Sitting of 18 January 1994

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

    Health and Safety Executive (Grant Aid)
    Mr. Kilfoyle: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what assessment he has made of the effect of the proposed reduction in grant aid to the Health and Safety Executive on charges to industry.
    Mr. Mudie: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what assessment he has made of the effect of the proposed cut in grant aid to the Health and Safety Executive on charges to industry.
    The Minister of State, Department of Employment (Mr. Michael Forsyth): Next year, the grant in aid to the Health and Safety Commission will be increased in cash terms. It is for the HSC to decide how to plan its work within the available resources.
    Mr. Kilfoyle: Is not the reality that there will be further charges? I refer specifically to the letter from the director to the staff of December 1993, which said that there would be an increase in charges to industry. Will not that add to the burdens that are placed on business generally? Will not there be cuts in the number of Health and Safety Executive staff, which will mean fewer on-site inspections and less access to the professional support and guidance that is required, leading to a further lowering of standards of health and safety?
    Mr. Forsyth: The position is not as the hon. Gentleman suggests. The Health and Safety Commission has decided for the time being not to increase the range of charges that it levies. The hon. Gentleman is right—there may be a reduction in the overall staffing of about 120 posts, but that will be done by natural wastage. As I am sure the hon. Gentleman will know, staffing levels reached a record total in September last year and they are something approaching 50 per cent. higher than they were when the Health and Safety Commission was established by the last Labour Government.
    Mr. Mudie: Does the Minister accept that his first answer, in which he said that the grant was being increased in cash terms, is incorrect and that in real terms a cut of many millions of pounds is being made? Does he agree with the director-general of the HSE that proposals are coming through that will increase the charges on
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    businesses? How can he defend the cuts in services and staffing which could have horrifying consequences? Or does he care?
    Mr. Forsyth: The hon. Gentleman heard the answer that I gave about charging, which is that this is a matter for the Health and Safety Commission. At present, it is not minded to increase the scope for charging. That is what it has decided. As for the points about safety and the concerns in the workplace, the hon. Gentleman must know that we have had the lowest ever figures for fatal accidents in the workplace. That trend has been sustained through some three years. If the hon. Gentleman is arguing that the Health and Safety Commission has additional duties as a result of the Government's actions, I would accept that that is so. Even compared with the duties of the Health and Safety Commission under Labour when it was established, there has been a substantial increase in staffing. Any reductions in posts will maintain those front-line functions.
    Mr. Waterson: Does my hon. Friend agree that once the Government's deregulation Bill has become law, bodies such as the Health and Safety Executive will be able to concentrate on those regulations dealing with health and safety rather than on the unnecessary and pettifogging regulations that are the true causes of unnecessary charges to industry and business?
    Mr. Forsyth: I absolutely agree with the sentiments that my hon. Friend expresses about the importance of reducing the burden of unnecessary regulation and bureaucracy. One of the ironies of this debate is that the Labour party, which established the Health and Safety Commission and wrote into the legislation that it was under a duty to review and modernise the health and safety regulations, now distances itself from that very proposition to make cheap political points against the Government.
    Mr. John Greenway: Although I appreciate that he may not have personal knowledge of it, will my hon. Friend reassure my constituents in the vicinity of the proposed Kelt UK Ltd. gas-fired electricity generating plant in the vale of Pickering that the changes within the commission will not in any way undermine its ability to regulate that proposed plant, that it will be safe to the public and that there will be no damage to the environment?
    Mr. Forsyth: I can give my hon. Friend that assurance as part of a general assurance that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and I have repeatedly given. That is, nothing that the Government do, or that the Health and Safety Commission proposes, will in any way undermine standards of health and safety. On the contrary, by making regulations more understandable and by removing duplication and red tape we shall ensure higher standards of health and safety in the workplace.
    Mr. Barron: If the Health and Safety Commission is not going to increase charges, can the Minister assure the House and businesses that no charges will be levied on businesses to pay for the statutory duties of the commission?
    Mr. Forsyth: I can give the hon. Gentleman the assurance that that is a matter for the Health and Safety Commission. It is for the commission to make proposals and Ministers have made it clear that we shall be guided by its advice. The hon. Gentleman cannot argue that the

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    taxpayer should put in more money while at the same time arguing that a large proportion of the Health and Safety Commission's income, which comes from charging, should not be reviewed from time to time. The trouble with Opposition Members is that they are not prepared to embrace change or to take account of changing circumstances.

    Employment (East Midlands)
    Mr. Garnier: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment how the total of civilian employment in the east midlands has changed in the last 10 years.
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Employment (Miss Ann Widdecombe): Between March 1983 and September 1993, the civilian employment total in the east midlands rose by 170,000.
    Mr. Garnier: Has my hon. Friend had a chance to study the reports of the Lloyds bank business survey, which deals with both the national position and that in the east midlands and which predicts larger job increases, more profits and wider overseas markets for east midlands businesses? Is she aware that the employment picture in Harborough is better than it was 10 years ago, last year or even last month? Indeed, our unemployment figures are under 2,000.
    Miss Widdecombe: I can confirm to my hon. Friend that, quite fortuitously, I have here the survey that he mentioned. It shows, among other things, that about a quarter of the firms in his constituency have taken on more staff. It also confirms that 16 per cent. expect to take on more staff during the next six months. It ends with a sentiment which I think would be generally echoed from the Government Benches:
    "This survey clears up any doubts that the UK economic recovery is finally established and under way."
    Mr. Jim Marshall: That reply displays an unwarranted sense of complacency. The Minister may not have to hand the figures for my constituency, which is adjacent to that of the hon. Member for Harborough (Mr. Garnier), but may I remind her that it still has an unemployment rate of more than 13 per cent? Until the Government take a more proactive role, unemployment will remain unacceptably high.
    Miss Widdecombe: It is abundantly clear that the new year's resolutions taken by Opposition Members did not include one to put cheer, heart and encouragement into their constituents. Perhaps I could carry out that role for the hon. Gentleman and give his constituents some heart and encouragement by saying that in his area there has also been a rise in civilian employment of 78,000 during the period in question. Will he please welcome that?
    Mrs. Angela Knight: Is my hon. Friend aware of the recent publication of a pamphlet entitled "Unemployment in Derbyshire", which shows that unemployment was falling fast in the county and that vacancies were rising? Does she agree that that underlines the fact that Britain is moving out of recession? Does it also mean that the prospects are better, not just for those without a job in the county and in my constituency of Erewash, but for school leavers this summer?
    Miss Widdecombe: I can confirm what my hon. Friend says. With the exception of the Opposition, there is now no one in the country who does not welcome the fall in unemployment in every region, the increase in vacancies and in civilian employment and the flexibility which means that we can take advantage of inward investment. When the Opposition start cheering those facts, I will believe that they care about British workers.

    Part-time Employment, Leeds
    Mr. Battle: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what is his estimate of the number of (a) male and (b) female part-time workers in Leeds, West.
    The Secretary of State for Employment (Mr. David Hunt): Up-to-date information is not available, but unemployment in the hon. Gentleman's constituency has decreased by 9 per cent. in the past year and by 21 per cent. since 1986.
    Mr. Battle: Is the Minister aware that many of my constituents are being offered permanent temporary work, but on a "term-time only" basis? That applies to people who are offered work at the Leeds metropolitan university, in the hospitals, and increasingly in business. It means that people have to sign on and off the dole and be in and out of the benefit office three, four and five times a year to make up their incomes from social security. Is not that employment practice reducing people to casual hired hands reminiscent of the last century, and costing the economy dearly?
    Mr. Hunt: The hon. Gentleman is living in the past.
    First, I greatly regret that the hon. Gentleman did not see fit to welcome the decrease in unemployment in his constituency. Secondly, I ask him to examine the statistics, which show that the percentage of those employed in temporary and casual work has remained between 5 and 6 per cent. in the past 10 years. I agree that it has increased sharply in the rest of Europe. It has trebled in France. In Spain, mainly as a result of the statutory minimum wage and other restrictions, the share of temporary and casual work has increased in the past 10 years from 15·6 per cent. —bearing in mind that it is between 5 and 6 per cent. in this country—to 32 per cent. Will the hon. Gentleman reflect on that?

    Labour Statistics
    Mr. Parry: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment if he will make a statement on the latest employment figures.
    Mr. David Hunt: Employment increased by 124,000 in the six months to September 1993 and the total employed in the civilian work force now exceeds 25 million.
    Mr. Parry: The Government's recent crowing about the drop in unemployment will raise no joy in Liverpool, Riverside. Is the Minister aware that there is 24·3 per cent. unemployment in Riverside, and 306,000 are unemployed in the north-west region? Can he say when he expects the figures to drop below 10 per cent. in Liverpool, especially in Riverside?
    Mr. Hunt: I regret that the hon. Gentleman has not welcomed the fall in unemployment in his area and in the north-west, nor recognised that it has now fallen, as a

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    national average, below 10 per cent., nor that unemployment in the nation is 226,000 less than it was in January last year.
    I believe that the prospects are good in Merseyside. I wish that Opposition Members would stop disparaging Liverpool and Merseyside. Merseyside has some of the best-known companies in the world, which are not only doing well but setting an example in Europe and in the rest of the world. I would simply refer the hon. Gentleman to the example of GPT, which I visited only a few weeks ago. It has revolutionised working practices and now has one of the most competitive work forces in the world. We are the centre, for instance, of the intelligent payphone industry, exporting from Chorley and Liverpool to 88 countries throughout the world. The hon. Gentleman should start singing the praises of the work force on Merseyside.
    Sir Michael Neubert: For a proper perspective, is it not important to remember the present size of the work force? Does my right hon. Friend know the number of people in work, as opposed to out of work, and what proportion of the population of working age it represents?
    Mr. Hunt: Those are two interesting statistics. First, the number of people employed now exceeds 25 million, which is 1·4 million more than were in the work force 10 years ago. That is a good figure. My hon. Friend also asked about the percentage of the working-age population in work. We have one of the highest rates in the whole of Europe; close to 80 per cent. of the male population of working age, and 63 per cent. of women of working age are in work. Altogether, 69 per cent. of adults of working age are in work. It is about time that the Labour party started looking at the statistics and praising the performance of the British people.
    Ms Eagle: Will the Secretary of State admit that in drawing attention to the plight of the long-term unemployed on Merseyside my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mr. Parry) was talking down not Merseyside but the Government policies that have led to a massive loss of manufacturing employment there, and have thrown on to the scrap heap large numbers of young men, who find that they have no role in life and so turn to other diversions? Will the right hon. Gentleman admit that substantial and persistent high unemployment, such as has been suffered on Merseyside during his Government's time in office, does serious damage to the social fabric of our society and to our local communities, and that we must return to full employment to create a society "at ease with itself"?
    Mr. Hunt: Most of my political life has been spent fighting the Labour party in and around Merseyside. Socialism has done enormous damage to Liverpool and Merseyside, and I am not prepared to take lectures from the hon. Lady on that subject. She referred to criticisms of policies, but her party would introduce a statutory minimum wage that would cost up to 2 million jobs, compulsory working weeks and statutory works councils. The Labour party wants to move in that direction just at the moment when the rest of Europe is beginning to heed our language and to realise that flexible labour markets bring more job opportunities.
    Mr. Mans: Will my right hon. Friend join me in congratulating British Nuclear Fuels plc on the opening of the thermal oxide reprocessing plant, and on the extra job
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    opportunities that that will create in the north-west? Does he agree that it is scandalous for the Labour leader of Lancashire county council to preach a policy of more jobs, while trying to prevent the plant from opening?
    Mr. Hunt: I agree with my hon. Friend. The Labour party was split on that issue as on so many other key issues facing the nation today. The right hon. Member for Copeland (Dr. Cunningham) said one thing and the chairman of the county council said another. Fortunately, the overwhelming arguments in favour of that prestigious development prevailed, and it has now provided much-needed job opportunities in the area.
    Mr. Prescott: Does the Secretary of State accept that, despite some of the improvements, unemployment today is at least 1·75 million more, using the fiddled figures—or 2·5 million more—than in 1979, when the Conservatives won the election on the slogan, "Labour isn't working"? Does he accept that, even with the present improvement in employment, it is likely to take until the next century for him and his Government to achieve the levels of employment and unemployment taken on by the Tory Government in 1979?
    Mr. Hunt: I greatly regret that the hon. Gentleman has referred to the figures in a way that casts a great deal of suspicion on the independent statisticians in my Department. I make him the same offer as I made to his predecessor: I invite him to come to meet the independent statisticians whom he slanders, and to hear them tell hirn how much they, as well as I, regret that slander. I take great pride in the fact that productivity is at record levels. I recognise that that has led to a reduction in employment in manufacturing, but I take great heart from the fact that today 4 million people in the manufacturing industry are producing more than 7 million people produced in 1979. I believe that we have one of the best work forces in the world and that is why I believe that unemployment is on a firm downward trend. The hon. Gentleman disparages the country for being a service industry, yet he works in the service sector himself and it is about time that he exposed himself to a little market testing.

    Inward Investment
    Mr. Luff: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what studies his Department has made of the employment implications of inward investment into England.
    Mr. David Hunt: Extensive and very positive.
    Mr. Luff: If I were to pay tribute to my right hon. Friend's excellent record of attracting inward investment into Wales, would he join me in paying tribute to the inward investment by American, Japanese and European companies in my constituency of Worcester, creating and safeguarding many hundreds of jobs? What estimates does he have of the total number of jobs safeguarded and created in England by inward investment which was largely opposed by the Labour party?
    Mr. Hunt: I agree with my hon. Friend. The record on inward investment has been quite spectacular. Since 1979, in the United Kingdom there have been 3,800 projects, involving more than 500,000 jobs—many of them new and safeguarded jobs. They are good jobs and have provided a

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    real local base. As we look forward to the future, let us stop talking down the United Kingdom and England and start talking up the fact that that investment is coming because we have the best work force in the world.
    Mr. Cryer: When does the Minister expect the inward investment to allow us to get back to the basic figure of 4·1 per cent. Unemployment—around 1·8 million people—of April 1979 under the last Labour Government?
    Mr. Hunt: As I pointed out earlier, that was when we had 7 million people producing as much as 4 million people produce today. It is about time the hon. Gentleman reflected on the fact that British industry was so uncompetitive when we took over in 1979 and we have seen some of the best productivity increases seen anywhere in the world.
    Mr. Nicholas Winterton: I warmly welcome the most encouraging statistics that my right hon. Friend has given to the House in answer not only to this question but to others today. Will he accept that my constituency has one of the lowest levels of unemployment in the country, but that the north-west has in recent times encountered one or two serious and unfortunate blows, not least the receivership of Ferranti International—the sonar division of which is based in my constituency—and, more recently, the redundancies at Avro International Aerospace at Woodford on the periphery of my constituency? Will my right hon. Friend explain to the House what assistance he is giving to those two companies and to those being made redundant so as to minimise the adverse effects of those redundancies on them and their families?
    Mr. Hunt: I greatly regret the redundancies that have occurred and the incidents to which my hon. Friend referred. Those jobs, certainly the ones recently announced by British Aerospace at Woodford and Chadderton, are part of British Aerospace's overall drive to improve efficiency and reduce costs. Of course there are concerns about the joint venture with Taiwan, but talks with Taiwan are continuing and British Aerospace has made it clear that Avro will continue in business whatever the outcome of those talks. Of course, local training and enterprise councils and the employment service will give the maximum possible assistance to all those who are affected by the closures.

    Health and Safety
    Mr. Leighton: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what Acts and regulations relating to health and safety in force before December 1992 have been affected by the six EC directives which came into force on 31 December 1992; and if he will make a statement.
    Mr. Michael Forsyth: Implementation of the directives has resulted in changes to 70 Acts, regulations and orders. I will arrange for a full list to be placed in the Library. However, of particular interest to Opposition Members might be the repeal of the Gut Scraping etc. Preparation of Tripe, Welfare of Workers Order 1920 and the Spinning by Self-Acting Mules Regulations 1905.
    Mr. Leighton: Does the Minister recall the press release issued by the Secretary of State on 20 July, which referred to the Government's scrutiny report into the implementation of Community law? In it, he said that
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    health and safety legislation had been implemented in the United Kingdom without what he called the addition of unnecessary extra requirements, and that the scrutiny demonstrated that the charges that the Health and Safety Executive had been gold plating EC directives was completely unfounded. Does not what he said prove that it is entirely possible for the Health and Safety Executive to remove redundant legislation without a special Bill?
    Mr. Forsyth: The hon. Gentleman is quite right to say that the DTI scrutiny absolved the Health and Safety Executive and the Government of any blame that we were gilding the lily in implementing EC directives. However, the hon. Gentleman is perhaps not aware that the Health and Safety Executive asked the Government to look at section 1(1) of the Health and Safety at Work, etc. Act 1974, which it believes prevents it from repealing redundant legislation without replacement.
    Mr. David Atkinson: Can my hon. Friend confirm that only two member states of the European Community—Denmark and the United Kingdom—have implemented in full into their national legislation all nine of the EC directives on health and safety at work? Are they not to be congratulated, rather than criticised, for that fine record?
    Mr. Forsyth: Of course I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. He is quite right. Only two member states—Britain and Denmark—had implemented the so-called six-pack by the January deadline. Indeed, only three EC countries have not been subject to criticism by the Commission in respect to their implementation of health and safety legislation. It is important not to regard the matter of health and safety as passing regulations and legislation. It is about influencing people's conduct in the workplace.
    Mrs. Clwyd: Does the Minister recall bragging in November that Britain had opted out of European legislation to protect children from exploitation at work? The Social Affairs Commissioner said in Strasbourg this week that
    "It is very regrettable that the UK cannot endorse a minimal threshold for the protection of children, considered acceptable by the other 11 Member States."
    What would the Minister say to him? Is it not the case that, as the Commission and the International Labour Organisation have condemned the British Government, the whole rotten deal to exploit children will soon be thrown out?
    Mr. Forsyth: If ever we needed evidence of the Labour party's federal view, we have just heard it in that question. Those in Europe who seek to prevent us from allowing paperboys and others to continue their jobs should mind their own business. We have a long tradition of youngsters taking those jobs, and only the Labour party would wish to frustrate that continuing tradition.
    Mr. Ian Bruce: Is my hon. Friend being somewhat defensive about health and safety regulations in this country? Is it not a fact that we have probably the best health and safety record in the world? It is Opposition Members who want to run down the excellent work and the excellent partnership between the Health and Safety Executive and caring employers and employees.
    Mr. Forsyth: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Our record on health and safety is second to none. It is among the best in the world—better than those of many of our European partners.
    Mr. Prescott: Why change it?
    Mr. Forsyth: The hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull, East (Mr. Prescott) asks, "Why change it?" That is exactly why the Government have resisted the approach from Europe which, a few minutes ago, the hon. Member for Cynon Valley (Mrs. Clwyd) criticised us for doing.

    Youth Training Guarantee
    Mr. McFall: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment how many young people under 18 years of age are not covered by the Government's youth training guarantee.
    Miss Widdecombe: All young people aged under 18, who are not in a job or full-time education, are guaranteed the offer of a suitable youth training place if they want one.
    Mr. McFall: Will the Minister look at the figures again? In Scotland, the Labour party contacted both the careers service and local enterprise companies, and the figure of 8,000 young people without a guarantee was given. That figure has still to be refuted. Whatever the precise figures, does the Minister agree that many thousands of young people are going about the United Kingdom without a job, without benefit, without hope and without a future? If back to basics means anything, does it not mean going back to giving a commitment to young people about a job and their future?
    Miss Widdecombe: The long faces among Labour Members are equalled only by the sheer inaccuracy of their figures. I have in front of me the figure for Scotland, which the hon. Gentleman quoted as "8,000". The exact figure is 1,535. Perhaps I could give the hon. Gentleman some good news from his constituency. In August, 688 young people were waiting more than eight weeks, but today there are only 141. That is progress. Let the hon. Gentleman loudly welcome it.
    Mr. Paice: Can my hon. Friend confirm that CAMBSTEC—the Cambridgeshire training and enterprise council—which services my constituency, now has only 12 young people waiting over eight weeks for their guarantee? Does not that underline why CAMBSTEC regularly comes near the top of all the surveys of training and enterprise councils throughout the country? Does not it demonstrate that the guarantee can effectively be met if TECs get their act together?
    Miss Widdecombe: Indeed, I congratulate CAMBSTEC on its performance on the youth training guarantee, as I do on its performance on other issues. I have pleasure in confirming the figure mentioned by my hon. Friend. I have even greater pleasure in confirming that there are TECs with even lower figures, and many now with nought.
    Mr. Tony Lloyd: Those 16 and 17-year-olds who have been abandoned by the Government, often to a life of the sort of crime that people up and down this land resent, are the direct victims of the Government's policies. Can the Minister deny that this time last year, when the
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    Government were claiming that there were no 16 and 17-year-olds not on the guarantee, their labour force survey later revealed that 125,000 young people were not in work? Let me make it clear that we do not accuse civil servants of fiddling the figures or lying. The answer as to who is lying is much higher up the chain.
    Miss Widdecombe: The hon. Gentleman does not seem to understand the way in which the youth guarantee works, despite patient explanations from the Government. No young people are abandoned by the Government. They are in one of three places. They are either in education—[Interruption.] Will the hon. Gentleman welcome the fact that 77 per cent. of 16 to 18-year-olds are now in full-time education, or will he take the line that education is second best and Labour Members want an untrained, lowly qualified work force, rather than a highly educated one? Will he welcome the number of young people in training and jobs? Will he welcome the decrease in the number waiting? When will Labour Members welcome that performance? Will the hon. Gentleman stand up now and welcome all that?

    Labour Statistics
    Sir Thomas Arnold: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what is the latest unemployment figure; and if he will make a statement.
    Mr. David Hunt: Two million seven hundred and sixty-six thousand two hundred—that is, 9·8 per cent. Last month's fall of 46,800 means that unemployment is 226,100 lower than it was in January 1993.
    Sir Thomas Arnold: Is it not the case that the improvement in the figures is largely due to the fact that the job market is responding more quickly to the upturn in the economy because of more flexible labour relations?
    Mr. Hunt: I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. There has been a transformation in industrial relations in this country. In 1979, industry lost 1,270 working days per 1,000 employees through disputes and strikes. By 1992, thanks to Conservative legislation, that number had fallen to 24. That is a significant development, and my hon. Friend is quite right to pay tribute to it.
    Mr. Malcolm Bruce: Welcome as the reduction in unemployment is, does the Secretary of State accept that unemployment has fluctuated between 2 million and 3 million during the past 10 years? Will he look to the future and state when he thinks the figure will go below 2 million or 1 million? In the post-general agreement on tariffs and trade era and with the recovery of Germany and Japan and the rising nations of the Pacific rim, does he believe that this country has the skill base to compete and to ensure low unemployment and competitive trading conditions?
    Mr. Hunt: First, may I thank the hon. Gentleman for doing what the Labour party did not do, which was to welcome the fall in unemployment.
    The hon. Gentleman must recall that there has been an increase in jobs during the past 10 years, with an increase in the number of people in work of 1·.4 million. Nevertheless, I accept that 2,766,200 is still an unacceptably high level of unemployment. I want to see that number brought down, and brought down permanently.

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    Therefore, I ask the hon. Gentleman and his party to oppose the Opposition policies of a minimum working wage, statutory works councils and compulsory working weeks which would only cost jobs. I urge him to join the Government in creating a new and modern apprenticeship scheme which will help to restore skills that are lacking at certain levels—particularly NVQ level 3.
    Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: Does my right hon. Friend accept that the news that unemployment in Lancaster has fallen steeply compared with this time last year is welcome? The figure has fallen faster than either the national average or the regional average. Does my right hon. Friend also agree that if Commissioner Millan were to agree with the proposition made in the European Parliament by my noble Friend Lord Inglewood, that tourism should be declared an industry, we could do even better?
    Mr. Hunt: I agree with my hon. Friend on the significance of tourism, not only as an employer but also as a contributor of substantial sums of money. I cannot give her what she is looking for in terms of categorisation, but I recognise the importance and the significance of tourism. I welcome with her the reduction in unemployment in the north-west.
    Mr. Prescott: Does the Secretary of State accept that the reduction in the employment figures is due to the transformation of the labour market and that the loss of 3 million full-time jobs since 1979, and their replacement by 3 million part-time jobs has transformed the British labour force into a low-pay, low-skill skivvy labour force? Does the Secretary of State accept that that is no way for Britain to get economic prosperity?
    Mr. Hunt: First, the hon. Gentleman got it wrong. We are talking about a fall in unemployment, and not employment as he said a few moments ago. There has been an increase in employment.
    It is quite absurd for the hon. Gentleman to categorise the great success of this country as if it were just an increase in fast food jobs. We heard earlier a question regarding the fast food industry, because some Opposition Members have said that the rise in employment has come in the fast food industry. I do not know what those Opposition Members want. Do they want slow food, as they are in the slow lane of British politics? McDonalds? They are in the era of Ramsay MacDonald. Pizza Hut? They are still in a stone age hut. It is about time that the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues woke up to the modern world.

    Employment Service
    Mr. Sumberg: To ask the Secretary of State for Employment how many people in the north-west region have been placed into work by the Employment Service in the last 12 months.
    Mr. Michael Forsyth: More than a quarter of a million people have been placed into jobs by the Employment Service in the north-west.
    Mr. Sumberg: May I pay tribute not only to the Employment Service but to the people of the north-west, whose businesses are coming through the recession with
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    success and determination? Has my hon. Friend noted the silence on the Opposition Benches? Is not good news for Britain and Lancashire bad news for Labour?
    Mr. Forsyth: I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. Opposition Members are the first people in history to shoot the messenger when he brings good news. The north-west is benefiting from the recovery more than any other part of the country. That was demonstrated by the Lloyd's bank review, which showed full order books there at a better level than in any other part of the United Kingdom.
    Mr. Bryan Davies: Even before the collapse of Ferranti and the loss of jobs at British Aerospace, only one school leaver out of 12 in my constituency could get a job. What does the Minister say to the other 11?
    Mr. Forsyth: I would tell those youngsters looking for jobs that they should not listen to the Jeremiahs on the Opposition Benches but should recognise that 250,000 people have been placed in work in the north-west in the past year, that the Lloyd's bank survey showed that more than a third of employers expect to take people on in the coming years, and that we shall get more jobs only by being more competitive and rejecting the Labour party's policies.

  PRIME MINISTER

    Ministerial Visits
    Mr. Enright: To ask the Prime Minister what plans he has to visit South Elmsall.
    The Prime Minister (Mr. John Major): I have no immediate plans to do so.
    Mr. Enright: With the closure of Frickley colliery, one in three men in South Elmsall is now out of work, which is extremely serious. Will the Prime Minister promise to back Wakefield district council's bid for coalfield area funds so that it can co-operate, as it has successfully before, with the local chamber of commerce, British Coal Enterprise and others to produce a regeneration programme, which is so desperately needed? Wakefield council has shown that it can do it sensibly and sensitively and I ask that it be given the opportunity.
    The Prime Minister: I understand the difficulties that face the hon. Gentleman and those of his constituents presently without work. I am delighted that unemployment has fallen in his constituency in recent years, but I recognise the serious problems that exist there. I do not believe that the hon. Gentleman's constituency will specifically benefit from the coalfield area fund, but a wide range of help will be available. In the hon. Gentleman's area alone,£4 million will be available for an industrial and commercial development programme, and £3 million will be provided to training and enterprise councils for training and business support. As the hon. Gentleman will know, intermediate area status has been granted. Regional enterprise grants have been extended and, in addition, in excess of £2·5 million of European structural funds has been granted to the Wakefield area. We shall continue to keep those under review and do all that we can to help miners who have lost their jobs.

    Engagements
    Mr. Rathbone: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 18 January.
    The Prime Minister: This morning, I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall have further meetings later today.
    Mr. Rathbone: Will my right hon. Friend spare a moment today to congratulate police and Customs on the co-ordinated job that led to the seizure of £50 million worth of cocaine in Manchester recently? Is he in a position yet to announce how the Government will co-ordinate Government departmental activity to give new impetus to the Government's own efforts to counter drugs misuse?
    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend touches on a vital point, which is of great concern to this Government and across Europe. The fight against drugs involves all of us —police, customs, parents and Government—and we must all play our part in stepping up the campaign against those who deal in that trade. I welcome the seizure of cocaine to which my hon. Friend refers and congratulate all those involved in it. My right hon. and learned Friend the Home Secretary announced before Christmas that the Government are setting up a drugs unit, the purpose of which will be to ensure that the policies of all Departments are co-ordinated to improve co-ordinated action against the general problem of drugs.
    Mr. John Smith: Can the Prime Minister tell us whether by any chance he received a memorandum around the time of the Budget from the Treasury informing him that freezing income tax allowances for two years in succession would force 400,000 low-paid people into income tax for the first time? Was he aware that his Budgets would have that result?
    The Prime Minister: As the right hon. and learned Gentleman knows, take-home pay for people in all strands of income has risen materially over recent years—by 40 per cent. plus for those on average earnings since 1979 and by 30 to 40 per cent. for those on half-average earnings. The right hon. and learned Gentleman might also recall that it fell between 1974 and 1979 for single people and for couples without children, and barely rose for couples with children.
    Mr. John Smith: That was hardly an answer to my question. If the Prime Minister cannot answer that question may I ask him whether anyone told him that the tax changes in those Budgets would put the equivalent of 7p on income tax and that a typical family would have to pay another £1,330 over the next two years, or are those things that he preferred not to know about?
    The Prime Minister: If the right hon. and learned Gentleman was not entirely satisfied with the first answer, let me tell him further that even after the Budget there will be half a million fewer taxpayers next year than there were in 1979. Tax rates have fallen dramatically over that period and low inflation means that freezing personal allowances will cost basic rate taxpayers 34p a week when compared with inflation. He mentioned people on low incomes, but he neglected to mention family credit, child care allowance, the uprating in child benefit and the fact that the
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    real take-home pay of families on average earnings will be 40 per cent. higher than when his party was last in government.
    Mr. John Smith: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman to make a special effort of memory? I know that it is hard for him with all these papers crossing his desk all the time, but can he not struggle to recall his repeated promises to the British people that he would not increase income tax or national insurance and that he would not extend the scope of value added tax? Is not the breaking of those promises the reason for justified public cynicism and anger at this discredited Government?
    The Prime Minister: The right hon. and learned Gentleman is beginning to sound like a very worn record. It is absolutely clear that the standard rates of tax under the Conservative party have dropped dramatically since the Opposition were in government and, in any given circumstance, the rate of taxation under any Conservative Government would be lower than under any Labour Government at any time.
    Mrs. Ann Winterton: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 18 January.
    The Prime Minister: I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave some moments ago.
    Mrs. Winterton: Bearing in mind the interest presently shown by the press in the lives of the politicians, does my right hon. Friend agree that the press itself should show the same honour and integrity that it expects of others?
    The Prime Minister: Madam Speaker,—[Interruption.]
    Madam Speaker: Order. I am as anxious as anyone to hear the response to that question.
    The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend might think that; I could not possibly comment.
    Mr. Mudie: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 18 January.
    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Mudie: The Prime Minister will be aware that at permanent secretary level he was advised that the aid package to the Malaysian power station was a bad buy, uneconomic and an abuse of the aid system, yet he still instructed that the aid should be given. In view of the fact that it will cost the British taxpayer more than £230 million, does he consider that to be good judgment, and if so, why is he refusing to allow Members of the House to see papers relating to that decision?
    The Prime Minister: The Government made a commitment to the Pergau project in 1989 personally to the Malaysian Prime Minister. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary and I decided in 1991 to proceed, both to honour the commitment made by my predecessor and in the wider context of maintaining billions of pounds of British exports to Malaysia—exports of £5 billion since 1982, and doubled exports between 1988 and 1992. To have withdrawn the contract would have put British jobs at risk. It is about time that the Opposition took a consistent position on these things. How does the hon. Gentleman

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    reconcile his party's call for lower unemployment with his criticism of this project? The British Government are backing British business and achieving orders abroad and all the hon. Gentleman can do is carp and criticise. Does he want jobs for British workers or does he not?
    Mr. Kynoch: Will my right hon. Friend confirm that the latest figures for manufacturing output show further significant growth? Does he agree that that represents further proof that the United Kingdom is leading Europe from recovery into a period of sustained growth?
    The Prime Minister: Yes, I can certainly confirm that to my hon. Friend and the basis of this is the record that we have on inflation, the fact that we have been able to bring interest rates down and the fact that it is now clear to everyone that the British economy is recovering and growing—recovering more comprehensively and growing more rapidly than any other economy in western Europe.
    Mr. Winnick: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 18 January.
    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave some moments ago.
    Mr. Winnick: Is the Prime Minister aware of the concern felt by so many people at the amount of financial sleaze in this country arising from Government policies and attitudes? Is he further aware that the one "back to basics" attitude that people desperately want and crave is the restoring of integrity to public life? Is it not clear that they will not get that from the Government?
    The Prime Minister: I agree entirely about the necessity for integrity in public life. The hon. Gentleman and other Opposition Members have sought to take a moral stand about standards in public life. I do not object to that. It is also necessary for those Opposition Members to look at their own colleagues who spread smear and innuendo on a week-by-week basis with a complete disregard for the truth. Smear and innuendo are the hallmarks of political cowardice and they have become the trademark of the Opposition.
    Dr. Liam Fox: Will my right hon. Friend congratulate Rover Cars on its 9 per cent. increase in sales last year many of which were exported through Royal Portbury docks in my constituency? Is he aware that their production output outstripped Mercedes Benz in a difficult market and that neither the success of Rover nor Royal Portbury docks would have been possible without the privatisation programme which only the Conservative party would have had the courage to champion?
    The Prime Minister: I entirely agree with my hon. Friend both about the remarkable success of Rover Cars which I hope and expect will continue in future, and the success of privatisation both specifically and generally. It has been remarkable. What we now see in the motor car industry—in Rover and other parts of the industry—is that it has made the most remarkable turn around in recent years and soon will be a net exporter of motor cars. It is quite different from the old days a few years ago when Red Robbo and others were wrecking the entire industry.
    Ms Quin: To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 18 January.
    The Prime Minister: I refer the hon. Lady to the reply I gave some moments ago.
    Ms Quin: Is it not the case that the only clear message that the Prime Minister gave to the public yesterday when he was questioned by the Scott inquiry was, "Don't ask me, I'm only Prime Minister?"
    The Prime Minister: I suggest that, in due course, the hon. Lady reads the six hours of detailed evidence that I gave. She might then regard her remarks of a moment ago to be just a touch inadequate.

    Ministerial Visits
    Mr. Luff: To ask the Prime Minister whether he plans to make an official visit to Worcester.
    The Prime Minister: I have no immediate plans to do so.
    Mr. Luff: If my right hon. Friend were to visit Worcester—[Interruption] would he join me in welcoming the decision by two of the teacher trade unions to drop their boycott of national curriculum tests? Does he agree that that sets an excellent example for the other teacher trade union—the National Union of Teachers—to follow?
    The Prime Minister: Yes, I very strongly agree with that. I very strongly agree with the two teacher trade unions that have decided to drop their boycott. It would be of immense help, not just to the profession of teaching but, essentially, to the children in the classroom, if the NUT were to take precisely the same action so that the tests can proceed. I believe that there is no justifiable reason for the boycott in the future. There was little, if any, justification before; now there is none. The NUT should follow the leadership of the other two unions.

  BILL PRESENTED
    DEREGULATION AND CONTRACTING OUT
    Mr. Secretary Heseltine, supported by the Prime Minister, Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Secretary Howard, Mr. Secretary MacGregor, Mr. Secretary Gummer, Mr. Secretary Hunt, Mr. William Waldegrave, Secretary Sir Patrick Mayhew, Mrs. Gillian Shephard and Mr. Tim Sainsbury, presented a Bill to amend, and make provision for the amendment of, statutory provisions and rules of law in order to remove or reduce certain burdens affecting persons in the carrying on of trades, businesses or professions or otherwise, and for other deregulatory purposes; to make further provision in connection with the licensing of operators of goods vehicles; to make provision for and in connection with the contracting out of certain functions vested in Ministers of the Crown, local authorities, certain governmental bodies and the holders of certain offices; and for purposes connected therewith: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time tomorrow, and to be printed. [Bill 33.]

Abolition of Service Charges in Restaurants
3.31 pm
Mr. Michael Fabricant (Mid-Staffordshire): I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to prohibit the levying of service charges in restaurants; and for connected purposes.
The Bill will amend the Consumer Protection Act 1987 and prohibit the imposition of service charges to restaurant bills.
I wonder whether you, Madam Speaker, have ever had the experience that I have had. [Laughter.] One goes into a restaurant with friends and orders the meal. Perhaps one gets good service. Perhaps one does not. The bill then arrives. It includes a hefty service charge. One proffers one's credit card, and back comes the credit card voucher for one to sign, but with the total left blank. One inquires of the waiter whether service was included in the bill, and he answers, "Yes, but we don't get to see any of it."
My Bill is designed to address that problem, which besets we British and foreign visitors alike. The Bill will not discourage good service; it will encourage it. The Bill will not stop tipping: it will encourage it, but only as a reward for good service. Tipping for good service, not tipping for bad service, seems to me, dare I say, like getting back to basics.
I am well aware that, despite the Bill having the support of the Consumers Association, the Office of Fair Trading, trading standards officers and, last but by no means least, the Restaurateurs Association of Great Britain, there may be some lawyers in this place who will oppose it. Their argument, predictably, goes rather like this. Sure, a service charge is legally binding if it mentions the charge on the menu, but once one has sat down, started to munch on a roll and butter and look at the menu, if it mentions a service charge, one can always get up and leave—oh, come on!
Then they say that, if the service is so bad and if one does not want to pay the charge, one can always hire a lawyer and argue it in court. The lawyers would say that, would they not?
The Bill would bring to an end the battle of confusion, nerve and, frankly, sharp practice that so often causes heartburn and grief at the end of an otherwise mellifluous meal. The price of a meal would be clear on the menu, just like the price tag in a shop, with no extras added on later. That is vital, not only for us, but for the millions of foreign visitors to Britain each year who feel that they are simply being ripped off.
My Bill will end all that confusion. It will protect those who have gone for pleasant meals—in otherwise reputable restaurants—which have been soured by the addition of an unexpected 10, 12·5 or even 15 per cent. service charge at the end of the bill. It would end the optional service charge, which is not optional to any but the bravest of souls prepared to dispute the level of service received. It would cease the moral strife that haunts the diner who queries the suggested gratuity and is informed that it is used to pay staff wages. In what other industry would such an important overhead as staffing costs be left to chance payments by customers?
Making it absolutely clear that the price stated on the menu is inclusive of all charges should also stamp out what can only be described as blackmail—that open credit card slip. As the informed consumer knows, there is no need to
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leave a further tip or free will offering for staff if service is included—yet for some, and for many foreign visitors, it takes nerves of steel to argue the toss with the waiter or management.
Let there be no doubt that the service charge is the tip. If all prices were stated net, there would be no confusion. The mutual degradation of anxious waiter and befuddled diner would be ended.
I re-emphasise that I have no wish to stop free will gifts or tips but I want to end the informal pressure on people to pay a tip as an inevitable part of eating out, regardless of quality of service. I do not tip in pubs or fast food or cheap restaurants. Nor do I make a so-called free will offering to the stewardess on an airline, no matter what service she has given. Given that we do not tip in all those different circumstances, why should there be a virtual compulsion through service charges in restaurants?
The service charge is an anomaly left over from the second world war, when rationing and price controls led certain expensive restaurants to find ways around the restrictions. The law stipulates that all menu prices must be inclusive of value added tax. According to the Department of Trade and Industry code of practice on misleading price indications, any compulsory service charge should be included in the price for each item wherever practicable. In the four years or so that the code has been in existence, it has had little effect on the restaurant trade.
The House might find it hard to believe that in 1993, The Good Food Guide listed only 93 out of 1,400 restaurants that close credit cards by filling in the total, including the service charge. A survey by Which? in May 1992 showed that many restaurants made a compulsory service charge, leaving credit card slips open. Even worse, they presented credit card slips without the bill or anything else to remind the customer that service had already been included in the price of the meal.
That code of practice is simply not working, and discussions on its amendment have yet to have any impact. The code has little legal effect. Until it does, I suspect that the majority of restaurants will continue to avoid net prices on their menus, for the reason that it makes their prices appear cheaper and more competitive than other restaurants, which is most unfair.
A ban on additional service charges is supported not only by the many consumer organisations that I mentioned earlier but, I suspect, by my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor. I refer not to his dining habits but to the tax man, who should benefit from net prices and the removal of the supposedly optional charge that allows the restaurant to avoid VAT on that element.
As my colleagues know, I am not a regulator by nature —far from it—but tighter guidance is needed to ensure that the intentions behind the Consumer Protection Act 1987 stick. You will find this impossible to believe, Madam Speaker, but even the French have legislated to make all-inclusive restaurant prices obligatory. Now, every European Union member state except Britain and Greece has all-inclusive prices.
Recently, The Good Food Guide commented:
"The recession may have forced proprietors to reduce their headline prices to persuade customers through their doors, but some of them load the other costs to the point of virtual deceit. The public sometimes feels restaurants are combat zones.
My Bill will go some way towards ending that.
I realise that, in presenting this Bill, I face the gravest danger. Hon. Members on both sides of the House have

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drawn my attention to the risk of ground glass or worse. The Bill, however, has cross-party support, and it needs to be passed, for the sake of both equity and our tourist industry. I commend it to the House.
3.40 pm
Mr. Andrew Mackinlay: I do not think that we should pass the Bill. Notwithstanding its- superficial attraction, it should be seen against the backdrop of the current wage position: at present, we have no national minimum wage. It ill behoves the hon. Member for Mid-Staffordshire (Mr. Fabricant) to bleat on about people who can pay for their meals with credit cards. Many people who work in restaurants are, unhappily, dependent on tips to obtain their wages.
Dr. John Reid: They are not getting them.
Mr. Mackinlay: No, they are not. Not only is there no minimum wage; such people have no access to industrial tribunals, and thus cannot complain about the unreasonable behaviour of their employers.
The hon. Member for Mid-Staffordshire mentioned the practice in France. In France, there is a basic minimum for people working in restaurants, and they are able to complain about unreasonable behaviour on the part of employers.
If the House passes the Bill, it will give satisfaction to those who can purchase meals with credit cards, but it will do nothing to improve the lot of restaurant workers receiving low wages, who often have no national insurance or pension rights, and are paid skivvy wages.
The House should concentrate on introducing employment protection, especially for people on low wages. We should ensure that such people have a right, and remedy, to complain about employers who withhold money to which they are entitled. The House should take such action, rather than placating people with bits of plastic in their wallets who can afford to pay more.
Question put, pursuant to Standing Order No. 19 (Motions for leave to bring in Bills and nomination of Select Committees at commencement of public business):—
The House proceeded to a Division, but no Member being willing to act as Teller for the Noes, MADAM SPEAKER declared that the Ayes had it.
Question accordingly agreed to.
Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Michael Fabricant, Mr. Tony Banks, Dr. John G. Blackburn, Mr. Robin Corbett, Mr. Quentin Davies, Mr. John Gorst, Mr. Gerald Kaufman, Sir James Kilfedder, Sir Fergus Montgomery, Mr. Bill Olner, Dr. John Reid and Mr. John Sykes.

ABOLITION OF SERVICE CHARGES IN RESTAURANTS
Mr. Michael Fabricant accordingly presented a Bill to prohibit the levying of service charges in restaurants; and for connected purposes: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time upon Friday 4 March, and to be printed. [Bill 34.]

Scott Inquiry
3.47 pm
Mr. Bruce Grocott: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. I wish to make a brief point of order which goes to the heart of what we try to do in the House. It is about ministerial responsibility.
Yesterday, at the Scott inquiry, the gist of what the Prime Minister had to say was that he could not possibly know all that was going on in the Department of which he was the head. Every time we work with Ministers in the House, at Question Time or in debates, we have to work on the assumption that Ministers are here speaking and responsible for the work of the Departments over which they preside.
If they are able to offer as a defence, "It is nothing to do with me; I could not possibly have known what was going on; far too much work is covered by my Department and far too many pieces of paper go through my office," that makes complete nonsense of the notion of ministerial accountability.
The House needs to know whether a Minister speaking from the Dispatch Box speaks with knowledge and authority, having been properly briefed by his Department, and whether he is accountable. In that sense, "accountable" means that, if things go wrong, Ministers will do the honourable thing and resign. Or will they always simply offer us the defence that they gave us a misleading answer or a duff performance, but that that is entirely explicable because, in modern government, it is impossible for Ministers to be responsible for their Departments. If that is the case—
Madam Speaker: Order. This is a long point of order, and barely a matter for me. I advise the hon. Gentleman to read the response that I gave to a similar point of order yesterday, so that I do not have to be tedious and repetitious with the House. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will look at yesterday's Hansard, in which he will find my answer to a similar point of order.
Mr. George Foulkes: Further to that point of order, Madam Speaker.
Madam Speaker: I will take no further point of order. I have dealt with the matter.

Orders of the Day

  Coal Industry Bill
  Order for Second Reading read.
  Madam Speaker: I have had to place a 10-minute limit on speeches between the hours of 6 and 8, because of the great interest in the Bill.
  3.48 pm
  The President of the Board of Trade and Secretary of State for Trade and Industry (Mr. Michael Heseltine): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
  In our election manifesto, we pledged to privatise British Coal. Last spring, in our White Paper "Prospects for Coal", we renewed that pledge. Before I deal with the specific measures in the Bill, it is worth spending a few moments on the wider issues of nationalisation.
  The British coal industry is one of the last major industrial sectors left in the public sector. Nationalisation of our industries was a central feature of post-war Labour Governments. It was resisted fiercely by the Conservative Opposition of the day, and there are few people left who would deny that, as a policy, it imposed intolerable economic and legislative burdens on our country and contributed to the decline of our regional economies.
  The policy was designed to transfer the commanding heights of the economy to state control. The naive political rationalisation at the time was that control would be vested in the people. In reality, power rapidly shifted to monopoly providers and monopoly producer unions. What power the people possessed was exercised by civil servants, who rapidly became both protector and confidant of the industries' self-interest, and, worse, by the political convenience of the party in power.
  The traditional—and, in the end, the only effective—disciplines of the marketplace were replaced by ill-disciplined compromises and cash-consuming delay. The objectives of enhanced efficiency, increased productivity and a high quality of service played little part in the day-to-day practices or assumptions.
  Industrial management, hitherto widely dispersed throughout the regions of the United Kingdom, was replaced by top-heavy bureaucracies that were located largely in London. Perhaps most damaging of all, in virtually every case our key industries withdrew from or were denied access to the markets of the world. I say this to reinforce the case for the Bill, if such reinforcement were necessary. Today, the concept of state ownership is bankrupt. Across the world, country after country is turning to the discipline of the marketplace as each seeks to dispose of its nationalised industies.
  Even the Labour party has lost the will to fight for this arcane concept of industrial organisation and management. Of course it parades and re-parades the weary arguments that a tiny body of its constituents, and of course its union paymasters, want to hear, but it knows that the tide of freedom that we have brought to the nationalised industries is now as irreversible here as it is in so many countries, under Governments ranging from the socialists of China to the right-wing Government in France.
  Mr. Dafydd Wigley: Does the Secretary of State accept that one of the worries of many
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  ex-coalminers and miners' widows is that the benefits and agreements that they had with the National Coal Board will not be continued after privatisation? Will he give a categorical assurance on the matter?
  Mr. Heseltine: I shall deal with the specific objects of concern case by case, as I consider the detailed contents of the Bill.
  Before I leave the overwhelming case in favour of privatisation at large, which rests behind the Bill, I must point out that, as hon. Members will know, the facts are stark. In 1979, the nationalised industries were costing the taxpayer £50 million per week in losses. Today, they pay £60 million per week in taxes on the profits that they earn as private sector companies and, most chilling of all for the Labour party, 6 million shareholders are willing to testify and to vote for the success that privatisation has brought.
  What are the facts about the nationalisation of the mines? At the time of nationalisation in 1947, there were 720,000 mineworkers employed by the National Coal Board. By 1980, that figure was down to 230,000—a reduction on average of around 15,000 a year. The rundown was as much a characteristic of Labour as of Conservative Governments.
  The number of operating pits also declined throughout that period. Opposition Members will recall, for example, that between 1964 and 1970, and between 1974 and 1979, the number of producing pits fell by 313. Indeed, since 1979, it is a Conservative Government who have injected by far the largest support for British Coal in the history of British Coal—nearly £20 billion.
  Mr. Ronnie Campbell: That was redundancy pay.
  Mr. Heseltine: Yes, the Conservative Government made very generous redundancy payments. However, the hon. Gentleman is not prepared to face up to the fact that £8 billion of that £20 billion was capital investment in the industry. So, since the war—
  Mr. Campbell: I can give the Secretary of State one example of what happened in my colliery. A transport system, which cost £300,000, was bought, put in the timber yard, hapt up and kept there, and charged to that colliery when it closed. That is only one example. What happened at the other collieries in which the Government invested?
  Mr. Heseltine: The hon. Gentleman can quote his £300,000 example, but does the House seriously believe that it stands up against the £8 billion that has flowed into capital investment in the Coal Board since 1979? The Opposition talk as though they cared about the industry, but they ran it down. There has never been such a large investment programme in the coal industry as under Conservative Governments since 1979.
  Mr. John Evans: Is the Secretary of State aware that, at Parkside colliery in my constituency, a £6·5 million investment in a new face, which was in production for a fortnight before it was closed down under his regime, is now rotting in the ground?
  Mr. Heseltine: The hon. Gentleman might ask himself whether the decision to invest such large sums of money was justified in the face of a falling market for the product. That is an example of precisely the lack of discipline that I have been referring to—a lack that was characteristic of nationalised industries throughout the post-war period.
  Mr. Eric Clarke: The accounts of the National Coal Board show that it repaid to the Government, at a very high interest rate, loans that it had received over some years. The money that the right hon. Gentleman was crediting the Government with investing in the industry was paid back before the so-called profit was decided. The Secretary of State can investigate that fact if he likes.
  Mr. Heseltine: The hon. Gentleman must understand that most of the £20 billion invested in the National Coal Board since 1979 will be written off, which means that it will be charged in perpetuity to the taxpayer. I admire the fact, however, that he is now a director of a private sector coal company. I know that the House will wish him all the very best good fortune.
  Mr. Clarke: I am not a director of a private company: the right hon. Gentleman has been misled. I am an adviser to a company which has the involvement of the Scottish trade union movement.
  Mr. Heseltine: I would not wish to misrepresent the hon. Member. If his advice is successful, however, he might soon be a director of the company.
  Since the war and nationalisation, the coal industry has lost its market for producing town gas, it no longer sells coal to the railways or mines coking coal, and it has lost the greater part of sales of coal for home heating and industrial use. During the debates of the past year or so, we have been all too familiar with the fact that British Coal is now very dependent on sales for electricity generation, and we are equally and starkly aware that it is coming under increasing pressure in that market as well.
  Mr. Derek Enright: If there is no market whatsoever for coal, can the President please explain why five applications are being processed for opencast coal mining in my constituency, when the opencast coal will be dearer than that from Grimethorpe?
  Mr. Heseltine: The explanation is entirely a matter for those people who have submitted the applications to carry out the mining. It seems extremely unlikely to me that people are bidding to take on onerous responsibilities for mining coal in an opencast field when they could get it cheaper from the deep-mined industry. However, that is a judgment for those people who are prepared to invest their money in the process.
  The Government's position is clear. We have given an undertaking to ensure that the Coal Board offers to license the deep mines to the private sector, and I am glad that there are a number of cases in which agreements have been reached or the negotiations are well advanced. I much admire all those Opposition Members who are playing a role in facilitating negotiations and encouraging the prospects that those pits might find an alternative life in the private sector.
  Several hon. Members rose—
  Mr. Heseltine: I cannot give way to three people at once, but the lady must of course have preference.
  Ms Joan Walley: Will the President tell us exactly why he is not prepared to set up a target for the amount of opencast mining, and why it is that in, north Staffordshire, Trentham and Silverdale have been
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  closed, and we now expect even more opencast mining to go ahead? Why are not environmental issues at the heart of his energy policies?
  Mr. Heseltine: The hon. Lady mentions a most important subject, and she must be aware that consultation is now under way on mineral planning guidance 3. It is a matter for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment, but it raises important issues of balancing the environmental and economic arguments that are—superficially at least—in conflict. I have great sympathy with the hon. Lady's arguments.
  Mr. John Cummings: The right hon. Gentleman has confused me. I agree with him that successive Governments, Labour and Tory, have invested heavily in the mining industry during the past 30 years. Indeed, with the closure of Easington colliery, tens of millions of pounds of taxpayers' money have been left in a flooded mine. Is it not obligatory for the President to underpin that £20 billion-worth of taxpayers' investment by assisting in working a market for the benefit of a British industry, providing British coal?
  Mr. Heseltine: The hon. Member has obviously missed the point: that, with the approval of the House, we offered to put more taxpayers' money behind the production of deep-mined coal if people would come forward and find an additional market for that coal. In some cases, negotiations have been concluded or are proceeding. It would be wrong for me to give artificial assurances that I can sustain economic activities for which there is no market justification.
  Mr. Terry Lewis: Will the President explain the logic of taxpayers' money subsidising the acknowledgedly inefficient Spanish coal industry through the European Union?
  Mr. Heseltine: I challenge that logic constantly. My department, as the custodian of much of the trading interest of this country, has the responsibility of constantly challenging the existence of subsidies. The aim is not for us to introduce them into our economy; it is for us to try to eliminate them from the rest of the European Union. That is the task in which we are engaged.
  Mr. Paddy Tipping rose—
  Mr. Heseltine: Will the hon. Gentleman forgive me? Madam Speaker, you introduced a ten-minute limit, and I suspect that I am beginning to intrude into rather more speeches than I would wish to do. I must ask hon. Members to allow me get on to the detail of the Bill.
  There is one last point that I wish to record about my judgments on the industry. I have not the slightest doubt that our coal industry would be in a much healthier position today if the adjustment which has taken place under every Government, and too late, had taken place in the post-war period of economic expansion, when the diversification of the economy could have proceeded faster and when the highly desirable employees of the coal industry could have found jobs in growth industries of that time.
  I will go further. I have little doubt that, if the coal industry had had to face the challenge of the marketplace much earlier, it would have achieved productivity gains which recently, and under pressure, it has begun to achieve, but it would have achieved those productivity gains in time

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  to head off at least part of the dash for gas, and thus it would have secured for itself a larger share of the marketplace than is today realistic.
  Mr. Simon Hughes: If the President is arguing that a secure future for coal required privatisation some time ago, there have been 14 years of his government during which that could have happened. Is not the criticism the same—that a lack of strategic energy policy has been the consistent feature of every year of his Department and its predecessor since 1979? That is why coal is in difficulty; it has never known what place it would have and never been given any security as part of a diverse market supply, as the best resource that we have available.
  Mr. Heseltine: That was an interesting intervention by the hon. Member from the Liberal party. I do not pretend to have been shadowing with great care Liberal policy statements for the earlier part of the past decade, but I do not remember, Madam Speaker—perhaps you do, and perhaps I owe the hon. Member an apology—the Liberals making a major demand in all those years that we should privatise the coal industry.
  Indeed, if the Liberals had ever come forward with any firm demand at all, especially one that might contain any element of controversy, it would have come as a surprise to me. The Liberals would demand privatisation of the coal industry only in sections of industry, or of the electorate, where there was no coal industry, for fear that otherwise they might offend someone. That is a classic example of the Liberal Democrat party waiting until all the policy options have been closed, and then asking, "Why don't you do it some other way?"
  Mr. Dennis Skinner: Will the President of the Board of Trade give way?
  Mr. Heseltine: I cannot resist.
  Mr. Skinner: The right hon. Gentleman has not been following Liberal policy closely enough. I know that he has been ill and has been missing, and that for a long time he was not a Cabinet Minister. However, if he would check the facts, he would find that, in true Liberal Democratic fashion, that party was in favour of privatisation before the general election, but is now against it.
  Mr. Heseltine: The hon. Gentleman reveals the sort of inconsistency on doctrine that we have come to expect from the modern Labour party. I congratulate him on having read the documents. It shows that he is preoccupied with "back to basics", and has learnt to read effectively after all this time.
  Mr. Bill Etherington: I took great note of the right hon. Gentleman's long diatribe against nationalisation. Is he prepared to tell the House how many private companies have made as many gains in productivity as the Coal Board has made over the past two years?
  Mr. Heseltine: The hon. Gentleman will know that British Steel is now a world-class company, that British Gas is trading in more than 45 foreign countries, that British Airways is now one of the most successful airlines in the world, and that our electricity, our power and our telecommunications industries are straddling the world in the best interests of Britain.
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  Why? It is because we privatised the companies that have made that possible. Let us remember that we did that in the teeth of the opposition of the Labour party. If it had had its way, we would still have huge bureaucracies of politicians and civil servants suffocating the entrepreneurial zeal that the Conservative party has let loose on the world market.
  Mr. Jack Thompson: Will the Secretary of State give way?
  Mr. Heseltine: For the last time.
  Mr. Thompson: I have followed the right hon. Gentleman's argument closely for the last few minutes, and he rightly claims that £20 billion has been put into the industry in the period concerned—£8 billion in capital investment. But does he recall that the Conservative party has been in power for the past 15 years, and that he and his predecessors were responsible for policy? Surely policies could have changed over those 15 years so as to accommodate the situation that has developed now.
  Mr. Heseltine: If I had to plead guilty to the hon. Gentleman's accusations, I would have to say that I wish that we had privatised the coal industry in the early 1980s. I must make that clear. However, the implication is that, in doing so, we would have gained the serried support of the Labour party, whereas actually it was encouraging the National Union of Mineworkers in any obdurate political action that it could devise to stop the modernisation of the industry. The coal industry has found itself at the end of the queue. More's the pity, and, I suspect, more's the price that the coal industry has paid as a result.
  The Bill contains the Government's proposals for restructuring and privatising British Coal. It sets out the necessary provisions for safeguarding pension rights and concessionary fuel entitlements, and those affected by mining subsidence. It also reflects our determination to ensure that the high safety standards in the industry are maintained or improved in the light of the advice of the Health and Safety Commission.
  We believe that a competitive energy market is the best guarantee of secure, diverse and sustainable energy supplies in the forms that people and companies want, and at competitive prices. Electricity and gas privatisation have changed the nature of the energy market from a producer-led to a consumer-led market. We have made it a priority to establish a range of substantial privately owned energy companies free to take strategic decisions within a proper framework of regulation. The time has come for the coal industry to enjoy the same freedom.
  We examined the prospects for coal within the energy market very carefully during the coal review. On the basis of all the evidence that was presented to us, we had to conclude that there was every prospect that the market would continue to be difficult.
  Despite that, it remains the case that coal accounts for over half of all fuel used for electricity generation. On any calculation, coal will continue to be one of the chief sources of energy for the electricity supply industry in the years ahead. The House will remember that we accepted the key recommendation of the Select Committee and have introduced a subsidy for additional sales for electricity generation from deep mined coal. However, the real test is the rate at which the industry can improve its competitiveness.

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  The industry, as Opposition Members have said, has made considerable strides in improving productivity over recent years. It is only by building on those gains that the industry will compete effectively in future. Privatisation will best ensure that prospect. Time and again, privatisation has demonstrated the ability of industries which had previously lagged behind their international competitors to catch up and, increasingly to set the pace. That is true whether one looks at the docks, at steel, or at a whole range of public utilities. There is every reason to expect that the coal industry will do the same.
  Mr. William O'Brien: Will the President give way?
  Mr. Heseltine: If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I think that I have given way enough.
  Our intention is to offer British Coal's assets for sale in five regional businesses. Those will be based on Scotland, Wales, the north-east, and two parts of the central coalfield. Potential purchasers will be able to bid for one or more packages, and all bids will be considered on their merits. Our proposals will attreact new outside management, and they will give the industry's existing managers and employees the chance to make proposals to take over their own industry.
  The Government have made it clear that we are prepared to offer financial support to help potential management and employee buy-out teams to carry their proposals forward.
  Mr. William O'Brien: Will the President of the Board of Trade give way?
  Mr. Heseltine: No.
  On receiving Royal Assent, the Bill will end immediately the existing statutory restrictions that limit the scale of operations of private sector mines that can be licensed by British Coal. It will provide for a new Coal Authority to carry out those functions of British Coal which would not be appropriate for the private sector.
  The new Coal Authority will be based in Nottinghamshire. Its main functions will be licensing of coal mining, owning and granting access to our coal reserves, carrying out British Coal's responsibilities for the physical legacy of past mining to the extent that they are not taken over by the private sector, and making available mining records and geological information.
  The Coal Authority must be fully impartial in carrying out its licensing duties, so it will not, therefore, be allowed itself to participate in commercial mining. British Coal will become a licensee of the Coal Authority prior to privatisation. The Bill contins scheme-making powers, similar to those in previous privatisations, for the transfer of property, rights and liabilities of British Coal to other parties as necessary for the privatisation of the business. The Bill provides for the dissolution of British Coal in due course.
  I turn now to the critical issue of safety. The coal industry in the United Kingdom has one of the best safety records in the world. I made it clear as soon as I arrived at the DTI that I would do nothing to prejudice that record. I repeat that pledge today. In 1992, we sought—
  Mr. Ronnie Campbell: Will the President give way?
  Mr. Heseltine: The hon. Member has had a go.
  In 1992, we sought the advice of the Health and Safety Commission on the safety implications of privatisation. The commission's full and considered advice was received in October. The Government published that advice, and accepted it in full.
  The essence of the commission's advice is that it should continue to be the health and safety regulatory body for the coal industry, that the Health and Safety Executive should be the enforcement authority, and that the framework of legislation must be sufficiently robust to command the continued confidence of the industry and to ensure that health and safety standards are maintained or improved.
  Mr. Ronnie Campbell: On that point—
  Mr. Heseltine: The commission's advice is that there is already a comprehensive framework of law governing the mining industry, with a rigorous inspection and enforcement regime. The commission believes that the work that it has been doing since 1983 to modernise that framework will make an important contribution to ensuring that it is adequate to the demands of a privatised industry.
  The commission has also taken steps to ensure that the best practice in British Coal's existing owners' instructions continues to be applied throughout the industry. The work to achieve that is now largely completed. Draft regulations were laid by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment on 1 October last year to give legal status to a number of the most important requirements of British Coal's safety instructions.
  The commission has also recommended that there should continue to be a national rescue service. The commission will consult widely about the way forward. The Bill reflects the advice that we have received from the commission.
  Another issue of fundamental concern to employees and former employees of British Coal is pension provision. I am determined that the pension entitlements of those who have given their working lives to the industry, and their dependants, should be fully respected and safeguarded in the process of privatisation. A consultation paper on proposals for British Coal pensions after privatisation was published in September last year. Comments were received from the trustees of the British Coal schemes, from the corporation, from industry unions and from more than 1,000 individuals.
  After careful consideration of all the responses to the consultation paper, on 2 December we announced our decisions. All pensioners and deferred pensioners of the mineworkers' pension scheme and the staff superannuation scheme and all currently contributing members will be able to leave their past service entitlements in the schemes, which, on privatisation, will be closed to new members. New industry-wide pension schemes will be created for employees of British Coal and its subsidiaries who are transferred to employment in successor companies.
  The Bill provides for the closed schemes to be given a Government solvency guarantee that will ensure that pensions and deferred pensions are increased annually after privatisation, in line with the retail price index by reference to their level at privatisation. In addition, beneficiaries will be able to benefit from any fund surpluses through pension payment increases over and above RPI levels. The new industry-wide schemes will provide the same package of

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  benefits as the corresponding main scheme. Employees transferred to the new schemes will be given protected person status under the Bill.
  The Government believe that those proposals meet in full our commitment to protect pensions under the two existing schemes. The proposals will provide security for pension entitlements earned from service with British Coal and will provide protection for pension entitlements from future service with successor companies. The Bill provides the necessary statutory underpinning for all the- safeguards proposed.
  Next, I refer to concessionary fuel entitlements. I am again determined that they should be properly safeguarded. A consultation paper on this subject was published in October. My hon. Friend the Minister for Energy yesterday announced our conclusions. Responsibility for meeting the entitlements of former employees and their dependants will be transferred to the Government. Successor companies will be responsible for the entitlements of British Coal employees who transfer to them.
  I believe that our policies for the treatment of pensions and concessionary fuel fully meet the Government's commitment to safeguard entitlements, and are fair to beneficiaries and to taxpayers. They will provide welcome and essential reassurance to many mining families that their hard-earned entitlements will not be jeopardised.
  Mr. Eric Illsley: Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. George Foulkes: Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Heseltine: No. I have given many times.
  The Bill addresses the issues of subsidence. There must be proper protection for the rights of householders and others who may be affected by coal-mining subsidence. A large part of the Bill is devoted to establishing a strong regulatory regime for that purpose.
  The Coal Authority will take over all British Coal's existing responsibilities for subsidence, except in clearly defined areas where licensees will be responsible. Householders will therefore be in no doubt against whom to claim. It is an enabling power. We have yet to take final decisions as to the extent of the areas for which licensees will be responsible. Obviously, that will need careful consideration, bearing in mind the interests of the industry, the taxpayer, and, of course, the claimants.
  The Coal Authority is given a strong duty to ensure that licensees make proper financial provisions for meeting claims, and the power to require that security, possibly in the form of a trust, is provided.
  Mr. Foulkes: Can the President give an assurance that the beneficiaries of concessionary coal will continue to receive coal if that is what they wish, and will not be forced to take cash in lieu?
  Mr. Heseltine: The answer is yes. But as happens now, there will be arrangements for a financial exchange of those rights if it is agreed with the individuals concerned. The hon. Gentleman's point is well made.
  After nearly 50 years in the public sector, the coal industry has acquired exactly the same myths as those that used to haunt other nationalised industries. It is commonly suggested that they can never match the efficiency of their competitors; that their future lies only in an endless continuation of taxpayers' subsidies of one sort or another;
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  that somehow or other they cannot attract significantly worthy management for the task in their control; and that, in the end, only politicians are fit to take the strategic decisions affecting their future. Time and time again, all those myths have been exposed and exploded. In case after case, they are myths.
  This Bill will give the coal industry the opportunity to demonstrate that it can compete, it can stand on its own feet, it can attract managers who are the best in the world, and it is fit and able to take control of its destiny. I do not have the slightest doubt that the industry will make good use of that opportunity.
  I look forward to the day when private sector coal companies will join other privatised companies as free-standing, competitive enterprises, carrying a new entrepreneurial spirit into the marketplaces of the world. To enable that to happen, we will privatise the coal industry. We will set the industry free to meet the challenges of the marketplace, to innovate, to compete and to win its rightful share in the diversified energy market in the years ahead. That is the Government's policy, and I commend the Bill to the House.
  4.21 pm
  Mr. Robin Cook: The President has presented the Bill to the House in a speech which began with a light essay in history in which he was willing—indeed, enthusiastic—to take interventions, followed by a presentation of the detail of the Bill in which, perhaps wisely, he appeared to be extremely reluctant to take interventions.
  My hon. Friends who listened carefully to the speech noticed that there was a gap. We heard about the details of the device by which the Government will privatise the coal industry. We heard about the arrangements for the claims of subsidence. We heard how the Government propose to resolve the bill that will be left for the pensioners of the two coal industry pension funds. It was proper that the President went on at such length about the pension arrangements, as there are now 20 times as many people with a claim on the pension fund as there are left among the dwindling few people working in the pits.
  There was a gap in the speech. Although the House heard all the details about how the Government propose to privatise the pits, we did not hear how many pits will be left in the coal industry when it is privatised. The President told us about the arrangements for concessionary coal, hut he could not tell us how many pits will be there to dig the coal in the first place. He knows perfectly well how many pits will still be there at privatisation. If he does not know, he should take the Bill away and come back when he is able to answer that question.
  On Friday, the Chief Secretary provided us with a timely warning of the threat of this great institution of Parliament being undermined by cynicism. I wholeheartedly agree that there is a danger of the House being undermined by cynicism. What undermines the House is the cynicism of Ministers who will not tell us what is common knowledge within their Departments. It is worse cynicism than that: it is the cynicism of Ministers who think that it is all right to brief the press privately on what they are not prepared to share with the House.
  I give the example of The Times last Thursday. Someone told The Times how many pits will survive privatisation. The Times is quite confident that it knows

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  how many pits will be closed in the future; the article has the confidence of being accompanied by a photograph of the President of the Board of Trade. It tells us that six pits will close next February. Whoever told The Times did a thorough job, because the article names seven pits out of which the six will be chosen.
  The same story also appeared in The Independent, and the same seven pits are named. If all those pits go, there will be only two left of the famous 12 pits which we were told would be reprieved by the White Paper last March. That White Paper is now so discredited that it makes the Government's tax proposals at the election appear to be models of probity and candour.
  A remarkable feature of the list is that most of the pits that are to be closed next month were not even on the President's list of the original 31 pits for closure. They are pits that received a clean bill of health for their financial viability, and where there is no pretence of coal reserves being exhausted. If those seven pits close, they will take with them the 114 years' working life of their coal reserves. That is the scale of the coal reserves which we will lose as a result of the vandalism of pit closures.
  The Times obligingly tells us how the closures will be presented to us next month. Those pits, we are told, will be not closed but merged. The pits will be shut down, miners will be sacked and the shafts will be plugged. However, the pits will not be closed. They will become merger-seeking pits.
  I would not want Ministers to be embarrassed as they sit on the Front Bench by appearing to be less well-informed than The Times. I therefore give them the chance to prove that they know as much as The Times. Will they tell the House whether it is true that six pits will shut next February? [HON. MEMBERS: "Give way."] If it is not true, I will give way also. Can Ministers deny it? Can they tell us how many pits will survive until privatisation? I will give way to anyone on the Government Front Bench who feels that he knows as much as appeared in The Times.
  I must warn the President of the Board of Trade: if we are to be lectured on cynicism by Government Members, I believe that nothing would demonstrate greater cynicism than to invite Parliament in January to debate and give a Second Reading to a Bill to privatise 22 pits, to proceed to Committee to consider the Bill line by line and then to announce in February, "We are sorry, there are now only 15 pits." That is all that will be left.
  If the number is not 15, I will give way. I will give way to anyone on the Government Benches who finds his tongue and who can tell us how many pits will be there, because they know. I would not wish them to think that we believe that they are ignorant or that, like the Prime Minister, they did not read the briefing note or, if they did read it, they did not take it in. We know that they know.
  There were 50 pits in operation at the time of the general election. In the next month or two, there may be only 15. There were 44,000 miners employed at the time of the general election. After the next round of closures, there may be 10,300 miners left in the whole of Britain, from Longannet to Point of Ayr. In two years, the Government have closed two thirds of the remaining pits and destroyed three quarters of the remaining jobs.
  After that smashing of the industry, how dare the Government pretend to us that privatisation is intended to
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  strengthen the industry? It was to privatise the industry that the Government ran it down to a tiny profitable core. Privatisation brings a new threat of more closures. There is only one real asset which they have to privatise in the Bill, and that is the contracts of British Coal with the generators. The Bill may be selling the jobs of 10,000 miners and the local economy of whole communities. The one thing that the bidder will want to buy is the contract to supply the generators.
  The contracts expire in March 1998. By the time privatisation is well down the road, there will be only three years left of those contracts. There is no guarantee that they will be renewed. If they are, there will certainly be another cut in the volume of coal unless the Government act to tackle the rigged market in which those contracts are given.
  That is why the President of the Board of Trade has been unable to come to the House today with any expressions of interest from the big private corporations in mining. That is why Rio Tinto Zinc and Hanson are not named in the press reports of what will happen after privatisation. The President was unwise enough to say at a press conference on the day the Bill was published:
  "the short duration of contracts with the electricity industry would not deter buyers."
  He even mentioned Hanson as a possible buyer. Unfortunately for him, on the same day, the chief executive of Hanson ruled out making a bid on the pithy ground that
  "short-term contracts are not our idea of fun."
  The President looks like being stuck with bids from second-rank mining companies.
  The danger is obvious to those of my hon. Friends with knowledge of the mining industry. It is that companies that must borrow to buy out British Coal will then run the pits with a single objective—to get their money back within the three years left in the contracts. My hon. Friends who have been down mines know that, once it has been decided to run down a pit, a lot of money can be made for a couple of years. One has simply to halt the development work that costs the money and rip out the coal that can be reached easily. The mining equivalent of looting leaves pits robbed of a long-term future.
  If Ministers want to assure us that that will not be the outcome of privatisation, they can do so simply by plugging the most obvious hole in the Bill. The Bill provides the scheme by which the new coal authority will privatise the industry by granting licences to operate the present pits.
  The clauses contain provisions for all sorts of tests to be made on operators' financial standing and credit rating, just to ensure that the Government get their money out of the measure. Clause 26 makes it perfectly clear what comes first when the coal authority judges an application for a licence—the financial terms on which a mere bid is made for that licence. Nowhere in the Bill is there a requirement on the applicant for a licence to submit a mining plan for a long-term future for the pits.
  The test that we shall lay down as to whether privatisation will provide a long-term future for the coal industry will be contained in amendments in which we shall require those who apply for licences to submit a mining plan that will keep a deep-mine coal industry alive into the next century. If Ministers really believe the promises that they have made today that privatisation will provide a long-term future for the coal industry, they will welcome our amendments. They may even offer us drafting assistance to ensure that we get them right. But if

