduction of tax and this applies to the self-employed as well as the employed. In fairness to the children, exempt income should only include essential expenditure. Even after the payment of maintenance parents will be left with some two-thirds to three-quarters of their net income in order to meet other expenses.
We accept that in some cases these expenses may be genuine and, as the noble Lord said, heavy; but the issue is whether it would be right to give them precedence over the child's right to basic maintenance. The protected income provisions, as opposed to the exempt income which will apply to all absent parents whatever their means, safeguard the position of an absent parent. That means that an absent parent who is not receiving income support will retain enough of his income to ensure that his income remains above income support levels even after he has made his maintenance payments.
The list proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, raises a number of detailed issues; for example, what is to be covered by legal costs and outstanding debts and to what extent. Should all the debts be covered, or merely those applicable to legal costs relating to the break up of the marriage, obligations from personal guarantees, and so on? The noble Lord spoke also about the costs of access. To ensure that we are not talking at cross purposes I should say that the noble Lord referred also to shared access; namely, where the child lives for some of the time with one parent and some of the time with the other. That would be a special case to be dealt with by Clause 34(2)(f).
We believe that the provisions to be made on exempt income should be restricted to what is essential in order to ensure proper recognition of the needs of the child. Maintenance will form only one-third or less of net income and there is the safeguard of the protected level of income. We shall reflect on the points raised by the noble Lord about exempt and protected income when we decide on the precise definitions. It is important to achieve the right balance

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in the interests of parents and children. Therefore, I hope that at present the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: I listened carefully to the noble Lord and I am encouraged to some degree because he said that he listened to what I and other Members of the Committee said. This is an important matter, particularly in respect of access. As I pointed out when I moved the amendment, access costs can be very high. Where people are on relatively low incomes it may well mean that the costs of maintenance are such as to leave the contributing or liable parent with insufficient money to meet his other commitments plus access costs. That is the major matter about which I am anxious, though the other items are important.
It must be understood that often a parent who is liable for maintenance may well have been left with many debts by his ex-spouse. I have heard of many cases where a father, or perhaps a mother, has been nearly bankrupted by the debts which have been left. Again, it may well be that the strain on a parent of having to meet his commitments plus access costs will be so great that it will prevent access taking place, or he may be put in default and end up in court.
Therefore, when the Government frame the regulations, I hope that they will deal with this matter in an understanding manner and with due consideration for the human costs that may be involved. Proper provision should be made for the contributing parent. Unless it is ensured that he does not run himself into debt the whole business will be self-defeating. Having said that, and in the light of what the noble Lord said, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 9 agreed to.
Schedule 1 [Maintenance Assessments]:
[Amendment No. 60 had been withdrawn from the Marshalled List.]
5.30 p.m.
Lord Meston Lord Meston moved Amendment No. 61:
Page 30, line 27, at end insert:
("( ) such further amount or amounts (if any) with respect to a disabled child as may be prescribed").
The noble Lord said: In the absence of the noble Lord, Lord Carter, I wish to move Amendment No. 61 and speak also to Amendments Nos. 74, 118 and 127.
These amendments are designed to write into the Bill some flexibility to take account of the special needs of disabled children. I suggest that provision should be made for the extra costs of disabilities which can be both various and considerable. The existence of such extra costs and expense is recognised in the foster care allowance. There is statistical evidence to support the existence of that additional expense, which may derive from extra heating, the requirement of special equipment, extra child-minding and a number of other items about which one cannot be comprehensive.
I hope that that brief explanation justifies the amendments. Amendment No. 118 seeks to add to Clause 34, to which the Minister referred, provision for special cases. It is disappointing that in the list of
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special cases in Clause 34 there is no reference to disabled children. I hope that Amendment No. 118 will be agreed to, to rectify the situation. It must be borne in mind also that the poorer the family the greater the financial impact will he of the disability of a child or children. I beg to move.
Earl Russell: In the absence of the noble Lord, Lord Carter, I shall speak briefly in support of my noble friend's amendment. There are a number of these amendments to the formula. I believe that here the Government are impaled on their own hook due to their attempt—as explained to us on the first day of Committee by the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor —to eliminate altogether the element of discretion. Were discretion to be allowed such cases could be considered as they arose. If discretion is to be eliminated it becomes necessary for this Chamber to foresee every possible case which we may wish to be taken into account where extra costs might arise. If we are doing that then the costs of a disabled child, which in any case are considerable, are matters which the Committee would wish to take into account.
Lord Henley: These amendments seek to provide for the basic amount of provision of the maintenance required to be increased where a child for whom maintenance is sought is disabled.
The noble Lord, Lord Meston, will recall that in the White Paper the Government said that they were not minded to include the allowances available where a child is disabled in the maintenance requirement, but invited comments. We received comments from a number of organisations. Some felt that provision should be included in basic maintenance; others felt it should not be included, while it was also suggested that this should more properly be a matter for the court's discretion.
We are carefully considering all those views. Our aim is to do what is in the best interests of children while being fair to the parent paying maintenance. We do not wish to exclude disabled children from the improved system of child maintenance but we recognise that there are other complex issues here which may be more appropriate for the courts.
I am grateful for the comments from both the noble Lord, Lord Meston, and my noble kinsman Lord Russell. We shall reflect further on them and advise on the outcome. I hope that in the light of that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Prys-Davies: Will the Minister bear in mind also that these amendments were drafted by the Spastics Society, supported by Barnardo's and MENCAP? I believe that the citizens advice bureaux would have supported them had they seen them in good time.
While endorsing everything that has been said, I wish to make one additional point. To recognise the disabled child as worthy of special consideration would be consistent with existing policy. I remind the Minister that in a sense statutory authority exists for this. The courts were obliged by statute to consider the needs of a disabled child when assessing maintenance. I refer specifically to Section 25 of the Matrimonial

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Causes Act 1973; that was a duty enshrined in Section 27. I see no reason why the child support agency should not pay the same regard as the courts to the needs of the disabled child.
Lord Henley: As I said, I shall reflect upon the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Prys-Davies, as much as on the points made by other noble Lords earlier. I thank the noble Lord for his information regarding those who are behind the amendment. We shall certainly take note.
Lord Meston: I am grateful that the Minister is in a reflective mood. I hope that he will advise us of his conclusions sooner rather than later. So far as I can tell, this is the first series of amendments which seek to allow a discretion to increase the amount of child support. Subject to correction, all the previous amendments debated during the Committee stage of the Bill sought to introduce a discretion to reduce the amount of child support.
Should the Minister consider, while his mind is so refreshingly open, the possibility that the extra expense of disabled children may be dealt with by the court—I imagine he has in mind the provisions of Clause 7(5)(c)—perhaps he would consider also that one of the arguments against Clause 7 in its entirety is that it may create the necessity for a parent of a child to knock on two doors rather than one. In other words, a mother who has a claim for maintenance for the child may have to go to the agency for the basic child support and to the court for a contribution towards the extra expenditure she incurs in respect of the disabled child.
The point has been made. It would be an unfortunate state of affairs. It would be better for the whole thing to be dealt with through one operation. However, given the indications of the Minister's thoughts, at this stage I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Earl Russell Earl Russell moved Amendment No. 62:
Page 31, line 34, leave out ("zero") and insert ("0·24").
The noble Earl said: This rather cryptic amendment says,
"Leave out (`zero') and insert (`0.24')".
The purpose of this otherwise rather obscure form of words is to ensure that where the absent parent's income increases the child shall gain some share of that increase. My noble friend Lord Meston explained that this was the first of a series of amendments designed to increase support available to the child in some circumstances. It seems to us to be entirely equitable that where the absent parent's income increases and he becomes wealthier, the child should at least to some degree participate in that increased prosperity. In the absence of any such provision the situation may arise—I am sure that Members of the Committee are aware of this—where the absent parent flourishes one might almost say, "as the green bay tree", and resentment grows among the children. The amendment may help to avoid that. I beg to move.
Lord Henley: I am interested to see that my noble kinsman does not think that the reduction rate of 15
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per cent., which we quoted as an illustrative example in the White Paper, is high enough. He wishes to ensure that the rate is at least 25 per cent. That is my understanding of his amendment. I am aware that some commentators feel that 15 per cent. is not high enough. That is the rate which applies to assessable income in excess of the amount needed to meet the maintenance requirement. We have suggested that 50 per cent. should be the deduction rate that should apply for maintenance requirements. We believe that a lower rate should apply beyond that.
I accept that it is right that maintenance should not stop with the basic provision of the maintenance requirement because there will be expenses that it does not always cover. But we wish to maintain a proper balance between recognising that children should share in parents' prosperity and the practical fact that this share does not necessarily remain constant as income grows. As I imagine my noble kinsman will understand, we propose to set out the lower rate in regulations. We do not think that it will be right to restrict the options available in the way that my noble kinsman suggests, making a minimum of 0.24 per cent. I shall certainly consider the points he made as to what the rate should be for those on higher incomes. We propose to consult on the regulations. At this moment it would be wrong to restrict us to the figure that my noble kinsman has in mind. Therefore I hope that he will feel able to withdraw this amendment.
Earl Russell: I thank my noble kinsman the Minister for the continuing openness of his mind. I am very grateful for the assurance that he is willing to think further about the matter. In the light of that it is only proper that I should read his reply carefully and perhaps take part in any further consultation. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 63 to 69 not moved.]
Lord Simon of Glaisdale Lord Simon of Glaisdale moved Amendment No. 69A:
Page 33, line 42, after ("is") insert ("reasonably").
The noble and learned Lord said: In moving this amendment I shall also speak to Amendments Nos. 71A and 71B. They all raise the same point. Amendment No. 69A refers to paragraph 9 of the schedule on page 33 of the Bill which begins:
"The Secretary of State may by regulations provide that, in such circumstances and to such extent as may be prescribed"—
that is two lots of regulatory-making powers—
"(b) where the child support officer concerned is satisfied that a person has intentionally deprived himself of a source of income".
The amendment seeks to include the word "reasonably" before "satisfied" so that subparagraph (b) now reads:
"where the child support officer concerned is reasonably satisfied".
That is the kind of point which arose very frequently during the first great surge of bureaucracy after the 1939–45 war, though nothing then perpetrated was as bureaucratic as this Bill. Time and again in various ways the Executive tried to exclude the cognisance of

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the court over its proceedings. It also tried to minimise parliamentary control. Both of those elements are very marked in this Bill.
One of the ways was to leave the matter to the satisfaction of an executive officer without requiring that he should be reasonably satisfied. If he is reasonably satisfied, or purports to be, the court can examine the basis; but if the matter is left so that he is satisfied, then very often the court will have no right to question whether there are proper grounds for the satisfaction. The matter arose in a most dramatic form during the war on the rights of a constable to arrest. The long doctrine of the common law was that a constable's power of arrest had to be on reasonable grounds. But in one of the defence regulations the word "reasonably" was left out. It was sufficient if the constable, or the Secretary of State in another case, were satisfied. It was argued that it was sufficient if he were suggestibly satisfied without it being examinable to see that there were reasonable grounds.
The two famous cases I have just mentioned for the record were Liversedge v. Anderson and the Point of Ayr colliery case. There were other cases as well. The law is not entirely clear on this matter, but we should not leave any element of doubt. In this case there can be a decision which is a considerable invasion of the rights and privileges of the person who may be liable for child support maintenance. In the first case, for example, it is a question of whether a person has intentionally deprived himself of a source of income.
That is quite right as a criterion, but it should not be left to the unquestioned discretion or ukase even of an official. The matter should be examinable in a court of law. I beg to move.
5.45 p.m.
Earl Russell: I am grateful to the noble and learned Lord for introducing these amendments. We on the Liberal Democrat Benches support them. The points that he makes about executive discretion are vitally important. The point that he makes about the use of the word "reasonably" is equally vitally important. All through our debates today it has struck me that the statements made on behalf of the Government on such matters as to whether a woman has been a victim of domestic violence or whether she knows the father of the child, have been "if we are satisfied" and "if we are persuaded".
There is not enough check on that. Power ought to be subject to checks and external controls. The word "reasonably", through the judicial precedents which the noble and learned Lord gave us, subjects it to that check. I very much hope that the Government will agree. If this matter goes further we on these Benches will support the noble and learned Lord.
Lord Mishcon: As we will.
Lord Henley: I am grateful to the noble Lord for the brevity of his speech. I am also grateful to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon, for his very helpful explanation. I do not think that we are very far apart on this matter. There are issues on which it is right that the child support officer should proceed with
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proper care and attention to ensure that decisions are made that are fair to both parents and children. In performing any of these duties under the Act the child support officer will have to act reasonably. He will accordingly have to act reasonably when deciding whether and how to proceed in these as in all circumstances. In doing that he will give proper weight to the evidence before him so that he can be reasonably satisfied as to the basis on which he is acting. Inevitably there must be an element of judging.
The noble and learned Lord suggests that this should be made explicit by providing that the child support officer is to be reasonably satisfied. We do not believe that this is necessary as there is a basic presumption of acting in a reasonable manner. However, as always, I want to weigh very carefully the words of the noble and learned Lord and give very full consideration to these amendments. I shall do so particularly in the light of what he had to say in quoting Liversedge v. Anderson, and another case of which I did not catch the name, and in the light of what he had to say about the courts, looking behind the child support officer's satisfaction and the reasonableness of that satisfaction. I hope that in the light of those comments the noble and learned Lord will feel able to withdraw his amendments.
Lord Mishcon: Perhaps I may intervene, as I made such a short speech earlier. I wonder whether I may plead with the Minister, who is very fair minded. When a substantial case is made in regard to an amendment which has been tabled, and of which the Government have notice, would it not be gracious to concede when the case made is obviously the right case? The Minister talked in terms of having to act reasonably. If there should be the right of a check on that reasonableness by a court of law, if ever that is brought into question, why do the Government need further time within which to concede what is such a "reasonable" point?
Lord Henley: I accept the reasonableness of the noble Lord's point. I should like to make it quite clear that I believe I am behaving in a thoroughly reasonable way in saying that we should like to take away these amendments and consider them. I remind the noble Lord that, if he looks carefully at today's Marshalled List he will notice that amendments marked with an asterisk are new or have been altered. He will also notice that the noble and learned Lord's amendments are new and have appeared at relatively short notice. For that reason I think it is reasonable of me to say that on this occasion we should like further time to consider these matters.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: I must concede that the amendments were tabled late and that therefore it would be most ungracious of me to do other than express gratitude to the noble Lord for his offer to consider this matter. I shall only add that the argument in any opposition to this amendment is, in effect, that the words are unnecessary because the child support officer will in any case act reasonably. That is an age-old argument. It applies to the constable and it applies to the Secretary of State. Not