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  they resist the amendments, they will confirm what everyone in the industry knows—privatisation is pathetically irrelevant to the real pressures on the coal industry.
  Dr. Michael Clark: Does the hon. Gentleman really believe that, if he could have his way tonight and defeat the Bill, there would be a better and longer future for the coal industry in its present form, rather than if it were privatised so that it could compete and get a larger market?
  Mr. Cook: The hon. Gentleman's intervention conveniently takes me on to what we must do if we are to give coal a long-term, healthier future than at present. The answer to his question is that, if the Government genuinely wanted a long-term future for the coal industry, they would tackle the rigged market that arises from their privatisation of the electricity industry.
  Dr. Clark: The hon. Gentleman is ducking the question.
  Mr. Cook: I am not ducking the question. The Government seek to duck the mistakes that they created when they privatised the electricity industry—mistakes that have given rise to the present pressures on the coal industry.
  The problem for the coal industry is that it has been squeezed out of a fair share of electricity generation. The President talked of the long-term decline in electricity generation from coal. As recently as 1988—even under this Government—the Central Electricity Generating Board was planning to expand, not contract, coal generation. It applied for consent to build two new coal-fired stations and had prepared plans for a third.
  The coal for those three power stations is equal to the output of the half dozen pits that the Government intend to close next month. Those plans were knocked on the head by the privatisation of electricity, a privatisation that opened the door to the dash for gas.
  Last week we gained a new ally in our attempts to expose the fact that the privatised electricity market is rigged. The director of business planning at National Power, the biggest privatised electricity company of all, revealed its breakdown of generation costs. That shows that electricity from new gas-fired power stations is one third more expensive than electricity from the coal-fired stations that are being shut to make room for them. That does not even take account of the bogus subsidy offered in the White Paper. I do not take account of it, because the generators have not taken a penny of it.
  I put to the President the question which I have asked in every debate on coal in the past year and to which I have received no answer. How can the Government pretend that there is not a rigged market when its effect is to reduce the market for coal even though it produces the cheapest electricity for the consumer? They should present a Bill not to privatise coal or to waste our time on another piece of their dogma but to end that rigged market. That is the way to provide a real future for coal.
  The White Paper promised to take some measures to tackle that rigged market—not many, but one or two. One of the factors squeezing coal out of the market is that one of its biggest rivals, the nuclear industry, gets £1 billion subsidy a year. Subsidy is being poured into the most expensive source of electricity. Last month, the chief
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  executive of Scottish Power explained that electricity from nuclear power was now 50 per cent. more expensive than that from coal. However, so daft is the current market that nuclear power is being expanded and coal generation is being cut to make room for it.
  Mr. Peter Hardy: In addition to my hon. Friend's comparison, will he comment on the fact that last week British Nuclear Fuels issued figures showing that the cost of decommissioning new nuclear power stations is less than 1/100th of 1p per kWh? In that context, the justification for the levy against coal-fired generation is completely non-existent.
  Mr. Cook: My hon. Friend will be aware that the Select Committee recommended that the nuclear power levy should be ring-fenced so that it was used specifically for decommissioning and not to subsidise current operations. The Committee also recommended that the nuclear review be brought forward to 1993. The Government accepted that, and the White Paper said that that review would be brought forward to 1993. In October, the Minister of State said that the nuclear review would be announced before the end of the year.
  I may not carry the Minister of State with me on many issues, but I think that he will agree that we are past the end of 1993 and into 1994. The end of 1993 saw the end of another Government commitment, leaving the question as to how they can find the time, the energy and the priority to produce this thick Bill to privatise coal but cannot get down to the review of one of its main rivals and the biggest subsidised element in the energy industry.
  Why cannot the Government do something about French imports, for which we are paying more than 3p per kWh—50 per cent. more than it costs to produce electricity from our own coal?
  Mr. Richard Ottaway: We all know the answer to that.
  Mr. Cook: Yes, we do. That is possible only because the Government extended the nuclear subsidy to French imports. Why are not they doing something to tackle that distortion of the rigged market instead of privatising coal? How can the privatisation of coal help in view of those blatant market distortions? Why should a privatised coal industry be any more successful than British Coal in selling coal in that rigged market? For that matter, why should a privatised coal industry be any more successful than British Coal in improving productivity? For the first time, the President acknowledged the remarkable productivity improvements under British Coal.
  In the past 10 years, there has been a threefold increase in productivity and in the past year productivity has increased by more than one third. In nine of the past 10 months up to December, output per man shift broke all previous records. That is the achievement of the men down the pits who will be rewarded with closure next month —an achievement which outstrips that of any private industry. It is a public success story. Why can we not keep that success story in the public sector that made it possible in the first place?
  One of the features that gives British Coal in the public sector an edge over private companies is that its gain in productivity did not go into private pockets or was not taken out in increased profits; it was passed on in reduced coal prices. In the 10 years to 1992, the price of coal came

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  down in real terms by 36 per cent. Since then, the new contract with the new price has reduced the price of coal by 27 per cent. in cash terms. The Government tell us that containing inflation is their top priority. How many private sector industries could claim to achieve the reduction in price that British Coal has achieved over the past five years?
  The figures from National Power to which I referred earlier show that electricity can be generated from coal at a cost of 2·1p per kWh. It is currently sold at 2·8p per kWh. That is a mark-up of 33 per cent.—a rip-off produced by the last privatisation that Energy Ministers presented to the House. It is a rip-off at the expense of the consumer and the coal industry.
  The President had the nerve to tell the House that nationalisation had created monopoly power. Privatisation will create monopoly power and the abuse of monopoly power. If the President is serious about monopoly power, why is he coming to the House today, not to privatise the coal industry, which has no power, but to address the mistakes made in the last privatisation by tackling the monopoly power of the two giant generators and sending them before the Monopolies and Mergers Commission to explain why they are keeping up their prices when the price of the main fuel has fallen so markedly?
  The coal industry does not need privatisation to show it how to increase productivity or cut prices. Miners do not need privatisation and they do not want privatisation. How can privatisation improve the safety of the men who work 2,000 ft below the surface of the earth? When those men drop down in cages to work in that dangerous environment, they do not want to think that the people in charge up above are thinking first about the profits of the company. They come from coal communities and they remember when profit was the first priority of the pit owners.
  The greatest achievement of the public coal industry was to make Britain's pits the safest in the world—an achievement that is most prized by the men who work in it. Australia has the next safest mining industry in the world and its fatal accident rate is double that of Britain. That is not due to the regulations that the President lays down. British Coal has achieved that safety record because throughout British Coal there is—and it is a story of achievement—a safety culture that permeates every coal-face.
  The danger is that, by destroying the structure that created that culture, the Government will destroy the safety to which it gave rise. Why do they propose to tamper with that success story and put it at risk by destroying the structure of the industry that made it possible?
  Privatisation will not improve the pensions of the men who have already been pensioned off. The trustees of the pension fund have registered 17 areas of concern about the Government proposals on pensions. They relate to the same issue.
  Schedule 5, which deals with pensions, contains no fewer than 20 references to the powers of the Secretary of State. There has been an oversight here. It is about time that the President drew it to the attention of the parliamentary draftsmen that he is no longer Secretary of State but wishes legislation to refer to the powers of the President. Whatever name he chooses, for the first time a Secretary of State has
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  sweeping powers over the miners' pension funds—powers to sack the trustees and powers to require them to use the national interest to override the interests of the miners.
  The issue is not whether the pensions will be index-linked to inflation but how any increase in the value of funds will be divided between the Secretary of State and the miners who have created that fund by paying into it. The last person that the members of those pension fund schemes will accept as capable of giving them a fair division of the fund is the person who has taken away their jobs.
  I come to the final reason why the privatisation of coal does not make sense. To Conservative Members this may be the clinching reason. The final reason why privatisation does not make sense is that the Treasury will not benefit.
  We always knew that, when we opposed the privatisation of electricity, we were wasting our breath. There was a great deal of money to be made from it and the Treasury would steamroller it through whatever the arguments. When the Government discovered that they would not make money out of privatising the nuclear industry, they left it in the private sector.
  There is never much money in a fast sell and the Government will not get much money from selling off the rump of the much-reduced coal industry. They will be lucky to get back one third of the money they have poured out in redundancy payments in the past year alone. Not only will the Treasury not get much money, but it will be left with the liabilities for subsidence, for example. The Treasury will get the worst possible deal. It will be left with historic liabilities from the old coalfields without any of the revenue from the current operating pits to help pay for it.
  Privatisation is not needed to get the gains in productivity that the coal industry has achieved for itself. It will not resolve the real problems of the coal industry which arise from the privatisation of the electric industry. It will not even make the Government money, so why are they pressing ahead with the privatisation of coal?
  It has nothing to do with what is good for the coal industry. That came out strongly in the ideological preamble to the President's speech. The privatisation of the coal industry has everything to do with what is bad about the Government's dogma.
  Lord Parkinson first told us that coal would be privatised in a speech to the 1988 Conservative party conference. He described it as the ultimate privatisation. It was also Lord Parkinson who in October 1992 told us the real reason for the closure of 31 pits with when he told "The World at One" that we should never forget that the miners brought down a Conservative Government. The Government never forgot it and as they sink lower in the polls, caught in a web of their own deceits and buried in the rubble of the industries they have destroyed and the public services they have run down, they are determined to take the miners with them.
  The Bill is rich in symbolism. I began by reminding the House that the Chief Secretary had given us a sermon on cynicism. The deepest hypocrisy of the Chief Secretary lecturing us on the cynicism undermining national institutions is the fact that he has devoted his entire political career to undermining the national institutions of the post-war settlement—institutions that for 30 years fostered political consensus in a stable society.
  A prominent part of the post-war settlement was the nationalisation of the coal industry. For 30 years until the 1970s we had full employment, an excellent national

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  health service and an education service of which we could be proud. Part of that settlement was the nationalisation of the mining industry. It offered an alternative way of running an industry based on respect for the rights of men who worked underground at the coal face. It was an alternative way of running the industry motivated by the need of the nation for energy, not the desire of owners for profit. The Government cannot comprehend those values. That is why they want to destroy the coal industry. That is why they have found time for this pathetic, irrelevant little Bill.
  Of course the Government will win the vote tonight. But the Conservative party is so terrorised by the packs snapping at every straggler that they will all be found huddled together for safety in the same Lobby. I must tell the President that, long after today's speeches are forgotten and he and I are remembered only by our children and their children, the public ownership of coal will be remembered as a brave attempt to provide decency and dignity at work in the foulest conditions, to give expression to the common purpose of the nation by asserting the right of the nation to own the sources of its energy. The Government's betrayal of that great industry and the final insult of this mean little Bill will be remembered as a display of dogma and vindictiveness. We will reject their betrayal of the coal industry tonight, and history will reject that betrayal throughout the century.
  4.50 pm
  Mr. Michael Alison: Whatever else one might say about the speech that we have just heard from the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook), it cannot be construed by any stretch of the imagination as a welcome for the Coal Industry Bill. I am glad that, just before the Christmas recess last year, British Coal and its chairman, Neil Clarke; took a rather different line from that of the hon. Gentleman. Neil Clarke welcomed the introduction of legislation to return coal mining to the private sector. I echo his welcome unequivocally as one who represents the modern Selby complex of five integrated and interconnected mines employing some 3,500 people.
  Neil Clarke observed realistically enough:
  "The market realities will remain, whatever structure emerges from the privatisation process"
  But he went on to say:
  "Privatisation will help free the industry from some outdated restrictions. It will also allow the interests of coal mining in Britain and the people who work in it to be pursued separately from the interests of Government."
  Ms Hilary Armstrong: Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Alison: I shall make a little more progress and then I shall certainly give way to the hon. Lady.
  That formal farewell wave by British Coal to the embrace of Government is worth dwelling on for a moment. No industry in Britain has demonstrated so vividly and starkly that state ownership is no panacea and cannot inoculate an industry, however venerable, however widespread, against the pervasive realities of costs, competitiveness and market alternatives.
  As all hon. Members who are present will know, the coal industry has been clasped to the breast of Government for nearly half a century in Britain, and by an almost perverse reversal of nature, instead of a suckling infant becoming progressively bigger and stronger over those
  728
  post-war decades, a viable adult hitched to the paps of Government in 1947 has become progressively weaker and more infantile. The figures of decline are simply astonishing: 718,400 National Coal Board employees in 1947 down to 250,000 by the time Mrs. Thatcher came into office in 1979, with output down from 200 million tonnes in 1947 to about 120 million tonnes today.
  Ms Armstrong: I want to ask the right hon. Gentleman a specific question about the public responsibility arising from the consequences of coal mining, whoever owns the mines. It is about the responsibility to the land and to the environment, which will continue for generations and for many a long year beyond anything that we do today. Does he agree that that responsibility, for example, for ensuring that water continues to be pumped from the redundant mines, must lie with Government and that the Bill must address that fully so that in constituencies such as mine someone will accept responsibility for ensuring that the real danger of serious environmental damage is not allowed to arise?
  Mr. Alison: The hon. Lady's intervention strikes an echo in my mind and, I am sure, in the minds of many of my hon. Friends. Indeed, that is why the Bill as drafted, postulating the existence and future of the Coal Authority with an indefinate lifespan and with many responsibilities already spelt out, which no doubt will be further spelt out in Committee. This is precisely the mechanism that will ensure that her misgivings are properly attended to.
  Even at its lowest evaluation, privatisation could hardly preside over a more dismal decline in a state-owned industry than that which is now on record in the decline from the 718,400 employees in 1947 to the 31,700—a tiny fraction of the original body—that exists today. In my view, privatisation offers an attractive and reassuring prospect of future stability and profitability to the five mines, at least in the Selby complex, into which huge sums of capital have been poured by the Conservative Government.
  Productivity at Selby is about four times the British Coal average—30 tonnes output per man shift compared with about the 5 to 8 tonnes national average. If it was run as an independent mining enterprise, Selby could produce and sell coal at prices per tonne that could comfortably beat off any foreign coal at present on offer at any British port, let alone inland. Selby sits cheek by jowl with three of the largest power stations in the kingdom—Drax, Eggborough and Ferrybridge. Furthermore, its productivity and output can only get better under privatisation. Hence, its prospects are brighter.
  Mr. Etherington: The right hon. Gentleman made reference to the 50 years of close contact between the Government and the coal industry. He stated that he thought that privatisation would be much better. Would he care to refer to the 50 years prior to that, when we had a privatised coal industry which was a blight and disgrace on any civilised nation? Does he accept that we are likely to revert back to those standards when we go back to the same criteria for operating an industry, which will surely come when private enterprise takes over again?
  Mr. Alison: The hon. Gentleman undermines his own argument. If he looks back over the span of nationalisation, going right back to vesting day in 1947, he will see that there was then, as I argued recently, a manpower

  729
  dimension of 718,400 employees in the coal industry and an output of 200 million tonnes a year. That did not come just by flicking the fingers at the moment of nationalisation. It represents a long evolution of 50 years, which the hon. Gentleman attempts to discredit.
  That was the treasure and the prize that was placed on the plate of Parliament to nationalise. If it had been such a discreditable, unconstructive and useless period, why was it that the point of nationalisation was the high point of output, quantity and quality in the coal industry? Since then, it has gone steadily and consistently down. That heritage is not to be discredited.
  I was saying that the prospects already for Selby are very bright because of its astonishing capacity in terms of output per man shift. Even as one of British Coal's star performers at present, there are shortcomings in efficiency in the Selby complex, particularly in relation to the waste of materials and the somewhat cavalier attitude sometimes taken towards stock control. That shortcoming will be familiar to those whose employment has straddled both public and private sector industrial activity.
  Experience of the electricity generating industry is a familiar guidepost in that respect. I received briefings on inefficiency and waste from miners who have worked overground and underground at the Selby complex, and believe that a yet better prospect for output, productivity and profitable coal sales will loom under privatisation.
  I hope that an experienced, perhaps international mining or extraction company will perceive the jewel that glitters in the Selby coalfield and seek to bid for it. The hon. Member for Livingston mentioned National Power and PowerGen in particular. Local generators should not overlook the marvellous asset that lies so close to hand. National Power has just invested millions of pounds in a flue gas desulphurisation plant at Drax and is thus committed to coal for many years. It should certainly consider a bid for the hand, so to speak, of the Selby complex.
  The closeness of that profitable mining operation to huge power stations suggests that one third of British Coal's entire prospective output of 30 million tonnes a year within the next few years could be produced at the Selby complex alone. That is a profitable and attractive basis not only for maintaining Selby's existing output but for increasing it. I believe that privatisation offers that.
  I want my right hon. Friend the President to register one or two cautionary notes. The industry's effective restructuring will depend crucially on the skills and dedication of relatively few key miners and managers, whose services will be essential in putting privatisation in place.
  In the worst scenario, one such miner or manager might deliberately forgo the option of early retirement or redundancy and suffer the loss of a huge redundancy payment out of his dedication to seeing the transition through to its conclusion—only to find that he had inadvertently done himself out of a subsequent long-term post in the new structure and had forgone his entitlement to the redundancy package to which he might have been eligible, had he chosen redundancy, and thus ends up with nothing.
  I hope that my right hon. Friend will put such possibilities under a microscope. Without his action to
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  safeguard prospects and future employment, the maintenance of essential morale and motivation at all levels will falter—particularly among those who will be responsible for seeing through the transition.
  I am deeply concerned about one or two narrower but significant aspects, and echo points made to me this afternoon by representatives of the Country Landowners Association. A compulsory rights order is a form of compulsory purchase order that applies to leases, with reversions at the end. CROs are used by British Coal for the acquisition, for example, of temporary rights for opencast operations. CROs are a familiar phenomenon at present, but it seems inappropriate for the new private companies or licence holders to enjoy the almost absolute, draconian power that British Coal currently enjoys through the CRO machinery. In the new privatised environment, normal private treaty negotiations should be the order of the day between private licensed holders and private landowners and the CRO procedure made redundant.
  I am concerned also about the future of working rights agreements, which are used and operated by British Coal but which are apparently destined for transfer intact and unmodified to the new private licence holders and owners. The unqualified transfer of WRAs would be inappropriate. Most were concluded by British Coal and private landowners under the somewhat coercive shadow of the possible use of compulsory rights orders, so WRAs were reached under modest duress. Most made only cursory provisions for current payments, terminal payments or indemnity payments to make good damage done when the agreements come to an end.
  The cursory character of such agreements has not mattered much in the past because behind the National Coal Board or British Coal lay the vast resources of the Exchequer. Everyone knew that the various payments for which WRAs provided would ultimately be available. No such basic security will exist in respect of the private company heirs and successors to British Coal, which may find themselves in real financial difficulty at certain points in their operation. Current WRAs should be updated and revised, and any that apply to prospective operations should be surrendered. It would not be appropriate to carry through that mechanism into the new structure without modification and amendment. I hope that my right hon. Friend will give that some thought.
  Landowners should have the right of notification when licence bidders apply to the authority, in the same way as they receive information when a local authority causes a planning application to be made public and drawn to the attention of all and sundry in the surrounding countryside. The same should apply with prospective licence holders, so that people on the ground know what is in prospect. Two thirds of the Country Landowners Association's members are owners of fewer than 100 acres—mostly farmers. It is essential that their modest inhibitions and doubts should come under close scrutiny by my right hon. Friend and my hon. Friend the Minister for Energy, probably in Committee, and that appropriate amendments be made.
  Unlike the hon. Member for Livingston, and on behalf of the Selby complex—which has a glittering future—I warmly welcome the provisions that my right hon. Friend has introduced today. I hope that the Bill will mark a new era for many miners and many mines throughout the United Kingdom.
  5.8 pm
  Mr. Kevin Hughes: I want to raise several matters of concern. It is a pity that the President of the Board of Trade is leaving the Chamber, because I wanted to refer to his typical performance this afternoon, which was long on rhetoric and short on detail. No doubt most Opposition Members will endeavour to extract that detail. I hope that the Minister who replies will take note of the comments by Opposition Members with many years' experience of the industry.
  I need hardly make clear my personal view of the principle of the Bill. I am firmly opposed to privatisation. The Government have spent many months preparing the ground for privatisation, beginning the process back in October 1992 with a mass closure programme. They were determined then—as they still are—to reduce the industry to what they consider a manageable size: between 10 and 15 pits. They have effectively undermined the industry's safety structure with measures that they introduced while Parliament was in recess, showing their complete contempt for parliamentary democracy.
  Those of us who have spent many years of our lives in the industry were horrified by the proposal to deregulate the industry in preparation for privatisation. The Government's plans prove that they are fundamentally concerned with ideology and their continuing grudge against the coal industry, rather than with what is best for the industry and the country as a whole.
  As Ministers well know, the industry's problem is not the question of ownership, but the question of market share. It has lost its market share as a direct result of the Government's energy policy—or, rather, their lack of an energy policy. The Government failed to redress the imbalance that they had created, because it was all part of their master plan. They allowed the electricity companies to move away from coal, encouraged the dash for gas and sat back while regional electricity companies made long-term deals to ensure that they could control the supply of gas that they bought. The privatised companies will profit; the taxpayer and the consumer will lose.
  As a direct result of the faults in the Government's thinking, pits have been closed on a massive scale—and there are more closures to come. There are now only 22 working collieries in British Coal, compared with 50 in October 1992, and recent newspaper reports suggest that the Government's axe is dangling over a further seven. No doubt Ministers are pleased that they seem to be meeting their original target, and do not care about the misery that they have brought to thousands of miners and their families.
  Interested parties are worried chiefly about the number of holes in the Bill. We are being asked to vote for a measure that is only half complete. Vital concerns—concerns of great importance to mining communities such as those in north Doncaster—have yet to be resolved fully, or even addressed. The number of job losses is immense: 180,000 jobs have been lost since the strike of 1984–85. My area has just lost its last two pits, Bentley and Hatfield, which has meant the loss of more than 700 jobs. That does not include all the jobs lost through redundancy in previous months.
  However, despite the appalling problems with which mining communities have been presented, the Bill is silent about the Government's plans for the future of British Coal Enterprise. Only passing mention is made of BCE, which
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  is a wholly owned subsidiary of British Coal. It is important for the Government to make clear what they intend to do with BCE. The services that it provides are needed more than ever, given the increased number of pit closures: the Government must ensure that that source of help for men who have lost their jobs, and for local businesses, is maintained in the months and years ahead. I hope that Ministers will be able to give us more details about their intentions—if not today, in the near future.
  The Bill is also relatively silent about the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation, known as CISWO. Although it provides for the abolition of the Miners' Welfare Act 1952, it sets out no alternatives. I hope that the Minister will soon be able to dispel the uncertainty that still surrounds CISWO's future; I know that he has been examining the position, and I believe that we would all have liked to hear concrete proposals today.
  CISWO plays an important role in mining communities. It provides recreational facilities such as welfare halls, playing fields and social clubs, as well as providing important social services such as convalescent homes. Its social work helps disabled miners and their families. If the Bill makes no provision for them, those services could well be lost to local communities. That would be a huge loss, which would place additional burdens both on local authorities such as Doncaster metropolitan borough council and on the mining communities themselves.
  Many people would be affected by the loss of CISWO's services. The whole mining community can use its recreational facilities, and it estimates that more than half a million people may require its assistance. Those people's needs must be recognised. I call on the Minister to ensure that full provision is made for the continuation of CISWO's work, so that local authorities are not left to carry the financial can.
  So far, CISWO has been financed by proceeds from the coal industry and miners' contributions. Adequate provision must be made to ensure that its services are maintained and that help is available to keep them going; otherwise, elderly and disabled people will suffer, and valuable facilities used by the whole community will be lost.
  There is also concern about the pension fund changes announced by the Minister in December—in a pretty diabolical way, by means of a parliamentary answer. I understand that discussions about the operation of the funds following privatisation are still taking place; I hope, however, that the Minister will be able to respond to anxieties raised by the trustees of both pension schemes about the extent of the Secretary of State's powers over the funds. Pensioners are entitled to know that the money that they have worked hard to earn is safe, and that it will continue to pay them a decent pension in the years to come.
  Pensioners are also entitled to know that the Government will guarantee to increase benefit levels if necessary. The Government's present proposals mean that, as a guarantor of the scheme, they should be able to cream off a large part of the surplus. Unless they can provide a cast-iron guarantee that pensions will be increased by more than the retail prices index, many pensioners will rightly feel that they are being ripped off.
  The Bill is totally inadequate. It contains no plans for an overall energy policy, and no recognition of the fact that the private sector failed in the marketplace when it was last in control of the industry. The Government cannot even justify their proposals on the basis of their most popular

  733
  argument—that nationalised industries are overstaffed and inefficient. Not even the Tories can say that about the present coal industry.
  Only last week British Coal boasted about the latest productivity records. Miners broke the record of 10 tonnes per man shift for the first time in the industry's history. So the legislation is not about dealing with an inefficient industry. It is purely and simply about the Tory dogma of privatisation. In pursuit of it, the Tories have wreaked havoc in our communities.
  Only this Tory Government could be stupid enough to destroy an industry that should be supplying our base energy needs. Their theory is simple: if it is public, it is no good, and do not let the facts get in the way of a good privatisation. These people are manic about privatisation no matter the cost in money or human misery. From public funds, the Government will gladly take care of the billions of pounds of liabilities and let their friends in the public sector cream off the millions of pounds of profits.
  I stress that there is absolutely no justification for the privatisation. The Government know it, we know it, the miners know it and the public know it. The only things that could possibly come out of coal privatisation are higher electricity bills, the sterilisation of a magnificent national asset, a return to unsafe practices underground and the destruction of our coalfield communities.
  5.20 pm
  Mr. Spencer Batiste: I am grateful to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for calling me so early in the debate. Perhaps at the outset I should declare an interest. I am a partner in a large firm of solicitors and among our clients we have had many people who are affected in many different ways by the coal industry and will have a strong interest in the outcome of the Bill.
  I have always been a strong supporter of privatisation. Everything that I have seen of the privatisation process so far has confirmed that belief. Companies have outstandingly improved their performance in the private sector simply because the basic management decisions are left to those who run the industry instead of managers being always second-guessed by the Government. I can see no reason why the coal industry should not also be the beneficiary of that process. I believe that the coal industry has suffered considerably because it was so far down the queue of privatisation in an energy industry most other members of which have already been able to reap the benefits of freedom.
  I wish to raise four specific points which I imagine will affect many of my colleagues in the House as well as myself and my constituency. The first point is about coal-fired power stations. It would have been far better, had it been possible, for the coal industry to be privatised in the 1980s as a package of power stations and the coalfields supplying them. The great weakness that the coal industry has suffered in a competitive environment is that it can sell coal only to a relatively small handful of customers whereas it ought to be able to sell electricity competitively.
  In the past two or three years, groups of people have looked at the prospects for putting power stations and coalfields together, but the idea has always foundered on the rock of PowerGen and National Power insisting on unreasonable prices for redundant coal-fired power
  734
  stations. It should be put clearly on the record at this stage that that is unacceptable and uncompetitive. If it means a reference to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission, so be it.
  The coal industry must have the opportunity of access to the provision of electricity so that we can expand and enhance the competitive energy environment in this country. If the course of privatisation had not been distorted by the miners' strike in the 1980s, such a system would already have been in place.
  My second point is about the industrial health of individual miners. I understand that the Bill provides that those who have retired from the industry before privatisation and those who retire on privatisation will retain intact any claims directly or indirectly against the Government resulting from ill health perhaps derived from events early in their mining careers. Equally, I understand —the principle must be right, that those miners who transfer to the private sector will have their rights transferred with them primarily against the private sector company which employs them.
  It is important that the Government give a clear undertaking that if, for example, a miner in his mid-40s who, in the early part of his career suffered the cause of an industrial injury which appears much later in his life, goes into the private sector and if that private company fails for some reason or another, perhaps in circumstances in which there are unsatisfactory insurance arrangements for the company's liability, his residual rights relating to his period of employment with British Coal will remain intact. It is vital in justice and equity that those rights should not be extinguished.
  Thirdly, I wish to deal with the powers of compulsory purchase. It is one thing for the public sector to exercise compulsory purchase powers; it is another thing for those powers to be transferred to the private sector. My hon. Friend the Minister must make it clear that there will be no fundamental change in the way in which those powers are exercised as a consequence of the privatisation of the coal industry.
  The whole issue of compulsory purchase for coal should be put on exactly the same footing as the gravel industry or any other opencasting or quarrying activity in the private sector. I know that my hon. Friend envisages a transition period, but I would require persuading that such a transition period, is necessary. If it is necessary, excessive use of compulsory purchase powers should not become a blight for many of our constituents during the interim period. In other words, I wish to see the public sector, through the coal authority, maintain tight control over the exercise of compulsory purchase powers and ensure that the exercise of those powers comes firmly within the general area of Government accountability.
  The fourth point that I wish to raise is, for my constituency, the most important—the general issue of opencasting. It relates to part II of the Bill and its interaction with the consultation exercise now under way on mineral planning guidance 3. The interaction of the Bill with planning law will be of the gravest possible concern to many Members of Parliament and their constituents across areas where there have been coal workings in the past and which now face a huge rash of new opencast applications.
  It must be clear that, in most circumstances, there is no longer any national priority to justify the extraction of opencast coal. It is the opposite. If we agree that there is a

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  need to maintain a strategic reserve of coal for the future for unforeseen circumstances, opencastable coal is the best way of preserving that strategic reserve while we use the already developed deep-mined coal.
  I am not completely opposed to opencasting. Three separate issues have to be addressed which I should like to illustrate in the context of my constituency. Where there is dereliction, opencasting can be the best way of dealing with it. In my constituency we had a huge site at St. Aidan's which was flooded when the river wall between the River Aire and the Aire and Calder canal collapsed causing a massive problem in the constituency. There was widespread consultation on the methods of dealing with that problem, extensive involvement of the local community and the local authority granted planning consent for further opencasting with the support of all parties. A private Bill came before the House in the previous Session of Parliament.
  That seems an entirely appropriate way in which opencasting can provide for dealing with dereliction and the enhancement of the countryside and the environment when that opencasting has been completed. In the interim, it will often provide a substantial financial gain to local community groups as part of the exercise. It has certainly done so in my constituency.
  I also accept that, when a major new road programme runs across existing or past mine workings, there is a strong case—within the confines of that programme, in terms of the time allowed and of restricting work to the most limited area necessary—for allowing coal to be taken ahead of road building, so that the land can be graded and the roal built more easily and expeditiously. The A1-M1 link road will go through my constituency and no doubt opencast coal mining applications will be made so that the route can be stabilised; I accept that that will be necessary.
  However, nowadays, when environmental issues are far more important, it is not acceptable for opencast applications to be made for green-field sites, where there is no dereliction. Such applications are being made for the most sensitive areas of green belt in my constituency. There are a variety of important and exceptionally sensitive green belt areas around Garforth in my constituency, separating the Garforth community from the Leeds conurbation on one side and from Kippax village on the other. That is the core of planning, and I want it clearly spelled out that local planning authorities can reject unsuitable applications on environmental and planning grounds.
  I have considered carefully part II of the Bill and the MPG3 consultation document which has been published by the Department of the Environment. I recognise that my hon. Friend the Minister cannot provide me with answers today because a consultation process is under way, which will expire in a couple of months. Having looked at the consultation document, I submit my speech as part of that consultation process. When one is attracting high-quality world-class investment in manufacturing industry, as is the case in Garforth, where there is a good environment and the planning ethos of the area has long since moved from its roots in the coal industry, it must be clear that there will be good and satisfactory grounds for rejecting opencast applications.
  The consultation document refers to the role of unitary development plans. In West Yorkshire, we already have the benefit of unitary authorities, and in the Leeds area we
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  are engaged in a major consultation exercise, which will shortly result in the commencement of public inquiries for our unitary development plan. I see that there is also scope within that plan for a minerals plan
  From reading the documents, I do not know the extent to which the exercises can be put together. If the unitary development plan specifies that certain areas must be left as open land, to protect the separate identities of communities and the quality of the environment for developments in those communities, that should be honoured in the planning process and should not be overridden by opencast applications. That must be right, not merely from the point of view of people who live in the area but from that of the opencast industry, which does not want to incur the odium of public protest time and again and ought to focus clearly on those areas where opencast mining will be acceptable rather than those where it will not.
  I am happy for the House to give the Bill a Second Reading and will watch with great interest how the debate develops in Committee and during the consultation process on MPG3. I hope that, by the time that the Bill returns to this Chamber on Report, the answers to those questions and to the three questions that I have asked earlier will be clearly answered. If my hon. Friend the Minister is to carry many of my colleagues with him on Report and Third Reading, we must be given clear answers on those issues.
  5.34 pm
  Mr. Simon Hughes: Tonight's debate is about the long-term future of our main non-renewable source of energy. The background to the debate—judging by what the President of the Board of Trade said, it is much delayed as far as the Tories are concerned—is that the coal industry has been in decline for 20 years. We all know that that is because of the decrease in sales to the electricity supply industry, which is its principal market.
  The way in which the Government dealt with that industry, especially in the past 10 years, and the fact that it has moved to using gas-fired power stations has caused the gradual dying of the coal industry. The domination of electricity generation by the two companies that the Government set up—National Power and PowerGen—and the monopoly in distribution, which has been given to one regional electricity company in each area, have had the coal industry by the neck.
  We could have had, and still could have, an energy-efficient and cleaner coal industry. Coal is a natural mineral resource, which remains a crowning national asset. If the Government had wanted to liberalise the market, they could have done so without jeopardising efficiency or the security of supply. Instead, because of the way in which the Government tackled the electricity industry several years ago, they have made it impossible for the coal industry to survive at a size at which it could otherwise have done.
  The President of the Board of Trade, like his colleague the Prime Minister, has obviously not read the documents produced by the Liberal Democrats. That is a common Government failing. Perhaps they are also failing to read the opinion polls. If they had read both, they might be doing better.
  Mr. Martin O'Neill: My hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) has.
  Mr. Hughes: Yes, he appears to have done so.
  We have never opposed the privatisation of the coal industry. However, we have opposed and will oppose, which is why we will vote against the Bill tonight—
  Mr. Peter Atkinson: On one hand, and on the other.
  Mr. Hughes: Not at all. We have been consistent throughout and have always made it clear that we cannot expect the coal industry to survive as one of the sources of energy supply if we rig the market to its disadvantage in advance. Unless coal is allowed to compete fairly, it will be fighting with one hand tied behind its back. The central issue is not whether coal should be in the public or the private sector.
  What opportunity is there for the coal industry to sell its product? The market has not changed during the past 10 years from the perception of the Government. The President of the Board of Trade may tell us that one reason why coal has done badly is that it was not privatised several years ago, but that would be a bit rich from a Government who have privatised everything else and could have put coal on the agenda a decade ago.
  What has happened? During the past few years the industry has died the death of about 50 cuts—27 mines have already closed, four are out for market testing and there are only 18 to go. The former Secretary of State for Energy called it the "ultimate privatisation". None of us realised that "ultimate privatisation" meant privatisation when everything else had gone and there was nothing left to privatise.
  We have inherited as a race the black energy jewel of coal in our energy-diverse crown; yet, years before the sale, the Government took away the glass case of any protection. They then, in the disguise of the electricity generators, sent in people to smash, and now they will put up the industry for others to grab. What the Tories destroy they later sell off.
  It should not, and need not, have been like that. The hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) said, correctly, that coal, without distorting subsidy to other sectors, is still cheaper than two of its main competitor industries. It is cheaper than nuclear power, which has had a persistent and consistent subsidy from the Government—the only reason why the Government did not privatise the nuclear industry was that they realised that no one would buy it—and it is cheaper than electricity derived from gas.
  The figures were provided last week. The figures for electricity produced, as given by the bosses of National Power, are 2·7p per kWh in relation to gas and 2·1 per kWh in relation to coal. That difference in cost could have made up for the cost of fitting and running flue gas desulphurisation equipment at Drax. One could have used the differential money to do to the power stations what was necessary to improve them in environmental terms. Coal has never lost in terms of competitiveness, it has never lost in terms of its price advantage and it has never failed—the figures continue to improve—in its productivity. We have produced British coal increasingly effectively and efficiently.
  The words used by the former Chancellor of the Exchequer, the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Thames (Mr. Lamont), in his personal statement came to
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  mind when, in the past few days, I was thinking about the debate today. He said to the Prime Minister, in his first speech from the Back Benches:
  "I now wish to say one thing to him; it goes to the heart of the way in which the Government conduct themselves. There is something wrong with the way in which we make our decisions … As a result, there is too much short-termism … not enough shaping of events … We are, … the trustees of the nation."—[Official Report, 9 June 1993; Vol. 226, c.282.]
  Tonight, we are watching the final act of a policy that, above all, is a short-term policy. First, it was a short-term employment policy. Just when the country wanted, and needed as nothing else, more people to be employed, the Government stood by and allowed pit after pit to close and community after community effectively to be put out of work.
  Secondly, it was a short-term economic policy because it was, and remains, in the economic interests of our nation that we produce cheap coal, not only so that we can buy it at home for the uses at home and do not have to import it and buy it from abroad, but so that we can sell it abroad too —we have some of the best coal in the world.
  Thirdly, it was a short-term energy policy, because, if one cuts out of the alternatives that supply of which we have the largest reserves, if one takes away and closes pits that one then cannot reopen, one reduces the diversity and the security of supply that we may need when the dash for gas is no longer as economically advantageous as it is at the moment.
  It is that neglect of long-termism—that adoption of short-termism—for which we criticise the Government's energy policy and for which, sadly, we have had to criticise the Government on so many other issues over the years.
  Coal offered, and still offers, security, diversity and competitiveness of supply. It offers good productivity, good quality and good competitiveness. It lacked only a chance to have a fair crack of the whip. All of us who have been down pits—even those of us who have not been employed in pits—ought to pay tribute to those who have so well served the industry, fought for it and kept Britain served by the power from the industry. It is not their fault that there has been no national planning, no national strategy and no reconciliation of the interests of coal, gas, oil, potentially nuclear power—although my party opposes it—and renewable energy sources.
  The issue has never been, "Who owns the pits?" The issue has always been, "Why rig the market?" The prospects for coal—the title of the Government's paper of a year ago—were determined when the Government fixed the structure for electricity at the very start of its term.
  Whatever our view about how we got here, some questions are not answered by the Bill. There is no clear sign that the Government are committed to keeping coal as a national asset indefinitely, as we believe that they should. Coal should be a Crown asset for all time and only licences to extract and to mine should be given. The rights to ownership of the coal should never be given away.
  Questions about the historic liabilities are also left unanswered. The Minister knows well that through, for example, subsidence claims, there are significant and costly liabilities that will cross over the transition from the public sector to the private sector. I gather that the claims in 1992–93 in relation to subsidence alone were about £46 million. Who will pay those claims? If the plan is for them to be transferred in part to the new owners, what is the prospect of the new owners buying if they have to inherit an unquantified amount of liability as part of the package?

  739
  There are worries—there have been interventions and contributions on the subject—about a range of environmental liabilities. The first of those worries is about contaminated mine water, the subject of an intervention by the hon. Member for Durham, North-West (Ms Armstrong) when the President opened the debate. The National Rivers Authority has told the Government that it has inadequate powers to deal with pollution from water from abandoned mines. There have been dramatic illustrations of that, and not only in coal mines—for example, Wheal Jane in Cornwall only a few months ago. The liability needs to be determined and, above all, the resources need to be put in. They need to be national resources and it is the responsibility of the Government to supply them.
  There is no provision in the Bill for long-term liability for gas emissions, a common danger with our pits. The Minister for Energy said recently that the Government would ensure that all current responsibilities in respect of the physical legacy of historic mining would continue to be discharged, and that those that were not taken by successor bodies would' fall to the public sector. Before the Bill can be approved, people need to know which fall where and which the Government will keep to themselves.
  The most important environmental topic was the subject of the speech by the hon. Member for Elmet (Mr. Batiste)—opencast mining. If we are not careful, we shall not have given up the need for coal, but we shall have substituted for using deep-mined coal in mines that are already there, opencast mining in the countryside, where it is far less acceptable and often far less advantageous. There have been few guarantees that there will be protection for our communities from opencast mining. Opencast mining can be as much of a blight on our communities as ever were pits and spoil from deep-mined coal, and not just immediately but for a considerable period afterwards.
  When he winds up, will the Minister be able to assure us that no approval will be given to the Government's mineral planning guidance as set out in MPG3 until the House has debated it after the present consultation period, and until there is cross-party assent in both Houses to a regime that will protect our green and pleasant land in Scotland, England and Wales from the ravages of opencast mining, and that will not allow exploitative applications? As the hon. Member for Elmet said, such applications are often approved only because local considerations are not allowed to apply, and the national interest, whatever it may be, is said to be overriding. That has been a blight on many of our communities. It is unacceptable, and needs to be changed. I hope that the Government will give specific guarantees.
  By the Government's own definition, the Bill has been long delayed. The danger is that there will now be a quick sell-off of the small part of the industry that is left. It is rather as if the Government, having stood by while the industry was run down, are now washing their hands of it as they try to sell it off. There is a suspicion that that was the intentional plan all the time, and that the Government knew that they would not be able to sell the coal industry until it had been run down, so, willingly and knowingly, they acted as accomplices in that process. That is a tragedy, because it need not have happened.
  The new general secretary of the TUC has said:
  "History will charge this Government with the murder of the British coal mining industry. Now, in the ultimate insult, they are seeking to sell off the dismembered body".
  740
  It is odd that the "ultimate privatisation" is perceived by the great British public to be the "ultimate insult" to that great industry of ours. The Government are trying to walk quickly away from responsibility ; they say that the marketplace can provide, but they have the responsibility for a national energy policy. For 14 years we have never seen it; for 14 years we have paid the price, and all that we can do with the Bill now is to hope that the House and another place will make the best of a thoroughly bad job.
  5.52 pm
  Mr. Winston Churchill: I strongly agree with the part of the speech by the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) that echoed the earlier contribution by my hon. Friend the Member for Elmet (Mr. Batiste), about the protection that needs to be provided and assured, in the Bill and in related legislation, in connection with opencast applications, especially in the countryside and in areas of outstanding natural beauty. It would be entirely unacceptable for the Government to be a party to closing down a large slice of such a major industry as the deep-mined coalfields of this country, only to spawn a mass of opencast workings on the surface. That is the last thing we need.
  I warmly welcome the decision to privatise the coal industry. I believe it to be axiomatic that anything that the state can run, private industry could run better, more efficiently and more cheaply. However, I am bound to say that I regret the fact that once again we have too little, too late.
  Privatisation should have been carried out sooner. Indeed, the President of the Board of Trade almost conceded as much in his opening speech. Certainly it should have been carried out before the industry was decimated in the wake of electricity privatisation. Now, there is little left to privatise; two thirds of the pits have gone since we first debated the subject at the beginning of this Parliament 15 or 16 months ago. Three quarters of the jobs in the industry have gone in that time, or are on the point of disappearing—30,000 jobs all told. I count that an unnecessary tragedy.
  I trust that the Government will be successful in finding buyers for the residue of the industry. Above all, I hope that they can find buyers intent on operating the mines on a long-term basis, who are prepared to invest in them. We do not need the industry to be delivered in to the hands of the rape and pillage merchants, who will take out as much coal as is readily accessible but will make no investment in the future of the industry or of its work force.
  The Government's determination to saddle new prospective owners with the responsibilty for past liabilities in respect of subsidence and of the health of the work force—no doubt one sees the hand of the Treasury there—appears to be a major disincentive, set against the relatively limited likely profits. On the face of it, it would appear unreasonable for the Government to seek to pass on to the new owners the responsibility for past damage done to the health of miners employed for many years, perhaps two decades or more, by British Coal. I should be grateful if the Minister for Energy, when he winds up, would deal with that matter.
  For example, to take an extreme case, what would happen if, after a single year of working in the private sector, a miner or group of miners, having previously worked for 20 years for British Coal, developed

  741
  pneumoconiosis? Under the terms of the Bill, the new owner would have to bear the entire cost of compensating that individual, although the damage would almost certainly have been caused while the miner or miners concerned worked for British Coal, when, in earlier years, there was no provision for effective dust sampling, and it was not the norm for masks to be worn.
  Mr. Michael Clapham: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that, if the industry is to be privatised, the way forward on pneumoconiosis is for the Government to accept the no-fault liability scheme currently run by the industry, and to carry it over to the private sector?
  Mr. Churchill: The hon. Gentleman almost takes the words out of my mouth. I was about to ask my hon. Friend the Minister and his ministerial colleagues whether they realised that such unquantified and unquantifiable liabilities are likely to act as a supreme disincentive.
  Furthermore, to take up the point made by the hon. Member for Barnsley, West and Penistone (Mr. Clapham), what would happen to such a miner if his new employer went into liquidation? That is quite possible, given the present turmoil in the coal market in this country, and the fact that not a tonne is now being purchased—indeed, I am not aware that any of the £500 million subsidy supposedly on offer from the Treasury has had to be ponied up so far. What protection would there then be for the miner with pneumoconiosis or any other industrial disease? That is clearly something that must be properly addressed.
  I know that it is the view of my hon. Friend's Department that pneumoconiosis is no longer a significant problem in terms of the numbers of new cases that are appearing, and that therefore the cost burden will not be great. In those circumstances, would it not be more appropriate for the Coal Authority to shoulder responsibility for that serious, long-term industrial disease?
  If those unquantifiable liabilities were removed, not only would that make the remaining mines more saleable, but it would be the miner's guarantee that his compensation would be assured in the event that he developed that much-feared industrial disease, which bears comparison only—
  Mr. Jack Thompson: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Member for Davyhulme, but I was also under the impression that it was a convention of the House that one did not read newspapers during a debate. I see that one hon. Member is doing so.
  Mr. Malcolm Moss: Mr. Deputy Speaker—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Geoffrey Lofthouse): Order. Let me rule on one point of order before I take another. I had not noticed that any hon. Member had been reading a newspaper. If that was the case, I have no doubt that the hon. Gentleman will not continue to do so.
  Mr. Moss: I am happy to clear up the situation, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I was reading an article about the Drax clear-up, which is relevant to the debate.
  Mr. Churchill: Not only would the removal of those unquantifiable liabilities make the mines more saleable, but it would be the miner's guarantee that his
  742
  compensation would be assured if he were to develop pneumoconiosis. I ask my right hon. and hon. Friends if they will look at that question again.
  The most striking difference between the sale of British Coal's core mines and the sale of steam coal properties in the world's biggest free coal market, the United States, is the shortness of the coal contracts with the power stations available in the country to potential new operators. The one certainly dominating the scene is that only three years of contracts remain with the generators. Beyond that, there is only uncertainty. Even the generators believe that, of all the coal-fired stations, only Drax is likely to be on base-load operation by the turn of the century.
  Of course, it is too late to extract longer contracts from the generators, but, even now, there are two things that the Government could do to encourage would-be purchasers of the remaining mines. First, they could insist on the completion of flue gas desulphurisation at Ferrybridge—a bargain made at the time of electricity privatisation with the industry and referred to many times by the noble Lord Wakeham. The industry should be held to that. Secondly, and even more importantly, the Government should require redundant coal-fired stations to be made available at reasonable prices to other operators, including the principal coal producers.
  We know that the regulator is concerned to see redundant stations offered to other users. However, he does not believe that he has the powers to require it. It is clear that National Power bases its asking price on the loss of sales value for its best stations. That would have the effect of pricing, for example, a 1,000 MW station—even one that is 35 years old and without gas cleaning—at over £300 million, which would be indefensible in terms of investment by a future private operator.
  That is in stark contrast to the sales on the real market. Recently, it was reported that PowerGen sold three stations to China for a mere £20 million.
  Mr. O'Neill: I am following the hon. Gentleman's argument carefully, and I have some sympathy with it. Perhaps he might consider as a possible conclusion that the generators should be referred to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission. The only difficulty with that conclusion is that it would interrupt the Government's proposals to sell off the remaining tranche of shares of the two generators and would prejudice the sums that may be involved. If one has an abuse of monopoly power, it is logical to refer it to the MMC.
  Mr. Churchill: I could not agree more. It is a matter of great regret that we in Britain appear to have a significantly less powerful regime against monopolies and the abuse of monopoly power than, for instance, the United States, which clearly acts to the detriment of consumers. The Government need to address that as a matter of urgency.
  If the two generators were required to offer all the redundant coal plant at reasonable prices, it would boost the sales prospects of the remaining mines, provide the best guarantee that those who earn their living in the industry have the prospect of long-term employment, while at the same time providing consumers with much-needed competition in what is at present an over-restricted and an over-controlled market.
  It is vital that the Government do not allow what is left of that once great industry to be blighted by an unwillingness on their part to address the abuses and

  743
  distortions that have arisen in the wake of electricity privatisation. While welcoming the Bill, I call on my right hon. and hon. Friends to fine-tune it during its passage through the House to ensure the success of privatisation and to offer the industry and those who work in it a clear and prosperous future in the private sector.
  Several hon. Members rose—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I must remind the House of Madam Speaker's ruling earlier today that speeches between the hours of 6 pm and 8 pm will be limited to 10 minutes. We are now in that period.
  6.7 pm
  Mr. Peter Hardy: The hon. Member for Davyhulme (Mr. Churchill) clearly does not have the same enthusiastic view of public ownership as his revered grandfather. Apart from that, I hope that the hon. Gentleman will join those of us who hope to serve on the Standing Committee, in which, perhaps with the assistance of the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes), we shall be able to fine-tune some aspects of the Bill, not least with regard to the latter points of his speech and the question of opencast mining, which cause some of us who live in the coalfields considerable anxiety.
  On one side, we shall have the sites of destroyed pits, and on the other the devastation of a long period of opencasting, which no one in the local communities wanted. I hope that the consultation over the arrangements for opencast mines will not diminish the influence of local communities and their local authorities so that distant people can help rape what is left of our heritage.
  It is a long time since nationalisation. It is appropriate to tell the House that, on vesting day in 1947, when I was a schoolboy, I went with my father and stood at the celebration of this decision by the greatest of post-war Governments. It was an interesting experience for a boy, because it was quiet, it was dignified and it was decent. There were some Tories there, but they were probably on the platform with one or two local dignitaries. I remember that because of the quiet satisfaction and decency of the occasion.
  The other day, I stopped my car just to the north of the former pithead baths at Manvers colliery, exactly where I had stood with my father, and thought about what had happened since then. We have had 33 years of Conservative administration, and we, after being in office for only a minor part of the period that has elapsed since then, bear all the blame.
  I know what the men were satisfied about and what they were celebrating. Each and every one of them would have known somebody or had relatives or neighbours who had been killed in the pit. Each of them would have known men who had been maimed. Each and every one of them would have known the short-cuts that had operated in the previous arrangements. They had seen waste and lost opportunities —so much so that, during the war, they had to have "Bevin boys" to make up for the inadequate provisions of the 1920s and 1930s.
  The mine was taken into public ownership with good will. It was a very important decision. In the 1970s, the Labour Government—the hon. Member for Davyhulme took part in some of the debates, as I did—produced their
  744
  "Plan for Coal". The Conservative party in opposition enthusiastically supported it, and, until recent years, boasted about it.
  We then saw the Conservative Government turning their backs, saying what a pity it was that the miners had not improved productivity earlier. In fact, productivity has been improving at a rate of knots in the past six or seven years. I heard Lord Haslam castigate the Secretary of State only a few months ago for not understanding that fact.
  We have many problems, but, with a 10-minute limit on speeches, I cannot refer to all 'of them, but I hope that I serve on the Committee and that Opposition Members will find time, without attempting to prolong the proceedings improperly or unreasonably, to consider matters such as the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation and concessionary pensions. We have heard little about the rake-off that the Government proposed to take from the surplus. I hope that we are also able to consider environmental responsibilities and health and safety matters.
  Unfortunately, Mr. Deputy Speaker, you are unable to speak in the House. From your experience of the mining industry, you must be deeply concerned about the paraplegic centre in Pontefract and the future of other such establishments. I hope that the Minister will assure us that there will be proper provision for such establishments.
  Subsidence has been referred to. We will have to explore that and many other issues in depth, but I wish to discuss safety.
  The other day, a learned judge—the Minister for Energy knows which case I am referring to—perceived
  "a mining industry which, in future, may see privatisation and, thus, an end to much of the regulation that British Coal has put in place."
  We have been told that it dismantled much of the safety structure, and the President of the Board of Trade boasted about that this afternoon. [Interruption.] The right hon. Gentleman said that he would not have done anything to injure safety, except to do what has already been done, and that is to replace what existed before with all sorts of provisions, and then provide the let-out clause that appears on virtually every page of the regulations, stating that there will be priority for safety "in so far as it is practicable".
  One thousand men a year were killed in the British mining industry before nationalisation. One thousand men a year was the average in the 1920s, 1930s and early 1940s. As has been demonstrated, the average has been brought down to a tiny proportion, and it is at risk. There will be corner-cutting and short-sighted calculations. If not, the Secretary of State would have given a little more time to consider the disposal of the industry to one company which would have had the capacity to operate with scale, which would not have had to look over its shoulder at competitors operating on the lowest common denominator principle in safety and investment, and which would have been able to take a forward look.
  The right hon. Member for Selby (Mr. Alison) might think that all the Selby pits will be saved, but I doubt whether that will be the case.
  Mr. Jimmy Hood: Will my hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Hardy: No. I do not have time to give way.
  I have one colliery left—Silverwood. It is a proud pit, with a superb record. My hon. Friends know that Silverwood has been one of the most successful collieries

  745
  during the post-war period. It has made enormous profits. Only a little while ago, I spoke in the House about the proud achievements of that colliery when it had broken another record. A few months ago, I heard of investment at the pit, but subsequently learned that a development on which much money has been spent was stopped about three weeks before it started to yield.
  That is the colliery to which British Coal used to send distinguished visitors. In Jubilee year, the Queen visited Silverwood colliery. A picture of the Queen at that pit was displayed in every colliery in Britain. Men from that pit have often featured in the honours list—one as recently as three weeks ago. They have been treated scurvily.
  We now hear that the pit will not be closed abruptly, but will be whittled away, and that some men might be transferred to Maltby. The only problem is that people in Maltby tell me that they have been assured that Maltby's requirements do not need to be met by Silverwood men. What a way to treat people who have made such an enormous contribution. If they are treated like that by British Coal, how on earth will they be treated by private operators?
  I again ask the Minister a question. I have asked four Ministers of the Crown this question, and I have not had a satisfactory answer. If the Minister is concerned about safety, will he guarantee that no overseas coal owner will be allowed to buy British mines if his record is as bad as some Opposition Members suspect some are? If coal owners abroad have unsatisfactory safety records, we do not want them here, because we value the lives and limbs of our constituents.
  It is no good the Minister saying that that is a matter for the Health and Safety Executive, because the Health and Safety Executive does not decide who will buy the British coal industry. That is a ministerial responsibility, and the executive should not exercise it.
  I should like to say much more about Silverwood. I find it far too distressing even to contemplate that men with such a proud record and splendid achievement should be treated as British Coal has treated them. The one thing that I regret about the leadership of British Coal is that they seem to have forgotten that they have been paid to lead their industry on behalf of the nation.
  I suspect that, in recent years, they have largely led the industry in the direction in which they want it to go for their personal reasons, overlooking the fact that their position has been—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Geoffrey Lofthouse): Order. I call Mr. Peter Atkinson.
  6.17 pm
  Mr. Peter Atkinson: I congratulate my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade and my hon. Friend the Minister for Energy on bringing the Bill to the House. It has been a long time in coming, but it is better late than never.
  The hon. Member for Wentworth (Mr. Hardy) took us back in history to vesting day in 1947, when the nationalisation of the coal industry came into effect. Although the hon. Gentleman described that day very eloquently, sadly, when we look back at the era of nationalisation from a perspective of history, we see it as nothing more than an unremitting disaster.
  746
  A once great industry was reduced to a rump by years of protectionism and, I have to say, Government interference. This Government's bold decision—it was a bold decision—to liberalise the energy market in this country showed just how featherbedded, feeble and incompetent British Coal and the British coal industry had become. The result was an unpleasant reality with which my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade had to deal, taking much flak in the process.
  In 1947, when the hon. Member for Wentworth stood outside the gates of the colliery, Britain was the leading nation in mining technology. It was exporting tonnes of coal all around the world. Welsh steam coal probably fired nearly every locomotive in the world. We were world leaders. There were dozens of successful and profitable collieries in the north-east of England at the time.
  For example, pits in my home county of Northumberland—as the hon. Member for Wansbeck (Mr. Thompson) knows, there were many pits in my home county—made a profit at that time. Private coal owners would not have kept the pits open if they had not made a profit.
  I rember that Shilbottle colliery used to supply all the coal to Buckingham palace, because it was considered to be the finest household coal in the United Kingdom. Shilbottle coal was requested by the late King. The Queen burns house coal in many of her grates. Many people will now have to burn Polish coal, because British coal cannot provide house coal for our market.
  Time and time again, we hear about the effectiveness of the United States system of pillar and stall mining. That method has been recommended to the Coal Board and many private operators as a way to mine coal economically. The technique was invented in the north-east of England. Originally, it was used in the Ellington and Wearmouth collieries. Wearmouth colliery is under threat at present. We will have to bring mining engineers from the United States in order to re-learn the skill of pillar and stall mining.
  I am worried that those people who ran the National Coal Board and subsequently British Coal are now, through their plans for colliery closures, helping to shape the future of the privatised industry. It is totally wrong that a group of British Coal managers, who have an eye on future management buy-outs, should be shaping the industry in the way they see fit, while private companies are being frustrated in their efforts to take over pits which British Coal has closed and which are not wanted but which the private sector believes could have a good future.
  I shall give an example. I am sorry that the hon. Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Etherington) is not in his seat, because Wearmouth colliery is a classic example. A private company wants to buy that pit and re-employ some of the 650 men who lost their jobs. Wearmouth colliery is ideal, because there is plenty of good-quality coal which can be transported straight from the pithead to ore-carrying ships and exported.
  To sell on the world market, coal must be priced at about £15 a tonne—that is before shipping costs of £5 or £7 a tonne are added. A pit near the coast with easily mined coal is highly competitive. Private coal companies that are interested in Wearmouth realise that they will be able to achieve the target of £15 a tonne and export coal to overseas markets from that colliery.
  Mr. Jack Thompson: The hon. Gentleman's constituency is next to mine. Is he aware that Wearmouth colliery could achieve that target whether it is privatised or nationalised? It was able to achieve the target before it was closed, but it was still closed by British Coal, as part of the Government and British Coal exercise of "slimming down the industry", as it has been described.
  Mr. Atkinson: The hon. Gentleman is totally wrong. The figures are only averages, because they vary from pit to pit. Even after making enormous steps forward in productivity, collieries have a long way to go to get down to the level of £15 a tonne. However, they can and will do so under private management. If British Coal had been able to do it years ago, it would have done so, but the management and protection of the business have always prevented it. It will be left to the private sector to achieve that possibility.
  It is worth noting that, in the United States, deep-mined coal from mines exactly like Ellington colliery in Northumberland and Wearmouth colliery in Tyne and Wear can land coal on the surface for £7 a tonne in West Virginia. Such a target is ultimately achievable in British deep-mining collieries. [Laughter.] Labour Members may laugh about that, but if we can achieve that level of productivity in our mines, British Coal will have a future of bringing on new customers in the industrial sector as well as exporting coal around the world, especially to Germany, which spends about ten times that amount on mining one tonne of coal.
  It is no wonder that British Coal managers do not want Wearmouth colliery to fall into competitors' hands. Despite making the pit available for leasing, they are making it almost impossible for a private company to take over the colliery.
  There are two faces at Wearmouth. One of them is brand new—it has been under development for several months. New coal-cutting machinery imported from America was already at the face. That machinery has been removed and taken to Longannet colliery in Scotland, where puzzled managers have been told to use it come what may.
  At the same time, expensive roof supports have been removed from the new face and replaced with temporary supports. The supports have been taken to Ellington colliery, where they are simply lying on the surface. Next week at Wearmouth, work will start on pulling the coal-cutting equipment from the existing face, and more roof supports will be removed.
  Why is British Coal doing that? One thing that British Coal cannot be short of in this day and age is coal-cutting machinery, because it has been removed from several pits recently. Surely British Coal cannot be short of roof supports for the same reason. The reason is obvious: British Coal managers, who are looking towards a management buy-out, consider that Wearmouth colliery is a danger. Therefore, they will seek to frustrate a private company which wants to take it over, as they frustrated another company which wanted to take over Bevercotes colliery in Newark.
  Hon. Members will watch carefully the way in which the Coal Board deals with the pits between now and the time that the Bill becomes law. The Coal Board retains a much greater responsibility than simply worrying about the management buy-outs which individual managers may be considering. It has a statutory responsibility to the mining
  748
  industry as a whole. Once the Bill becomes law, it will then be held accountable for what it has done in the months leading up to privatisation.
  I welcome this privatisation. Whatever the mockers on the other side of the House may say about it, it will give the British coal industry an opportunity to live once again, to compete in the world, to attract new customers, and to move to being one of the leading coal-producing nations once again.
  6.26 pm
  Mr. John Evans: I listened with some anger to the hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson) refer to the glories of mining of Tyneside and in north-east England in the days when it was privatised. I merely tell him that my father worked at the Rising Sun colliery at Wallsend. When he was 32 years of age, he drowned in a mining accident for which my mother received no compensation. My mother and three small children aged under six were left in abject poverty. My memories of the privately owned mining industry leave me with no pleasure whatever.
  It is with some pleasure that I preface my speech by referring to early-day motion 359 entitled "Women Against Pit Closures Camp at Parkside Colliery". Unlike the Government, those brave women believe passionately in their menfolk and their pit. Tonight, they are holding a party to celebrate the first anniversary of their camp. It was an incredible achievement and experience for those women, who often suffered from foul weather. Severe gales, deep frosts and downpours of rain have often been their lot. Frankly, I do not believe that a group of men could have stuck it out for 24 hours a day for a whole year in the same way as those women. The women have made it clear that they will stay at Parkside colliery until it is reopened and producing coal. I salute them, and I am delighted to wish them a very happy birthday.
  When I was elected to the House in February 1974, there were over 250,000 miners in this country working in more than 100 pits. There were innumerable collieries dotted all over north-west England. Today, there are 22 pits and about 20,000 miners—none in north-west England. Parkside, which was the last colliery in the Lancashire coalfield, closed one year ago. Since I was elected, a quarter of a million miners have been sacked and almost 100 mines have closed.
  Two hundred thousand jobs have disappeared since the Tories were elected in 1979. The contraction of the industry is continuing. As my hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) said, it has been leaked that half a dozen collieries will close during the next few weeks. By the time the Bill reaches the statute book—if it reaches the statute book—we will be down to the 12 to 14 pits which were identified by the Rothschild report as ripe for privatisation.
  Ministers of course are washing their hands, and claiming that the rundown of the industry is a result of market forces and that there is no point in digging coal if there is no one willing to buy it. It has been demonstrated many times in the House that that simply is not true. The market has been rigged against coal, and the main features of that rigged market are well known and have been well aired—the dash for gas, the nuclear power levy of a billion

  749
  pounds-plus, the protected market share of the nuclear power industry and the continuing nonsense of the French interconnector.
  There are questions of a possible conflict of interest for the senior management of British Coal, and whether they end up with an agreed market with some profitable collieries which they will look to purchase. Clause 1 of the Bill will establish the Coal Authority, which I have no doubt will be another quango stuffed with Tory grandees, including probably some from the other place.
  The Bill instructs the authority to sell all surplus land. British Coal owns 250,000 acres of land throughout Great Britain, some of which I suspect may be valuable. I suspect that the Treasury will be looking for substantial returns from the sale of much of that land. I also believe that a number of proposed sales of land from British Coal to individuals have been stalled for a couple of years prior to privatisation.
  A substantial amount of land is owned by British Coal in my constituency, particularly at Haydock. A number of small businesses have leased properties on the site of the old colliery workshop at Haydock. Many of those properties are in a poor condition, and British Coal has always refused to maintain them. One of the small businessmen at Haydock has tried for months to buy the freehold of the property that he is leasing to improve his factory, its output and the conditions of his workforce. However, it has been impossible for him to reach any agreement with British Coal.
  wrote to the Minister for Energy last year about the situation. While he sympathised with me, as he often does, he went on to say in his letter of 31 August 1993:
  "However, as I am sure you will appreciate, decisions on the appropriate disposal of individual sites are entirely a matter for British Coal."
  When the authority is set up, I suspect that it will no longer be a matter for British Coal but for the Treasury. Certainly, I expect that the Treasury will be interested in the outcome of the sale of that land.
  I want to turn to the issue of opencast mining. The north-west in general, and my constituency in particular, has lost deep mining, and people are greatly concerned about the opencast mining aspect of the Bill. Presumably British Coal's land bank is to be sold off to the highest bidder. Those who purchase the land will expect to be able to mine it, irrespective of the views of the local people who will be affected, because opencast mining is a highly profitable exercise.
  In my constituency—particularly at Billinge and Garswood—there has been a number of applications for opencast mining during the past few years. That opencast mining would have gone literally to the precincts of those villages, and it would have had a dreadful impact on the lives of the people of those two communities. The villagers have resisted the propositions ferociously and the council has always backed them. I trust sincerely that that will continue in the future.
  If an application were received for opencast mining in the St. Helens and Wigan area, the response of the people of those communities would be that if the nation requires coal, the place to get it is Parkside colliery. The colliery has millions of tonnes of coal lying there and millions of pounds' worth of valuable machinery with which coal can
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  be extracted. An argument which is unacceptable to the people in my area is that the country requires the coal. If the country requires it, the place to go is Parkside.
  Another issue to which I would like to refer briefly—because time is running out—is the issue of subsidence. Many hon. Members are concerned about the impact of subsidence on areas where mining will continue. My concern is about the areas where coal mining will no longer be going on. What happens to those areas?
  Hon. Members who have dealt with British Coal over the years would be only too willing to say that they have not always had an easy ride. Often, it has been difficult to get British Coal to agree adequately to compensate individuals concerned. We must now deal with the Coal Authority. In the past, we have dealt with a north-west area board but I suspect that we will now have to deal with the coal authority in London. I suggest to the Minister that the north-west is entitled to an area office so that subsidence claims may be dealt with locally.
  This is a bad Bill. I sincerely trust that, if it is not rejected tonight, major amendments will be imposed on Report.
  6.37 pm
  Mrs. Elizabeth Peacock: I start by apologising to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and hon. Friends on the Front Bench for my absence during the opening speeches. As they are probably aware, I was leading a deputation of people involved in the textile industry in West Yorkshire to the Department of Trade and Industry. As the discussions there took longer than was expected, I decided not to return to the House.
  My interest in manufacturing, and particularly in the coal industry, is well known in the House. My more recent interests in the coal industry are listed in the Register of Members' Interests.
  In my view, coal has a positive future. It will move back to the centre of the British energy supply industry in the long term if it is part of a well-thought energy policy. The Government must have such a policy to regain the country's confidence and they must support the remains of an important industry by retaining its ability to use the massive coal reserves. Within that policy, a free and competitive market will, with other forms of energy, ensure that there is a viable British coal industry.
  Coal will be able to compete in terms of quality, price and service. However, at present the British coal industry is heading towards a crossroads. If the wrong turning is taken, the industry will disappear into the realms of industrial archaeology. With successful privatisation—I say to my hon. Friend the Minister that I support the privatisation aspects of the Bill—and restructuring, the industry will rejuvenate and grow. To achieve that, the industry must be imaginative and take note of past mistakes.
  For centuries, coal has been the main energy source for Britain. Much of our industry today was founded on coal during the industrial revolution. The city of London was rebuilt after the great fire, and St. Paul's cathedral would not exist today but for a levy on all the coal which was consumed at that time in London. Yet despite massive reserves under Britain, we are running down our indigenous production and turning to gas, which everyone accepts has a limited life. That is contrary to all

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  international trends. World production levels have risen from below 2,800 million metric tonnes in 1980 to more than 3,500 million metric tonnes in 1992.
  For more than a century, the industry has been the source of intense political, social and commercial controversy, often to its severe detriment. In the 1930s, the industry needed restructuring because there were too many pits, there was no investment and productivity was poor. Politicians from all sides of the political spectrum then began to consider nationalisation as a solution.
  At that time, Harold Macmillan supported that route in his "Middle Way" publication, proposing
  "an industrial structure with broad strategic control in the hands of the store and the tactical operation in the hands of private management".
  That was an admirable strategy but we have never perfected it.
  I have always believed that the state has a part to play in the energy market, which is currently rigged against coal. The announcement of the White Paper last year gave the Government an opportunity to resolve some of that rigging, but no such action was taken.
  Nationalisation in 1947 brought about the required reshaping and reinvestment. In the 1950s and 1960s, the National Coal Board, led by men of vision, Lord Ezra and Lord Robens, perhaps with the help of the combative union co-operation of Lord Joe Gormley, made great strides to increase production and, more importantly, improve safety. We have heard quite a bit about safety this evening.
  However, nothing stands still. The advent of cheap oil from newly discovered reserves, the development of nuclear energy to produce electricity, and the availability of vast supplies of natural gas revolutionised the energy market. We are still suffering the consequences—some of my hon. Friends will say that we are still enjoying the benefits.
  State-run organisations have been shown to be almost incapable of redirecting and restructuring themselves. That was certainly true of the British coal industry. By the 1990s, even with the intervening industrial relations dramas of 1974 and 1984, the industry's structure was unsuited to the marketplace. Overheads were too high, there was too much bureaucracy and poor productivity, production costs were comparatively high, demand was falling and the market share had been reduced. It was a typical demise of a demand-driven rather than market-led industry.
  Albeit with hindsight, I believe that the coal industry, with its diverse structure, difficulties in production and social importance to hundreds of communities around the country, should have been privatised before gas and electricity.
  The Government's review of their pit closure programme, resulting from my right hon. Friend's devastating announcement in October 1992, has not saved many of the pits that were threatened with closure. However, there is an outside chance that new operators may wish to reopen some of the redundant pits if, when they are ready to be licensed, any of the machinery for extraction from those mines is left and if the bottom of the mines are not flooded.
  By 1995, we shall be down to a small number of pits, despite massive increases in output per man from 504 tonnes in 1982–83 to 1,611 tonnes in 1992. I appreciate the fact that, with a falling market and increasing productivity, that has been one of the problems. Because the miners did
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  everything that we asked them from the 1980s onwards, they have, ultimately, been their own worst enemy. But the cost of production is falling and the industry is becoming more competitive. We must ensure that our coal is competitive with imports because we have an ideal situation for substantial import substitution.
  We have four basic markets for solid fuel: electricity generation; coking coal for the steel industry; and the domestic and industrial sectors. Obviously, generating demands have fallen because of competition from gas.
  The steel industry still consumes 7 million to 8 million tonnes of coking coal a year and the domestic sector uses more than 5 million tonnes of solid fuel a year in nearly 3 million homes. If the Queen wants sensible coal in Buckingham palace, it can be supplied by British industry and our coal merchants, who are good at supplying what their customers demand.
  By the end of this year, the market for coal is likely to be some 60 million tonnes. Imports now cover the shortfall of indigenous coal, with major imports coming from Poland, Colombia and South Africa where production costs are low. However, there is a market out there and the demand for coal exists. It is ironic that British Coal, while saying that there was no market for coal, doubled the imports for domestic and industrial coal and, the following week, closed down the very mines that could have supplied that coal. We should look at that carefully.
  I agree with my right hon. Friend the Minister and other hon. Members about opencast mining. It adds insult to injury to close pits in Yorkshire and then allow planning applications for the small amount of green field that is left. There will be huge opposition to any such proposals. Planning applications should be granted for derelict land but not for green field sites.
  There is never enough time to say everything that one wishes to say in 10 minutes. But all is not lost for the coal industry. Costs are falling and coal is becoming more competitive in the marketplace. Private companies already want to license mines because they know that there is a market, whereas British Coal said that there was none. It is interesting to note that managers of British Coal now feel that they may wish to put in bids for the very coal market which they said did not exist. That suggests that there may be a market in the future.
  Some 3,000 merchants sell coal products in this country and they engage in commercial activity through the Solid Fuel Association, selling the "real fire" image. Although many people like to see a real fire in the local pub and elsewhere, not all of us have the time to clean the grates every morning. However, we should try to ensure that coal consumers can consume British coal, mined in British mines by British people, rather than imported coal that is not always of the same quality.
  Although I support the privatisation of the coal industry, because the industry has no future if it is left in the hands of British Coal, issues within the Bill will need to be discussed and considered carefully. One of those issues is CISWO—the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation —which has a role to play. Another is pensions—
  Madam Speaker: Order. Mr. Michael Clapham.
  6.47 pm
  Mr. Michael Clapham: Privatisation of the industry makes no sense whatever, except in so far as it represents the

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  Government's hostility to the deep coal mining industry in the United Kingdom, the mining unions and mining communities.
  The real issues concerns not ownership as such, but markets. The Government have failed to deal with that point. It is evident from the way in which the energy market was privatised in 1990 that the architects of that privatisation, Lord Parkinson and Lord Wakeham, rigged the market against the coal industry to cause its demise. Privatisation is the final part of that agenda.
  The format for privatisation has not come about simply in the past couple of months. The Rothschild report has been in the public domain for the past four years. It suggested that the deep mined coal industry could be viable with 10 to 14 pits, which is the agenda towards which the Government have been working. Following the report, the industry was rapidly run down. In 1990 there were 73 collieries and 65,400 men. Within two years, that number was down to 50 collieries and just 42,000 men.
  The White Paper, "Prospects for Coal", and the administration package are part of the agenda. The President of the Board of Trade gave the impression to the House when presenting his paper that he would save 12 of the 31 collieries earmarked for closure. The House should be aware that, of the 31 collieries, only four are now in operation. Of the 12 that were to be reprieved, only four are producing coal, and on 23 December The Independent reported that British Coal was considering closing the last four of those 12 collieries early in the new year. The work force has been cut dramatically since October 1992. By December 1993 it had been reduced from 42,000 to 14,700 men. If the other collieries are closed, that will add a further 3,000 to the 27,000 already lost.
  The ripple has gone well beyond traditional mining Communities. For example, giving evidence to the Select Committee on Trade and Industry, Mr. Andrew Glyn, an economist from Corpus Christi college Oxford, said that the knock-on effect of 23,300 redundancies in the industry would be a total of 78,900 jobs. That estimate was supported by Yamaichi, which estimated in evidence to the Select Committee that, for every job lost in the industry, three were lost elsewhere.
  The hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson), who is not in his place, spoke of world prices and the competitiveness of British coal. He and the House should be aware that world prices do not result from the interaction of the normal forces of supply and demand. Price follows the lowest common denominator, which at present tends to be South African coal which is cheap because it is produced involuntarily by cheap labour. All the other producers tend to follow that price.
  Columbia uses child labour. On Wednesday I was privy to a screening arranged by my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) of a BBC documentary which showed clearly that child labour is used in Colombian mines. It showed children under the age of 10 working in the most awful conditions. When the Minister replies to the debate he should make it plain that Britain will not import coal from countries that use child labour.
  Some United Kingdom mines have been producing coal at below world market prices. In September, Bentley colliery was producing coal at 88p per gigajoule, but that colliery has been closed. Similarly Silverdale colliery,
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  which was in deficit at the beginning of the year, turned the loss into a profit by September, the beginning of the second half of the financial year. Like the miners at Bentley colliery, however, those at Silverdale were treated to a colliery closure.
  If it was used properly, the modified colliery review procedure would scrutinise some of those facts, but will that procedure continue? Will the current procedures for monitoring a colliery's performance be continued if the Bill becomes law and the industry has a private sector? Would the Minister be prepared to add a consultation clause to the Bill so that current consultation procedures will continue in the private sector?
  The 27 collieries that have already closed have resulted in the sterilisation of 500 million tonnes of coal. That extremely valuable resource could be lost for ever, at massive cost to future generations. Britain has half western Europe's coal reserves—enough for 230 years at current extraction rates. Will the Minister ensure that no colliery is permanently closed, but that all are placed on a care and maintenance basis until he has at least had an opportunity to explore with the European Community whether funds can be made available to pay for keeping the pits on that basis so that, should the need arise, the pits can be reopened quickly?
  The Bill contains no provision for continuing Government investment in research and development. In other nations the industry enjoys significant state support. The Australian coal industry gets a 150 per cent. tax rebate for all research and development, and last year the Federal Government of the United States spent $700 million on research and development. The Dutch electricity generating board has just opened a £600 million clean coal project, and is talking in terms of opening perhaps another six projects using such technology to generate electricity for about the next 20 years. Will investment in research and technology, and especially in clean coal technology, continue?
  It has been said that privatisation is likely to lead to a bigger industry. I think that the hon. Member for Batley and Spen (Mrs. Peacock) genuinely believes that under private ownership the industry will become larger. How could that be when companies will be operating a handful of pits which will be vulnerable to failure, particularly that caused by bad geology? Of course, when cost targets are not reached, collieries will close.
  Secondly, privatisation will be accompanied by a rundown in research and development, and that by the coal research establishment will no longer be carried out. Therefore, developments that would be good for coal are unlikely to be forthcoming.
  Thirdly, we must bear in mind the volume of coal that will be sold to the electricity supply industry—
  Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Janet Fookes): Order. The hon. Gentleman's time is up.
  6.56 pm
  Mr. Alan Duncan: It is a rather happy coincidence that I should follow the hon. Member for Barnsley, West and Penistone (Mr. Clapham) because, as he well knows, I was the hapless young Conservative who contested that seat in the 1987 general election. I stood against the hon. Gentleman's predecessor, Allen McKay, and when the results were announced on the night of the election I found that I had run him a distant second.