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every civil servant behaves reasonably, simply because he is a human being. He no more invariably behaves reasonably than those of us present in the Chamber. The second argument is that this is inevitably a matter of judgment. So it is. But who should judge—the civil servant or a court of law? In expressing gratitude to the noble Lord for offering to consider this matter I hope that the consideration will be favourable. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Earl Russell Earl Russell moved Amendment No. 70:
Page 34, line 2, at end insert:
("Passported Benefits
9A. Where receipt of maintenance under this Act or the reduction in hours for family credit entitlement entail a loss of entitlement to free school meals or social fund payments, the person concerned shall be eligible for such benefits on the basis of low income or family credit entitlement.").
The noble Earl said: Amendment No. 70 deals with a problem which must be familiar to most of us. It is the problem of passported benefits resulting from being on income support. There is, therefore, frequently a possibility that by coming off income support and thereby losing passported benefits the person concerned may be worse off than before.
There are two specific passported benefits for which the amendment seeks to protect the entitlement of a single parent and the child. One is the entitlement to free school meals. Some noble Lords now present were in the Chamber on the 27th February when we debated an Unstarred Question tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Ewart-Biggs, on a report prepared for UNICEF by Professor Jonathan Bradshaw of the University of York. He is the same Professor Bradshaw on whose research the Government have relied so heavily in the preparation of this White Paper, so they obviously take his work seriously. Professor Bradshaw argued that there is now a great deal of malnutrition among children in the United Kingdom. Free school meals are obviously one of the practical ways by which such deprivation can be combated. Losing an entitlement to free school meals may therefore, correspondingly, be a way by which the amount of malnutrition increases. We really ought to take this matter seriously. It has been pointed out that children are now becoming a scarce resource in this country. They need to be looked after. Depriving them of free school meals is not going to help.
The other specific point with which the amendment deals is entitlement to the use of the social fund. That is very carefully tied to entitlement to income support. If the receipt of maintenance lifts the mother above income support levels, she will, unless this amendment is accepted, be deprived of her entitlement to the social fund and, therefore, in particular, to such benefits as crisis loans. The level of income, even with the receipt of maintenance, may be such that, for example, the breaking down of a cooker or the collapse of a refrigerator may cause a very real financial crisis. Anyone who has ever tried to look after babies' bottles with the refrigerator out of order will know very well what that can mean. The provision as it stands could cause real distress, real hardship and a great deal of
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confusion. For those reasons, within the principles of the Bill as they stand at present, it would be possible for the Government to accept this amendment. I very much hope they will do so. I beg to move.
Lord Prys-Davies: I wish to make clear that we fully support the amendment. As I understand it, if maintenance is set at the income support level then the mother, or the parent, would automatically lose passported benefits. As the noble Earl, Lord Russell, pointed out, they include free school meals, which are important, free prescriptions, free dental and optical care and the social fund payments. It seems very unjust indeed that a parent should lose out on these benefits merely because child support is assessed at or just above income support level. We give this amendment our fullest support.
Lord Henley: I am afraid that I can no longer be as amenable as I have been on some of the earlier amendments. The amendment seeks to change the rules of the schemes under which social fund payments are made and local authorities provide free school meals. Neither of these is the subject of the Bill. The Bill sets out a new system of child maintenance. The amendment therefore has much wider implications.
Contrary to the implication of the amendment not all payments in the social fund are restricted to people who receive family credit or income support. Funeral payments are available to people in receipt of housing benefit or community charge benefit; and in an emergency crisis loans, which my noble kinsman specifically mentioned, can be paid to anyone who is without resources. That is what they are for.
Budgeting loans, community care grants and cold weather payments—the other components of the social fund—are intended to focus help on those people in the greatest need. That means that a dividing line has to be drawn between those who can get help and those who cannot. We believe that the most appropriate place to draw that line is at the income support level. That applies as a general principle. We believe that it would be wrong to make an exception in this case.
I turn now to the provision of free school meals. They are provided under Section 22 of the Education Act 1980, as amended by Section 77 of the Social Security Act 1986. By virtue of that section, local education authorities have a duty placed upon them to provide free school meals only to those children whose families are in receipt of income support or to pupils who receive it themselves. The amendment would create new arrangements and responsibilities for education authorities; but, again, only for this sort of case. We believe that it would not be right to make an exception in this instance for the reasons which I gave with regard to the social fund.
We do not believe that these are issues for the Bill. We do not believe that it is right to seek to amend the rules of the schemes just to cover these particular circumstances. In that event, I ask my noble kinsman to withdraw his amendment.
6 p.m.
Earl Russell: I am sorry that the period of openness in the mind of my noble kinsman is now over. It would seem that the window of opportunity has disappeared. I listened with care and interest to what he said. I take his point about crisis loans. I also take his point about the issues going somewhat wider than the scope of the Bill. Nevertheless, I believe that they are extremely relevant.
In effect, this is a Bill designed to use maintenance to float mothers off benefit. That is what it is really all about. We on this side of the Committee have expressed sympathy many times with the strategy of floating people off benefit. However, the loss of passported benefits always has the effect of creating a big problem as regards floating people off benefit. In fact, the loss of such benefits creates a situation where people may often be taken off benefit and ultimately end up worse off than they were previously.
If the effect of the Bill is to leave the mother and child worse off than they were before because they are not receiving passported benefits, I believe that the legislation is not achieving the desired effect. That is an issue which could be considered perfectly properly within the scope of the Bill. Nevertheless, between now and the Report stage I think that I need to consider most carefully whether we should most appropriately return to the matter while considering this Bill, or whether we should return to it the next time that we have a social security Bill before us. I imagine that we shall have another social security Bill at some time within the near future. If that proves to be the case, we would then shall be able to address the problem of passported benefits in a more general context. However, in one form or another, we will need to return to the matter. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 71 to 71B not moved.]
Schedule 1 agreed to.
Clause 10 [Interim maintenance assessments]:
Lord Simon of Glaisdale Lord Simon of Glaisdale moved Amendment No. 71C:
Page 7, leave out lines 29 and 30.
The noble and learned Lord said: The amendment proposes to leave out lines 29 and 30 from page 7. That omission would leave subsection (2) reading:
"The Secretary of State may by regulations make provision as to,
(a) the procedure to be followed in making an interim maintenance assessment; and
(b) the basis on which the amount of child support maintenance fixed by an interim assessment is to be calculated".
In my submission that wording is all that is required. The subsection says:
"The Secretary of State may"—
I emphasise the fact that that is permissive—
"by regulations make provision as to interim maintenance assessments".
Subsection (3) states that,
"The regulations may, in particular, make provision as to—".
The words in line 30 are expressly a particularity of those in the two previous lines. I venture to ask my
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noble and learned friend, or the Minister, what regulations are proposed to be made which cannot be made under the clause which we seek to amend. I beg to move.
Lord Henley: The amendment moved by the noble and learned Lord seeks to remove lines 29 and 30 from subsections (2) and (3) of Clause 10. He has asked us to define the purpose of this regulation-making power. I am happy to tell the noble and learned Lord what our motives are for inserting this power. I can tell him what matters will be covered by the regulations.
Subsection (3) of the clause describes in general terms the matters with which the regulations will deal. As the subsection says, the regulations "may" include,
"the procedure to be followed in making an interim maintenance assessment",
and also the basis of the calculation for an interim assessment. I shall expand upon that explanation in order to make the position clear. However, in order to do so, I believe that it would be helpful to set out at this point the need for interim maintenance assessments. The main purpose of interim maintenance is to establish liability as early as possible and speed up the process of making an assessment based on complete information in order to secure an early and accurate payment of maintenance.
I shall now set out briefly the general circumstances in which interim maintenance assessments will be used. The parent with care makes a claim for maintenance. The absent parent is then contacted and told of his liability. If the absent parent then proves evasive and does not co-operate in providing information about his circumstances, a maintenance assessment cannot be made. It may be possible to obtain sufficient information to calculate an assessment without the co-operation of the absent parent by using the powers to obtain information. However, that could be a very lengthy and time-consuming process and some relevant information may never be obtained. In the meantime, the parent with care receives no maintenance.
Interim maintenance assessments will encourage provision of the required information since they will in general be for a greater amount than an assessment made on the basis of complete information and they will also be enforceable. Therefore, they will be an incentive for the absent parent to provide the information.
It will be necessary for the regulations under the clause to set out in some detail the procedure to be followed when making interim maintenance assessments. The agency will issue at least one letter to the absent parent where an application is made before an interim maintenance assessment is raised. The regulations will include what the form and content of the letters issued to the absent parent should be, and when the letters should be issued.
The regulations may also specify what action should be taken when there is no response to an interim maintenance assessment and when that action should be taken. We intend that the regulations will also include the method of calculation of an interim assessment. In general, we expect that that will be the maintenance requirement as set out in Schedule 1. As

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I said earlier, that will usually be more than an assessment made on the basis of complete information since it will take no account of the absent parent's circumstances.
There may be circumstances where it would be right for the interim maintenance assessment to be more or less than the maintenance requirement. We envisage circumstances where there may be some evidence about the absent parent's financial situation where we may wish to vary the amount of the initial assessment so that it is more or less than the maintenance requirement. Such evidence may show that the absent parent is especially rich and that an assessment made using complete information, including the additional element under Schedule 1 Part I paragraph 4 will produce more than the maintenance requirement.
In such circumstances an interim maintenance assessment, based on the maintenance requirement, would provide no incentive for the absent parent to provide the necessary information and he may prefer to pay the interim maintenance assessment. In that case, the parent with care will receive less than the amount that will be produced based on complete information. There may also be cases where an interim maintenance assessment would seem harsh; for example, if there were some doubt about the eligibility of one of the children for whom the parent with care was making a claim for maintenance.
From what I have said, I hope that the noble and learned Lord will appreciate that there are genuine reasons why a regulation-making power is required in the clause. There is a considerable amount of detail in the procedure to be followed when making an interim assessment. We shall need flexibility to deal with the range of different circumstances. Such matters are not appropriate for primary legislation. I hope therefore that the noble and learned Lord will feel able to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: The Minister gave a helpful and illuminating description of why interim maintenance assessments are required and how they will operate; but unfortunately he did not deal with the point of the amendment. In particular, he did not say what was required by the words,
"sought to be left out".
What he did say was that a detailed procedure would be required. Very well, so it is. It comes under head (a) which provides the procedure to be followed. That will cover everything the Minister wants. He also referred to the calculations required by Schedule 1. They are covered in head (b) which provides:
"the basis on which the amount of child support maintenance fixed by an interim assessment is to be calculated".
As the Minister did not say what regulations he might make if he is confined to heads (a) and (b)—that is the effect of the amendment—one is left, as so often in the Bill, with the suspicion that the department wants to keep something up its sleeve just in case something may have been forgotten and may turn up. It is an abstract regulating power which may prove useful in case something has been forgotten. The Minister challenged me to say that regulations rather than primary legislation were suitable in this case. I never controverted that point. If he would be good enough
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to read the amendment again he will see that it expressly left the regulation-making power, merely eliminating the amorphous background that might turn out to be useful, and confining him to everything that he enumerated might be required in the regulations.
However, the Minister has the point. I hope that he will consider it. There is no point in calling a Division at this time. I again emphasise that the point of the amendment was not dealt with. I ask the Minister and my noble and learned friend to reconsider the matter with their advisers. I shall, if necessary, return to the subject on Report. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
6.15 p.m.
Lord Mishcon: Only so that the debate is complete, and out of sheer fairness—I am aware of the noble and learned Lord's reputation for complete and absolute fairness—I must say that I followed the Minister's speech carefully to check whether everything he said would be covered by heads (a) and (b). He made one comment that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale, may not have noted. Until that point I was in favour of the amendment. The Minister talked in terms of having to have regulations to enforce payment of the interim maintenance. The noble and learned Lord may agree that if we read heads (a) and (b) we see that there is no provision for enforcement. I point that matter out only so that the debate is complete, and that when the Minister considers the matter he will consider it in the light of all the discussions.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: I am obliged to the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon. If I said that the clause made provision for enforcement I was in error; but on the other hand, the Minister did not say that he wanted any power of enforcement. The point of the amendment remains entirely unanswered. There is no proposal for enforcement and so everything is covered in heads (a) and (b), especially procedure and calculation which were the matters to which the Minister referred. I asked the Committee's leave to withdraw the amendment. I do not believe that the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, opposed that, but he rightly corrected me if I said something inaccurately.
Lord Mishcon: Just one further quick remark: it was not that the noble and learned Lord said anything about enforcement; it was that the Minister said something about enforcement which was not covered by heads (a) and (b). The noble and learned Lord made no error at all. It would be singularly unlike him if he did.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 72 not moved.]
Clause 10 agreed to.
Clause 11 [Child support officers]:
Lord McGregor of Durris Lord McGregor of Durris moved Amendment No. 73:
Page 8, line 18, at end insert:
("( ) keep such accounts and statistics as the Secretary of State may direct, prepare in respect of each financial year a statement of accounts and statistics in such

571
form as may be so directed, and include such accounts and statistics in the report produced under paragraph (c) above,
( ) conduct or commission such relevant research as the Secretary of State may direct.").
The noble Lord said: This place discussed government statistics last week. During that discussion I spoke about statistics available to cover the results of judicial decisions in family matters. I do not propose to inflict upon the Committee a repetition of what I then said. I am certain that there will be no dispute that good statistics are essential for the proper administration of justice and for the proper scrutiny of the working of judicial institutions by citizens and Parliament. It is notorious that these statistics barely exist in a worthwhile form in our country, and have not done so since 1921. By and large there have been two sources for the scrutiny of the work of the courts in family justice, the first being statistics of proceedings passing through the courts. In the past the statistics relating to the actions of the summary courts have been almost worthless, misleading and inaccurate. I doubt very much whether they have been greatly improved by the attempts of the Home Office to produce a new series since 1985.
The statistics of the work of the superior courts are much better—not, I am sorry to say, as a result of the interest in these matters by the Lord Chancellor's Department but because they have demographic implications which have since 1947 attracted the attention of the Registrar General and are now covered by OPCS. Even so, the information that we have is very limited indeed. Everyone who has been concerned with policy-making on this, from the Law Commission downwards, has stated the inadequacies and pointed to the impossibility of dealing with such subjects as maintenance without better information.
The whole problem with which this agency is concerned—namely, the relations between the public law of social security and the private law of family maintenance—is an area of almost complete ignorance. The only information we have about it has been that provided by surveys carried out either by university departments or by OPCS. I have no desire to detail the work, beyond pointing out that the White Paper from which the Bill stems relied to a large extent upon a university survey, the results of which have not been published. They have therefore not been tested in any way by the scrutiny of outsiders competent in the field.
The case for a serious attempt to improve, or rather to lay the foundations for adequate, knowledge in this subject is overwhelming. I cannot believe that the Minister will wish to suggest otherwise. The amendment seeks in a small way to lay those foundations. I assume that when he replies he will be enthusiastic and welcoming and I therefore propose to leave the matter there. If he is cold and not welcoming, we shall have to return to the subject later. I beg to move.
Baroness Faithfull: I support the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord McGregor. A great deal of money will be spent on what one might call this experiment. It is essential that we know that it is being spent and
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that there will be a good return. Based on my personal experience of dealing with such cases, I believe that the return will be small; I do not know that it will be cost-effective. Therefore, it is essential, as the noble Lord said, that good statistics are kept.
One other point is that in the White Paper and the Bill we are asked to pass these provisions with little knowledge of the past. Perhaps I may cite some examples. We have had the liable relative officers in the Department of Social Security dealing with maintenance. In my experience, we shall never persuade some men to pay, whatever we do. If a man is schizophrenic, a mental case, in prison or has disappeared he will never pay. So far as I can ascertain, no list has ever been kept of cases where the liable relative officer has pursued the man and been able to find out whether he can pay. I could cite a number of other such instances where during the passage of this Bill we shall be taking decisions when we do not know the facts. Therefore, if we pass the Bill I hope that in future we shall keep a record of the facts so that we can follow them up in a positive and constructive way.
Lord Henley: I hope that I shall respond as warmly as is necessary to satisfy the noble Lord and my noble friend. We realise that the amendment recognises the importance of keeping statistics about the work of child support officers. I thank the noble Lord for putting it down because it gives me an opportunity to reassure the Committee that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Social Security will require his officials to keep statistical records. Some will be published in the chief child support officer's annual report but others will appear in other departmental publications. I am pleased to be able to assure the Committee that the statistics collected will not just include the work of child support officers but other activities of the child support agency such as tracing absent parents and the collection and enforcement of child maintenance.
I can also assure the Committee that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Social Security will require the chief executive of the new child support agency to submit and publish an annual report and accounts. He will also expect the chief executive to commission research. The chief child support officer, who is suggested in the amendment and who may be the same as the chief adjudication officer, will not be responsible for the organisation of the agency, only for the work of his independent child support officers. Therefore we feel that it would be right and proper for the chief executive to produce the report.
Further, the framework document and the business plans for the agency will, as with other agencies that have been set up, clearly set out the work that is expected from the chief executive and his staff. As with all the other executive agencies within the Department of Social Security, those details will be published.
The noble Lord also referred briefly to the survey conducted by, I believe, Jonathan Bradshaw at the University of York and Jane Millar. This was commissioned by the Department of Social Security and the survey will be published some time later this