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  In the course of working in that area I got to know it very well and I appreciate the hon. Gentleman's passion for the interests of miners and former miners in the constituency. Those passions are shared by the hon. Member for Wentworth (Mr. Hardy), who made an impassioned speech earlier in the debate, and by the hon. Member for Barnsley, Central (Mr. Illsley), who is seated on the Opposition Front Bench. I hope that the hon. Member for Barnsley, West and Penistone will not impugn the motives of Conservative Members who welcome the Bill, because we greatly share the concerns that he so well expressed.
  The Bill is long overdue and it is the only hope for securing the long-term interests of the coal industry which are so important to the hon. Gentleman's constituency, to mine and to those of his colleagues and mine.
  It has been a wretched year for coal. The industry has faced closures which simply cannot fail to provoke the sympathies of every hon. Member. Productivity increases since the 1984 strike have been staggering, and every person in the industry deserves recognition for that success. However, the tragedy of the industry's decline must be recognised and we must try to contend with it in as practical a way as we can. The decline in volume has been going on for ages—for decades. It has been inevitable, and it is our duty to face the realities of that decline.
  Labour Members would argue forcefully that that inevitability has been exacerbated by what they would describe as a rigged market. I do not share that view. Competitive purchasing by competing generators is not a rigged market. What lies behind the charge that the market is rigged is a request for the generators to pay an inflated price for coal which would otherwise be above world markets.
  In the face of its historic decline, the Bill is designed to provide the best possible prospects for the future development and success of the coal industry. Conservative Members will agree that nationalisation is not and never has been the solution. Any study of all the nationalised industries since the war suggests that it is simply not the answer. In 1979, 10·5 per cent. of our entire gross domestic product was in the hands of nationalised industries. About one seventh of all fixed investment was poured into nationalised industries. Nationalised industry employed 2 million people, but it was going backwards and costing the Treasury billions of pounds.
  One of the arguments in favour of nationalisation was that certain commercial concerns simply could not survive in the private sector and required to remain in the public sector, but if the last 14 years have proved anything, they have surely proved the fallacy of that view. All privatised industries have fared better than when they were in the public sector. Privatisation is not the product of blind ideology. It is indeed the product of our conviction that any industry will perform better in private hands, but it is also the product of clear evidence that that conviction is borne out by experience.
  Other heavy industries have been privatised. We can cite examples of oil, gas and steel. They are all massive, heavy industries; they require high investment and heavy infrastructure and they have to survive in vicious global markets. We started by selling BP shares in 1979. It is a perfect example of the success of privatisation. The oil industry, in which I have worked, does not need to be nationalised. Shell, BP and other massive private concerns
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  find oil, ship it, refine it, distribute it and finance it, all without help. British Gas does the same; it is a triumph of United Kingdom industry.
  British Steel was once a white elephant costing the Treasury hundreds of millions of pounds. It is now the fourth largest company in the western world, producing 78 per cent. of all the crude steel in the United Kingdom. It has a turnover of £5 billion pounds and a couple of years ago made profits of £500 million pounds. Those examples should convince us that, in as much as there are serious long-term prospects for the coal industry in the United Kingdom, those prospects are best served by placing the
  If it were just a matter of productivity, I would begin to see some of the reasons for which the Opposition have argued today for the continued public ownership of the coal industry. The productivity increases have been fantastic—almost unbelievable—but the principles which lie behind the Bill involve far more than productivity. The ownership of the industry, which the hon. Member for Barnsley, West and Penistone said was unimportant, is critical to the energy and principles which lie behind the purposes of the Bill.
  If we change the ownership and place the industry in private hands, as we did for British Gas and other industries before it, we will change the whole climate of initiative, which could pervade the entire ethos of the workplace and the management. It will free the industry to take a more global outlook. It will free it from all the stop and go, the generosity and parsimony of Government finance. It will free the industry from Government interference.
  I fervently believe that this is not the place to discuss the exact economics of any business, industry or competing commercial concern. The House can never know as much about the detail of running an industry as the people who are trying to run it. We should free those people to run the industry in the best interests of its profits and its employees.
  Let me dwell on safety. Are oil and gas any less safe because they are in private hands? The hon. Member for Barnsley, West and Penistone nods his head, but I defy him to quote an example. In my experience of the oil and gas industry, I simply do not accept that.
  The Bill will offer the industry for sale in five regional businesses. The employees will have a stake in it and there are already interested parties. It will set up a coal authority which, I am pleased to say, will be based in Nottinghamshire near my constituency and it will involve proper consideration for subsidence, the environment, pensions and the future prospects of the industry.
  A number of hon. Members have mentioned the threat of opencast mining. They do not need to convince me of that. When the Duke of Rutland lay down in front of the bulldozers to stop opencast mining in the vale of Belvoir, he did the right thing. If he were to do the same thing again, I would be chained next to him to stop the bulldozers digging up the most beautiful part of my constituency.
  Mr. Skinner: I will be driving it.
  Mr. Duncan: I am delighted that the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) will be driving the bulldozer—we know what a careful driver he is.

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  Asfordby pit is in my constituency. I look forward to seeing it thrive and flourish. If oil and gas can survive and thrive in the private sector, so can coal. I welcome the Bill and look forward to supporting its Second Reading tonight.
  7.5 pm
  Mr. Paddy Tipping: I was in Bilsthorpe the other week, where a miner's wife told me that she was fed up with living in the shadow of uncertainty and with the knowledge that the Bill cast a blight over her future. Unfortunately, she had been taken in by the promises in the White Paper "Prospects for Coal" in March, but now she knows the truth. She knows that six collieries in Nottinghamshire have closed since March—Silverhill, Cotgrave, Clipstone, Bevercotes, Rufford and Calverton. That is 4,769 jobs lost since last March.
  The miner's wife wants to know what will happen next. People in Nottinghamshire are practical and pragmatic. They can take the bad news, but they cannot take no news at all.
  The Energy Minister ought to come clean tonight and confirm whether the coal industry in Nottinghamshire has a future and whether the rumours that Bilsthorpe and Annersley Bentinck are about to close are true. He should confirm whether there are plans to merge 011erton with Thoresby and Welbeck with Manton.
  When the review process begins in a few weeks' time when we move towards restructuring day, the woman in Bilsthorpe wants to know whether it is true that there will just be just three collieries left in Nottinghamshire, based on Welbeck, Thoresby and Harworth. She has a right to know, because her family, her community and her fathers before her have contributed to that industry.
  She knows that, in 1980, there were 40,000 miners in Nottinghamshire, and that, if the closures go ahead, in a few months' time there will be only about 3,000 mining jobs in the county. In 14 years, nine out of every 10 mining jobs in Nottinghamshire will have gone. At the same time, Nottinghamshire miners, and miners throughout the country, have increased their productivity by up to 150 per cent. over the past five years. They are producing coal at half the cost of that in Germany. No other sector in British industry can match that record.
  Is it any wonder that people in Nottinghamshire and throughout the country feel that promises made to them have been broken, and that they have been betrayed? Does not the Minister realise that people believe that the Government's plan is now to put the coffin lid on British Coal, hammer it down and bury it deep, and quickly?
  Will the Minister say—he has been asked before—how many pits will remain on restructuring day, perhaps 1 January 1995, or will privatisation be on 1 April next year? Does he know? Will he say? Does he care? People in Nottinghamshire feel that the promises made last March and by Lady Thatcher's Government before that have been torn up. Perhaps he will tell us what his valuation of British Coal will be on privatisation. The value is clearly the remaining contract with the generators. Is it not true that that would give it a market price of perhaps £200 million? Perhaps he will confirm that.
  Perhaps the Minister will talk about the substantial private sector interest that has been talked about in the Chamber tonight. Pits have closed unremittingly over the
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  past year. Let me remind the House that not one colliery has opened under private ownership. Promises have been made, leases were about to be signed, but the pit wheel has yet to turn and produce one lump of private coal.
  They have had their opportunities. I wish Richard Budge well in his chances to reopen Clipstone colliery. Hon. Members may recall that it closed last March, and that the north Nottinghamshire training and enterprise council was given £2·7 million to redeploy and retrain the miners there, and find new jobs for them.
  Is it not a condemnation of the Government's energy policy that, in December, that same TEC voted Richard Budge £200,000 to open the pit again. Is that not a waste of money? It cost £2·7 million to close it down, yet now, as it is seen in the area, a grant of £200,000 has been given to reopen it.
  That smacks of sharp practice. People want to know why British Coal is presently repairing the pit at Clipstone. Why is it spending £100,000 on the shaft so that Richard Budge can open it up, perhaps in March? They want to know why he is not footing the bill himself. He will not do so, because he is going to make a profit out of the pit.
  That is what it is about. Richard Budge will make that profit off the backs of the miners, because it is clear that one of the ways that he intends to make a profit is to drive wages down. The rumours are loud. The papers seem quite clear—he intends to pay new miners at Clipstone 20 to 30 per cent. less than they would get under British Coal.
  While we are moving towards privatisation, perhaps the Minister can tell us how the Bill deals with coal stocks. There are currently 47 million tonnes of coal stocks on the ground. How will he handle that? How will British Coal and the generators handle that problem? In particular, how will the market handle it in the run up to privatisation?
  What will he do if Professor Littlechild, the regulator for the electricity industry, decides to intervene and report the generators to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission? Does he not think that that will put a spoke in the wheel of privatisation? Is it not time that perhaps regulators stopped acting like Lone Rangers and became policemen, looking after the real interests of consumers?
  There are a great many issues in the Bill. My hon. Friends have talked about some that we shall pursue in Committee—for example, pensions. Miners know that there is a surplus. They want a share of it. They feel that they have contributed, and that it should not be ripped off by the Government.
  The subsidence provisions can only be described as a minefield. The notion of areas of influence that the new private owners will take on board seem to me to be a recipe for disaster, because people who suffer mining subsidence want to know who is responsible. They want to go to one door. They do not want to go to the private owner and then to the Coal Authority. There should be one port of call on that issue—the Coal Authority.
  I congratulate my colleague, Dennis Walker, the vice-chairman of Boughton parish council, for his work on subsidence in the Ollerton area. He would say that, although he has difficulties and arguments with British Coal staff, at the end of the day he gets a fair reception.
  What will happen to those British Coal staff after privatisation? Who will be the experts? What about British Coal's property? It is perhaps the biggest property owner in the country. What will happen to the profits made marketing Babbington colliery? Who will own Hucknall golf course? What will happen to all those assets? Who

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  will raise the quality of the environment and look after the reclaimed tip heaps? Who will look at mine water discharge, about which the Bill says nothing?
  British Coal Enterprise is hardly mentioned. Nottinghamshire and areas throughout the country face real difficulty. Those areas need help, new investment, new jobs and a new future. That is why it is important that British Coal Enterprise has a future. In Nottinghamshire at the moment there are just 22 vacancies for young people, with 212 youngsters chasing every vacancy. It is their future we are talking about. We need proper regeneration, and a new future for them and for coalfield areas.
  7.16 pm
  Mr. Malcolm Moss: The debate is essentially about the mechanism for the privatisation of the coal industry. The essential question is, does the Bill set out the most effective and efficient structure to effect the transfer from a state-owned monopoly to a privatised industry, to produce maximum benefits together with necessary controls and assurances?
  The debate is not about the market for coal, the future of the deep-mined coal industry in this country, Government intervention in the energy market, or an overall energy policy, whatever that might mean. We have been through all that with the Select Committee report and the Government White Paper.
  Opposition speakers are still putting yesterday's arguments. They are still going back over old ground. They are still fighting a rearguard action, on which many of their supporters cannot agree. On the one hand, the Labour party presses the Government to implement all the Select Committee's recommendations; on the other, it appears that Labour members of the Committee do not agree with all its recommendations, to which they signed up only last autumn.
  The Labour party has repeatedly failed to secure a market for coal. The Labour Governments of 1964–70 and 1974–79 closed 313 pits—a loss of 205,700 jobs. More pits closed in those 11 years than in the 15 years of this Government. Not that they did not try to expand the market. Between 1974–77, they made a big commitment, but failed miserably. Output fell by 16 per cent., from 142 million tonnes to 119 million tonnes.
  A former Labour Energy Minister accepts that Labour Governments misled themselves and the miners. The noble Lord Marsh said:
  "We genuinely believed that with a benevolent mixture of good intentions and massive subsidies we could reverse the market trend.
  My Lords, we completely misled ourselves and them … Every time they were betrayed, not by individuals, not by Ministers, but by the realities of the situation."—[Official Report, House of Lords, 20 October 1992; Vol. 539, c. 692.]
  Despite being repeatedly challenged, Labour still avoids the key questions. Today, the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) avoided them again. Labour refuses to say how much money it is prepared to commit to continue subsidising British Coal, or in which of the independent commercial contracts between private companies it would interfere to secure additional coal sales.
  What would be the cost in compensation? Does Labour realise that that would set a massive precedent that would send reverberations through British industry? How many jobs in other industries is Labour prepared to destroy—in
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  regional electricity companies; the two power generators; the nuclear, offshore oil and gas industries; and the construction industry?
  The $64,000 question is, how many mines would Labour keep open? How many times must we keep asking the same question? How many pits would Labour retain, and for how long?
  We heard again tonight the myth of coal reserves. Labour keeps saying that energy supplies that would keep us energy-sufficient for hundreds of years are being irrevocably lost. In the words of the Library research paper:
  "Such a view is over-simplified."
  That is charitable, for Labour's claim is certainly overstated, and definitely misleading. There are large reserves in theory, but new pits would not be sunk to exploit them, because of cost.
  The Select Committee stated:
  "In fact, the problem for British Coal is not the availability of reserves but the high investment costs of new pits … which are much higher than opencast costs elsewhere in the world."
  The Committee produced revised figures:
  "Taking all mines together, the ratio of reserves to production at present levels of output and assuming present prices is 21 years. Whether or not the number of British Coal's deep mines falls to 15 by 1997, British Coal's output is likely to decline rapidly in the early years of the next century as reserves are exhausted."
  That output decline is fact, and inevitable in the free market.
  Mining companies freed from state interference could perform much better, as the history of privatisation has repeatedly shown. Coal will join other energy industries privatised since 1979—North sea oil and gas, particularly BP and British Gas, and the electricity supply industry. All those privatisations were great successes, particularly for the consumer.
  Since British Gas was privatised in 1986, domestic gas prices have fallen 20 per cent. and industrial prices 28 per cent. in real terms. There has been increased efficiency, and the customer-to-employee ratio has increased more than 30 per cent. Gas sales per employee have risen 18 per cent. All the regional electricity companies have announced domestic price freezes or cuts for this year. Real prices for domestic users have fallen 6.5 per cent. in the last two years.
  Competition will be further pursued in both industries by references to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission, to ensure downward pressure on prices. Whichever way one looks at it, energy privatisation has been singularly successful, yet it was opposed by Opposition Members.
  The Bill's key provisions must address certain critical issues and offer essential guarantees. The Bill must offer potential buyers a flexible system of purchase. I believe that that has been secured by the establishment of five regional businesses, with the option for potential purchasers to bid for one or all of them. The Bill must allow management and employee buy-outs. It must not just give clearance to bid but must offer active co-operation, support and Government funding to help in the preparation of bids. Some £200,000 is being allocated per team bid.
  The Bill must place great emphasis on safety, and I believe that that is ensured by a full acceptance of recommendations in the Health and Safety Commission report, "The Framework for Health and Safety in Britain's

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  Coal Mines". Hon. Members on both sides of the House will widely welcome the fact that continuing responsibility for health and safety will remain with the commission.
  It is essential that guarantees are given in respect of existing pension funds, to protect existing and future pensioners. It was said tonight that the Government or British Coal are preparing to rip off some surplus pension funds. Let us remember the deficits and underfunding that occurred a few years ago, and who made them up. If there is a surplus in future, it is only right and proper that some of it should be returned to the taxpayer.
  The Bill should give the public full protection in cases of subsidence. It appears to contain the necessary provisions, including the general approach adopted by the Coal Mining Subsidence Act 1991, which enjoyed wide support on both sides of the House.
  Privatisation of the coal industry is not just about raising money, saving revenue for the Treasury or interfering in the energy market to secure a larger share for coal. It is about freeing up an industry that has for long been restrained by the heavy and intrusive hand of successive Governments. It is about setting management free to think more laterally and to introduce innovation and initiatives that will secure new markets.
  This country has some of the best deep mining expertise in the world. The future of the privatised industry does not lie just in British mines, because that expertise—as in the case of British Gas—could become a key international export. British Gas has shown the way in developing overseas interests, and I have no doubt that the privatised coal industry could emulate its record. I wish it Godspeed on that journey.
  7.26 pm
  Mr. Jack Thompson: The hon. Member for Cambridgeshire, North-East (Mr. Moss) may be interested to know that I am a beneficiary of the mineworkers pension fund, as the recipient of 33p a week. I shall lose a lot of sleep tonight over the taxpayers' contribution to that 33p.
  I am disappointed that the hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson) is not in his place, after his reference to mining activities in the county in which I live and which I represent. I should like the hon. Gentleman to visit my constituency and talk to the miners there about the situation at Ellington and Wearmouth collieries in particular, which work coal reserves 10 km out under the North sea. My recollection is that west Virginia is somewhere in the centre of the United States of America.
  The hon. Gentleman mentioned American machinery. I spent most of my life working as an engineer in the coal industry, converting and adapting American machines that did not meet British safety standards.
  It is with great pride that I can claim membership of the National Union of Mineworkers for 51 years this month —although I assure my hon. Friends that that does not put me in the Zimmer brigade. I worked in the Northumberland coal industry 40 years before becoming a Member of Parliament. My constituency was once one of the largest coal mining communities in Britain, if not the world.
  Earlier, the President of the Board of Trade referred to the mines closed under a Labour Government. There were
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  20 mines in my constituency at one time, but they have all closed—some recently—because their coal reserves were exhausted. The employment that they provided was replaced by work at companies attracted to the area by incentives offered at the time, such as Alcan Aluminium, Searle Pharmaceutical, Glaxo—renamed Synpac after being purchased by a Taiwanese company—and Robinson Chemicals. Others became established in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Blyth Valley (Mr. Campbell), including Merck Sharp and Dohme and Boots, taking up the employment slack when mines were closed.
  I may be unique in being the only Member of Parliament to have worked in the coal industry before its nationalisation. Believe it or not, I worked in the mines for three years before 1947. I see some astonished faces on the Conservative Benches, but I have worn well. Anyone who has worked in the industry will know that mining engineers do take the wear pretty well.
  I cannot claim to have happy memories of those times, although it is fair to say that the Ashington coal company was probably one of the best of a bad lot, given the coal owners of the day. The arrangements in those pits were anything but ideal. Pay and conditions were poor, production was the god and safety was a secondary consideration. Miners' lives were completely dominated by the interests of the pit. Not only were miners hired and fired on the whim of management but if an employee lived in a company house as a tenant, any sons in the family were expected to work in one of the mines after leaving school. Some tenants were evicted for failing to comply with that requirement.
  At that time, it was common practice to send for employees at any time of the day or night, seven days a week. Working conditions were often extremely unpleasant and dangerous. Dust, water and bad roof conditions had to be endured. Equipment—some of which miners had to purchase out of their wages—was primitive. Pithead baths, safety helmets, footwear, protective clothing and even the local hospital—now in the process of being closed—were mainly financed by miners' contributions. As I have said, that was one of the better mining companies of the time. I shudder to think what conditions were like in other coalfields.
  Nationalisation not only brought vastly improved conditions for miners but recognised the value of coal as a national resource, following the need to rebuild our economy after the war. Since then, coal has consistently made a significant contribution to our energy needs. I am sure that Conservative Members will claim that, when the Bill is enacted, the circumstances will be different. Forty years on, a vast expansion of mining technology will prevent the return of such conditions. Time will tell, of course, but there is some evidence of the attitudes that are likely to prevail under privatisation.
  I am in close touch with what is happening at Ellington colliery, in Northumberland. For some time, parts of its mining activity have been conducted on a contractual basis, involving the private sector. Initially, the private contractors were involved in the limited development that was taking place; now, large sections of support services are included—for instance, transport and engineering maintenance. Many ex-British Coal employees are being blackmailed into accepting work with the contractors. They are doing exactly the same job as before, earning a basic wage and receiving no sick pay or pensions. They are

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  given minimal holidays and there is scant regard for many of the safety regulations. That is probably a foretaste of miners' conditions under privatisation in the 1990s.
  The Bill is the final piece that the Government are putting into place to remove any co-ordinated national influence on the vital energy industries. Oil, gas and electricity all now respond to market forces; coal will join them, and the withdrawal of Government influence from the critical role played by the energy industries in our economy will be complete.
  Perhaps the Opposition should learn a lesson from the crafty way in which the Government began the whole process, especially in relation to the privatisation of the electricity industry—permitting, if not deliberately encouraging, the dash for gas, and appointing British Coal board members who felt little enthusiasm about working for a nationalised industry. That was followed by a policy of closing pits and writing off huge potential coal reserves, along with minimal investment in research and development relating not only to clean coal technology but to technology to produce oil and gas from coal—technology that is important for the future.
  Let me give another example involving Ellington colliery. In the early 1980s, an area of coal reserves was identified to the north of the existing mine workings. To reach the coal, it was necessary to drive tunnels to, and then through, faulted strata. Tunnelling began in 1983, the year when I left the mine, and the work has still not been completed.
  Almost throughout the 1980s and early 1990s, the mine made substantial profits. Few of those profits went into this important development. Only after a meeting last year between the Minister, the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith) and myself did things begin to move. The colliery restarted the development. The project is taking longer than the development of the Channel tunnel, and has made much less progress, but it is vital to the mine.
  Even under privatisation, those future coal reserves should have been opened up, so that someone interested in buying the mine could at least have seen them. The tunnellers, however, are still trying to get through the fault —not because the operation involved is difficult but because of the lack of investment. None the less, it should be noted that Ministers sometimes respond to representations.
  Too often, the miners have been blamed for the industry's problems when management has been the real culprit. Little criticism has been levelled at management. I do not support management buy-outs; I see little advantage in having an industry run by those who created many of its problems in the first place. I shall oppose the Bill, in the interests of not only the miners but the nation arid the future generations who will pay the price for the employment of political dogma against national interests.
  The Minister will visit my constituency on Monday and will talk to representatives of Britich Alcan Aluminium. Its power station in the area has power lines on British Coal land, and the extraction of sea water for cooling purposes also takes place on that land. The company clearly wants to be granted a privileged position, and to be allowed to purchase the land to protect its power station and its interests generally.
  Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. I call Mr. Charles Hendry.
  7.36 pm
  Mr. Charles Hendry: Like several of my hon. Friends, as a young politician I cut my teeth on an area known for its mining industry. As a 23-year-old, I had the privilege and pleasure of standing against the hon. Member for Clackmannan (Mr. O'Neill), who won with a huge majority. I well remember visiting the mining villages of Cowie and Airth in the constituency. I was viewed with some shock—I understand that I was the first Conservative ever seen there.
  Mr. O'Neill: And the last.
  Mr. Hendry: When the villagers got over the shock, they went out and re-elected the sitting Member of Parliament, giving him a vastly increased majority. The hon. Gentleman is undoubtedly right in saying that I was the last Conservative Member to visit the area.
  Undeterred by my experience, I contested Mansfield in the 1987 election, with somewhat more success—it was the most marginal result in the country. I have one abiding memory of the constituency and the campaign. The night before polling day, I went into the Mansfield miners' welfare club, where the steward on the door immediately took the rosette off my lapel because he wanted to wear it. We had to send out for extra "Vote Hendry" badges. When the Labour candidate turned up, he was asked to leave, because he had supported the National Union of Mineworkers during the strike.
  Mr. Ronnie Campbell: Another scab. [Interruption.]
  Mr. Hendry: Inevitably, my interest in those constituencies means that I feel very sad about the way in which the mining industry has declined there. Both the pits based in Mansfield—Crown Farm and Sherwood—have now closed, although there is a glimmer of hope. The closures were referred to by the hon. Member for Sherwood (Mr. Tipping), who is a doughty fighter for the mining industry—as, indeed was his predecessor, Mr. Andy Stewart, who was a great friend of the industry. The hon. Gentleman referred to the prospective purchase of Clipstone under licensing to Richard Budge and Company. I think that shows that, where the nationalised industry has failed to work, there is hope for pits in the private sector.
  I believe that, in small communities that have grown up purely around the pits, those pits should be kept going wherever possible. It is difficult for such communities to attract new investment—particularly large inward investment, which will inevitably be made in areas with a larger population. That is the key issue which is exemplified by Clipstone. Can the mines be run better, more efficiently and more in the interests of their customers and their workers in the public sector or in the private sector?
  I make no apology for being an absolute believer in the principle of privatisation. It means that people can plan ahead for the long term—I shall come back to that point in a moment. Privatisation stimulates enterprise and initiative. It gives managers the ability to do what they believe is right and frees them from the dead hand of Government. I say that with tremendous feeling, because a few years ago when, along with my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester (Mr. Luff), I was a special adviser at the Department of Trade and Industry, I experienced the involvement of the Government in another nationalised industry, the Post Office. Even with a benevolent

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  Government who wished to interfere as little as possible, that interference made it more difficult for the industry to operate as it ought to.
  I remember well a meeting between my Minister and the chairman of the Post Office to discuss a minor change in the pension plan arrangements for a director of the Post Office Board. As that change had a knock-on effect on public spending, it had to involve a Cabinet Minister and the chairman of that company. That is no way to run a company. It is no way for Ministers to spend their time. If we want industries to do their best, we need to ensure that they are taken away from that interference. Nationalised industries cannot compete effectively. They cannot provide the best service for their customers or the best and safest conditions for their workers.
  I especially welcome two aspects of the Bill. The first is that management and employees will be encouraged to take part in buy-outs and the Government are making £200,000 available to help them to prepare their bids. I welcome that because I believe that it is right and essential that the expertise that exists in the industry should be retained and should not be passed over without employees having the chance to compete and bid for their pit against others from outside.
  I welcome the interest that has been shown by the Union of Democratic Mineworkers. I pay tribute to the members of that union for their courage as miners—every miner deserves our respect for the conditions in which they are prepared to work and earn their living—and more particularly for the courage that they showed in standing up to some of the worst aggression that we have seen in this country. They have earned the right to have a greater say in their industry and they have the knowledge to contribute to it. I am glad that the legislation will give them the chance to do so. I hope that in time the National Union of Mineworkers will decide to do so, too.
  My second reason for welcoming the Bill is its commitment to safety. I listened with great interest to the hon. Member for St. Helens, North (Mr. Evans) talking about the family tragedy of the death of his father in the mining industry when he was a young boy. That was 50 years ago. Every industry that operated in bad conditions then has tightened up its working methods and improved its, safety. That has happened through improvements in technology, greater safety requirements, more laws and public pressure. I am convinced that the commitment to safety enshrined in the Bill will ensure that levels of safety in the mining industry will continue to rise.
  As the Member for High Peak, I have to say that the growth of safety standards owes much to the mines research establishment of the Health and Safety Executive in my constituency at Harpur Hill and the tremendous work that is done there to find out ever safer ways of mining. I am particularly encouraged by the fact that the Health and Safety Commission, which looks after the HSE, will be the sole regulatory body ensuring safety in the mines.
  We must now free the mines so that they can compete effectively for the maximum market share. Tonight I have heard Labour Members say that they need to know now how many pits there will be. I am afraid that that simply shows how little they understand about the way industry works. If they had asked a few years ago how many cars Rover would produce in 1994, how many passengers
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  British Airways would carry, what percentage of British Telecom public telephone boxes would be operational or what dividend would be payable to people in the National Freight Consortium who had become owners of their own company, the answers given by Ministers would have underestimated those companies' potential. Every privatised company has performed beyond expectations.
  Moreover, the move towards privatisation will enable the mining industry to make the long-term investment decisions that it believes are right. It will make them because they are economic and sound and can be justified in the long term. That includes not only the development of pits but the long-term commitment to desulphurisation. Again, I declare a constituency interest. The lime for the desulphurisation process will come mostly from my constituency and that will ensure that many jobs are protected in High Peak. That demonstrates the way in which a dynamic mining industry has a knock-on effect and creates and maintains jobs elsewhere. All Conservative Members seek to encourage that. We support the Bill tonight because we believe that it contributes to that process.
  The history of privatisation is one of remarkable and continuing success. Lossmakers of which we despaired which required ever more Government money have become world beaters. For too long, the mining industry in Britain has been deprived of the opportunity to be part of that success story. I welcome the Bill. I shall vote for it because at long last it gives the coal industry in Britain and the miners in that industry a chance to take part in that success story.
  7.46 pm
  Mr. David Hanson: The debate today has shown the chasm that exists between the Government and the Labour party. I enjoyed listening to my hon. Friends—in particular my hon. Friends the Members for Wentworth (Mr. Hardy) and for Livingston (Mr. Cook)—give a stout defence of the principle of public ownership.
  The Bill tackles the wrong issues at the wrong time in the wrong way. It will come as no surprise to Conservative Members that the Labour party opposes the privatisation in the Coal Industry Bill. It is a folly. To privatise the coal industry is wrong, but to do so at this time is simply criminal because it will undoubtedly have a great knock-on effect on my constituency and others represented by my hon. Friends.
  The Government have been strangling coal for the past two years. This is the death knell. The background to the privatisation is a deliberate policy on the part of the Government. All the actions of the Government have been damaging to the long-term prospects of the industry. Their actions have damaged the morale of my constituency and the safeguarding of communities such as north Delyn, which has been damaged so heavily in the past two years by Government policies and which faces no future if privatisation goes through.
  Government policy is a failure. We debate the issue at a time when none of the problems created by the privatisations of gas and electricity have gone away. The nuclear power industry is still subsidised by more than £1 billion a year and has a protected market share. The regional electricity companies are still buying power from new gas-fired power stations, which they now own, rather than from cheaper coal-fired power stations. As my hon.

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  Friend the Member for Barnsley, West and Penistone (Mr. Clapham) said, coal is still being imported which is mined by cheap labour in Colombia and other countries. The French interconnector is still being used and is subsidised by the United Kingdom's nuclear levy.
  Privatisation at this point in time tackles the wrong issue. Who owns the industry is purely a dogmatic matter for members of the Government. They should be more worried about securing the future of the coal industry instead of settling old scores of 20 years ago, tilting at old windmills and putting forward dogmatic ideas for the future.
  The generation of electricity will remain the main market of the coal industry whether it is in private or in public hands. The volume of coal has been fixed until 1999. If British Coal cannot survive and compete in that market, how on earth will private operators compete? British Coal is already making enormous strides to improve efficiency and productivity. At my own pit of Point of Ayr in north Wales much has been achieved in the past 18 months under the pressure of the need for a more efficient coal market. The colliery in my constituency now produces coal based on less than £1 per gigajoule. The miners in my constituency have bent over backwards to improve productivity. In 1987–88, they produced 3·1 tonnes of coal per man shift. Last year, when they were still threatened with closure and on the hit list, they produced 14·7 tonnes of coal per man shift.
  The pit in my constituency needs help. It needs a market share and investment, but what it does not need—and what I have not heard anybody in my constituency say that it needs—is a transfer to private ownership. None of the miners in my constituency want that. Throughout the debate on this issue, I have not had a single letter from anybody in my constituency who wants that. Nobody but the Conservatives, who were roundly defeated in my constituency at the previous general election, want privatisation.
  Would a private operator have had the millions of pounds necessary to invest to bring productivity in my local pit up to the new levels? I doubt it. Even if an operator had managed to stump up the £2 million needed to purchase the capital equipment installed in the past two years at the Point of Ayr, could it have afforded the weeks of disruption and training necessitated when the equipment was installed and the changeover made? I doubt it. If, in the brave new world of the free market, production was disrupted for any period, the operator could wake up to see markets vanish and profits disappearing.
  Should we be selling the pit now after public sector investment has been made to create an efficient, productive market? There are no guarantees in the Bill for the future of the coal industry and it is likely only to accelerate the pit closure programme.
  This very week, in British Coal's "Westminster Brief', the Minister is reported as saying:
  "The political straitjacket of nationalisation has no place in the industry of the 21st Century. Only by allowing real competition in coal, only by letting real business considerations decide the future, can we hope to maintain a viable British Coal industry".
  What do "real business considerations" mean in practice for my constituents?
  How could private operators provide a better service at the pit in my constituency than British Coal? They could do it in several ways: they could lower the wages of the staff who work in that pit, and they will do so. They could
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  provide less money for research and development, and they will do so. They could and will have the option of reducing safety measures. Nothing in the Bill will protect the pit's safety record.
  The Minister for Energy (Mr. Tim Eggar): Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Hanson: No, I shall not let the Minister intervene because time is limited and we must make progress.
  Private operators could lower safety regulations and they will do so. They could employ fewer miners and they will do so. Private industry will go for a quick kill. Privatisation will not lead to greater efficiency because we have already had that over the past three years under British Coal, particularly in my region.
  The Bill is an admission of failure by the Government. Productivity could have been increased and any improvements could have been made while the coal industry was under public ownership. Their lack of responsibility and action should be condemned.
  The Bill is full of contradictions that should be highlighted. The major one is that, instead of stabilising and strengthening the coal industry, the Bill will have the opposite effect. Some of its worst faults lie in the duties given to the coal authority to license private operators. Clause 2 establishes a general duty for the coal authority to promote the continuation of the coal industry in the United Kingdom. On the other hand, the coal authority is charged with promoting competition among private operators. The dichotomy of protecting an industry while allowing competition should not escape hon. Members.
  Clause 2 states that the Coal Authority should seek an economically viable coal industry "so far as practicable". What the hell, Minister, does that mean?
  Madam Deputy Speaker(Dame Janet Fookes): Order. I remind the hon. Member that he is addressing the Chair.
  Mr. Hanson: I thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.
  What would the Minister say is the meaning of "so far as practicable"? The Coal Authority will be as much use as a chocolate fire guard. The coal industry will not in any shape or form be protected by a coal authority that seeks to protect both sides of the market.
  Privatisation will be to the detriment of several other factors of key concern. We have already heard about mine safety. The Bill contains 20 lines on mine safety. Without a statutory duty on the coal authority and with no draft licences yet available, the ability of the coal authority to intervene is not sufficiently robust. I also remain unconvinced of the Government's reassurances on the mine rescue service.
  We have heard about the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation, which is to be abolished at a time when the work force increasingly need additional welfare services and when more than 500,000 people in our communities benefit from such provisions. We have heard about environmental liabilities. The Bill's provisions for dealing properly with environmental concerns are poor. Coal is a messy business—water pollution can and does occur. Gas emissions are not unknown, yet the Bill contains no commitment to cleaning them up or making polluters accept their responsibilities.
  If the Bill is passed unamended, private mine operators will have few environmental liabilities and no good

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  neighbour policy, as undertaken by British Coal. The public sector will, as always, pick up the bill for any environmental lapses by the private sector. British Coal Enterprise has not been mentioned, nor has subsidence. The question of pensions is skated over and massive powers are put in the hands of the Secretary of State. What happens to those constituents of mine who might face redundancy under privatisation? That issue has not been considered.
  The Bill should be opposed because it is a travesty of justice. I am proud to support a publicly owned industry, which is in the best interests of those I represent.
  7.56 pm
  Mr. Dennis Skinner: It has been an interesting debate, because some of the Tories who have spoken in favour of the Government and privatisation have not been altogether with it. I got the impression that the hon. Member for Batley and Spen (Mrs. Peacock) was trying to explain that she supported hardly any aspect of the Bill, but that she would vote for the Government and privatisation even though her heart was not in it.
  The hon. Member for Rutland and Melton (Mr. Duncan) told us frankly that he was in favour of privatisation. He is in favour of all sorts of privatisation, apart from that of his own houses. He is careful to keep them. I want to make it clear that, although I said that I would drive a bulldozer if he lay in front of it, I would not drive a bulldozer because I am in favour of opencast coal production.
  Mr. Eggar: That is what you said.
  Mr. Skinner: No. I would drive the bulldozer to ensure that the hon. Member for Rutland and Melton got out of the way.
  I should like to put opencast mining in its proper perspective. Last year, there were 18 million tonnes of opencast coal production at a time when pits were shutting. That is equivalent to about 15 coal mines in Britain. Under privatisation, the chances are that there could be 20 million tonnes or even more. We should therefore consider the matter from the viewpoint of the miners who will be thrown on the scrap heap, not to mention the massive environmental damage that will accrue in my constituency.
  Opencast mining is easy; it is easy to rip off the turf. The Coal Board is shifting a village. About 200 houses are going to be moved from one village and put in another. That shows the money that can be made out of opencast mining. Everybody should understand that opencast mining means stripping the first 200 or 300 ft of ground, and the rest is sterilised for ever. A mine cannot be drifted once opencast has taken place. The reserves of coal that remain will have gone for good. That is why, apart from the environmental considerations, opencast mining is a dangerous practice.
  My hon. Friend the Member for St. Helens North (Mr. Evans) referred to the Lancashire coalfield. My guess is that there will be opencast production in all those coalfields if the operators can get away with it. The same will be true in Derbyshire. Not one pit is left in my constituency or in Chesterfield, although there is one combined operation, between north-east Derbyshire and south Yorkshire. When I was first elected president of the Derbyshire miners in
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  1964, there were more than 30 pits in the Derbyshire coalfield, even more in Nottingham and many more in Yorkshire.
  I want to talk about shutting pits, because it needs to be put on the record. Yes, pits have been shut ever since Waleswood in 1949, two years after nationalisation, when there was a great outcry and the men stopped down the pit. Every single one was offered a job somewhere else. Do not get me wrong—I am not saying that it was a wonderful thing to shut those pits. I did not like the idea when Parkhouse colliery, where I worked, was shut in 1962 and 1963, but at least, when I asked about a job, I was offered six or seven at different collieries within a perimeter of about six miles.
  Contrast that with what happens today. In 1993—and now in 1994—hardly any of the miners at the pits that have been shut have had the chance of a job. The Government talk about Labour Governments shutting pits. I did not like it, and I voted against, but we should set that against a background in which people had the chance to work in a neighbouring colliery or sometimes in another region.
  It must also be set against the background that there were never more than 1·5 million people on the dole. We should always remember that, until 1979, there were never more than 1·5 million people without jobs in Britain. This Government have 4 million people out of work. It is not 2·7 million—what about all the miners from Sheffield who are on payment schemes? They are not included in the unemployment figures, but they should all be added on.
  We all know that, if we went down any street and counted, we would see thousands—there must be scores of thousands of unemployed people in south Wales, Yorkshire and Durham, who are all on the schemes. They do not add to the unemployment figures—and what about all their children, who are also on slave labour schemes?
  We do not want any lectures from this Tory Government or the President of the Board of Trade and his sidekicks when they talk of shutting pits. There is a qualitative difference between shutting a pit but giving someone the chance of a job somewhere else and doing so against a background of 4 million people on the scrap heap.
  Mr. Allan Rogers rose—
  Mr. Skinner: I cannot give way to my hon. Friend, because many other hon. Friends would like to speak.
  It has often been said before, but it needs stressing, that no other industry in Britain can claim that it has increased productivity by 35 per cent. during the past 12 months. What an idea—privatising an industry that has increased productivity by that amount. When I first went into the pit in 1949, output was 1 tonne per man shift throughout the industry, and it was hard work. Now, output is 10 tonnes for every miner in Britain, and in some coalfields it is as high as 40 tonnes per man, yet the Government have the gall to say that they need to privatise the mines.
  We all know why. It is a conspiracy between this lousy Government and British Coal executives—the members of the board. The miners group met them in July 1992, when some of my hon. Friends were present. I confronted Clarke, the chairman, and asked if he would give us a guarantee that he would oppose privatisation, just as Ezra did before him. He said, "No, I can't give that guarantee." I asked them all, one by one, to stand up and be counted.
  To his credit, Moses, with whom we had some great battles during the strike actually said, "Not me, Skinner. I

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  wouldn't join a privatised board. I was born and bred in this industry like thee, so don't say that to me." Then Clarke said, "Don't anyone else answer that question." He picked up his papers and told us, "We're not staying another minute."
  From that moment, I knew that the idea of a privatised coal industry was linked to the board taking over when they had the chance. Of course the executives do not want 30 or 40 pits—Neil Clarke only wants a few. He wants to get hold of the 30 million tonnes for the power stations, and he does not want anyone else to compete with him.
  When I heard that Tory, the hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson), talking about all the shenanigans at Wearmouth colliery and about shifting all that tackle—important engineering machinery—I knew why they were taking it away: because they did not want any private entrepreneur to run Wearmouth or any of the other collieries. They want that 30 million tonne captive market, and they do not want anyone to compete with them, so that they can make a massive killing.
  By the end of the century, it could all be over. However, we must be optimistic. We socialists cannot afford to acknowledge that we will allow that to happen, because we clearly have an opportunity to win next time. This privatisation must be set against the background that the Tory Government will not last very long. We have a wimp of a Prime Minister and hardly any Tories were here to cheer on the President of the Board of Trade today. The fan club had gone. One of the most interesting features of this debate is that the right hon. Gentleman used to have phalanxes of Tories behind him, but they are no longer there. The game is up.
  Tory Members are more concerned about returning to their constituencies to try to stem the tide that will surely engulf them in a Canadian-style obliteration at the next election. I can see it coming, and that is why we must prepare and know what we are going to do. We must therefore ensure that we do not allow this conspiracy to continue much longer.
  My hon. Friend the Member for St. Helens, North mentioned the women of Parkside, and I heard one or two sneers from the Tory benches. What were those women doing there, and why have they been sitting at the pithead? To try to stop British Coal filling in the shafts, because they are optimistic and, in all the gloom and despair, have been trying to stop British Coal pouring cement down the shafts, so that, when the Labour Government get in, we shall be able to start the process up again.
  Make no mistake about it: the British coal industry is competitive. One cannot have a 350 per cent. increase since 1984 and not be in the frame for selling, which is why it is important that, when that political sea change takes place, we should take advantage of that competitiveness. We know why privatisation is on the cards—because Cecil Parkinson said so, and that must stick in the gullet of Tory wets. Is that not roughly the size of it? There was all the acclaim at the Tory conference, but it was symbolic, as their hearts are not really in it.
  However, there is money involved. What are they going to do? They will get hold of the two pension funds. which have £14 billion in them. That is written into the Bill, although not precisely. They have written in that they will get hold of the surplus and use it—they might use it as bait to catch someone. Who knows, Neil Clarke might have
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  another crack at the pension fund, or this Tory Government might use it to offset all the other difficulties that they have been running into.
  But it is a scandal. It is corruption and sleaze if they get their hands on that pension fund, when it should go to the miners, their widows and all those who have contributed. There should be no talk of a pension holiday; the money should go to all those who have spilled their blood over the years.
  The same is true of concessionary coal. There are no guarantees. The Government say that they will guarantee it to pensioners, but they are really saying that they will buy them out. As all my hon. Friends know, that is what is happening in the coalfields.
  There is no guarantee for the working miners. For the information of Nottinghamshire miners—if they are not already aware of it—the new contractors, such as Budge, are already telling miners when they recruit them that they will give them a job, but instead of £5·50 per hour it will be £3·50. What is more, there is no concessionary coal and one takes it or leaves it. When 4 million people are out of work, it is a seller's market. That is the background. So anyone who listens to Ministers saying that concessionary coal will be preserved should forget it. That is the real scene.
  The same is true of subsidence. It is not spelt out in the Bill. Literally thousands of people will suffer. It is easy to imagine the arguments that will take place about whether the subsidence at Clipstone or any of the other mines belongs to British Coal, which has just left the scene, or to Budge. Many people will lose as a result of subsidence. British Coal has not been the softest touch of all time, and we have a massive landslip at Bolsolver that will cost about £1·5 million to put right, but it will be even worse in the forthcoming period, if and when the Bill goes through.
  Another problem, which has been mentioned before, is the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation. If anyone thinks that it is all about football fields, they should forget it. CISWO is a bigger organisation than that. It is all about providing help for disabled miners and convalescent homes for disabled miners and their widows. Thousands of them go there every year. It is all about providing aids for the disabled which are not provided by the local authority. It is all about providing holidays for some of the disabled and mentally handicapped kids of miners.
  So the CISWO operation is not simply about providing a cricket field and one or two other bits and bobs. It is a massive organisation. I hope that the Minister will tell us that CISWO will remain intact, because, once the Government start interfering with it, the whole thing will break down.
  The same is true of Mines Rescue—what a wonderful organisation. Everyone has spoken about it over the years; about the fact that, when there is a disaster in the pit. or even the threat of one, Mines Rescue is on the scene—the professionals. They were the paramedics long before anyone else thought about it—paramedics underground. Mines Rescue will be dismantled. There is no reference in the Bill to its being saved.
  The Bill has been brought into being to carry through the revenge against the miners, as a result of the Tones' dogma from yesteryear. It has no relevance to the present day. Everyone knows that the best privatisations have been and gone—all the big money that was whittled away and handed over to the richer in our society. All that has gone. This privatisation and that of British Rail does not add up

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  to that type of money at all, like gas and electricity and rain. We are discussing a pettifogging privatisation that is based purely on dogma.
  I have to say, in spite of all that, that we have to be ready for government. I say first—it has not been said yet today, but I had better put it on record—that we have to take coal back into public ownership. That is the view of all those in the miners group. It is the view of literally hundreds of Members of Parliament in every region of Britain. I do not say it with the idea that I am putting it in the manifesto, but I am trying to do so because I do not believe that we can resolve the key problems otherwise.
  I do not believe that we can rescue the pensions unless we are in control of the industry. I do not believe that we can rescue CISWO unless we control it. I do not believe that we can sort out the problems of people who get concessionary coal unless we are in charge of the industry. What is more, we must curb those imports, and that can only be done by having a publicly owned industry, so that we can demand that those imports are curtailed; so that we can stop the French interconnector link, which is equivalent to about five pits; so that we can curb the opencasting. We need to be in control of our own affairs.
  Some of my hon. Friends have mentioned that rail is on the agenda for the next Labour Government. I will run through the Lobbies to carry it through. I will go through the Lobby tonight—we all will—to vote against privatisation. It logically follows that we are not discussing a lot of money: we are discussing a minor privatisation that we could do without even paying them anything. I am not saying that my hon. Friends on the Front Bench will go that far, but I just put it in their minds en passant.
  We are discussing an important subject. It is about shaping the future. We have to be able to show people outside that we do not just vote against things here in the House of Commons, but that we are starting to formulate plans to mop up the massive unemployment figures that surround us every day. It is a prime example of having an energy policy which is co-ordinated among all the various sectors. In order to do so, we have to ensure that we take coal back into public ownership.
  It has been a good debate. The Tories have packed up and run away. I will leave it now to my hon. Friends.
  8.15 pm
  Mr. John Cummings: It is perhaps the first time—at least in the past 150 years—that a Member for Easington has spoken in the Chamber without having a working colliery in his constituency. In the past 15 years, the massacre of an industry has taken place, for one reason and one reason alone, and that is to slim the industry down for privatisation. It is a disgrace that Tories, who have favoured the privatisation of the coal mining industry, the jewel in the crown, are so thin on the Benches this evening.
  Tens of thousands of miners were working in the Easington constituency in 1951, thousands in the 1980s and nil in the 1990s. Perhaps in future we should consider employment trends in the region rather than unemployment trends, because recent European figures have shown that employment in Easington has dropped by more than one third in the past 25 years. Those are the figures from Europe, which cannot be massaged or changed by a
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  Government who have been so clever in changing the method of assessing unemployment figures more than 25 times in the past 15 years.
  Having understood that the industry is to be slimmed down for privatisation, Ministers must be asked why, out of £20 billion-worth of investment into the industry, at the flick of a switch more than £20 million-worth of expensive coal mining equipment and machinery has been left to flood at Easington colliery.
  Those questions are perhaps worthy of some national public inquiry, because they do not affect Easington only, but many other collieries throughout the country, especially Wearmouth colliery, where about £10 million-worth of equipment has been stripped out in the past few months, perhaps to deter potential investors from moving in to exploit the many tens of millions of tonnes of coal that still lie under the sea.
  I should have thought that a responsible Government, bragging about an expenditure of £20 billion during the past 15 years, would try to underpin the taxpayers' investment by encouraging a market to exploit the many hundreds of millions of tonnes of coal that lie in and beyond the coastline of Durham, that will be sterilised for ever, ever more. As has been said before, one cannot opencast mine coal reserves that lie under the sea, so they are lost to our generation and future generations for ever.
  Questions must also be asked, with £20 billion-worth of investment, about what happens to the highly skilled and motivated work force, basically born and bred to work in a mine—educated to work in a coal mine. Those people now find themselves on the scrap heap. Dignified workers, who have always earned reasonable wages, and at times excellent wages, are now working as security guards for £1·10 an hour—or £1·20 an hour if one provides one's own guard dog. That is not a joke; that is what is happening in the north-east now.
  We must deal with the awful incestuous relationship between the suppliers and the generators of electricity. The suppliers are now the generators, and people are paying through the nose for that relationship.
  What will the legacy be in Easington and other coal mining areas when the last collieries close? In Easington, we can immediately point the finger at colliery housing. There are hundreds of colliery houses in and around the colliery. All my life, I have lived within 400 yd of a working pit, and we have tolerated the dust, the noise and the clamour because that was our work, and the pits were where we earned our wages.
  Now that the colliery will no longer be there, what are we to do with the legacy? What are we to do with the modernised colliery houses grouped together, which need tremendous sums spending on them to provide a decent environment for the former mineworkers who now occupy them? The need comes at a time when local government finances are being squeezed, and there is less money for grants. Will the new Coal Authority take the responsibility for what is left of colliery housing, and for providing a decent environment for former mineworkers?
  My hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) talked about the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation, and said, "Don't mention parks." Fair enough; I shall not mention parks, although they exist, as do football fields, tennis courts, swimming pools, welfare halls, brass bands and other cultural and leisure facilities.

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  There are tens of millions of pounds in the coal industry benevolent fund—a fund that was paid for by miners out of their pay packets every week for the past 15 years.
  Has the Minister thought about what will happen to that money? There are social workers too, who provide a vital service for retired aged or disabled mineworkers. Once again, the question arises at a time when local authority social services departments are being cut to the bone. The money in the fund was all provided by ourselves out of our pay notes week by week and year by year—ha'pennies from our grandfathers, pennies from our fathers and shillings from ourselves. There are vast sums of money lying there, and they must be protected and used for retired mineworkers in the future.
  What about the legacy of methane gas? That problem existed in Blyth because of the closure of Bates colliery, and 12 boreholes had to he sunk in and around the town. A tremendous debate took place between Blyth council and the National Coal Board. The board said, "That is not our responsibility, it is the local authority's responsibility." But in the end British Coal relented, and took the responsibility for sinking the shafts.
  Will the residual Coal Authority be responsible for maintaining the integrity of collieries in future, in case someone wants to take out a licence and operate them, perhaps in 18 months' time? If it will, I should like to know where the money will come from to make such an operation successful.
  There is also the problem of mine water pollution. The Government should be careful, because mine water pollution from a colliery that closed about 20 years ago is now percolating through the garden of the Bishop of Durham. There are seven pumping stations in the county of Durham, pumping billions of gallons of water every year, and if someone does not take responsibility for continuing those operations, within six months of the pumps being switched off, there will be pollution in the River Wear at Bishop Auckland. Within 18 months, there will be pollution at Lumley water treatment works, and if that becomes contaminated, someone will have to pick up a bill for about £25 million.
  I want to know what will happen in Durham. The Minister will have to give a categorical assurance that someone will be responsible for the pumping operations; otherwise, there will be orange polluted water in the river around the castle and the cathedral, at a world heritage site. There will be gross pollution in the River Wear. The people of Durham and Sunderland are sitting on an ecological time bomb, which could have an awful effect on the environment unless the Minister gives us categorical assurances tonight that the residual body will be given teeth and the money to tackle those problems.
  That is extremely important, because major Japanese factories with investments of hundreds of millions of pounds have located in that area of the county of Durham because of the quality of the groundwater. Detailed surveys carried out by Durham county council show that, if pumping operations cease at the seven pumping stations, pollution will occur within months.
  I ask the Minister to recognise publicly that that is a major issue in Durham, and that the situation is so serious that it is crucial to deal with it properly. Nothing must fall down the cracks during the process of transferring the environmental liabilities from British Coal. I am confident
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  that anyone thinking about licensing or buying collieries in the north-east will not want to handle several million pounds' worth of pumping costs.
  I also seek from the Minister a clear statement on the outcome of parallel work being undertaken by the Secretary of State for the Environment, especially in the context of the review of minerals planning guidance, in which the Government are apparently considering the framework of legal responsibility for pollution from abandoned mines. The scenario in Durham that I have painted must have parallels elsewhere in the country—although I believe that in Durham the position is more serious than elsewhere. I look forward to hearing some assurances when the Minister winds up the debate.
  I shall vote against the Bill. I am sure that the relevant amendments will be tabled in Committee, and that the Bill will be opposed tooth and nail through all its stages.
  8.28 pm
  Mr. Ronnie Campbell: Mr. Deputy Mayor—I am sorry, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I was just trying to promote you. Mr. Deputy Speaker, one of the aspects of privatisation that worries me is safety in the privatised industry. Having worked down the mine for 27 years, and for 14 years at the coal face, I have a pretty good idea of what happens.
  I have heard stories about small private mines and what happens at them. We all know that entrepreneurs will buy the collieries, but I hope that some of them are decent people. It remains to be seen. However, some of them are worthy of watching. We must watch them carefully because safety down the mines is paramount to people working there and their families above ground whose loved ones have been lost and buried and families have become fatherless.
  If I may, I shall cite a couple of frightening stories of what safety means in a private mine. A few years ago, the mines inspectorate turned a blind eye, but it has a big role to play in the future of the coal industry. In one private mine, the haulage rope snapped and because a new one could not be afforded, a knot was tied in the old rope and the haulage system was started up and the rope was tied to a truck at the top of the bank. The knot did not hold and a man was killed.
  Another instance which occurred in a private mine was nearer to my home. A private mine, which employed about 15 men, bought a cheap, large electricity socket to be used down the mine from a scrappy somewhere and plugged it into the system in the mine to get the machinery going. Lo and behold, within 12 hours, the plug caught fire and almost caused a fatality. Six or seven men almost lost their lives and one man was rushed to hospital, never to go back down the pit again.
  We have heard a lot about the £20 billion that has been invested in the collieries over the years. I said to the President of the Board of Trade earlier that some gross indecencies have occurred over the spending of that money. I mentioned the transport system, which was put in the pit yards and left for over two years, accruing a bill for the colliery of £300,000. We only discovered that when we fought to save the colliery because the books had to be opened.
  I could cite incidents, Mr. Deputy Mayor—sorry, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I am thinking of the council. It must be your dickey bow. I could cite incidents where the worth of

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  big machines, trying to be proved in the heading, have been pulled out into the roadways, pushed aside and covered up, and the cost of that machine has been left to the collieries. Wooden chocks and roof supports have been left on the face to rot, never to be recovered. That is where that £20 billion was lost. Pieces of machinery were never recovered and it was never attempted.
  Opencast is a big subject in Northumberland, as it is in the whole country. I tabled a written question two months ago asking the Minister about the state of play regarding opencast in Northumberland and Durham and how many tonnes of coal were available. The answer was 16·5 million tonnes of coal at approved sites in Northumberland and Durham. That is the answer to the earlier question. We are not talking about entrepreneurs taking over mines, but about entrepreneurs taking over opencast.
  Two or three Conservative Members spoke violently against opencast. They should not think for one minute that we will avoid opencast, because the whole purpose of the Bill is to move from deep coal mining to opencast. We have seen that happen in Northumberland. We even have the figure for Northumberland—-16·5 million tonnes of coal. Anyone taking on the mines in Northumberland will get that coal, but the pits will shut.
  We have seen what has happened in Wearmouth and we do not want that to happen in Northumberland. We have seen what has happened in the workshops and we do not want that to happen to the workshops in Northumberland. Ellington colliery is on the fringe. I hope that we can save it and that there is a future for it, because there is a lot of coal there. I have my doubts and I have voiced them not only to the entrepreneurs who will buy the pit, but to people in the industry. I believe that the entrepreneurs want opencast.
  If the people of Northumberland and Durham want to see the end of the industry, they will see the beginning of a new one—opencast from one end of Durham to the other end of Northumberland; dug up every inch of way. That will include the constituency of the hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson). He will have to face the wrath of his constituents. We should chuck him in and cement him up as well. The deadly side of opencast is the prospect for the people of Northumberland, because that is what the Bill means.
  8.35 pm
  Sir Trevor Skeet: This is a great opportunity to say one or two words on the mining industry. Looking back over the years, considering the Reid report and the Samuel report, I never envisaged that it would come to the stage when the mining industry of the United Kingdom would be so attenuated. I can remember when production was about 44 cwt of coal output per man shift and now it has exceeded £10 milion tonnes per annum. The miners have done a great job over the years and I am sure that, in the segment where they will be operating, they will continue to do good work.
  I have never been able to understand how people can work underground for their whole lives and then recommend to their sons that they should do that as well. However, those miners have been close to the ground of such matters; they have done a superb job and I am glad that the President of the Board of Trade has decided that
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  the pension plans must be considered carefully and that the money which we have been pouring into industry for years —£20 billion, of which about £8 billion has gone into machinery—has been a fitting investment in an industry which has now reduced in size.
  Mining is not the only industry which has fallen into disrepair over the years. The steel industry has been truncated. I remember that at one stage the production was to be about 35 million tonnes per annum in the United Kingdom and is now well down at about 12 million tonnes. We have seen one or two private sector companies almost eliminated because of the recession, and disrepair comes to many industries if there is not a market.
  Mr. Rogers: The hon. Gentleman said that seeing the mining industry come into disrepair makes him sad. I am sure that it does. Surely his memory does not stop at a particular time. Does he remember how bankrupt and how rotten the coal industry was in private hands? Does he remember how the royal commission in 1918 said that it could not leave the industry in the corrupt hands of the private coal owners and that it had to be nationalised? That took a long time, and into public ownership came a bankrupt industry that was in complete disrepair, because profits were being sucked out of it. Being a public industry turned it round and made it the efficient industry it is today.
  Sir Trevor Skeet: The hon. Gentleman will realise that the first step was the taking over of coal rights in 1938. It was not until 1947 that it was decided to nationalise the whole industry and to put it into Government hands. The state has controlled the industry for a long time.
  Instead of growing from strength to strength, the industry has dwindled because the market has reduced. That is not the miners' responsibility. British coal was so costly that it could not sell abroad. British coal is probably the cheapest to produce in Europe, compared with German coal and so on. However, the Europeans will accept it only in very small quantities. We want coal to be imported because of the steel industry and other requirements. We find that it is essential to blend it. The state has not been successful in running mines.
  The industry has absorbed £20 billion over the years, and it has not been a success. Is that a recommendation for the state to run an operation? Would it not be much wiser to put the industry into the private sector where there are high standards? The private sector has been transformed. It is much more caring, much more responsible and much more adept.
  Let us consider Australia and the United States of America. Hanson Industries runs the Peabody company in the United States. It has some problems, I agree. Shell and one or two other companies still have interests in Australia. Many companies successfully operate out there. They are able to bring coal to the United Kingdom at very much lower prices. Of course, the coal industry is becoming more competitive, I hope that, over the years, with the change of ownership, it will be remarkably successful, but that will not be easy. My hon. Friend the Minister does not pretend that there will be an easy ride for it.
  Let us consider the era of the Labour Government and remember when Lord Robens was in charge of the National Coal Board. He closed more pits than were ever closed by the Conservatives. As chairman of the National Coal Board, he was primarily concerned to make the industry viable. He faced exactly the same problem that we

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  have today—a declining market. In the early days, we used to produce gas from coal. That was stopped. Later, coal had a diminished market for electricity production. We now have the additional problem of gas turbines. They are remarkably successful and can be brought into operation very much faster than other methods.
  Mr. Rogers: The record should be straight in respect of colliery closures under a Labour Government. In my constituency of Rhondda, at one time there were 63 coal mines. Most collieries were closed during the period of a Labour Government, but it was a process of rationalisation. Very small coal mines were integrated. In a dozen large collieries, the same coal take was worked. It was a process of rationalisation, not of trying to destroy an industry. The hon Gentleman completely distorts the statistics. That process happened in every coalfield in the United Kingdom.
  Sir Trevor Skeet: I appreciate that the hon. Gentleman likes rationalisation and that it should be done gradually. In the Rhondda valley, much investment was brought in from abroad. In that area, or fairly near to it, Japanese investment produced wirelesses and other electronic equipment. Over time, certain industries were developed because others were retired. That is the ideal way to do things, but if the market is eroding at a fast pace, what are we to do?
  If miners are prepared to produce coal in abundance and to build stocks to a gigantic height over the years and we then find that we cannot sell that coal either in Europe, elsewhere abroad or on the local market, what should we do? Should those miners produce still more coal which will remain totally unsaleable? Perhaps, in order to reach a viable size, the state industry will have to do what the private sector has done and cut itself to a suitable size at which it can operate.
  Mr. Ronnie Campbell: If we did the same as we do in the nuclear industry and subsidise coal stocks to the tune of £1 billion a year, we could sell it abroad more cheaply, just as our competitors in Australia, America and South Africa, who are subsidised, do.
  Sir Trevor Skeet: The hon. Gentleman talks about subsidies. The industry has had enormous subsidies to the tune of £20 billion over the years. Those subsidies came from the taxpayer. The hon. Gentleman must take that point into account and be realistic. We do not like a local industry to be shut down or diminished, but that is sometimes inevitable because of the state of the market. However, the miners are not responsible for that; we should blame the management, that is British Coal or the National Coal Board, as it was. The experiment was tried for many years but it was not satisfactory. There is no way out of our plight.
  Mr. Campbell: What about the nuclear levy?
  Sir Trevor Skeet: The hon. Gentleman mentioned the nuclear levy. I was a member of the Committee which considered the electricity legislation. I argued strongly, with the support of the Labour party, that we should keep the nuclear industry in state hands because of the implications and repercussions that were likely to arise. It had to be made a viable industry. It was decided that the best way to do that would be to have a nuclear subsidy or a nuclear levy. That is set out in the Act. The chairman of
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  the nuclear power body has recommended that, over the next two or three years, it is to be discontinued. Therefore, the industry will cease to be subsidised. It will be as competitive as any other section of private enterprise.
  Over about three or four years, I would welcome the elimination of the so-called subsidy, but we should remember that money has to be put aside for the retiring of nuclear power plants. We live in a competitive world. Electricity is produced not only from coal. A little is produced from oil, and more and more is produced from natural gas, which seems to be the in thing these days. The various products must be competitive.
  We are asking the private sector, "If you take over certain branches of the industry, can you compete successfully?" They say that they can. In the five areas in which licences are to be granted, some of the deep mines and some of the opencast systems should be linked. A combination of both would make them satisfactory.
  The hon. Member for Blyth Valley (Mr. Campbell) mentioned opencast mining. Opencast mining has produced about 60 million tonnes of coal. Much of the mining in the United States of America, Australia, South Africa and elsewhere is opencast. We must compete with that. Mining in the United Kingdom is principally underground, and it is very expensive.
  With regard to opencast mining, hon. Members should remember that we have not only the precedent from abroad but the profitability of it. If we had opencast mining, we would be able to compete with South Africa, Australia and the United States. We would be able to compete with Peabody. Hon. Members should bear in mind the fact that opencast mining is not eliminated, although there will be continuous planning difficulties to get an operation going. In view of some of the restoration work that has been undertaken over the years, full congratulations must go to the companies involved for what they have done to reinstate the land.
  Mr. Campbell: The hon. Gentleman is talking about a subject which I have closely monitored in my constituency. Coal in opencast mines can be reached at any time in the next century because it can be dug up quite easily. But once mines are shut, millions of tonnes of coal disappear. If it is too expensive to open new mines, the coal will disappear, never to be mined again. The hon. Gentleman is advocating opencast mining and locking away millions of tonnes of coal underground.
  Sir Trevor Skeet: I am obliged to the hon. Gentleman for making that point. Of course, the coal is readily recoverable—the overburden is removed and the coal is taken out when it is needed. My primary aim is to keep miners in jobs. I am sure that a change of ownership would be much more successful because it would make the industry more prosperous.
  I shall refer briefly to one or two points that I have in mind. These are problems largely for the Government. There are enormous stocks at the pithead and in the hands of the power-generating companies. When the new licensees take over, what will be the allocation for the liabilities of those stocks because they could be a burden on the market for many years? I agree with everything that has been said about the problem of pollution. The polluter pays, and it could be expensive. Will the licensees be responsible for such problems?

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  Anyone who takes over an area will be concerned about subsidence. Subsidence can occur at any time in any area. Some of the developments are near towns and villages and can be very expensive. During the passage of the Electricity Bill, I told the Government that one of the principal difficulties in having nuclear power in the privatisation programme would be the unlimited liability which could visit the companies. Will the licensees who are prepared to take over and receive grants be fully compensated for the subsidence which is likely to occur in 20, 30, 40 or 50 years?
  Another point that I shall raise briefly is the size of the market which is left. Over the years, we have heard many analyses. A few years ago, Rothschild talked about production in the United Kingdom falling to about 30 million tonnes, and other estimates have been given. I hope that we will not take the mining industry down too far. If we do, it will cease to be as viable as we hope it will become, and it may become more economical to buy more coal of the right quality from abroad.
  Now that we are fully participating in Europe, and as most EC countries do not have high-quality coal of their own, I hope that an earnest attempt will be made to pressure the Europeans to take some of our indigenous material. Who are the European producers? Coal is produced mostly in Germany, with small amounts produced in France and Spain. Most parts of Europe do not have coal, and we have the benefit of large quantities of it. I do not want to see resources wasted over the years. If we can get our costs right, and the Minister is determined to secure this, I hope that we will have a thriving industry in the future.
  8.54 pm
  Mr. Peter Hain: The question we must ask is, why is the Bill being introduced? Is it being introduced because it will bring about greater efficiency? No. Productivity has increased by 500 per cent. since the industry was nationalised and rescued by public ownership in 1947. Let us remember that in 1947 private mine owners begged the Labour Government to take over the mines and nationalise them, as was done. Recently, productivity increases have been spectacular, so the Bill is nothing to do with efficiency.
  Is the Bill being introduced to save taxpayers' money? No. If we examine its financial effects, we see that there is a continuing subsidy of at least £1 billion until the end of the century—£1 billion will be used to prop up this private industry. On top of that, the Government have provided grant aid totalling £3 billion. Also, literally billions of pounds have been spent on redundancy costs for miners who lost their jobs. The 26,000 miners who have lost their jobs since the President of the Board of Trade started to sentence the industry to death in October 1992 have cost the state £234 million in terms of unemployment benefit, lost revenue, and so on. The costs of subsidising a privatised mining regime are mounting.
  There are other costs as well. Documents in the Library show that it costs £1 million a year, on average, to keep pits mothballed while awaiting privatisation. The new Coal Authority established in the Bill will not be cash-limited. That is made perfectly clear in schedule 1, which states:
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  "The Secretary of State shall, in respect of each accounting year, pay to the Authority such amount as he may determine to be the amount required by the Authority for the carrying out during that year of its functions under this Act."
  It is not cash-limited. Potentially, a large amount of money is being made available to the Coal Authority to prop up this privatised regime.
  What we will see is a total cost to the taxpayer that is many times more than what the Select Committee on Trade and Industry said would be required to subsidise British Coal over a couple of years so that it could become fully competitive and compete on a level playing field with the rest of the world. Therefore, this is not about savings to the taxpayer.
  Is it about a coherent energy policy? Of course not. If the coal industry is privatised, it will pursue its own narrow private interests, as the electricity industry has done since it was privatised. In turn, privatisation of the electricity industry has been responsible for the death of the coal industry over which the Government are presiding.
  Privatisation of the energy industry has been responsible for the damaging effects on all our energy resources. About 15 years' worth of our precious gas reserves in the North sea oil shelf have been depleted as a result of gas-fired power stations and the dash for gas, which is totally unsuitable as a fuel for a power station base load. Our reserves have been wasted. The Government are depleting our precious natural gas reserves, which should be directed at domestic and industrial heating.
  Sir Trevor Skeet: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Hain: No, I will not give way. Some of my hon. Friends want to speak and the hon. Gentleman has not been here for the whole evening, as many Opposition Members have.
  The Bill is not about a coherent energy policy—that certainly would not come from the Government. They have allowed coal imports to rise by almost five times since 1983, from 4·5 million tonnes to 20 million tonnes a year. That is damaging to the balance of payments and causes difficulties for our economic policy.
  The Bill is not about energy policy. Is it about protecting the environment? No, because one of the consequences of privatisation will be the acceleration of the dash for opencast mining at the expense of deep mining. We have seen all the destructive environmental consequences of that in recent years.
  In my constituency, it is interesting to see the contrast between British Coal's applications for opencast work at Selar—one of the largest sites ever to be worked in Britain, at the top of the Neath valley—and the situation at Tower colliery, the last British Coal pit in south Wales. Tower has been slimmed down, ready for privatisation, and its production has been cut as opencast mining has been opened up. That gives some idea of the real priorities of the privatisation of coal.
  The Bill is not about any of those things. It is really about giving freebies to the friends of the Government who want to set up companies to take advantage of the privatisation of coal. It is also about the long-standing vendetta of the Conservative party against the mineworkers and, in particular, their trade union. It is about the dogma that allows crucial and strategic industries which are vital to the nation's interests to be subordinated to the concerns of shareholders, rather than to act in the wider public interest.

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  The way it has been done is a scandal. The Government have pursued their strategy absolutely ruthlessly and have slimmed down the coal industry as a matter of deliberate policy to create a small industry for which the private sector would bid. I give the example of Blaenant, which was the last pit to close in Neath. My agent, Howard Davis, used to work there. The pit employed 600 men, and there is a familiar tale in what happened to it. For a long period, it was profitable. Then, 18 months before its closure, a new management team was brought in. That team set about destroying industrial relations and creating turmoil in the pit. It quickly slid from its profitable state to a deficit within six months of the team's taking over. That gave a good excuse for the pit to be closed.
  An under-manager at Blaenant was so disgusted by what was happening that he walked off the site in disgust at his senior managers, a practice unknown in south Wales. The conditions that been created for the pit to close. How often have we heard that tale regarding pits across the country as the ruthless drive towards privatisation has been pursued?
  The Bill means that we are now on the brink of one of the biggest scams of the century. The same managers who have run down the industry are now to bid for it, and they will reap the benefits as private managers and owners in a new private coal industry. The preparation for the privatisation of British Coal stinks to high heaven. We are seeing nothing short of a national scandal, where all the social costs of private mining are to be dumped on the state while the private owners skim the industry and make profits from it.
  The Bill is about two things—protection of the past and planning for the future. So far as the past is concerned, I believe that the Bill does not give adequate protection for pensions, as was mentioned earlier in the debate. Representatives of the mineworkers pension scheme have made it perfectly clear that the Government have not satisfied them that they are interested in the future of miners' pensions. The issue of subsidence was addressed earlier, and that subject is treated absolutely cavalierly.
  The pollution from old coal workings is also inadequately dealt with. For example, the Pellenna river, which flows through the former mining village of Tonmawr in my constituency, is a deep orange-brown colour. The river is literally disgorging into the surrounding rivers and the sea thousands, if not millions, of gallons of water which is heavily polluted with iron and sulphur. The pollution is ultimately seeping through into the water table. Lots of old mine workings are deeply polluted and there is no guarantee that the Bill will give local communities the protection that they need.
  Another example was brought to light when representatives of Neath angling club approached me recently and took me down to the Neath river to show me a patch that was heavily polluted by an old Ynysarwed mine which closed in 1938. The pollution has just come' out into the Neath river. I approached the National Rivers Authority, Welsh Water and British Coal, none of which wanted to know. If British Coal does not want to know about a private pit that closed in 1938, imagine a private regime wanting to take responsibility for that. Yet that case shows that pollution from a pit that closed almost 60 years ago can suddenly come out of the ground and infect the local environment.
  The Bill provides protection for neither the environment nor the many thousands of individuals and families who
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  have benefited over the decades from the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation, the future of which is deeply threatened. A sword of Damocles hangs over it as a result of the Bill, which abolishes the Miners' Welfare Act 1952, through which CISWO was funded from within the industry. The Bill provides no alternative means of funding.
  For how long will concessionary fuel continue to be provided? It is vital to the livelihood of many miners' widows and former miners' families, but it is not guaranteed in the long term.
  I invite the Minister to come to my constituency, which has more private mines than any other constituency in the country. It has 36 drifts and levels employing from two to 140 men, totalling 450 miners. Ironically, that is double the number of miners now employed by British Coal in the whole of south Wales. I have strongly supported private licensed mines. I have appealed to the Welsh Office to give them grant aid and supported Ryans colliery's successful application to reopen the Vale of Neath railway line to transport coal by rail rather than clog up the roads. Under the Transport Act 1985, that mine received a grant of more than £6 million for that development.
  Local private mines are an important part of the local economy, but almost all of them hark back to the turn of the century. In the past two years in my constituency, two miners have died and one narrowly escaped death and was paralysed from the waist down. Conditions are dreadful. Miners have no showers and, in Crugau colliery in particular, some are not even paid with proper payslips, which contravenes contracts under employment law. At Pentwyn colliery, miners who were working over the Christmas period according to their basic conditions of service were about to take the normal Christmas break to which they are entitled under law when the private owner simply sacked 20 of them. That is the kind of thing that will happen under privatisation.
  Ponies are still used to bring the coal out of some of the collieries in my constituency. Forest colliery opposite my home in Resolven has two ponies called Amos and Prince, while Nant-y-Cafn colliery near Seven Sisters has a pony called Turbo. Pentwyn pit in Ystalyfera also has a pony. People do not believe that such conditions exist in 20th-century Britain. Those conditions of last century will come back with a vengeance if the Bill is enacted.
  The safety problems in those pits are enormous. A survey by the Health and Safety Executive compares accidents in private pits with those in British Coal pits per thousand employees. A miner in a private pit is 23 times more likely to die than a British Coal miner. What reassurance can the Minister give on that? The Bill gives no reassurance. It is an exercise in going back to the future, as the finest deep-mine industry in the world is demolished, men's safety is threatened and lives are risked on the altar of the free market mania that has failed the rest of the British economy.
  9.9 pm
  Mr. Eric Clarke: I shall be brief because we are at the tail end of the debate. My hon. Friends have covered many issues, including the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation, Mines Rescue, pensions and the importation of coal; therefore, I shall deal with just two matters.

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  I have written to the Minister about the composition of the Coal Authority, which will have many powers if privatisation goes ahead. In the context of controls on opencast extradition, will it give licences to all and sundry or will that be pre-empted by the overall sale of large packets or areas of land with opencast potential? With a nod and a wink, potential buyers will get a licence anyway. Will privatisation be a bonanza for the asset strippers or cherry pickers who will concentrate only on opencast mining?
  The Minister will not have the answers to those questions. We all worry about who will make decisions. I hope that they will not be made by the people who run British Coal or by ex-members of the British Coal board of management. There are qualified people in the industry and in the mining communities. Ex-miners, mines inspectors and even academics, university professors of mining, would have some credibility.
  Sir Trevor Skeet: Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Clarke: No, because I have just a short time in which to make my speech and other hon. Members wish to take part in the debate.
  Sir Trevor Skeet: I thought that the hon. Gentleman was giving way.
  Mr. Clarke: I said no; there was a misunderstanding.
  I also wrote to the Minister about coal mine abandonment plans. I do not think that he is paying attention to me. Those plans are not being left in the areas where the extradition took place. In 1950, the Coal Board was given the right to take all the abandonment plans into the relevant areas. That was because the area representatives said that it would be handy to have these working plans of exhausted mines in one area to which there was access. They were in the Edinburgh area, but they are now in Midlothian, in my constituency. However, British Coal has now gathered them all together and taken them to Bretby.
  It may be useful to have all the plans under one roof, but it is difficult for a mining surveyor or a private developer, who must examine such plans before development is allowed, to have access to them. I do not want those plans to end up under the jurisdiction of Group 4 or some such organisation, because if that happened people would have to pay to look at them. Half of them would probably go missing anyway—we know what happened to prisoners. Even academics who want to study the plans would not have access to them. Perhaps the Minister will consider that point.
  I asked the Secretary of State for Scotland about the matter and he said that it had to do with British Coal. That is not the case, because these plans relate to the heritage of the Scots, the Welsh, the people of the north-east and others in Britain. The plans do not belong to British Coal. They belong to the people, and people should have access to them.
  Anybody who knows the technicalities will appreciate that colour slides are not good enough. We have to look at the plans carefully because their age makes the shades appear to be on top of each other. Obviously, it is a complicated and difficult plan and it is possible to find things one was not looking for. I am asking the Minister
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  whether the Coal Authority could be responsible for these matters and whether the position could be reversed so that the plans are sent back to Scotland or elsewhere.
  Like many other people from Scotland, I feel that the Bill is a bit of a post mortem on the coal industry. A great industry has been decimated, and Conservative Members have voiced many inaccuracies today.
  The miners were heroes in the first and second world wars. After the second world war, the coal industry gave up. The miners worked five-day weeks and 11-day fortnights. They produced coal for Britain and sold it to industry. They put British industry back on its feet. British Coal sold coal at a lower price. It imported United States coal and sold it at local prices to keep industry going. It could have used market forces to produce a surplus and it would not have had to take out the loans that were a millstone around its neck for many years.
  I spent some time in the Library going through British Coal accounts dating back to 1979. There were many loans, and the interest on them was a millstone around the industry's neck. I know that, because every time we went to British Coal on an organised basis to negotiate wage increases, the management said that the company was not profitable because it had to pay back massive loans.
  I will not bore hon. Members with the figures, but I can assure them that they go up and up. Page 8 of the NCB annual accounts for 1979–80 makes it quite clear that the national loans fund was on a 15-year term and that the borrowing was too inflexible to allow the nationalised industries to act commercially. We had blinkers, handcuffs and financial embargoes on the nationalised coal industry, which was not working properly.
  Let us get the whole issue straight and put the blame where it belongs. Privatisation is a political decision, not an economic one. It is the politics and economics of madness to close down such an asset. [Interruption.] Yes, they are closing it down; it is a systematic closure. There is no argument about it. Hon. Members can go and see how many coal mines will be privatised.
  Like many other people who spent their lives in the coal industry, I have nothing of which to be ashamed. It was an honest, hard-working and honourable job and the miners were the finest men I have had the honour to work beside. Many of them are retired now and remain in the communities. I am looking after their interests through the pension funds and elsewhere.
  If the privatisation goes through and many other things happen, I want those people and their families to be protected.
  9.8 pm
  Mr. Martin O'Neill: In the 20 months since the general election, we have had many debates on coal, and many of them have followed the same track. We have had paving legislation, announcements on closures, calls for Government action, belated and irrelevant responses from the Government and disgraceful handling of safety arrangements. Now we reach what Conservative Members will regard as the final stage—the privatisation of coal and the Government's washing their hands of the whole issue.
  In the immediate aftermath of the miners' strike, the Government ceded control of the coal industry to individuals in the corporation to lick it into shape in preparation for privatisation. Some said that the shape

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  would consist of 12 to 14 pits employing about 10,000 men. Others wanted to sell it into private hands—perhaps their own—and have as big an industry as possible. In the event, the debate turned out to be academic, because the structure of the privatised industry was determined by the availability of cheap gas and subsidised nuclear power from France. As well as that, the electricity industry was privatised.
  I seem to have been living on a different planet from Conservative Members, some of whom tell us that the privatisation of gas and electricity was the greatest piece of privatisation ever, while the other half tell us that coal should have been privatised before the other two. The Government's ceding of control and responsibility for the generation of power in this country is highly irresponsible, but that battle in many respects has been lost and we must try to make the best of a bad job.
  In the period since the end of the strike, we have seen increased production, the cutting of costs and the reduction of prices in the coal industry. In the first week back at work this year, a figure of 10.26 tonnes per man shift was achieved for the first time ever. Last April, the figure stood at 8.23 tonnes per man shift. As has been pointed out, the record has been broken nine times in the past 10 months. Indeed, at Whitemoor colliery in the Selby complex, some 280 men cut 42.8 tonnes per man shift.
  In the northern group alone, up to November last year, four pits were producing at less than E1 per gigajoule. In my constituency, the Longannet mine has been successful in achieving figures for price and quality that have enabled it to sign a five-year agreement with Scottish Power to take 2 million tonnes per annum from the colliery. Those are not the achievements of an industry on its knees. Those figures for cost reduction and production are not evidence of an industry that has lost its way. They are testament to effective public ownership. They are a vindication of the motives of those who nationalised the industry in the first place.
  The Attlee Government nearly half a century ago saw the appalling record of the private coal owners, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wansbeck (Mr. Thompson) pointed out to us from his personal experience of working in what are alleged to have been the glory days of private ownership of the British coal industry. We tend to forget that, in the days when it was nationalised, coal was used for heating in almost every home in the country, not merely the 2.5 million of today. It was the fuel source for our railway system and our ships. It provided the coke for the gas and steel industry. It fuelled our electricity generation.
  With markets like those, it must have taken a particularly spectacular form of incompetence in the private owners not to be able to run their industry at a profit or in a manner that was safe and which afforded the work force—[Interruption.] Fifty years ago, Conservative Members were not arguing in favour of private ownership of the coal industry—they were advocating public ownership. Fifty years later, the performance of the coal industry is such that members of the Labour party—the advocates of public ownership—have nothing to be ashamed of.
  There are other aspects of the coal industry. Indeed, the remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Neath (Mr. Hain) a few moments ago showed that the safety of private mines stands very bad comparison with the figures and conditions that prevail within British Coal today, especially if one considers that, in 1946, 1,000 miners a
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  year lost their lives. Between 1933 and 1942, the fatal accident rate was 1.3 deaths per 1,000 miners. Within the first five years of public ownership, that was halved. Today, it is now 0.13—one tenth the rate of 50 years ago.
  Safety in private mines, then as now, is far worse. The accident rate is five times as bad in the private service. When we hear about the accidents in mines and about how good the record is, it nevertheless requires us to pay tribute, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) did tonight, to the Mines Rescue service. Some of us remain to be convinced—we shall raise this in Committee —of that service's future. It is not a cheap operation—and it requires sacrifices not only by employees but by employers in allowing their staff time off work to attend training courses and to be available whenever a disaster occurs. There must be guarantees about the continuation of that rescue service.
  Under past private ownership, low priority was given to safety, but labour relations were also deplorable. I refer not only to disputes but to the demeaning, casualised nature of employment mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Wansbeck. Contractors picked and chose their men, and security of employment, holidays and even basic days off were never granted in any systematic fashion. At the end of the second world war, there were few sincere voices raised against nationalisation. The view held today is that, since the industry is small and output low, it should be left to the private sector. The message today was that it does not matter who owns the coal industry because it barely has a future and will never regain its role even in electricity regeneration.
  There are, however, vast reserves of coal in the United Kingdom. Estimates range from 40-plus years to an optimistic 230 years. Whatever figure is used, it cannot be disputed that, at current European consumption levels, Britain has half Europe's coal reserves and the cheapest deep-mined coal in the European Union. That point was made by the hon. Member for Bedfordshire, North (Sir T. Skeet), who mentioned the possibility of exporting United Kingdom coal to the European Union.
  Perhaps it would be more sensible to make an arrangement with the French whereby they conceded third party status and we could use the interconnector to export British-generated electricity to Italy and Germany. That would be a more satisfactory way of using our surplus coal supplies. However, there is broad agreement across the House that the United Kingdom must make use of its reserves.
  We all agree also that security of energy supplies will depend on a variety of fuels, and that the organisation of that portfolio will depend on proper investment levels being sustained. The danger inherent in a small coal industry under several owners is that there is likely to be insufficient critical mass to sustain the industry.
  We have already seen the impact on the mining machinery industry of the decline in the home market, which has severely prejudiced the prospects of companies in that sector competing in the international market for mining equipment. A small, privately owned industry would have great difficulty supporting research and development.
  Will the Minister for Energy indicate Government thinking on the coal research establishment, which is partly funded by European money in the form of the return of part of the levy on coal produced in this country? It would be ridiculous if the price of British coal were to reflect a levy

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  from which this country cannot benefit. The CRC is not mentioned in the Bill, but it ought to be considered. It is one of the main coal industry research bodies in the world, producing valuable research for not only the United Kingdom and Europe but companies worldwide. It is essential to the industry's long-term future that the centre is protected.
  The prospect of a small, privatised coal industry has attracted little interest from international companies with the resources to fund research and development. It is feared that the private operators who are interested in entering the business will be too small or too heavily indebted to have the resources for research and development, and will merely pursue short-term profit by rape and pillage.
  Hon. Members have asked about pay and conditions, safety and related procedures. No doubt we shall return to those matters in Committee and on Report. The Bill's implications for existing employees are, however, almost overtaken by the scale of the responsibilities to be shouldered by the Coal Authority and future owners. As drafted, the Bill gives little comfort to pensioners. Some members of the latest group of former workers have already been exposed to unscrupulous insurance salesmen, who have encouraged them to contract out of the industry and adopt other pension schemes.
  The Bill does nothing to resolve disputes with trustees about the disposal of surpluses, especially in the staff scheme. The assurances that have been given have not allayed the anxieties of existing staff about the safety of their contributions. If the Government are not prepared to guarantee future employment or redundancy arrangements, surely they can promise to protect the pensions of the existing work force from unscrupulous private owners.
  An integral part of a mining pensioner's package is the concessionary coal scheme, but no one is yet convinced of the Government's present and continuing commitment to that scheme. I understand that the Minister answered a question about it yesterday. The matter will be scrutinised closely if and when the Bill enters its Committee stage; I do not think that a one-paragraph answer was sufficient to allay any of our fears.
  Those who do not know the industry and the communities that depend on it do not realise the significance of the concessionary coal scheme. It is worth between £650 and £850 a year to the 160,000 people who receive coal and smokeless fuel, and some £270 a year to the 40,000 who receive cash in lieu. The scheme costs about £150 million a year. A number of my hon. Friends have referred to the blatant attempt to buy out that entitlement, and the failure to spell out tax implications of such deals to the elderly pensioners involved. The unscrupulous approach adopted by some parts of British Coal in its attempt to shed the burden must be scrutinised far more closely. I hope that the Minister will at least begin to consider that aspect this evening.
  Such problems affect all hon. Members with former miners in their constituencies. Because of the degree of interdependence in mining, and the failure of private owners and the social welfare system to look after the needy, miners have been required to provide for themselves in the past.
  Mr. Etherington: Is it not incredible that the President of the Board of Trade did not refer once to the Coal
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  Industry Social Welfare Organisation? In 1921, following the report of the Sankey commission, the Government of the day introduced legislation that placed a levy on tonnage; that levy was worth more than the Coal Board is paying now. Is it not almost beyond belief that the right hon. Gentleman did not mention such an important aspect of the matter?
  Mr. O'Neill: Having been in the House for 15 years, I am no longer surprised by anything that the President of the Board of Trade says or does not say. It is significant, however, that in 1952 the incoming Conservative Government—on the back of coal nationalisation—introduced the Miners' Welfare Bill, which created the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation as we know it today. It plays an invaluable part in the lives of communities associated with the mining industry. Apart from the welfare institutions and the clubs, its regional system of social workers complements the social services. [Interruption.] Conservative Members who think that this is amusing should remember that, when the House faces further public expenditure cuts, it will be to voluntary organisations such as CISWO that people will have to turn in increasing numbers for the support that the social services, deprived of funds, cannot provide.
  It has been suggested that in the next 25 years about half a million people will need the services of CISWO. Therefore, it is incumbent on the Minister to mention CISWO, even if the President of the Board of Trade does not consider it important enough to be included in his speech.
  CISWO and British Coal Enterprise deserve a mention. Neither of them features anywhere in the Bill. Some of us have been sceptical about the contribution made by British Coal Enterprise, but we know that it has a loan fund of £50 million and a cumulative total of some £75 million in loans and grants. We do not want them to be jeopardised because we recognise that the level of unemployment in our areas is such that any help that we can get is welcome.
  The Bill does not affect only individuals and the economies of the coalfield communities. Repeated reference has been made to the environmental consequences of mining. There has been discussion of the implications of stopping pumping in the north-east and Wales. There has been discussion of the significance of opencast mining and its irrelevance when we consider the importance of securing markets for deep-mined coal.
  The Bill leaves many questions unanswered. We have yet to know the size of the industry that the Government propose to privatise. We do not know how many collieries will remain. We do not know whether proper security will be provided for the pensions and working arrangements of the people who will be left in the industry. But we know that the Government want to get shot of the industry. Indeed, when Lord Parkinson spoke in 1992 in the wake of the pit closures announcement, he made it clear that the closures were more about marking off the scores of the 1974 strike, which brought down the then Tory Government, than about a proper energy policy for Britain.
  The Bill is not about a coal industry of the future. It is about a Conservative Government's revenge. The privatised remains of the coal industry, with contracts with the electricity generators of only three years, will not be attractive to the Peabodys or RTZs of this world. It could appeal only to companies such as Budge which operate rates of £3·50 an hour for a 10-hour day—a cut of 31 per

  791
  cent. in wages. That is what is being offered at the Clipstone mine. It could appeal only to those who operate under safety regulations which will be bereft of the contribution of the mining deputy and in which safety will be paramount only so long as it is practicable to make it so.
  Following privatisation, at the end of the contract, when the bankers and the men from the City have walked away with their profits, all that will be left will be the coal miners of this country, the vast reserves of coal and, if we are lucky, supplies of over-priced gas. And there will be one more thing, Madam Speaker there will be a Labour Government mindful of their responsibility to provide a national energy policy in which the public sector will once again play its part. Until then, we must oppose the Bill. If we are defeated tonight, we must fight for changes in the Bill to protect miners, their families, the environment and the energy supplies of this country. I urge all those who believe that there is a future for coal to join us in the Lobby tonight to keep the nation's resources in the hands of the people.
  9.38 pm
  The Minister for Energy (Mr. Tim Eggar): We have had a good debate, with 25 hon. Members speaking, and I shall do my best to answer as many of their questions as possible. Without wishing to offend my hon. Friends and Opposition Members, may I say that my image of the debate is of the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner). He was in fine form.
  Mr. Stuart Bell: It was a good speech.
  Mr. Eggar: Yes. He reminded us that the Nye Bevan wing of the Labour party is still alive—just. His speech was fascinating. He did not speak to the Conservative Benches.
  Mr. Skinner: There was no one there.
  Mr. Eggar: He did not talk to the mining group of Labour Members of Parliament. No, he spoke directly to the Labour Front Bench and made an impassioned plea for the Labour party to prepare for government—but by doing what? By renationalising the British coal industry. The battle that he was fighting was not with his mining friends but with his Front Bench.
  What was the best answer that the hon. Member for Clackmannan (Mr. O'Neill) could come up with in response to that speech? He said, "Well, we might have a little bit of public sector involvement in the coal industry if we ever happen to get back into power." That was the best contribution that the Opposition spokesman could give the hon. Gentleman.
  The hon. Member for Bolsover has a lot more work to do and I am delighted that he has some colleagues on his side, such as the hon. Member for Blyth Valley (Mr. Campbell). I am not sure about the hon. Member for Easington (Mr. Cummings)—I am not even sure about me —but I am looking forward to the battle developing on the Labour Benches in Committee.
  I must begin by picking up on some of the comments about the safety regime.
  Sir Donald Thompson: Will my hon. Friend cast his mind back 10 years, when we should have introduced this Bill but did not do so because there would
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  have been a synthetic national strike by all those companies and businesses that had been denationalised and which now realise that the miners are coming in too late?
  Mr. Eggar: I agree. One of the tragedies that has befallen the mining industry is the way in which labour relations and the attitude of the Opposition have meant that the safety regime has come later to the private sector than to other parts of the energy industry.
  I recognise that hon. Members on both sides of the House are concerned about safety issues. My right hon. Friend the President and I are absolutely determined that privatisation will not lead to a reduction in safety standards. Modern mining practice, new technology and a tough regulatory framework will ensure that the industry's safety record continues to be excellent.
  I repeat that safety is, and will remain, the Government's paramount concern as we go through the privatisation process. No Conservative Member and no member of the Government will countenance any proposal that puts safety standards at risk. We therefore sought the advice of the Health and Safety Commission. That is why I announced in October that we would accept all the recommendations that the commission has made to us as we move towards privatisation.
  Mr. Hardy: If the Minister is as concerned as he says —we shall no doubt explore that in Committee—will he explain why the Government allowed the phrase
  "as far as may be practicable"
  to be repeated in almost every page of the new regulations governing safety in mines? Does he accept that the repetition of that phrase causes enormous dismay and deepening anxiety in the mining industry because it obviously provides a let-out clause for every sharp practice that may occur?
  Mr. Eggar: I utterly reject the hon. Gentleman's assertion. He knows perfectly well that the document to which he refers, the management and administration of safety and health at mines package, was put together by the Health and Safety Commission, which is a tripartite organisation and which, although I know that it was opposed by the union by which the hon. Gentleman is sponsored and with which he is associated, has generally been welcomed by other entities involved in safety.
  Mr. Martin Redmond rose—
  Mr. Eggar: I hope that the hon. Gentleman will forgive me if I do not give way.
  Several hon. Gentlemen, including the hon. Member for Clackmannan, have mentioned the mines rescue service. Having met some of the people who were associated with the work at the Bilsthorpe pit after the tragic accident there, I recognise that this is an important matter. The Health and Safety Commission has said that it intends to submit new regulations to the Secretary of State for Employment as soon as possible and extensive consultation will follow from that. That has already started.
  The Health and Safety Commission's report states that a national rescue service, jointly operated by mine owners, appears to be the best way of meeting the fundamental rescue objectives after privatisation. I will take full account of that report when advancing our proposals for the industry.
  A number of my hon. Friends and hon. Members have mentioned the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation.

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  I agree with the hon. Member for Bolsover and others that CISWO plays an important role. As I think has been recognised by the hon. Member for Doncaster, North (Mr. Hughes), I have been in discussion with CISWO's trustees and executives, as have my officials. I intend to carry forward those discussions. I recognise the importance of the areas of activity that were identified by the hon. Member for Bolsover, and I will make proposals in due course.
  Mr. O'Neill rose—
  Mr. Eggar: I hope that the hon. Gentleman will forgive me if I do not give way, because I am trying to respond to several points that were made in the debate.
  Several hon. Gentlemen, including the hon. Members for Sherwood (Mr. Tipping) and for Doncaster, North, mentioned the future of British Coal Enterprise Ltd. BCE's job creation activities will continue throughout the privatisation of British Coal and the Government will continue to support the funding of BCE's operations.
  Mr. O'Neill rose
  Mr. Eggar: I hope that the hon. Gentleman will forgive me. He did not leave me a lot of time.
  My hon. Friends the Members for Davyhulme (Mr. Churchill) and for Elmet (Mr. Batiste) and the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) mentioned the possibility of a reference to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission and, connected with that, the possibility of the disposal of power stations by the generators. As I think the House knows, the Director General of Electricity Supply is considering all those issues. It is for him to seek agreement with the generators or to recommend a reference to the MMC, and we await his recommendations.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Davyhulme mentioned flue gas desulphurisation fitting, specifically at Ferrybridge power station. I think that he is aware that we have given section 36 consent for work on FGD fitting to take place and, as the company knows, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment has the power to direct Her Majesty's inspectorate of pollution to require the fitting of FGD in a specific case if he and the inspectorate consider it appropriate.
  Mr. Churchill: Will my hon. Friend confirm that the Secretary of State will indeed use those powers of direction?
  Mr. Eggar: My right hon. Friend will obviously need to consider the issue. The stance that the generator concerned will take is not yet clear. I was pointing out to my hon. Friend that the powers are there.
  The hon. Member for Wansbeck (Mr. Thompson) mentioned Alcan and the ownership of land around the Alcan plant. I know that the company is concerned about that matter. As he knows, I will visit the plant and hold discussions with management, and I am sure that that subject will come up.
  My right hon. Friend the Member for Selby (Mr. Alison) and my hon. Friend the Member for Elmet mentioned compulsory rights orders. We fully intend that procedures for compulsory access should be matters of the last resort. We are conscious of the need to balance the
  794
  interest of the landowners and the need for compulsory access during what we recognise, under the terms of the Bill, is a temporary period of about five years.
  The hon. Member for Clackmannan asked about the future of the coal research establishment and research and development funding. The Government are committed to expanding funding for clean coal technology. That was made clear in the White Paper, and the CRE is currently involved in many joint projects. We are aware of the issue that the hon. Gentleman raised about European funding, and we shall work closely with the CRE and with British Coal to find a way forward for that organisation.
  Several of my hon. Friends, and Opposition Members too, asked about consultation on mineral planning guidance 3, and the relationship between that document and the compulsory rights orders. Of course, we are in consultation now on MPG3, and I shall ensure that the comments of my hon. Friends and of Opposition Members on opencast mining are conveyed to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment.
  My hon. Friends the Members for Elmet and for Davyhulme asked about compensation claims for industrial diseases when employees transfer to private sector purchasers. I assure them that what they have said, both during the debate and previously, has been taken on board and that we are examining those matters closely.
  Many hon. Members asked about pensions. The Government are determined to guarantee existing pension arrangements, and we also guarantee index linking. We have made it clear that beneficiaries should be able to benefit from any surplus on a 50:50 basis. We are taking part in discussions and shall shortly enter further discussions with the trustees about the balance between protecting the interests of taxpayers and protecting those of beneficiaries. I look forward to the discussion in Committee on concessionary fuel. As I said, we made an announcement following the consultations.
  Tonight we have heard the usual arguments from Labour Members. Yet again the Labour party seems to be bound to fail to recognise the realities that face the coal industry and the fact that the best hope for its future lies in the private sector. The hon. Members for Livingston and for Clackmannan both brought up the myth that the Conservative party supported the nationalisation of coal in 1946. I went back to the Hansard report of the debate, so let me tell the House what Mr. Eden said at the time:
  "What this Bill proposes to do is to set up a State monopoly for the production of coal, and that is all. Are hon. Members opposite"—
  Labour Members—
  "really certain that the bulk of their supporters are enthusiastic for such a monopoly; and are they sure that the evils of monopoly disappear, once it comes under the aegis of the State?"—[Official Report, 29 January 1946; Vol. 418, c. 718.]
  Winding up for the Conservatives, Mr. Macmillan said —[Interruption.] Labour Members should listen; Mr. Macmillan said:
  "What about the relations between the National Union of Mineworkers and the Socialist machine? That is more than a friendship. It is a marriage which I am sure Transport House will be careful never to dissolve so long as the sums under the marriage settlement are regularly and punctually paid, whether they are voluntarily subscribed or compulsorily extorted."—[Official Report, 30 January 1946; Vol. 418, c. 958.]
  Mr. Macmillan and Mr. Eden got it right. The history of the British coal industry has been bedevilled by that incestuous relationship between the National Union of

  795
  Mineworkers and the Labour party. Even now Opposition Front-Bench spokesmen cannot shake off the shackles of that relationship.
  Over the past 18 months or so, there has been an intense debate in the House and elsewhere about the future of our energy industries in general, and of the coal industry in particular. Many organisations have put forward their views in a constructive way. Most noticeable was the thorough and helpful report from the Trade and Industry Select Committee. We are also grateful to those who responded on the issues of pensions and concessionary fuel.
  Throughout that time, there has been one voice missing from the debate. We have not had a single constructive idea, not a single policy, not a single commitment from Labour party. We are told by the press that the Labour party is now being pulled, kicking and screaming, into the late 20th century. When will the Labour party have the guts to say anything positive at all on energy? There are those who say that it is fear that stops the Labour party from coming out with its views on energy. It is fear, some say, of the hon. Member for Bolsover. It is fear, others say, of a union leader whose union has not negotiated with management on a single issue since 1984.
  Mr. Hood: Whose fault is that?
  Mr. Eggar: The union's, I suggest. Listen. The right hon. Member for Islwyn (Mr. Kinnock), the ex-Leader of the Opposition, had it in for him. He summoned the courage in June to tell David Frost just what he thought of Mr. Scargill. The Independent headline heralded, "Kinnock says Scargill to blame over pit closures." The right hon. Gentleman said:
  "The way in which his part in the leadership of the NUM conducted the argument did ensure, in my view, first of all that the prophecy of massive mine closures came true".
  The 'question that the Labour party must answer is., if the Leader of the Opposition could say that in June 1993, where was such a statement during the strike of 1984–85? Why did not the Labour party make obvious then the position that was made obvious nine years later? Why did not it say something when it really mattered during that strike? The hon. Member for Bolsover may not have liked it, but perhaps the mining industry would have benefited from it.
  Perhaps I am being too harsh. perhaps it is not mere fear from which Opposition Front Benchers suffer, but stubbornness. Perhaps the Labour party and the hon. Member for Livingston recognise the overriding advantage of a market-based energy policy but are simply too stubborn to admit it, are too stubborn to own up to it and are too stubborn to acknowledge the success that privatisation and competition have brought to other industries. Perhaps they are too stuck in the past and too stubborn to concede that the private sector offers the best and the only chance for coal.
  I must give the hon. Member for Livingston his due. He did once have a definite view. He published a policy called "No Nukes", which stated that nuclear power was unneeded and uneconomic. That was in 1981. He once had a policy back in those heady days of 1981—but not now. He has not answered any of the questions that we have put to him from the Government Front Bench.
  Mr. Robin Cook rose—
  Mr. Eggar: The hon. Gentleman must wait. I shall give him plenty of chance to answer once I have asked the questions. No, I am not giving way.
  Mr. Cook rose—
  Madam Speaker: Order. The Minister is not giving way. Is that right?
  Mr. Eggar: Absolutely not. I will not give the hon. Gentleman—
  Mr. Cook rose—
  Madam Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman should not persist if the Minister is not giving way.
  Mr. Cook rose—
  Madam Speaker: Order.
  Mr. Cook: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. It may not be about a ruling of the Chair, but if it is the case that I should not rise when the Minister will not give way, the Minister should not ask questions and not be willing to face the answer to them.
  Mr. Eggar: I am willing to give way to the hon. Gentleman, but I have asked him a number of questions, going back debate after debate, and he has failed to answer a single question.
  Mr. Cook: Will the Minister give way?
  Mr. Eggar: I will give way, but let me ask my questions. I want the answers to them. This is my—
  Mr. Cook rose—
  Madam Speaker: Order. The hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) knows not to persist. The Minister is not giving way, apparently.
  Mr. Cook: On a point of order, Madam Speaker.
  Mr. Eggar rose—
  Madam Speaker: Order. I am listening to a point of order.
  Mr. Cook: The Minister distinctly said that he was willing to give way. That is why I rose again.
  Mr. Eggar: I want answers to my questions. Is the Labour party going to pour taxpayers' money into keeping uneconomic pits open? Is it committed to renationalisation? Privatisation is the way forward.
  Question put, That the Bill be now read a Second time:—
  The House divided: Ayes 319, Noes 282.

  Division No. 74]

  [9.59 pm

  AYES

  Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)

  Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)

  Aitken, Jonathan

  Baker, Rt Hon K. (Mole Valley)

  Alexander, Richard

  Baker, Nicholas (Dorset North)

  Alison, Rt Hon Michael (Selby)

  Baldry, Tony

  Allason, Rupert (Torbay)

  Banks, Matthew (Southport)

  Amess, David

  Banks, Robert (Harrogate)

  Arbuthnot, James

  Bates, Michael

  Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)

  Batiste, Spencer

  Arnold, Sir Thomas (Hazel Grv)

  Bellingham, Henry

  Ashby, David

  Bendall, Vivian

  Aspinwall, Jack

  Beresford, Sir Paul

  Atkins, Robert

  Biffen, Rt Hon John

  Atkinson, David (Bour'mouth E)

  Blackburn, Dr John G.

  797

  Body, Sir Richard

  Fry, Sir Peter

  Bonsor, Sir Nicholas

  Gale, Roger

  Booth, Hartley

  Gallie, Phil

  Boswell, Tim

  Gardiner, Sir George

  Bottomley, Rt Hon Virginia

  Garel-Jones, Rt Hon Tristan

  Bowden, Andrew

  Garnier, Edward

  Bowis, John

  Gill, Christopher

  Boyson, Rt Hon Sir Rhodes

  Gillan, Cheryl

  Brandreth, Gyles

  Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair

  Brazier, Julian

  Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles

  Bright, Graham

  Gorman, Mrs Teresa

  Brooke, Rt Hon Peter

  Gorst, John

  Brown, M. (Brigg & Cl'thorpes)

  Grant, Sir A. (Cambs SW)

  Browning, Mrs. Angela

  Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)

  Bruce, Ian (S Dorset)

  Greenway, John (Ryedale)

  Budgen, Nicholas

  Griffiths, Peter (Portsmouth, N)

  Burns, Simon

  Grylls, Sir Michael

  Burt, Alistair

  Gummer, Rt Hon John Selwyn

  Butler, Peter

  Hague, William

  Butterfill, John

  Hamilton, Rt Hon Sir Archie

  Carlisle, John (Luton North)

  Hamilton, Neil (Tatton)

  Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)

  Hampson, Dr Keith

  Carrington, Matthew

  Hanley, Jeremy

  Carttiss, Michael

  Hannam, Sir John

  Cash, William

  Hargreaves, Andrew

  Channon, Rt Hon Paul

  Harris, David

  Churchill, Mr

  Haselhurst, Alan

  Clappison, James

  Hawkins, Nick

  Clark, Dr Michael (Rochford)

  Hawksley, Warren

  Clarke, Rt Hon Kenneth (Ruclif)

  Hayes, Jerry

  Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey

  Heald, Oliver

  Coe, Sebastian

  Heath, Rt Hon Sir Edward

  Colvin, Michael

  Heathcoat-Amory, David

  Congdon, David

  Hendry, Charles

  Conway, Derek

  Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael

  Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)

  Hicks, Robert

  Coombs, Simon (Swindon)

  Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence L.

  Cope, Rt Hon Sir John

  Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas (G'tham)

  Cormack, Patrick

  Horam, John

  Couchman, James

  Hordern, Rt Hon Sir Peter

  Cran, James

  Howard, Rt Hon Michael

  Currie, Mrs Edwina (S D'by'ire)

  Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)

  Curry, David (Skipton & Ripon)

  Howell, Rt Hon David (G'dford)

  Davies, Quentin (Stamford)

  Howell, Sir Ralph (N Norfolk)

  Davis, David (Boothferry)

  Hughes Robert G. (Harrow W)

  Day, Stephen

  Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)

  Deva, Nirj Joseph

  Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)

  Devlin, Tim

  Hunter, Andrew

  Dickens, Geoffrey

  Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas

  Dicks, Terry

  Jack, Michael

  Dorrell, Stephen

  Jackson, Robert (Wantage)

  Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James

  Jenkin, Bernard

  Dover, Den

  Jessel, Toby

  Duncan, Alan

  Johnson Smith, Sir Geoffrey

  Duncan-Smith, Iain

  Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)

  Dunn, Bob

  Jones, Robert B. (W Hertfdshr)

  Durant, Sir Anthony

  Jopling, Rt Hon Michael

  Dykes, Hugh

  Kellett-Bowman, Dame Elaine

  Eggar, Tim

  Key, Robert

  Elletson, Harold

  Kilfedder, Sir James

  Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter

  King, Rt Hon Tom

  Evans, David (Welwyn Hatfield)

  Kirkhope, Timothy

  Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)

  Knapman, Roger

  Evans, Nigel (Ribble Valley)

  Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)

  Evans, Roger (Monmouth)

  Knight, Greg (Derby N)

  Evennett, David

  Knight, Dame Jill (Bir'm E'st'n)

  Faber, David

  Knox, Sir David

  Fabricant, Michael

  Kynoch, George (Kincardine)

  Fairbairn, Sir Nicholas

  Lait, Mrs Jacqui

  Fenner, Dame Peggy

  Lamont, Rt Hon Norman

  Field, Barry (Isle of Wight)

  Lang, Rt Hon Ian

  Fishburn, Dudley

  Lawrence, Sir Ivan

  Forman, Nigel

  Legg, Barry

  Forsyth, Michael (Stirling)

  Leigh, Edward

  Forth, Eric

  Lennox-Boyd, Mark

  Fowler, Rt Hon Sir Norman

  Lester, Jim (Broxtowe)

  Fox, Dr Liam (Woodspring)

  Lidington, David

  Fox, Sir Marcus (Shipley)

  Lilley, Rt Hon Peter

  Freeman, Rt Hon Roger

  Lloyd, Rt Hon Peter (Fareham)

  French, Douglas

  Luff, Peter

  798

  MacGregor, Rt Hon John

  Shepherd, Richard (Aldridge)

  Maclean, David

  Shersby, Michael

  McLoughlin, Patrick

  Sims, Roger

  McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick

  Skeet, Sir Trevor

  Madel, Sir David

  Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)

  Maitland, Lady Olga

  Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)

  Major, Rt Hon John

  Soames, Nicholas

  Malone, Gerald

  Speed, Sir Keith

  Mans, Keith

  Spencer, Sir Derek

  Marland, Paul

  Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)

  Marlow, Tony

  Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)

  Marshall, John (Hendon S)

  Spink, Dr Robert

  Marshall, Sir Michael (Arundel)

  Spring, Richard

  Martin, David (Portsmouth S)

  Sproat, Iain

  Mates, Michael

  Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)

  Mawhinney, Rt Hon Dr Brian

  Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John

  Mellor, Rt Hon David

  Steen, Anthony

  Merchant, Piers

  Stephen, Michael

  Milligan, Stephen

  Stern, Michael

  Mills, Iain

  Stewart, Allan

  Mitchell, Andrew (Gedling)

  Streeter, Gary

  Mitchell, Sir David (Hants NW)

  Sumberg, David

  Moate, Sir Roger

  Sweeney, Walter

  Monro, Sir Hector

  Sykes, John

  Montgomery, Sir Fergus

  Tapsell, Sir Peter

  Moss, Malcolm

  Taylor, Ian (Esher)

  Needham, Richard

  Taylor, John M. (Solihull)

  Neubert, Sir Michael

  Taylor, Sir Teddy (Southend, E)

  Newton, Rt Hon Tony

  Temple-Morris, Peter

  Nicholls, Patrick

  Thomason, Roy

  Nicholson, David (Taunton)

  Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)

  Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)

  Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)

  Norris, Steve

  Thurnham, Peter

  Onslow, Rt Hon Sir Cranley

  Townend, John (Bridlington)

  Oppenheim, Phillip

  Townsend, Cyril D. (Bexl'yh'th)

  Ottaway, Richard

  Tracey, Richard

  Page, Richard

  Tredinnick, David

  Paice, James

  Trend, Michael

  Patnick, Irvine

  Trotter, Neville

  Patten, Rt Hon John

  Twinn, Dr Ian

  Pattie, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey

  Vaughan, Sir Gerard

  Pawsey, James

  Viggers, Peter

  Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth

  Waldegrave, Rt Hon William

  Pickles, Eric

  Walden, George

  Porter, Barry (Wirral S)

  Waller, Gary

  Porter, David (Waveney)

  Ward, John

  Portillo, Rt Hon Michael

  Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)

  Powell, William (Corby)

  Waterson, Nigel

  Rathbone, Tim

  Watts, John

  Redwood, Rt Hon John

  Wells, Bowen

  Ronton, Rt Hon Tim

  Wheeler, Rt Hon Sir John

  Richards, Rod

  Whitney, Ray

  Riddick, Graham

  Whittingdale, John

  Rifkind, Rt Hon. Malcolm

  Widdecombe, Ann

  Robathan, Andrew

  Wiggin, Sir Jerry

  Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn

  Wilkinson, John

  Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)

  Willetts, David

  Robinson, Mark (Somerton)

  Wilshire, David

  Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)

  Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)

  Rowe, Andrew (Mid Kent)

  Winterton, Nicholas (Macc'f'ld)

  Rumbold, Rt Hon Dame Angela

  Wolfson, Mark

  Ryder, Rt Hon Richard

  Wood, Timothy

  Sackville, Tom

  Yeo, Tim

  Sainsbury, Rt Hon Tim

  Young, Rt Hon Sir George

  Scott, Rt Hon Nicholas

  Shaw, David (Dover)

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)

  Mr. Sydney Chapman and Mr. Andrew MacKay.

  Shephard, Rt Hon Gillian

  Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)

  NOES

  Abbott, Ms Diane

  Ashdown, Rt Hon Paddy

  Adams, Mrs Irene

  Ashton, Joe

  Ainger, Nick

  Austin-Walker, John

  Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)

  Banks, Tony (Newham NW)

  Allen, Graham

  Barnes, Harry

  Alton, David

  Barron, Kevin

  Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)

  Battle, John

  Anderson, Ms Janet (Ros'dale)

  Bayley, Hugh

  Armstrong, Hilary

  Beckett, Rt Hon Margaret

  799

  Beith, Rt Hon A. J.

  Garrett, John

  Bell, Stuart

  George, Bruce

  Benn, Rt Hon Tony

  Gerrard, Neil

  Bennett, Andrew F.

  Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John

  Benton, Joe

  Godman, Dr Norman A.

  Bermingham, Gerald

  Godsiff, Roger

  Berry, Dr. Roger

  Golding, Mrs Llin

  Betts, Clive

  Gordon, Mildred

  Blair, Tony

  Gould, Bryan

  Blunkett, David

  Graham, Thomas

  Boateng, Paul

  Grant, Bernie (Tottenham)

  Boyes, Roland

  Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)

  Bradley, Keith

  Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

  Bray, Dr Jeremy

  Grocott, Bruce

  Brown, Gordon (Dunfermline E)

  Gunnell, John

  Brown, N. (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)

  Hain, Peter

  Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)

  Hall, Mike

  Burden, Richard

  Hanson, David

  Byers, Stephen

  Hardy, Peter

  Caborn, Richard

  Harman, Ms Harriet

  Callaghan, Jim

  Harvey, Nick

  Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

  Hattersley, Rt Hon Roy

  Campbell, Menzies (Fife NE)

  Henderson, Doug

  Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

  Heppell, John

  Campbell-Savours, D. N.

  Hill, Keith (Streatham)

  Canavan, Dennis

  Hinchliffe, David

  Cann, Jamie

  Hoey, Kate

  Carlile, Alexander (Montgomry)

  Hogg, Norman (Cumbernauld)

  Chisholm, Malcolm

  Home Robertson, John

  Clapham, Michael

  Hood, Jimmy

  Clark, Dr David (South Shields)

  Hoon, Geoffrey

  Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)

  Howarth, George (Knowsley N)

  Clarke, Tom (Monklands W)

  Howells, Dr. Kim (Pontypridd)

  Clelland, David

  Hoyle, Doug

  Clwyd, Mrs Ann

  Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

  Coffey, Ann

  Hughes, Roy (Newport E)

  Cohen, Harry

  Hughes, Simon (Southwark)

  Cook, Frank (Stockton N)

  Hutton, John

  Cook, Robin (Livingston)

  Ingram, Adam

  Corbett, Robin

  Jackson, Glenda (H'stead)

  Corbyn, Jeremy

  Jackson, Helen (Shef'ld, H)

  Cousins, Jim

  Jamieson, David

  Cox, Tom

  Janner, Greville

  Cryer, Bob

  Jones, Barry (Alyn and D'side)

  Cummings, John

  Jones, leuan Wyn (Ynys Môn)

  Cunliffe, Lawrence

  Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)

  Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)

  Jones, Lynne (B'ham S O)

  Dafis, Cynog

  Jones, Martyn (Clwyd, SW)

  Darling, Alistair

  Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)

  Davidson, Ian

  Jowell, Tessa

  Davies, Bryan (Oldham C'tral)

  Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald

  Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)

  Keen, Alan

  Davies, Ron (Caerphilly)

  Kennedy, Charles (Ross,C&S)

  Davis, Terry (B'ham, H'dge H'l)

  Kennedy, Jane (Lpool Brdgn)

  Denham, John

  Khabra, Piara S.

  Dewar, Donald

  Kilfoyle, Peter

  Dixon, Don

  Kinnock, Rt Hon Neil (Islwyn)

  Dobson, Frank

  Kirkwood, Archy

  Donohoe, Brian H.

  Leighton, Ron

  Dowd, Jim

  Lestor, Joan (Eccles)

  Dunnachie, Jimmy

  Lewis, Terry

  Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth

  Litherland, Robert

  Eagle, Ms Angela

  Livingstone, Ken

  Eastham, Ken

  Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)

  Enright, Derek

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Etherington, Bill

  Lynne, Ms Liz

  Evans, John (St Helens N)

  McAllion, John

  Ewing, Mrs Margaret

  McAvoy, Thomas

  Fatchett, Derek

  McCartney, Ian

  Faulds, Andrew

  Macdonald, Calum

  Field, Frank (Birkenhead)

  McFall, John

  Fisher, Mark

  McKelvey, William

  Flynn, Paul

  Mackinlay, Andrew

  Foster, Rt Hon Derek

  McLeish, Henry

  Foster, Don (Bath)

  Maclennan, Robert

  Foulkes, George

  McMaster, Gordon

  Fraser, John

  McNamara, Kevin

  Fyfe, Maria

  McWilliam, John

  Galbraith, Sam

  Madden, Max

  Gapes, Mike

  Maddock, Mrs Diana

  800

  Mahon, Alice

  Roche, Mrs. Barbara

  Mandelson, Peter

  Rogers, Allan

  Marek, Dr John

  Rooker, Jeff

  Marshall, David (Shettleston)

  Rooney, Terry

  Marshall, Jim (Leicester, S)

  Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

  Martin, Michael J. (Springburn)

  Rowlands, Ted

  Martlew, Eric

  Ruddock, Joan

  Maxton, John

  Sedgemore, Brian

  Meacher, Michael

  Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert

  Michael, Alun

  Shore, Rt Hon Peter

  Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)

  Short, Clare

  Michie, Mrs Ray (Argyll Bute)

  Simpson, Alan

  Milburn, Alan

  Skinner, Dennis

  Miller, Andrew

  Smith, Andrew (Oxford E)

  Mitchell, Austin (Gt Grimsby)

  Smith, C. (Isl'ton S & F'sbury)

  Moonie, Dr Lewis

  Smith, Rt Hon John (M'kl'ds E)

  Morgan, Rhodri

  Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

  Morley, Elliot

  Snape, Peter

  Morris, Rt Hon A. (Wy'nshawe)

  Soley, Clive

  Morris, Estelle (B'ham Yardley)

  Spearing, Nigel

  Morris, Rt Hon J. (Aberavon)

  Spellar, John

  Mowlam, Marjorie

  Squire, Rachel (Dunfermline W)

  Mudie, George

  Steel, Rt Hon Sir David

  Mullin, Chris

  Steinberg, Gerry

  Murphy, Paul

  Stevenson, George

  Oakes, Rt Hon Gordon

  Stott, Roger

  O'Brien, Michael (N Wkshire)

  Strang, Dr. Gavin

  O'Brien, William (Normanton)

  Straw, Jack

  O'Hara, Edward

  Taylor, Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)

  Olner, William

  Taylor, Matthew (Truro)

  O'Neill, Martin

  Thompson, Jack (Wansbeck)

  Orme, Rt Hon Stanley

  Tipping, Paddy

  Parry, Robert

  Turner, Dennis

  Patchett, Terry

  Tyler, Paul

  Pendry, Tom

  Vaz, Keith

  Pickthall, Colin

  Walker, Rt Hon Sir Harold

  Pike, Peter L.

  Walley, Joan

  Pope, Greg

  Wardell, Gareth (Gower)

  Powell, Ray (Ogmore)

  Wareing, Robert N

  Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lew'm E)

  Watson, Mike

  Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

  Wicks, Malcolm

  Prescott, John

  Wigley, Dafydd

  Primarolo, Dawn

  Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Sw'n W)

  Purchase, Ken

  Williams, Alan W (Carmarthen)

  Quin, Ms Joyce

  Wilson, Brian

  Radice, Giles

  Winnick, David

  Randall, Stuart

  Wise, Audrey

  Raynsford, Nick

  Worthington, Tony

  Redmond, Martin

  Wray, Jimmy

  Reid, Dr John

  Wright, Dr Tony

  Rendel, David

  Richardson, Jo

  Tellers for the Noes:

  Robertson, George (Hamilton)

  Mr. Alan Meale and Mr. Eric Illsley.

  Robinson, Geoffrey (Co'try NW)

  Question accordingly agreed to.
  Bill read a Second time and committed to a Standing Committee, pursuant to Standing Order No. 61 (Committal of Bills).

  BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
  Motion made, and Question put,
  That, at this day's sitting, the Motion relating to Coal Industry Bill [Ways and Means] may be proceeded with, though opposed, until any hour.—[Mr. Patnick]
  The House divided: Ayes 315, Noes 278.

  Division No. 75]

  [10.17 pm

  AYES

  Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)

  Aspinwall, Jack

  Aitken, Jonathan

  Atkins, Robert

  Alexander, Richard

  Atkinson, David (Bour'mouth E)

  Alison, Rt Hon Michael (Selby)

  Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)

  Allason, Rupert (Torbay)

  Baker, Rt Hon K. (Mole Valley)

  Amess, David

  Baker, Nicholas (Dorset North)

  Arbuthnot, James

  Baldry, Tony

  Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)

  Banks, Matthew (Southport)

  Arnold, Sir Thomas (Hazel Grv)

  Banks, Robert (Harrogate)

  Ashby, David

  Bates, Michael

  801

  Batiste, Spencer

  Forth, Eric

  Bellingnam, Henry

  Fowler, Rt Hon Sir Norman

  Bendall, Vivian

  Fox, Dr Liam (Woodspring)

  Beresford, Sir Paul

  Fox, Sir Marcus (Shipley)

  Biffen, Rt Hon John

  Freeman, Rt Hon Roger

  Blackburn, Dr John G.

  French, Douglas

  Body, Sir Richard

  Fry, Sir Peter

  Bonsor, Sir Nicholas

  Gale, Roger

  Booth, Hartley

  Gallie, Phil

  Boswell, Tim

  Gardiner, Sir George

  Bottomley, Rt Hon Virginia

  Garel-Jones, Rt Hon Tristan

  Bowden, Andrew

  Garnier, Edward

  Bowis, John

  Gill, Christopher

  Boyson, Rt Hon Sir Rhodes

  Gillan, Cheryl

  Brandreth, Gyles

  Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair

  Brazier, Julian

  Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles

  Bright, Graham

  Gorman, Mrs Teresa

  Brooke, Rt Hon Peter

  Gorst, John

  Brown, M. (Brigg & Cl'thorpes)

  Grant, Sir A. (Cambs SW)

  Browning, Mrs. Angela

  Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)

  Bruce, Ian (S Dorset)

  Greenway, John (Ryedale)

  Budgen, Nicholas

  Griffiths, Peter (Portsmouth, N)

  Burns, Simon

  Grylls, Sir Michael

  Burt, Alistair

  Gummer, Rt Hon John Selwyn

  Butcher, John

  Hague, William

  Butler, Peter

  Hamilton, Rt Hon Sir Archie

  Butterfill, John

  Hamilton, Neil (Tatton)

  Carlisle, John (Luton North)

  Hampson, Dr Keith

  Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)

  Hanley, Jeremy

  Carrington, Matthew

  Hannam, Sir John

  Cash, William

  Harris, David

  Channon, Rt Hon Paul

  Haselhurst, Alan

  Churchill, Mr

  Hawkins, Nick

  Clappison, James

  Hawksley, Warren

  Clark, Dr Michael (Rochford)

  Hayes, Jerry

  Clarke, Rt Hon Kenneth (Ruclif)

  Heald, Oliver

  Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey

  Heath, Rt Hon Sir Edward

  Coe, Sebastian

  Heathcoat-Amory, David

  Colvin, Michael

  Hendry, Charles

  Congdon, David

  Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael

  Conway, Derek

  Hicks, Robert

  Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)

  Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence L.

  Coombs, Simon (Swindon)

  Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas (G'tham)

  Cope, Rt Hon Sir John

  Horam, John

  Cormack, Patrick

  Hordern, Rt Hon Sir Peter

  Couchman, James

  Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)

  Cran, James

  Howell, Rt Hon David (G'dford)

  Currie, Mrs Edwina (S D'by'ire)

  Howell, Sir Ralph (N Norfolk)

  Curry, David (Skipton & Ripon)

  Hughes Robert G. (Harrow W)

  Davies, Quentin (Stamford)

  Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)

  Davis, David (Boothferry)

  Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)

  Day, Stephen

  Hunter, Andrew

  Deva, Nirj Joseph

  Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas

  Devlin, Tim

  Jack, Michael

  Dickens, Geoffrey

  Jackson, Robert (Wantage)

  Dicks, Terry

  Jenkin, Bernard

  Dorrell, Stephen

  Jessel, Toby

  Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James

  Johnson Smith, Sir Geoffrey

  Dover, Den

  Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)

  Duncan, Alan

  Jones, Robert B. (W Hertfdshr)

  Duncan-Smith, Iain

  Jopling, Rt Hon Michael

  Dunn, Bob

  Kellett-Bowman, Dame Elaine

  Durant, Sir Anthony

  Key, Robert

  Dykes, Hugh

  Kilfedder, Sir James

  Eggar, Tim

  King, Rt Hon Tom

  Elletson, Harold

  Kirkhope, Timothy

  Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter

  Knapman, Roger

  Evans, David (Welwyn Hatfield)

  Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)

  Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)

  Knight, Greg (Derby N)

  Evans, Nigel (Ribble Valley)

  Knight, Dame Jill (Bir'm E'st'n)

  Evans, Roger (Monmouth)

  Knox, Sir David

  Evennett, David

  Kynoch, George (Kincardine)

  Faber, David

  Lait, Mrs Jacqui

  Fabricant, Michael

  Lamont, Rt Hon Norman

  Fairbairn Sir Nicholas

  Lang, Rt Hon Ian

  Fenner, Dame Peggy

  Lawrence, Sir Ivan

  Field, Barry (Isle of Wight)

  Legg, Barry

  Fishburn, Dudley

  Leigh, Edward

  Forman, Nigel

  Lennox-Boyd, Mark

  Forsyth, Michael (Stirling)

  Lester, Jim (Broxtowe)

  802

  Lidington, David

  Shephard, Rt Hon Gillian

  Lloyd, Rt Hon Peter (Fareham)

  Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)

  Luff, Peter

  Shepherd, Richard (Aldridge)

  MacGregor, Rt Hon John

  Shersby, Michael

  Maclean, David

  Sims, Roger

  McLoughlin, Patrick

  Skeet, Sir Trevor

  McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick

  Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)

  Madel, Sir David

  Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)

  Maitland, Lady Olga

  Soames, Nicholas

  Major, Rt Hon John

  Speed, Sir Keith

  Malone, Gerald

  Spencer, Sir Derek

  Mans, Keith

  Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)

  MarLand, Paul

  Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)

  Martow, Tony

  Spink, Dr Robert

  Marshall, John (Hendon S)

  Spring, Richard

  Marshall, Sir Michael (Arundel)

  Sproat, Iain

  Martin, David (Portsmouth S)

  Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)

  Mates, Michael

  Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John

  Mawhinney, Rt Hon Dr Brian

  Steen, Anthony

  Mellor, Rt Hon David

  Stephen, Michael

  Merchant, Piers

  Stern, Michael

  Milligan, Stephen

  Stewart, Allan

  Mills, Iain

  Streeter, Gary

  Mitchell, Andrew (Gedling)

  Sumberg, David

  Mitchell, Sir David (Hants NW)

  Sweeney, Walter

  Moate, Sir Roger

  Sykes, John

  Monro, Sir Hector

  Tapsell, Sir Peter

  Montgomery, Sir Fergus

  Taylor, Ian (Esher)

  Moss, Malcolm

  Taylor, John M. (Solihull)

  Needham, Richard

  Taylor, Sir Teddy (Southend, E)

  Neubert, Sir Michael

  Temple-Morris, Peter

  Newton, Rt Hon Tony

  Thomason, Roy

  Nicholls, Patrick

  Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)

  Nicholson, David (Taunton)

  Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)

  Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)

  Thurnham, Peter

  Norris, Steve

  Townend, John (Bridlington)

  Onslow, Rt Hon Sir Cranley

  Townsend, Cyril D. (Bexl'yh'th)

  Oppenheim, Phillip

  Tracey, Richard

  Ottaway, Richard

  Tredinnick, David

  Page, Richard

  Trend, Michael

  Paice, James

  Trotter, Neville

  Patnick, Irvine

  Twinn, Dr Ian

  Patten, Rt Hon John

  Vaughan, Sir Gerard

  Pattie, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey

  Viggers, Peter

  Pawsey, James

  Waldegrave, Rt Hon William

  Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth

  Walden, George

  Pickles, Eric

  Waller, Gary

  Porter, Barry (Wirral S)

  Ward, John

  Porter, David (Waveney)

  Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)

  Portillo, Rt Hon Michael

  Waterson, Nigel

  Powell, William (Corby)

  Watts, John

  Rathbone, Tim

  Wells, Bowen

  Redwood, Rt Hon John

  Wheeler, Rt Hon Sir John

  Renton, Rt Hon Tim

  Whitney, Ray

  Richards, Rod

  Whittingdale, John

  Riddick, Graham

  Widdecombe, Ann

  Rifkind, Rt Hon. Malcolm

  Wiggin, Sir Jerry

  Robathan, Andrew

  Wilkinson, John

  Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn

  Willetts, David

  Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)

  Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)

  Robinson, Mark (Somerton)

  Winterton, Nicholas (Macc'f'ld)

  Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxboume)

  Wolfson, Mark

  Rowe, Andrew (Mid Kent)

  Wood, Timothy

  Rumbold, Rt Hon Dame Angela

  Yeo, Tim

  Ryder, Rt Hon Richard

  Young, Rt Hon Sir George

  Sackville, Tom

  Sainsbury, Rt Hon Tim

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Scott, Rt Hon Nicholas

  Mr. Sydney Chapman and Mr. Andrew MacKay.

  Shaw, David (Dover)

  Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)

  NOES

  Abbott, Ms Diane

  Armstrong, Hilary

  Adams, Mrs Irene

  Ashdown, Rt Hon Paddy

  Ainger, Nick

  Ashton, Joe

  Ainsworth, Robert (Cov"try NE)

  Austin-Walker, John

  Allen, Graham

  Banks, Tony (Newham NW)

  Alton, David

  Barnes, Harry

  Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)

  Barron, Kevin

  Anderson, Ms Janet (Ros'dale)

  Battle, John

  803

  Bayley, Hugh

  Ewing, Mrs Margaret

  Beckett, Rt Hon Margaret

  Fatchett, Derek

  Beith, Rt Hon A. J.

  Faulds, Andrew

  Bell, Stuart

  Field, Frank (Birkenhead)

  Benn, Rt Hon Tony

  Fisher, Mark

  Bennett, Andrew F.

  Flynn, Paul

  Benton, Joe

  Foster, Rt Hon Derek

  Bermingham, Gerald

  Foster, Don (Bath)

  Berry, Dr. Roger

  Foulkes, George

  Betts, Clive

  Fraser, John

  Blair, Tony

  Fyfe, Maria

  Blunkett, David

  Galbraith, Sam

  Boateng, Paul

  Gapes, Mike

  Boyes, Roland

  Garrett, John

  Bradley, Keith

  George, Bruce

  Bray, Dr Jeremy

  Gerrard, Neil

  Brown, Gordon (Dunfermline E)

  Gilbert, Rt Hon Dr John

  Brown, N. (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)

  Godman, Dr Norman A.

  Bruce, Malcolm (Gordon)

  Godsiff, Roger

  Burden, Richard

  Golding, Mrs Llin

  Byers, Stephen

  Gordon, Mildred

  Caborn, Richard

  Gould, Bryan

  Callaghan, Jim

  Graham, Thomas

  Campbell, Mrs Anne (C'bridge)

  Grant, Bernie (Tottenham)

  Campbell, Menzies (Fife NE)

  Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)

  Campbell, Ronnie (Blyth V)

  Griffiths, Win (Bridgend)

  Campbell-Savours, D. N.

  Grocott, Bruce

  Canavan, Dennis

  Gunnell, John

  Cann, Jamie

  Hain, Peter

  Carlile, Alexander (Montgomry)

  Hall, Mike

  Chisholm, Malcolm

  Hanson, David

  Clapham, Michael

  Hardy, Peter

  Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)

  Harman, Ms Harriet

  Clarke, Tom (Monklands W)

  Harvey, Nick

  Clelland, David

  Henderson, Doug

  Clwyd, Mrs Ann

  Heppell, John

  Coffey, Ann

  Hill, Keith (Streatham)

  Cohen, Harry

  Hinchliffe, David

  Cook, Frank (Stockton N)

  Hoey, Kate

  Cook, Robin (Livingston)

  Hogg, Norman (Cumbernauld)

  Corbett, Robin

  Home Robertson, John

  Corbyn, Jeremy

  Hood, Jimmy

  Cousins, Jim

  Hoon, Geoffrey

  Cox, Tom

  Howarth, George (Knowsley N)

  Cryer, Bob

  Howells, Dr. Kim (Pontypridd)

  Cummings, John

  Hoyle, Doug

  Cunliffe, Lawrence

  Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

  Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)

  Hughes, Roy (Newport E)

  Dafis, Cynog

  Hughes, Simon (Southwark)

  Darling, Alistair

  Hutton, John

  Davidson, Ian

  Ingram, Adam

  Davies, Bryan (Oldham C'tral)

  Jackson, Glenda (H'stead)

  Davies, Rt Hon Denzil (Llanelli)

  Jackson, Helen (Shef'ld, H)

  Davies, Ron (Caerphilly)

  Jamieson, David

  Davis, Terry (B'ham, H'dge H'l)

  Janner, Greville

  Denham, John

  Jones, Barry (Alyn and D'side)

  Dixon, Don

  Jones, leuan Wyn (Ynys Môn)

  Dobson, Frank

  Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)

  Donohoe, Brian H.

  Jones, Lynne (B'ham S O)

  Dowd, Jim

  Jones, Martyn (Clwyd, SW)

  Dunnachie, Jimmy

  Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)

  Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth

  Jowell, Tessa

  Eagle, Ms Angela

  Kaufman, Rt Hon Gerald

  Eastham, Ken

  Keen, Alan

  Enright, Derek

  Kennedy, Charles (Ross.C&S)

  Etherington, Bill

  Kennedy, Jane (Lpool Brdgn)

  Evans, John (St Helens N)

  Khabra, Piara S.

  804

  Kilfoyle, Peter

  Primarolo, Dawn

  Kinnock, Rt Hon Neil (Islwyn)

  Purchase, Ken

  Leighton, Ron

  Quin, Ms Joyce

  Lestor, Joan (Eccles)

  Radice, Giles

  Lewis, Terry

  Randall, Stuart

  Litherland, Robert

  Raynsford, Nick

  Livingstone, Ken

  Redmond, Martin

  Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)

  Reid, Dr John

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Rendel, David

  Lynne, Ms Liz

  Richardson, Jo

  McAllion, John

  Robertson, George (Hamilton)

  McAvoy, Thomas

  Robinson, Geoffrey (Co'try NW)

  McCartney, Ian

  Roche, Mrs. Barbara

  Macdonald, Calum

  Rogers, Allan

  McFall, John

  Rooker, Jeff

  McKelvey, William

  Rooney, Terry

  Mackinlay, Andrew

  Ross, Ernie (Dundee W)

  McLeish, Henry

  Rowlands, Ted

  Maclennan, Robert

  Ruddock, Joan

  McMaster, Gordon

  Salmond, Alex

  McNamara, Kevin

  Sedgemore, Brian

  McWilliam, John

  Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert

  Madden, Max

  Short, Clare

  Maddock, Mrs Diana

  Simpson, Alan

  Mahon, Alice

  Skinner, Dennis

  Mandelson, Peter

  Smith, Andrew (Oxford E)

  Marek, Dr John

  Smith, C. (Isl'ton S & F'sbury)

  Marshall, David (Shettleston)

  Smith, Rt Hon John (M'kl'ds E)

  Marshall, Jim (Leicester, S)

  Smith, Llew (Blaenau Gwent)

  Martin, Michael J. (Springburn)

  Snape, Peter

  Martlew, Eric

  Soley, Clive

  Maxton, John

  Spearing, Nigel

  Meacher, Michael

  Spellar, John

  Michael, Alun

  Squire, Rachel (Dunfermline W)

  Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)

  Steel, Rt Hon Sir David

  Michie, Mrs Ray (Argyll Bute)

  Steinberg, Gerry

  Milburn, Alan

  Stevenson, George

  Miller, Andrew

  Stott, Roger

  Mitchell, Austin (Gt Grimsby)

  Strang, Dr. Gavin

  Moonie, Dr Lewis

  Straw, Jack

  Morgan, Rhodri

  Taylor, Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)

  Morley, Elliot

  Taylor, Matthew (Truro)

  Morris, Rt Hon A. (Wy'nshawe)

  Thompson, Jack (Wansbeck)

  Morris, Estelle (B'ham Yardley)

  Tipping, Paddy

  Morris, Rt Hon J. (Aberavon)

  Turner, Dennis

  Mowlam, Marjorie

  Tyler, Paul

  Mudie, George

  Vaz, Keith

  Mullin, Chris

  Walker, Rt Hon Sir Harold

  Murphy, Paul

  Walley, Joan

  Oakes, Rt Hon Gordon

  Wardell, Gareth (Gower)

  O'Brien, Michael (N W'kshire)

  Wareing, Robert N

  O'Brien, William (Normanton)

  Watson, Mike

  O'Hara, Edward

  Wicks, Malcolm

  Olner, William

  Wigley, Dafydd

  O'Neill, Martin

  Williams, Rt Hon Alan (Sw'n W)

  Orme, Rt Hon Stanley

  Williams, Alan W (Carmarthen)

  Parry, Robert

  Wilson, Brian

  Patchett, Terry

  Winnick, David

  Pendry, Tom

  Wise, Audrey

  Pickthall, Colin

  Worthington, Tony

  Pike, Peter L.

  Wray, Jimmy

  Pope, Greg

  Wright, Dr Tony

  Powell, Ray (Ogmore)

  Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lew'm E)

  Tellers for the Noes:

  Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

  Mr. Alan Meale and Mr. Eric Illsley.

  Prescott, John

  Question accordingly agreed to.