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year. I hope that with those assurances the noble Lord will at least feel satisfied and will withdraw his amendment.
6.30 p.m.
Lord McGregor of Durris: I welcome the assurances that the Minister has given. I would hope that the chief executive of the agency, when he is tackling the problem of deciding what statistics he will keep, will also consult other relevant departments—the Home Office and the Lord Chancellor's Department—because it would be quite absurd for the agency to keep its own isolated statistics in a matter which inevitably affects a whole series of family relationships. We shall never get the basis of effective statistics in this area from this one agency.
On the matter that the Minister mentioned about the York/Bath survey my point was a rather different one. It seems to me bad practice on the part of the Government to commission a survey in a field in which only commissioned survey work can provide information essential for policy making, to base to a large extent the White Paper on the findings of that survey and yet to publish the survey long after the Bill will have been discussed in your Lordships' House. This is indefensible and treating Members of your Lordships' House with contempt. How can we discuss this sensibly when we are denied the information that the Government used to frame their legislation?
Lord Henley: I accept the point that the noble Lord has made that that research was the only research that was the basis for the White Paper and government legislation. That was research that the department commissioned, and we have every intention of publishing it later this year.
Lord McGregor of Durris: I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 74 not moved.]
Clause 11 agreed to.
Clause 12 [Information required by Secretary of State]:
Lord Prys-Davies Lord Prys-Davies moved Amendment No. 75:
Page 8, line 35, leave out subsection (3).
The noble Lord said: I beg to move this amendment on behalf of my noble friend Lord Carter. It relates to Clause 12(3), which gives the Secretary of State power by regulation to authorise the disclosure by him or by the child support officer of information held by him for the purpose of the Act. It seems to us that Parliament ought to be very reluctant to give this authority to the Secretary of State. It may well be that the information has been disclosed to him or to the child support officer on the understanding that it is to be used only for the purpose of this Bill.
Solicitors may well recall the practice note issued by the Family Division authorising us to obtain information from the DHSS, or the Department of Health, or the Ministry of Defence, or the Passport Office, but on the clear understanding that we use it only for the purpose of matrimonial proceedings and
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that we will not disclose it to the other party. The power as it stands is extremely wide and we are reluctant to give Parliament that power.
Earl Russell: On behalf of these Benches I should like briefly to offer our support for this amendment. The powers are extremely wide and vaguely prescribed and we should like to see them set our with greater precision.
The Lord Chancellor: Obviously the confidentiality of information, particularly information of a personal nature, is of great importance. Regulations concerning the disclosure of information will include safeguards to ensure inappropriate disclosure is not authorised. For example, information that would help to identify an individual's whereabouts such as their address or the name of their employer will not be disclosed without the written authority of the individual concerned. There are, however, certain circumstances in which disclosure of information that does not assist in identifying the individual's whereabouts is necessary if the provisions of this Bill are to have the desired effect.
An individual can only judiciously exercise right of appeal, for example, when he or she if fully aware of the facts on which an assessment has been made. It is intended that all information necessary for an individual to understand the assessment will be disclosed. Such disclosure will be the minimum possible information—names, addresses and employers will not be disclosed; merely, for example, the number of children, the amount of housing costs or the net earnings. Other occasions when it is intended to disclose information include disclosure for the purpose of assessing benefits under the benefits Acts and disclosure to the courts in related matters.
Many persons with care are in receipt of benefits, and it is important that correct account is taken of maintenance received. If the amount of maintenance payable changes or if an absent parent fails to make a payment, it is important that benefit can be adjusted as quickly as possible. Allowing the child support agency to supply this information directly to the relevant benefit authority will reduce any potential delays in the making of such adjustments. We have to set up the child support agency and we must be careful to ensure that this kind of information can be passed. I believe that it is wise to take a general power of this kind, but I indicate the areas in which we expect to use these powers and assure the Committee that proper safeguards of confidentiality will be maintained. Such a provision will also minimise the procedures to be followed by the public in dealing with the Department of Social Security.
The public will be required to make only one notification of change of circumstances which will then be taken into account, as appropriate, for both benefit entitlement and child maintenance. I think that that must be good common sense. This will avoid the need for duplicate notification and associated form filling. Disclosure to the courts will be appropriate in circumstances where the court is considering a matter related in family law. This would allow the same

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evidence to be available to the agency and to the courts, providing for consistent decision making between the two authorities.
I think that I can assure the noble Lord, and the noble Lord on whose behalf he moved the amendment, as well as the noble Earl, that safeguards will be introduced to ensure that disclosure of information occurs only when strictly appropriate. In view of my assurances and explanations, I hope that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw the amendment.
Before this system operates of course the regulations will be made. Therefore, a person from whom information is taken will give it in the light of the regulations about the purposes for which it can be used. I would certainly take it that the forms would indicate reasonably plainly to what purposes the information given may be put. I hope in the light of that explanation that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Prys-Davies: I am grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Russell, for his support. I have listened with great interest to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor indicating the precise scope of the clause and also the safeguards that will be built into the regulations. My noble friend Lord Carter will no doubt read with great care what has been said by the Lord Chancellor, and in those circumstances I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 12 agreed to.
Schedule 2 [Provision of Information to Secretary of State]:
Lord Houghton of Sowerby Lord Houghton of Sowerby moved Amendment No. 76:
Page 35, line 27, leave out from beginning to end of line 3 on page 36.
The noble Lord said: I am not certain whether the atmosphere of your Lordships' Committee is right to deal at this time and occasion with a matter of such grave importance as the first part of Schedule 2. Behind the slogan, Children Come First, is the grubbiest Bill, the most unprincipled Bill, in the calendar of legislation in my long experience of Parliament. It is a shocker. Schedule 2 is among the shocking things in it.
I have long held the view that the citizen, if required to disclose any matter respecting himself or herself to a government department as a matter of statutory duty, with penalties if he or she fails or neglects to do so, is entitled to rely on that information being used by the department to which the statute refers and not for any other purpose.
This is a principle which it has been extremely difficult to hold over the years, because information that goes to different government departments is desired by other government departments and agencies for other purposes. One has to beware of this in case, in the end, the citizen is so vulnerable to the purposes of a multitude of bureaucracy that his best protection, his only protection, is not to give the information in the first place.
When Gladstone threatened, or promised, that he would abolish the income tax in the 1880s he did so on the ground that the income tax produces a nation of liars. He was not re-elected to repeal the income tax, and whether or not it has produced a nation of liars I am not prepared at this moment to say. But one thing the Inland Revenue has done throughout its history is to lay down, as a matter of firm principle, that the affairs of those who are required to deal with it shall be kept confidential.
It is over 70 years since I gave my oath of secrecy to the Inland Revenue when I first became an officer of that department, and it is astonishing that a Cabinet of 25 people leaks a great deal more than 70,000 officers of the Inland Revenue. You cannot hold a secret in the Cabinet for more than five minutes, but in the Inland Revenue you can keep a secret for over 70 years, and I have a few.
In the wake of the Poulson scandal of some years ago, I was appointed to a Royal Commission on standards of conduct in public life. The chairman of that commission was the noble and learned Lord, Lord Salmon, and there are several Members of your Lordships' House still about who were on it with me. The biggest rift, the deepest cleavage, on that commission came over the role and the duties of the Inland Revenue in relation to confidentiality, because the question that arose in the commission's investigation into the Poulson affair was: what did the Inland Revenue know and, if it knew, why was not something said and the matter not left to the Director of Public Prosecutions, who seemed to be unaware of what the file kept hidden which he would have liked to know? So the question was: should the Inland Revenue tell?
I took the view that it should not and defended that view in the commission to the point of dividing the commission, with the chairman, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Salmon, making a minority report, the majority being against him on the question of Inland Revenue disclosure.
The issue before the Royal Commission went far deeper than the matter in Schedule 2. Nevertheless it is part of the same principle of keeping confidential what the Inland Revenue knows. If that is breached then the table of every tax inspector must contain the warning: whatever you say at this table may be taken down in evidence and used against you in the event of criminal proceedings. How far would the Inland Revenue get, if it had to utter a police warning to accountants and taxpayers who came into the office?
Who would be safe if all the secrets in the hands of the Inland Revenue were freely available to other government departments? Where do you draw the line in defence of the citizen's right to certain privacy in his affairs? In the end, the majority of that Royal Commission stood firmly on the confidentiality of matters that went into the hands of the Inland Revenue.
It may be purely coincidence that, in the Revenue Review publication of last week, the Inland Revenue set out yet again, for the information of the staff, their duties and responsibilities to keep the affairs of taxpayers confidential. It probably feared that this Bill

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had some bearing upon the matter and that it was desirable, in the light of this measure, to reinforce the duty of Inland Revenue officers.
The effrontery of this Bill in certain respects absolutely astonishes me. All that is in this Bill is to be enacted in the interests of the children. Children do not come first. Parents can put children first, but the state cannot. The state can only put children a little higher up the scale of humanity and of the rights of human beings if the parents fail, or if they lose their parents. But children cannot come first. In many matters it is the parent who must come first, and then he must pass on to the child his own sense of priorities in family life.
Today, there are far more important matters relating to children in family life than what we are dealing with in this Bill. In this Bill we are dealing with money, nothing but money. There is nothing about education, nothing about care, nothing about love and nothing about anything related to children, except money and where it comes from.
There is a duty placed upon the social security system to provide the citizens with money to enable them to keep their families in a reasonable state of health and wellbeing, and this Bill, in part at any rate, is an intention to get from parents towards the maintenance of children what, at the present time, the social services have to do instead. It is to recoup the social services by some £400 million, we are told—I do not know where that figure comes from—the money paid out in social security which, in whole or in part, should be coming from a parent or from parents jointly. That is what the Bill is about.
It is true that, in passing, the Bill provides the bureaucratic machinery needed for the purposes of the Bill to offer services to those who, while not on social security, are nevertheless in need of some help to establish their right to maintenance for their children. At present they go to the courts. In many cases that is not a very satisfactory procedure. Nevertheless, that service is provided, and the Bill provides for fees to be charged to those who take advantage of it.
That has led to the setting up of a state detective service. If the police go into a tax office saying that they are investigating a fraud or other crime and would like some information about a person who, they believe, is being dealt with for tax purposes in that office, and they ask to see the records they will be refused permission. There are only two crimes in Britain for which the Inland Revenue will open its books to the police—murder and treason. That is emphasised in the instructions given to the staff during the past fortnight.
The Inland Revenue is protected in this particular matter by one saving subsection. Subsection (3) reads:
"This paragraph extends only to disclosure by or under the authority of the Commissioners of Inland Revenue".
The Commissioners of Inland Revenue are appointed by the Crown and operate under letters patent. We have no Minister for income tax; it is not a department over which there is a ministerial head in the same sense as there is a Minister for industry or education. The Inland Revenue can pull out its letters patent and rely on them for what it will permit and what it will not.
I gained personal experience of that in the company of my noble friend Lord Callaghan when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer and I was Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. We sought the Inland Revenue's co-operation in the use of the tax service machinery for social security objectives relating to income guarantee and the distribution of moneys which could be regarded as part of the social services. The Inland Revenue demurred at being asked to use the income tax system for that purpose. We were reminded that its duty was the care and management of the income tax Acts. No Chancellor of the Exchequer has felt able to override that point of view. In my opinion, if the Inland Revenue had stood firm on this issue no one would have overridden it on this either.
What is proposed? It is proposed that the child support officer—a misnomer if ever there was one—or other officer deputed by the Secretary of State for Social Security shall be able to obtain information for the purpose of tracing a person he wants to know more about. I admit that it is not for information about income, although I am sure that that was raised in this context, because other people have raised it. They think that the Inland Revenue is in possession of valuable information about the resources and income of people at large. The poll tax reformers put that forward. They wished to use the information of the Inland Revenue for the purposes of graduating a poll tax according to ability to pay. That would have raised very grave matters in relation to the taxation system.
In this case information is required to enable the Department of Social Security and its officers to trace a person. That may be regarded as relatively unimportant, but it is important enough for the information to be wanted from the Inland Revenue. If it is important enough for people to want it, it is also important to the Inland Revenue to know what it is wanted for.
The Inland Revenue is provided with a safeguard in subsection (3). I take it that if the Board of Inland Revenue withholds its consent there is no further argument about the right of the Secretary of State to the information. The Inland Revenue has the final say as to whether or not it will disclose information. I presume that, if it says that it will not, there is no more argument about it. If that is not so, the matter is even more grave.
The disclosures that are made at the present time under the Finance Acts, and not by an Act of this kind, relate to the exchange of information between the two revenue departments, HM Customs and Excise and the Inland Revenue. Customs and Excise is interested in VAT and the registration of firms for VAT purposes. The Inland Revenue has information about firms and others in business for tax purposes. Exchange of information is permitted by statute law for taxation purposes in both cases. There is also an arrangement—again approved by statute—between the Department of Social Security and the Inland Revenue. In that context the Inland Revenue collects and assesses contributions for national insurance purposes and is therefore the biggest supplier of the resources of the Department of Social Security. It is

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not too objectionable that certain information can be exchanged between the Inland Revenue and the Department of Social Security, but not for the present purpose.
It is for this purpose that the law apparently has to be changed, and that is to be done in a Bill which is intended to put children first rather than in the Finance Act where it belongs. The dangers of the thin end of the wedge in this matter are too great for me at least not to take it seriously. Believe me, the Inland Revenue is efficient and diligent and its relations with the public are good because the public know where the Inland Revenue stands in regard to the confidentiality of their affairs. That extends to the refusal of the Inland Revenue to part with information about a fraud which may be known to the Inland Revenue and about which the Director of Public Prosecutions has wanted to know in the past but in connection with which he has been forbidden entry into the records of the Inland Revenue.
It is more important that the Inland Revenue should keep confidential information the disclosure of which might have some public benefit for the purpose of the suppression of crime; it is far more important to keep the Inland Revenue safe from misuse and to protect it from becoming a private detective service than it is onerous to require discovery by other means of those who may commit crimes which do not affect the Inland Revenue but in relation to which the Inland Revenue has full remedy in its hands.
That great chairman of the board of the Inland Revenue, Sir John Anderson, later Lord Waverley, laid down the principles for the conduct of the Inland Revenue. His principle was that the job of the Inland Revenue was to collect tax and not to make criminals. That has been the guiding principle of the Inland Revenue throughout the years. It takes the form of being able to reach settlements with taxpayers who are transgressors which elsewhere might be the subject of proceedings under the criminal law but which the Commissioners of Inland Revenue, in their discretion, decide to treat as a matter between them and the taxpayer. They do not proceed in the courts against the taxpayer unless the charge involves such criminality that it is a matter of public interest that the court should deal with it.
In those circumstances I am bound to defend the citadel of confidentiality, which is the cardinal principle of the Inland Revenue. I am astonished that the Government and in particular the noble and learned Lord on the Front Bench should be associated with a proposition which they know is unwelcome to the Inland Revenue. They know the dangers and apparently are not willing to deny the child support officer access to revenue records in order to preserve the position of the Inland Revenue. How can information sought for the benefit of some child or children be more important than safeguarding the integrity and confidentiality of the Inland Revenue, upon which so much depends?
We have the best system of taxation in the world. We collect our taxes. People can tell the truth to the Inland Revenue without danger of being given away,
580
not only in matters of crime but in matters of personal conduct and personal relations. I hope that I can make some impression on the Government in regard to this issue. They should take out this provision. It is not important enough for the recipient of the information. After all it can be used only in the interests of an individual or individuals and not in the interest of the state. It is more important to them than to anybody else.
But the Inland Revenue has a principle to safeguard which it should go to the last ditch to defend. Certainly I would go to the last ditch to defend it. I had a very unpleasant time on the Royal Commission in respect of this issue. It is not often that the chairman of a Royal Commission insists on making a minority report against the majority of his commissioners. But the inquiry went long and deep into the role of the Inland Revenue and what it should and should not be. It should not be what is in Schedule 2. I beg the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor to abandon this paragraph and leave the Inland Revenue out of the matter. There are plenty of other means to find out what one wishes to know. There is the right to go to employers. It is not pleasant for officers to go to employers to ask for addresses of members of their workforce because those employees are wanted for failure to support their children.
That is what I have to say. The Committee will know that I feel very deeply about this matter. I do not know what to do about the amendment. I can only wait for the response to my over-long representations. Sometimes in a Bill of this kind people stumble into a matter of deeper significance than they realise. This is one of those matters. I no longer have any responsibility for the staff of the Inland Revenue. However, if I were the general secretary of the Inland Revenue Staff Federation today, the Government would have to reckon with me and I am not a pleasant person to be reckoned with.
I ask the Committee to accept my amendment to delete from Schedule 2 those words which are worth far more to the state in safeguarding the position of the Inland Revenue than they are of value to those who seek the information that they want to obtain.
7 p.m.
The Lord Chancellor: The noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby, explained clearly the difficulty that he has about this provision. I entirely agree with a great deal of what he said about the confidentiality of matters which are held by the Inland Revenue. I know that when he was an officer of the Inland Revenue and of the staff federation he maintained the traditions of the department with commendable tenacity, even when they were challenged by so distinguished a figure as the chairman of the Royal Commission on which he sat. At one time in my life I had the advantage to hold an appointment from the Commissioners of Inland Revenue. I appreciated fully —but no doubt not to the extent that the noble Lord does—the need for confidentiality in the affairs of the Inland Revenue.
The position is that the only information in the custody of the Inland Revenue which is the subject of

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this provision is the information it holds which the Secretary of State requires for the purposes of tracing, first, the current address of an absent parent and, secondly, the current employer of an absent parent, and nothing else. There is nothing disclosed about the tax affairs of the absent parent, the income or anything of that sort; it is required only to trace the current address of the absent parent and the current employer of the absent parent.
The noble Lord had something to say about the principle of the Bill. I endeavoured to deal with that point at Second Reading, which is perhaps the appropriate place in which to deal with it. There was a great deal of support for the principle of the Bill in this Chamber generally. I know that the noble Lord did not share that view with any enthusiasm. Still, the general feeling was that the principle of the Bill is a sound one, in that a parent, whether absent or present, has the responsibility to maintain his child and when he is absent that responsibility continues. This Bill provides an adequate method of enforcement. I am sure that many Members of the Committee have had experience of people with orders from the court for the maintenance of children which are not worth the paper on which they are written because those people cannot be found. For that purpose and that purpose only are these alterations to the law proposed. The noble Lord's amendment seeks to delete them.
This type of power is already provided in the Social Security Act 1986 for the purpose of enabling officials in the local offices of the Department of Social Security, who are currently working on seeking to recover from absent parents while the caring parent is on income support, to obtain the same type of information. The provision has not been long in operation but it already exists in the law. In my submission this is an appropriate provision to make to allow the Secretary of State, or the child support officer, as a matter of last resort to have recourse to the Inland Revenue for information. Sub-paragraph (3) is an important provision to which the noble Lord has directed attention.
I fully appreciate the strength of his feelings on the matter. He certainly has not ceased to be a force to be reckoned with simply because he is no longer the general secretary of the staff association. I deeply appreciate his point of view but on this occasion, to the extent necessary to support the clause as drafted, I am unable to agree with him. In the light of those representations, I hope the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Houghton of Sowerby: This is becoming a battle between the noble and learned Lord and myself. All I can do in the present circumstances is to keep my powder dry. I propose to do that by withdrawing the amendment and considering what I shall have to do on this matter at a later stage. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 76A not moved.]
Schedule 2 agreed to.
Clause 13 [Powers of inspectors]:
Lord Meston Lord Meston moved Amendment No. 77:
Page 9, line 33, at end insert:
"(6A) If a justice of the peace or in Scotland a justice of the peace or a sheriff, is satisfied that any information or documents are on any premises (as defined in subsection (3) above) and that their production or inspection are necessary for the purpose of requiring information which the Secretary of State or any child support officer requires for the purposes of this Act and that any of the conditions specified in subsection (6B) below is met, he may by warrant under his hand authorise a child support officer to enter any such premises, if need be by force.
(6B) The conditions referred to in subsection (6A) above are—

(a) that admission to the premises has been or is likely to be refused and that notice of intention to apply for a warrant under that subsection has been given to the occupier;

(b) that an application for admission, or the giving of such a notice, would defeat the object of the entry;

(c) that the premises are unoccupied;

(d) that the occupier is temporarily absent and it might defeat the object of the entry to await his return.

(6C) A warrant under subsection (6A) above may be issued only if—

(a) in England and Wales the justice of the peace is satisfied as required by that subsection by written information on oath; or

(b) in Scotland the justice of the peace or sheriff is so satisfied by evidence on oath.

(6D) A warrant under subsection (6A) above shall continue in force for a period of one month.
(6E) A child support officer entering any premises by virtue of this subsection may take with him such other persons as may appear to him necessary.
(6F) On leaving the premises which he has entered by virtue of a warrant under subsection (6A) a child support officer shall, if the premises are unoccupied or the occupier is temporarily absent, leave the premises as effectively secured against trespassers as he found them.").
The noble Lord said: In the unavoidable absence of my noble friend Lord McGregor of Durris, I move this amendment on his behalf. I do so only briefly in the hope that the Government will accept the principles of the amendment. If they do not accept those principles, I seek to discover their position on the matter. If necessary, I shall return to the matter at a later stage.
The purpose of Amendment No. 77 is to ensure that a warrant is obtained before an inspector attempts a potentially forcible entry of premises. The amendment fills an important gap—indeed a surprising gap—in the Bill and provides proper, lawful regulation of powers of entry. In addition to the matter of warrants, the amendment provides two new provisions. New Section (6E) restricts the number of persons a child support officer may take with him on entering any premises. New Section (6F) imposes a requirement on a child support officer to leave premises effectively secured. I beg to move.
7.15 p.m.
Lord Mishcon: It may be for the convenience of the Committee if we joined the debate on these amendments to the clause stand part debate. I believe that would be a sensible economy of time. With the permission of the Committee I propose to take that course. I say at once that if the Government accept the amendment which was moved so clearly and in such

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brief terms by the noble Lord, Lord Meston, I for my part would not proceed to oppose that the clause stand part of the Bill, as amended by this resolution.
I refer the Committee to the clause we are talking about. I described it in the speech I ventured to make on Second Reading as a truly draconian measure. I hope the Committee will consider that I am not accustomed to use exaggeration of language. I meant those words when I spoke them. I therefore ask the Committee to be good enough to refer to Clause 13. Clause 13 concerns the powers of inspectors. The Committee will recall that we are dealing with the maintenance of children by fathers. I know that the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, will remind me that in some cases we are also talking about mothers. Clause 13(2) states:
"For the purpose of acquiring information which the Secretary of State or any child support officer requires for the purposes of this Act, an inspector appointed under this section shall have power—

(a) to enter at all reasonable times any premises which may be inspected under this section; and

(b) to make such examination and enquiry there as he considers appropriate".

The inspector does not need to ask the leave of anybody to take such action. The Committee may be interested to know what premises an inspector can enter, without further leave, for the purposes of gathering information. I repeat that an inspector may take such action without the imprimatur of anyone other than himself. Clause 13(3) states:
"The premises which may be inspected under this section are any which the inspector concerned has reasonable grounds for supposing to be premises at or from which—
(a) any person is employed".
I pause there for the Committee to realise that if an inspector wants to obtain information, he does not have to obtain the leave of anyone else. Purely for the purposes of this Act, he can walk into the premises of a man's employer. Clause 13(3) (b) refers to premises where,
"there is being carried on any agency or other business for the introduction or supply to persons requiring them of persons available to do work or provide services; or
(c) any person carries on any trade, profession, vocation or a business of any kind".
An inspector may enter any premises where any trade, business or profession is being carried on by the father concerned. He may enter any place where the father is employed. He is not required to seek the leave of anyone before taking such an action. Having reached the premises he wishes to inspect, the inspector under the terms of Clause 13(4) in,
"exercising the powers conferred on him by this section may question, either alone or in the presence of any other person, any person whom he finds on the premises".
That means that if the employer happens to be present, the inspector may question him. The inspector may say, "I believe you have Mr. Jones in your employ. We are chasing him for maintenance for his child. He has not paid the maintenance and we would like a bit of information about Mr. Jones". There is nothing to stop the inspector asking such
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questions. He does not have to ask leave of anyone to do so. He may question any person whom he finds on the premises in question. Clause 13(5) states:
"If required to do so by an inspector exercising powers conferred on him by this section, any person who is or has been—

(a) an occupier of the premises in question;

(b) an employer or an employee working at or from those premises;

(c) carrying on at or from those premises an agency or other business of a kind mentioned in subsection (3) (b);

(d) an employee or agent of any person mentioned in paragraphs (a) to (c),

shall furnish to the inspector all such information and documents as the inspector may reasonably require for the purposes mentioned in subsection (2)".
In case the Committee thinks that this is not a serious provision, there is a safeguard in subsection (6) which states:
"No person shall be required under this section to answer any question or to give any evidence tending to incriminate himself or, in the case of a person who is married, his or her spouse".
Does the Committee agree with me that in dealing with the maintenance of a child it is absolutely draconian and a grave infringement of the rights and liberties of the subject to give powers to an inspector, however worthy he may be?
It may be said that there is another Act, such as the Social Security Act, where similar powers are given. Without arguing whether those powers should be given under that Act, I point out that one is there dealing with opportunities for fraud. People may be taking social security by fraudulent means on fraudulent representations. Perhaps under the Social Security Act such behaviour could be justified. However, I repeat that here we are dealing with a Bill that is supposed to be looking after children, putting them first and through an agency ensuring that the child's maintenance is properly collected from the parent. If we gave such untrammelled power under this clause—and I seek not to use exaggerated language—we should be driving a horse, a chariot, an automobile, a van and a lorry through the liberties of the subject, which this Chamber has protected over the centuries.
I should like to remove the clause from the Bill. However, I realise that in some urgent circumstances it may be necessary for such powers to be given. I wish to present a reasonable case to the Committee in order to obtain its support, if not on this occasion due to the lateness of the hour, on another occasion. As was said by the noble Lord, Lord Meston, in moving his amendment, if the provision were made subject to a magistrate's warrant, with the magistrate having to be satisfied that in the circumstances it was proper to grant such powers, I should yield to its inclusion. However, I should yield only to that extent. Although I should prefer the clause to be deleted, if the Government accepted the noble Lord's amendment it would not be my intention tonight or at a future stage to ask that the clause as so amended should not stand part of the Bill.
Lord Meston: I support the comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon. As we are debating the

585
matter generally I wish to refer to Amendment No. 78 standing in the name of my noble friend Lord McGregor. Clause 13(5) provides for the extraction of information from, among others, an agent of a person mentioned in the proposed clause. Amendment No. 78 would allow for legal professional privilege to be raised in support of a refusal to provide such information or documentation.
Earl Russell: I agree with what the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, has said. The clause reminds me of Lord Burghley's description of the High Commission as being a device to seek for offenders rather than for reforming. They are offenders of a great many kinds. It is an extraordinary infringement of the liberty of the subject and I hope that we shall hear of concessions.
Lord Houghton of Sowerby: Not only are we to consider the length to which the Bill goes, as in Clause 13, for example, but we must bear in mind that many regulations are still to be made by the Secretary of State. It will be impossible for us to apply any judgment in detail upon them and we must accept or reject them en bloc when they come to this Chamber.
I turn to the machinery for the pursuit of criminal fathers. I do not know, but there appear to be no lengths to which this Bill and its regulations will not go in pursuit of this wretched maintenance which must be recovered from absent fathers. What possesses the Government? What the devil are they up to? If the other place stands for this Bill in the form in which we are discussing it today it should be ashamed of itself. The time will come when something must be done with a Bill of this kind if it is finally enacted. I could use some offensive terms about the Bill but I must restrain myself.
I thought that there were some members of the Government who could see where they were going in the pursuit of noble principles of social and human policy. A few moments ago the noble and learned Lord said that the Chamber approved the Bill's principles on Second Reading. Did we then go into the details and see the full implications of officers, inspectors, the rights of entry and the rights of inspection'? We do not pursue criminals as we are pursuing these absent fathers. If we attended a little more to the pursuit of criminals we might do better for the state than pursuing absent fathers who are required to pay money only under this Bill towards the maintenance of their children. I can only say that I am shocked that such a Bill should come forward under the auspices of the new Government. Are they afraid of abandoning the Thatcherism of the last Administration? Must they stick to something that was imposed upon them under a previous regime, or what? I feel so indignant that I am almost speechless about the provisions.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: I hope that I made plain the fact that I have no sympathy for fathers who default on their duty to maintain their children. I hope that I made plain my view that it is entirely reasonable that steps should be taken to reimburse the general body of taxpayers on whom the liabilities are thrown. However, there must be a limit to what one will do in
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pursuit of those aims. It is no use having enormous paving stones of good intentions. What is done in this clause goes far beyond what is permissible in any decent system of civil liberties.
I should be perfectly content if the draconian powers were allowed on a magistrate's warrant. However, even that safeguard is not vouched safe. Obviously the noble Lord, Lord Meston, will not press the amendment this evening. I hope that my noble and learned friend—who is the embodiment of the law, as Gilbert said—will recognise that an important principle of the rule of law is at stake.
Earl Russell: I apologise for intervening again but I should like clarification on one matter. Subsection (3) (c) of the clause provides that an inspector may enter premises where:
"any person carries on any trade, profession, vocation or a business of any kind".
Let us suppose that the child support officer wishes to enter an official secret weapons research establishment. Does he have the power to do so, and, if not, why not?
7.30 p.m.
The Lord Chancellor: My noble and learned friend referred to Gilbert and Sullivan. No doubt there is some substance in what Gilbert and Sullivan said on that occasion.
My noble and learned friend said also that it is no good having a paving stone system of good intentions. I say that it is no good having an intention to enable children to be properly maintained by their parents without giving the necessary powers to those who are to make that effective. Having pious thoughts and supporting the principle of the Bill without giving the necessary powers to those charged with the responsibility of collecting the maintenance is not to support the principle of the Bill at all.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: Surely my noble and learned friend will agree that a line must be drawn. We do not permit any means to be used to extract maintenance from absent fathers. The question is where we draw the line. We who object to the provisions of the clause merely suggest that it should be drawn on the nearside of civil liberty.
The Lord Chancellor: The first point I wish to make is that it is necessary to have the powers effectively to follow up the obligation. I submit to the Committee that the question raised here is whether or not there can be effective powers without such obligations as are contained in Clause 13.
It is strange that the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord McGregor of Durris, so succinctly moved by the noble Lord, Lord Meston—and I shall endeavour to follow his good example—allows premises to be entered by force provided that there exists a warrant. I believe that goes beyond what is necessary in the pursuance of effective powers in the Bill. Quite frankly, I prefer what we have; namely, an authority given by the statute to the inspectors. The only situation in which those matters can be resolved is by reference to an offence. The only enforcement procedure is by reference to the offence system.