  Coal Industry Bill [Money]
  Queen's Recommendation having been signified—
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Coal Industry Bill ("the Act"), it is expedient to authorise—
  (1) the payment out of money provided by Parliament of the following, namely—

  (a) sums required by the Secretary of State for paying to the Coal Authority established by the Act amounts required by that Authority for carrying out its functions;

  (b) expenses incurred by the Treasury or the Secretary of State in consequence of provision made by the Act for the acquisition of, or of rights to subscribe for, securities of successor companies;

  (c) sums required by the Secretary of State for making grants to the British Coal Corporation and to successor companies which are wholly owned by the Crown;

  (d) sums required by the Secretary of State for making payments for purposes connected with the supply pf concessionary coal and the payment of sums in lieu of concessionary coal;

  (e) sums required by the Secretary of State for making any payment of compensation for loss of office—

  (i) to a person who ceases to hold office as a chairman or member of the Corporation, or

  (ii) to the person who is the chairman of the Domestic Coal Consumers' Council when it ceases to exist;

  (f) sums required by the Secretary of State for making payments in pursuance of arrangements entered into by him for securing that the assets of an existing pension scheme are sufficient for meeting pension obligations arising under the scheme;

  (g) administrative expenses incurred by the Secretary of State or the Treasury in consequence of the provisions of the Act;

  (h) sums required by any Minister of the Crown or Government department for meeting obligations arising in consequence of that Minister or department becoming entitled or subject, in accordance with a scheme under the Act, to any property, rights or liabilities;

  (i) increases attributable to the Act in the sums payable out of money so provided under any other Act;

  (2) the extinguishment of liabilities of the British Coal Corporation in respect of—

  (a) sums lent to that Corporation out of money provided by Parliament;

  (b) sums which are to be taken as having been so lent; and

  (c) interest in respect of any such sums;

  (3) the issuing out of the National Loans Fund of sums required by the Secretary of State for making loans to a successor company at a time when it is wholly owned by the Crown;
  (4) the charging on and issuing out of the Consolidated Fund of sums required by the Treasury for fulfilling such guarantees given by them for the discharge of financial obligations in connection with sums borrowed by a successor company as are given in respect of such a company at a time when it is wholly owned by the Crown.
  In this Resolution "successor company" means any company to whom property, rights or liabilities of the British Coal Corporation or any of its wholly-owned subsidiaries are transferred in accordance with a scheme under the Act and at a time when the company is wholly owned by the Crown.—[Mr. Arbuthnot.]
  10.30 pm
  Mr. Derek Enright: One has only to read the money resolution to realise what is wrong with the privatisation of the coal industry. The Government need not look far beyond the end of their noses—if, indeed, they need to look that far.
  We need to take a long-term view of our energy needs. We should not consider coal, electricity, nuclear power or gas in isolation, but should take account of our long-term
  806
  energy needs in their entirety. That is very far from what is suggested in the resolution. Britain requires an integrated energy policy. [Interruption.]
  I was silent for a moment to give Government Front-Benchers a little time to cool down so that they can prepare themselves to listen to my important words, just in case they believe that they are able to reply to the strength of our arguments.
  One of the most important questions is whether Government Front Benchers can cite any specialist from the energy world who says anything other than that, by the turn of the century, coal will once again be the main source of energy. Even if they cannot do so, the fact remains that the resolution would mean the running down of our coal resources. In other words, by the turn of the century we shall have made ourselves utterly dependent on foreign resources for our energy needs.
  Such a situation is dangerous but not untypical of what is happening at the moment, or of the Government's policy. It is why, for example, we lost the race for the European bank. We lost the race because of our absurdities and our ridiculous posture on Maastricht. We also lost because London is a short-term financial sector, whereas Frankfurt has always made it clear that it is a long-term financial centre. Our continental partners rightly chose Frankfurt as the location for the bank, and their decision was important. That is not merely symbolic but at the heart of the Government's failure to take this country into the next century.
  As many of my hon. Friends want to speak, I will briefly examine different aspects of Government policy. The gas industry was most unwilling to provide the electricity supply industry. That was the last thing it wanted, but it was prepared to make that provision at what it said was a commercial price. I thought that we had freed gas to operate in the marketplace, but a money resolution made the gas industry sell its product below the market price.
  The money resolution before the House will sell off the coal industry to a company with remarkably limited objectives, which cannot possibly pursue what is really needed in energy policy.
  Mr. Peter L. Pike: One problem with private coal mines is that they can rarely restore the environment properly at the end of their operations. Does my hon. Friend believe that the money resolution makes adequate provision to ensure adequate environmental restoration to British Coal standards?
  Mr. Enright: That would be possible, if the motion contained a single enabling factor giving the companies the money and powers to restore clapped-out coal mines—of which there are many in my constituency—to their previous state.
  The resolution provides no guarantee in respect of small social factors that still count in the local environment. It takes no account, for example, of the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation. The senior and junior Frickley bands really go back to basics, to coin a phrase. Those institutions take young people off the streets and give them something worth while to do, education and culture, and are enduring. I think also of Frickley Amateur Athletic, which is at the heart of football in that area.
  How much money would be needed to keep two bands going? Remarkably little. I am sorry that the Financial Secretary to the Treasury is not present. I also expected his

  807
  Parliamentary Private Secretary—the hon. Member for City of Chester (Mr. Brandreth)—to be present in support of his boss. The hon. Member of City of Chester had enough money given to his company, Unicorn Heritage, to support a football team and two bands into the next century.
  Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Janet Fookes): Order. The hon. Gentleman must not try my patience too much. The money resolution does not go as wide as the hon. Gentleman might want, and I ask him to confine his remarks to the motion.
  Mr. Enright: My complaint is that the money resolution does not cater for functions previously performed by British Coal in respect of bands, football teams, athletics, social welfare and pensions. It was apparently very easy for another Department to provide money that could be thrown down the drain and allow companies to go bankrupt. That money would have enabled two bands and one football team to continue for not 50 but 250 years, on the basis of the average amount that is currently given by British Coal as subvention, and should be given by the new body that is being established.
  It is scandalous that two hon. Members who are so closely associated with the motion do not see fit to give that money to my people in Frickley, who have suffered directly as a result of the Bill and the motion. There is no doubt that people in South Elmsall, South Kirby, Hemsworth, Featherstone and Havercroft have suffered particularly from the restrictions imposed by the inadequate creature that we are discussing.
  I feel very strongly about what the Government are doing. In their rush towards a crazed nationalisation that they have not justified—I appreciate that I cannot discuss it on this motion—they have taken no account of the lives that they have tossed aside, especially in constituencies such as mine. The smirking of public school Conservative Members is intolerable. I am not referring to the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Technology; I applaud his jolly nice secondary modern-school background. I am referring to the Minister for Energy, whose school motto is "Manners makyth man".
  Mr. D. N. Campbell-Savours: May we have that in Latin?
  Mr. Harry Barnes: Or Greek.
  Mr. Enright: "Manners makyth man" is the actual wording of the motto. It does not translate into Latin or Greek; it is the creation of a good and eminent English writer.
  The Minister displayed none of the virtues associated with "Manners makyth man". It means consideration for ordinary people—not just those who can take the money and make the profit, which is what the motion is all about, with no thought of protecting the five sites in my constituency—the only five green field sites—that will be opencast. Following the erection of the filthy muckstacks, we now have the craters; but we do not even have the consolation of seeing moon men land on them. We may have the consolation of seeing the junior Minister open those sites, but I warn him that that would be a dangerous task to undertake.
  Another important aspect has not been dealt with properly. I refer to the scientific research undertaken by British Coal. It was very successful, relying on a tradition
  808
  going back to Dr. Bronowski—who, although much maligned by the Daily Express, did superb work for British Coal very early on. The work on clean-coal technology, particularly that done at Grimethorpe, was a wonder, marvelled at by the rest of the world. The rest of the world bought it, and was grateful for it. What mention is it given in the motion? None at all.
  There is a simple reason. British Coal closed down Grimethorpe. The reason why Grimethorpe was closed down was simple: it was successful. It was going to show how one could use coal effectively and cleanly. That technology was thrown away. The people who will benefit are the Swedes and the French. That shows precisely why we cannot trust energy policy to the Government, and why this pathetic creature that is called a money resolution will not and should not survive. It should be beaten. I urge the House to throw it out as the puny creature that it is.
  10.44 pm
  Mr. Stuart Bell: It is always a pleasure, even a joy, to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Hemsworth (Mr. Enright). We felt at one stage that he was about to use a Latin phrase when he said, "Manners makyth man". When he was describing the Minister of State, I thought that he was going to say, "Profits makyth man" because to the Government profits are more important than manners. We have got used to that over the years.
  I am glad to say that my hon. Friend excluded the Under-Secretary from the accusation of having a public school background. We all looked at my hon. Friend aghast, if that is the right word, when he seemed about to suggest that the former miner about whom we have heard so much, who has come such a long way from the Back Benches to the Front Benches and who will take the Bill through Committee, went to public school. My hon. Friend the Member for Hemsworth pulled back and listed him as a former pupil of a secondary modern. I can feel a little superior, having gone to a grammar school; I got through the 11-plus.
  I shall come back to the money resolution, Madam Deputy Speaker. I know that it pleases your heart enormously that we stay on the script, the programme and the resolution before us.
  We heard a lot today from the President of the Board of Trade in the first instance about a £20,000 million investment in the coal industry since 1979. Our figures alshow £12,000 million investment in deep mining since 1974. The hon. Member for Bedfordshire, North (Sir T. Skeet) said in an intervention that £8,000 million of that had gone into machinery. The question was asked in a sedentary intervention on our side how much of that had gone into redundancy. How much of that money was not investment but redundancy money to pay off the miners, get them out of the pits and soften up the industry?
  When the President of the Board of Trade referred to the figure of £20,000 million, my hon. Friend the Member for Easington (Mr. Cummings) intervened to ask how, if that investment had been made in the coal mining industry, the Government could walk away from collieries and leave them in a state of desuetude—if, unlike my hon. Friend the Member for Hemsworth, I may use a word that comes from the Latin. How could they leave them to flood? How could they invest so much money in plant and machinery arid walk away from it?

  809
  The money resolution, the financial obligations in the resolution and the financial memorandum, which is part of the Bill, are not about money. They are about ideology. My hon. Friend the Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner), who was so highly praised by Lord Lawson in his autobiography—Lord Lawson enjoyed his interventions —was right to say that the Bill and the money resolution are more to do with ideology than money.
  If we were debating tonight the sale of British Petroleum shares, to add to the Government's piggy bank, we could say at least that there was merit in the Bill. If we were debating the sale of other assets of the state which Lord Stockton, to whom the Minister of State referred, called the family heirlooms or jewels—assets that would bring money into the coffers of the state and reduce the public sector borrowing requirement, we could say that at least there was merit in the Bill. There is no merit in the Bill or the money resolution, because the legislation is ideological.
  The President of the Board of Trade said that privatisation of the coal industry was in the manifesto, and that the Government had a mandate for it. What we say is this: we had a mandate in 1945 and nothing has given this, or any, Conservative Government the right to reverse the mandates of previous Governments and take us back to a past that we heard about from my hon. Friends. The Minister does not need to grimace. He can intervene later if he wishes.
  The mandate that the Government are trying to reverse is our mandate from many years ago, and they are doing so on ideological grounds. The financial memorandum to the Bill mentions the sum of about £70 million in respect to concessionary fuel for former British Coal employees. We believe that the figure should be £150 million.
  On pensions, the memorandum states:
  "The capital values of these liabilities are not expected to exceed £400 million and £45 million respectively."
  A whole host of financial obligations will reduce the impact of the privatisation and show that the Bill is ideologically and politically correct from the Government's point of view, but has no merit in financial terms.
  The money resolution is part of the sham of the Bill, which has nothing to do with raising money.
  Mr. Peter Hardy: Before my hon. Friend concludes, will he look at paragraph (4) of the resolution regarding the sums required for the purposes of providing a pension guarantee? My hon. Friend is probably more of an expert than I in that area.
  If there is an average retail price index of 4 or 4·5 per cent., in five out of every six years the pension fund could be expected to provide a surplus far in excess of the RPI. We have heard little from the Government today, or in the preceding weeks, but they are minded to take half the surplus of the pension fund. If that is the case, will my hon. Friend invite the Minister to tell us what the Government expect sub-paragraph (f) to cost and what they expect to get from their share of the miners pension fund during the next 10 or 12 years?
  Mr. Bell: I thank my hon. Friend for intervening in that way. I and other hon. Members in the House appreciated his moving account of the vesting day of 1947 when he gave his first speech, as I also remember that day. We
  810
  remember the great relief felt throughout the mining communities that the coal owners had gone. There was a blue flag on the masthead of our colliery and a cartoon at the time said, "Never come back." That message was directed to the coal owners. Opposition spokesmen stand at this Dispatch Box today with some sadness, with Members of Parliament for mining constituencies all around us, knowing that the coal owners will come back.
  The President of the Board of Trade said that nationalisation had been a failure. It was Conservative Governments' refusal to accept it and to change the management of British Coal—in some cases, their activities were worse than the coal owners of old—that was the failure. That conspiracy between the National Coal Board, as it was then, and Conservative Governments has undone the mining industry.
  To respond to my hon. Friend the Member for Wentworth (Mr. Hardy), that matter is a part of my speech. The financial memorandum contains this phrase:
  "The Bill provides, in return for the guarantee, for surplus assets in the modified schemes to be available to the Secretary of State"—
  who is acting in the guise of the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Treasury.
  The President of the Board of Trade and the Minister, when he summed up, referred to the interests of taxpayers, but they have no interest in pension funds that were built up by mine workers over many years. We shall point that out in Committee, as we have done on the Floor of the House.
  I know that other colleagues want to speak in the debate, which is important, so I shall be brief. The money resolution touches on many issues. I referred to pensions, and we have spoken to the trustees of the pension funds, who are not entirely happy with the Government's approach. They are also not entirely happy that the Minister wishes to appoint and dismiss members of the board and to handle the fund's surplus.
  The Minister of State, in his usual glib fashion, was saying from the Dispatch Box that there would be all types of guarantees for people in the pension fund; there would be index-linked pensions and guarantees. Then he mentioned a 50:50 split of the surplus. We shall examine those matters carefully as we go along, when we consider the financial memorandum and the money resolution before the House.
  Many of our colleagues spoke about water from the mines, especially in the north-east of England—the environmental liabilities. Where are the environmental liabilities in the money resolution and the financial memorandum? We shall consider that serious—as we see it—issue of pollution in the north, and the complications that that will pose for the privatisation of the industry. That is another subject to which we shall return with the Minister—I understand that he will serve on the Committee with us and that he will work with us in Committee.
  Concessionary coal has also been mentioned. I mentioned earlier the reference in the financial memorandum to the sum of £70 million. We believe that £150 million is involved, and we say that the current proposals on the table fall short of providing concessionaries with security in their entitlement to concessionary fuel and cash in lieu. We shall return to that and the lack of

  811
  protection, as we see it, for the entitlement of workers who are currently employed in the industry. That worries us; it will worry the Committee, and we will take that forward.
  We have also heard about the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation—CISWO. The interesting thing about CISWO is that the Minister did not quite know how to pronounce it. There was a great difficulty in the pronounciation. As my hon. Friend the Member for Wentworth (Mr. Hardy) says, it is pronounced "Siswo", not "Kiswo". We could have a lot of discussion about that. Nevertheless, it is a major subject that we shall consider.
  We say that the Bill as a whole, with the money resolution, should seek to continue the work of CISWO and ensure that it is adequately funded. As yet, as we see it, there are no satisfactory proposals which would give CISWO or a successor organisation a secure enough future with adequate funding.
  So the Minister can see—I am glad that he will be on the Committee—that, as we wend our way through the money resolution and through ways and means, and as we get through the Bill and into Committee, there will be enough sustenance for us. There will be enough fears to allay of pensioners, of people who receive concessionary fuel and of people who are worried about environmental liabilities.
  We promise, not a long hot summer for the Minister, but a chilly, lengthy winter.
  10.57 pm
  Mr. Geoffrey Dickens: I shall make a short contribution to the debate.
  Mr. Eric Illsley: More!
  Mr. Dickens: No; I shall not go on all night.
  The money resolution is central to the privatisation of the coal industry. One has to ask oneself why the coal industry needs to be privatised. If one thinks back to the days when the coal mining industry was nationalised, one has to remember that there were about 1,000 coal mines in the United Kingdom. Year after year, closure has followed closure. It is common knowledge that Lord Robens and the former Secretary of State for Energy, the right hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn), closed about one coal mine every 10 days. The right hon. Gentleman was Secretary of State for Energy for the Labour party: we must not forget that.
  We must not sit on the Conservative Benches taking lessons on why we should do this and why we should do that, without fighting back a little and reminding the coal mining industry why we need the money resolution. We need the resolution because, if we are to save the coal mining industry—hon. Members should remember that, even in the state in which it is today, it is still one of the largest coal mining industries in the world, and it will remain as such—we still need to safeguard the work force with a money resolution.
  The successor companies must have the wherewithal to safeguard pension funds and to ensure that the obligations are met, so that miners receive their proper pensions, whoever owns the coal mines. We have to ensure that the concessionary fuel that mining families have enjoyed over the years is still paid to those families, or money in lieu. That is why the money resolution is central to the Bill. If they want to save the mining industry, the Opposition should not vote against it, or make difficulties in
  812
  Committee. It is through the money resolution and in Committee that we shall safeguard the welfare of the work force in the mines.
  It may surprise Labour Members to know that I come from mining stock. I had relatives down the Ripley and the Alfreton mines, in Derbyshire. I do not need lectures from the Opposition about the interests of the coal mining industry, because I speak for my own flesh and blood. No, I did not go to university, either. I went to a secondary modern school, and I am quite proud of it, although I also wish that I had had a university education, because I know that the lack of it shows at times—although not so clearly as it shows every day of the week in Labour Members.
  The money resolution is central. We must ensure the continuation of the mining industry, because we must have a mix of fuel. The hon. Member for Hemsworth (Mr. Enright) talked about an energy policy, and we need oil, gas, nuclear power and coal—one could put those fuels in the reverse order if one liked. Never again must the United Kingdom be held to ransom by a year-long miners' strike that threatens to put out the lights and stop companies from running. Never again must we be placed in that position.
  Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Janet Fookes): Order. Before the hon. Gentleman takes off too far, I remind him that we are dealing with a money resolution. I should be grateful if he would return to that topic.
  Mr. Dickens: I am grateful to you for having drawn that to my attention, Madam Deputy Speaker. You are right. Just by chance, I was about to finish my speech, because I know how many Labour Members want to speak.
  Mr. Illsley: Has not the hon. Gentleman just let the cat out of the bag with his reference to the 1984 miners' strike? Obviously he intended to go on to refer to the 1974 strike, too. Is it not true that the privatisation of coal is related to those strikes, in that it is a way of getting back at the mining unions in revenge for those strikes, especially that of 1974?
  Mr. Dickens: The hon. Gentleman probably knows more about that question than I do, because in earlier days he was an adviser to Arthur Scargill in Barnsley.
  Mr. Enright: And a very good one, too. It was when Arthur Scargill lost my hon. Friend that he went astray.
  Mr. Dickens: I am trying to be brief, but clearly Opposition Members are enjoying my contribution.
  To answer the question asked by the hon. Member for Barnsley, Central (Mr. Illsley), we are privatising the coal industry for one reason alone. Whatever party is in power, politicians, in the form of the Department of Trade and Industry, are the worst people to help run industry. The sooner we get politicians off the back of industry the better. The DTI has done a reasonable job until now, but I am sure that private industry will do a good job in one respect.
  The mining industry is in a mess today because of its pitiful marketing of coal. It is no good digging coal if one cannot sell it. Private industry, with its management techniques and marketing skills, is far better able to market coal across Europe and to provide the coal mining industry with a future. As I finish my speech, all that I ask Labour Members to remember is that the future of the United Kingdom coal mining industry is in their hands today. If they want a future, they must allow it to carry on.
  Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Gentleman's peroration, but it is not relevant.
  11.3 pm
  Mr. Harry Barnes: It would be useful if, when hon. Members discussed the money resolution, they showed some sign of having read it. It is a funny old money resolution, because in some ways it says too much and is too open ended, yet in other ways it says too little.
  As my hon. Friend the Member for Hemsworth (Mr. Enright) pointed out some of the omissions in the motion, perhaps I ought to illustrate some of the ways in which the motion opens issues up too much and how they should be defined more clearly. It has been talked about it as a funny old money motion. A lot of funny old money is likely to be made out of the privatisation of mining, because the country has massive coal reserves. We are blocking off certain coal reserves off the Durham coast, but otherwise the coal reserves of deep-mined coal will remain underground for a future of opencast development.
  If we shift pricing policy and alter the fuel market, vast amounts of profit will be made from the coal mining industry.
  Mr. Jimmy Hood: On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. May I bring to your attention the conference being held in the corner, which is distracting me? I cannot hear what my hon. Friend is saying.
  Madam Deputy Speaker: I am sure that that point will be well taken.
  Mr. Barnes: The point might have been well taken if it had been heard by the people responsible.
  There is a great deal of money to be made out of coal in the country, despite the fact that we are now considering the privatisation of a relatively small industry, which has been allowed to shrink considerably. Nevertheless, there are massive coal reserves, from the Leeds area to Nottingham and Derby, cutting through my constituency, to be obtained by opencast methods. Whether it is in a former mining area or in areas which were mined in the past century, almost any piece of land that has not been built on will become open to that potential.
  There is something missing to enable our consideration of the money motion. Nothing in the motion or the Bill tells us what size the coal industry will be after privatisation. We should have figures that are relevant to its size, because of the open-ended provisions in the motion. The motion outlines the Coal Authority's rights of acquisition, its rights of obtaining security, the operations of successor companies, and the compensation to people being moved from positions on the board. However, for us to be able to make some assessment of all that, we should be able to understand what is being proposed and planned for the future of the industry. It is a peculiar motion.
  Even if Opposition Members accept that we have lost the Second Reading, that measures are to go into Committee, and even in the light of the fact that the money resolution is attached to that Bill, it has massive shortcomings. The motion should be rejected on its own demerits, as well as on the demerits of its being part and parcel of a Bill which is anti-social and will kill off the coal industry in Derbyshire, in Durham and in many other parts of the country.
  Mr. Hood: My hon. Friend is making an important point. I am pleased to see that the President of the Board of Trade has joined us as we come to the end of discussing the money resolution. Perhaps he can tell us what paragraph 1(e)(i) means, which uses the words:
  "to a person who ceases to hold office as a chairman or member of the corporation".
  Is it not the responsibility of the President of the Board of Trade to tell the House what sums of money are involved in that so-called compensation?
  How much are we talking about? Neil Clarke has been as good to the coal industry as Rachman was to housing policy in Westminster city council. Now we have a provision that will pay him hundreds of thousands of pounds in compensation. The President of the Board of Trade should say exactly how much we are going to use to pay off the chairman, who has ruined the coal industry, as a backhander for his services.
  Mr. Barnes: I agree. If we consider paragraph (1)(a) to (i), we will find similar questions to ask.
  It is interesting that the Minister has not sought to speak. He could have jumped up at the beginning of the debate and explained what the missing points are about. Ideally, there should not be missing points. We should be able to read the motion, see the detail and the implications involved, and do our own accountancy in order to make up our minds before we vote.
  In the absence of that, and in a very short time, the Minister should explain exactly what the motion is about. He should also take up the points that were made on Second Reading about the environment, safety and so on, and tell us how they relate to the measure and whether our concerns will be answered by the resolution.
  11.10 pm
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Technology (Mr. Patrick McLoughlin): In some respects, this has been a rather amusing debate. The hon. Member for Middlesbrough (Mr. Bell) told us that, because the Labour party nationalised the coal industry in 1947 and it was in its election manifesto, and therefore a mandate, we should not seek to change it. I take a little more comfort from a more recent document, the previous Conservative manifesto, which said that we would privatise British Coal. That commitment has far more standing than one given in 1945.
  Mr. Hood: As we are discussing manifestos, would the Minister like to tell us about his party's commitment not to increase taxes?
  Mr. McLoughlin: That point has been perfectly covered on numerous occasions. I am speaking to the motion and about a certain commitment about which I was asked tonight.
  The hon. Member for Hemsworth (Mr. Enright), in a most incredible speech, almost accused me of having gone to a public school. That has never happened to me before. He asked for an assurance that the bands in his constituency will be around for the next 250 years. Not many politicians—not even the hon. Gentleman—would make a commitment relating to the next 250 years. That was a strange request. It shows the farce which the debate has come to.
  Mr. Enright: I did indeed do that. I shall give the precise figures. The mover of the motion has a

  815
  Parliamentary Private Secretary who took enough money out of the Government to subsidise, for 250 years at current prices, the shortfall for the two bands of Frickley and Frickley Athletic. It was a simple mathematical point that I was making.
  Mr. McLoughlin: That is a spurious point, and the hon. Gentleman knows it. If that is his argument, it just shows how devoid the Opposition are of sensible arguments on the issue.
  I was asked several questions about concessionary fuel by the hon. Member for Middlesbrough. That is a matter in which I have a particular interest. My mother has been receiving concessionary fuel as the beneficiary of my father, who worked in the coal industry for 30 years. Concessionary fuel and the rights and entitlements of beneficiaries are very important.
  Yesterday, in announcing our conclusions on the consultation paper, my hon. Friend the Minister of State made the Government's position clear. If Labour Members vote against this resolution, they will be voting against the Government having the opportunity to provide the funds for concessionary coal.
  Mr. Michael Clapham rose—
  Mr. McLoughlin: I am sorry—I have literally a couple of minutes left. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will find time to come back to this point.
  As we have seen from the exchanges tonight, it is an important matter which undoubtedly will be debated in Committee. I have made my position clear on the importance of that subject. Clearly, if Labour Members vote against this money resolution, they will be voting against the provision of concessionary coal—
  It being three-quarters of an hour after the commencement of proceedings on the motion, MADAM DEPUTY SPEAKER put the Question, pursuant to Standing Order No. 14 (Exempted business).
  The House divided: Ayes 304, Noes 122.

  Division No. 76]

  [11.15 pm

  AYES

  Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)

  Boswell, Tim

  Aitken, Jonathan

  Bottomley, Rt Hon Virginia

  Alexander, Richard

  Bowden, Andrew

  Alison, Rt Hon Michael (Selby)

  Bowis, John

  Allason, Rupert (Torbay)

  Boyson, Rt Hon Sir Rhodes

  Amess, David

  Brandreth, Gyles

  Arbuthnot, James

  Brazier, Julian

  Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)

  Bright, Graham

  Arnold, Sir Thomas (Hazel Grv)

  Brooke, Rt Hon Peter

  Ashby, David

  Brown, M. (Brigg & Cl'thorpes)

  Aspinwall, Jack

  Browning, Mrs. Angela

  Atkins, Robert

  Bruce, Ian (S Dorset)

  Atkinson, David (Bour'mouth E)

  Budgen, Nicholas

  Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)

  Burns, Simon

  Baker, Rt Hon K. (Mole Valley)

  Butler, Peter

  Baker, Nicholas (Dorset North)

  Butterfill, John

  Baldry, Tony

  Campbell, Menzies (Fife NE)

  Banks, Matthew (Southport)

  Carlile, Alexander (Montgomry)

  Banks, Robert (Harrogate)

  Carlisle, John (Luton North)

  Bates, Michael

  Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)

  Batiste, Spencer

  Carrington, Matthew

  Berth, Rt Hon A. J.

  Carttiss, Michael

  Bellingham, Henry

  Cash, William

  Berestord, Sir Paul

  Channon, Rt Hon Paul

  Biffen, Rt Hon John

  Chapman, Sydney

  Blackburn, Dr John G.

  Churchill, Mr

  Bonsor, Sir Nicholas

  Clappison, James

  Booth, Hartley

  Clarke, Rt Hon Kenneth (Ruclif)

  816

  Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey

  Howard, Rt Hon Michael

  Coe, Sebastian

  Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)

  Colvin, Michael

  Howell, Rt Hon David (G'dford)

  Congdon, David

  Howell, Sir Ralph (N Norfolk)

  Conway, Derek

  Hughes Robert G. (Harrow W)

  Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)

  Hughes, Simon (Southwark)

  Coombs, Simon (Swindon)

  Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)

  Cope, Rt Hon Sir John

  Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)

  Couchman, James

  Hunter, Andrew

  Cran, James

  Hurd, Rt Hon Douglas

  Currie, Mrs Edwina (S D'by'ire)

  Jack, Michael

  Curry, David (Skipton & Ripon)

  Jackson, Robert (Wantage)

  Davies, Quentin (Stamford)

  Jenkin, Bernard

  Day, Stephen

  Jessel, Toby

  Deva, Nirj Joseph

  Johnson Smith, Sir Geoffrey

  Devlin, Tim

  Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)

  Dickens, Geoffrey

  Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)

  Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James

  Jones, Robert B. (W Hertfdshr)

  Dover, Den

  Kellett-Bowman, Dame Elaine

  Duncan, Alan

  Key, Robert

  Duncan-Smith, Iain

  Kilfedder, Sir James

  Durant, Sir Anthony

  King, Rt Hon Tom

  Dykes, Hugh

  Kirkhope, Timothy

  Eggar, Tim

  Knapman, Roger

  Elletson, Harold

  Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)

  Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter

  Knight, Greg (Derby N)

  Evans, David (Welwyn Hatfield)

  Knight, Dame Jill (Bir'm E'st'n)

  Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)

  Knox, Sir David

  Evans, Nigel (Ribble Valley)

  Kynoch, George (Kincardine)

  Evans, Roger (Monmouth)

  Lait, Mrs Jacqui

  Evennett, David

  Lang, Rt Hon Ian

  Faber, David

  Lawrence, Sir Ivan

  Fabricant, Michael

  Legg, Barry

  Fenner, Dame Peggy

  Leigh, Edward

  Field, Barry (Isle of Wight)

  Lennox-Boyd, Mark

  Fishburn, Dudley

  Lester, Jim (Broxtowe)

  Forman, Nigel

  Lidington, David

  Forsyth, Michael (Stirling)

  Lloyd, Rt Hon Peter (Fareham)

  Forth, Eric

  Luff, Peter

  Foster, Don (Bath)

  Lynne, Ms Liz

  Fowler, Rt Hon Sir Norman

  MacGregor, Rt Hon John

  Fox, Dr Liam (Woodspring)

  Maclean, David

  Fox, Sir Marcus (Shipley)

  McLoughlin, Patrick

  Freeman, Rt Hon Roger

  McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick

  French, Douglas

  Maddock, Mrs Diana

  Fry, Sir Peter

  Madel, Sir David

  Gale, Roger

  Maitland, Lady Olga

  Gallie, Phil

  Malone, Gerald

  Gardiner, Sir George

  Mans, Keith

  Garnier, Edward

  Marland, Paul

  Gill, Christopher

  Marlow, Tony

  Gillan, Cheryl

  Marshall, John (Hendon S)

  Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair

  Marshall, Sir Michael (Arundel)

  Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles

  Martin, David (Portsmouth S)

  Gorman, Mrs Teresa

  Mates, Michael

  Gorst, John

  Mawhinney, Rt Hon Dr Brian

  Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)

  Mellor, Rt Hon David

  Greenway, John (Ryedale)

  Merchant, Piers

  Griffiths, Peter (Portsmouth, N)

  Milligan, Stephen

  Grylls, Sir Michael

  Mills, Iain

  Gummer, Rt Hon John Selwyn

  Moate, Sir Roger

  Hague, William

  Monro, Sir Hector

  Hamilton, Rt Hon Sir Archie

  Montgomery, Sir Fergus

  Hamilton, Neil (Tatton)

  Moss, Malcolm

  Hampson, Dr Keith

  Needham, Richard

  Hanley, Jeremy

  Neubert, Sir Michael

  Hargreaves, Andrew

  Newton, Rt Hon Tony

  Harris, David

  Nicholls, Patrick

  Harvey, Nick

  Nicholson, David (Taunton)

  Haselhurst, Alan

  Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)

  Hawkins, Nick

  Norris, Steve

  Hawksley, Warren

  Onslow, Rt Hon Sir Cranley

  Heald, Oliver

  Oppenheim, Phillip

  Heathcoat-Amory, David

  Ottaway, Richard

  Hendry, Charles

  Page, Richard

  Heseltine, Rt Hon Michael

  Paice, James

  Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence L.

  Patnick, Irvine

  Hogg, Rt Hon Douglas (G'tham)

  Pattie, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey

  Horam, John

  Pawsey, James

  Hordern, Rt Hon Sir Peter

  Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth

  817

  Pickles, Eric

  Sumberg, David

  Porter, Barry (Wirral S)

  Sweeney, Walter

  Portillo, Rt Hon Michael

  Sykes, John

  Powell, William (Corby)

  Taylor, Ian (Esher)

  Rathbone, Tim

  Taylor, Matthew (Truro)

  Redwood, Rt Hon John

  Taylor, Sir Teddy (Southend, E)

  Rendel, David

  Temple-Morris, Peter

  Renton, Rt Hon Tim

  Thomason, Roy

  Richards, Rod

  Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)

  Riddick, Graham

  Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)

  Rifkind, Rt Hon. Malcolm

  Thurnham, Peter

  Robathan, Andrew

  Townend, John (Bridlington)

  Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn

  Townsend, Cyril D. (Bexl'yh'th)

  Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)

  Tracey, Richard

  Robinson, Mark (Somerton)

  Tredinnick, David

  Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)

  Trend, Michael

  Rowe, Andrew (Mid Kent)

  Trotter, Neville

  Rumbold, Rt Hon Dame Angela

  Twinn, Dr Ian

  Ryder, Rt Hon Richard

  Tyler, Paul

  Sackville, Tom

  Vaughan, Sir Gerard

  Sainsbury, Rt Hon Tim

  Viggers, Peter

  Shaw, David (Dover)

  Waldegrave, Rt Hon William

  Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)

  Walden, George

  Shephard, Rt Hon Gillian

  Waller, Gary

  Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)

  Ward, John

  Shepherd, Richard (Aldridge)

  Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)

  Shersby, Michael

  Waterson, Nigel

  Sims, Roger

  Watts, John

  Skeet, Sir Trevor

  Wells, Bowen

  Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)

  Wheeler, Rt Hon Sir John

  Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)

  Whitney, Ray

  Soames, Nicholas

  Whittingdale, John

  Spencer, Sir Derek

  Widdecombe, Ann

  Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)

  Wiggin, Sir Jerry

  Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)

  Wilkinson, John

  Spink, Dr Robert

  Willetts, David

  Spring, Richard

  Winterton, Mrs Ann (Congleton)

  Sproat, Iain

  Winterton, Nicholas (Macc'f'ld)

  Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)

  Wolfson, Mark

  Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John

  Wood, Timothy

  Steel, Rt Hon Sir David

  Yeo, Tim

  Steen, Anthony

  Young, Rt Hon Sir George

  Stephen, Michael

  Stern, Michael

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Stewart, Allan

  Mr. Andrew Mackay and Mr. Andrew Mitchell.

  Streeter, Gary

  NOES

  Abbott, Ms Diane

  Dowd, Jim

  Adams, Mrs Irene

  Enright, Derek

  Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)

  Fatchett, Derek

  Anderson, Ms Janet (Ros'dale)

  Foster, Rt Hon Derek

  Armstrong, Hilary

  Foulkes, George

  Barnes, Harry

  Fyfe, Maria

  Battle, John

  Galbraith, Sam

  Beckett, Rt Hon Margaret

  Gerrard, Neil

  Bell, Stuart

  Godman, Dr Norman A.

  Betts, Clive

  Godsiff, Roger

  Bradley, Keith

  Graham, Thomas

  Brown, Gordon (Dunfermline E)

  Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)

  Brown, N. (N'c'tle upon Tyne E)

  Hall, Mike

  Campbell-Savours, D. N.

  Hanson, David

  Cann, Jamie

  Hardy, Peter

  Chisholm, Malcolm

  Heppell, John

  Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)

  Hill, Keith (Streatham)

  Clelland, David

  Home Robertson, John

  Clwyd, Mrs Ann

  Hood, Jimmy

  Cohen, Harry

  Howarth, George (Knowsley N)

  Corbyn, Jeremy

  Hoyle, Doug

  Cousins, Jim

  Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

  Cryer, Bob

  Hutton, John

  Cunliffe, Lawrence

  Illsley, Eric

  Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)

  Ingram, Adam

  Dafis, Cynog

  Jackson, Helen (Shef'ld, H)

  Darting, Alistair

  Jones, leuan Wyn (Ynys Môn)

  Davidson, Ian

  Jones, Jon Owen (Cardiff C)

  Davis, Terry (B'ham, H'dge H'l)

  Jones, Martyn (Clwyd, SW)

  Denham, John

  Kennedy, Charles (Ross,C&S)

  Dixon, Don

  Kennedy, Jane (Lpool Brdgn)

  Donohoe, Brian H.

  Kilfoyle, Peter

  818

  Leighton, Ron

  Prentice, Ms Bridget (Lew'm E)

  Lewis, Terry

  Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

  Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)

  Primarolo, Dawn

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Raynsford, Nick

  Macdonald, Calum

  Roche, Mrs. Barbara

  McFall, John

  Short, Clare

  Mackinlay, Andrew

  Simpson, Alan

  McMaster, Gordon

  Skinner, Dennis

  McNamara, Kevin

  Smith, Rt Hon John (M'kl'ds E)

  McWilliam, John

  Snape, Peter

  Mahon, Alice

  Spearing, Nigel

  Martin, Michael J. (Springburn)

  Spellar, John

  Martlew, Eric

  Steinberg, Gerry

  Meale, Alan

  Stott, Roger

  Michael, Alun

  Strang, Dr. Gavin

  Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)

  Taylor, Mrs Ann (Dewsbury)

  Milburn, Alan

  Tipping, Paddy

  Miller, Andrew

  Turner, Dennis

  Moonie, Dr Lewis

  Vaz, Keith

  Morgan, Rhodri

  Walker, Rt Hon Sir Harold

  Morley, Elliot

  Wareing, Robert N

  Mowlam, Marjorie

  Watson, Mike

  Murphy, Paul

  Wigley, Dafydd

  O'Brien, Michael (N W'kshire)

  Wilson, Brian

  Olner, William

  Wise, Audrey

  O'Neill, Martin

  Worthington, Tony

  Patchett, Terry

  Wray, Jimmy

  Pickthall, Colin

  Pike, Peter L.

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Pope, Greg

  Mr. Michael Clapham and Mr. Bill Etherington.

  Powell, Ray (Ogmore)

  Question accordingly agreed to.
  Resolved,
  That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Coal Industry Bill ("the Act"), it is expedient to authorize—
  (1) the payment out of money provided by Parliament of the following, namely—

  (a) sums required by the Secretary of State for paying to the Coal Authority established by the Act amounts required by that Authority for carrying out its functions;

  (b) expenses incurred by the Treasury or the Secretary of State in consequence of provision made by the Act for the acquisition of, or of rights to subscribe for, securities of successor companies;

  (c) sums required by the Secretary of State for making grants to the British Coal Corporation and to successor companies which are wholly owned by the Crown;

  (d) sums required by the Secretary of State for making payments for purposes connected with the supply of concessionary coal and the payment of sums in lieu of concessionary coal;

  (e) sums required by the Secretary of State for making any payment of compensation for loss of office—

  (i) to a person who ceases to hold office as a chairman or member of the Corporation, or

  (ii) to the person who is the chairman of the Domestic Coal Consumers' Council when it ceases to exist;

  (f) sums required by the Secretary of State for making payments in pursuance of arrangements entered into by him for securing that the assets of an existing pension scheme are sufficient for meeting pension obligations arising under the scheme;

  (g) administrative expenses incurred by the Secretary of State or the Treasury in consequence of the provisions of the Act;

  (h) sums required by any Minister of the Crown or Government department for meeting obligations arising in consequence of that Minister or department becoming entitled or subject, in accordance with a scheme under the Act, to any property, rights or liabilities;

  (i) increases attributable to the Act in the sums payable out of money so provided under any other Act;

  (2) the extinguishment of liabilities of the British Coal Corporation in respect of—

  (a) sums lent to that Corporation out of money provided by Parliament;

  819

  (b) sums which are to be taken as having been so lent; and

  (c) interest in respect of any such sums;

  (3) the issuing out of the National Loans Fund of sums required by the Secretary of State for making loans to a successor company at a time when it is wholly owned by the Crown;
  (4) the charging on and issuing out of the Consolidated Fund of sums required by the Treasury for fulfilling such guarantees given by them for the discharge of financial obligations in connection with sums borrowed by a successor company as are given in respect of such a company at a time when it is wholly owned by the Crown.
  In this Resolution "successor company" means any company to whom property, rights or liabilities of the British Coal Corporation or any of its wholly-owned subsidiaries are transferred in accordance with a scheme under the Act and at a time when the company is wholly owned by the Crown.

  Coal Industry Bill [Ways and Means]
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Coal Industry Bill, it is expedient to authorize—

  (a) the making by the Coal Authority established by the Act of charges for things done in the exercise and performance of its powers and duties;

  (b) the imposition of charges to corporation tax by provisions relating to the taxation of persons to and from whom property, rights and liabilities are transferred in accordance with schemes under the Act; and

  (c) the payment of sums into the Consolidated Fund or the National Loans Fund.—[Mr. Kirkhope.]

  Several hon. Members rose—
  Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Janet Fookes): Order. Before I call hon. Members, may I make it clear that the Ways and Means motion deals with specific charges. It is not an excuse for a re-run of the provisions of the Bill.
  11.29 pm
  Mr. Eric Illsley: I take on board your warning, Madam Deputy Speaker.
  Paragraph (a) of the motion states:
  "the making by the Coal Authority established by the Act of charges for things done in the exercise and performance of its powers and duties ;". [Interruption.]
  Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Gentleman, but there is still a general buzz of conversation, which is not confined to hon. Members from one party. It is discourteous to the hon. Gentleman.
  Mr. Illsley: I am grateful for your assistance, Madam Deputy Speaker, in subduing a crowded House.
  I should like to speak about the Coal Authority that will be established by the Bill and about the charges for the exercise of its powers and duties. Surprisingly, some powers have been left out of the authority's remit. The timing of the Bill and the associated legislation is deplorable. In the previous debate, the hon. Member for Littleborough and Saddleworth (Mr. Dickens) spoke about an industry in the grasp of politicians, and said that politicians should not involve themselves in the running of an industry. To some extent, I agree with him, and ask why politicians have retained an interest in the running of the nuclear power industry by way of subsidy to that industry. That subsidy is not available to coal.
  Mr. Geoffrey Dickens: The hon. Gentleman invites me to explain. He was a member of the Select Committee on Energy and knows that the suggestion that the nuclear industry should be privatised could not be made bankable because the generators could not explain the costs of decommissioning. If that had been explained, privatisation would have been a bankable matter and could have gone ahead.
  Mr. Illsley: The hon. Gentleman is right: he and I served on that Select Committee. When we examined the evidence that the Department of Energy was willing to present—that which was not comercially confidential—we realised that the nuclear power industry had been uneconomic for many years. The price of coal to the generators had not increased since 1985, and it was apparent that coal had subsidised nuclear power for many years. The industry suffered greatly as a consequence, but

  821
  I shall not debate the nuclear power industry, not only because it is outside the terms of the motion, but because I am aware of sedentary admonition from some of my hon. Friends.
  The coal industry has been run down from 1985. Prices have not been increased and in the past two years the industry has been run down even more rapidly, and that has led to the Bill and the associated legislation. Over the past 18 months the President of the Board of Trade has announced the closure of 30 pits, and in the months ahead there are likely to be many more. Press releases in the past few days have shown that seven collieries are scheduled to close.
  It is ludicrous to debate this legislation at a time when the coal industry is in turmoil. Nobody can say how many collieries will be left this time next year or whether any will be left. Established coal contracts are for about half the tonnage agreed in previous years. We now have a much reduced market and a large number of colliery closures. The Bill, the resolution and the Coal Authority are not strong enough to deal with what is happening now. It is the wrong time to be considering the privatisation of the industry which is in such turmoil that we should take the Bill, the Ways and Means resolution, the money resolution and the rest and rethink the idea of coal privatisation.
  Mr. Stuart Bell rose—
  Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. Before the interven-tion takes place, may I point out that we are dealing specifically with the Ways and Means resolution, and that any remarks must be related to that? I am sure that considerable ingenuity will be exercised by hon. Members.
  Mr. Bell: My hon. Friend will understand what you are saying, Madam Deputy Speaker. All that will happen when the Bill goes through Committee will relate to the Coal Authority. The Coal Authority will be responsible for the charges and for the exercise and performance of its powers and duties. I am sure that, as my hon. Friend makes his speech, he will think about the significance of the Coal Authority.
  Mr. Illsley: I shall move on to the powers and duties in relation to the Ways and Means resolution. I was slightly distracted by the argument about nuclear power.
  The resolution is untimely in creating the coal authority when the industry is in a state of uncertainty. No one can envisage exactly how the industry will fair over the forthcoming few months and whether the Coal Authority will have any collieries over which to preside when the Bill receives Royal Assent.
  The Coal Authority, to which the resolution refers, takes over certain liabilities from British Coal and from the Government. It also takes over some of the outstanding liabilities. One of the arguments on which I shall expand in a few moments relates to the liabilities that the Government will leave to a privatised industry. They will make it unattractive to anyone wanting to buy into the industry and will add costs to any private operator.
  Those liabilities and costs could be detrimental to the industry when it is privatised and should be accepted by the coal authority and the Government to make sure that, when the industry is privatised, there will be no danger that it will die because no private operator will take on its liabilities.
  Mr. Bob Cryer: My hon. Friend makes an interesting point, which covers the sale of assets by British Coal. When estimating the amount of liability which British Coal has now, it would be worth while my hon. Friend casting his mind over the assets which will yield revenue that is authorised by the Ways and Means resolution.
  Mr. Illsley: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The main revenue-raising power for the coal authority will be licensing. I intend to make some remarks in due course relating to the conditions that the authority will place on licences to the private sector. The strength of that licensing regime will be crucial to certain aspects of the Bill.
  Mr. Cryer: If I could just make a further inquiry on my hon. Friend's speech, one wonders whether the Ways and Means resolution is necessary. The section of the Bill relating to manpower or staff envisages at least 100 people being employed by the Coal Authority. One wonders what revenue is envisaged as a result of the licensing activities of the Coal Authority which provides revenue authorised by the Ways and Means resolution. It seems to me that the licensing revenue may be so trivial and set against the liabilities that it makes the Ways and Means resolution otiose.
  Mr. Illsley: My hon. Friend makes an interesting point. The financial memorandum to the Bill refers to the Coal Authority's costs, but states:
  "Accurate assessments of the Coal Industry's costs—including staffing and subsidence costs—and income are not possible at this stage."
  Even the Government are not able to give us an idea of the income that will be generated through the authority's licensing operations.
  Mr. Jimmy Hood rose—
  Mr. Illsley: Will my hon. Friend bear with me for a moment?
  Even now, the authority's income is not included in the Bill because the Government have been unable to estimate it. One hopes that by the time the Bill is discussed in Committee, such points will be highlighted. The omission lends credibility to my argument that, if we cannot determine the authority's income and what the licensing regime will be, we should not be debating the Bill, the money resolution or the Ways and Means motion now, because they are premature.
  Mr. Peter Hardy: My hon. Friend makes a serious point. In Committee, the Minister will have a great many questions to answer.
  My hon. Friend referred, among other things, to the Coal Authority's licensing fees, but no one seems to have considered the costs that it will incur. Until recently, the mines drainage unit was based in my area. The unit was then closed and the responsibility was passed to Silverwood colliery. Silverwood is to close, so who will take on the drainage function? In my constituency, there are four seams of outcrop which are very close to the surface and which have been known to engage in spontaneous combustion. Would my hon. Friend care to ask the Minister how many staff there will be in South Yorkshire to exercise the authority's responsibility in that respect?
  Mr. Illsley: My hon. Friend makes an important point. He and I have already discussed what would happen if there were fires—underground fires or, as he fears, outcropping fires—without the mines rescue resources to deal with them. Clearly, as outlined in the motion, the Coal Authority takes responsibility for licensing and charges and will have within its remit the income from the sale of land.
  One issue that must be debated thoroughly is how the authority will dispose of the land and what regulations will be in place to ensure the safety of that land which is disposed of and which is a fire hazard, such as that mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Wentworth (Mr. Hardy). Will the sale include a covenant to ensure that the private operator purchasing such a plot of land will have the responsibility of dealing with any emergency?
  I again cite the financial memorandum, which states that the costs and income of the Coal Authority cannot be assessed "at this stage". The Bill is therefore premature.
  Mr. Dickens: For the privatisation to be successful, the successor companies will want to know the ground rules, which have to be set out most carefully. In addition to acquiring any of the industry's assets, the companies will have a duty to acquire the liabilities which will include having to deal with spontaneous combustion and subsidence. The Government have to lay down the ground rules sensibly to make the privatisation attractive; if not, the industry will not be privatised.
  Mr. Illsley: The hon. Gentleman makes a very fair point; one that I should like to stress. He is saying that, unless the Ways and Means resolution gives sufficient finance to the Coal Authority to exercise its powers and duties, the privatisation is unlikely to be a success because the successor companies will not accept such liabilities. My point is that the ways and means given to the authority have to be sufficient to enable it to discharge its functions. Not only that but under the resolution, the Government will have to give the authority wider powers to deal with matters scheduled to be transferred to the successor companies. In my view, the Government must accept through the Coal Authority more duties than at present—and the costs that go with them.
  A major obstacle to successful privatisation are the liabilities left to successor companies—and which in this case will not pass to the Coal Authority, as most people expected.
  Mr. Martin O'Neill: I am not clear in my mind whether the resolution gives the Coal Authority the power to reimburse the Government for the sums of up to £200,000 that will be made available to groups wishing to exercise their right to apply for a licence.
  Mr. D. N. Campbell-Savours: It could be a royal exhibition grant.
  Mr. O'Neill: It could, but there are not many exhibitions in Barnsley on the scale that the hon. Member for City of Chester (Mr. Brandreth) had in mind.
  The Coal Authority will receive applications from groups that have received money from the Government, not British Coal, for the purpose of putting together the business plan that will form the core of a licence. That is apparently being done to encourage management buy-outs and worker participation. Does my hon. Friend believe that, under the terms of the Ways and Means resolution, the
  824
  authority will have the necessary powers and duties to provide that money, or will that be the responsibility of the Government or British Coal?
  Mr. Illsley: The conflict that arises is whether the Coal Authority is likely to have returned to it the funding that the Government will give out in the form of loans to successor companies. My hon. Friend will have read the explanatory and financial memorandum to the Coal Industry Bill, which states:
  "The Bill enables the Secretary of State to grant loans of up to £3,000 million to successor companies".
  My hon. Friend mentioned a figure of £200,000. That relates to individual grants to groups contemplating a buy-out. The total sum involved will be £3 billion. Will the Coal Authority have sufficient teeth to recoup that Government expenditure, and will it have any licensing teeth in respect of the liabilities in the Ways and Means resolution.
  If one considers the outstanding liabilities, one can see how many powers have been allocated to the authority and judge how successful it will be after privatisation. The resolution makes reference to the powers, duties and money given to the authority, which is another quango.
  One of the first references in the Bill is to the salaries of the people who will serve on the Coal Authority. We cannot determine the authority's income, the charges that it will levy or the licensing regime that it will operate—hut the measure is quick to point out that the members of the authority will receive sufficient salaries and expenses to enable them to do their work.
  Under the Coal Industry Bill, the authority will be responsible for licensing not only deep-mine operations but opencast mining. Applications for opencast mining are still to be encouraged as part of the Coal Authority's duties. At the same time, the industry is being totally run down and subjected to colliery closure after colliery closure.
  Last year, just under 18 million tonnes of coal was opencast in this country; total contract tonnage for the generators was 30 million. Almost two thirds of our coal is now being obtained through opencast for power generation, which is the last market available to British Coal. We are allowing opencast to undercut British Coal: we have allowed that cheaper mining method to pose a problem in the search for future markets. Yet the number of opencast applications continues to increase, despite public opposition to the process.
  The motion refers to "powers and duties". Where is a duty placed on the Coal Authority to protect the environment? Opencast mining causes pollution—dust, noise, fumes and heavy traffic, for instance. Will the Coal Authority be given any environmental duty under the licensing regime? We know that it will have power to grant licences, but will it have the power to tell any private operator to whom it gives such a licence that the licence will be conditional on an adequate environmental protection regime, thus ensuring that the countryside in opencast areas is left in a decent state when the operation is finished?
  Mr. Derek Fatchett: My hon. Friend has raised a number of important points about the Coal Authority's functions. Has he noted paragraph 1(4) of schedule 1, which lists the circumstances in which the Secretary of State can remove a member of the authority? Under paragraph 1(4)(c), he can remove a member of the authority if he considers that person

  825
  "unable or unfit to carry out the functions of a member"
  Does that condition worry my hon. Friend, who has made some important points about opencast and environmental considerations? Might not a member of the authority who was opposed to opencast mining, and the environmental conditions that it creates, lose his position? Should we not consider such issues?
  Mr. Illsley rose—
  Madam Deputy SpeakerOrder. Before the hon. Member for Barnsley, Central (Mr. Illsley) replies, may I issue a small warning? We are dealing with the question of charges, and hon. Members' remarks must relate to that subject. Hon. Members cannot engage in a general debate about the duties of the Coal Authority without relating it to charges.
  Mr. Illsley: I accept your warning, Madam Deputy Speaker.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, Central (Mr. Fatchett) has made an important point, which will presumably be taken up on Committee: it may well be beyond the scope of the motion. Clearly, fitness for membership of the authority should be paralleled by the fitness of successor companies to be considered for licences, and that should be defined in the schedule.
  All the powers and duties of the Coal Authority will, of course, be subject to either charges of income. They will all be related to the licensing regime.
  I mentioned opencasting earlier. The charges are relevant to opencasting in that presumably the Coal Authority will obtain income from the scale of land to various successor companies and from charging under the licensing regime. It will charge the opencasting companies for the benefit of obtaining a licence.
  The Coal Authority will pass responsibility for health and safety to the Health and Safety Executive and the Health and Safety Commission. Health and safety should be a responsibility of the Coal Authority. There is little reference to health and safety in the Bill. Clause 4 is about 20 lines long. Previous legislation contained an all-important clause stating that British Coal had responsibility for the health and safety of its work force. As I understand it, the Bill and the Ways and Means motion do not place a duty on any successor company. There is no requirement that any successor company should take steps to safeguard the health and safety of its employees.
  The licensees to whom authority is given to win coal should have an obligation placed on them, and be charged for it by the Coal Authority, to ensure the health and safety of their employees. Whether the companies are engaged in opencast mining or deep mining, they should be responsible for the health and safety of their work force.
  Several hon. Members have raised fears about health and safety and the inadequacy of the Bill's health and safety provisions. I do not intend to follow that line of argument. I simply wish to make the point that the Coal Authority should have a duty on health and safety and should have the power to charge and fine companies or refer them to the Health and Safety Executive if they are in breach of the normal health and safety guidelines. That brings me to what powers the Coal Authority has to levy charges and the conditions that it can place in the licences.
  826
  We are discussing the Coal Authority again under the Ways and Means motion yet we have not seen the contents of the licences that will be awarded by that authority to the successor companies. We have no idea what could be in the licences. That gives cause for concern. When we have discussed the Bill, the resolutions and all the rest of it, we might still not know what conditions the Coal Authority can place in a licence, what charges it can make and what income it will derive from licensing operations.
  Britain's record in health and safety could be jeopardised. I see the hon. Member for Cambridgeshire, North-East (Mr. Moss) falling asleep at what I am saying. As a former member of the Energy Select Committee, I am sure that he cares about health and safety in the mining industry. He should perhaps listen more intently to the fears of Opposition Members.
  One of the powers and duties of the Coal Authority, which has been referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Wentworth (Mr. Hardy), is the operation of a mines rescue service. The point relates particularly to charges and duties. There is little in the Bill or the information on the Coal Authority about a mines rescue service. That liability will be passed to the successor companies. If the Coal Authority has responsibility for a mines rescue service, it will have to levy a charge against the successor companies.
  Returning to the comments of the hon. Member for Littleborough and Saddleworth (Mr. Dickens), are the successor companies willing to take on the financing and operation of a mines rescue service and have that charge levied against them by the Coal Authority? Will they be willing to accept that, or are they likely to say that they want little to do with the service and do not see why they should pay for it because that duty should be placed on the Government as a residual liability?
  The Government have not dealt with residual liabilities in the motion. The mines rescue service has considerable expertise, equipment, land and buildings. Obviously a great deal of thought—[Interruption.]
  Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. We cannot have a semi-private conversation between a Back-Bench Member on one side and a Minister on the other.
  Mr. Illsley: Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.
  A considerable amount of planning has to go into the mines rescue service. One of the latest rescue centres was established by British Coal to service the Selby coalfield. Obviously, with five packages as disparate as Scotland, Wales and the central areas of England, the successor companies will want to contribute as little as possible in charges to the Coal Authority for a mines rescue service. They will want the minimum service that they can get away with, because they will not want to contribute to the cost.
  Where will the centres be based if they are to service an industry that is spread across the length and breadth of the north of England? How are the charges to be levied? Will it be a condition of the licence that successor companies will be required to contribute to the rescue service and, if so, in what proportions? Will the service be Government-funded?
  The Government should retain the rescue service as a residual liability. It is just another example of a liability that should have been allocated to the Coal Authority. We should be discussing that authority's detailed provisions for health and safety and the mines rescue service. The

  827
  authority will grant a licence to the successor company. Will the rescue service and health and safety be conditions of that licence? Will a duty be placed on the Coal Authority to remove a licence if a successor does not meet an accepted standard of health and safety provision, or its contributions towards a mines rescue service?
  Mr. O'Neill: My hon. Friend's argument is of special relevance to the colliery in my constituency. Any charge imposed by the Coal Authority on a Scottish coal operation would be disproportionate.
  As you well know, Madam Deputy Speaker, a mines rescue service is a complicated business, as it requires a continuous shift system and therefore needs four or five times as many people to run it. The facility also needs to be fairly close to the coalfield. In Scotland, the difficulty is that for the foreseeable future there is likely to be only one complex of mines. There is a small offshoot at Monktonhall. At present British Coal pays for that and Monktonhall miners co-operative does not contribute to it.
  When the new coal authority grants a licence, if the charge is to be sufficient to meet the cost of such a scheme it will have to be disproportionately expensive for the Scottish mining operation because the scheme would be smaller than one for the centre of northern England, where the Yorkshire mines will be located. The costs of a rescue scheme are of great significance to licensing in different parts of the country.
  Mr. Illsley: That is a telling point about Scotland, and the same will apply to Wales. If the Coal Authority is to consider a mines rescue service when issuing licences, the successor companies will look long and hard at the situation in Scotland and Wales. If the Coal Authority is to take account, under the licensing regime, of a mines rescue service and, as a consequence, has to ensure that a part of that service will operate in Scotland and in Wales, obviously, as a result of the disproportionate number of collieries in Scotland and Wales compared with the central region, the successor companies in the central region will be required to pay the lion's share of maintaining a service that will operate in outlying areas.
  That is a cost which the successor companies will be unwilling to meet, because they will be paying, in the central region, for a mines rescue service that is to operate in Scotland and peripheral areas. I am sure that those companies will regard that as a disproportionate cost placed on their company after privatisation.
  As my hon. Friend the member for Clackmannan (Mr. O'Neill) points out, the licensing regime under the resolution and the charging by the coal authority is crucial in all those respects. Without having sight of the licences, we cannot know the conditions that will be placed on the successor companies in such a crucial sector as mines rescue. How are we to maintain a mines rescue service under that system? Will the successor companies be willing to be charged by the Coal Authority for the provision of that services?
  A further liability is subsidence. The Coal Authority will not be given sufficient duties or powers in relation to subsidence. Earlier, the President of the Board of Trade said that subsidence liability would be passed to the Coal Authority, except in certain circumstances in which subsidence damage or compensation for subsidence damage can be allocated to a specific successor company. The President of the Board of Trade said in his speech that
  828
  that would enable members of the public to determine exactly who is responsible for subsidence damage to their properties or their land and to take the appropriate action.
  I put it to the Minister that that is an absolute nonsense. There is no way that a member of the public will get a straight answer from the successor companies operating in the industry in relation to subsidence. It is difficult enough now under British Coal. Obviously, members of the public will chase from one company to another as each company denies responsibility for the subsidence damage to their property. How is the average member of the public to prove responsibility for subsidence damage?
  Mr. Hood: That is one of the parts of the Bill that puzzle me. It says:
  "It is estimated that subsidence will initially cost the Authority £35–40 million per annum, but that this is expected to fall to under £20 million in the last year of the century."
  I assume that my hon. Friend's experience is the same as mine. The cost of subsidence has not been decreasing, and it will continue to increase for a considerable time after the end of the century. That seems to be an estimate by an organisation which is not identified in the Bill and which I suspect from the rhetoric in the Bill has no expertise or understanding of the problem of subsidence. Is that not another nonsense? The true calculations have not been put into the Government's assumptions of actual costs.
  Mr. Illsley: I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. My experience of the Bill also takes into account the report of the Energy Select Committee in relation to subsidence and the Coal Mining Subsidence Act 1991. It was apparent from those deliberations that the general public do not get the fairest deal when it comes to subsidence damage. Matters will only be made worse because of the Government's intention to place the responsibility for subsidence damage on successor companies and only partly on the coal authority. As a result, the Coal Authority will have to mop up all the residual liabilities when members of the public cannot obtain adequate compensation from the colliery company responsible in their particular region.
  The question is why, under the licensing and charging regime, the Coal Authority has not been given total responsibility for subsidence damage. It would be far simpler for that authority to be vested with the power to grant compensation for subsidence, and subsequently to charge the money back to the successor companies that it determined were responsible for the damage. That would give members of the public direct access to one body., a one-stop shop where they could go to pursue a claim. The successor companies would know that the coal authority would charge the compensation back to them as part of the licensing regime, and that would be far simpler than the procedure envisaged in the resolution.
  It is sad that certain sections of the Coal Mining Subsidence Act 1991 are to be deleted. I served on the Committee on that Act when it was a Bill. It is now likely that the coal authority will place no responsibility on successor companies to notify individual areas, and the owners of houses and other properties, of local mining orperations and the consequent likelihood of their properties being subject to subsidence damage. The Bill will remove that responsibility.
  Mr. Hardy: My hon. Friend will recall that, during proceedings on the Coal Mining Subsidence Act 1991, our

  829
  former colleague and good friend Allen McKay, who was then the Member of Parliament for Barnsley, West and Penistone, and whose constituency—a mining area since ancient times—adjoined mine, told the House about an occasion not long before he became a Member of Parliament when he was a voluntary fireman. He attended an incident in which some land had collapsed in order to rescue two cows that had fallen down a long-disused mine.
  This is a true story, Madam Deputy Speaker, and is entirely relevant to the point that my hon. Friend was making. Conservative Members will recall Allen McKay, and he informed the House—[Interruption.] We are entitled to ask the Minister to take the matter seriously. My former hon. Friend asked the House who would be responsible for the subsidence, for the expenditure of the voluntary and professional firemen who had to attend, and to the farmer for all the inconvenience that he had suffered, and for the suffering, injury or even loss of the two cows? Does my hon. Friend think that such calculations crossed the Government's mind as they prepared to establish the authority?
  Mr. Illsley: Certainly some calculations have crossed the Government's mind—mainly concerning how much responsibility should be passed to the successor companies. To minimise that responsibility they have decided to do away with some sections of the 1991 Act in so far as they relate to notification of individuals and to the responsibility of the industry to maintain plans in connection with subsidence damage. Without such notification, individuals will not be appraised of their rights under the subsidence legislation. The change is being made to reduce the costs of the industry after privatisation. The Act is less than three years old, so we have debated the subject recently and decided that that duty should be placed on the industry; yet the Government now seek to remove it.
  The original provisions had the blessing of the all-party Select Committee on Energy, which debated subsidence damage as a precursor to the Act, and there was all-party agreement to its report, which said that there should be the duty of notification. I am surprised that the Government are seeking to reduce the effectiveness of the 1991 Act. The new subsidence proposals are totally unacceptable. They will be ignored by private sector companies and the rights of members of the public in relation to subsidence damage will be severely diminished as companies try to avoid their responsibilities for such damage, which is especially severe in the Nottinghamshire area.
  Will the Minister tell us why no successor body to the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation—CISWO—has been delineated? The coal Authority has not been given any powers in relation to welfare. The Minister and I have discussed welfare and he has taken the view that an industry such as mining has no need for welfare provision. He would make the point that welfare provision does not apply in any other area other than the armed forces. The mining industry has been a dangerous industry, it is a dangerous industry and there will always be requirements for welfare. The Bill scraps the Miners Welfare Act 1952 and makes no provision for a successor body.
  Madam Deputy Speaker: Order. I am sorry to pull up the hon. Gentleman, but he must relate what he is now
  830
  saying more closely to the charges. If he can do that, fine. We cannot have a general debate, in which I think he is now engaging.
  Mr. Hood: I am sure that my hon. Friend is going to keep in order and I hope that my question is as well. Is it not the case that CISWO provides social care for 11,000 miners, retired miners and paraplegics at a cost of £2·5 million a year? If that care is not provided for in the Bill, either the 11,000 miners who have been receiving that care will lose out, or there will be a burden on local authority community care and it will cost a lot more than £2·5 million.
  Mr. Illsley: The industry requires welfare provision. The point that I wish to make in relation to the motion is that the Bill removes the Miners Welfare Act 1952 and leaves a void. The only successor body under the whole privatisation scenario would be the Coal Authority. That cost of £2·5 million per annum, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Clydesdale (Mr. Hood) referred, should be charged through the Coal Authority either to the successor companies or to some other bodies which are created to provide welfare.
  Obviously, the best way in which the coal industry social welfare organisation could have moved forward would have been to leave it alone, to leave the Act of 1952 in place and not meddle with it. Once the Government begin to consider a successor to the Act of 1952, the only available option is the Coal Authority, and we shall unravel a whole host of difficulties in the provision of welfare.
  Will the Minister consider specifically making the Coal Authority the body responsible for welfare and giving it power to recharge the relatively modest cost for the provision of welfare—some £2·5 million—back through the industry to maintain that welfare? The other side of the coin is that if we are left with a void in relation to welfare provisions nobody will pick it up. The successor companies will go to the Coal Authority which wishes to charge them for welfare and why they should pay for the welfare of their work force when they do not see that as an appropriate cost to their business.
  All year, we have heard of the costs to industry of social provision, but here we have a clear case where social welfare provision should be retained. As I have said, there are 500,000 beneficiaries of that provision and 72,000 people in receipt of benefit for pneumoconiosis—a prescribed disease in the mining industry. That is where the need for welfare arises. The coal industry is unique in terms of its dangers and its susceptibility to industrial illness and injury. There is a requirement for welfare, and it should be taken on by the Government.
  I hope that amendments are moved in Committee to enable the Coal Authority to become the responsible body for that welfare provision. There will be considerable disappointment in mining areas if welfare provision is not accounted for. Obviously, local authorities will be mentioned as taking up the responsibility for welfare. They do not have the resources to do so. Therefore, they cannot charge the Coal Authority for that provision. The Coal Authority will not have a duty to a local authority for the provision of welfare.
  There are two other matters to which I wish to refer in relation to the Coal Authority. The penultimate one—
  Mr. Malcolm Moss: The hon. Gentleman should not cut short his speech.
  Mr. Illsley: It is not a long speech—or, rather, it would not have been.
  My penultimate point is about pensions, the Coal Authority and why the Coal Authority will not be allowed to take on responsibility for pensions after privatisation. As the Minister knows, pensions are dealt with by the British Coal pensions and insurance centre in Sheffield, and there is a question about its future role in the provision of pensions and benefits. The coal industry insures its own risks. British Coal does not have an insurance policy. It has to insure itself against whatever risk—for example, civil liability, personal injury—and there are substantial claims against it. The pension schemes relate to a fund of £14 billion.
  Where is the safeguard through the Coal Authority in respect of pension schemes? It is suggested that the £14 billion be allocated to the Government and that they will take responsibility for allocating pensions in future, on the basis that 50 per cent. of the surplus will be allocated immediately to the Government. But what will happen to current workers? Their existing pension entitlement will end, their pension scheme will be wound up, and they will begin another pension scheme, perhaps with a private pension fund.
  Where are the safeguards for serving mineworkers pension provision? The mineworkers pension scheme is quite good. When it came to opting out a few years ago under the 1986 legislation, many private pension companies were unwilling to accept mine workers transferring because the benefits under private provision were not as good as under the mineworkers pension scheme. In particular, the mineworkers pension scheme contained provision for widows' benefit. The private pension industry was unwilling to make a similar commitment, and transfers to private pension funds were not as good as under the mineworkers pension scheme. Therefore there were few transfers to private pension plans.
  We have the same problem now with privatisation. A very good scheme, which is in surplus, and which has employees taking a contributions holiday to the tune of £800 million, is to be wound up. What is the logic in winding up the mineworkers pension scheme, and forcing every serving mineworker to take on a new scheme? Surely there is a vehicle—the Coal Authority—which can take responsibility for the provision of pensions, or license the existing pension organisation and charge the successor company.
  The Coal Authority has licensed its pension provision to the pensions organisation, the pensions organisation administers the pension scheme on behalf of the successor companies and charges them for that service. I am convinced that the successor companies will welcome that with open arms. How many companies will welcome with open arms the idea that they must start a pension scheme for new employees which perhaps will be more poorly funded than the existing mine workers' pension scheme and which will provide poorer benefits? The answer is that the Government want the £14 billion.
  It is simple: £14 billion goes into the Government's coffers and they are home and dry. The idea is that the Government will take the £14 billion from the mineworkers pension fund and the British Coal superannuation scheme and then pay the pensions as they fall due. At a time when we have a £50 billion public sector borrowing requirement, £14 billion is a handy little nest egg that the Government have stumbled upon. It looks
  832
  attractive. Obviously, the Government will turn logic on its head and stop the pension scheme from operating simply to get their hands on the £14 billion. That is scandalous.
  What has happened to pension schemes over the past three or four years? Who has been castigated for stealing pension fund moneys? Who gets all the blame for nicking pension funds? This is a classic example of £14 billion going the same way as the Maxwell pensions. The future pension entitlements of 500,000 beneficiaries could well be jeopardised by the ending of the mineworkers pension scheme. It is an absolute disgrace.
  Mr. Bill Etherington: My hon. Friend has mentioned that the closed pension scheme proposed by the Government will take 50 per cent. of any surplus for the benefit of the Treasury, leaving only 50 per cent. for existing beneficiaries. The 50 per cent. offered by the Government compares poorly with the Coal Board's record of offering 70 per cent. to beneficiaries. Does my hon. Friend accept that the Coal Board, which is by no means the most generous employer, could manage to do a little better than the Government's proposals?
  Mr. Illsley: My hon. Friend is right. One has only to look at the existing mineworkers pension scheme. Over the past few years, British Coal has taken various contribution holidays amounting to £800 million, yet the scheme still has a viable fund of £14 billion to meet pension commitments. As I recall, the scheme has never been in deficit to the extent that the employer has had to make good the deficit.
  The pension scheme is in excellent shape, yet the Government want not only to take the £14 billion fund. They automatically want 50 per cent. of any surplus. As my hon. Friend says, they want the cake, and they want to eat it as well. They want every last pound from the scheme. That is detrimental to the scheme and threatens the beneficiaries of it.
  I shall refer to the duties of the coal authority.
  Mr. Campbell-Savours: Is this the penultimate point?
  Mr. Illsley: This is the penultimate point, and it relates to concessionary coal. [HON. MEMBERS: "Come on."] If Tory Members do not interrupt me, I shall conclude my remarks more quickly.
  The Government have said that concessionary coal is a liability that can be passed on to the successor companies. We must ask how the successor companies will be made responsible for concessionary coal. How will they be obliged to meet their commitments to beneficiaries under the concessionary coal scheme? The Government have chosen to pass the concessionary coal scheme on to the successor companies rather than allow the Coal Authority to be responsible for it.
  That plan would be far more sensible than what is envisaged. It would be far easier for the Coal Authority to take on board the arrangements for concessionary coal and to charge the successor companies for the provision of that service to serving mineworkers and to beneficiaries. Of course, if people were attracted to cash in lieu as an alternative to concessionary coal it becomes far easier, as that is only a money transaction. The provision of coal could be through the companies and could be charged back to the Coal Authority.
  Many concessionaires and beneficiaries are worried that their historic right to concessionary fuel will be affected by