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My submission to the Committee is that the collection of proper maintenance for a child from its parents is as important an obligation as there can be. The powers which are proposed here are similar to those powers which already exist for inspectors to visit employers on matters regarding national insurance contributions, statutory sick pay and maternity pay. These inspectors and inspectors from other government departments will be able to obtain information on behalf of the agency. As subsection (2) makes clear, the power is limited to
"the purpose of acquiring information which the Secretary of State or any child support officer requires for the purposes of this Act".
Any attempt to enter premises or use these powers except for those purposes will be ultra vires and not subject to the criminal penalty in subsection (12).
In my submission, when this Parliament has been willing to give those powers to inspectors for those purposes—that is, national insurance contributions, statutory sick pay and maternity pay—it is reasonable that they should be given also for the purposes of obtaining maintenance for a child from a parent who is responsible for paying that maintenance.
Lord Mishcon: The noble and learned Lord has reached a very important stage in his argument. Does the noble and learned Lord agree that whatever may be the other statutory provisions, the circumstances under this Bill are quite different?
If an employer's premises are entered and the inspector says that he understands that an employee is claiming sick pay, national insurance or maternity benefit, there exists a set of circumstances known to everybody and, quite obviously, although the maternity matter may be of some confidentiality, any relationship between employer and employee is not affected.
However, let us suppose that an inspector enters an employer's premises and says that he is inquiring about the payment which should be made by a father who has an illegitimate child but he is not doing so, or that he is separated from his wife and there is an obligation on him to pay which he is not honouring and, therefore, the inspector wants information. Does the noble and learned Lord realise what may happen to the position of that employee? Does he not realise also how different are the circumstances which may arise—and the noble and learned Lord has a very definite imagination under the provisions of this clause which deals with parenthood?
Baroness Faithfull: Perhaps I may ask the noble and learned Lord whether any approach has been made to employers on this matter. My experience tells me that many employers will resent this provision and will not want it, let alone the other way round. Have the employers' associations been approached and are they willing to accept this?
The Lord Chancellor: The proposals of the White Paper were open to all. I believe that the question which must be asked is whether Members of the Committee are prepared to allow fathers to have substantial employment earning quite a lot of money
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when they have obligations to their children which they are prepared to ignore. I should have thought that my noble friend and the noble Lord opposite would not wish to see that situation.
Perhaps I may turn to the question of the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon. I see no reason why an inspector seeking information on premises will be giving information. This clause deals with seeking rather than giving information. The authority under which the inspector acts is that he requires the information for the purposes of the Act. Nothing in the clause suggests that he should state precisely what is the situation in respect of which he requires the information. I believe that he will ask whether the person in question is employed there and, if so, what is his wage, salary, and what are the conditions under which he obtains payment. Information of that sort can be obtained without any disclosure of the information which the officer has about the person from whom the money is sought.
The idea that this clause empowers the inspector to give out information which he has from the child support agency for the purpose of informing employers about the state of family relations of the person in question is, with great respect to the noble Lord, a complete mistake. The fact that the noble Lord labours under that misapprehension may explain why he described the powers as draconian.
Lord Mishcon: The noble and learned Lord must —and I say this with deep respect—enter the world of reality. Does he imagine that an employer, on being approached by an inspector who has come on to the premises asking for information, will not have the intelligence to ask why the information is sought? That is obvious.
In those circumstances does the noble and learned Lord believe that the answer of the inspector will be, "I am afraid I cannot tell you that but please give me the information just the same". He will say that he is inquiring about child maintenance. There is nothing in the Bill to stop him. Is the noble and learned Lord saying that he will introduce regulations that will prevent the inspector from telling anybody why he is asking for the information? We must enter the world of reality. As it stands it is a draconian clause.
I am sure that the noble and learned Lord will tell us why he objects to the safeguard of a magistrate's warrant in those circumstances; perhaps then we can continue with the debate. However, I ask him also to answer the point regarding whether he believes that the employer will not ask the inspector why he is asking for the information.
The Lord Chancellor: I am in the world of complete reality. All I need to do to illustrate the point I was making earlier is compare the noble Lord's last formulation with his earlier formulation of the basis on which the inspector would approach the employer.
The noble Lord looks puzzled, but perhaps I can leave the matter there. I do not want to waste the time of the Committee but I do I wish to make my point clearly. The inspector would not be authorised to give any information regarding the state of affairs between the father and his child. He is asking for information

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in regard to what is going on in the premises in the shape of payment. To suggest that he was the father of an illegitimate child would be outside his power. There is nothing in the clause to suggest that the inspector would give such information.
The reason I prefer our clause to the clause proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Meston, is that it implies the entry of premises by force and under the exercise of a warrant. We do not require those powers. We are content with powers that do not entitle people to enter by force but require the occupier—or whoever has control of the premises—to accede unless he has some good reason not to and would be able to defend himself on that matter.
The authority of the inspector will be fundamental to those powers, and the purpose for which the inspector requires the information will be given. If one is interested in civil liberties, Clause 13 is a better clause from that point of view and more on the right side of civil liberties than the intrusive power to enter by force as the result of a magistrate's warrant. The amendment proposed in form by the noble Lord, Lord McGregor of Durris, is additional to those powers contained in Clause 13.
Earl Russell: I wonder whether the noble and learned Lord has considered one specific case which may arise. The business to be investigated may be a husband and wife business and the child being investigated may be the child of the husband by a liaison previously unknown to the wife. Do we then end up with two lots of single parents instead of one? Is that in the public interest?
7.45 p.m.
The Lord Chancellor: The inspector would make no comment on the relationship between the husband and wife or who it is in respect of which the maintenance is in question. However, it is likely that the situation would become evident to the party from other circumstances.
If the noble Earl is suggesting that that is a situation in which maintenance should not be paid I could understand his point. He shakes his head. If the wife is a partner in the business she will know that payment is going out in respect of the child should an order for deduction of maintenance be made against the firm of which the wife and the husband are partners.
Lord Houghton of Sowerby: What will an inspector do when he goes on his mission? He will have to say he is an inspector of something from somewhere. What will he say? What will he introduce himself as? Presumably he will not say that he is an inspector of police. He will have to say that he is empowered by the Child Support Act to make certain inquiries. Is it then assumed that the employer will not be interested in what his mission is likely to be?
The Lord Chancellor: Many people are interested in why the police seek to make inquiries. The police are usually not forthcoming regarding the purpose of their inquiry so long as their authority to make the inquiry is made clear. That is usually sufficient.
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For the purposes of this question the inspector would be able to say that he was there for the purpose of acquiring information which the Secretary of State or a child support officer required for the purposes of the Child Support Act. That is all. He would not need to say anything more. He certainly would not be required to answer questions regarding the status of the people who might be entitled to the maintenance.
There is no point in introducing an elaborate system for assessing how much maintenance is to be unless one has a proper system for following it up. Many Members of the Committee must be aware that one complaint about the present system is that people have a maintenance order from the court, with all the authority of the court behind it, but cannot get a penny from the person named because of the difficulty of enforcement.
The provision is intended to meet a real difficulty in practical terms. I cannot believe that it will be effective without the powers set out and which are mirrored by the provisions that exist in the social security legislation. As the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, illustrated by example, that might be in respect of liability, as a relative, for maintenance which the social security fund is entitled to recover as a result of income or support paid out.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: My noble and learned friend denounced indignantly the element of violent entry in the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Meston. If that element of violent entry were omitted would he be prepared to accept the amendment?
The Lord Chancellor: I imagine the reason for the warrant is because of that very factor.
Lord Mishcon: I do not think the Committee would like to extend the debate much further at this hour. As far as I am concerned, though I cannot speak for the noble Lord, Lord Meston, the stage has been reached to consider what we shall do.
I cannot resist uttering one further sentence—it may extend to two. The noble and learned Lord seems to be incapable—I say this with deep respect—of recognising the harm that could be done at an employer's premises; I take that as only one example. I know that he is a defender of civil liberties. He is endeavouring by some mental process to persuade himself that there is no difference between making an inquiry about national insurance, sick pay or maternity pay, and the delicate matter of child support. He cannot see the difference. I believe that he can but is unwilling to say so because, with his usual skill, he is defending the Bill. I do not believe that he can do so with any conscience, bearing in mind his duty, in the position which he holds with such dignity, to protect the liberties of the subject.
Having uttered one long sentence, or possibly two, I shall seek another opportunity of saying that the clause should not stand part of the Bill. The noble and learned Lord appears to be minded to agree to the amendment should the question of force be left out. He nods his head in a direction which does not encourage me and not in a way which might. I must leave the noble Lord, Lord Meston, and the noble

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Lord whose place he took in moving this amendment to decide what course they will take in future. At Report stage I shall certainly be moving that this clause does not stand part of the Bill unless an amendment comes forward which the Government are prepared to accept.
Lord Meston: It is certainly not my intention to test the opinion of the Committee at this stage. I defend my noble friend's amendment from the charge that it is the product of pious thought. It was the intention to strike a balance on the question of the wide powers of entry given by Clause 13 as drafted. It is not just a question of the power of entry but a power under subsection (2) (b),
"to make such examination and enquiry as (the inspector) considers appropriate".
The inspector should not be immunised from the need to obtain a warrant in certain circumstances. I accept that there may be matters of form which make the amendment as presently produced defective. For that and the reasons already indicated, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment, but on the basis already indicated by the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, that we shall certainly need to return to this matter at a later stage when we have been back to the real world which we all claim to inhabit. Before I formally withdraw the amendment, I remind the Committee that I spoke to Amendment No. 78. The noble and learned Lord did not refer to that amendment. As a matter of completeness, I wonder whether he will comment on it at this stage, but if not I shall quite understand.
The Lord Chancellor: The question of legal professional privilege is unlikely to arise in relation to the kind of information which the inspector is authorised to get. We shall certainly look to see whether something further is required. As I have said, these provisions are modelled on existing statutory provisions where that is not expressly referred to. I want to check that for myself. At present I feel that that is omitted because it is not thought to be necessary. In other words, there is no intention of evading or overcoming legal professional privilege.
Lord Meston: I am most grateful to the noble and learned Lord. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 78 not moved.]
Clause 13 agreed to.
Lord Cavendish of Furness: I beg to move that the House do now resume. I suggest that the Committee stage begins again at 8.55 p.m.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
House resumed.

Pneumoconiosis etc. (Workers' Compensation) (Payment of Claims) (Amendment) Regulations 1991
7.54 p.m.
Viscount Ullswater Viscount Ullswater rose to move, That the draft regulations laid before the House on 4th March be approved [13th Report from the Joint Committee].
The noble Viscount said: These regulations are being made under the Pneumoconiosis etc. (Workers' Compensation) Act 1979. The purpose of the regulations is to increase by 9 per cent. the amounts of compensation paid under the Act to those who first satisfy all the conditions of entitlement on or after 1st April 1991. The 1979 Act was introduced to give help to an unfortunate group of workpeople suffering from very unpleasant diseases of the lung brought on by exposure to the harmful dust at their workplace. These diseases develop slowly and may only become disabling and capable of diagnosis many years after exposure and perhaps long after the sufferer has been out of contact with the cause.
This time lapse increases the possibility that the employer in question may have gone out of business before the sufferer becomes aware that he has cause for civil action. As a result, some workers find that, although entitled to social security benefits, they are unable to seek redress by civil action simply because their former employers are no longer in business.
The Act introduced a scheme to provide some measure of compensation to sufferers and their families when they are unable to get it in the normal way through civil action. It is not the intention of the Act that the state should take over the responsibilities which are properly those of employers. It therefore includes two basic conditions of entitlement. These are that there is no former employer remaining in business against whom a claim for damages could be made; and that no court action has been brought nor compensation received in respect of the disease. Another basic condition is that disablement benefit has been awarded by the Department of Social Security. Payments under the Act are in addition to any social security benefits awarded.
The reason for this debate is that the Government have made a commitment to Parliament to review the amounts of compensation payments with the aim of keeping them in line with the value of money. The original payment regulations, setting out a scale of payments by age and percentage disability, came into operation on 1st January 1980. This is now the eighth occasion on which the Government have asked Parliament to increase the rates of payment. Last year we approved an increase of 8 per cent. from April to take account of the movement in the index of retail prices during the preceding 12 months. The proposed increase this year is 9 per cent. I am sure Members of this House will agree with me that the circumstances leading to these payments are to be regretted. I very much welcome the opportunity provided by these amending regulations to maintain the value of the compensation.
I know that your Lordships will recognise that no amount of money will ever compensate individuals and families for their pain, suffering and loss, but at least these regulations allow us to give practical and material help. The Department of Employment does all it can to administer the Act in a sympathetic way. We recognise that each case is an individual tragedy and we are as generous as the statute will allow us to be. Since the Act came into force at the beginning of 1980, 6,653 people have made claims, 75 per cent. of whom have received payment. The total cost to date has been £29.8 million.
Although numbers of claims for dust diseases covered by the Act are much less than when the Act was introduced, it is a sad fact that claims are still being received by the Department of Employment. Present claims are mainly from those suffering from the asbestos related disease, mesothelioma. Medical statistical projections indicate that deaths from this disease among men will not peak until early in the next century. This reflects the poor conditions which applied in some workplaces a generation or more ago and the long time-span between exposure to the harmful dust and the onset of symptoms of the disease. The dangers of asbestos are now well recognised and extensive legislation is in place which prevents such exposure today.
Sadly, people are still suffering from what has happened in the past and it is clearly right that, where they cannot obtain redress in the normal way, they should nonetheless receive some measure of compensation for support in the tragic circumstances in which they find themselves. Your Lordships will readily understand the importance of maintaining the value of the amounts of compensation to those who are entitled to payments under this scheme. I therefore commend the uprating of these payment scales to the House and ask for your Lordships' approval of the regulations.
Moved, That the draft regulations laid before the House on 4th March be approved [13th Report from the Joint Committee].—(Viscount Ullswater).
Baroness Turner of Camden: My Lords, I rise to thank the Minister for his usual lucid explanation of the order. He is quite right to draw attention to the tragedies involved in a number of these cases and to the fact that people who suffer from dust related diseases very often are quite unaware of the condition, or at least the reasons for their condition, until many years later. Therefore it was quite right that a scheme like the pneumoconiosis scheme should have been introduced. The order is an entirely uncontroversial one. There was a commitment to up-rate in line with the RPI. This was done last year by the 8 per cent. increase. We now have a 9 per cent. increase for this year. On these Benches we have nothing to say in opposition to the order.
Viscount Ullswater: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for the welcome she has given to these draft regulations. I commend them to the House.
On Question, Motion agreed to.

European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (Immunities and Privileges) Order 1991
8 p.m.
Lord Reay Lord Reay rose to move, That the draft order laid before the House on 11th March be approved [14th Report from the Joint Committee].
The noble Lord said: My Lords, the draft order was approved in another place on 13th March. Your Lordships will remember that the House approved the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (Immunities and Privileges) Order 1990 on 25th July 1990. That order gave effect to the immunities and privileges set out in Chapter VIII of the agreement establishing the bank. The order before the House today will revoke the 1990 order and replace it with fresh provisions. The immunities and privileges set out in the agreement establishing the bank, previously given effect to by the 1990 order, and the new privileges and immunities accorded in the headquarters agreement negotiated between the bank and Her Majesty's Government, are now consolidated in the draft order before us. The order, when made, will enable the United Kingdom to grant to the bank, its officers and employees, experts performing missions for the bank and representatives of members of the bank these privileges and immunities.
I informed the House on 25th July last year when privileges and immunities for the bank were first debated in the House that the Government would be presenting the order now before us for approval once the negotiations for a headquarters agreement for the bank were completed. The headquarters agreement was laid before the House in draft on 7th February as Command Paper 1440. The order requires the approval of each House under Section 10 of the International Organisations Act 1968 before it can be submitted to Her Majesty in Council.
The order needs to be formally made at the meeting of the Privy Council tomorrow so that the headquarters agreement may be signed at the inaugural meeting of the bank on 15th April—a most important occasion, which will be attended by my right honourable friend the Prime Minister, by President Mitterrand and by several other heads of state or government. The agreement will enter into force on signature. It is for this reason that the order is before the House today.
When presenting the 1990 privileges and immunities order last July, I explained that the privileges and immunities set out therein had been accepted by all the prospective members of the bank as necessary to enable the bank to fulfil its purpose and function. All member countries of the EBRD will grant the bank these immunities and privileges. The House approved the 1990 order and the privileges and immunities set out therein. Those privileges and immunities are now reproduced in the draft order and include certain exemptions from duties and taxation for the bank and certain immunities from seizure for its property. The officers and employees of the bank

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are exempted from taxation on the salaries paid to them by the bank (although they will pay an internal tax for the benefit of the bank) and they will be immune from suit and legal process in respect of their official acts. Legal status is conferred on the bank by the order.
In a number of respects the draft headquarters agreement goes beyond the agreement establishing the bank; this is because there are certain matters which are obviously not especially relevant to the membership of the bank as a whole but are of particular concern to the bank and to the United Kingdom as the host state, in their mutual relations. The headquarters agreement gives immunity to the bank within the scope of its official activities from legal proceedings, subject to specified exceptions, and inviolability for the bank's premises. Persons connected with the bank (which includes officers and employees, experts performing missions for the bank and representatives of members of the bank) are granted varying privileges and immunities according to their status. Those who are British citizens or permanent residents of the United Kingdom receive, however, only the essential minimum privileges and immunities to enable them to perform their official functions.
I should explain that the original of the draft order before us was withdrawn and relaid on 11th March to take account of a point raised by the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments. A second paragraph has been added to Article 6 of the draft order to reflect the last sentence of Article 6.2 of the draft headquarters agreement negotiated between the Government and the bank. This article regulates the inviolability of the bank's premises. A second point concerning this article raised by the joint committee was addressed by the department in a further memorandum sent to the committee. The joint committee completed its consideration of the draft order on 12th March.
In conclusion, we are satisfied that the privileges and immunities accorded under the draft order are necessary to fulfil our obligations under the agreement establishing the bank and the headquarters agreement. The House may rest assured that the privileges and immunities accorded are no more than are necessary for the effective operation of the bank in London and that they are granted in accordance with the limitation imposed by the International Organisations Act 1968, as amended, under whose provisions the order is made,
Finally, I am delighted that the bank has chosen London as the location of its headquarters; it will be the first multilateral development bank to be based here. We think that this will be good for the bank and good for London. The establishment of this new bank represents the commitment of the international community to support the process of political and economic reform in Central and Eastern Europe. Your Lordships will no doubt join me in welcoming the bank to London and wishing it every success in its endeavours. I beg to move.
Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 11 th March be approved [14th Report from the Joint Committee].—(Lord Reay.)
Lord Richard: My Lords, I shall be very brief in response to the noble Lord, Lord Reay. First, on this side of the House we welcome the fact that the bank is coming to London. Secondly, we accept that the immunities and privileges set out in the order are 64indeed necessary for the proper operation of the bank. Thirdly, in view of what is going to happen in the Privy Council tomorrow, the noble Lord will no doubt be not surprised, though I hope relieved, to hear that we shall certainly not be opposing the order tonight. This is not the occasion on which one should debate the bank itself, or the way in which the bank will operate. I shall ask the noble Lord two questions. I do not expect answers from him tonight, however, so he need not be too worried about that. Perhaps he will be kind enough to note the following points and write to us, because they are matters of some concern.
It would be interesting to have some further information as to how the bank's limited funds will be allocated. It would also be helpful if we could know by whom the bank's limited funds will be allocated. At present, as I understand it, members will have equal votes on general policy matters, but on finance some members will be more equal than others. We should welcome at least some further indication from the Government on these two points at an appropriate stage. Subject to that, we support this order.
Lord Reay: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for the welcome he has given to the order. He has posed two questions but has kindly given me the option of replying to him in writing, which I think it will be best if I accept. On that basis, I should like to offer to do so.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
The Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne: My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now adjourn during pleasure until 8.55 p.m.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
[The Sitting was suspended from 8.9 to 8.55 p.m.].