  833
  the Government's proposals. The transfer of rights contained in the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 1981 is unlikely to be sufficient to enable beneficiaries to continue their concessionary coal entitlement because any company can place its employees on a new contract which does not allow for concessionary fuel. That fuel could be lost to serving mineworkers.
  Mr. Michael Clapham: Does my hon. Friend agree that a better way of protecting the existing beneficiaries of the concessionary coal scheme and of providing for the workers in the privatised industry would be to have the Coal Authority preside over the 1983 concessionary fuel agreement? Does my right hon. Friend agree that that would protect both the current beneficiaries and the future work force?
  Mr. Illsley: My hon. Friend and I have studied the 1983 agreement long and hard. There is no reason why the Coal Authority could not have the duty to take responsibility for the concessionary coal scheme and to charge the successor companies for dealing with that scheme.
  I will conclude my remarks on concessionary coal by referring to another aspect which worries a great number of serving mineworkers. Contractors within the coal industry do not receive concessionary coal, and it is open to the successor companies as part of their licensing arrangements that their employers are sub-contracted to them. In that way, the successor companies can avoid the liability for concessionary coal.
  There are a number of other matters on which I had hoped to touch, and I will refer to them briefly.
  Mr. Hood: My hon. Friend makes a valid point as he comes to the end of his excellent speech. Is he aware that the example he has given is happening now in the industry? Private mining companies have taken over other companies have had to take over the historical liabilities of the scheme. Those companies are now saying—quite openly, and without any threat from the Government—that they are taking away the concessionary fuel agreement. If that is happening now before privatisation, can anyone be surprised that miners who work in British Coal pits now fear that the same may happen to their concessionary fuel agreement?
  Mr. Illsley: My hon. Friend makes a valid point. In advance of legislation to define a particular industry, companies are ignoring the provisions of a Bill. The same thing happened with regard to Sunday trading; I will make only a passing reference to the subject, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Employees have been placed on six-day working contracts regardless of the contents of the Bill.
  I will draw my remarks to a close, as I have discussed concessionary coal. However, there are other worries which are not addressed in the Bill or by the Ways and Means resolution in relation to the coal authority. I have mentioned the insurance claims of British Coal. Will the successor companies insure their own risks or take out insurance? What will be the level of premiums? Will they be judged like other companies for employer's liability insurance? That is a big area, in view of the number of accidents which have to be compensated for in the industry.
  834
  I have been involved in that side of the industry and I am well aware that there are claims within my area of Yorkshire which go as far back as 1982. Those claims amount to around £3 million or £4 million pounds per annum in terms of compensation paid. Should the Coal Authority take responsibility for that area?
  There are outstanding compensation claims. The successor companies will not welcome with open arms the liability for historical compensation claims, many of which will not be settled before the privatisation legislation is in force. Noise-induced deafness is currently soaking up much of British Coal's resources. There are also other residual compensation claims. Those points must be addressed and must be the responsibility of the Coal Authority.
  Insufficient residual liabilities are to be passed to the Coal Authority to protect the public from such dangers as subsidence or for the industry to be viable after privatisation. The privatisation is untimely, unnecessary and incomplete. The Bill and the motion are confused. There are insufficient safeguards and the Bill is hurried. There are major omissions which hon. Members must consider in Standing Committee in the coming months. There will be a bleak future for pensioners and beneficiaries of the pension scheme. Above all, the future for serving mineworkers is bleak.
  12.35 am
  Mr. Peter Hardy: I will be brief, as I spoke earlier. However, I want to raise one or two points that I did not have time to mention then. I hope that the Minister will pay attention to my points and, if he cannot reply to them tonight, reply to them at an early and
  I recognise that the matter is very narrow. Paragraph (a) of the resolution refers to
  "the making of the Coal Authority … of charges for things done in the exercise and performance of its powers and duties."—
  [Interruption.] I recognise that the House is a trifle excited about possible developments, but when the Minister's adviser has finished telling him about the latest dramatic developments, I hope that the Minister will pay particular attention to my points.
  Mr. Hood: Perhaps I can be helpful. I am also interested in what is happening between the Government Whip and the Minister. I heard a whisper when I was outside the Chamber a moment ago to the effect that there is a security alert outside St. Stephen's entrance. An unidentified car has been left there and the police are genuinely concerned that there might be a bomb in it. The police are worried about the possibility of a Division, as that would attract hon. Members to the House. I am sure that hon. Members will feel obliged to continue to examine the Ways and Means motion until the security alert is cleared. I am sure that that is what the Government Whip was telling the Minister.
  Mr. Hardy: My hon. Friend has done the House a great service by bringing us up to date with the latest development in the insanities of life in this city. I hope that the car belongs to a representative of one of the foreign mining firms with a bad safety record who might have heard our strictures and gone away.
  In an earlier intervention, I mentioned the experience regaled to us by our former good colleague and friend, Allen McKay. When we debated subsidence a few years ago, he told us about his experience as a volunteer fireman

  835
  when he rescued two cows which had fallen into an old mine working. My serious questions on the resolution relate to the fact that my constituency, like the neighbouring constituencies of some of my colleagues, lies in the very heart of the old south Yorkshire coalfield.
  There has been mining in our constituencies for 300 or 400 years. The first fatality in the mining industry in my constituency occurred around 1660. The industry is an ancient industry because several seams of coal outcrop and can be found easily in close proximity to Wath upon Dearne, where I live in my constituency in the heart of South Yorkshire. The Warren house seam, which comprises part of the coal being mined today in the Selby coalfield, outcrops at Warren house, which is about one mile from my home. It is close to the Abdy seam, which outcrops 18 in below the surface at the point where the Warren house colliery, which closed many years ago, had its first shaft. The seams bear the names of the localities where they outcrop. Within about a mile of my home there is the Newhill seam, the Meltonfield seam, the Warren House seam and the Abdy seam, all of them outcrops.
  A few years ago, there was a fire in the Abdy seam and the mines drainage unit, based at the Westfield colliery site at Parkgate, had enough men to deal with it. As the industry contracted, the mines drainage unit was closed and responsibility was placed on Silverwood colliery, to which I referred in an earlier debate. That colliery may be whittled away; if it is, who will bear the responsibility and have the capacity to respond to an event such as the Abdy seam fire?
  That is one of the problems that arise from contraction. Another difficulty is that we are dealing with an old industry whose problems may have their roots in events that occurred a century or more ago. Will manning in the authority be sufficient to understand and appraise such problems, and will it have the resources to organise a response to them?
  Using the mines drainage unit, British Coal could respond rapidly to such problems, but many pits have closed or are to close. However, the problems arising from heritage remain. I represent an area in the heart of one of the older coalfields. Can I be assured that the problems arising from the legacy of past mining will be met by public provisions or by the authority under its obligations when that authority may have no capacity to do so?
  When I was a student, I was researching the history of mining and happened to be taking photographs with a little box Brownie camera in pursuit of my thesis. In Rawmarsh, which is just a couple of miles from my home, I saw that the land had fallen in at a place where a bell-pit had operated, probably in the late 17th century. No one could prove that date because the records of a mine's workings were not collected then. Some of the mining operations in my constituency are not on official records. I shall give an illustration that is covered by the legislation.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Geoffrey Lofthouse): Order. I do not think that places of work are covered by the resolution.
  Mr. Hardy: Paragraph (a) refers to
  "the making by the Coal Authority …of charges for things done in the exercise and performance of its powers and duties".
  I shall illustrate what I mean. About 2,000 yd from my home is the site of what was the Rockingham porcelain manufactory. The Fitzwilliam estate, which owned the
  836
  whole area, was a kind landlord to the Rockingham manufacturers, the Brameld brothers. They were given permission to mine coal in that vicinity—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. This is all very interesting, but it does not have a great deal to do with the subject of the debate. The hon. Gentleman should confine his remarks to the resolution.
  Mr. Hardy: I shall try to make the matter clear. The Coal Authority would be empowered to charge for the exercise of its responsibilities, but who will pay the charges if the pit that is responsible for the problem ceased to exist 150 or 200 years ago? [Interruption.] I should like to finish this point which you were correct to require me to explain, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
  If the pit closed 150 years ago, who will pay the charge? Who will ascertain the degree of responsibility? The problem will exist, so who will be identifiable as the person or body responsible? I do not propose to go further, but the Minister will understand that the questions that my hon. Friends and I have raised tonight will have to be answered in Standing Committee, otherwise we shall be placing an impossible responsibility on the British Coal authority arid asking it to perform tasks which are completely insoluble.
  Mr. Etherington rose—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. Is the hon. Gentleman giving way?
  Mr. Hardy: Yes.
  Mr. Etherington: My hon. Friend raised a vital point when he used the term "heritage" in referring to the liabilities that have been created in mining areas. He spoke about the problems of pumping and of old pits that have closed. He will obviously be aware that the position will be particularly grim in areas where no pits remain. Does he agree that it is important that the powers and duties taken on by the Coal Authority should involve the responsibility for dewatering areas where a rise in the mine water could lead to pollution and other environmental problems? It is extremely unfair that the areas which—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. Is the hon. Gentleman making a speech or an intervention? I understood it to be the latter, and interventions are supposed to be brief.
  Mr. Etherington: I was following the spirit of the interventions which have been made tonight, but I accept your advice, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Does my hon. Friend agree that the cost of the burden should be borne by the country rather than by the people living in the area, who have given quite enough to society?
  Mr. Hardy: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. He has put to the Minister some aspects of the problem which may not have dawned on him and given him due warning that, when we consider the relevant parts of the Bill, satisfactory explanations will have to be made in Standing Committee and on Report. I would stress that a number of noble Lords will take a deep interest in some of those matters.
  The Government will have to do their homework in the next fortnight. The Bill and the manner it is being dealt with do not give us confidence that any homework is being done.
  12.46 am
  The Minister for Energy (Mr. Tim Eggar): I have heard speeches from a number of Labour Members. I did not realise what good news was given from a sedentary position by the hon. Member for Barnsley, Central (Mr. Illsley). I must tell him immediately that I shall miss him.
  I venture to think that there may be some misunderstanding on the Opposition Benches about the thrust of the motion on the Order Paper. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Wentworth (Mr. Hardy) for his interesting historical exposition of the outcropping and its relationship with the porcelain manufacturer in his constituency. It was one of the more interesting speeches from the Opposition and I should be delighted to hear the conclusion of that story.
  Mr. Bell: My hon. Friend is on the Standing Committee.
  Mr. Eggar: Then we may have many such opportunities.
  A wide number of issues have been aired, some of which are relevant to the proceedings in Committee. I am sure that Opposition Members will not be surprised or offended when I say that few of them, indeed almost none, were relevant to the resolution, but that is a matter for their consciences, the Chair and the length of time they wish to detain the House.
  I am grateful to the hon. Member for Barnsley, Central for giving me notice of some of the issues that will be raised in Committee. I am particularly interested in considering how I will deal with the cows.
  Much of the debate has been about the range of the Coal Authority's duties. The resolution will, of course, permit the authority to charge for the services that it provides, but it in no way restricts the range of its duties or the services that it provides. That is a matter for the Bill, and I shall not get into a discussion on that now.
  It might be helpful and avoid doubt if I outline what the resolution covers. First, it covers charges levied by the Coal Authority. The Bill enables the authority to charge for the services that it provides and a good example would be a licence application fee for services provided in the processing and consideration of an application. The aim is to set fees at a level that will enable the authority to cover its administrative costs. As the House knows, that is a well established practice for such bodies.
  Secondly, the resolution covers corporation tax. The Bill contains provisions that deal with the consequences for corporation tax purposes of the transfer under restructuring schemes of property rights and liabilities to successor companies and other public sector companies. There are also provisions to deal with the subsequent taxation treatment of such transferees. The general approach follows that adopted in previous privatisations which involve statutory bodies already subject to corporation tax. Finally, the resolution covers any sums to be paid into the Consolidated Fund or the national loans fund.
  I hope that it has been of some use to the House to define exactly what the Ways and Means resolution covers. I am upset that we shall not be hearing any further contributions from the hon. Member for Barnsley, Central in Committee—we shall all miss him.
  Mr. Greg Knight rose in his place and claimed to move, That the Question be now put.
  Question put, That the Question be now put:
  The House divided: Ayes 210, Noes 56.

  Division No. 77]

  [12.51 a.m.

  AYES

  Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)

  Gillan, Cheryl

  Alexander, Richard

  Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair

  Allason, Rupert (Torbay)

  Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles

  Amess, David

  Gorst, John

  Arbuthnot, James

  Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)

  Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)

  Greenway, John (Ryedale)

  Ashby, David

  Hague, William

  Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)

  Hamilton, Rt Hon Sir Archie

  Baker, Rt Hon K. (Mole Valley)

  Hampson, Dr Keith

  Baker, Nicholas (Dorset North)

  Hanley, Jeremy

  Baldry, Tony

  Hargreaves, Andrew

  Banks, Matthew (Southport)

  Harris, David

  Bates, Michael

  Hawkins, Nick

  Beresford, Sir Paul

  Hawksley, Warren

  Blackburn, Dr John G.

  Hayes, Jerry

  Bonsor, Sir Nicholas

  Heald, Oliver

  Booth, Hartley

  Heathcoat-Amory, David

  Boswell, Tim

  Hendry, Charles

  Bowden, Andrew

  Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence L.

  Bowis, John

  Horam, John

  Brandreth, Gyles

  Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)

  Brazier, Julian

  Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)

  Brooke, Rt Hon Peter

  Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)

  Brown, M. (Brigg & Cl'thorpes)

  Hunter, Andrew

  Browning, Mrs. Angela

  Jack, Michael

  Bruce, Ian (S Dorset)

  Jenkin, Bernard

  Burns, Simon

  Jessel, Toby

  Butterfill, John

  Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)

  Carlisle, John (Luton North)

  Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)

  Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)

  Jones, Robert B. (W Hertfdshr)

  Carrington, Matthew

  Kellett-Bowman, Dame Elaine

  Carttiss, Michael

  Key, Robert

  Cash, William

  Kirkhope, Timothy

  Chapman, Sydney

  Knapman, Roger

  Clappison, James

  Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)

  Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey

  Knight, Greg (Derby N)

  Colvin, Michael

  Knox, Sir David

  Congdon, David

  Kynoch, George (Kincardine)

  Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)

  Lait, Mrs Jacqui

  Coombs, Simon (Swindon)

  Legg, Barry

  Cope, Rt Hon Sir John

  Lennox-Boyd, Mark

  Cran, James

  Lidington, David

  Currie, Mrs Edwina (S D'by'ire)

  Luff, Peter

  Davies, Quentin (Stamford)

  MacGregor, Rt Hon John

  Day, Stephen

  MacKay, Andrew

  Deva, Nirj Joseph

  Maclean, David

  Devlin, Tim

  McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick

  Dickens, Geoffrey

  Madel, Sir David

  Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James

  Maitland, Lady Olga

  Dover, Den

  Malone, Gerald

  Duncan, Alan

  Mans, Keith

  Duncan-Smith, Iain

  Marland, Paul

  Dykes, Hugh

  Marshall, Sir Michael (Arundel)

  Eggar, Tim

  Martin, David (Portsmouth S)

  Elletson, Harold

  Mates, Michael

  Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter

  Mawhinney, Rt Hon Dr Brian

  Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)

  Mellor, Rt Hon David

  Evans, Nigel (Ribble Valley)

  Merchant, Piers

  Evans, Roger (Monmouth)

  Milligan, Stephen

  Faber, David

  Mills, Iain

  Fabricant, Michael

  Mitchell, Andrew (Gedling)

  Fishburn, Dudley

  Moate, Sir Roger

  Forman, Nigel

  Montgomery, Sir Fergus

  Forsyth, Michael (Stirling)

  Needham, Richard

  Forth, Eric

  Neubert, Sir Michael

  Foster, Don (Bath)

  Newton, Rt Hon Tony

  Fox, Dr Liam (Woodspring)

  Nicholls, Patrick

  French, Douglas

  Nicholson, David (Taunton)

  Gale, Roger

  Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)

  Gallie, Phil

  Norris, Steve

  Gardiner, Sir George

  Oppenheim, Phillip

  Garnier, Edward

  Ottaway, Richard

  839

  Page, Richard

  Stewart, Allan

  Paice, James

  Streeter, Gary

  Patnick, Irvine

  Sweeney, Walter

  Pattie, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey

  Sykes, John

  Pawsey, James

  Taylor, Ian (Esher)

  Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth

  Temple-Morris, Peter

  Powell, William (Corby)

  Thomason, Roy

  Rathbone, Tim

  Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)

  Rendel, David

  Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)

  Richards, Rod

  Thurnham, Peter

  Robathan, Andrew

  Townsend, Cyril D. (Bexl'yh'th)

  Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn

  Tredinnick, David

  Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)

  Trend, Michael

  Robinson, Mark (Somerton)

  Trotter, Neville

  Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)

  Twinn, Dr Ian

  Rowe, Andrew (Mid Kent)

  Tyler, Paul

  Ryder, Rt Hon Richard

  Viggers, Peter

  Sackville, Tom

  Walden, George

  Scott, Rt Hon Nicholas

  Wallace, James

  Shaw, David (Dover)

  Waller, Gary

  Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)

  Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)

  Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)

  Waterson, Nigel

  Shepherd, Richard (Aldridge)

  Wells, Bowen

  Sims, Roger

  Whitney, Ray

  Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)

  Whittingdale, John

  Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)

  Widdecombe, Ann

  Spencer, Sir Derek

  Wiggin, Sir Jerry

  Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)

  Wilkinson, John

  Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)

  Willetts, David

  Spink, Dr Robert

  Wolfson, Mark

  Sproat, Iain

  Wood, Timothy

  Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)

  Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Stephen, Michael

  Mr. Robert G. Hughes and Mr. Derek Conway.

  Stem, Michael

  NOES

  Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)

  Leighton, Ron

  Barnes, Harry

  Lewis, Terry

  Bell, Stuart

  Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)

  Campbell-Savours, D. N.

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Cann, Jamie

  McMaster, Gordon

  Clapham, Michael

  McWilliam, John

  Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)

  Mahon, Alice

  Clelland, David

  Marshall, Jim (Leicester, S)

  Cryer, Bob

  Martin, Michael J. (Springburn)

  Cunliffe, Lawrence

  Meale, Alan

  Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)

  Michael, Alun

  Dafis, Cynog

  Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)

  Dixon, Don

  Miller, Andrew

  Enright, Derek

  Morley, Elliot

  Etherington, Bill

  Olner, William

  Foster, Rt Hon Derek

  O'Neill, Martin

  Foulkes, George

  Pickthall, Colin

  Godman, Dr Norman A.

  Pike, Peter L.

  Graham, Thomas

  Pope, Greg

  Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)

  Primarolo, Dawn

  Hall, Mike

  Simpson, Alan

  Hanson, David

  Skinner, Dennis

  Hardy, Peter

  Strang, Dr. Gavin

  Hood, Jimmy

  Turner, Dennis

  Howarth, George (Knowsley N)

  Wise, Audrey

  Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

  Wray, Jimmy

  Illsley, Eric

  Jones, leuan Wyn (Ynys Môn)

  Tellers for the Noes:

  Kennedy, Jane (Lpool Brdgn)

  Mr. Jon Owen Jones and Mr. Jim Dowd.

  Kilfoyle, Peter

  Question accordingly agreed to.
  Question put:—
  The House divided: Ayes 212, Noes 60.

  Division No. 78]

  [1.02 am

  AYES

  Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)

  Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)

  Alexander, Richard

  Baker, Rt Hon K. (Mole Valley)

  Amess, David

  Baker, Nicholas (Dorset North)

  Arbuthnot, James

  Baldry, Tony

  Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)

  Banks, Matthew (Southport)

  Ashby, David

  Bates, Michael

  840

  Beresford, Sir Paul

  Horam, John

  Blackburn, Dr John G.

  Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)

  Bonsor, Sir Nicholas

  Hughes Robert G. (Harrow W)

  Booth, Hartley

  Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)

  Boswell, Tim

  Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)

  Bowden, Andrew

  Hunter, Andrew

  Bowis, John

  Jack, Michael

  Brandreth, Gyles

  Jenkin, Bernard

  Brazier, Julian

  Jessel, Toby

  Bright, Graham

  Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)

  Brooke, Rt Hon Peter

  Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)

  Brown, M. (Brigg & Cl'thorpes)

  Jones, Robert B. (W Hertfdshr)

  Browning, Mrs. Angela

  Kellett-Bowman, Dame Elaine

  Bruce, Ian (S Dorset)

  Key, Robert

  Burns, Simon

  Kirkhope, Timothy

  Butterfill, John

  Knapman, Roger

  Carlisle, John (Luton North)

  Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)

  Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)

  Knight, Greg (Derby N)

  Carrington, Matthew

  Knox, Sir David

  Carttiss, Michael

  Kynoch, George (Kincardine)

  Cash, William

  Lait, Mrs Jacqui

  Chapman, Sydney

  Lawrence, Sir Ivan

  Clappison, James

  Legg, Barry

  Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey

  Lennox-Boyd, Mark

  Colvin, Michael

  Lidington, David

  Congdon, David

  Luff, Peter

  Conway, Derek

  Maclean, David

  Coombs, Anthony (Wyre For'st)

  McNair-Wilson, Sir Patrick

  Coombs, Simon (Swindon)

  Madel, Sir David

  Cope, Rt Hon Sir John

  Maitland, Lady Olga

  Cran, James

  Malone, Gerald

  Currie, Mrs Edwina (S D'by'ire)

  Mans, Keith

  Davies, Quentin (Stamford)

  Marland, Paul

  Day, Stephen

  Marshall, Sir Michael (Arundel)

  Deva, Nirj Joseph

  Martin, David (Portsmouth S)

  Devlin, Tim

  Mates, Michael

  Dickens, Geoffrey

  Mawhinney, Rt Hon Dr Brian

  Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James

  Mellor, Rt Hon David

  Dover, Den

  Merchant, Piers

  Duncan, Alan

  Milligan, Stephen

  Duncan-Smith, Iain

  Mills, Iain

  Dykes, Hugh

  Moate, Sir Roger

  Eggar, Tim

  Montgomery, Sir Fergus

  Elletson, Harold

  Moss, Malcolm

  Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter

  Needham, Richard

  Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)

  Neubert, Sir Michael

  Evans, Nigel (Ribble Valley)

  Newton, Rt Hon Tony

  Evans, Roger (Monmouth)

  Nicholls, Patrick

  Faber, David

  Nicholson, David (Taunton)

  Fabricant, Michael

  Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)

  Fishburn, Dudley

  Norris, Steve

  Forman, Nigel

  Oppenheim, Phillip

  Forsyth, Michael (Stirling)

  Ottaway, Richard

  Forth, Eric

  Page, Richard

  Foster, Don (Bath)

  Paice, James

  Fox, Dr Liam (Woodspring)

  Patnick, Irvine

  French, Douglas

  Pattie, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey

  Gale, Roger

  Pawsey, James

  Gallie, Phil

  Peacock, Mrs Elizabeth

  Gardiner, Sir George

  Pickles, Eric

  Garnier, Edward

  Powell, William (Corby)

  Gillan, Cheryl

  Rathbone, Tim

  Goodlad, Rt Hon Alastair

  Rendel, David

  Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles

  Richards, Rod

  Gorst, John

  Robathan, Andrew

  Greenway, Harry (Ealing N)

  Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn

  Greenway, John (Ryedale)

  Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)

  Hague, William

  Robinson, Mark (Somerton)

  Hamilton, Rt Hon Sir Archie

  Roe, Mrs Marion (Broxbourne)

  Hampson, Dr Keith

  Rowe, Andrew (Mid Kent)

  Hanley, Jeremy

  Ryder, Rt Hon Richard

  Hargreaves, Andrew

  Sackville, Tom

  Harris, David

  Scott, Rt Hon Nicholas

  Hawkins, Nick

  Shaw, David (Dover)

  Hawksley, Warren

  Shaw, Sir Giles (Pudsey)

  Hayes, Jerry

  Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)

  Heald, Oliver

  Shepherd, Richard (Aldridge)

  Heathcoat-Amory, David

  Sims, Roger

  Hendry, Charles

  Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)

  Higgins, Rt Hon Sir Terence L.

  Smith, Tim (Beaconsfield)

  NOES

  Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)

  Leighton, Ron

  Barnes, Harry

  Lewis, Terry

  Bell, Stuart

  Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)

  Brown, Gordon (Dunfermline E)

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Campbell-Savours, D. N.

  McMaster, Gordon

  Cann, Jamie

  McWilliam, John

  Clapham, Michael

  Mahon, Alice

  Clarke, Eric (Midlothian)

  Marshall, Jim (Leicester, S)

  Clelland, David

  Martin, Michael J. (Springburn)

  Clwyd, Mrs Ann

  Meale, Alan

  Cryer, Bob

  Michael, Alun

  Cunliffe, Lawrence

  Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)

  Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)

  Miller, Andrew

  Dafis, Cynog

  Morley, Elliot

  Dixon, Don

  Olner, William

  Enright, Derek

  O'Neill, Martin

  Etherington, Bill

  Pickthall, Colin

  Foster, Rt Hon Derek

  Pike, Peter L.

  Foulkes, George

  Pope, Greg

  Godman, Dr Norman A.

  Primarolo, Dawn

  Graham, Thomas

  Simpson, Alan

  Griffiths, Nigel (Edinburgh S)

  Skinner, Dennis

  Hall, Mike

  Smith, Rt Hon John (M'kl'ds E)

  Hanson, David

  Strang, Dr. Gavin

  Hardy, Peter

  Turner, Dennis

  Hood, Jimmy

  Vaz, Keith

  Howarth, George (Knowsley N)

  Wise, Audrey

  Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

  Wray, Jimmy

  Illsley, Eric

  Jones, Ieuan Wyn (Ynys Môn)

  Tellers for the Noes:

  Kennedy, Jane (Lpool Brdgn)

  Mr. Jon Owen Jones and Mr. Jim Dowd.

  Kilfoyle, Peter

  Spencer, Sir Derek

  Trotter, Neville

  Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)

  Twinn, Dr Ian

  Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)

  Tyler, Paul

  Spink, Dr Robert

  Viggers, Peter

  Sproat, Iain

  Walden, George

  Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)

  Wallace, James

  Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John

  Waller, Gary

  Stephen, Michael

  Wardle, Charles (Bexhill)

  Stern, Michael

  Waterson, Nigel

  Stewart, Allan

  Wells, Bowen

  Streeter, Gary

  Whitney, Ray

  Sweeney, Walter

  Whittingdale, John

  Sykes, John

  Widdecombe, Ann

  Taylor, Ian (Esher)

  Wiggin, Sir Jerry

  Temple-Morris, Peter

  Wilkinson, John

  Thomason, Roy

  Willetts, David

  Thompson, Sir Donald (C'er V)

  Wolfson, Mark

  Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)

  Wood, Timothy

  Thurnham, Peter

  Townsend, Cyril D. (Bexl'yh'th)

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Tredinnick, David

  Mr. Andrew MacKay and Mr. Andrew Mitchell.

  Trend, Michael

  Question accordingly agreed to.
  Resolved,
  That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Coal Industry Bill, it is expedient to authorize —

  (a) the making by the Coal Authority established by the Act of charges for things done in the exercise and performance of its powers and duties;

  (b) the imposition of charges to corporation tax by provisions relating to the taxation of persons to and from whom property, rights and liabilities are transferred in accordance with schemes under the Act; and

  (c) the payment of sums into the Consolidated Fund or the
  National Loans Fund.

  Agriculture
  1.13 am
  The Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Michael Jack): I beg to move,
  That the Farm and Conservation Grant (Variation) Scheme 1993 (S.I., 1993, No. 2901) dated 24th November 1993, a copy of which was laid before this House on 30th November, be approved.
  This scheme came into existence after a major review of help to farmers in 1988. As a result, the conclusions reached reflected the need at that time to introduce assistance for farmers to help curb production. It was decided that aid should be switched away from investments intended to increase productive capacity and that the benefits to farmers should be in the form of help with conservation schemes and schemes to benefit the environment.
  To that end, I must start by making some announcements about improvements to the farm and conservation grant scheme [Interruption.] We have decided to provide additional assistance in three ways. First, through grants to help farmers with the costs of capital works to open up access to farmland. They will underpin further assistance because we shall return to the House to seek its approval shortly on matters connected with access and environmentally sensitive areas. Also we have decided to give grant aid to people in the poultry industry to deal with poultry waste, just as grants are available for assistance with other livestock wastes. Finally, we want to extend the life of the special package of grants for the Scilly Isles offered under the farm and conservation grant scheme for a further year while we consider the longer term needs of growers on the islands. I hope that the House will agree that those are three small but important ways in which we are trying to develop the
  I shall now mention the rates of grant. As the hon. Member for Workington (Mr. Campbell-Savours) said from a sedentary position, there are reductions. However, those measures have to be viewed in the context of the overall position of farm incomes. Farmers in the dairy sector have benefited significantly, especially from the on-farm schemes to deal with waste, and it is perhaps worth reflecting that in recent years dairy incomes have steadily increased. In 1991–92 incomes increased by 11 per cent. I expect that last year's 1992–93 forecast of a 19 per cent. increase in that sector will be fully realised.
  In the beef sector there have been increases in incomes and in beef special premium and suckler cow premium. Those have been substantially increased and will increase further up to 1995.
  Finally, for those farmers in the less favoured areas, total direct subsidies will be worth about £550 million in 1994.
  Mr. John Greenway rose—
  Mr. Jack: will hon. Friend allow me to make a little progress? I do not want to detain the House unnecessarily.
  The fact that grant rates under the scheme are to be reduced should also be viewed in the context of what that will mean in terms of the expenditure next year on the farm and conservation grant scheme. I must draw the attention of the House to the fact that that will amount to about £27 million —only £2 million less than the peak

  843
  expenditure in this financial year. That indicates the continuity of help that we are providing under the scheme, because much help is in the financial pipeline and is reflected in that expenditure.
  Mr. Greenway: Perhaps it is as well that my hon. Friend continued a little longer, because he has just mentioned the point that I wanted to discuss. He is right to say that many dairy farmers have benefited enormously from the recovery in incomes and from the grant while it was 50 per cent. It is fair to say that those farmers who have money in the bank have made use of that. The farmers who now have schemes in the pipeline are the poorer farmers, who will lose out as a result of the cut to 25 per cent. Does the Minister think that there is a case for saying that those farmers who had a scheme at the planning stage and ready to go ahead should receive the 50 per cent. anyway?
  Mr. Jack: Those farmers who submitted acceptable plans prior to 1 December 1993 will receive the old grant rate, as witnessed by the amount of money that I said was already in the pipeline.
  Several hon. Members rose—
  Mr. Jack: I hope that hon. Members will allow me to make a little more progress.
  The rate of grant, such as it was at 50 per cent., was above the European Community then maximum level of 35 per cent. We did that as a pump-priming exercise, to encourage farmers to take up that important opportunity to deal with farm wastes. It is worth pointing out that we have already paid out more than £115 million in grant in the four and a half years since the scheme was announced in February 1989. At that time, the intention was to spend about £50 million only in the first three years of the scheme.
  To answer my hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway), about 9,000 farmers have already taken advantage of the scheme. Its success is demonstrated by the fact that in 1989 nearly 600 serious pollution incidents were attributed to agriculture. The figure in 1992 was less than 200.
  Mr. Cynog Dafis: Very many farmers still have not been able to carry out works in relation to pollution. I am worried that some of them, because they cannot afford the costs, will sell their quota. To all intents and purposes, that will mean that the farms they occupy will cease to be viable units. That will lead to further fragmentation and amalgamation of units, and make it that much more difficult for young people to enter the industry because the farm sizes will constantly increase as a consequence.
  Mr. Jack: The hon. Gentleman might have had a point if I had been saying that we intended to end the grant scheme altogether. But I have described a remarkable take-up; 9,000 farmers have participated. The hon. Gentleman mentioned young people coming into farming, and I can think of no finer way to respond to that point than to remind him that the proposal to reform tenancy law has come from the Government.
  As I was saying, the grant will continue, but at the rate of 25 per cent. The other area affected by the proposals is conservation, involving hedges, stone walls and traditional buildings.
  Mr. James Wallace rose—
  Mr. Jack: Before I take the hon. Gentleman's intervention, I draw the attention of the House to the fact that the farm conservation grant scheme came into existence at a time when many of the environmental schemes that have subsequently been developed were at a very early stage.
  Mr. Wallace: The Minister has told us that there will be a reduction in the grant. Is he aware that already farmers in my constituency have told me that, because of that reduction, they do not intend to proceed with projects that they had hoped to undertake? Will he confirm that, under the current regulations, if certain action is not taken on waste disposal, it will be possible for environmental health officers to close a farm down? Against such a background, how is it possible to justify cuts that are stopping investments necessary for environmental and even for statutory reasons?
  Mr. Jack: The fact that I can say that 9,000 farmers have already decided to minimise their risk of being penalised for pollution by taking up the grant shows me how aware the farming community is. I recently visited a farm in Cumbria where a substantial amount of work had been completed and more plans were in the pipeline. The people there were glad of the assistance, which had helped them to modernise and improve their farm. I saw no evidence that they intended to diminish their attempts in that direction, taking advantage of the scheme.
  Mr. Peter Hardy rose—
  Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman rose—
  Mr. Jack: I want to make progress. Perhaps I shall give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster (Dame E. Kellett-Bowman) in a moment.
  In connection with the conservation and environmental aspects of the grants, I have already told the House that the scheme was introduced when other schemes, such as that designating environmentally sensitive areas, were in their infancy. In January 1993, six new environmentally sensitive areas were established, and six more are expected to be launched in March. By the year 1996–97, expenditure in the United Kingdom on such areas, which provides assistance for many of the types of scheme covered by the farm and conservation grant scheme, will total about £63 million. There will also be benefits in terms of farm conservation activity from parts of the agri-environment package, details of whose timetabling and introduction we shall announce later this year.
  The House should also take into account the fact that the Department of the Environment has a budget of £105 million to deal with schemes such as the Countryside Commission's countryside stewardship scheme, the hedgerow incentive scheme and the work undertaken by English Nature. All of those are complementary to the work of the farm and conservation grant scheme in connection with hedges, stone walls and traditional buildings.
  Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: I am glad that my hon. Friend has mentioned hedges and traditional stone walls. Surely it is more important to spend money on those, especially in our part of the world, than on encouraging access to the hideous set-aside land.
  Mr. Jack: My hon. Friend is right to draw attention to the idea of the typical landscape—in Cumbria and the

  845
  north-west, for example. That is the aspect that I am discussing. As I explained, in addition to our farm and conservation grant scheme, which will continue to provide assistance for such work, a range of other schemes funded by the Department of the Environment will also enable similar work to be carried on. Those complementary schemes show why it is justifiable in our scheme for us to reduce the grant rates in that area.
  Mr. Hardy: Will the Minister give way?
  Mr. Jack: I want to come to a conclusion, as many other hon. Members want to speak and I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will have an opportunity to do so.
  The third element in the grant scheme, which is coming to an end, deals with matters connected with horticulture. It is a matter of sadness to me as I made my living in the horticultural business before coming into the House. Although there was help for horticultural buildings, especially glasshouses and modernisation grants for orchards, less than 9 per cent. of eligible holdings took up the orchard replanting grant and less than 4 per cent. took up the greenhouse replacement grant.
  Clearly, much work needs to be done in that area and I can assure the House that I shall take into account the problem with grant schemes in the work that I am undertaking to consider horticulture as a whole.
  I commend the motion to the House and I hope that hon. Members will understand that, on the Conservative Benches, there is no diminution in our wish to provide assistance to farmers, in our effectiveness in dealing with farm waste, in the commitment of the Government to provide funding for environmental concerns and in the complementarity between schemes from the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and those from other Government Departments.
  1.25 am
  Mr. Elliot Morley: There are parts of the supplementary estimates which we on the Labour Benches welcome. Those are the parts that the Minister has rightly outlined: grants for access, changes in provisions concerning poultry waste and the extension of support for the Isles of Scilly.
  However, overall, the statutory instrument is a major blow to the farming community. It represents substantial cuts in environmental and conservation management. Unless the Minister will give some indication that he is prepared to take the statutory instrument away and consider it again, we shall have no alternative but to vote against it, because the changes are not to the advantage of the farming community, nor do they meet a number of commitments that the Government have made, as I shall outline.
  The changes are a double blow. They are not only a direct blow to the farming community because of the loss of capital grants, but a blow to the wider issue of protecting and managing our countryside. I remind the House that the intentions of the scheme, as printed in the foreword of the original farm conservation grant scheme handbook were as follows:
  "The Farm and Conservation Grant Scheme is designed to help farmers maintain efficient farming systems while also meeting the often heavy cost of combating pollution and conserving the countryside and its wildlife. The scheme focuses
  846
  on those investments which cut costs by updating existing resources and those which help to achieve good countryside management. A special priority of the scheme is to help farmers install and improve waste handling facilities to avoid the risk of pollution.
  I am sure that those are worthy aims, which the whole House should fully support. There is a shift in support payments for such objectives and such schemes which are exactly the kind to which we in the Labour party give high priority. We want to see the large amounts of public money being diverted towards such aspects of the CAP.
  The scheme is comparatively modest in comparison with the total sums of available agricultural support. The scheme totals £74 million this year. To put that in perspective, it is well below 10 per cent. of the £840 million spent on set-aside and the arable payments scheme. Even though the scheme is modest, grants for conservation. schemes are to be cut from 50 per cent. to 30 per cent. in less favoured areas, and from 40 per cent. to 25 per cent. elsewhere.
  Capital grants for the handling, storing and treating of waste are to be cut from 50 per cent. to 25 per cent. Grants for the repair and reinstatement of traditional farm buildings are to be cut from 35 per cent. to 25 per cent. in less-favoured areas and to 20 per cent. in other areas. It is estimated that those cuts will bring about savings of about £12 million in the current year. I contrast that with total Government spending of £2·5 billion on the CAP in the current year. Such comparisons put into perspective the amount being spent on conservation management.
  The National Farmers Union parliamentary land use and environment committee this morning—
  Mr. Tim Devlin: Yesterday morning.
  Mr. Morley>Not according to the parliamentary day.
  That committee pointed out that the great advantage of such a scheme is that it is available to the whole country and that, unlike schemes such as environmentally sensitive areas, valuable though they are, it applies to the 85 per cent. of the countryside outside less favoured areas and environmentally sensitive areas. Such cuts, therefore, are detrimental to the whole countryside.
  The scheme can be said to have been successful, unlike many agricultural support schemes. There has been a good take-up, and spending on waste handling facilities in particular has increased from £64,000 in 1989, to a peak of £23·4 million in 1991–92, and to £21·1 million in 1992–93. That demonstrates the tremendous investment that has been made in the farming community to deal with the problems of agricultural waste and its potential for polluting waterways.
  Cuts in grant are a major blow to the livestock sector and they will affect the investment plans that many farmers, particularly those who do not have large sums of money available to them, have been planning. Of course, they have a knock-on effect on the environment and on jobs.
  Mr. Jon Owen Jones: Will my hon. Friend comment on the likely adverse effect on watercourses of cutting grants to subsidise the treatment of waste? According to a recent report from the National Rivers Authority, in Wales the number of pollution incidents, from farms in particular, has increased alarmingly over the past few years.
  Mr. Morley: My hon. Friend is right. Over the years, agricultural run-offs have accounted for a large proportion of pollution incidents in waterways. There has been a recent reduction, but that is a tribute to the scheme and it is a reason why the scheme should not be cut when there are tangible gains in capital grants to deal with potential pollution problems.
  It is worth raising a query which was referred to me by the Country Landowners Association, which shares my concern about the impact of cuts in grant. If capital grants for livestock waste are to be reduced, will the Government consider diverting some resources into grant-aiding the separation of clean and dirty water on livestock farms? That would reduce the volume of muck to be disposed of and it would also help the farmer and the environment. Is it possible to divert resources to such a purpose?
  Apart from livestock waste, the grants have helped greatly in respect of environmental features such as shelter belts, trees for shading stock, the enclosure of grazed woodlands, traditional field boundaries, bracken control, the regeneration of heather and grass moorland, and the repair and reinstatement of traditional buildings. Again, the House will agree that those are important objectives and that they deserve support in terms of cuntryside management.
  I shall focus on traditional field boundaries. I refer, of course, to hedges and dry-stone walls. Both features of the agricultural landscape are attractive, functional and important conservation features.
  The loss of grant assistance for the reinstatement of hedges is a serious blow. Indeed, a recent Government survey revealed that there was a net loss of 23 per cent. of hedgerows between 1984 and 1990 and a substantial increase in derelict hedges because of a lack of management.
  I wonder how the cut in grant for landscape features such as hedgerows squares with the Government's manifesto pledge to introduce legislation to protect hedgerows. What has happened to that pledge? Is it yet another broken promise to add to a litany of broken promises? Is the Minister prepared to urge his counterpart in the Department of the Environment to introduce the legislation which was promised many years ago and which is very necessary? Many miles of hedgerow continue to be lost or destroyed. Indeed, there is a case for increasing the amount of grant available for hedgerow planting, rather than decreasing it, as the statutory instrument does.
  A measure for features such as hedgerows is too important to be left to the private Bill procedure, although I know that hon. Members, including my hon. Friend the Member for Wentworth (Mr. Hardy), have campaigned for a long time for such legislation. We had a private Bill on hedgerow protection. I regret that Tory Members wrecked it by talking it out and ensuring that it did not get on the statute book. If they continue to use such wrecking tactics, the Government need to introduce proper legislation to meet their manifesto promise.
  Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman: Although I am in favour of hedges, there were certain disadvantages to the private Bill. It would have put the power into the hands of local authorities, which often do not know much about farming. I would rather have the power to deal with hedges with the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food or the farmers themselves but not with local authorities.
  Mr. Morley: Obviously, there is an argument about the detail of the Bill. But dealing with hedgerows in terms of planning was a logical way forward. The Bill was supported by Ministers. If they think that the way forward is to introduce hedgerow legislation as part of planning controls—of course, they drafted the detail of the Bill—I assume that they think that it is the best way to proceed. Although the hon. Lady has her disagreements, I am sure she would agree that we do not need this statutory instrument.
  The introduction of legislation is the right way forward, although we could argue about how it would work. I still think that it is important for the Government to give hedgerow protection some priority and to ensure that they abide by their commitment. Certainly, they do not abide by that commitment in this statutory instrument.
  The Council for the Protection of Rural England rightly argues that what we need in terms of agricultural policy is an increase in countryside management and the support that goes with it. As for dry-stone walls as a field boundary, the CPRE refers to surveys which show that there has been a 10 per cent. reduction in the amount of dry-stone walling on agricultural land. Of course, such cuts do not impact simply in terms of conservation features and conservation management: they also impact on jobs in the rural economy.
  Many people are trying to acquire new skills, or relearn old skills, in terms of hedge laying, tree planting and rebuilding dry-stone walls. Indeed, a colleague of mine is encouraging the reinstatement of dry-stone walls on his farm. He told me that the person who is doing the work has taken on an apprentice to learn the skill. That work is supported by the grants. I wonder how many people will lose their jobs and their income as a result of the cuts in grant. Such grants would otherwise have encouraged the reinstatement of these important features.
  The same applies to the renovation of traditional farm buildings. In many parts of the country farm buildings are an important part of the landscape, and not only is their reinstatement valuable as a landscape feature but there are employment opportunities for acquiring and implementing traditional skills which are much needed within the rural economy.
  I do not see how cuts of this kind will benefit the rural economy or rural communities. Not only will the cuts have an impact in terms of conservation features, but they are particularly badly timed in terms of the Government's commitment to publish a biodiversity plan which I understand will be published on 26 January. I wonder how the Minister can argue that the cut can meet the Rio commitments made by the Prime Minister for meeting biodiversity. Is that yet another broken promise which we can add to the list of commitments which have been given?
  Is the Minister aware that a survey published last November by the Institute of Terrestrial Ecology underlined the losses to wildlife species and the importance of hedges in maintaining their populations?
  Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that in the Cotswolds, where there is a large proportion of stone walls, those stone walls are disappearing because they are simply too expensive to keep up? The hon. Gentleman quoted from a report by the Institute of Terrestrial Ecology. The reason why hedgerows are disappearing is simply because they are becoming derelict.

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  The proposed Hedgerows Bill would have had no effect on that. If the hon. Gentleman and his hon. Friends wish to keep up such landscape features, the only way is to have a proper management plan under such schemes as the countryside stewardship scheme. There is considerably more money available for that scheme from the Department of the Environment and the hedgerow incentive scheme from the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food than is available under the farm conservation grant scheme, which is merely—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. This sounds like a speech, and not an intervention. Interventions are supposed to be brief.
  Mr. Morley: I have put in perspective the sums which are available for farm conservation grants. Those sums are tiny in terms of the global commitment made by this country on the common agriculture policy.
  I say to the hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Clifton-Brown) that it is true that it is expensive to maintain and repair stone walls. It is often difficult to find people with the skills to do so. However, cuts in grants will do nothing to assist hedgerow maintenance. I would have more respect for the hon. Gentleman on such issues if he had not been one of the main culprits in wrecking the Hedgerows Bill which was put before Parliament. I should have thought that, if he wants to be taken seriously on such matters as landscape protection, he should make sure that there was a proper facility or provision to protect such things as hedgerows, rather than wrecking the Bill in the way he did.
  Mr. Clifton-Brown: The simple reason, as my hon. Friend the Member for Lancaster (Dame Elaine Kellett-Bowman) pointed out, was that we did not want local authorities which do not understand about growing hedgerows interfering and telling farmers what to do. That would not have been the right way forward and would have been bureaucratic.
  The hon. Gentleman criticises me personally for wrecking the Bill. I have a record of a net gain of one mile of hedgerows on my farm.
  Mr. Morley: I return to the original point that Ministers drafted the Bill, and they felt that local authority planning was the correct mechanism. While I do not doubt his commitments, that is no excuse for wrecking a Bill which many people were anxious to see put on the statute book.
  I return to the issue of the impact of biodiversity. Is the Minister aware of the detailed farmland bird census which was carried out by the British Trust for Ornithology? That census demonstrated the dramatic losses of many of the once-common farmland birds. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds calculated that the numbers of grey partridges have fallen by 73 per cent. during the last 20 years. If the hon. Member for Crawley (Mr. Soames) were here, he would share my concern at the decline of a species such as the grey partridge.
  The measure also includes grants for heath and moorland reinstatement. Heath and moorland are vital to threatened species like the sand lizard, which is a red data book species. The proposals to reinstate habitat have been cut by the statutory instrument. How does all that square with the Rio declaration which the Prime Minister signed
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  and which supports the biodiversity convention and protection when the Government are taking measures to cut the kind of support systems that are protecting biodiversity?
  We need clear objectives and targets in terms of protecting species and habitat. How can cuts in a measure like this achieve that? Did MAFF consult the Department of the Environment about the statutory instrument? Will the DOE set targets for habitat protection and restoration? How will the cuts allow the Government to comply with the European Union habitat directive? That is particularly important, as the Government are already on record as saying that they will meet the requirements of the habitat directive precisely through measures of this kind.
  If the Government are going to cut the farm conservation grant scheme, how will they meet the commitments that they have already made with respect to the habitat directive? Is that yet another broken promise to add to the list? Those issues, in addition to conservation and the impact on farmers, are important in terms of the overall commitment and responsibility that the Government should have for our countryside and environment.
  The welcome aspect of the statutory instrument relates to the grants for access to agricultural land. The Opposition have been arguing for that for sometime. We welcome the grants for the provision of gates, stiles and footbridges. We believe that encouraging farmers to allow public access to their land is a valid use of public money. We hope that that will succeed. It is therefore a matter of regret that such positive measures are outweighed in the measure by the negative impact of the overall cuts in grant.
  Given the overall reduction, will the Minister confirm what I understood from his opening remarks? Are the new grants for support for access to come from the budget for the farm conservation grant scheme or has there been diversion from the agri-environment programme to fund the improvement? I am working on the assumption that that is not the case because the Minister said that there is to be a further announcement about the agri-environment package and support for public access. I would be grateful if the Minister could confirm that we are not talking about diversion from the agri-environment package.
  That point is important because the agri-environment package is not exactly a generous scheme. A joint report by the CPRE, the Ramblers Association and the Royal Society for Nature Conservation demonstrated that green payments to farmers, including environmentally sensitive area schemes, amounted to £2·31 per hectare on a United Kingdom average, while set-aside and arable payments amounted to a somewhat larger £45·39 per hectare on a United Kingdom average. That is a considerable difference, particularly in terms of value of money.
  There is a great deal more value for money with regard to conservation and environmental support as part of agri-environment packages than simply paying farmers to keep land in set-aside. Farmers in my constituency share that view. They would rather see public money being spent on positive schemes which the public can appreciate and see than on the negative set-aside scheme.
  Cutting environmental payments under the farm and conservation scheme while £840 million is spent on set-aside and arable aids, shows lack of commitment to environmental management. The cuts will produce minimal savings this year and will undermine a good value-for-money scheme. They will also undermine the

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  ability of farmers to protect and manage our countryside, and they breach the Government's commitment to the habitat directive and the biodiversity treaty. I urge the Government to withdraw the instrument and to think again on the matter. If they do not, they will stand accused of breaking yet more promises, adding to a record that is already littered with broken promises, and of a shift away from responsible management and protection of our countryside rather than giving the commitment and support that our farmers and our countryside deserve.
  1.50 am
  Mr. Kenneth Carlisle: I am glad to take part in the debate. As a farmer, I do not think that, in a time of economic stringency, it is at all unreasonable to reduce grants. Grants still remain to spur the planting of hedges and shelter belts, and farmers are increasingly likely and increasingly encouraged to do that off their own bat. The hon. Member for Glanford and Scunthorpe (Mr. Morley) rather ruined his speech by exaggerating the effect that such fairly modest cuts would have on the countryside. I am sorry that he lost his balance.
  When drainage grant was about 20 per cent. lower than what is proposed in the legislation, it was a spur for many farmers to continue with drainage schemes. Moreover, it is in the general interest of farming to be weaned from grants. We do not want to be the one sector of society that is continually encouraged and fed by grants to do what is fairly natural work in the maintenance and stewardship of the countryside.
  I understand the reasons for the measure. It is necessary for farmers to share the general stringency that the rest of the country faces at a time when we are seeking to reduce public expenditure. The concern that has been generated about the reduction in grants is understandable because we all want to conserve and increase the wildlife value of our countryside. It is certainly not right to be complacent about what is being done to make the countryside a better place for wildlife and to rebuild some of the depleted stocks.
  I am convinced that we can and should do more, and this is a unique opportunity to do that. The obvious way is not through grants and small measures of the type that we have been debating, but by using the vast sums that are available under the set-aside scheme. As the hon. Member for Glanford and Scunthorpe said, last year farmers were paid about £840 million to set aside nearly 1·5 million acres. We are speaking of sums that are 100 times more than the relatively modest cuts in the measure.
  Few of us who have anything at all to do with the land are pleased by the set-aside regime. We certainly feel that the existing arrangement is of little benefit to wildlife. In addition, the management of the set-aside regime is costly and, as a farmer, I do not think that it improves the fertility of the land or assists in growing crops in the following year. Under the set-aside regime, there is a massive opportunity and a real challenge to improve our efforts to help conservation and wildlife. We have a real opportunity to make set-aside of lasting benefit to conservation.
  One such measure that we are moving towards is permanent set-aside. Set-aside along the edge of a wood can be of permanent benefit to wildlife.
  We also have to accept that, to achieve real benefit to wildlife, we have to manage some areas. Where we manage the countryside, we increase the benefit of that countryside to wildlife. Let me give two examples. Britain has a
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  shortage of lowland heathland. The reinstatement of heathland requires a low level of grazing. It would be valuable if we could secure that.
  If we want really good permanent pasture, we need a regime of mowing for hay at a late date without adding fertiliser. If we could secure through the Common Market some measures by we which could have limited cropping from land, the advantages to conservation and wildlife would be huge. That is what we want, and it would produce real value for money from the huge sums being spent.
  If we could secure the proper management of set-aside combined with growing areas under the environmentally sensitive area scheme and many other schemes—for example, the management of ancient woodlands—we could continue making real efforts to reconstruct valuable habitats on a grand scale and we would be spending the huge sums of available money effectively.
  In conclusion, I certainly accept the modest measures proposed this evening. We should be weaned from grants and contribute to the national economic efforts, but I cannot accept our continuing failure to make set-aside work creatively for conservation. I should like the Government to be absolutely certain that the measures we take with other members of the European Community in the next few years ensure that set-aside land is of lasting benefit to the environment.
  1.57 am
  Mr. Paul Tyler: I am delighted to follow the hon. Member for Lincoln (Mr. Carlisle), because he has shown yet again that there is a groundswell in the House—an increasing tendency to realise that set-aside is central to the Government's problems with agriculture and with the misinvestment of resources in agricultural development.
  When the former Minister came back to the House waving a piece of paper and saying that he had achieved peace in our time, he claimed reduced surpluses, reduced costs and reduced bureaucracy as major benefits from his common agricultural policy reform package. Initially, the Liberal Democrats were alone in the House in taking the view that the dependence on set-aside, especially rotational set-aside, would be the seed of the decline of the whole policy. In fact, it had built into it its own calamitous conclusion.
  I very much endorse the views expressed this evening about the way in which, sadly, the cuts that the Treasury has made in agricultural support have been on the wrong targets. That has to be the message that hon. Members on both sides of the House have to express to the Government.
  I hope that the Minister will be able to explain to us, if he speaks again tonight, how precisely the target has been selected out of all the targets that could have been selected by the Treasury in making cuts, when there is such a clear view among the agriculturists, conservationists, the general public, taxpayers and Members of the House that the real target should be the huge sums being paid in arable area compensation for rotational set-aside.
  In the meantime, as hon. Members have already said, there is an element of double-speak or double standards in that the proposals are being brought forward at this juncture, when the Department of the Environment is to publish its biodiversity action plan within a few days. I hope that the Government will reiterate their support for

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  the European Union habitats directive. How could any Government square the reiteration of that support with those cuts and those proposed targets for economies?
  The National Farmers Union has made it clear that the great value of the farm and conservation grant scheme is that it is generally applied, extremely popular, nationwide and comprehensive and all farms are eligible, wherever they are. It is not selective and does not depend on lines on maps. Surely that is the way to proceed if we want all farmers—not only a few in particular areas—to sign up to wider environmental and community benefits.
  The organisations that brief hon. Members of, I am sure, all parties have emphasised the fact that the take-up of the scheme has been unique in that it has been so cost-effective and has led to real improvements. The most popular take-up has been for investment in waste handling facilities and the scheme has been one of the best run of any Government. As the hon. Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) said, the people who now wish to benefit from such schemes were not making large profits before and therefore had no ready cash to invest. We are therefore penalising the least well-off—in the dairy sector in particular—when it should be the other way around.
  What message are the Government sending to the industry and to the country? In recent weeks, I have been to the borders of Scotland, to North Yorkshire and Somerset and, of course, to Cornwall, to meet dairy farmers. I do not think that the hon. Member for Lincoln has as many dairy farmers in the city of Lincoln as I have in my constituency. The diary farmers in particular know only too well that the scheme is of practical help to them. It is a deplorable day when cuts are made simply because the Treasury finds it easy to make them. That is the real reason for the cuts; it is not because the Minister felt he had found the correct target for reductions in costs.
  On-farm waste management is a major problem, as has already been mentioned. Of course there is room for significant improvement. The National Rivers Authority and other organisations outside government have emphasised that fact and, in the interests of a long-term environmental policy, it is extremely important that there continue to be improvements.
  It is significant that the grant scheme makes no great difference to the profitability of an individual holding; indeed, it may increase costs on the farm. Nor does it make any difference to the productivity of a particular enterprise. There is no benefit to the farmer. The benefit is to the environment and the wider community and, one hopes, to the Government's long-term environmental objectives.
  The Minister referred to increasing income. What we are discussing is not a matter of income. It is not intended to help the farmer to make a bigger profit. Indeed, it cannot do so, but it can achieve other benefits for the community and the environment.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Wallace) said that the NRA can effectively close a dairy farm enterprise if it does not meet the appropriate waste management standards. The scheme is not merely a voluntary addition to help farmers do a better job, or make a bigger profit, but has much wider advantages.
  I remind the Minister that it was his right hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Norfolk (Mr. Ryder), who is now the Patronage Secretary—that shows how far the Minister can
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  rise if he plays his cards right—who introduced the scheme in 1989 when he was Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister. On 14 February 1989, which is Valentine's day—I am sure that that was appropriate—he said:
  "Concern to protect and enhance the beauty and wildlife variety of our countryside is growing all the time. Increasingly, too, the public look to the farmer as the guardian of the countryside … What is less often recognised … is the extra cost this can impose on the farmer."
  That is the point—it is an extra cost, not an advantage, to the farmer to introduce such a scheme. He continued:
  "Another important priority under the … scheme deals with the problems of pollution from farm effluent. The pressure on farmers to clean up their act is acute, and rightly so."
  He added:
  "It also shows our determination to target assistance where it can do most good, both for the farmer and for the community as a whole."—[Official Report, 14 February 1989; Vol. 147, c. 269–70.]
  Where is that promise and that targeting tonight? Cuts has been made precisely where, on that occasion, the then Parliamentary Secretary identified a need to expand and increase support.
  What has changed in those few years? Do the Government no longer believe that protecting the environment is important? Were their claims of sustainability so much cant? Is this measure just a sop to the Treasury because the environment does not really matter when the chips are down?
  Do the present ministerial team share the right hon. Gentleman's view that the extra cost should not fall on the farmer? Today's targeting is most curious in relation to the priorities set at the Rio summit, the European Union habitats directive and the terms in which the scheme was introduced in 1989.
  The Government's own 1990 countryside survey, published just a few months ago, reported the decline of habitats over the past 12 years—including the most valuable in this country. I refer to hedgerows and to upland grass and moorland—in both of which I am extremely interested, given the part of the United Kingdom that I represent.
  Those habitats were precisely targeted, and rightly so, under the farm and conservation grant scheme, on the best possible advice to the Ministry. However, during the 12 years of the survey, 23 per cent. of hedgerows were lost, in addition to the considerable losses that occurred in previous eras. Up to 8 per cent. of upland grass and moorland was also lost.
  Those areas are of huge value in terms of not only natural habitat but the upland landscape available to be enjoyed by people who do not live there all year but who visit from all parts of the world to see a man-made but nevertheless extremely attractive landscape—so there is even tourist value in work done under the scheme.
  The survey identified an increase in derelict hedges, probably because of declining hedge management. Mention was made tonight of skills being lost because the grant is not enough—not because it is too much or too generous. Surely no one suggests that the scheme has outlived its usefulness. The reverse is true. Hedgerows, stone walls and Cornish banks—each area has its landscape vocabulary—are all part of the fabric of our countryside. The survey confirmed that they are still deteriorating. That is surely a reason for increasing the amount.
  The Minister made three small announcements this evening. We heard nothing dramatic about poultry waste.

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  Although I am delighted—I am sure that the hon. Member for St. Ives (Mr. Harris) shares my interest—that the Isles of Scilly scheme will continue, that announcement was not so dramatic that we can all tear up our Order Papers and go home.
  The access provisions are not a new announcement. On 10 August 1993, the Department announced that it would introduce funding for public access as part of its commitment to the European Union's agricultural environment programme. We cannot have double booking—that support cannot appear twice in the accounts. I hope that right hon. and hon. Members on both sides of the House will press the Minister to say this evening whether that is new money or whether it has simply been recycled—already announced, but presented by the Minister this evening as new by a sleight of hand.
  The scheme's objectives are most worth while and deserve maximum support, but we want to ensure not only payment for existing rights of way but increased public access as part of the bargain, otherwise, we shall be paying for something that we already have. There is no value in that.
  As the hon. Member for Lincoln pointed out eloquently, what is so galling is the contrast between the huge sums being spent on arable set-aside, particularly rotational set-aside—which he rightly identified as having limited conservation benefits—and this cut. The Council for the Protection of Rural England has pointed out that the cut represents 0·08 per cent.—less than 1 per cent.—of the total amount that will be invested in organised dereliction. Rotational set-aside, after all, is simply managed dereliction.
  Rotational set-aside is in danger of becoming a bottomless pit into which increasingly large area payments will be thrown, bringing the whole of farming into disrepute. Already, parts of the tabloid press—perhaps not so ostentatiously in recent weeks; they have had other interests—have identified as scandalous the huge sums paid to large landowners in the eastern part of England. This will increasingly become a scandal, and the taxpayer will not put up with it in the long term. It simply is not sustainable politically. That would be so even if it were sustainable in other regards, which it clearly is not.
  In the last year, 550,000 hectares of farmland in the United Kingdom were left idle, with virtually no environmental or social benefits. The Government's proposals will bring the CAP to its knees. It has already been brought into disrepute.
  As the arable area scheme is now constituted, it is clearly doing great damage to the reputation of the farming community, and to the taxpayer. It appears that it is doing some good only to the largest landowners and the largest farmers. No doubt they used to be Conservative supporters. I do not know whether that is still the case. In the meantime, the Minister has suffered a severe defeat.
  Let us be clear about this: these are not the Minister's proposals. I give her credit for at least having the good judgment to know that this is not the right target for cuts, although it may be a soft target. The statutory instrument involved has the Treasury's fingerprints all over it; it is nothing to do with the priorities of the Minister and her team. I have too much respect for them to believe otherwise. The Treasury has been allowed to savage the most valuable and vulnerable elements in the Minister's budget. No flights of fancy can disguise the fact that this represents a major defeat.
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  That defeat concerns not only the Minister; the real victims will be the farmers who really want to plan, in the long term, for the conservation of their land, as good stewards of that land. This is a defeat for the countryside.
  2.12 am
  Mr. David Harris: I trust that the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler) will forgive me if I do not follow his remarks too closely; others wish to speak. Let me say, however, that I felt that a good speech was spoilt by his conclusions. The remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Lincoln (Mr. Carlisle) put the matter into perspective. I think that it was a bit over the top to talk about a "savaging" policy. I am, however, grateful for his reference to the Isles of Scilly, which are in my constituency.
  I fear that I have spent a good deal of my time in the House criticising my hon. Friend and his predecessor over their responsibility for fishing matters. I am delighted to be able to congratulate my hon. Friend on the announcement about the Isles of Scilly.
  As one of your predecessors knows, Mr. Deputy Speaker—Lord Dean spends all his summer holidays there —the fabric of the islands is composed of small holdings. They are not farms in the accepted sense; they are minute holdings, but they make the landscape for the inhabited islands. In recent years, I—along with others—have been increasingly concerned about the future of some of those holdings. The structure of agriculture and horticulture on the islands has come under trememdous pressure from economic forces and several other factors. One of those factors was cold weather and violent storms some years ago, which destroyed the hedge pattern of the islands.
  I was pleased to accompany my right hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk, Coastal (Mr. Gummer) to the islands when he was Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. He announced the application of the scheme to the islands with particular reference to replacing some of the hedges. [Interruption.] I cannot hear what the hon. Member for Glandford and Scunthorpe (Mr. Morley) is saying. That is probably just as well. I am sure that his comments are not helpful.
  My right hon. Friend the Minister for Suffolk, Coastal announced the scheme to give aid to the islanders Io replace hedges and to improve and store bulbs. That has been a valuable scheme. I am sorry that, as a result of economic factors, there has not been the take-up for which some of us hoped. It is right, and greatly appreciated, that my hon. Friend the Minister has announced tonight that the scheme will be extended for another year while longer-term measures are considered. That will be welcomed by farmers on the Isles of Scilly and particularly by Mrs. Penny Rogers, the splendid secretary of the National Farmers Union branch. She is a grower, as are all her members of her family. She has worked extremely hard on behalf of all those involved in horticulture and agriculture on the islands. She has been in constant contact with me about the scheme and other measures that are needed.
  My concluding remarks refer to the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Lincoln (Mr. Carlisle) said. He was right to say that responsible farmers do not expect to survive or depend on grants. That is perhaps the fundamental difference between Conservative Members and some Opposition Members on the point. There is a

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  place for grants where encouragement is needed and where they are necessary to carry out certain preservation works. The Isles of Scilly certainly come into that category.
  Isles of Scilly farmers are extremely independent. They do not expect to survive on grants. They have done an enormous amount to help themselves, particularly in marketing the daffodil crop. It always gives me enormous pleasure to see Sol d'Or daffodils being sold at Westminster tube station. A year ago, when Mrs. Rogers came to the House, she stopped at the tube station because the florist there was selling Sol d'Or daffodils from the Isles of Scilly. She looked at the box and they came from Lunnon, her farm on the Isles of Scilly.
  The farmers have imagination. They have done a tremendous amount in marketing and promoting their products, particularly the daffodils. The scheme is a little further encouragement. For those reasons, I thank the Minister, on the farmers' behalf, for his announcement tonight.
  2.18 am
  Mr. Peter Hardy: I had not intended to speak, but I wanted to ask the Minister a simple question. I was sorry that he did not give way. I shall be brief because I know that several hon. Members wish to speak.
  The hon. Member for St. Ives (Mr. Harris) referred to hedgerows. We have lost 23 per cent. of our hedges in 12 years. I presented a hedgerows measure in 1982. The Government said that it was not required because the threat to hedgerows had ended. Between 1984 and 1990, almost a quarter of Britain's hedgerows disappeared. I urge the Minister to give favourable consideration to the Bill that I have presented in the past few days. It has been refined from the one that was blocked in 1989. It commands the support of hon. Members on both sides of the House, including some of the Minister's hon. Friends who have a distinguished record in conservation. I know that I could have had the support of more of his hon. Friends, if a larger number of supporters were allowed. The Minister will recall that we are trying to keep that measure non-partisan and I say that as a long-serving chairman of the Council of Europe sub-committee on the natural environment.
  I would like Britain to maintain its leading position in the field. The Government's commitment in the manifesto on which Conservative Members were elected in 1992 means that they have an obligation to ensure that a hedgerows Bill is allowed to go through and that would make up for the decline in interest in hedgerows which may be a consequence of the order.
  2.19 am
  Mr. Jonathan Evans: I am grateful for the opportunity to make a short contribution to the debate. My hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) made one of the most telling contributions when he asked the Minister about the position of those farmers who have already submitted plans to the Ministry and had them accepted. I was very interested and encouraged by the Minister's response that, if plans are accepted, they will receive grant at the higher rate. I note that the Minister is again agreeing to that.
  I am especially pleased about that because, sadly, at the time that the farm and conservation grant scheme was
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  introduced in 1989 there was some difficulty about the interpretation of the expression, "expenditure incurred", which appears in paragraph 2 of the statutory instrument.
  One such case involves one of my constituents, Mr. Winston Richards, who was engaged in a project under the agricultural improvement scheme, which predated the farm and conservation grants scheme. The interpretation of "expenditure incurred" in his case has been particularly inflexible. I shall briefly quote to the Minister a letter that I received from the Secretary of State for Wales, which said that he accepted
  "that the Welsh Office has to determine in any individual case how the term 'expenditure incurred' is to be applied. In doing so it must act in accordance with the guidelines which have been agreed between all Agriculture Departments and the Treasury".
  If the interpretation has changed, I wonder how it will apply to constituents such as Mr. Richards, who incurred £15,000 of expenditure and—whether the grant is 25 per cent. or 50 per cent. —has not received a penny of assistance because of the inflexible interpretation of the rule.
  I was very much encouraged by what the Minister said about developing the agri-environmental package. Environmentally sensitive areas are playing a more significant role in some of the most beautiful parts of the United Kingdom, such as my constituency. Two areas within it—the Cambrian mountains and the Radnor area —have been designated ESAs in recent times. However, the Brecon Beacons national park—an area of equal beauty —has within it many hedgerows, as the hon. Member for Wentworth (Mr. Hardy) will know, on which the skills of hedge laying have been kept alive.
  Although other schemes assisted hedge laying and maintenance, I look forward with anticipation to the proposals that.the Minister has said that he will present to the House in due course to ensure that we do not lose those skills and that farmers will be in a position to carry on their important work of looking after our beautiful countryside, in which they should be supported.
  2.23 am
  Mr. Colin Pickthall: I was struck by one comment made by the hon. Member for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler), the Liberal Democrat spokesman on agriculture. He said that each area has its traditional landscape. I only wish that that were true in my area on the Lancashire plain. When I first knew it 20 or 25 years ago, it looked as most hon. Members would expect. Now it is a huge plain, which resembles Saskatchewan more than Lancashire.
  So many years of destruction and dereliction of hedgerows will need a lot of fixing. The hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Clifton-Brown), who mentioned having created one mile of hedgerow, would have to work extremely hard to restore some of those in west Lancashire. They have been left as stunted stumps, which have all sorts of implications for country roads in the area. My hon. Friend the Member for St. Helens, North (Mr. Evans)—who has quite a large rural patch, believe it or not—watches as, in dry weather, thousands of tonnes of topsoil annually blow off his constituency and all over mine. Much as I like to receive things from his constituency, we could do without that. That is attributed by the farmers to the destruction and dereliction of hedgerows.
  Mr. Peter L. Pike: When my hon. Friend refers to the situation on the south side of Lancashire, will he recognise that, in east Lancashire, the situation on the Pennines is very different in terms of the need for stone walls? The farmers in other parts of Lancashire will not be happy about what a Lancashire Minister said in opening the debate.
  Mr. Pickthall: I welcome the intervention by my hon. Friend the Member for Burnley (Mr. Pike). He is quite right and the wind that blows in his part of the world is even more ferocious than it is in mine, although I maintain that, in a flat area like west Lancashire, any diminution of grants towards the maintenance and building of shelter belts and hedgerows is nothing short of disastrous.
  I shall briefly mention the cuts in grant for the handling and storing of poultry manure in my region, where farmers have already expressed a great deal of concern to me about their problems in disposing of that manure. Especially they express concern in connection with the 15 per cent. set-aside, which presents them with extra diffficulties. When I brought the problem to the attention of Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food officials, I was told that the solution was simply to burn it. That seems to me not only an absurd waste of energy in the process of the burning, but an absurd waste of energy in the material itself, which I suggest should be more imaginatively used. The types of grant that we are discussing could be useful in that respect.
  I wish to comment on what the Minister said about the low take-up of greenhouse replacement grant. Most of that grant must have been taken up in my constituency, where there are vast areas containing thousands of derelict greenhouses, which are being restored piece by piece, with great difficulty in these times of recession. I very much resent any cut in that grant.
  I welcome the provision of grants towards access to agricultural land for the maintenance of stiles, gates and so on, as did my hon. Friend the Member for Glanford and Scunthorpe (Mr. Morley). Such provision is important because popular paths especially sustain much damage from normal wear and tear. Footpath groups such as the Ramblers Association are, quite rightly, aggressive in keeping those paths open to walkers. That costs a good deal of money.
  I hope that it will be possible for some of the grant to go towards the major footpath projects that we have in my part of the world. We have a lot of huge sluices in the peatland area, which sometimes can be as much as 20, even 30, ft across. Where the footbridges have fallen into disuse, it costs a vast sum of money to put them back in place. I know that the hon. Member for Lancaster (Dame E. Kellett-Bowman) will be reaching for her garlic, but Lancashire county council has shared with the Council for the Protection of Rural England the cost of building a bridge there that has cost tens of thousands of pounds. Farmers could not afford that, even with the type of grant assistance that we are discussing. That is the responsibility of local authorities and I hope that some of the money might find its way in their direction.
  2.29 am
  Mr. Morley: With the leave of the House, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I should like to respond to some of the comments which have been made.
  The hon. Member for Lincoln (Mr. Carlisle) made a fair contribution, describing how farmers were trying to move
  860
  away from grant support. Indeed, there should be a move away from set-aside schemes to environmental support schemes. That is precisely what the Opposition are arguing. The whole farm and conservation grant scheme is extremely small compared with the overall package of agricultural support and in such a small scheme, which has been viable and well supported, the cuts made are mean and petty.
  The Opposition want a major shift in the structure of the agricultural support system. I know that farmers want to be more commercial and more independent, but for all sorts. of reasons—whether social, environmental, economic or strategic—there will always be a need for some sections of the agricultural community to receive support. Assistance should be shifted away from subsidies for production towards support for environmental gain. Measures such as the grants scheme should therefore be expanded rather than cut.
  I much appreciate what the hon. Member for St. Ives (Mr. Harris) said about the Isles of Scilly. I usually spend a week there each year, and last time I was there I had talks with the chief executive about local problems. I generally go to the Isles of Scilly during the week of the Conservative party conference, because there are few better places to be at that time, and I recognise the sensitive and fragile nature of their habitat. Incidentally, I believe that support for increased public access would be much appreciated by the tourists who go to Scilly.
  I again emphasise the importance of a proper measure to protect hedgerows. The hon. Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Clifton-Brown) may well have created one mile of hedgerow on his farm, but by wrecking the private Member's Bill on hedgerows he destroyed the chance to protect hundreds of miles of hedgerow. His constituents will judge him on that rather than on the one mile that he has created, and the electorate will judge the Government on their commitment, or lack of commitment, to conservation and the environment—a commitment that is sadly missing from the scheme.
  2.31 am
  Mr. Jack: With the leave of the House, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I shall try to reply to some of the points that have been raised in the debate.
  First, I put on record my profound appreciation of the considerable interest shown in the measure by hon. Members on both sides of the House, but especially on the Government side. There has been an excellent turnout. Many of my hon. Friends have stayed throughout the debate, and I was especially pleased by the telling contributions by my hon. Friends the Members for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway), for Brecon and Radnor (Mr. Evans), for Lancaster (Dame E. Kellett-Bowman) and for St. Ives (Mr. Harris).
  The hon. Member for Glanford and Scunthorpe (Mr. Morley) chastised me for being the bearer of the news that rates of grant were to be diminished. He shows the typical Opposition approach to such matters, in that he is unable to take the wider view. We have heard during the debate about additional farming income from other sources. The Government have had to take a balanced view, because our task is to make the best use of scarce and limited resources. We reviewed the effectiveness of the scheme and, for the reasons that I explained in my opening speech, we concluded that we could afford to make some

  861
  sensible and modest reductions without inhibiting the take-up of money. As I have said, about 9,000 farmers have already taken advantage of the waste management grants. We have spent £149 million under the scheme, £119 million of which has gone towards waste handling projects.
  One of the common themes of the debate has been the question whether we have put fundamentally at risk our commitment to the restoration of dry-stone walls, hedgerows, traditional farm buildings and various forms of banks and cover. I commend to the House an excellent book called "Conservation Grants for Farmers", a joint publication by my Department and the Department of the Environment, which lists a tremendous range of available schemes.
  I can put on record the fact that, in additional to our expenditure, the Department of the Environment has a budget of some £105 million, which goes to the Countryside Commission, to national parks, to English Nature and to Groundwork, all of which have various schemes to deal with some of the important features of our countryside. The Government's commitment to working to restore those features is second to none, especially in the extension of the environmentally sensitive areas.
  While considering the expenditure on those environmentally sensitive areas, the hon. Member for Glanford and Scunthorpe chose to ignore the fact that by the financial year 1996–97, £63 million will have been spent on that highly focused form of help to special types of countryside, of which hedgerow management and dry stone wall restoration are a part.
  I visited Cumbria during the Christmas recess—I did not visit the constituency of the hon. Member for Workington—and went into an environmentally sensitive area. One of the farmers there said that the available money meant that there was no excuse for not maintaining the country craft of restoring dry-stone walls. Opposition Members' use of some rather cataclysmic and flowery language to describe the changes, when they are balanced by the introduction of many other schemes, must be for the consumption of local newspapers.
  The hon. Member for North Cornwall (Mr. Tyler) referred to the wider environmental package. I remind him that, in addition to the environmentally sensitive areas and the continuity of the farm and conservation grant scheme, and the schemes which I mentioned under the Department of the Environment's responsibility, in 1994 we shall introduce the moorland scheme, the habitat scheme, nitrate sensitive areas, the countryside access scheme—which the hon. Member for Glanford and Scunthorpe mentioned—organic aid schemes, and so on. We are not reluctant to take seriously our responsibility for the countryside and the environment.
  Opposition Members must have written their speeches on the financial impact of the changes before I had a chance to put on record that expenditure in the next financial year under the farm and conservation grant scheme in England will be £27 million—£2 million less than it is in the present financial year. By any standards, that is a substantial amount of money spent on such important matters.
  The hon. Member for Glanford and Scunthorpe asked me a number of questions. He asked whether resources could be made available to separate in the schemes water from building roofs and run-offs resulting from the farm
  862
  waste scheme. The answer is no. If the scheme had been extended to do that, we would have ended up cutting grant rates on the wider scheme. The hon. Gentleman asked whether access provision was paid for by money diverted from the agri-environment package. The short answer to that is no. It is in the envelope of the existing farm and conservation grant scheme.
  The hon. Gentleman also suggested that there was no consultation between the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and the Department of the Environment on the changes. The fact that I have pointed out a growing range of schemes administered by the Department of the Environment which dealt with many of the sensitive issues that he chose to raise shows carefully that, as expenditure in one area of Government rises, quite properly we re-examine expenditure in those same areas of our own budget.
  Much criticism has been made of money that farmers are receiving under the arable area payments scheme and in other community receipts. It was this Government who fought for the reforms of the common agricultural policy and it was this Government who fought to control expenditure in that area. Farmers cannot ignore the fact that that income enables them, at a time when, properly, price support is being reduced and they are becoming more market sensitive, to play their part with or without grant schemes and to maintain the traditional fabric of the countryside which they have fashioned. The hon. Member for North Cornwall should not lose sight of that fact, because that is a farmer's responsibility.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Lincoln (Mr. Carlisle) made his speech from the Back Benches for the first time in six years. It was a special contribution, and I am glad that he made it. He reminded us of the importance of good management practice within the set-aside scheme. I assure him that there is growing awareness of that. My hon. Friend will be aware of the new requirements within the rotational and non-rotational set-aside, and I shall write to him and spell out in more detail some of the important measures. I welcomed my hon. Friend's recognition of the need to re-examine our spending priorities in light of the substantial income that farmers receive from various sources.
  The hon. Member for North Cornwall mentioned the habitat scheme. That is part of the agri-environment package. the hon. Gentleman cannot walk away from the fact that we are committed to introducing it during 1994. I emphasised environmentally sensitive areas. They cover about 10 per cent. of the land area of England. That brings to bear in a very focused way schemes to deal with many of the points to which the hon. Gentleman rightly drew attention. I am certainly convinced, from my own involvement in inspection during the Christmas recess, that farmers in those areas are taking advantage of schemes.
  Mr. Tyler rose—
  Mr. Jack: I am sorry, but I shall not give way; I want to finish my speech in a moment.
  Such schemes are contributing to the preservation of those important features of our landscape.
  I thank my hon. Friend the Member for St. Ives for his generous comments on the Scilly Isles. It is right and proper that, when discussing big agriculture, we do not forget small, innovative farmers in places such as the Scilly Isles.

  863
  This has been an interesting debate. It clearly shows that, when farm incomes are rising, the Government were right to re-examine their priorities. I hope that I have demonstrated that we do not shirk our responsibilities in the environmental sense and that the schemes of my Department and of the Department of the Environment fulfil the objectives laid down by the House.
  Question put:—
  The House divided: Ayes 153, Noes 38.

  Division No. 79]

  [2.41 am

  AYES

  Ainsworth, Peter (East Surrey)

  Faber, David

  Alexander, Richard

  Fabricant, Michael

  Amess, David

  Forman, Nigel

  Arbuthnot, James

  Forsyth, Michael (Stirling)

  Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)

  Fox, Dr Liam (Woodspring)

  Ashby, David

  French, Douglas

  Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)

  Gallie, Phil

  Baker, Nicholas (Dorset North)

  Gardiner, Sir George

  Baldry, Tony

  Gillan, Cheryl

  Banks, Matthew (Southport)

  Goodson-Wickes, Dr Charles

  Bates, Michael

  Gorst, John

  Beresford, Sir Paul

  Greenway, John (Ryedale)

  Bonsor, Sir Nicholas

  Hague, William

  Booth, Hartley

  Hamilton, Rt Hon Sir Archie

  Boswell, Tim

  Hanley, Jeremy

  Bowden, Andrew

  Hargreaves, Andrew

  Bowis, John

  Harris, David

  Brandreth, Gyles

  Hawkins, Nick

  Brazier, Julian

  Hayes, Jerry

  Bright, Graham

  Heald, Oliver

  Brown, M. (Brigg & Cl'thorpes)

  Hendry, Charles

  Browning, Mrs. Angela

  Howarth, Alan (Strat'rd-on-A)

  Burns, Simon

  Hughes Robert G. (Harrow W)

  Butterfill, John

  Hunt, Rt Hon David (Wirral W)

  Carlisle, Kenneth (Lincoln)

  Hunt, Sir John (Ravensbourne)

  Carrington, Matthew

  Hunter, Andrew

  Carttiss, Michael

  Jack, Michael

  Chapman, Sydney

  Jenkin, Bernard

  Clifton-Brown, Geoffrey

  Jessel, Toby

  Colvin, Michael

  Jones, Gwilym (Cardiff N)

  Congdon, David

  Jones, Robert B. (W Hertfdshr)

  Conway, Derek

  Kellett-Bowman, Dame Elaine

  Coombs, Simon (Swindon)

  Key, Robert

  Cope, Rt Hon Sir John

  Knapman, Roger

  Davies, Quentin (Stamford)

  Knight, Mrs Angela (Erewash)

  Day, Stephen

  Knight, Greg (Derby N)

  Deva, Nirj Joseph

  Kynoch, George (Kincardine)

  Devlin, Tim

  Lait, Mrs Jacqui

  Douglas-Hamilton, Lord James

  Legg, Barry

  Dover, Den

  Lennox-Boyd, Mark

  Duncan, Alan

  Lidington, David

  Duncan-Smith, Iain

  Maclean, David

  Elletson, Harold

  Madel, Sir David

  Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter

  Maitland, Lady Olga

  Evans, Jonathan (Brecon)

  Malone, Gerald

  Evans, Nigel (Ribble Valley)

  Marland, Paul

  Evans, Roger (Monmouth)

  Mawhinney, Rt Hon Dr Brian

  864

  Merchant, Piers

  Spink, Dr Robert

  Milligan, Stephen

  Squire, Robin (Hornchurch)

  Mitchell, Andrew (Gedling)

  Stanley, Rt Hon Sir John

  Moate, Sir Roger

  Stephen, Michael

  Montgomery, Sir Fergus

  Stewart, Allan

  Moss, Malcolm

  Streeter, Gary

  Neubert, Sir Michael

  Sykes, John

  Newton, Rt Hon Tony

  Taylor, Ian (Esher)

  Nicholls, Patrick

  Temple-Morris, Peter

  Nicholson, Emma (Devon West)

  Thomason, Roy

  Oppenheim, Phillip

  Thompson, Patrick (Norwich N)

  Page, Richard

  Thurnham, Peter

  Paice, James

  Townsend, Cyril D. (Bexl'yh'th)

  Patnick, Irvine

  Trend, Michael

  Pawsey, James

  Twinn, Dr Ian

  Pickles, Eric

  Viggers, Peter

  Rathbone, Tim

  Walden, George

  Richards, Rod

  Waller, Gary

  Roberts, Rt Hon Sir Wyn

  Waterson, Nigel

  Robertson, Raymond (Ab'd'n S)

  Wells, Bowen

  Robinson, Mark (Somerton)

  Whitney, Ray

  Rowe, Andrew (Mid Kent)

  Whittingdale, John

  Ryder, Rt Hon Richard

  Widdecombe, Ann

  Sackville, Tom

  Wiggin, Sir Jerry

  Shaw, David (Dover)

  Willetts, David

  Shepherd, Colin (Hereford)

  Wolfson, Mark

  Shepherd, Richard (Aldridge)

  Wood, Timothy

  Sims, Roger

  Smith, Sir Dudley (Warwick)

  Tellers for the Ayes:

  Spencer, Sir Derek

  Mr. Timothy Kirkhope and Mr. Andrew MacKay.

  Spicer, Sir James (W Dorset)

  Spicer, Michael (S Worcs)

  NOES

  Ainsworth, Robert (Cov'try NE)

  Lloyd, Tony (Stretford)

  Barnes, Harry

  Llwyd, Elfyn

  Campbell-Savours, D. N.

  McMaster, Gordon

  Cann, Jamie

  McWiiliam, John

  Clelland, David

  Michael, Alun

  Cryer, Bob

  Michie, Bill (Sheffield Heeley)

  Cunliffe, Lawrence

  Miller, Andrew

  Cunningham, Jim (Covy SE)

  Morley, Elliot

  Dafis, Cynog

  Pike, Peter L.

  Foster, Rt Hon Derek

  Rendel, David

  Foster, Don (Bath)

  Skinner, Dennis

  Foulkes, George

  Strang, Dr. Gavin

  Godman, Dr Norman A.

  Turner, Dennis

  Graham, Thomas

  Tyler, Paul

  Hardy, Peter

  Wallace, James

  Howarth, George (Knowsley N)

  Wise, Audrey

  Hughes, Kevin (Doncaster N)

  Wray, Jimmy

  Jones, Ieuan Wyn (Ynys Môn)

  Jones, Nigel (Cheltenham)

  Tellers for the Noes:

  Kilfoyle, Peter

  Mr. Colin Pickthall and Mr. Jon Owen Jones.

  Lewis, Terry

  Question accordingly agreed to.
  Resolved,
  That the Farm and Conservation Grant (Variation) Scheme 1993 (S.I., 1993, No. 2901) dated 24th November 1993, a copy of which was laid before this House on 30th November, be approved.

  Sheltered Accommodation
  Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Conway]
  2.52 am
  Mr. Andrew Miller: First, may I say how pleased I am to be able to raise this issue in the House. My interest started as a result of a complaint from a group of constituents who were living in one of the types of property which I intend to describe.
  When the group originally wrote to me, they also copied the letter and sent it to a now retired county councillor, Mr. Ken Maynard, who lives close to me. He had written an article for the magazine Choice. My subsequent research has so far identified 65 hon. Members with a constituency interest, and so far 93 colleagues have signed early-day motion 161. Before I go any further, I put on record my thanks to Ken Maynard, to Wendy James of Choice magazine and to my researcher, Keir Woods. They have done a tremendous amount of work to uncover the scandals which are going on up and down the country.
  I refer in particular to owner-occupied sheltered accommodation where the freehold is owned by a third party. Such types of property expanded rapidly during the 1980s, and there are now more than 80,000 units of accommodation in 2,000 developments across the country. Managing agents are appointed by the freeholder—usually the builder of the complex—to provide a certain range of services, including that of a warden in return for a monthly services charge. The managing agents also deal with the appointment of firms to undertake building repairs and to deal with contractors.
  That is well and good, except in the case of inefficient, uncaring and incompetent managing agents, who provide sub-standard care and who do not give access to audited accounts.
  The examples that I have uncovered range across a wide spectrum. They include the sacking of a window cleaner so that a more expensive sister company of the managing agent could be brought in to do the job a lot worse. I found overcharging and hidden charges, including an exorbitant percentage of the service charge directed towards company administration. In some cases, that amounted to almost 30 per cent. A warden was paid £7,000 a year for just three mornings work a week.
  I also found outrageous and unjustified service charge rises of as much as 60 per cent. over three years. They were in direct contravention of brochure promises, and massively in excess of most people's pension increases. Owners or relatives of the owners of properties were responsible for charges when properties were vacant. Despite that, leaseholders were prevented from subletting. In some cases, a 1 per cent. payment had to be made to the managing agents' solicitors just for surrendering the lease when a sale was made. There was lack of consultation with leaseholders before properties were passed from one group of managing agents to another.
  There were also problems with a National House Building Council guarantee which ran from the date of the first occupancy in a development and not the last. That left the managing agents reluctant to challenge builders, as they do not hold possession of the lease until the last property is occupied. Transfer fees, a proportion of the sale price, were paid to the landlord on the sale of the lease.
  866
  They do not benefit the occupier, but go directly to the landlord, for whom they are a useful source of regular income.
  The principle of peppercorn rents has long been established in the leasehold sector. A minimal ground rent is charged to maintain freeholders' rights. That has long since vanished from the sheltered accommodation sector. In its place, freeholders often charge high ground rents to leaseholders who have paid capital sums for their properties but receive no benefits.
  I want to give examples to show how widespread the scandal is. In Peterborough, a resident bought a property managed by Haven Management, a subsidiary of Anglia Secure Homes, because she felt that she might one day require a wheelchair, and she was allowed storage space in the property. She was subsequently told that she could not store her wheelchair in the property, because the battery might emit toxic fumes. Despite assuring the managers that the batteries were not of that type, the poor woman was left high and dry.
  In another case involving Haven Management in Cromer, Anglia Secure Homes built the houses, and related firms received all the contracts to maintain the properties. Painting was carried out in bad weather. It peeled off quickly and had to be replaced. In that case, no regard was paid to safety considerations. Railings were left out of place for some weeks. Only when a shareholder who was also a resident threatened to tell a shareholders' meeting did the company relent and pay money that it owed to residents.
  Hanover housing association in Droitwich appointed what was described as a poor-quality warden, who failed to repair important things like the timer switch on communal lighting facilities in corridors. In Millbrae gardens in Scotland, changes in prices between 1989 and 1992 were such that service costs rose 40 per cent.; warden costs rose by 50 per cent.; central alarm costs rose 31 per cent.; and administration costs rose by a staggering 100 per cent.
  Mrs. Angela Browning: I have waited until this late hour to listen to the hon. Gentleman, because he is raising a very important subject. He is aware that some of my constituents have contacted him. I have received correspondence, and I am concerned about the figures that the hon. Gentleman has recounted. At a time of low inflation, when prices have been held down, service charges across a range of services provided to the elderly in sheltered accommodation appear to be inflationary and exorbitant.
  The hon. Gentleman makes an important point when he says that there is often great difficulty in finding out how these sums have been charged. Elderly residents often have great difficulty in presenting their case, even when they act collectively, and sometimes even when some of the residents have a legal background. Increasingly, they write to MPs and others seeking assistance.
  One of the most frightening aspects of the problem is the fact that these are elderly people who entered sheltered accommodation at a time in their lives when they were looking carefully at their income and what it would provide in their latter years. These huge, unexpected and regular increases cause enormous stress and anxiety at a time when people least expect it and least need it. I hope that the Minister will pay careful attention to the hon. Gentleman's account, because I know from the information that he has

  867
  received that this is not just a small, isolated incident. There are cases all around the country, including some in the west country, and we are all concerned about the trend.
  Mr. Miller: The hon. Lady makes some important points, and I hope that the Minister was listening carefully. I shall seek to address some of them specifically later in my speech, when I pose some ideas to the Minister about how significant improvements can be made.
  I was speaking about Millbrae gardens in Scotland. When residents withheld some money, Hanover went to court and was ordered to go to arbitration but refused. Its representative system in the properties is deeply flawed, because employees of the company sit on a committee which can only make decisions unanimously. That is crazy.
  In Hampshire, the Humanist housing association has made increases of 40·6 per cent. and a management fee increase of 48 per cent. and has said:
  "We do not speculate on their willingness to pay, they are bound to do so by the terms of their leases."
  That association is a charity. Some charity! I uncovered an example in Halifax of service charge increases in excess of 36 per cent. in a year.
  In Scotland, the situation is slightly different, but the House should congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, South (Mr. Griffiths), who did a tremendous amount to uncover the practices of a company called McCarthy and Stone. That company recently sold its subsidiary, Perevel, which managed some 16,000 of its units, and has transferred the freeholds of its properties to Perevel. One wonders how much consultation preceded those moves.
  These problems have arisen basically because there is inadequate regulation of managing agents and enforcement of the regulatons. It is widely assumed that all leaseholders are protected in law enshrining the rights of the tenant in protection from many of the problems that I have highlighted, especially rising prices, hidden charges, sub-standard service or lack of consultation and access to accounts.
  Enforcement through the legal process is extremely complicated and time-consuming. For example, to replace a managing agent, preliminary notice must be served, the name and address of the tenant lodging the complaint, intent to go to court to have a manager appointed, and grounds under which the attempt will be made have to be stated, and an ultimatum must be sent to the landlord. If the landlord and freeholder do not take any positive action, the tenant must apply to the court for the appointment of a manager. The names and addresses of all those who are affected have to be listed, and, finally, the tenant has to recommend a manager to the court. Would the Minister want to follow such a procedure now, let alone when he is 75 years of age?
  In other instances the process is similarly long and involved and, for a number of reasons, it is off-putting for the leaseholder.
  Some of the people are frail and not really capable of going through all that trouble, and the hon. Member for Tiverton (Mrs. Browning) touched on that. They moved into sheltered accommodation to avoid just such hassle. The process is extremely slow, particularly if the landlord or managing agent decides to contest the matter, and the pensioner may well die in the meantime.
  868
  Finally, there is the cost. The people concerned are not rich; they are often on fixed pensions, as the hon. Lady said. A gentleman from Tewkesbury was advised against taking legal action
  "mainly because of the risk of very high costs".
  Even the managing agents of sheltered housing, who are advantaged by such a complicated process, seem to appreciate its absurdity. Robert Smith, finance director of Haven said in The Daily Telegraph in October 1989:
  "there are some historic cases where there are anomalies, and it would be better if people could go to a totally impartial ombudsman to resolve these disputes by arbitration. It seems crazy that people should have to go to court which is expensive, stressful and demoralising".
  That was true in 1989; it is much more true today.
  The present position is described in a letter from a Minister in a letter to Mr. Maynard on 27 April 1993 saying something to the effect that the ombudsman service for housing association tenants is available to owner-occupiers where the tenants are a registered housing association. However, that does not take into account those leaseholders whose managing agents are not a registered housing association—a large proportion of the cases to which I refer.
  The ombudsman is not a statutory appointment by the Minister and does not have the power to enforce his conclusions unless he is hired as an arbiter to settle a dispute, for which a fee is required. He reports to the Housing Corporation, which uses its statutory powers if action needs to be taken.
  The remit of the ombudsman is unclear. He is unable to rule on the justness of a service charge, and thus is useless to a large number of owner-occupiers who have legitimate grievances. It appears that he will be an irrelevance to the majority of complainants.
  The limitation of the ombudsman must also be noted. He can act only on the reference being made, and that presupposes all the points that I mentioned earlier coming to a head and being agreed on by the tenants of a particular property in an organised group.
  Recent legislation states that, if 66 per cent. of leaseholders in a sheltered development decide to buy out their freehold, they are at liberty to do so. They can choose their own managing agents. However, why should leaseholders, who have already paid substantial sums of money to purchase the leasehold, be asked to pay further sums of money just to get legal protection? Again, the process is extremely complicated and the organisation involved extremely onerous, particularly to the elderly.
  The landlord is entitled to expect the investment value of the block and half the marriage value, and compensation for loss of any development rights. In addition, the new freeholders take on joint responsibility for the management of the flats, even though they may employ an outside managing agent and they are all responsible to shareholders. Those are not exactly the issues that people want to take on at that time of life.
  Despite the complications and the expense, some groups have sought to purchase of the freehold and it is not as simple as it might seem, even to a host of lawyers. There was an example in Hayling Island in Hampshire, where it was reported that obstructive tactics from a freeholder's solicitors were used in order to circumvent the leaseholders' right to the first refusal on the freehold. Such tactics are deplorable and must be stopped.
  What is needed? FRASH—the Federation of Residents Associations in Sheltered Accommodation—presented the

  869
  other place with some recommendations before 6 April last year, hoping that amendments would be made to the Housing and Urban Development Bill, which became the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993. FRASH sought, first, regular and public review of service charges rises; secondly, independent opinion on what is a reasonable charge—incidentally, Age Concern has suggested between £6 and £12 a week—thirdly, random independent audits to ensure discipline; fourthly, an agency to monitor the application of the codes approved by the Secretary of State and envisaged in the Bill but not with the force of law; and finally, the availability of an arbiter or an ombudsman to settle disputes.
  There is also an urgent requirement for some direct accountability. Currently, managing agents are responsible to the wrong people—to the freeholders who appoint them rather than to the leaseholders to whom they have a duty of care. Some amendments in that respect may go a long way towards solving the problem.
  David Bogle, the housing manager of the Guardian housing association, was reported in The Sunday Times of 12 April 1992 as worried that leaseholders who purchase their freehold and select their own managing agents
  "could fall prey to irresponsible management companies offering low tenders".
  That sounds suspiciously like a justification for management companies imposing high charges.
  Although it is a pretence to claim that increased accountability will automatically lead to irresponsibility, the deficiency in the Government's approach thus far is clear. Even if the right to buy the freehold worked effectively and was attractive to residents, without some regulatory system residents would still be open to the type of abuse to which I have referred.
  Beyond the expansion of the role of the ombudsman, the problem requires a two-pronged assault. The regulations in place need to be backed by more stringent monitoring to ensure that they work in line with FRASH's recommendations and, if leaseholders were given the right to choose their managing agents, a good proportion of agents would improve their services voluntarily or risk losing business. Managing agents would clearly have to have statutory duties towards the freeholder, but pressure would be taken off the leaseholder, as he would no longer have to go through complicated legal processes to ensure accountability. I recommend that the Minister considers that novel approach in great detail.
  Finally, may I thank the Minister for replying to the series of parliamentary questions that I tabled in November? I can provide him with yet further enormous amounts of detailed documentation on cases across the country but, now that the Minister is aware of the problem, I hope that he and his Department will have the good grace to acknowledge how widespread it is and agree that it justifies a fresh look. I am sure that all parties would welcome moves to improve the lot of the elderly in the situation that I have described.
  3.13 am
  The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Tony Baldry): I have listened with great care to the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Mr. Miller) and also took note of the intervention of my hon. Friend the Member for Tiverton (Mrs.
  870
  Browning). I appreciate the hon. Gentleman's concern about the management of sheltered housing and agree that elderly leaseholders, like all owner-occupiers, should of course have the greatest possible control over the way in which their properties are managed. That is why all leaseholders do, in fact, have statutory protection, do have rights under the terms of their lease and do have opportunities to take control when they wish to do so. Indeed, control was one of the most important principles behind recent housing legislation, especially with regard to leaseholders.
  The hon. Gentleman has suggested that the attractiveness of the sheltered housing option is being eroded because leaseholders do not have sufficient protection, and that there should be further protection to ensure that managing agents are accountable.
  The lease protects the leaseholder, because it forms a contract with the landlord. Anyone entering into a lease needs to take legal advice before signing any agreement. A lease is a series of mutually reinforcing covenants, rights and remedies that need to be understood. Any lawyer specialising in property law will be able to examine a lease and advise the prospective leaseholder of its terms and protection. It is to everyone's advantage if disputes do not lead to the courts and to all the expense and distress that can cause. I therefore welcome the services of the Sheltered Housing Advisory and Conciliation Service.
  The hon. Gentleman said that one managing agent's actions had directly contravened a brochure promise. If I were the lawyer representing the leaseholder in question, my first instinct would be to ascertain the terms of the lease. In the case where the managing agent would not allow a wheelchair to be stored, as a lawyer I find it difficult to imagine what restrictive covenant the landlord could possibly have inserted in the lease to prevent that leaseholder from doing as he wished.
  Both parties are entitled to expect the terms of their contract to be honoured—and if they are not, remedies are available. If a landlord fails to perform his obligations under the lease, the leaseholder may take him to court.
  I am aware of concern that some leases are unsatisfactory, and Parliament has given all leaseholders statutory protection under the Landlord and Tenant Acts 1985 and 1987, strengthened by the Leasehold Reform, Housing and Urban Development Act 1993. That legislation strengthened the courts' powers in cases of proven bad management, gave leaseholders the right to a management, gave leaseholders the right to a management audit and, most importantly, allowed long leaseholders the right to buy their freeholds or to extend their leases.
  I shall describe the most important protection given by those Acts. For management problems alone, there are a formidable range of rights. Leaseholders have a right to information that will enable them to identify their landlord and an address in England or Wales to serve notices. They have the right to find out about the insurance of their block or complex and can challenge it in court. Also, a recognised tenants association has the right to be consulted about the appointment or employment of a managing agent.
  If the management of a block proves totally unsatisfactory, leaseholders have the sanction of asking the court to appoint a manager to allow compulsory acquisition.
  Under a new right that only came into force on 1 November 1993, leaseholders may require a full

  871
  management audit of their landlord's service charges or other management accounts, which will provide evidence where there has been bad management. Such evidence may be used in court.
  The hon. Gentleman and my hon. Friend gave examples in which the levelof service charges was of concern. Under legislation, leaseholders have the right to ask how charges are made up and to inspect documents. They have full statutory protection to challenge unreasonable charges, and a stututory right to be consulted about major works.
  Qualifying long leaseholders have the ultimate sanction, where they wish to obtain control of enfranchising under the 1993 Act without the need to prove bad management. That right is open to elderly leaseholders where they are qualifying tenants—although I appreciate that in many cases, enfranchisement would not be the right course for elderly leaseholders.
  I acknowledge that the choice of sheltered housing may not have been totally satisfactory for everyone. In many cases, dissatisfaction is genuine and needs resolving. In others, it has been brought about by a failure of communication between managers and tenants.
  In cases in which dissatisfaction is genuine, as I have said, we have recently introduced an important power that offers protection for all leaseholders. The 1993 Act gives the Secretary of State power to approve codes of practice relating to the management of residential property. Such codes are likely to be drafted with the consensus of best practice from across a wide range of interested bodies, to ensure that they command general respect. They will be useful in directing the managers of residential property, and helping tenants where management is not satisfactory.
  Mr. Miller: Will the Minister assure me that he will consult the organisations that represent such residents before publishing codes of practice?
  Mr. Baldry: Yes, indeed when we are drawing up codes of practice, it is our usual practice to consult bodies that will have an interest in them, wherever possible. Where there are recognised special interest groups or consumer groups, it will be the general practice of the
  872
  Department to consult those organisations. I am convinced that the codes of practice can play a vital role in improving standards of management of residential property.
  The hon. Gentleman called for the introduction of an ombudsman service to register and regulate landlords or managing agents in the private sheltered housing sector, similar to the service set up by the Housing Corporation for tenants of registered housing associations. I am not sure how that arrangement would work. Unless the parties are prepared to agree some other jurisdiction, only the courts can settle private disputes and impose sanctions; an ombudsman, therefore, would be of benefit only if both parties agreed to conciliation.
  The hon. Gentleman gave the example of a managing agent who said he felt that a matter should go to independent arbitration. It is always possible, of course, for a matter to go to independent arbitration—or any other form of arbitration—if both sides agree; the difficulty in such cases is the fact that landlord and leaseholders cannot agree, cannot arbitrate and cannot concur that legal agreements have been broken. The only answer is legislation to replace the jurisdiction of the courts with that of an ombudsman—but I see no scope for an ombudsman, beyond the role of a voluntary conciliator.
  Other roles for ombudsmen—including that of the parliamentary commissioner—specifically exclude the power to investigate if there is access to the courts to seek relief. In addition, the ombudsman is concerned with maladministration, rather than the level of service charges. A conciliation service is already available to leaseholders in sheltered accommodation, sponsored by Age Concern.
  I consider that elderly leaseholders—along with all other leaseholders—have considerable rights, remedies and protection under existing legislation. I shall, of course, take careful note of the points made by the hon. Gentleman, in case there is a lacuna in the protection offered; but I believe that the new legislation provides considerable protection. I shall, of course, take a close interest in that legislation—
  The Motion having been made after Ten o'clock and the debate having continued for half an hour, MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.
  Adjourned at twenty-two minutes past Three o'clock

LORD CHANCELLOR'S DEPARTMENT

  Magistrates Courts
  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department how many independent inspections of the magistrates courts system he estimates will be employed; and what is his estimate of their annual pay.

  Mr. John M. Taylor
  The magistrates courts service inspectorate employs the following inspectors:

  Chief Inspector

  4 Senior Inspectors

  12 Inspectors

  The inspectorate's annual salary budget in 1994–95 for these 17 individuals will be £867,492.

  Magistrates Clerks' Committees
  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department how many magistrates' clerks committees the Lord Chancellor has met in(a) England and (b) Wales; and if he will list each venue he has visited and organisation he has met.

  Mr. John M. Taylor
  The Lord Chancellor has not attended any formal meetings of magistrates courts committees, nor have all the members of any magistrates' courts committee attended a meeting with him. However, during his visits to magistrates courts, meetings with representative bodies from the service, meeting with magistrates and staff from particular areas and attendance as a speaker at gatherings of magistrates, he has met and talked to members of various magistrates courts committees.

  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department how many magistrates courts have closed since 1979; how many court closures are currently scheduled.

  Mr. John M. Taylor
  The provision of magistrates court house accommodation is a matter for the courts committee for the area concerned in conjunction with the local paying authority. The Department has no central record of the number of magistrates courthouses that have been closed or are scheduled to be closed. A local authority that is aggrieved by a decision of a magistrates court committee to close a courthouse has the right of appeal to the Lord Chancellor. In 1993 the Lord Chancellor dealt with six appeals.

  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what is his estimate of the annual cost of supporting the courts units of management.

  Mr. John M. Taylor
  The administrative costs of the magistrates courts service depend on decisions taken by magistrates' courts committees, the local managers of the 454
  service, about how the service in their area is organised. It is likely that costs will vary between magistrates courts committee areas, according to their decisions taken in the light of local circumstances.

  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what principles and objectives he has in mind in the amalgamation of magistrates courts committees.

  Mr. John M. Taylor
  The objectives of the reforms set out in the White Paper "A New Framework for Local Justice" included yielding improvements in the efficiency and effectiveness of the service, and securing maximum co-operation in the management of the service with other parts of the criminal justice system. The Government believe that a reduction in the number of areas from the present 105 to 50 to 60 would provide a good balance between the local character of the service and operational needs.

  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department how many individual letters the Lord Chancellor has received from magistrates concerning his court reforms.

  Mr. John M. Taylor
  The Lord Chancellor has received approximately 300 letters from members of the magistrates courts service and other interested bodies, the majority of which were from serving magistrates. However, it is not possible to give an accurate figure of the number of magistrates that have written to the Lord Chancellor since this information is not recorded.

  "A New Framework for Local Justice"
  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department how many representations he has received on the White Paper, "A New Framework for Local Justice"; and if he will list each organisation that responded.

  Mr. John M. Taylor
  In addition to 964 responses to the consultation documents issued by his Department the Lord Chancellor has received in the region of 950 representations on the White Paper, comprising approximately 650 letters from honourable Members and approximately 300 letters from members of the magistrates' courts service and other interested bodies, the majority of which were from serving magistrates. He has also received personal representations from 10 magistrates. A list of the organisations that responded appears at the back of each of the consultation documents. Copies of these documents are available in the House of Commons Library.

  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department if he will list those persons and organisations that have protested to him concerning(a) judicial independence, (b) chief justices clerks, (c) fixed-term contracts and (d) performance-related pay.

  Mr. John M. Taylor
  In addition to 964 responses to the consultation documents issued by his Department the Lord Chancellor has received in the region of 950 letters about the White Paper, comprising approximately 650 from hon. Members and approximately 300 from members of the magistrates courts service and other interested bodies. However, it is not possible to break down these figures into the specific topics requested since the information has not been recorded in this form.
  455
  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what assessment the Lord Chancellor has made of the extent of consultation on the White Paper, "A New Framework for Local Justice"; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. John M. Taylor
  Since the publication of the White Paper "A New Framework for Local Justice" in February 1992, 11 consultative documents on various aspects of the reforms have been issued. The reforms have also regularly been discussed by the Magistrates' Courts Consultative Council. The Lord Chancellor has taken careful note of respondents' comments in reaching conclusions about how the White Paper will be implemented.

  Courts Inspectorate
  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what is his estimate of establishing and of running annually the courts inspectorate.

  Mr. John M. Taylor
  The cost of establishing and of running annually the magistrates courts service inspectorate is estimated to be £1·005 million for the set-up costs in 1993–94 and £1·8 million a year in subsequent years when the inspectorate will be fully operational and undertaking a full programme of inspections. This does not include overhead costs, such as general accommodation and other charges, which are not separately identified and which are met from a central budget.

  Magistrates
  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department if he will make a statement concerning fixed-term contracts and performance-related pay for magistrates.

  Mr. John M. Taylor
  The majority of magistrates are unpaid lay volunteers, so there is no possibility that they could have fixed-term contracts or performance-related pay. There is no proposal that stipendiary magistrates should be placed on fixed-term contracts or that their pay should be linked to their performance.

  Courts Inspectorate
  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department if he will make a statement on the guiding principles in the training of independent inspectors.

  Mr. John M. Taylor
  Since the inspectorate is operationally independent of the Lord Chancellor's Department, the training of the inspectors is being undertaken by the chief inspector and her senior management team. It builds on the existing competencies of the inspectors who have been recruited from a wide range of backgrounds.

PRIME MINISTER

  Iraq and Iran
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Prime Minister what record has been kept of representations made to the Prime Minister by members of the public in regard to Iraq since 1985.
  456
  The Prime Minister
  Records of representations from members of the public in the form of correspondence on this and other topics that have been received by my office since November 1990, and to which I or my office have replied, have been retained. No records exist prior to April 1989.

  Scott Inquiry
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Prime Minister if any request has been made by(a) Lord Justice Scott or (b) members of the public to Her Majesty's Government to permit cameras and tape recorders to be taken into and used in the Scott inquiry.

  The Prime Minister
  The procedures of the Scott inquiry are a matter for Lord Justice Scott.

  Mr. Winnick
  To ask the Prime Minister what representations he has received and from whom in the last six months that the terms of reference or the workings of the Scott inquiry into arms for Iraq should be modified or changed.

  The Prime Minister
  In the last six months I have answered a written question from the hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent (Mr. Smith) concerning a change to the procedures of the inquiry, and a letter from the hon. Member for Coventry, South-East (Mr. Cunningham) seeking an extension to the inquiry's terms of reference. I have received no other requests for changes.

  Christmas Cards
  Mr. Bayley
  To ask the Prime Minister how many official Christmas cards were sent out in 1993 by(a) himself, (b) civil servants and (c) staff of Government agencies working in or to his office; and how much these cards cost (i) to buy, (ii) to post and (iii) in staff time to sign, address and place in envelopes.

  The Prime Minister
  The information as requested can be provided only at disproportionate cost.

  Arms Sales
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Prime Minister what records are held at 10 Downing street of a telephone conversation made between his predecessor and Mr. Frank Machon in regard to arms sales in January 1989.

  The Prime Minister
  As far as I am aware, there have not been any conversations and there are no records.

  Engagements
  Mr. Harry Greenway
  To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Tuesday 18 January.

  The Prime Minister
  This morning I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House I shall be having further meetings later today.

  Channel Tunnel Rail Link
  Mr. Dobson
  To ask the Prime Minister if he will publish a full list of all statements he has made, and/or press notices issued by his Department, which referred to a possible completion date for the channel tunnel rail link, the dates on which each such statement was made and the possible completion date which was mentioned.
  457
  The Prime Minister
  I have not made any such statements.

  Crossrail
  Mr. Dobson
  To ask the Prime Minister if he will publish a full list of all statements he has made and/or press notices issued by his Department, which referred to a possible completion date for the crossrail project, the dates on which each such statement was made and the possible completion date which was mentioned.

  The Prime Minister
  I have made no statements nor has my Department issued any press notices which referred to a possible completion date for the crossrail project.

  Broadcasting Acts
  Mr. Madden
  To ask the Prime Minister what information he has received from the Irish Republic concerning its decision not to renew section 31 of the Irish Broadcasting Act 1960; when he received copies of guidelines issued to the staff of Irish broadcasting organisations following the non-renewal of section 31; what action he proposes concerning section 10 of the Broadcasting Act 1990; what representations he has received concerning households in the United Kingdom receiving television and radio broadcasts originating in the Irish Republic and observing different broadcasting requirements; and if he will make a statement.

  The Prime Minister
  The Irish Government's announcement of their decision was made immediately available to us, together with relevant background information. So far as the United Kingdom Broadcasting restrictions are concerned, I refer to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick) on 17 January,Official Report, column 369. I have not received any representations concerning the reception of broadcasts originating in the Irish Republic.

FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS

  Hong Kong
  Sir Thomas Arnold
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what timetable he envisages for the introduction of his proposals for greater democracy in Hong Kong.

  Mr. Goodlad
  The legislation for the 1994–95 election arrangements in Hong Kong will need to be passed into law by the Hong Kong Legislative Council by the time the Council rises for its summer recess in July.

  The Council is currently considering the first stage of the legislation. The timing for the introduction of the second stage has yet to be decided.

  Pakistan
  Ms Jowell
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what representations he has received on the cases of Salamat, Manzoor and Rehmat Masih, three Christians held in Gujiran-wala central gaol, Pakistan under the blasphemy laws; and what action he has taken.

  Mr. Lennox-Boyd
  There has been continuing parliamentary and public interest in these cases, which we 458
  have often raised with the Pakistani authorities. Most recently, I expressed our concern when I visited Pakistan last November. All three Christians have now been released on bail. Dates have not yet been set for their cases to be heard.

  Market Testing
  Mr. McAllion
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will publish for each service that has been market tested in his Department in 1993(a) the cost of the testing process, including consultancy costs, (b) the result of the test, (c) the name of the successful contractor, (d) the value and duration of the contract, (e) the number of staff involved, (f) estimated annual cost reductions and (g) whether the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 1981 were deemed to apply.

  Mr. Goodlad
  My Department is currently analysing the outcome of the 1992–93 "Competing for Quality" programme with the efficiency unit in the Cabinet Office. Much of the information requested in the question will, once it has been finalised, be published in aggregate form in the "Citizen's Charter Second Report".

  Major General Mohnke
  Mr. John Marshall
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what representations have been made to the German authorities about the possible prosecution of Major General Mohnke.

  Mr. Heathcoat-Amory
  Jurisdiction in the case of General Mohnke lies with the German authorities, to whom we have given full co-operation in their investigation.

  Social Development Summit
  Ms Jowell
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what preparations Her Majesty's Government have made for the 1995 World summit for social development in Copenhagen; and what progress has been made on the UN proposals for the establishment of a national committee on the summit.

  Mr. Douglas Hogg
  The United Kingdom intends to participate fully and constructively in preparations for the World summit for social development to ensure that it is a success. We are holding inter-departmental discussions to formulate the United Kingdom's approach to the summit, and have submitted a national report to the summit secretariat in New York to feed into the preparatory process.

  We have no plans at present to establish a national committee on the summit. We will review this question following the first preparatory committee of the summit in February.

  Yugoslavia
  Mr. Robert Banks
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what is his estimate of the total number of people killed in former Yugoslavia since the break-up of that country.

  Mr. Douglas Hogg
  We have seen no reliable figures on the number of casualties since the break-up of the former Yugoslavia, but the numbers are very large.
  459

  Tibet
  Ms Abbott
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what is the policy of Her Majesty's Government towards the occupation of Tibet by China and to the reported human rights abuses there.

  Mr. Goodlad
  The situation in Tibet is a matter of serious concern. We and our European Union partners regularly raise human rights with the Chinese authorities, urging them to conform to internationally recognised standards of behaviour. We also encourage the Chinese authorities to enter, without pre-conditions, into a real dialogue with the Tibetans, including the Dalai Lama, as the best means of achieving greater autonomy for the people of Tibet.

  Foreign Affairs Council
  Mr. Barnes
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, pursuant to his answer of 17 December 1993 to the hon. Member for High Peak (Mr. Hendry),Official Report, columns 968–69, if he will place in the Library copies of (a) the Council's code of conduct governing public access to public documents and (b) the Council's code of conduct on the publication of formal votes.

  Mr. Heathcoat-Amory
  The following documents have been placed in the Library of the House:The code of conduct concerning public access to Council and Commission documents agreed by the Council on 6 December;
  The Council decision on public access to Council documents, adopted on 20 December;
  The amendments to articles 5(1) and 7(5) of the Rules of Procedure, on making votes public, agreed by the Council on 6 December, together with the code of conduct for the implementation of those articles by the Council.

  Turkey
  Mr. Alfred Morris
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, pursuant to his answers of 16 December 1993,Official Report, column 769, what progress there has been in obtaining a response from the Turkish authorities to the representations made by Her Majesty's Government regarding the maltreatment of Manchester United supporters by Turkish police officers and others.

  Mr. Lennox-Boyd
  In his reply to the letter of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs of 2 December the Turkish ambassador reported that details of the main allegations made by Manchester United supporters have been passed to the Ministry of the Interior in Ankara for an inquiry. The ambassador has promised to let my right hon. Friend have the results of the inquiry as soon as they are known.

DUCHY OF LANCASTER

  Data Protection
  Mr. Cohen
  To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster whether he will make arrangements for the Data Protection Registrar to inspect relevant contracts with suppliers of IT services that involve the use of personal data held by his Department in order to check whether all 460
  appropriate arrangements in relation to the Data Protection Act 1984 have been made, and whether such contracts make provisions for the registrar to make random inspections in order to check the suppliers' compliance with the eighth data protection principle.

  Mr. Waldegrave
  The Data Protection Registrar's powers are such that I do not consider such arrangements are necessary. Should he so wish, the registrar may inspect the one contract we have with an IT services supplier that involves the use of personal data held by my Department.

  This relates to the "Charterline" service run on the citizens charter units behalf by IBM (UK) Ltd. at its Havant offices; this service was registered under the Data Protection Act 1984 in June 1993.

HOME DEPARTMENT

  Primates
  Mr. Flynn
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will set a target date to end the use of non-EU sources of primates in research.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  No target can be set until we can be confident that the EU will be self-sufficient in breeding non-human primates for research.

  Mr. Morley
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement on progress made in the European Community in setting a target date after which the use of wild-caught primates in research will be prohibited; and when the group of national competent authorities established under directive 86/609 will make a statement on this subject.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  The group of national competent authorities established under directive 86/609 has been giving active consideration to the problems associated with the elimination of the use of wild-caught primates in research, but I cannot at this stage predict what the outcome of their deliberations will be.

  Ms Lynne
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what assessment he has made as to the possibility of the EU becoming self-sufficient in breeding primates for its research purposes within the next five years; what resources are available for this purpose; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  The European Commission is now collating statistics on animal use and the availability of breeding stock but it is unlikely that the EU will be self-sufficient within the next five years.

  Ford Prison
  Mr. Redmond
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list the projects now under(a) development and (b) consideration at Her Majesty's prison Ford, West Sussex, the cost of each project and if funding for each project has been approved and granted.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Responsibility for this matter has been delegated to the Director General of the Prison Service, who has been asked to arrange for a reply to be given.
  461
  Letter from Mr. A. Butler to Mr. Martin Redmond, dated 18 January 1994:

  HM Prison Ford

  The Home Secretary has asked me, in the absence of the Director General from the office, to reply to your recent Question about the projects under development and consideration at HM Prison Ford.

  Work is currently being carried out to lay a new floor in the kitchen at an overall cost of £260,000. The sanitary recesses in A Wing are being refurbished at a cost of £10,000 per recess.

  Projects under consideration include a new kitchen and dining facility, the options for which are currently being examined; the replacement of the sewage works at a cost of around £1 million; and the upgrading of the hutted accommodation. Design work has also been completed on a new sportshall, the estimated cost of which is £1·1 million. No funding has as yet been allocated for any of these schemes.

  Probation
  Ms Corston
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how he will measure efficiency and productivity in respect of future pay rounds in the probation service in England and Wales.

  Mr. Maclean
  In reaching a judgment about the productivity and efficiency of the probation service I shall have regard to the service's key performance indicators, as set out in the three year plan for 1994–97, a copy of which is in the Library.

  Ms Corston
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans he has to carry out a review of probation officer basic training in respect of the diploma in social work.

  Mr. Maclean
  Such a review is timely and I propose to announce its basis and terms of reference shortly.

  Ms Corston
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department when he will conduct the next review of probation national standards; and when the review will be completed.

  Mr. Maclean
  The review will take place over the first half of 1994 with a view to the publication of revised national standards in September.

  Ms Corston
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans he has for the assistant chief officer grade in the probation service in England and Wales.

  Mr. Maclean
  I have at this stage no proposals for changes to this grade.

  Ms Corston
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans he has to reduce the entry requirements for probation training in England and Wales.

  Mr. Maclean
  None at this stage, but I propose to review the qualifying training arrangements and to announce the basis of and terms of reference for the review shortly.

  EC Nationals
  Mr. Shore
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if nationals of the European Union and of the European Economic Area have the right to enter the United Kingdom(a) without an offer of employment but with the intention of looking for employment, (b) without the
  462
  guarantee of having somewhere to live and (c) without having provided proof that they will not have recourse to public funds during their time in the United Kingdom.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  European Community and other European Economic Area nationals may enter the United Kingdom simply on production of a valid passport or national identity card, but can be refused entry on grounds of public policy, public security or public health.

  The rights of nationals of European Community and other European Economic Area member states to reside in the United Kingdom are subject to the conditions and limitations laid down in European Community law, including, in the case of those wishing to reside without working, the requirements to have sufficient resources to avoid becoming a burden on the social security system.

  Prisoners' Earnings
  Mr. Cox
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what is the policy of his Department as to the handing over of money earned by inmates being held in penal establishments in England and Wales who are being deported from the United Kingdom; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  The pay of prisoners awaiting deportation is not liable to be used to help defray the expenses of deportation. Money (apart from pay) belonging to a prisoner awaiting deportation is applied to defray the expenses of deportation and maintenance of the prisoner and his dependants until their departure from the United Kingdom.

  Land Byelaws
  Mr. Boateng
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department which local authorities in England have adopted a byelaw prohibiting the occupation of land within 300 yd of any dwelling house so as to cause injury, disturbance or annoyance to those living in the house.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  Our records indicate that, prior to 1969 when the Home Office ceased to offer it to local authorities, this model byelaw was adopted by the following local authorities in England and Wales:

  Beaumaris borough council

  Bedfordshire county council

  Bristol city council

  Cornwall county council

  Edmonton borough council

  Epsom and Ewell borough council.

  Evesham borough council

  Flint borough council

  Flint county council

  Glamorgan county council

  Harrow borough council

  Hendon borough council

  Hertfordshire county council

  Huntingdon borough council

  Leicester county council

  Middlesex county council

  Rhondda borough council

  Southall borough council

  Southampton county council

  Uxbridge borough council

  Wembley borough council

  Willesden borough council

  Wisbech borough council

  Yorkshire (North Riding) county council

  463

  Police
  Mr. Hain
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what was the expenditure(a) per officer and (b) per 100,000 population (i) in total, (ii) on vehicles, (iii) on buildings and (iv) on communications for each year since 1979 for the South Wales, Thames Valley, Kent, Lancashire, Avon and Somerset and Hampshire police authority areas; and what were the comparable totals for all non-metropolitan and Welsh non-metropolitan police authority areas.

  Capital Expenditure £ million

  Authority

  1990–91

  1991–92

  1992–93

  1993–94

  1994–95

  (Provision)

  Avon and Somerset

  8·010

  7·356

  6·097

  6·948

  10·359

  Hampshire

  1·523

  3·607

  3·747

  4·867

  4·311

  Kent

  1·532

  2·778

  3·751

  4·068

  3·672

  Lancashire

  2·654

  4·133

  5·908

  4·014

  4·607

  South Wales

  1·056

  3·795

  3·880

  4·053

  5·673

  Thames Valley

  7·325

  5·190

  5·283

  4·806

  4·681

  All non-metropolitan

  74·275

  97·759

  113·210

  116·147

  113·573

  Welsh (non-metropolitan)

  4·189

  10·771

  11·490

  12·190

  10·907

  Mr. Hain
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what were the number of (i) arrests and (ii) prosecutions(a) per officer and (b) per 100,000 population for each year since 1979 for the South Wales, Thames Valley, Kent, Lancashire, Avon and Somerset and

  Arrests for all types of offence

  Police force area

  Total non-metropolitan

  South Wales

  Thames Valley

  Kent

  Lancashire

  Avon and Somerset

  Hampshire

  England and Wales

  Wales only

  Arrests per police officer

  1979

  9

  13

  12

  11

  10

  14

  11

  9

  1980

  10

  13

  12

  12

  11

  14

  11

  11

  1981

  11

  13

  13

  12

  12

  14

  12

  11

  1982

  14

  15

  13

  12

  13

  14

  13

  13

  1983

  15

  15

  13

  14

  12

  14

  13

  13

  1984

  16

  14

  13

  16

  13

  14

  13

  15

  1985

  17

  16

  14

  16

  13

  16

  14

  15

  1986

  14

  14

  14

  15

  11

  16

  13

  13

  1987

  15

  14

  16

  15

  12

  16

  13

  14

  1988

  16

  14

  16

  16

  12

  17

  14

  15

  1989

  17

  15

  16

  16

  13

  19

  15

  16

  1990

  18

  16

  15

  18

  14

  20

  15

  17

  1991

  18

  16

  15

  19

  12

  19

  15

  17

  1992

  18

  15

  17

  19

  11

  19

  15

  17

  Arrests per 100,000 population

  1979

  2,236

  2,146

  2,324

  2,458

  2,211

  2,608

  2,205

  2,131

  1980

  2,512

  2,234

  2,437

  2,881

  2,393

  2,668

  2,382

  2,451

  1981

  2,764

  2,365

  2,528

  2,915

  2,669

  2,686

  2,482

  2,569

  1982

  3,294

  2,598

  2,639

  2,885

  2,820

  2,806

  2,638

  2,879

  1983

  3,503

  2,695

  2,590

  3,270

  2,782

  2,761

  2,708

  3,023

  1984

  3,936

  2,620

  2,573

  3,618

  2,901

  2,719

  2,745

  3,316

  1985

  4,090

  2,777

  2,783

  3,529

  2,947

  3,079

  2,835

  3,469

  1986

  3,466

  2,522

  2,771

  3,347

  2,461

  3,024

  2,595

  2,999

  1987

  3,626

  2,508

  3,119

  3,468

  2,601

  3,150

  2,774

  3,195

  1988

  3,861

  2,589

  3,165

  3,696

  2,678

  3,271

  2,833

  3,384

  1989

  4,042

  2,931

  3,108

  3,845

  2,822

  3,651

  3,037

  3,567

  1990

  4,296

  3,015

  3,085

  4,115

  3,001

  3,768

  3,208

  3,775

  1991

  4,363

  2,997

  3,146

  4,451

  2,768

  3,717

  3,269

  3,913

  1992

  4,344

  2,998

  3,532

  4,422

  2,479

  3,630

  3,275

  3,955

  464
  Mr. Charles Wardle
  An answer could be provided only at disproportionate cost.

  Mr. Hain
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what were the capital programmes for each year since 1979 for the South Wales, Thames Valley, Kent, Lancashire, Avon and Somerset and Hampshire police authority areas; and what were the comparable totals for all non-metropolitan and Welsh non-metropolitan police authority areas.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  The information requested, which is available only from April 1990, is set out in the table.

  Hampshire police authority areas; and what were the comparable totals for all non-metropolitan and Welsh non-metropolitan police authority areas.

  Mr. Maclean
  The available information is contained in the tables. Information on prosecutions prior to 1983 could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.
  465

  Persons proceeded against at magistrates courts for indictable offences

  Police force area

  1983

  1984

  1985

  1986

  1987

  1988

  1989

  1990

  1991

  1992

  Prosecutions per police officer1

  South Wales

  6

  6

  6

  5

  6

  6

  5

  6

  6

  6

  Thames Valley

  4

  4

  4

  3

  3

  3

  3

  4

  4

  4

  Kent

  4

  3

  3

  3

  3

  3

  3

  3

  2

  2

  Lancashire

  5

  5

  5

  4

  5

  5

  4

  4

  4

  4

  Avon and Somerset

  4

  4

  4

  4

  4

  4

  4

  4

  4

  4

  Hampshire

  4

  4

  5

  5

  4

  4

  4

  4

  4

  4

  Total non-metropolitan England and Wales

  4

  4

  4

  4

  4

  4

  4

  4

  4

  4

  Wales only

  5

  5

  5

  5

  5

  s

  5

  5

  5

  5

  Prosecutions per 100,000 population1

  South Wales

  1,363

  1,344

  1,366

  1,277

  1,365

  1,396

  1,237

  1,338

  1,446

  1,415

  Thames Valley

  738

  665

  648

  603

  608

  621

  588

  699

  713

  703

  Kent

  745

  665

  667

  631

  674

  626

  505

  571

  470

  490

  Lancashire

  1,143

  1,157

  1,139

  1,027

  1,105

  1,103

  959

  1,025

  1,004

  962

  Avon and Somerset

  895

  866

  933

  901

  871

  916

  808

  810

  844

  789

  Hampshire

  843

  842

  899

  867

  836

  842

  782

  815

  822

  792

  Total non-metropolitan England and Wales

  906

  886

  887

  813

  855

  868

  790

  838

  869

  855

  Wales only

  1,171

  1,147

  1,152

  1,047

  1,154

  1,177

  1,072

  1,160

  1,173

  1,212

  Mr. Hain
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what were the number of incidents requiring police deployment(a) per officer and (b) per 100,000 population for each year since 1979 for the South Wales, Thames Valley, Kent, Lancashire, Avon and Somerset and
  466
  Hampshire police authority areas; and what were the comparable totals for all non-metropolitan and Welsh non-metropolitan police authority areas.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  The information requested is not collected centrally.
  467

  Prisons (Drugs)
  Mr. Hinchliffe
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement on the currently available medical treatment for drug abuse within British prisons.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Responsibility for this matter has been delegated to the Director General of the Prison Service, who has been asked to arrange for a reply to be given.

  Letter from Mr. A. Butler to Mr. David Hinchliffe, dated 18 January 1994:

  The Home Secretary has asked me, in the absence of the Director General from the office, to reply to your recent Question about medical treatment for drug abuse currently available in British prisons.

  In England and Wales policy and guidance on this is set out in Circular Instruction 12/1991 and the resource manual "Caring for Drug Users"—a copy of which is/has been placed in the House of Commons Library. This covers Provision of Detoxification, General Health Care, Management of Drug Induced Psychiatric State, Harm Minimisation, Longer Term Treatment, General Lifestyles, Work etc. and Pre-Release Work.

  The Prison Service is currently developing a strategy for dealing with drug misuse in prisons which includes a review of existing policy and advice in this area.

  Mr. Hinchliffe
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many known drug addicts have been identified within prison establishments in each year since 1990.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Responsibility for this matter has been delegated to the Director General of the Prison Service, who has been asked to arrange for a reply to be given.

  Letter from Mr. A. Butler to Mr. David Hinchliffe, dated 18 January 1994:

  The Home Secretary has asked me, in the absence of the Director General from the office, to reply to your recent Question about the number of known drug addicts in prisons for the years 1990 to 1993.

  The number of prisoners reported by prison medical officers to the Addicts Index at the Home Office as required by the Misuse of Drugs (Notification & Supply to Addicts) Regulations 1993 follows.

  Year

  Number

  1990

  1,420

  1991

  1,747

  1992

  2,586

  Data for 1993 are not yet available.

  Mr. Hinchliffe
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many discoveries of(a) heroin, (b) cocaine and (c) cannabis were made by the Prison Service in each year since 1989.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Responsibility for this matter has been delegated to the Director General of the Prison Service, who has been asked to arrange for a reply to be given.

  Letter from Mr. D. Lewis to Mr. David Hinchliffe, dated 18 January 1994:
  468
  The Home Secretary has asked me to reply to your recent Question about discoveries of heroin, cocaine and cannabis in the years 1989 to 1993.

  The following table shows the number of heroin, cocaine and cannabis finds from 1991 to 1993 reported to the Incident Management Support Unit of the Prison Service. Records prior to November 1990 are not held centrally.

  Heroin

  Cocaine

  Cannabis

  Total

  1991

  72

  50

  2,333

  2,455

  1992

  99

  65

  2,081

  2,245

  1993

  156

  65

  3,371

  3,592

  Mr. Cox
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what was the number of(a) men and (b) women serving prison sentences in England and Wales for drug offences who were not British nationals as at 10 January.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Responsibility for this matter has been delegated to the Director General of the Prison Service, who has been asked to arrange for a reply to be given.

  Letter from Mr. D. Lewis to Mr. Tom Cox, dated 18 January 1994:

  DRUG OFFENCES

  The Home Secretary has asked me to reply to your recent Question asking what was the number of (a) men and (b) women serving prison sentences in England and Wales for drug offences who were not British nationals as at 10 January.

  The latest available provisional information is for 30 September 1993. On that date 767 foreign nationals (of whom 623 were male and 144 female) were recorded centrally as being under sentence for drugs offences, excluding any where drugs offences were not the principal offence. These figures include those born outside the UK for whom a nationality was not recorded.

  Mr. Hinchliffe
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement on the availability of prescribed methadone maintenance and withdrawal programmes within British prisons.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Responsibility for this matter has been delegated to the Director General of the Prison Service, who has been asked to arrange for a reply to be given.

  Letter from Mr. A. Butler to Mr. David Hinchliffe, dated 18 January 1994:

  The Home Secretary has asked me to reply to your recent Question about the availability of prescribed methadone maintenance and withdrawal programmes within British prisons.

  In England and Wales policy and guidance relating to these matters are set out in Circular Instruction 12/1991 and the resource manual "Caring for Drug Users".

  A detoxification programme should be offered, unless specifically contra-indicated, where a prisoner presents with signs of addiction which are verified by a prison medical officer. In the case of opiates a methadone detoxification programme is advised and details of suitable detoxification schedules are provided.

  Current policy and advice is that methadone maintenance is not normally appropriate in prisons.

  As with all medical treatment, decisions about individual treatment must be a matter for the clinical judgement of the doctor responsible.

  The Prison Service is currently developing a strategy for dealing with drug misuse in prisons and is reviewing policy relating to methadone detoxification and maintenance as part of this work.
  469
  Mr. Hinchliffe
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many prison staff have been(a) suspended and (b) disciplined for the possession or alleged possession or importation of an unlawful drug into prison establishments annually from 1990.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Responsibility for this matter has been delegated to the Director-General of the Prison Service, who has been asked to arrange for a reply to be given.

  Letter from Mr. D. Lewis to Mr. David Hinchliffe, dated 18 January 1994:

  The Home Secretary has asked me to reply to your recent Question about the numbers of Prison Service staff who have been suspended and/or disciplined for the possession of drugs, or for trafficking drugs into or out of prison, since 1990.

  The information available centrally is set out in the table below.

  Year

  Suspensions

  Disciplinary action taken

  1990

  4

  3

  1991

  5

  4

  1992

  2

  1

  1993

  1

  1

  1994

  0

  0

  Number of sales prosecuted for various homosexual offences 1989–92 England and Wales

  Offence description/age of offender

  1990

  1991

  1992

  Sexual Offences Act 1966, Section 12 as amended by the Sexual Offences Act 1967

  Buggery, including attempt, with a boy under the age of 16 or with a woman or an animal

  under 18

  38

  35

  23

  18 to 20

  13

  22

  19

  21+

  299

  267

  312

  Total

  350

  324

  354

  Buggery, including attempt, by a man with a male person of the age of 16 or over without consent

  under 18

  3

  4

  —

  18 to 20

  3

  1

  2

  21+

  24

  26

  38

  Total

  30

  31

  40

  Buggery, including attempt, by a man of the age of 21 or over with another male person under the age of 21 with consent

  under 18

  —

  —

  1

  18 to 20

  1

  2

  1

  21+

  9

  17

  12

  Total

  10

  19

  14

  Buggery, including attempt, by a man with another male person other than above

  under 18

  2

  2

  4

  18 to 20

  2

  2

  2

  21+

  10

  11

  4

  Total

  14

  15

  10

  Sexual Offences Act 1956 Section 13 as amended by the Sexual Offences Act 1967

  Indecency by a man of the age of 21 or over with another male person under the age of 21

  under 18

  10

  3

  2

  18 to 20

  10

  9

  10

  21+

  420

  182

  191

  Total

  445

  194

  203

  Indecency by a man with another male person other than above

  under 18

  10

  4

  5

  18 to 20

  38

  22

  16

  21+

  831

  594

  550

  Total

  879

  620

  571

  470

  Year

  Suspensions

  Disciplinary action taken

  Total

  12

  9

  There are three instances where disciplinary action was not taken. In two cases, the suspension was lifted when the members of staff involved were found not guilty of the criminal charges against them. In the remaining case the member of staff resigned before disciplinary action could be concluded.

  Most of these cases concerned incidents away from the prison, and typically involve possession of small quantities of cannabis. In one case a member of staff was found guilty of possession of drugs and trafficking inside the prison.

  Homosexual Prosecutions
  Mr. Donald Anderson
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many prosecutions have taken place in each of the past three years for which figures are available involving homosexual acts with those(a) under 18 years and (b) between 18 and 21 years.

  Mr. Maclean
  Available information on prosecutions under sections 12 and 13 of the Sexual Offences Act 1956, as amended by the Sexual Offences Act 1967, is given in the table.
  471

  Offence description/age of offender

  1990

  1991

  1992

  Man of or over the age 21 procuring or attempting to procure or being party to the commission by a man under 21 of an act of gross indecency with another man

  under 18

  —

  —

  —

  18 to 20

  —

  —

  —

  21+

  71

  19

  14

  Total

  71

  19

  14

  Man procuring or attempting to procure or being party to the commission by a man NOT under 21 of an act of gross indecency with another man

  under 18

  2

  3

  —

  18 to 20

  11

  4

  2

  21+

  302

  217

  61

  Total

  315

  224

  63

  Note In some sections the defendant is under the legislative age; this may be due to a recording error or where attempting, conspiring, aiding, abetting, causing or permitting a crime is classified under the heading of the crime itself.

  Mr. George Howarth
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many prosecutions have been taken out against men under section 1 of the Sexual Offences Act 1967 involving a person(a) aged between 18 years and 21 years and (b) aged between 16 years and 18 years for each year since 1989.

  Number of males prosecuted for various homosexual offences 1989–1992 England and Wales

  Offence description/age of offender

  1989

  1990

  1991

  1992

  Sexual Offences Act 1956, Section 12 as amended by the Sexual Offences Act 1967

  Buggery, including attempt, with a boy under the age of 16 or with a woman or an animal

  under 16

  11

  18

  17

  7

  16 to 17

  16

  20

  18

  16

  18 to 20

  21

  13

  22

  19

  21+

  264

  299

  267

  312

  Total

  312

  350

  324

  354

  Buggery, including attempt, by a man with a male person of the age of 16 or over without consent

  under 16

  —

  —

  —

  —

  16 to 17

  1

  3

  4

  —

  18 to 20

  2

  3

  1

  2

  21+

  23

  24

  26

  38

  Total

  26

  30

  31

  40

  Buggery, including attempt, by a man of the age of 21 or over with another male person under the age of 21 with consent

  under 16

  —

  —

  —

  1

  16 to 17

  —

  1

  1

  1

  18 to 20

  2

  1

  2

  1

  21+

  6

  9

  17

  12

  Total

  8

  10

  19

  14

  Buggery, including attempt, by a man with another male person other than above

  under 16

  —

  1

  1

  3

  16 to 17

  —

  1

  1

  1

  18 to 20

  1

  2

  2

  2

  21+

  22

  10

  11

  4

  Total

  23

  14

  15

  10

  Sexual Offences Act 1956 Section 13 as amended by the Sexual Offences Act 1967

  Indecency by a man of the age of 21 or over with another male person under the age of 21

  under 16

  1

  1

  1

  —

  16 to 17

  6

  9

  2

  2

  18 to 20

  13

  15

  9

  10

  21+

  384

  420

  182

  191

  Total

  404

  445

  194

  203

  Indecency by a man with another male person other than above

  under 16

  1

  3

  2

  —

  16 to 17

  13

  7

  2

  5

  18 to 20

  41

  38

  22

  16

  21+

  1,258

  831

  594

  550

  Total

  1,313

  879

  620

  571

  472
  Mr. Maclean
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: No prosecutions have been brought under section 1 of the Sexual Offences Act 1967. This section amended earlier legislation to make lawful homosexual acts in private between consenting men aged 21 or above.

  Available information on prosecutions under sections 12 and 13 of the Sexual Offences Act 1956, which were the principal offences amended by the 1967 Act, are given in the table.
  473

  Offence description/age of offender

  1989

  1990

  1991

  1992

  Man of or over the age of 21 procuring or attempting to procure or being party to the

  under 16

  —

  —

  —

  —

  commission by a man under 21 of an act of gross indecency with another man

  16 to 17

  2

  —

  —

  —

  18 to 20

  7

  —

  —

  —

  21+

  89

  71

  19

  14

  Total

  98

  71

  19

  14

  Man procuring or attempting to procure or being party to the commission by a man

  under 16

  —

  1

  1

  —

  NOT under 21 of an act of gross indecency with another man

  16 to 17

  3

  1

  2

  —

  18 to 20

  8

  11

  4

  2

  21+

  315

  302

  217

  61

  Total

  326

  315

  224

  63

  Note: In some sections the defendant is under the legislative age; this may be due to a recording error or where attempting, conspiring, aiding, abetting, causing or permitting a crime is classified under the heading of the crime itself.

  Ethnic Minority Prisoners
  Mr. Cox
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what is the percentage of prison inmates,(a) men and (b) women, being held in prisons in England and Wales who are of an ethnic minority background but are citizens of the United Kingdom as at 10 January.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Responsibility for this matter has been delegated to the Director General of the Prison Service, who has been asked to arrange for a reply to be given.

  Letter from Mr. D. Lewis to Mr. Tom Cox, dated 18 January 1994:

  ETHNIC MINORITIES

  The Home Secretary has asked me to reply to your recent Question asking what is the percentage of prison inmates, (a) men and (b) women, being held in prisons in England and Wales who are of an ethnic minority background but are citizens of the United Kingdom, as at 10 January.

  The latest available provisional information is for prisoners in Prison Service establishments on 30 September 1993. On that date 11 per cent of males and 11·5 per cent. of females were of minority ethnic origin and were recorded as having United Kingdom nationality.

  Ethnic Minority Pupils
  Mrs. Anne Campbell
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) how many children in British schools come from new Commonwealth countries;

  (2) how many extra children in British schools will be included in the new section 11 brief to include all members of ethnic minorities.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Information is not held centrally in the form requested and could not be obtained except at disproportionate cost.

  Immigration (Carriers Liability) Act 1987
  Mr. Allen
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what representations he has received regarding the Immigration (Carriers Liability) Act 1987; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  In 1993, representations regarding the Immigration (Carriers Liability) Act 1987 concerned primarily the decision not to extend the provisions of the Act to channel tunnel services and the direct airside transit visa provision which was added by the
  474
  Asylum and Immigration Appeals Act 1993. Representations from carriers against the imposition of charges are regularly received by the immigration service.

  999 Calls
  Mr. Hain
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what were the number of 999 calls made(a) per police officer and (b) per 100,000 population for each year since 1979 for the South Wales, Thames Valley, Kent, Lancashire, Avon and Somerset and Hampshire police authority areas; and what were the comparable totals for all non-metropolitan and Welsh non-metropolitan police authority areas.

  Mr. Maclean
  The information requested is not collected centrally.

  Racial Attacks
  Mrs. Anne Campbell
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans he has to curb the rise in racial attacks and the increasing activity of the British National party.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  The Government have on many occasions expressed their abhorrence of racial violence and harassment and fully support police efforts to tackle racially motivated crime.

  Ministers have decided to reconvene the interdepartmental racial attacks group, chaired by the Home Office. The group provides a forum in which different agencies can examine the issue of racial violence at a national level, and co-ordinate a broad-based response. The first meeting is due to take place in February 1994.

  The views of the British National party are as repugnant to the Government as they are to the public at large. If the activities of this group or its members breach the law, they are liable to be dealt with by the police under public order and criminal legislation, and a number of prosecutions of BNP members have been mounted in the past.

  Video Rentals (Children)
  Mr. Alton
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many proprietors of video rental outlets were prosecuted for supplying films with an 18 rating to children in the last year for which figures are available.

  Mr. Maclean
  I refer the hon. Member to the reply given to him on 11 January at column 139.
  475

  Immigration
  Mrs. Dunwoody
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans he has to change the status in relation to entering the United Kingdom of citizens of Antigua and Barbuda, the Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Botswana, Canada, Dominica, The Gambia, Grenada, Guyana, Kiribati, Lesotho, the Maldives, Malta, Mauritius, Namibia, Nauru, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, St. Lucia, the Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Solomon Islands, Swaziland, Tanzania, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, Western Somoa, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  My right hon. and learned Friend has at present no plans for any such changes.

  Police Overtime (M11)
  Mr. Gapes
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what was the total cost in 1993 of the police overtime payments and other costs related to the security and policing for the M11 link road through Wanstead; and if he will make a statement.