Child Support Bill [H.L.]
House again in Committee.
Clause 14 agreed to.
Clause 15 [Reviews on change of circumstances]:
Lord Mishcon Lord Mishcon moved Amendment No. 79:
Page 11 , line 5, at end insert ("and the Secretary of State shall arrange for the review to be conducted by a child support officer.").
The noble Lord said: The purpose of the amendment is to ensure that a review cannot be refused. I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: I would not have guessed the purpose of the amendment if the noble Lord had not explained it so plainly to me. The situation is that the Secretary of State is obliged to make the arrangement,

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and that is the kind of arrangement which I think is suitable in the circumstances. Therefore, there is no question of the review not being available.
I must say that I believe that this is a valuable method of dealing with the matter. It is referred to in rather formal terms in the Bill as the nature of things requires. However, the idea is that, before any formal proceedings outside the agency take place, the matter will be checked by another officer in the agency to ensure that all is well. That process ensures that no unnecessary formal procedures are required. In the light of that explanation, I hope the noble Lord will feel that the purpose of his amendment has been met and that he will therefore withdraw it.
Lord Mishcon: I was hoping that the noble and learned Lord would say that as the proposed purpose was also his purpose the amendment could be accepted. However, I heard what he said. In the circumstances, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 15 agreed to.
Clause 16 [Reviews at instigation of child support officers]:
Lord Mishcon Lord Mishcon moved Amendment No. 80:
Page 11, line 37, at end insert ("or where an application to the Secretary of State for review on one or more of those grounds has been made by one of the persons specified in section 15(1) (a) or (b),").
The noble Lord said: The purpose of the amendment is to give either parent the right to apply for a review under Clause 16 grounds and to ensure that such reviews are not limited to the question of a change of circumstances. I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: Clause 16 sets out the circumstances in which a child support officer may instigate a review of his own accord. It would be inappropriate to insert an additional enabling provision for the child support officer to process applications for review from the interested parties. However, in practice, if any of the interested parties brought to the attention of the child support officer that one of the grounds for review applied, the child support officer could carry out a review under this clause. Alternatively, under Clause 17, the interested parties may apply for a review through the appeal procedures. That should be within 28 days of the decision being given, but the time limit can be extended by the Secretary of State. The clause we are now dealing with gives powers to the child support officer to instigate a review on his own accord. I have sought to explain the ways in which other parties may apply for it.
Lord Mishcon: I have taken note of what the noble and learned Lord said and I shall consider his response most carefully to see whether the amendment is in fact necessary. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 16 agreed to.
9 p.m.
Clause 17 [Appeals against maintenance assessments and other decisions]:
Lord Mishcon Lord Mishcon moved Amendment No. 81:
Page 12, line 31, leave out subsection (7).
The noble Lord said: This is a probe with an edge to it—if I may put it that way—because I cannot conceive that subsection (7) means what it says. Is it correct that an appeal—not a review—from one such officer is to another such officer of precisely the same grade? I cannot believe that that is the noble and learned Lord's idea of an appeal procedure or that he would think it efficient. It is with that in mind that I tabled the amendment. I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: The provision is intended to be a procedure under which the matter in question can be reviewed within the agency. All that the subsection deals with is the need to have someone other than the person who did the original determination look at the case. Obviously it might be in the interests of the system that that should be done by an officer of higher grade, but that is a detail which could be looked at. My point is that it would not be the same person. The idea is to provide a review procedure within the agency. We refer to an "appeal" but it is just the first stage: it is an appeal within the agency itself from one officer to another. As I have said, I believe that it is a valuable provision. Those who are familiar with such matters believe that it is a valuable procedure to have before one embarks upon a more formal system. I hope that the noble Lord will agree that it is valuable to have a requirement that the case will be looked at by another officer before proceeding further, and that in the light of that explanation he may feel able to withdraw the amendment.
Earl Russell: By his few words, the noble and learned Lord has helped to clarify one of the underlying issues we have been debating for some time. he said that the matter was to be reviewed within the agency itself. He is concerned with the agency attempting to reach the correct decision to its own satisfaction. What we have been concerned with throughout the amendments is the possibility of doing justice between the agency and the parties who feel themselves aggrieved. The provision does not achieve the same thing.
The Lord Chancellor: That is the next step. It is an appeal from the agency. Once the agency makes a determination, there will be an appeal—a point that we deal with later—from the agency to some authority outside the agency. There is a question about what that authority might be. This is a procedure within the agency. Child support officers will be fallible and so it is useful to have a check within the agency. Another officer will look at the case. That is basically the procedure. If one is not satisfied with that decision, one appeals outside the agency.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: Perhaps I may raise at this stage a point that I was going to raise on clause stand part, because this is the beginning of a particular method of review. Subsections (1), (2) and (3) provide

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for an appeal to the Secretary of State. Subsection (7), as the noble Lord pointed out, merely provides for an appeal from one official to another of co-ordinate status. When one looks at subsection (6) the matter becomes even more extraordinary. The bureaucratic nature of the Bill, which appears throughout, becomes absolutely plain. The grounds of appeal are only provided for in paragraphs (a), (b) and (c). Paragraph (c) provides for a decision that was wrong in law. One would expect such an appeal to be made to a court or at any rate to a lawyer, not sideways to another official. On analysis, paragraphs (a) and (b) raise points of law, but one need not go into that because under paragraph (c) the appeal is expressly on a point of law.
What are we doing with a Bill of this type and with a provision of this type? I thought that we had rid ourselves of that type of provision by 1950 or 1951. This clause is typical of the bureaucratic drafting of statutes of that era. It is disturbing to find that the battle has to be fought all over again. It is hard to realise the effect that Crichel Down had. We had exactly this kind of provision: the gentlemen in Whitehall knew best. As the Clark Inquiry following the Crichel Down episode pointed out, the officials concerned showed active resentment when their decisions were questioned. One had all the paraphernalia of a bureaucracy, and as a result of Crichel Down a popular and able Minister resigned and two officials were shifted sideways. The air was cleared. There was no recrudescence, or at any rate very little until the past few years.
The Bill must be considered against a plethora of Henry VIII clauses and the downgrading of parliamentary control so that what should have been an affirmative procedure is made a negative procedure. I hope that we shall watch where we are going. I hope that my noble and learned friend, embodying the spirit of the rule of law, will explain exactly what we are doing in allowing an appeal on a point of law from one official to another.
The Lord Chancellor: The purpose of the provision is to try to ensure that the agency has made the right decision before the matter leaves it. The agency is merely an agency of the Secretary of State. The agency is not mentioned. The child support officer is a member of an independent organisation within the responsibility of the Secretary of State, with a duty to deal with these matters in a proper way. The Secretary of State himself will not intervene in individual cases.
The purpose of this provision is to allow the assessment made by a child support officer to be challenged and dealt with by another child support officer in the first instance. This is not the end of the story. It is a perfectly reasonable step enabling someone, who does not wish to take the matter immediately to a higher authority but who wishes to check what was done, to have it examined by another officer.
Officials who are child support officers will have to administer the law which is applicable to this. However, they are not the final step in the matter. I believe that the reference to Crichel Down was
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perhaps less than comprehensive in taking account of the appeal provisions, to which we shall come, beyond the Secretary of State. This is intended to be helpful and I repeat that those who are familiar with the subject will welcome the procedure.
Lord Coleraine: As I understood it, my noble and learned friend said that there was no need for the review procedures. If someone was not satisfied with the decision of the child support officer, he could go straight to court.
The Lord Chancellor: If I gave that impression, I did not intend it. The agency must have a chance to check the decision before there is an appeal outside it under Clause 18, but it will be as a result of reconsideration within the agency, before one can go outside. If I said anything to the contrary, I apologise, I was mistaken.
Lord Coleraine: I was surprised to hear what I thought I heard. It seemed to me that my noble and learned friend was saying that the clause was needed because the child support officer could not be relied upon to get the decision right the first time. It seems to me that anyone wishing to appeal will be extremely surprised to find that they must appeal to another official within the same agency. I should have thought that there ought to be some provision whereby, as a matter of administrative arrangements, the decisions of child support officers would be reviewed before they went further; or if the officers made decisions, there should be some provision to the effect that before the matter went to court the decision could be reviewed and overturned within the agency.
I do not believe that it would be satisfactory to face somebody who is appealing against an assessment or whatever it is, with having to appeal to another official of the agency.
Lord Mishcon: I suggest respectfully to the noble and learned Lord that he may wish to reconsider the matter. I hope briefly to explain why. One could have included in the Bill a provision that someone who was dissatisfied or wished to raise a question could ask an official of equal rank to the person who made the decision to review the situation created by his colleague. The word "review" was used. It is just intelligible that it could be done by a person of equal status who did not make the original decision.
However, the wording of the clause, as I believe the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale, pointed out, is an appeal procedure normally dealt with by an appellate tribunal. I refer the noble and learned Lord to the limitations laid down which do not make this a review in the way in which he interpreted it. First, there is the negative provision in Clause 17(5) that:
"An appeal…may be brought only on one or more of the following grounds".
That is not, "Please would you review? Is he quite sure that the arithmetic is correct?" Subsection (6) states:
"The grounds are that the decision appealed against"—
the word "appealed" is used again; it is not asking for a review:
"(a) was made in ignorance of a material fact;
(b) was based on a mistake as to a material fact; or

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(c) was wrong in law".
That is not a review procedure, it is an appeal procedure with limited rights of appeal. One might almost think one was looking at an Act of Parliament dealing with the limitations of the right to appeal to the Court of Appeal. It concerns limiting grounds, it is not a review generally but is limited to facts.
With that appeal procedure, which is not called a review, limiting the appellant to definite grounds upon which he can base his appeal (otherwise he is out of the jurisdiction of the appeal) one finds the appeal being considered by someone of equal rank but who did not make the original decision.
I shall not repeat the point made by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale, as to the oddity of an appeal on law being decided by a child support officer. Can the noble and learned Lord imagine any similar legislation where a Ministry is concerned? Can he really support a Bill where there is an appeal procedure from the decision of somebody in a Ministry and the appeal—limited to points of law, mistakes of fact, and so on—would be adjudicated upon by a person of equal rank to the civil servant who originally made the decision?
I do not intend to continue to deride this provision. I merely ask the noble and learned Lord, in the light of the debate this evening, to consider reviewing the whole of this clause and making it into a review provision of general and not particular limitation; namely, if somebody wanted to have a review he could have it conducted by somebody who was of equal rank and not on questions of law, but generally reviewed. Then, if the review did not satisfy the appellant with the eventual decision, a proper appeal procedure would be put into force. Before this Bill goes to another place I ask the noble and learned Lord not to make an absurdity, as I respectfully believe it is, of what is supposed to be an appellate provision in this Bill.
The Lord Chancellor: The noble Lord asked me earlier about the rank of the officer. I said that the detail of the rank of the officer could not be expected to be found in the primary legislation. That would be a matter for administration by the Secretary of State. Child support officers may not all be the same grade or rank. There is a chief child support officer, but I should have thought that he would be the head of the adjudication function. In any case, I am merely pointing out that the Bill does not specify equal rank. To give more force to his submissions the noble Lord put that in—which is a well-known argumentative device with which I am not unfamiliar.
I shall, of course, pay attention to what was said. I understood this to be regarded as quite a valuable additional provision. It is not taking anybody's rights away. However, if noble Lords think it is a subject for derision, obviously I ought to reconsider it.
Lord Mishcon: In the light of those courteous remarks, I ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
9.15 p.m.
Lord Meston Lord Meston moved Amendment No. 82:
Page 12, line 34, after ("State") insert ("or in circumstances where new evidence is produced").
The noble Lord said: The purpose of this amendment is to extend the time limit for appeal, specifically where new evidence is produced. I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: This is a provision for extension of time. One would assume that this is not necessarily limited to new evidence, but if new evidence is produced one would expect an out-of-time appeal to be allowed. That sort of circumstance is one of the grounds on which out-of-time appeals might be allowed. I suggest that it is better to leave it as a general power to extend the time rather than try to specify the circumstances in which an out-of-time appeal might be allowed, such as the one that the noble Lord mentioned.
Lord Meston: I had hoped by this amendment to provide one particular circumstance in which the time for appealing would be extended rather than, as the clause is drafted, leaving it to the discretion of the Secretary of State to grant leave. I accept of course that potentially, at any rate, the production of genuinely new evidence could be comprehended by the existing words of the clause, but it still remains a matter of discretion rather than a matter of right. For the time being I shall not pursue the matter and beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
The Deputy Speaker (Lord Ampthill): I should remind the Committee that if Amendment No. 82A is agreed to I cannot call Amendments Nos. 83 or 83A.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale Lord Simon of Glaisdale moved Amendment No. 82A:
Page 13, line 7, leave out subsection (13).
The noble and learned Lord said: The amendment is to leave out subsection (13). So that there is no mistake this time I should first say that the noble Lord, Lord Henley, and I were perhaps at cross purposes on my last amendment. I am not arguing that these matters should not be dealt with by regulation. On the contrary, matters regulating appeals are generally dealt with by secondary legislation. It is reasonable that in subsection (12) the Secretary of State is enjoined mandatorily to make regulations with respect to the procedures to be followed on appeal. Certainly he should. For example, he will want to lay down who shall be the parties to the appeal and what is the nature of the evidence. We are not nowadays tied to oral evidence, either at first instance or on appeal, so he can give a direction as to evidence and whether evidence shall be written.
He will want to make regulations as to who can appear as witnesses and give oral evidence. He will want to make regulations governing who should be called to produce documents, and indeed as to evidence generally. Obviously he will want to deal with adjournments and, above all, he will want to deal with what should be the result of the appeal.
Your Lordships will have realised that all I have been doing is to read out from paragraphs (b) to (i) of subsection (13). They are merely examples of the regulations that the Secretary of State is bound to make under subsection (12). They are not even ones that he is enjoined to make. They are particular examples of a generality and they are discretionary.
I would first venture to ask my noble and learned friend this question: If subsection (13) is omitted, cannot all those matters dealt with there be dealt with under subsection (12)? When we had the Children Bill we had pages of this stuff. It was rather worse generally, because what is now subsection (12) would have been discretionary with the word "may" and similarly with subsection (13).
We had pages of that and what my noble and learned friend said on the Children Bill was, "Yes, it is not strictly necessary"—which means that it is not necessary—"but it may be useful for Parliament to know what the Secretary of State has in mind by way of regulations". I hope that my noble and learned friend will not repeat that argument.
Of course we know what he has in mind, because they are the sort of things that are bound to be dealt with in regulations governing appeals. Moreover, I must ask my noble and learned friend this question: Is there no consideration to be given to shortening an Act of Parliament? If it is not strictly necessary, is it not, in the state of our bloated statute book, undesirable to admit things that are not necessary?
Finally I ask my noble and learned friend, specifically on paragraph (a) of subsection (13), how he thinks that that adds anything whatever to subsection (12). I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: My noble and learned friend enjoins me not to repeat the argument that I made in relation to the Children Bill. Perhaps I may therefore take it as read without repetition, though I should like to point out that I said then that the provisions in the Children Bill which were under discussion and the provisions in the present subsection (13) are not strictly necessary in the sense that, if they were left out, the Secretary of State could still make regulations dealing with these matters.
However, I included the word "strictly" advisedly because there may well be advantage in inserting the subsection. Perhaps I may give one example. It enables the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, to propose a particular condition that might be included in the regulations, as witness Amendment No. 83, in which he proposes that the regulations should include a particular restriction.
Parliament is interested in what is in the regulations and also what heads of regulation we have in mind. If a matter is as important as this it is useful to indicate the heads of regulation which the Secretary of State has in mind at the stage when the Bill is drafted. That enables us to discuss in Parliament the various matters which may properly be dealt with before the precise details are finally settled. As a result the Secretary of State may well benefit from suggestions as to what
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might properly be dealt with that he might not have thought of before Parliament had had an opportunity to consider the matter.
Therefore I hope that the noble and learned Lord will feel that, while it is important to make the statute book as succinct as possible, it is also necessary that the statute should be subject to consideration in Parliament, providing the best help in the final formulation of the full law as the circumstances permit.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: My noble and learned friend did not deal with the question that I asked as to subsection 13(a). Subsection 12 states that:
"The Secretary of State shall make regulations with respect to the procedure to be followed on appeals".
Subsection (13) provides that:
"The regulations may, in particular include provision—(a) as to the manner in which appeals are to be made".
Is that purely to take up space? What does it add to the previous provision?
A noble Lord: Order!
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: While my noble and learned friend is answering that question, will he also look at paragraph (g) as to evidence?
The Lord Chancellor: Perhaps I may answer that question specifically. The regulations may provide, for example, a form in which the appeal is to be made and the degree to which the matter has to be specified at that stage. That is what is envisaged in subsection (13) (a). I regret that I did not answer that point in detail earlier. I thought that I had remembered all my noble and learned friend's questions but I am sorry to say that that one had slipped my memory.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: I must apologise to my noble and learned friend for not giving way. I did not see that he had risen.
I confess that I cannot regard that as a satisfactory answer. I hope that my noble and learned friend will forgive me for saying so. There are other ways of letting Parliament know what the Secretary of State has in mind as to regulations. One is to reply in debate. After all, time and again during discussion of the Bill pleas have been made from all parts of the Committee for information as to what the regulations will be. However, they have been preserved strictly in pectore. Therefore it does not help to imply that the only way in which Parliament can be apprised of the type of regulation that will be made is to clutter up the statute book with provisions that are admitted to be not strictly necessary.
This is not a matter on which to divide the Committee, but it is yet another example of the bloated nature of our statute book. Drafting seems to be done without any regard to conciseness, in total defiance of the Renton Committee's denunciation of the prolixity of statutes. Our statute book is getting more and more prolix, which is entirely in keeping with the bureaucratic nature of this Bill. As I said, it would be useless to divide the Committee on this matter now. I beg indignantly to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
9.30 p.m.
Lord Mishcon Lord Mishcon moved Amendment No. 83:
Page 13, line 11, after first ("or) insert ("with the consent of the parties to the appeal").
The noble Lord said: I hope that the noble and learned Lord will agree that it would be singularly unchivalrous of him and therefore untypical to see the argument to substantiate the need for subsection (13) as an opportunity for me to move an amendment and then to refuse to agree with the amendment that I moved. Therefore I hope that, as I said, he will in sheer chivalry now agree to it.
The purpose of the amendment is clear. It is to ensure that there will be an oral hearing unless the parties agree otherwise. That is surely the right of the parties concerned.
The Lord Chancellor: As I said, these provisions enable this question to be examined, but not necessarily to be resolved in any particular way. As I tried to explain, the intention behind the provision is to produce a reasonably quick but thorough review by an officer not involved in the original decision. It will be open to that officer to interview the parties if he thinks that that is necessary. But to allow the parties to the appeal the opportunity to insist on a lengthier process might undermine its value as a quick means of correcting mistakes.
We shall be consulting on the content of these regulations, but as matters stand at the moment we feel that to make it obligatory to have the consent of both parties before the matter could be disposed of on written representations might be to introduce an unnecessary element of complexity and length into the process. For that reason we are not disposed to agree to this amendment.
Lord Mishcon: I should have thought that it was an essential right of a person to ask to be heard. Perhaps I may respectfully remind him that we are supposed to be moving in the real world, and surely he realises that the person most likely to appeal will not have the advantage of legal aid, will quite likely be illiterate, will want to be able to speak about the reason for coming to appeal and will be unable to put the case in writing in the way that any one of your Lordships would be able to do.
Is it fair that an officer should decide whether that should be an appeal in writing or whether the person should have the right orally to represent the grounds of the appeal? I hope that after he has had time to consider it, and in the light of the reality of the situation, the noble and learned Lord will agree that this is a proper amendment. In the hope that he will so regard it, I ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale Lord Simon of Glaisdale moved Amendment No. 83A:
Page 13, line 13, leave out ("appear and").
The noble and learned Lord said: This is a small amendment. It relates to Clause 17(13)(d). The Secretary of State under that paragraph may make regulations,
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"as to the persons entitled to appear and be heard on behalf of any of the parties".
My amendment seeks to leave out the words "appear and". I recognise that in the face of a refusal to do anything to shorten Acts of Parliament or to regard prolixity of statutory provision as in any way harmful, ambitions become very small indeed. In this case they are limited to two words. However, I am a little puzzled as regards how anyone can be heard unless he appears, or how people could appear but nevertheless not be heard. I hope my noble and learned friend will not say that this is a time-honoured phrase. If such be the case, the sooner dishonour is poured on it the better. I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: This is the language that has been used. However, I am willing to consider with parliamentary counsel whether anything would be lost through leaving out the words "appear and". It is true that people are entitled to appear, but they may not be entitled to be heard—notwithstanding the fact that they have appeared—for example, because the court does not require to hear them. They do not have a right to be heard in those circumstances. Perhaps that situation justifies the inclusion of this phrase. However, as I have said, I am content to seek the advice of parliamentary counsel in the light of what my noble and learned friend has said.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: I am grateful that the matter can be reconsidered as it falls into a larger context. The Renton Committee in referring to a memorandum by two famous Scottish judges condemned trying to cover every imaginable situation and trying to guard against any argument however far-fetched. I suggest that the argument that my noble and learned friend has just put forward is a little far-fetched when he said that people may appear and yet not be heard. As the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, has said, we must live in the real world even if it is the world of forensic business. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 17 agreed to.
Clause 18 [Further appeals]:
Lord Stoddart of Swindon Lord Stoddart of Swindon moved Amendment No. 84:
Page 13, line 27, leave out ("shall") and insert ("may").
The noble Lord said: The object of this amendment and of Amendment No. 85—I hope we can consider the amendments together—is to try to give some other body rather than the department the opportunity to have a say in this matter. We seek to allow an applicant to appeal to the courts rather than to the department once again. Clause 18(3), as drafted, states:
"Where an appeal under this section is allowed, the court shall remit the case to the Secretary of State".
I wish to replace "shall" with "may". Amendment No. 85 suggests that the courts should have the opportunity to declare upon the matter. The formula for assessment of child maintenance is clumsy and unproven. No doubt it will require a considerable amount of fine tuning. There are bound to be cases where the formula produces an unexpected result yet

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the appeals procedure does not allow for that. Appeals are allowed only to check whether the formula has been correctly applied and therefore they do not allow the courts to make their own assessments. Parents should have the protection of the courts. They must not be denied that protection in circumstances in which the formula causes undue hardship or discrimination.
I had intended to suggest that the Committee should also protect parents from the provisions in Clause 22. I no longer need to do so because the clause is not now part of the Bill. I can therefore spare the Committee the remarks that I had intended to make. I feel sure that, the Committee having voted to delete the clause, the Government will not seek to reinsert it. I do not know what the Bill will look like without it but I am sure that the noble and learned Lord will not attempt to bring it back.
Paragraph 9(b) of Schedule 1 relates to the child support officer being satisfied that a person has intentionally deprived himself of a source of income and has assessed his net income as being less than it is. There should be an appeal to the court if a person is accused of such a fraudulent offence. In such circumstances we are giving to clerks the powers that should properly be those of judges.
As the clause stands, if the court allows an appeal it must be remitted to the Secretary of State who will arrange for it to be dealt with by a child support officer. No other course of action is available. We are allowing the same department to deal with the problem in the same bureaucratic way. The Secretary of State is part of the bureaucratic set-up. He is part of the department and therefore the additional method of appeal is of no merit or benefit to the appellant. However, the child support officer may correctly be applying a faulty formula which does not properly cater for the case being appealed. Therefore in such instances we should allow the courts to exercise their discretion and to protect this hapless individual who has fallen foul of a quirk in the system. For that reason we should replace the word "shall" with "may".
Amendment No. 85 defines what the court may do. It states:
"Alternatively, if it appears to the court that the application of the formula has caused undue hardship or discrimination, the court may make its own assessment".
Someone else will look at the case rather than the department which made the original decision and which in some cases may refuse to alter that decision. I propose that in cases where the court makes its own assessment it shall have regard to all the circumstances. I beg to move.
Lord Prys-Davies: I support Amendment No. 85 in particular and believe that it is worthy of the support of the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor. The maintenance formula is untested and unproven. There may well be cases where, in practice, a full assessment, if levied, could produce unexpected results and hardship. for example, if a father was heavily burdened with debt or had made a substantial capital
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payment to the child, or possibly if the child is a beneficiary under a trust deed. In those circumstances it may be unfair and unjust to levy the full assessment.
It seems to me that Clauses 17 and 18 contain no provisions for an appeal on the basis of undue hardship. I wonder whether that has been overlooked. On my reading of Clause 18, the grounds of appeal to the court are confined to the same grounds as the appeals under Clause 17. Perhaps the noble and learned Lord will confirm that.
Amendment No. 85 would provide a reserve ground of appeal where the full application of the formula has caused undue hardship or discrimination. I hope that the amendment may be acceptable to the Government, although it may need to be redrafted.
9.45 p.m.
Earl Russell: On behalf of these Benches, I support the amendment. It is vital to introduce an element of discretion into the operation of the formula. Of course it is absolutely impossible for human beings to foresee all the circumstances which are likely to occur. In a situation of a broken family, where there are many commitments in many directions, failure to foresee all the circumstances may result in the application of the formula causing, as Amendment No. 85 suggests, quite unexpected hardship.
I remember very well the case on which I first learned the importance of hardship caused by the literal application of rules. It concerned one of my pupils who did not receive the full parental contribution towards her student grant. The five members of the family lived in two rooms and regarded it as the first call on its income to find a larger place in which to live. The formula for assessment took no account of something of that importance. The result was that the student concerned failed to get her degree and quite unnecessary hardship was caused. If we persist in denying an element of discretion in the formula we shall produce that sort of effect over and over again.
I beg the noble and learned Lord to think again about the importance of allowing an element of discretion. This may be a good way of achieving that.
The Lord Chancellor: There are broadly two ways of dealing with matters of this kind: one is to have detailed rules; the other is to have a wide discretion.
Perhaps I may take the noble Earl's example. It is surely better for the situation to be covered rather than not be covered. I do not know where the family lived to whom he referred. Let us assume that the family was based in London and was treated in a certain way by the court there. A family in exactly the same circumstances living in a different place may be dealt with differently under a discretionary system. When dealing with a large number of cases—and it is estimated that the workload of the agency will be considerable—I believe that people in like circumstances should be dealt with in the same way.
That is what gave rise to the complexity of the formula. The formula should deal with all circumstances. We are aware of the fact that we may not foresee every circumstance at the beginning. That is why the

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formula will be embodied in regulations so that it is possible to modify the formula in the light of circumstances which have not been envisaged.
If one has a detailed formula of that kind then to allow discretion is to negate the need for a formula to that level of detail. Therefore the present system is discretionary. As the White Paper narrates—I do not believe it has been contradicted—there are great diversities of awards in similar circumstances arising in the various jurisdictions in which these assessments are made. The point of introducing a formula is so that there may be a fair, consistent and predictable award of maintenance. Predictability is very important in this area to enable people to know in advance what their commitments will be, for example, when they separate.
That is the matter of principle on whether or not we have a formula. We have considered the matter carefully. The result is that we feel we should base the awards on a formula.
If the award is based on the formula, the right way to deal with the matter is that an appeal should be remitted so that the formula may be correctly applied in the light of the court's directions. The noble Lord, Lord Stoddart of Swindon, will see that Clause 18(4) states:
"The court may, in remitting any case under this section, give such directions as it considers appropriate".
In other words, it can tell the agency exactly what the basis is on which the formula is to be applied. The only reason it goes back to the agency is that that is the most economical way in which the court's decision can be made effective.
In considering these amendments one must consider Amendment No. 85 first. For the reasons gave I believe it is right that the formula should be detailed and try to deal with all the circumstances that have come to notice at the time it is put together. It will necessarily be a complicated formula; that is one of the reasons the expertise of the Secretary of State and his department is the place in which it is best put in order that it may be applied. Once that is the situation, it is right that the court, having made the decision on the matters raised, should tell the agency what to do in applying the formula, it being more economical that the agency should do that.
In the light of those explanations I hope that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: I may have misunderstood what my noble and learned friend said. I understood him to say that in order to produce flexibility the formula will be embodied in the regulations. I understood that the formula was embodied in Schedule 1.
The other point I found difficult to follow was that my noble and learned friend said that the result should be predictable and that that was the reason for adopting a formula rather than allowing the courts to take cognizance of all the different circumstances. If the application of the formula is predictable, is there not an element whereby a multiplier of zero to one is,
"such amount as may be prescribed"—
"prescribed" meaning by regulations?
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Last week my noble and learned friend argued that the advantage of regulations was that, if one found something wrong, one could immediately change it without bothering Parliament. In those circumstances how can one have predictability as a result of the application of the formula?
Lord Mishcon: Before the noble and learned Lord responds to the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale, perhaps he would guide me on this matter. Is subsection (4) to which he referred meant to give the courts power to make such directions as they think fit in regard to a direction to the agency as to what the agency should do, or is the noble and learned Lord saying that that subsection should be interpreted as meaning that the court is limited to the fixed formula under the Bill and is therefore unable to give directions which are not consistent with the formula?
The Lord Chancellor: It is the second of these; namely, that the court will give such directions as it thinks appropriate to enable the formula to be properly applied on the assumption that at the appeal it had been found that it was not properly applied. That is the purpose of the clause, read in the light of the whole situation.
I deal with the point made by my noble and learned friend Lord Simon in this way. The formula is predictable in its operation when it is put into the regulations. It is predictable provided the regulations stand. If they are changed then the result of the formula in its application to the circumstances which give rise to the change will therefore be different. It will be predictable in what the operation will be. If one leaves the matter on the basis of a court's discretion one cannot assume that because one case has been decided in a particular way, exactly the same circumstances will be met in the same way in another case. There is an element of predictability in the use of the formula which is much greater than if one leaves the matter to a question of discretion.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: One assumes that the appellant understands the formula, and that may be very difficult to begin with. As to formulae representing predictability, everyone who has had anything to do with these matters knows perfectly well that any formula that is produced may very well bring a result which was not intended. We have all sorts of formulae. For example, we had a formula for the pricing of gas and electricity. That did not prevent Ofgas from challenging the gas board or the gas company, whatever it is now called, as to the way in which it applied that formula.
The application of formulae will always be disputed as to whether all the elements have been applied as intended by Parliament. There is never certainty. That is why we have lawyers to interpret what Parliament actually means. If we wish to be fair and to give confidence to appellants under this Bill there has to be the longstop of a properly constituted court, as recognised by most people in this country, which can apply the test and the decision of fairness.
I feel quite sure that the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor will not agree with what I am saying.

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Nevertheless, it is a widely-held view that in the last analysis the courts will probably give a more humane and correct decision than civil servants, no matter how good and caring they may be, who are confined to a rigid formula which may not—I do not say will not —have been properly written by Parliament.
Therefore, I had hoped that the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor would have been more sympathetic towards these amendments which, as I said, are intended to give more confidence to people who will be affected by this Bill. However, it would be mean of me to press these amendments tonight and I shall not do so. I hope that between now and Report stage the noble and learned Lord will give some thought to what has been said, when I may wish to bring forward the amendments again. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendment No. 85 not moved.]
10 p.m.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon Lord Stoddart of Swindon moved Amendment No. 86:
Page 13, line 33, leave out ("(if any)").
The noble Lord said: This is a very simple amendment. As it stands, there is no requirement on the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor to make regulations for further appeals. The deletion of the words "if any" would ensure that he did make regulations and that therefore appeals would be properly catered for. Perhaps the noble and learned Lord will let me have his comments. I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: The words "if any" are intended to leave open the possibility that the matter might be left in some circumstances at the appeal stage as set out in Clause 18. It may well be that other provisions will be made, but until that is clear it is right to leave this open as an option for the Lord Chancellor. It would not specify with any clarity what was to happen even if the words "if any" were left out. The words "if any" emphasise that it may not be right to have any regulations made.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: I cannot see why there should be the words "if any" in the Bill. They do not add anything to that subsection. However, if the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor feels that they should be retained I shall not quarrel too hard about it tonight. I therefore beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Mishcon Lord Mishcon moved Amendment No. 87:
Page 13, line 35, at end insert ("and other interested bodies.").
The noble Lord said: I can put the argument for this amendment very briefly. It is purely to ensure that the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor, or any future Lord Chancellor, not only consults with the Lord Advocate, which is a very easy matter especially if he happens to be sitting next to him, but consults with "other interested bodies". The bodies one has in mind are the Family Law Association, the Bar, the
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Solicitors' Family Law Association and other bodies of a similar kind which specialise in these matters and would know the need for appeals and the procedure in regard to them. I hope that the vague words "and other interested bodies" give enough discretion to the Lord Chancellor as to those with whom he should consult.
The Lord Chancellor: The desirability of inserting a specific reference to the Lord Advocate is because of the Lord Advocate's responsibilities for courts and jurisdictions in Scotland. I confirm—and I should like to make this plain—that we shall have very full consultation before making any regulations under any part of this Bill. Where it is the Lord Chancellor who is charged with the responsibility, as is the case in this part of the Bill, I can give that clear undertaking. Obviously, consultation is to be general; and if any reference to consultation is to be included I should much prefer it to be a very general reference to consultation. It is standard practice nowadays to consult widely. I hope the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, will therefore feel that we shall do so. We are not, by mentioning the Lord Advocate, trying to make a special exception in subsection (5) to the general consultation. I have explained the special reason for that.
Lord Mishcon: In the light of what the noble and learned Lord has said, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. His reply is obviously on record and what he is recorded as having said is trusted in most confidently by the professional bodies.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Lord Mishcon Lord Mishcon moved Amendment No. 88:
Page 13, line 39, leave out ("such court or tribunal") and insert ("a magistrates' court, county court or High Court").
The noble Lord said: It will be seen that in Clause 18(7) the word "court" is defined as,
"such court or tribunal as the Lord Chancellor may, after such consultation, by order specify".
The object of the amendment is to ensure that it is not a tribunal but a court that deals with the appeal. The reason for that stipulation can be briefly summarised as follows. First, one still has the image of the family court as the ideal structure for dealing with all family matters. One remembers what happened when the Children Bill was under consideration: everyone said that anything which deals with children should, when it meets the law, be dealt with by one court if at all possible. It is also correct that if the noble and learned Lord says, "Ah yes, but we are only dealing with administrative matters and this has very little to do with other matters which may arise", I would immediately say that these issues are mixed up with a knowledge of family law. It is quite obvious that the courts are possessed of such knowledge but the tribunal may not be.
However, perhaps I may be very straightforward and say that my main argument here is that it is quite obvious that at this stage of the proceedings any appellant needs legal assistance. Therefore, I beg the noble and learned Lord to ensure that it is a court which deals with such matters. Alternatively, if it is to be a tribunal, perhaps he will ensure that a provision

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is made which is not available at present. I ask him to ensure that anyone appearing before such a tribunal will have the benefit of legal aid.
Naturally my preference is for the court to deal with such matters and I have endeavoured to explain the reasons for this request. However, I beg the noble and learned Lord to ensure that, if he insists on having the option of a tribunal, he will see to it that legal aid is available as would be the case if the matter were being dealt with by a court. I beg to move.
The Lord Chancellor: This is a difficult and rather finely balanced question. At present I would certainly wish to keep open the particular possibility which the amendment seeks to delete. As Members of the Committee have seen, the structure of the formula is provided under Schedule 1 to the Bill. That schedule contains regulation-making powers which will be used in connection with the detailed form of the formula.
The concepts which are used in the formula and the way in which it is applied are very close to those of the social security system. Such concepts are very familiar to the specialist tribunals associated with social security; namely, the social security appeal tribunals. Many of these cases will arise in connection with people who have concerns with the social security system and with appeals in that regard.
Accordingly, in all the circumstances I think that there may be a balance in favour of that type of tribunal. But, on the other hand, as matters develop —I hope that they will, and one has to proceed by stages—it may be that the family justice system would make it more appropriate that such appeals should be dealt with by the court. Such a court would be constituted rather on the lines of the court for the Children Act; namely, the magistrates' court, the county court or the High Court, according to the nature of the case.
As I said, this is a finely balanced question. Of course matters of cost, representation and so on are important and need to be taken into account in ascertaining the nature of the proper facility.
While I accept the noble Lord's point of view, there are strong considerations in the circumstances of the Bill for the tribunal to be one which is familiar with and expert in social security matters. Of course the noble Lord knows, better than I, that the social security appeal tribunals have a lay element and a legal element, so that they are well qualified to deal with such matters. I believe that they have a good reputation in dealing with such matters, and so careful consideration will have to be taken in the light of the developing situation.
I have another consideration in mind, which I mentioned briefly on a previous occasion; that is, I am anxious that as the Children Act work comes before the courts, the courts deal primarily with that work. They are well equipped to deal with that work. I am not so certain that they are well equipped to deal with the application of the formula. I would rather see the Children Act work being done well by the courts before any other responsibilities are placed upon the developing family justice courts which the Children Act has prepared for us and which I hope will come into action in October this year.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale: The noble Lord, Lord Houghton of Sowerby, roundly denounced the whole scheme and the Bill as being redolent of bureaucracy. Few Members of the Committee, except on the Government Front Bench, disagreed with that description. We had a great deal of that bureaucracy for many years after the war, and one of the various bureaucratic devices has been identified during the passage of the Bill. Another is the use of tribunals rather than the courts. There has always been a healthy tension between the judiciary and the Executive, and the Executive and Parliament. That is understandable, but the balance of the constitution —Executive/judiciary/legislature—should be maintained.
One of the sad features of the Bill is the not expressed, but nevertheless perceptible, hostility to having matters determined by the courts. We have outstanding the important compromise proposal of the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, that there should be concurrent jurisdiction, but even that was discountenanced when we discussed the matter in Committee last week.
We have again one of the characteristic instruments of bureaucratic government; namely, the use of a tribunal rather than a court. My noble and learned friend's argument fills me with dismay. There is a balance of argument to be struck, but in the circumstances of this case, and for the reasons stated by the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, the balance is definitely on the side of having the matter decided by a court.
I shall mention again the fact that we have the curious provision for an appeal on a point of law to an official, possibly of co-ordinate jurisdiction. My noble and learned friend said that that may not necessarily be the case: he might be the chief officer. So he might, but he might numerically be far more likely to be a subordinate officer of co-ordinate jurisdiction.
If he were a chief officer, there would be no difficulty in so stipulating. That is merely one other example. Here we have tribunals probably substituted for courts. I hope that in making the decision, if the amendment is not carried, my noble and learned friend will consider carefully the bureaucratic implications to be added to all the others endemic in the Bill.
10.15 p.m.
Lord Mishcon: I should have liked the Chamber to be fuller than it is and to have heard the eloquent support for my amendment of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Simon of Glaisdale, at a more reasonable hour. Therefore, I ask leave to withdraw the amendment at this stage.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 18 agreed to.
Clauses 19 to 21 agreed to.
Clause 23 [Collection of child support maintenance]:
[Amendments Nos. 89 and 90 not moved.]
Clause 23 agreed to.
Clause 24 [Collection and enforcement of other forms of maintenance]:
The Lord Advocate (Lord Fraser of Carmyllie)The Lord Advocate (Lord Fraser of Carmyllie) moved Amendment No. 90A:
Page 18, line 14, after ("sections") insert ("23,").
The noble and learned Lord said: This is a drafting amendment. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 24, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 25 [Deduction from earnings orders]:
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 91:
Page 18, line 41, at end insert:
("(7) Where—
(a) a deduction from earnings order has been made; and
(b) a copy of the order has been served on the liable person's employer,
it shall be the duty of that employer to comply with the order; but he shall not be under any liability for non-compliance before the end of the period of 7 days beginning with the date on which the copy was served on him.
(8) In this section and in section 26 "earnings" has such meaning as may be prescribed.").
The noble and learned Lord said: I wish to deal with Amendment No. 102 with Amendment No. 91. These amendments add a further provision to Clauses 25 and 26.
First, the provision establishes that an employer shall not have any liability for non-compliance with a deduction from earnings order for a period of seven days from the date a copy of the order is served on him. This provision is intended to allow employers a period in which to take any administrative action necessary to make deductions from the employee's earnings. It means that the first deduction an employer will be liable to make will be from the first earnings payable after this seven-day period. It is possible that an employer will be liable to make a deduction eight days after receiving the order, but in many cases, particularly where earnings are paid monthly, there may be a longer period before a deduction needs to be made. Amendment No. 91 makes this provision for new orders; Amendment No. 102 allows for a similar provision to cover variation of an order. These provisions bring this Bill in line with the Attachment of Earnings Act 1971.
Amendment No. 91 also introduces a provision to allow the term "earnings" to be defined in regulations. The Committee will be aware that there are an increasing number of employers who make payment in ways other than a weekly wage or a monthly salary. Profit-share schemes, bonus payments, commission payments and a variety of expenses and allowances may all make up an individual's remuneration package. It will be necessary for us to be very precise about exactly which of these payments we intend to be included as "earnings" and which we do not.
As I have indicated, there is an increasing number of employers using a wide variety of methods of payment. It is likely that there will be some such methods, which may be developed or may increase in popularity in the future, which may lead us to look again at our definition. For this reason, we have elected to provide for regulations to define the exact meaning of "earnings" for the purposes of this clause and Clause 26. This will allow us to make provisions in the light of any new methods of payment that may emerge.
Amendment No. 102 allows for provision in regulations for an order to lapse when the employer ceases to have the liable person in his employment. There is also provision to allow for circumstances in which an order may be revived. I beg to move Amendment No. 91.
Lord Mishcon: Will the noble and learned Lord agree that if the definition of "earnings" is to be prescribed by regulation, it will have to be a regulation produced at a fairly early date after the Bill is passed or concurrent with it being passed? Otherwise the whole formula is meaningless. Does he agree?
The Lord Chancellor: Yes. A number of regulations will require to be passed when the Bill comes into force. That will give us an opportunity for consultation on them. The noble Lord is perfectly right; that would be so in respect of a number of other regulations as well.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 25, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 26 [Regulations about deduction from earnings orders]:
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendment No. 92:
Page 18, line 44, at end insert:
("( ) as to the circumstances in which one person is to be treated as employed by another;").
The noble and learned Lord said: I beg to move Amendment No. 92, and I should like to speak also to Amendments Nos. 100 and 104. Clause 25 establishes the power of the Secretary of State to make an order requiring the employer of a person who is liable to make payment of maintenance to make deductions from that person's earnings. It is intended that the detailed technical and procedural matters will be included in regulations. The purpose of Clause 26 is to establish this regulation-making power. We have indicated, in Clause 26, the areas we intend the regulations to cover. These amendments provide some further areas, mainly of a technical nature, that may be covered in the regulations.
Amendment 92 allows for regulations to define the circumstances in which one person is to be treated as employed by another. In the vast majority of cases it will be relatively simple to determine whether a person is an employed person. This amendment is intended to cover the minority of cases where there may be a dispute as to whether a person is an employed or a self-employed person.
The provision suggested by Amendment No. 100 will be necessary, as a technical provision, to ensure that the provisions of Clauses 25 and 26 apply to all Crown employees. This provision is also included in the Attachment of Earnings Act 1971.
Amendment No. 104 allows regulations to make provision for the giving of notice by the Secretary of State to the employer concerned that an order has lapsed or ceased to have effect. It also includes a drafting amendment which clarifies that reference to "order" in this subsection refers to deduction from earnings orders as provided for in Clause 25. This provision is analogous to an existing provision in the Attachment of Earnings Act. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendments Nos. 93 to 99:
Page 18, line 45, leave out ("such").
Page 19, line 1, leave out ("such").
Page 19, line 6, leave out ("such").
Page 19, line 7, leave out ("such").
Page 19, line 10, leave out ("such").
Page 19, line 13, leave out ("such").
Page 19, line 17, leave out ("such").
The noble and learned Lord said: With the Committee's leave, I beg to move Amendments Nos. 93 to 99 en bloc. These are minor drafting amendments. We have managed to delete the word "such" from a number of parts of the clause without loss of value. We are making a small step in the direction of succinctness.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendments Nos. 100 to 104:
Page 19, line 21, at end insert:
("(gg) as to the operation of an order where the liable person is in the employment of the Crown;").
Page 19, line 22, leave out ("such").
Page 19, line 23, leave out paragraph (i) and insert:
("(i) similar to that made by section 25(7), in relation to any variation of an order;
(ia) for an order to lapse when the employer concerned ceases to have the liable person in his employment;
(ib) as to the revival of an order in such circumstances as may be prescribed;").
Page 19, line 26, leave out ("such").
Page 19, line 26, at end insert:
("(k) as to the giving of notice by the Secretary of State to the employer concerned that an order has lapsed or has ceased to have effect.
In this subsection "order" means a deduction from earnings order").
The noble and learned Lord said: I spoke to Amendments Nos. 100 to 104 earlier. With the Committee's permission, I shall move these amendments en bloc.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
The Lord Chancellor The Lord Chancellor moved Amendments Nos. 105 and 106:
Page 20, line 15, leave out ("without reasonable excuse").
Page 20, line 17, at end insert:
("(8A) It shall be a defence for a person charged with an offence under subsection (8) to prove that he took all reasonable steps to comply with the requirements in question.").
The noble and learned Lord said: If I may, I should like to move Amendments Nos. 105 and 106 together. It is intended that the provisions of this Bill with regard to deduction from earnings orders should mirror the Attachment of Earnings Act 1971 so far as practicable. Amendment No. 105 is a technical drafting amendment and introduces a new subsection (8A). This subsection will bring the provisions in this clause, which provides for a person failing to comply with a deduction from earnings order, to be guilty of an offence in line with the analogous provisions in Section 23(5) of the Attachment of Earnings Act. I beg to move Amendments Nos. 105 and 106.
On Question, amendments agreed to.
Clause 26, as amended, agreed to.
Viscount Davidson: I beg to move that the House do now resume.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
House resumed.
House adjourned at twenty-four minutes past ten o'clock.

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