  South Wales

  Thames Valley

  Kent

  Lancashire

  Avon and Somerset

  Hampshire

  General purpose vehicle

  70–100,000 miles

  80,000 miles/ 4 years

  100,000 miles/ 3 years

  70,000 miles/ 3 years

  75,000 miles/ 3 years

  80,000 miles

  Traffic vehicle

  120,000 miles

  100,000 miles/ 3 years

  120,000 miles/ 2 years

  70,000 miles/ 3 years

  100,000 miles/ 2·5 years

  120,000 miles

  CID general vehicle

  70–100,000 miles

  100,000 miles/ 5 years

  100,000 miles/ 5 years

  70,000 miles/ 3 years

  100,000 miles/ 2·5 years

  100–120,000 miles

  CID Special vehicle

  70–100,000 miles

  80,000 miles/ 3 years

  100,000 miles/ 3 years

  70,000 miles/ 3 years

  100,000 miles/ 2 years

  80,000 miles

  Special Vehicle

  70–100,000 miles

  Dependent on age and condition

  5–7 years

  Dependent on age and condition

  150,000 miles/ 10 years

  80,000 miles

  Motor-cycle

  80,000 miles/ 6 years

  80,000 miles/ 4 years

  45,000 miles/ 4 years

  65,000 miles

  Where no age criterion is given, forces replace vehicles on the basis of mileage alone. Each force reviews its policy regularly to take account of operating experience and other factors.

  Data Protection
  Mr. Cohen
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will make arrangements for the Data Protection Registrar to inspect relevant contracts with suppliers of information technology services that involve the use of personal data held by his Department in order to check whether all appropriate arrangements in relation to the Data Protection Act 1984 have been made, and whether such contracts make provisions for the registrar to make random inspections in order to check the suppliers in compliance with the eighth data protection principle.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  The Data Protection Registrar has a wide range of powers under the Data Protection Act 1984 to ensure that all individuals and organisations holding personal data on computer systems are registered and observe the data protection principles as required by the Act. When IT services are contracted out by a data user, the contractor and the user will be subject to the application of the data protection principles, and to the registrar's powers to promote compliance with them, as provided for in the Act. It is for the registrar to decide how he will use his
  476
  Mr. Charles Wardle
  I understand from the Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis that the total manpower costs in 1993 of security and policing for the M11 link road through Wanstead amounted to £256,211. Information on the cost of support services and other resources involved is not available.

  Police Vehicles
  Mr. Hain
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what are the vehicle replacement policies in terms of mileage and age for the South Wales, Thames Valley, Kent, Lancashire, Avon and Somerset and Hampshire police authority areas.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  The information requested is as follows:

  powers under the Act, and I do not consider that any further arrangements are necessary for him to discharge his duties effectively.

  Prisons (Foreign Nationals)
  Mr. Cox
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what is the policy of his Department in seeking to give specialist training to prison officers whose work involves them with foreign nationals serving prison sentences in prisons in England and Wales; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  There is no formal specialist training provided centrally for those working with foreign nationals, but all new officers receive race relations training which includes awareness of minority cultural, linguistic, spiritual and dietary needs.

  Responsibility for meeting the needs of foreign nationals is often co-ordinated by the race relations management team and liaison officers in establishments. Information on "best practice" in relation to foreign prisoners has been disseminated through the Race Relations Liaison Officers' Newsletter and their 1993 national conference.

  Training has been provided in this area for all staff at HM Prison Haslar (a specialised detention facility for deportees) by Prison Service College consultants.
  477
  There has also been a number of other initiatives to assist those working with foreign prisoners including translating the prisoners' information pack into 14 lanugauges; support for the Nuffield interpreters project to encourage accredited interpreters; introducing Language Line, a telephone interpreting service, into all prisons; and publication of the foreign prisoners' resource pack to provide information and guidance for staff working with foreign nationals, and the prisoners themselves.

  Ethnic Minority Grants
  Mrs. Anne Campbell
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how he proposes to meet the shortfall in services caused by the proposed cuts in section 11 funding.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Following discussions with local authorities, section 11 grant will now be distributed as a cash sum, rather than a percentage of expenditure. This will ensure maximum take-up of available funding, and it remains open to local authorities to provide additional resources in the light of their assessment of relative local priorities.

  Immigration Guidelines
  Mr. Allen
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will now publish his Department's guidelines for immigration officers.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  No. It is not the normal practice to publish internal instructions.

  Paramilitaries
  Mr. Barnes
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list all members of(a) proscribed loyalist and (b) proscribed republican organisations who are convicted prisoners in custody in England and Wales, giving in each case the date of their original conviction, their offence or offences, the length of sentence given and their paramilitary affiliation.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Responsibility for this matter has been delegated to the Director General of the Prison Service, who has been asked to arrange for a reply to be given.

  Letter from Mr. A Butler to Mr. Harry Barnes, dated 18 January 1994:

  Notifiable offences recorded by the police

  Police force area

  1979

  1980

  1981

  1982

  1983

  1984

  1985

  1986

  1987

  1988

  1989

  1990

  1991

  1992

  Recorded crimes per police officer1

  South Wales

  21

  23

  24

  27

  27

  29

  30

  33

  33

  35

  35

  42

  49

  51

  Thames Valley

  26

  23

  25

  28

  28

  30

  31

  33

  32

  29

  32

  39

  49

  50

  Kent

  18

  17

  18

  21

  21

  23

  24

  24

  25

  25

  26

  32

  43

  49

  Lancashire

  16

  16

  18

  20

  20

  22

  22

  24

  25

  26

  24

  29

  33

  35

  Avon and Somerset

  17

  18

  20

  22

  22

  24

  26

  30

  32

  31

  31

  40

  48

  55

  Hampshire

  21

  20

  23

  25

  25

  27

  28

  30

  30

  28

  30

  36

  43

  45

  Total non-metropolitan

  England and Wales

  19

  19

  21

  23

  24

  25

  26

  28

  28

  27

  29

  35

  41

  44

  Wales only

  19

  19

  21

  23

  24

  25

  26

  28

  29

  29

  29

  34

  40

  42

  Recorded crimes per 100,000 population1

  South Wales

  5,077

  5,432

  5,749

  6,468

  6,543

  7,089

  7,191

  8,089

  8,222

  8,576

  8,617

  10,205

  11,932

  12,355

  478
  The Home Secretary has asked me, in the absence of the Director General from the office, to reply to your recent Question asking for details of convicted prisoners in custody in England and Wales who are members of proscribed organisations.

  It is not the practice to discuss the claimed or suspected affiliation of individual prisoners to particular organisations.

  Leave to Remain
  Mr. Darling
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will set out his policy for issuing travel documents to individuals who have been granted exceptional leave to remain in the United Kingdom; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  I refer to my reply to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton (Sir I. Lawrence) on 16 December at column 791, which indicated that officials were writing that day setting out changes to be introduced on 1 January. A copy of the letter was placed in the Library. The new arrangements clarify policy and practice in the issue of Home Office travel documents, including the issue of documents to those granted exceptional leave to remain in the United Kingdom.

  Mr. Darling
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what is his policy with regard to allowing re-entry to the United Kingdom to those individuals who have been granted exceptional leave to remain in the United Kingdom and have been granted a travel document, and who then seek to re-enter the United Kingdom; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  A person granted exceptional leave to remain will normally be re-admitted on return to the United Kingdom before the expiry of the period granted if the immigration officer is satisfied that the circumstances which led to the granting of that leave still apply.

  Crime Statistics
  Mr. Hain
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what were the numbers of(a) recorded crime, per police officer, (b) recorded crime per 100,000 population for each year since 1979 for the South Wales, Thames Valley, Kent, Lancashire, Avon and Somerset and Hampshire police areas; and what were the comparable totals for all non-metropolitan and Welsh non-metropolitan police authorities.

  Mr. Maclean
  The information requested is contained in the following table:
  479

  Police force area

  1979

  1980

  1981

  1982

  1983

  1984

  1985

  1986

  1987

  1988

  1989

  1990

  1991

  1992

  Thames Valley

  4,079

  3,960

  4,267

  4,798

  4,941

  5,347

  5,607

  6,057

  5,968

  5,481

  6,060

  7,446

  9,340

  9,938

  Kent

  3,500

  3,463

  3,468

  4,195

  4,152

  4,427

  4,670

  4,762

  4,926

  4,936

  5,231

  6,509

  8,797

  10,102

  Lancashire

  3,777

  3,739

  4,120

  4,720

  4,689

  4,927

  4,947

  5,390

  5,854

  6,041

  5,587

  6,686

  7,600

  8,209

  Avon and Somerset

  3,616

  4,065

  4,500

  4,922

  4,814

  5,277

  5,656

  6,529

  7,012

  6,788

  6,895

  8,784

  10,662

  12,075

  Hampshire

  3,941

  3,912

  4,391

  4,886

  4,901

  5,175

  5,373

  5,603

  5,755

  5,351

  5,716

  6,966

  8,360

  8,770

  Total non-metropolitan

  England and Wales

  3,881

  4,022

  4,395

  4,859

  4,875

  5,180

  5,388

  5,726

  5,908

  5,712

  5,948

  7,293

  8,673

  9,353

  Wales only

  4,234

  4,407

  4,700

  5,237

  5,340

  5,783

  5,941

  6,403

  6,570

  6,583

  6,496

  7,625

  9,043

  9,602

  1 Excluding offences of criminal damage value £20 and under.

  South Wales Police
  Mr. Hain
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what is the basis for the categorisation this coming year of South Wales as a semi-rural police authority.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  Concentration of population is one of a number of factors which have been used in reaching decisions on the allocation of increases in police force establishments. As my right hon. Friend has made clear, however, available resources will not allow for further increases to establishments in 1994–95.

  Secure Training Centres
  Mr. Michael
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) what is his target date for the opening of each of his proposed secure training centres;

  (2) what target date he has set by which he intends that all five secure training centres shall be open and accepting referrals.

  Mr. Maclean
  The centres will open as soon as possible after Royal Assent to the Criminal Justice and Public Order Bill.

  Mr. Michael
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to his answer of 17 December,Official Report, column 952, whether he will now identify the region in which each of his five proposed secure training centres is to be sited and list the counties to be served in each case.

  Mr. Maclean
  Final decisions have not yet been reached. The notice recently placed in the Official Journal of the European Community invited expressions of interest from companies to finance, design, build/refurbish, operate and maintain secure training centres either on Home Office land or on alternative sites which they would themselves propose. The deadline for receipt of applications is 11 February 1994.

  Mr. Michael
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether all the running costs of his proposed secure training centres will be met by his Department.

  Mr. Maclean
  Running costs will be met by the contractor(s), who will be reimbursed by the Home Office.

  Electoral Registration
  Mr. Matthew Taylor
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many people under the age of 25 years are not included in the electoral register.
  480
  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Information on the number of people under 25 included in, or missing from, the electoral register is not collected. However, research carried out by the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys after the 1991 Census suggested that approximately 12·1 per cent. of people aged 18–19, 19·5 per cent. of people aged 20 and 20·6 per cent. of people aged 21–24 were missing from the register.

  Mr. Matthew Taylor
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how much his Department is spending on(a) electoral registration in the United Kingdom, (b) electoral registration of EC nationals in the United Kingdom and (c) electoral registration of overseas voters.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Electoral registration officers are appointed by district and London borough councils in England and Wales and receive their funding through their local authority. The Home Office undertakes an annual publicity campaign in support of electoral registration in England and Wales. Some £620,000 has been spent on television advertising in support of the canvass for the 1994–95 electoral register. We have no plans for expenditure on overseas electors publicity. We are currently considering ways of letting European Community nationals know about their new voting rights.

  Schools-Police Liaison Service
  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what consultations he has had with the chairman of the South Wales police authority in relation to the priority to be given to the schools-police liaison service in the forthcoming financial year.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  None.

  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many police authorities operate a schools-police liaision authority.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  Information is not held centrally in the form requested. Arrangements for police liaison with schools are the responsibility of chief officers of police. Some police forces have dedicated schools liaison personnel, others employ officers with wider youth and community liaison duties to undertake schools liaison.

  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what representations he has received in relation to the schools-police liaison service of the South Wales police authority.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  None.
  481

  Child Cruelty
  Mr. Michael
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department when and where he first announced his intention to extend the prosecution right of appeal to cases of child cruelty and indecent assault; and if he will list the occasions on which he has since made a similar announcement(a) to the House, (b) via Home Office press release, statement or communication or (c) otherwise.

  Mr. Maclean
  My right hon. and learned Friend first announced the Government's intention to extend the scope of the Attorney-General's power to refer unduly lenient sentences to the Court of Appeal in a speech at the Conservative party conference on 6 October. Since then, my right hon. and learned Friend has referred to this intention on a number of occasions in response to questions from hon. Members and the public, and in explaining the Government's overall strategy on law and order. On Thursday 13 January this year the Home Office public relations branch issued a press release giving further details of the offences to be covered and the proposed date of implementation, to coincide with the answer my right hon. and learned Friend gave in the House on that day to my hon. Friend the Member for Amber Valley (Mr. Oppenheim).

  Deported Jamaicans
  Mr. Madden
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what was the total cost, including plane charter, of returning to Jamaica on 25 December 1993, Jamaican nationals refused entry to the United Kingdom on 21 December 1993.

  Mr. Charles Wardle
  [holding answer 11 January 1994]: The figure was £126,765, including the cost of the charter and of in-flight escorts but excluding the cost of in-country escorts which have yet to be finalised.

  Peanut Allergy
  Sir Cranley Onslow
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many deaths are known to have been caused in England and Wales by peanut-related food allergy in each of the past 10 years.

  Mr. Sackville
  I have been asked to reply.

  For the latest 10 years, 1983 to 1992, for which data are available, there were no deaths registered where allergy to peanuts was the assigned underlying cause.

  Fine Defaulters
  Mr. William Ross
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what is the average prison sentence imposed for defaulting on a fine; what is the average period actually spent in prison by such a defaulter; and what is the average cost of such a person's imprisonment.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Responsibility for this matter has been delegated to the Director General of the Prison Service, who has been asked to arrange for a reply to be given.
  482
  Letter from Mr. D. Lewis to Mr. William Ross, dated 18 January 1994:

  Fine Defaulters

  The Home Secretary has asked me to reply to your recent Question asking about the average prison sentence imposed for defaulting on a fine; the average period actually spent in prison by such a defaulter; and the average cost of such a person's imprisonment.

  The latest available information is for 1992 when the average length of sentence imposed for fine default in Prison Service establishments in England and Wales was 22 days. The average period served was 7·5 days. Information relating to the average cost of imprisonment specifically for fine defaulters is not available. The average net operating cost for prisoners in local prisons and remand centres in 1992/93, however, was £526 per week.

  Community Charge (Fines)
  Ms Walley
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will give figures for April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December of the number of people imprisoned for non-payment of outstanding community charge and in each case specify the length and cost per person of imprisonment; and what proportion of those imprisoned are in receipt of benefit.

  Mr. Peter Lloyd
  Responsibility for this matter has been delegated to the Director General of the Prison Service, who has been asked to arrange for a reply to be given.

  Letter from Derek Lewis to Ms Joan Walley, dated 13 January 1994:

  NON PAYMENT OF OUTSTANDING COMMUNITY CHARGE

  The Home Secretary has asked me to reply to your recent Question about the number of people imprisoned in April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December for non-payment of outstanding community charge, and for each case the length and cost per person of imprisonment and what proportion of those imprisoned are in receipt of benefit.

  Provisional data is given in the attached table for the months April to October 1993. Because of the number of cases identified it is not possible to detail the length of sentence imposed in each case. Information relating to the cost per person of imprisonment specifically for these cases is not available. The average net operating cost for prisoners in local prisons and remand centres in 1992/3, however, was £526 per week. The average sentence applied was 34 days of which just under half would normally be served. Information on the proportion of those imprisoned who are in receipt of benefit is not available centrally.

  Receptions into Prison Service establishments in England and Wales for non-payment of community charge1: April-October 1993

  Month

  Number

  April

  25

  May

  28

  June

  21

  July

  36

  August

  35

  September

  27

  October

  35

  Total

  207

  1 Includes small numbers recorded as non-payment of rates.

  483

WALES

  Health Service
  Mr. Ieuan Wyn Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what steps employees in Wales of health service bodies, local authorities or voluntary organisations may take to raise concerns relating to patient or client treatment, to malpractice or to fraud.

  Mr. Gwilym Jones
  In the NHS, employees are encouraged to take up their concerns through all levels of management within the employing authority or NHS trust in accordance with local procedures designed to ensure such concerns are dealt with fairly and thoroughly. A copy of guidance issued last June is in the Library of the House.

  Every local authority has to appoint a monitoring officer who has a duty to prepare a report to the authority if it appears to him/her that an action or omission by the authority is or is likely to be illegal or amount to maladministration. The authority must consider his/her report before deciding what action to take. A local authority's chief finance officer has a similar duty with regard to matters of financial propriety. An employee of an authority could bring his or her concerns to the attention of the monitoring officer or the chief finance officer.

  It is also open to any person, including employees of a particular local authority, to approach the independent external auditor appointed by the Audit Commission to that particular authority.

  Amgueddfa Genedlaethol Cymru—National Museum of Wales

  Twelve months review—January to December 1993—Visitors numbers

  Branch

  Actual

  1992

  1992

  Variance per cent.

  Main Building, Cathays Park

  266,743

  255,601

  11,142

  4·4

  Welsh Folk Museum, St. Fagans

  413,840

  349,164

  64,676

  18·5

  Amgueddfar Gogledd, Llanberis

  77,079

  77,082

  (3)

  0·0

  Welsh Industrial and Maritime Museum

  67,971

  66,521

  1,450

  2·2

  Roman Legionary Museum, Caerleon

  47,181

  39,079

  8,102

  20·7

  Museum of the Welsh Woollen Industry, Dre-fach

  23,026

  21,835

  1,191

  5·5

  Segontium Roman Fort Museum

  10,571

  10,127

  444

  4·4

  Graham Sutherland Gallery

  10,551

  10,457

  94

  0·9

  Turner House, Penarth

  10,855

  13,012

  (2,157)

  (16·6)

  Welsh Slate Museum

  24,165

  25,065

  (900)

  (3·6)

  Total

  951,982

  867,943

  84,039

  9·7

  Ambulance Staff
  Mr. Ieuan Wyn Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales if he will make it his policy to ensure that health authorities and ambulance trusts in Wales make arrangements to allow ambulance personnel to retire at age 55 years.

  Mr. Gwilym Jones
  My right hon. Friend is to consider what arrangements might be introduced to facilitate the early retirement of long-serving ambulance staff in Wales.

SCOTLAND

  Rural Medical Care
  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will publish the report of the review of medical care in rural Scotland, chaired by Sir Thomas Thomson.
  484
  No central guidance has been issued to voluntary organisations. Since these are independent, employees are bound by the terms of their contracts of employment.

  Schools Inspection
  Mr. Dafis
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what percentage of the difference between the total value of the tenders placed in the financial year 1993–94 for the inspection of secondary schools in Wales and the sum of £933,000 transferred from the rate support grant to county councils to the Office of Her Majesty's chief inspector for Wales was spent on appointing staff to the office of Her Majesty's chief inspector for Wales.

  Sir Wyn Roberts
  None of the money transferred from the revenue support grant to the office of Her Majesty's chief inspector of schools in Wales was spent on appointing staff to that office.

  National Museum of Wales
  Mr. Faulds
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales if he will publish the attendance figures for 1993 reported by the National Museum of Wales, including its outstations, with the percentage increase or decrease on the attendance figures for 1992.

  Sir Wyn Roberts
  A total of 951,982 people visited the National Museum of Wales during 1993, an increase of 9·7 per cent. over the attendance reported for 1992.

  Mr. Stewart
  The report of the working party has not yet been received, but it is understood that it is at final draft stage and will be submitted early next month. It will thereafter be considered and a decision taken about publication.

  Government Papers
  Mr. McFall
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what plans he has to introduce legislation applying to Scotland similar to the 30-year rule regarding the release of Government and Cabinet papers.

  Mr. Salmond
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what plans he has for introducing legislation to provide for the public release of Scottish Office governmental papers; and if he will make a statement.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  Scottish Office papers have for many years been released as a matter of course under arrangements which mirror administratively
  485
  those which apply statutorily in England and Wales. I have no plans at present to place the system on a statutory footing.

  Glenochil Prison
  Mr. McFall
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland who granted permission for the visit in December 1993 of Mr. Roger Kendrick, former governor, and Mr. Walter Litherard to Glenochil prison; and how many staff and prisoners they interviewed.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  I have asked Mr. E. W. Frizzell, the chief executive of the Scottish Prison Service, to arrange for a reply to be given to the hon. Member.

  Letter from E. W. Frizzell to Mr. John McFall, dated 18 January 1994:

  The Secretary of State has asked me to reply to your Question about who granted permission for a visit in December 1993 by Mr. Roger Kendrick, former governor, and Mr. Walter Litherard, to Glenochil Prison, and how many staff and prisoners they interviewed.

  Mr. Kendrick telephoned Mr. L. McBain, Governor-in-Charge, HM Prison, Glenochil, and asked if he could visit to discuss a number of matters and Mr. McBain agreed.

  Mr. Litherard did not visit the establishment.

  Mr. Kendrick subsequently visited, The purpose of the visit was to advise the Governor of the existence of a new electronic drug detection unit that Mr. Kendrick's company was marketing. Mr. Kendrick also met with a Governor involved in the prison industries complex to ask if Glenochil Prison would be interested in seeking a contract to supply his company with items of prison industries output. No staff and no prisoners were interviewed by Mr. Kendrick.

  Football
  Mr. Pendry
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will list the Scottish League clubs together with the total season's attendance at(a) matches played in the Scottish Premiership and Leagues and (b) matches played in the Tennant's Scottish cup, Skol cup and B and Q cup with the total numbers of (i) arrests, (ii) ejections and (iii) arrests plus ejections as a percentage of the total attendance at each category of such matches, accurate to four decimal places for the seasons 1991–92 and 1992–93; and if he will make a statement on attendance rates and arrest rates at each category of such matches.

  Sir Hector Monro
  This information is not held centrally and cannot, therefore, be assembled in the time available. I shall write to the hon. Member and arrange for a copy of the letter to be placed in the Library of the House.

  Forestry Commission
  Mrs. Dunwoody
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland when he will make a statement on the future of the Forestry Commission.

  Sir Hector Monro
  Ministers will await the advice of the forestry review group before deciding what action, if any, should be taken in relation to the ownership and management of the Forestry Commission's woodlands.

  Mrs. Dunwoody
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what undertakings he has made to the forestry unions to guarantee the future of the Forestry Commission; and if he will place them in the Library.
  486
  Sir Hector Monro
  Forestry Ministers have given no undertakings to forestry unions in respect to any matter in relation to the Forestry Commission.

  Bulk Shipping
  Mrs. Ray Michie
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what tariff rebate subsidy will be applied to the bulk transport of timber; and what plans the Government have to reduce the rate or abolish the scheme.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  The bulk transport of timber currently attracts a TRS rate of 40 per cent. Arrangements for 1994–95 have not yet been finalised.

  Mrs. Ray Michie
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what estimate he has made as to the number of extra timber loads which will be transported by road in the west highlands following the termination of ship freight services; what assessment he has made of the cost in terms of repair and maintenance of trunk roads resulting from such extra loads; what studies he has made of the economic and environmental effect of such extra traffic on the areas concerned; and if he will make a statement.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  It is my understanding that Glenlight Shipping Ltd. is continuing to transport timber by sea within the highlands and islands area using the company's timber barge system. Glenlight Shipping Ltd. will continue to receive subsidy on such cargoes. In addition, other bulk shippers operating within the TRS scheme are eligible to receive subsidy for the carriage of timber.

  Given the continuing operation of Glenlight's timber barge system as well as the availability of other bulk shipping operators to carry timber, it seems unlikely that there will be any significant transfer of timber transport to road in the west highlands area.

  Mrs. Ray Michie
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland (1) which bulk shipping operators will be undertaking the transport of goods which were previously carried out by Glenlight Shipping; when he expects the commencement of the service by alternative operators; what level of subsidy they are receiving; and if he will make a statement.

  (2) what discussions his Department has had with freight shipping services following the collapse of the Glenlight Shipping company regarding the provision of life line shipping services to the Isles; if he will list the shipping services which have shown an interest in the routes currently served by Glenlight; and if he will make a statement;

  (3) what consultation has been initiated or entered into by his Department with bulk shipping companies in order to operate the routes relinquished by Glenlight Shipping Services Ltd; on what dates these meetings took place; and which ministers or officials were involved.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  Glenlight Shipping Ltd. has not collapsed. The company is still operating but has taken the commercial decision to discontinue bulk shipping operations in the highlands and islands area apart from the carriage of timber. The Scottish Office is continuing to provide tariff rebate subsidy to the company on the basis of eligible cargoes carried. In addition to Glenlight there are four other bulk shipping operators within the TRS scheme operating on the west coast. The
  487
  relevant companies are: Easdale Island Shipping Line, Gardner Shipping (Scotland) Ltd., Roderick Cunningham (Scalpay) Ltd. and Dennison (Shipping) Ltd. I understand that at least two of these shipping companies are already carrying cargoes for customers who were previously served by Glenlight Shipping Ltd. The Scottish Office maintains regular and frequent contact with shipping operators within the TRS scheme to discuss variations in traffic levels, the redistribution of TRS resources and other matters. In recent months the Scottish Office has had extensive discussions with Glenlight Shipping Ltd. and also with Easdale Shipping Line and Gardner Shipping (Scotland) Ltd., the two west coast bulk shipping operators that are most likely to carry the traffic previously carried by Glenlight.

  The general rate of TRS subvention on the west coast is 40 per cent. for cargoes originating from the mainland and 30 per cent. for cargoes originating from the islands. Each company's TRS allocation is based on the company's estimates of traffic to be carried within the specified period and on previous years' actual traffic carried as compared with forecasts. Individual bulk shipping operators' allocations are commercially confidential. In 1993–94 provision of £3·130 million is being made available for bulk shipping services and £6·768 million for P and O Scottish Ferries Ltd., giving a total TRS provision of £9·898 million.

  Local Government Reform
  Mrs. Ray Michie
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what assessment he has made of the effect local government reform will have on projects currently being planned and undertaken by existing local authorities and specific requests for assistance of objective 1 funding; what guidelines his Department has drawn up or plans; what discussions his Department has had with local authorities regarding the matter; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Stewart
  Local government reform will not affect the ability of local authorities to compete for objective 1 funds. Any rights, liabilities and obligations of existing authorities resulting from grant awards before the new local authority structure comes into effect will be inherited by relevant successor authorities, as provided for in the Local Government etc. (Scotland) Bill. No specific guidelines are planned in relation to the European structural funds; and my Department has had no discussions with local authorities regarding the matter.

  Crosshouse Hospital
  Mr. Donohoe
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland, pursuant to his answer of 6 December,Official Report, column 84, if he will make a detailed statement on the facilities which have been closed in Crosshouse hospital by the North Ayrshire and Arran NHS trust.

  Mr. Stewart
  There have been no reductions in service but there are two wards for which there are planned changes in use.

  In its first six months the trust has treated 400 more in-patients, 1,900 more day patients and 1,500 more out-patients compared with the same period last year. In orthopaedic surgery and gynaecology, changes in service delivery patterns have meant that fewer in-patient beds are required to meet an increased demand for services.
  488
  Orthopaedic day surgery has increased by 83 per cent. and in-patient activity by 11 per cent. following the appointment of an additional consultant orthopaedic surgeon and the opening of a £1 million purpose-planned day surgery unit. As day surgery patients no longer require to be cared for in a hospital ward, a 30-bedded orthopaedic ward will now be used to provide expanded and improved in-patient facilities for renal and haematology patients.

  Gynaecological day surgery has increased by 20 per cent. compared with last year and this improvement in clinical practice means that consultants require 26 fewer gynaecological in-patient beds to treat an increased number of patients. A gynaecology ward will shortly become available for use as a decanting facility which will ensure that the planned programme of ward upgrading at Crosshouse hospital can proceed without inconveniencing patients and with no reduction in the number of patients treated.

  Land Valuation
  Mrs. Ray Michie
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what representations he has received regarding amending revaluation forms under the Land Valuation Acts to simplify the procedure for business in Scotland by eliminating the need to provide detailed financial information about the business concerned; what are the implications for the arrangement of the commitment to reducing bureaucracy, and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Stewart
  My right hon. Friend has received three letters on this subject since 1 January 1993. Under section 7 of the Lands Valuation (Scotland) Act 1854, as amended, an assessor is authorised to call upon any ratepayer within his area to supply him only with such information as is reasonably required in order to value the property concerned. This is to ensure that the property is valued as accurately as possible with the objective of minimising the need for an appeal and the consequent additional costs for the ratepayer.

  Tourist Boards
  Mrs. Ray Michie
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what representations he has received regarding the consultation exercise into tourist boards in Scotland concerning the proposed new board covering Argyll and Bute; what suggestions have been made with regard to the geography of that tourist board area; when he expects the conclusion of the exercise; and if he will make a statement.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  The Scottish tourist board has submitted a recommendation on a new area tourist board structure to my right hon. Friend. This is being considered carefully and an announcement will be made in due course.

  NHS Trusts
  Mr. Robert Hughes
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will now direct that the salaries of general managers of NHS trusts be made public; and if he will arrange for the members of the boards of NHS trusts to declare any financial interests and that a register of such interests be made available for public scrutiny.
  489
  Mr. Lang
  These issues are under consideration following publication for consultation in England of draft codes of conduct and accountability for NHS boards and their members.

  Shipping Operators
  Mrs. Ray Michie
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland which companies presently receive tariff rebate subsidy ; what is the extent of tariff rebate subsidy for each shipping operator; what are the current guidelines for receiving the subsidy ; and if he will make a statement.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  The companies currently operating within the tariff rebate subsidy scheme are as listed. Each company's TRS allocation is based on the company's estimates of traffic to be carried during the year concerned as well as on previous years' actual traffic carried as compared with forecasts. Individual shipping operators' claims are monitored monthly against the TRS resources available. Individual bulk shipping operators' allocations are treated as being commercial confidential. In 1993–94 provision of £3·130 million is being made available for bulk shipping services and £6·768 million for P and O Scottish Ferries Ltd., giving a total TRS provision of £9·898 million. The TRS scheme operates on the basis of providing for reduction in shipping operators' normal commercial tariffs. The shipping operator determines tariffs on a normal commercial basis for the carriage of particular cargoes, and, if the cargo and the destination are eligible for subsidy under the scheme, the operator reduces the commercial tariff by a percentage decided by the Scottish Office. The Scottish Office pays subsidy to the shipping operator to compensate for tariff reductions. Before becoming eligible for assistance under the tariff rebate subsidy scheme a shipping operator is required to enter into an undertaking with the Secretary of State for Scotland to provide approved shipping services within the highlands and islands area.

  Companies operating within the TRS scheme:

  P & O Scottish Ferries

  Orcargo

  Orkney Line Ltd

  Shetland Line Ltd

  Dennison (Shipping) Ltd

  Easdale Island Shipping Line

  Gardner Shipping (Scotland) Ltd

  Glenlight Shipping Ltd

  Hay & Company (Lerwick) Ltd

  Roderick Cunningham (Scalpay) Ltd

  Student Awards
  Mr. Raymond S. Robertson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland, what conclusions he has reached about the future administration of student awards in Scotland.

  Mr. Lang
  I have decided that student awards branch of the Scottish Office Education Department should become an executive agency of the Secretary of State for Scotland, under the "next steps" initiative, with a proposed launch date of 5 April 1994.

  Mountain Deaths
  Mr. Canavan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland how many people died during 1993 as the result of incidents on Scottish mountains; and if he will make a statement.
  490
  Mr. Stewart
  [holding answer 14 January 1994]: The information requested for 1993 should be ready by April 1994. I shall write to the hon. Member as soon as it is available. Meanwhile, the numbers of deaths from such incidents in the most recent 10 years are given in the table.

  Deaths1 as the result of incidents on Scottish mountains ICD Code

  E884.1 Falls on mountains

  E908–909 Blizzard or avalanche

  E901.0 Hypothermia

  Total

  1983

  24

  —

  1

  25

  1984

  20

  —

  2

  22

  1985

  11

  3

  —

  14

  1986

  23

  4

  1

  28

  1987

  21

  3

  —

  24

  1988

  22

  —

  —

  22

  1989

  16

  1

  1

  18

  1990

  18

  —

  —

  18

  1991

  24

  1

  —

  25

  1922

  19

  1

  3

  23

  1 Excluding deaths from pre-existing medical conditions (eg heart attacks).

  Tourism
  Mr. Kirkwood
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will make a statement on progress being made on Her Majesty's Government's review of tourism support arrangements in Scotland.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: Good progress is being made in implementing the decisions announced by my right hon. Friend on 29 June 1993 following the tourism review.

  To ensure collaboration at the national level, my right hon. Friend has appointed representatives of Scottish Enterprise and Highlands and Islands Enterprise to the board of the Scottish tourist board. I hope to announce shortly the measures we are taking to strengthen the Scottish tourism co-ordinating group and the Scottish Confederation of Tourism. I expect the first national strategic plan for tourism to be published in the spring.

  Arrangements for the Scottish tourist board's assumption of Highlands and Islands Enterprise's tourism marketing and visitor service functions with effect from 1 April 1994, for the consolidation of business support within the enterprise network, and for the relocation of some of the board's functions to Inverness are well advanced.

  The provisions of the Local Government etc. (Scotland) Bill confirm the important role which local authorities have in supporting the tourist industry and provide for the establishment of a co-ordinated and coherent network of area tourist boards covering the whole of Scotland.

  Mr. Kirkwood
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland (1) when he will announce the Government's intentions regarding the future of tourism support in Scotland;

  (2) what reduction the Scottish tourist board has proposed in the number of area tourist boards in Scotland.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: The Scottish tourist board has submitted a recommendation on a new area tourist board structure to my right hon. Friend. This is being considered carefully and an announcement will be made in due course.
  491

  Teacher Training
  Mr. Foulkes
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland how many people graduated or qualified in teacher training in each of the Scottish teacher training colleges and universities in 1993.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: The available information is set out in the table:

  College/University

  Number of Graduates in 1993 (provisional)

  University of Paisley

  180

  Strathclyde University

  758

  Moray House Institute of Education

  539

  Northern College of Education

  455

  St. Andrew's College of Education

  420

  University of Stirling

  31

  All

  2,383

  Mr. Foulkes
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland how many newly qualified teachers were appointed to permanent teaching posts by each of the regional and island authorities in Scotland in 1993.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: Surveys to ascertain the first destination of

  Table 2

  Number of newly qualified teachers known to have been appointed to teaching posts in Scotland1 (September 1993)

  Employer in Scotland

  Permanent

  Temporary/supply

  Type of contract unknown

  All

  Borders

  4

  5

  5

  14

  Central

  14

  17

  1

  32

  Dumfries and Galloway

  12

  17

  0

  29

  Fife

  35

  30

  7

  72

  Grampian

  37

  33

  0

  70

  Highland

  8

  8

  0

  16

  Lothian

  54

  36

  9

  99

  Strathclyde

  148

  322

  3

  473

  Tayside

  38

  20

  3

  61

  Islands Authorities

  9

  8

  3

  20

  Independent or other schools

  18

  11

  8

  37

  Total

  377

  507

  39

  923

  1 The figures include an element of estimation in cases where only partial information is known.

  2 Information on the 31 Stirling University graduates is not available in this form. These students are categorised as having unknown destination in Table 1.

  A7
  Mr. Kirkwood
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland when he expects to be able to publish the route action plan for the A7 trunk route south of Hawick.

  Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: I refer the hon. Member to my previous answer of 10 December 1993.

  Ambulance Personnel
  Mrs. Ewing
  To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland (1) what recent discussions he has held with representatives of ambulance staff and Unison in connection with plans for early retirement of ambulance personnel;
  492
  newly qualified teachers are undertaken in September of the graduation year and in the following March, the later survey tending to give a more comprehensive picture of employment rates.

  Such information as is available from the September 1993 survey about teachers who qualified in 1993 is set out in the following tables. The high non-response rate—34 per cent.—to the survey questionnaire means, however, that the figures are of limited reliability.

  Table 1

  First destination of teacher training graduates1

  Destination at September 1993

  Number

  Number in teaching posts

  (a) In Scotland

  Permanent

  377

  Temporary/supply

  507

  Contract unknown

  39

  Total

  923

  (b) Elsewhere

  75

  Employed non-teaching

  168

  Studying

  9

  Unemployed

  405

  Unknown

  2803

  Total output

  2,383

  (2) what recent discussions he has held with representatives of the national Whitley council to look at provisions for early retirement schemes for ambulance personnel.

  Mr. Stewart
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: Early retirement was discussed in the ambulance council of the national Whitley council in October last year.

  On 13 January my noble and learned Friend the Minister of State announced a special scheme for this financial year to enable some ambulance staff aged 60 and over to retire early with the full pension rights which they would have accrued by age 65.
  493

AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD

  Common Agricultural Policy
  Sir Teddy Taylor
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how much the EC plans to spend in the current financial year on its agricultural policy; and by what percentage this has changed over the past five and 10 years.

  Mr. Jack
  Expenditure on agricultural support in the United Kingdom in the current financial year—1993–94 —is estimated at £3,011 million. This represents increases of 118 per cent. and 74 per cent. over expenditure in the 1988–89 and 1983–84 financial years respectively. Of this, £2,727 million represents the estimated expenditure on the CAP in the United Kingdom.

  Rare Livestock
  Mr. Morley
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what support the Government are giving to individuals preserving rare breeds of farm livestock.

  Mr. Jack
  Individuals rearing rare breeds of farm livestock are eligible for the same support under the common agricultural policy as other livestock producers. In addition, the European Commission has made a proposal on the conservation of genetic resources in agriculture which may prove helpful to organisations concerned with rare breeds: and my Department is planning a study to establish the extent to which rare breeds contribute to genetic diversity.

  Mr. Morley
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food whether she is encouraging conservation agencies to use rare breeds of livestock in conservation grazing schemes; and if she will make a statement.

  Mr. Jack
  None of the conservation schemes for which this Department has responsibility specifically encourages the use of rare breeds. However, a recent change to the EC set-aside rules has introduced the possibility of limited grazing of set-aside land in the autumn, including grazing by rare breeds.

  Rockingham Forest
  Mr. William Powell
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what plans she has to sell any woods owned by the Forestry Commission in the Rockingham forest.

  Mr. Jack
  The Forestry Commission is currently selling or considering the sale of the following woodlands in Rockingham forest:

  Woodland

  Area (hectares)

  Bolt Wood

  27

  Hayes Wood

  2

  Hewson's Spinney

  2

  Launde Big Wood

  41

  Launde Park

  55

  Owston Wood

  104

  Salome Wood

  23

  West Wood

  29

  494

  Farming
  Mr. Ainger
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how many farmers there are in Britain; and how many acres of land are farmed(a) in absolute terms and (b) as a percentage of the total land area.

  Mr. Jack
  The number of farmers, partners and directors working on agricultural holdings in the United Kingdom at 1 June 1993 was 278,700. The absolute area of land being farmed in the United Kingdom at 1 June 1993 was 45·7 million acres, which was about 77 per cent. of the total land area.

  Notes:

  Source Provisional results from the 1993 June agricultural and horticultural census. Final results are expected to be published towards the end of January.

  2. Estimates for minor holdings are included for England and Wales but not for Scotland and Northern Ireland.

  3. Figures exclude the wives/husbands of farmers, partners and directors, even though they themselves may be partners or directors.

  Mr. Ainger
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what was the total of all subsidies paid to farmers in Britain in the most recent year for which figures are available(a) by the British Government and (b) by the European Union, in sterling terms; and if she will give the total for each subsidy.

  Mr. Jack
  Table 9.1 of "Agriculture in the United Kingdom: 1992"—pages 78–79—provides details of public expenditure on market support measures and on other grants and subsidies paid in the United Kingdom. Receipts from the European Union are set out at the foot of page 79. A copy has been deposited in the Library of the House of Commons.

  Agricultural Wages Board
  Mrs. Dunwoody
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food when she will make a statement about the future of the Agricultural Wages Board.

  Mr. Jack
  I refer the hon. Member to the reply which my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food gave to the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East (Dr. Strang) on 11 January at column 50.

  Christmas Cards
  Mr. Bayley
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how many official Christmas cards were sent out in 1993 by(a) Ministers, (b) civil servants and (c) staff of Government agencies working in or to her Department; and how much these cards cost (i) to buy, (ii) to post and (iii) in staff time to sign, address and place in envelopes.

  Mr. Jack
  A total of 2,750 charity Christmas cards were purchased at a cost of £1,633 and sent out by MAFF Ministers and senior officials in 1993. The cost of sending these cards is not known. A combination of delivery by hand and by postal system was used.
  495

  Farm Incomes
  Mr. Colvin
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if she will apply flexibility in enforcing the closing date for the sheep annual premium, suckler cow premium and arable payments in cases of obvious hardship.

  Mr. Jack
  Rules which apply to claims received after the closing dates both for individual schemes and for the area aid application, required under schemes covered by the integrated administration and control system, are laid down in EC legislation. The explanatory literature connected with all these schemes makes it clear that it is the farmer's responsibility to get the claims in by the due date. However, we will look sympathetically at cases where it is claimed that delay is the result of force majeure.

  Averages of net farm income by type of farm in England1

  Farm type

  Dairy

  Cattle and sheep (lowland)

  General cropping

  Cattle and sheep (LFA)

  2£000s perfarm

  3Index in real terms

  2£'000s perfarm

  3£Index in real terms

  2£'000s perfarm

  3Index in real terms

  2£'000s perform

  3index in real terms

  1986–87

  21·7

  96

  4·7

  154

  31·7

  92

  9·5

  103

  1987–88

  25·5

  113

  8·5

  278

  12·1

  35

  12·8

  139

  1988–89

  34·2

  142

  9·6

  262

  8·2

  23

  16·3

  169

  1989–90

  28·6

  121

  6·0

  129

  31·3

  120

  10·8

  112

  1990–91

  21·9

  88

  2·6

  60

  30·0

  95

  7·2

  76

  1991–92

  23·2

  91

  5·0

  112

  27·3

  85

  9·1

  112

  41992–93

  5—

  5—

  5—

  5—

  5—

  5—

  12·9

  156

  1 Sample averages for farms larger than 8 ESU. The system of classifying farms by type and size is set out in appendix 3 of "Farm Incomes in the United Kingdom, 1991–92".

  2 1992–1993 prices deflated by the retail prices index—all terms

  3 1989/90–1991/92=100.

  4 Provisional.

  5 Some information on incomes on these types of farm will be published on 31 January.

  Source: "Farm Business Survey".

  Cattle Conference
  Mr. Dalyell
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how her Department was represented at the Cambridge conference on cattle.

  Mr. Jack
  Representatives from the State Veterinary Service and ADAS were present at the international conference of the British Cattle Breeders' Club held at Cambridge between 10 and 13 January 1994.

  Oilseeds
  Mr. Barnes
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, pursuant to her answer to the hon. Member for Waveney (Mr. Porter) of 17 December 1993,Official Report, columns 1071–72, if she will list all those member states whose area of oilseeds exceed a level calculated by reference to the 1989–91 average area; for what reasons the Council decided to extend the moratorium on the use of bovine somatotropin for one year only; and what was the Commission's recommended moratorium on bovine somatotropin.

  Mr. Jack
  The EC-US oilseeds agreement does not apply until the crop for harvest in 1994 nor will penalties apply unless total plantings throughout the Community exceed the EC's total base area. The member states with areas planted to oilseeds in 1993 in excess of their 1989–91 average area are Germany, Portugal, Spain and the United Kingdom.
  496
  Mr. Tyler
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if she will publish a table of farm incomes for each of the years 1982–83 to 1992–93 showing the figures at 1992–93 prices for the dairy farm, lowland livestock farm, cropping farm and hill and upland livestock farm sectors.

  Mr. Jack
  Estimates of the average net farm income at 1992–93 prices are provided in the following table. The method of farm classification has been changed and results are available only on the new classification from 1986–87. Year-to-year comparisons can best be made by reference to the indices shown in the table; these are based on results from identical samples between successive years.

  The Commission's proposal was that the marketing and use of BST within the Community should be prohibited for the duration of milk quotas, that is currently until 31 March 2000. The Council decided however, to extend the moratorium on the marketing and use of bovine somatotropin for a further year only, so that it could consider the implications of a long-term ban, including the consequences for international trade, and the new situation created by the recent decision of the United States to approve the marketing of BST from the beginning of February 1994.

  It remains the United Kingdom view that the final Community decision on BST should be based firmly on scientific principles, taking into account the need to avoid international trading problems, to encourage Community based research industries, and to maintain the competitiveness of the Community's agriculture and food industries. Nonetheless, we accepted that it was sensible to extend the current moratorium for not more than one year, so that the Council could consider these new developments and experience overseas.

NATIONAL HERITAGE

  Works of Art (Export Licences)
  Mr. Faulds
  To ask the Secretary of State for National Heritage if he will list the items for which the issuing of export licences was withheld on the recommendation of the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art during the half year ended 31 December 1993, specifying
  497
  in each case the valuation and whether an item was exported or retained, with particulars in the latter event of the acquiring institution; if he will list any items for which licences have been withheld but the final disposal of which is not yet decided, specifying in each case (a) the valuation

  Description of item

  Valuation (£)

  Outcome

  A gold, silver-gilt, lapis-lazuli and enamel exhibition clock, by Gustave Baugrand, 1867

  86,000

  Export licence refused

  A limestone relief fragment from Persepolis, Archaemenid, first half 5th century BC

  1,038,961

  Decision deferred until after 30 April 1994

  A drawing, 'The nursing of Cyrus', by Salvator Rosa (1615–1673)

  166,250

  Export licence granted

  A painting, 'The courtyard of a house in Delft with a young woman and two men drinking and smoking', by Pieter de Hooch, 1658

  5,000,000

  Export licence granted

  A drawing, 'A woman's head in profile wearing an elaborate head-dress, by Jacopo Ligozzi (1547–1626)

  130,000

  Export licence granted

  A drawing, 'The meeting of the Infant Baptist with the Holy Family', by Michalangelo, c.1532

  4,469,750

  Export licence granted

  A painting, 'Colonel Mordaunt's cock-match', by Johann Zoffany, c. 1784–86

  800,000

  Decision deferred until after 5 May 1994

  A statue, 'the Three Graces', By Antonio Canova, 1817

  7,600,000

  Reviewing committee's recommendation under consideration

  A Roman statue base with a cursus inscription, 2nd-3rd century AD

  45,000

  Decision deferred until after 18 March 1984

  A group of paintings from the Farquhar collection of flora and fauna from Malacca

  1,365,112·50

  Decision deferred until after 18 March 1984

  Full details of the items on which decisions were deferred were given in press releases issued following the decisions on the reviewing committee's recommendations. A further press release giving the outcome of cases will now be issued.

  Items in Lieu of Tax
  Mr. Faulds
  To ask the Secretary of State for National Heritage if he will list the allocations made to public institutions in the United Kingdom during the half year

  Item

  To whom allocated

  Conditions/wishes expressed

  Charles I silver-gilt cup and cover

  Victoria and Albert Museum

  Wish

  A Brogyntyn manuscript

  National Library of Wales

  Conditional

  The Wrest Park Papers

  Bedfordshire Record Office

  Wish

  The Richmond Race Cup

  National Trust

  Conditional

  Schudi Harpsichord

  National Trust

  Conditional

  Painting by Eileen Agar

  Tate Gallery

  Conditional

  Portrait by Romney

  Abbot Hall, Kendal

  Unconditional

  Barrington Papers

  British Library

  Unconditional

  Model Gun Ship

  National Maritime Museum

  Wish

  Items awaiting allocation

  Date of acceptance

  Portrait by Nicholas Hilliard

  15 December 1993

  Painting by J. F. Herring

  15 December 1993

  Lucas albums

  15 December 1993

  Two paintings by Vuillard

  21 July 1993

  Unicorn Heritage Plc
  Mr. Meacher
  To ask the Secretary of State for National Heritage on what criteria the English tourist board made a grant of £200,000 to Unicorn Heritage plc.
  498
  and (b) the relevant time limit; and whether a press notice will be issued by his Department covering the information given in his reply, including that relating to the outcome in individual cases.

  Mr. Sproat
  The information is as follows:

  ended 31 December 1993 of individual works of art and museum objects pre-eminent for national, scientific, historic or artistic interest which have been accepted in satisfaction of inheritance tax, together with information, where applicable, as to conditions or wishes expressed in the matter of allocation by testators or executors; and if he will list the works of art and museum objects which are still awaiting allocation, with the respective dates of their acceptance in satisfaction of inheritance tax.

  Mr. Brooke
  The information the hon. Member requests is as follows:

  Mr. Sproat
  In considering the application from Unicorn Heritage plc, the English tourist board applied its standard criteria for making grants under section 4 of the Development of Tourism Act 1969. These were as follows: the grant must be additional—that is, the project would not go ahead without the section 4 grant; there should be a clear market need for the project, and reasonable prospects for its success; the project should where possible be innovative; and the section 4 grant should constitute only a small proportion of the total funding.

  The English tourist board commissioned a report on the Unicorn Heritage project from consultants with particular expertise in developing visitor attractions. Drawing on this

  499
  report and its own assessment, the board concluded that the project met the section 4 criteria. Unicorn Heritage was treated in exactly the same way as any other company would be in such circumstances.

  Mr. Alan Williams
  To ask the Secretary of State for National Heritage on what date his Department was notified of the demise of Unicorn Heritage plc; on what date it was recognised that a grant was reclaimable; on what date it started action to recover the grant; what form that action took; how many months it took to refer the file to the Treasury; and what were the reasons for the time taken to refer the file.

  Mr. Sproat
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: The grant referred to was made by the English tourist board. The board has discretion to secure payment of any grant if the grant recipient becomes bankrupt or, in the case of a company, is wound up. The board was notified of the failure of the Unicorn Heritage plc shortly after the company went into liquidation on 25 June 1990. On 11 September 1990 the board agreed to raise a debt of £200,000, and proof of debt was submitted to the liquidators. On 12 October 1990 the liquidators replied stating that there was no prospect of any payment of any dividend to the board.

  The board kept the case open for some time because of the remote possibility that an unexpected dividend might have been forthcoming as the liquidators' work proceeded. This did not prove to be the case, so on 13 August 1992 the English tourist board recommended to my Department that this debt should be written off.

  Consultancies
  Ms Abbott
  To ask the Secretary of State for National Heritage if he will list the(a) accountancy firms and (b) merchant banks to which his Department awarded private consultancy work in 1992 and 1993, together with a list of the consultancies concerned and the amount paid.

  Mr. Sproat
  My Department let the contracts shown in the chart to accountancy firms and merchant banks in 1992 and 1993. Many of these contracts were with the management consultancy arm of the firm concerned rather than their accountacy arm. The total value of these contracts to date is approximately £0·71 million.

  CONSULTANT'S NAME AND CONSULTANCY DESCRIPTION

  Coopers and Lybrand

  Innovation Workshop in preparation for National Seminar

  Ernst and Young

  Review of Market Testing at the British Museum

  Facilities Management Survey—to review systems for the management of buildings in the 16 DNH sponsored museums and galleries

  Feasibility study into the Development of a Heritage Management Database

  Hill Samuel

  Financial advice on the National Lottery (let by DNH on behalf of the Director General of the Office of the National Lottery)

  KPMG

  Performance indicators—to review systems of performance management in the 16 DNH sponsored museums and galleries European Co-Production Fund Evaluation Review—to establish the results so far achieved by the Fund

  The Royal Parks Agency—development of Computerised Information Systems

  Price Waterhouse

  Review of the Arts Council

  Financial audit of the British Library St. Pancras Project

  Financial appraisal of new building options for DNH

  500
  Stoy Hayward

  Practical advice to the 16 DNH sponsored museums and galleries on the introduction of consolidated accounts

  Touche Ross

  Review of the Television Licence Fee

  Management Review of the National Film and Television School

  Grant Write-offs
  Mr. Flynn
  To ask the Secretary of State for National Heritage if he will list all companies which have had grants from his Department written off since June 1992 and set out his reasons for the decisions.

  Mr. Sproat
  [holding answer 14 January 1994]: My Department has not written off any grants which it administers directly.

  Under section 4 of the Development of Tourism Act 1969, the English Tourist Board has given financial assistance to projects providing or improving tourist amenities and facilities in England. As permitted by Act, the board attached conditions to the grants which allowed them to be recoverable, including bankruptcy/insolvency of the recipient. The board is required to surrender to my Department all the sums recovered. Any amount which proves to be irrecoverable has to be written off by the Department. Treasury approval is required where the amount is over £100,000 and for 20 per cent. of the value of cases assessed.

  Since June 1992, grant reclaimable debts have been written off in respect of the following companies. The debts were irrecoverable by reason of receivership, liquidation or because the company was wound up:

  Receivership

  Ashbourne Lodge plc

  Badgerealm Ltd.

  Border Developments Ltd.

  Callow Park Ltd.

  Grosvenor Arms Hotel (Pulford) Ltd.

  Marshall of Luton (Builders) Ltd.

  Theme Holdings Ltd.

  Wessex Farm Horse Centre Ltd.

  White Lion Hotel (Banbury) Ltd.

  Liquidation

  Backbrook Ltd.

  Bettematural Ltd.

  Brighton Rackets Club Ltd.

  E & P Hotels Ltd.

  Horsley Hall Ltd.

  National Jazz Centre Ltd.

  Sal Investments Ltd.

  Unicorn Heritage plc

  West Country Transport and Plant Hire Ltd.

  Voluntary wound up

  Oxford Area Arts Council Ltd.

  In addition to the English tourist board, the Department sponsors a number of non-departmental public bodies which make grants available as part of their activities. Responsibility for determining to whom grants are given, and the conditions attached, rests with the individual bodies. Where appropriate, these include the need for the recipient to repay the grant where compliance with the conditions has not been met. Responsibility for writing off any irrecoverable debts arising within certain limits rests with the sponsored bodies. Details of these are not held centrally and could only be obtained at a disproportionate cost. No cases outside the delegated limits have been submitted to the Department for approval.
  501
  Mr. Alan Williams
  To ask the Secretary of State for National Heritage in how many cases since 1987 tourist board grants have been written off as irrecoverable; how many were between £100,000 and £150,000, £150,000 and £199,000 and £200,000 or over; and what is the highest single amount written off.

  Mr. Sproat
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: The figures for debts relating to grants made under section 4 of the Development of Tourism Act 1969 are shown separately for England, Scotland and Wales.

  England

  Scotland

  Wales

  Debts written off since 1987

  53

  39

  13

  £100,000 – £150,000

  3

  2

  1

  £150,000 – £199,000

  3

  0

  0

  £200,000 or above

  2

  0

  0

  Highest amount written off

  £759,039

  £124,447

  £100,000

  Royal Armoury
  Mr. David Porter
  To ask the Secretary of State for National Heritage if he will make a statement about the progress made to date in the removal of the Royal Armoury to Leeds.

  Mr. Sproat
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: The new Royal Armouries museum in Leeds, scheduled to open in spring 1996, has won all the private sector support it needs to go ahead, and work has begun at the Clarence dock site. This prestigious enterprise is a leading example of a joint venture between the public and private sectors bringing benefits to Leeds, the armouries and the tourist. A consortium of investors has formed the Royal Armouries (International) plc which is putting £14 million into the project in addition to £20 million from my Department and contributions from Leeds development corporation and Leeds city council. The new museum will allow a far greater proportion of the armouries' unique collection to be displayed to the public and will make the Royal Armouries accessible to a much larger section of the population. The Royal Armouries will maintain a substantial display at the Tower of London, focused on the tower's rich history.

  Statutory Sick Pay
  Mr. Ingram
  To ask the Secretary of State for National Heritage what assessment he has made of the impact of the changes to statutory sick pay provision upon his departmental budget for the financial year 1994–95.

  Mr. Sproat
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: The abolition of the 80 per cent. statutory sick pay reimbursement rate will be offset, at least in part, by a reduction in employers' national insurance contributions. Any additional cost will be absorbed within the Department's existing running costs baseline.

DEFENCE

  Exercise Hadrian's Wall
  Mr. Wilson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will list(a) the newspapers and other media concerns and (b) the hon. Members to whom prior warning was given of Exercise Hadrian's Wall.
  502
  Mr. Hanley
  Since most of the activity took place in Scotland, a number of Scottish newspapers were informed on 3 December 1993 that the exercise was taking place. The list of these is as follows:

  Daily Record

  Scotsman

  Herald

  Galloway News

  Galloway Gazette

  Wegtown Free Press

  Dumfries and Galloway Standard

  Lennox Herald

  Helensburgh Advertiser

  South West Advertiser

  My noble Friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence wrote to the hon. Member and to the right hon. and hon. Members for the following constituencies on 24 November 1993 informing them of the exercise:

  Salisbury

  Westbury

  Devizes

  Hampshire North West

  Galloway and Upper Nithsdale

  Dunfermline East

  Angus East

  Argyll and Bute

  Ross, Cromarty and Skye

  Inverness, Nairn and Lochaber

  Caithness and Sutherland

  Mr. Wilson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what was the role of Hunterston power station during Exercise Hadrian's Wall.

  Mr. Hanley
  Hunterston power station had no role in the exercise. A small amount of activity did, however, take place at the disused British Steel direct reduction plant at Hunterston.

  Mr. Wilson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many sorties during Exercise Hadrian's Wall entered the airspace(a) within one nautical mile of Hunterston power station, (b) within the Glasgow airport control zone and (c) within the Scottish control zone; and what permissions were obtained from the relevant authorities for this activity.

  Mr. Hanley
  The numbers of sorties which entered the specified areas were as follows:

  Number

  Within one nautical mile of Hunterston Power Station

  4

  Within the Glasgow Airport Control Zone

  7

  Within the Scottish Control Zone

  29

  My Department consulted Scottish Nuclear and Hunterston power station before granting permission for flights within the provost marshal's prohibited area which affords special protection to the power station. Normal air traffic control clearances were obtained from airspace controlling agencies in the case of flights within the Glasgow airport and the Scottish control zones.

  Mr. Wilson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what was the nature and purpose of Exercise Hadrian's Wall in December 1993; what locations were used during the exercise; how many personnel and aircraft were involved; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Hanley
  Exercise Hadrian's Wall was designed to test aspects of the land, air and maritime skills of the armed
  503
  forces. The locations used were RAF Boscombe Down, RAF West Freugh, Oban, Mallam Charles camp, Barry Budden camp, Aldourie Castle estate, Rosyth dockyard, Hunterston and some stretches of the Caledonian canal. The exercise involved 450 personnel, seven helicopters, two Hercules transport planes and two Tornados.

  Hercules
  Mr. Marland
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many flight crew members are required to operate the C-130K Hercules aircraft; and what are their responsibilities.

  Mr. Hanley
  A minimum of five flight members are required to operate a Hercules C130K aircraft; the captain, co-pilot, navigator, air engineer and air loadmaster. The captain is a pilot and responsible for the overall safety of the aircraft; the co-pilot assists the captain with flight management and acts as a safety pilot in the event of incapacity of the captain; the navigator is responsible for the safe navigation of the aircraft in all phases of flight; the air engineer is responsible for all aircraft systems and the air loadmaster is responsible for all aspects of freight, passenger safety and security within the aircraft.

  Mr. Nigel Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what criteria, in addition to value for money, his Department will use in coming to a judgment on whether to replace half the existing fleet with the new C-130J Hercules or to opt for refurbishment.

  Mr. Aitken
  The basis on which we evaluate bids for military equipment is affordability, value for money, and technical considerations. In considering overall value for money, my Department will consider, with the DTI and Treasury, wider economic factors.

  Anti-personnel Mines
  Mr. Vaz
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what action the Government are taking to end the supply of anti-personnel mines to any faction attempting to buy them; and what attempts are made to halt the general trade in other weapons to sources outside the law.

  Mr. Aitken
  The United Kingdom supports responsible international efforts to control trade in defence equipment. We also adopt a responsible approach to the export of defence equipment and have one of the most rigorous systems for scrutinising licence applications. The United Kingdom has not produced or exported conventional anti-personnel landmines for some time.

  "Front Line First"
  Mr. Hargreaves
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if his Department's "Front Line First" review will include study of tactical aircraft; and if the study would go beyond basic air trooping.

  Mr. Aitken
  The DCS is not examining tactical combat aircraft, but is looking at the provision of air transport aircraft in all roles, including basic air trooping, as part of a wider study of procurement projects and practices.

  Iraq
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what discussions he, or his predecessors, have held since 1982 with his counterpart in the United States,504
  or with officials in the United States Department of Defense in regard to (a) the implications for United Kingdom policy of the United States removing Iraq from its priority list of terrorist states and (b) the provision of arms, military equipment or defence-related technology to Iraq by the United States or its allies.

  Mr. Hanley
  Since 1982, my right hon. and learned Friend and his predecessors have had frequent discussions with their United States counterparts covering a wide range of security and defence issues. The topics in question may have been included, but it would involve disproportionate cost to establish the details of such discussions.

  Pregnant Women (Radiation Exposure)
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what research has been conducted or sponsored by his Department into the effects of radiation exposure on pregnant women and their foetuses.

  Mr. Hanley
  We are not aware of any such research being conducted or sponsored by this Department.

  Persian Gulf
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what information he received from his counterparts in the Gulf Co-operation Council in regard to decisions taken at the GCC meeting in Riyadh on 20 to 22 December 1993 affecting British forces in the Gulf.

  Mr. Hanley
  During his recent visit to the Gulf, my right hon. and learned Friend discussed a wide range of defence-related matters, including the outcome of the GCC meeting in December. The GCC plan for an expansion of the Peninsula Shield force does not affect British forces.

  Small Battlefield Arms
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what assistance his Department gave to the production of the "Horizon" programme on the human impact of small battlefield arms, broadcast on 10 January.

  Mr. Hanley
  Mr. Martin Freeth, the senior producer in the BBC science and features department responsible for the "Horizon" programme, was given a number of unclassified background briefings while examining the feasibility of the programme. When a decision was taken by the BBC to proceed to make the programme, further unclassified briefings and interviews were provided.

  Trident
  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence whether the United Kingdom's Trident missiles will be more accurate than the Polaris ones they replace.

  Mr. Hanley
  Yes.

  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence whether the warheads deployed on the United Kingdom's Trident missiles will be independently targetable.

  Mr. Hanley
  Yes.

  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what proportion of the total number of Trident missiles being purchased by the United Kingdom are to form part of a processing margin.
  505
  Mr. Aitken
  On current plans, about 5 per cent. of the total number of United Kingdom's Trident missiles will form part of a processing margin.

  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence whether he plans any demonstration that the Trident deployment will not involve any increase in strategic nuclear warheads above Polaris levels.

  Mr. Hanley
  In keeping with the practice of successive Governments, we do not make public the number of warheads actually deployed on our submarines. The question of verification does not arise.

  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence whether he plans to deploy conventional warheads on the United Kingdom's Trident missiles.

  Mr. Hanley
  The Government have no such plans.

  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what is the maximum number of warheads assumed to be carried by each United States Trident D5 missile under the terms of the strategic arms reduction treaties.

  Mr. Hanley
  The details of the START I and START II treaties are a matter for the parties to those treaties. Under the memorandum of understanding on the establishment of the data base relating to the treaty between the United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics on the reduction and limitation of strategic offensive arms—START I—deployed United States Trident II ((D5) missiles are attributed with eight warheads. START II sets additional limits on the overall number of warheads attributed to deployed submarine-launched ballistic missiles and modifies the rules established under START I for reducing the number of warheads attributed to deployed missiles.

  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what is his policy on revealing the number of missiles and warheads deployed on the United Kingdom's Trident submarines; and in what circumstances the policy is reconsidered.

  Mr. Aitken
  It is our policy to be as open about the United Kingdom's nuclear deterrent as is possible without revealing information which might diminish the effectiveness of the system. For that reason we do not make public the number of missiles or warheads actually deployed on our submarines.

  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence whether he will apply a maximum ceiling to the number of warheads carried on any individual Trident missile.

  Mr. Aitken
  No. Overall, each Trident submarine will deploy with no more than 96 warheads.

  Chevaline
  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if Chevaline has been fitted to every Polaris missile.

  Mr. Aitken
  All in-service United Kingdom Polaris missiles are fitted with the Chevaline modification.
  506

  Submarines (Fishing Vessels)
  Mrs. Ray Michie
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence (1) what representations he has received regarding a complete ban on the movement of submarines in designated fishing areas; and if he will make a statement;

  (2) what discussions he intends to initiate with appropriate organisations and Her Majesty's Navy following the recent incident involving a fishing vessel and HMS Valiant;

  (3) what discussions he has had with the Royal Navy regarding the alleged breaching of guidelines on separation distances between submarines and fishing vessels;

  (4) when he expects to receive the report of the Royal Navy inquiry into the incident involving HMS Valiant during naval exercise off Cape Wrath; and if he will make a statement on this incident.

  Mr. Hanley
  I have received no representations in the last 12 months regarding a complete ban on the movement of submarines in designated fishing areas.

  I should, however, like to report that, during a training exercise off the coast of north-west Scotland on 8 November 1993, the submarine HMS Valiant's towed sonar array was lost after it apparently caught on the trawl of the fishing vessel Audacious. Communications were at once established with the fishing vessel, which reported that all was well.

  A full investigation was immediately put in hand. This is not yet complete, but preliminary findings have concluded that HMS Valiant accidentally breached the 4,000 yard separation distance laid down in the submarine and fishing vessel code of practice. However, as soon as this was realised, HMS Valiant, in accordance with the requirements of the code, immediately reduced speed, returned to periscope depth and established communications to ensure the safety of other vessels. The towed array which HMS Valiant lost is a lightweight plastic tube and, as such, presents no hazard to the other vessels.

  I have instructed that the report be concluded as soon as possible and its findings made available to the members of the Department of Transport's fishing industry safety group sub-group on submarine and fishing vessel interaction, which includes representative of the fishermen's federations. It does appear that, while the code of practice was accidentally breached, its subsequent observance prevented a possibly more serious incident. Nonetheless, the issue of safety at sea is one which I take very seriously and I shall be considering what lessons might be learnt for the future.

  Mrs. Ray Michie
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what detailed investigations have taken place into alleged incidents between submarines in Scottish waters and fishing vessels within the past 12 months.

  Mr. Hanley
  Other than the surface collison which occurred between HMS Opossum and the FV Amber Rose in poor visibility on 14 July 1993, in which no one was hurt and only minimal damage sustained, the only incident to have occurred in or close to Scottish waters within the last 12 months is that between HMS Valiant and the FV Audacious.

  The surface collision between Opossum and Amber Rose, which is not covered by the code of practice as this governs the conduct of dived submarines, was investigated by the MOD and the marine accident investigation branch of the Department of Transport.
  507
  The incident between Valiant and Audacious is currently the subject of an internal MOD investigation, the findings of which will be made available as soon as possible to members of the Department of Transport's fishing industry safety group sub-group dealing with submarine and fishing vessels matters.

  Competition Shooting
  Sir James Spicer
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement on the Army's policy on competition shooting.

  Mr. Hanley
  A major review of the Army's policy on training in shooting skills, including the role of the Regular Army skill-at-arms meeting, has recently been completed. The RASAM, which involved eight shooting days, was highly manpower intensive. Against the background of the Army's very heavy commitments at a time of restructuring and reducing numbers, I have taken the view that RASAM should be replaced by a one-day event, to be known as the Regular Army Queen's Medal competition. The new competition will continue to encourage excellence in Army shooting and meet the terms governing the award of the Queen's Medal. Competitors will be selected from divisional and district meetings, to be held under new guidelines issued by the Inspector General, Doctrine and Training. These guidelines will be designed to ensure a high standard of marksmanship throughout each Army unit, and that resources are available to improve the less proficient as well as enhance the skills of those who are already excellent shots.

  The Royal Navy, the Royal Marines and the Royal Air Force will continue to hold their own central skill-at-arms meeting, overlapping with the new Army competition. This will be run by the Royal Air Force on behalf of the other services. International competitors will be able to take part, as before, in the various service and National Rifle Association competitions as well as in the international match on the last day of the meeting.

  The Territorial Army skill-at-arms meeting and the combined cadet force (schools) and the inter-service cadet rifle meeting will take place as before.

  Nuclear Weapons
  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what is the policy of the Government on involvement of the United Kingdom in strategic nuclear arms control negotiations.

  Mr. Hanley
  Our policy continues to be that if, in time, the United States and former Soviet arsenals were further reduced substantially, and there had been no significant improvements in defensive capability, we would consider what further contribution we might make to nuclear arms control in the changed circumstances.

  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, pursuant to his answer of 30 November,Official Report, column 527, if an increase in accuracy of delivery allows a reduction in the number of warheads deployed or the yield of the warheads deployed.

  Mr. Hanley
  I have nothing to add to the answer I gave the hon. Member for Newport, West (Mr. Flynn) on 30 November 1993,Official Report, column 527.
  508
  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence whether any nuclear arms control treaties have measured nuclear capability according to comparative explosive yield of the weapons involved.

  Mr. Hanley
  The United Kingdom is not party to all nuclear arms control treaties, most of which are bilateral between the nuclear super-powers, but we are not aware of any that measure nuclear capability in this way.

  European Fighter Aircraft
  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence (1) when his Department originally determined the total procurement buy for the RAF of the European fighter aircraft;

  (2) what are the implications of the recently announced reductions in frontline RAF combat aircraft for the total procurement buy of the Eurofighter 2000 for the RAF.

  Mr. Aitken
  A decision on the number of Eurofighter 2000 aircraft to be procured for the RAF is not required until 1995. However, for planning purposes, we have assumed—and declared to our partners—an offtake of 250 aircraft, with deliveries commencing in 2000.

  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence which Royal Air Force combat aircraft types are due to be replaced by the Eurofighter 2000.

  Mr. Hanley
  Our current plan is to procure 250 Eurofighter 2000s to replace RAF Tornado F3s and Jaguars. The scope for replacing other RAF aircraft by the Eurofighter 2000 remains under consideration.

  Mr. Macdonald
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what slippage has occurred in the expected initial delivery date of the Eurofighter 2000 to the RAF since the inception of the programme; and what are the cost implications.

  Mr. Aitken
  The initial delivery date of the Eurofighter 2000 to the RAF has slipped by some two years from that envisaged at the start of development. Most of this results from the decision which the four partner nations took in December 1992 to delay the commitment to production. The cost implications of this delay will depend on the outcome of negotiations with industry on the necessary contract changes.

  Procurement Executive
  Mr. Ian Bruce
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, pursuant to his answer of 12 January,Official Report, column 156, if he will list the planned time scale for the project to move the Procurement Executive to Abbey Wood; by which date the decision on new computers will be taken; and what is his Department's latest estimate of the cost of the new computer equipment and software.

  Mr. Aitken
  The Procurement Executive's future corporate IT system is planned to replace the PE's existing IT system from the completion of collocation. A final decision will be taken later this year when the definition stage is complete.

  It would be prejudicial to the tendering process to disclose the current estimates.
  509

TRADE

  Iran
  Sir Paul Beresford
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what representations have been made to his Department following the announcement by the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs on 1 March concerning the Government's export licensing policy towards Iran.

  Mr. Needham
  We have received a number of representations about export business which was entered into before the moratorium on export licences was imposed on 17 December 1992. An exception has been made in one case to date: this concerns completion of a contract for repair and overhaul of non-lethal aircraft components, for which the company concerned held a valid export licence issued before the moratorium was announced. For reasons beyond its control the company was unable to complete the work within the time frame of the extant licence, which we have now renewed.

  Loan Guarantee Scheme
  Mr. Nigel Jones
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what plans he has to amend the rules applying to the loan guarantee scheme.

  Mr. McLoughlin
  The small firms loan guarantee scheme was improved significantly twice during 1993. There are no current plans further to amend the rules applying to the scheme.

  Mr. Nigel Jones
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what is the take-up rate for the loan guarantee scheme.

  Mr. McLoughlin
  The DTI is currently guaranteeing an average of around 240 loans each month. From its inception in June 1981 to 30 September 1993 a total of 34,689 loans have been guaranteed under the scheme.

  Mr. Nigel Jones
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what adverse representations he has received concerning the attitude of banks involved in the loan guarantee scheme.

  Mr. McLoughlin
  Complaints are received frequently from businesses unable to obtain a loan under the small firms loan guarantee scheme. The vast majority of these are from businesses which either fall outside of the scope of the scheme or whose proposals have been rejected by lenders on commercial grounds. With both public and lender funds at risk, successful applications under the scheme must be assessed carefully as commercially viable and meet fully the other conditions of the scheme.

  Fire Safety
  Mr. Robin Cook
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade (1) if he will make the recommendations of the construction task force, and the evidence upon which they are based, public; and if they will form the basis of a consultation exercise between his Department, the fire and emergency planning department of the Home Office and organisations representing the fire service;

  (2) if he will provide details of the findings and recommendations of the construction task force with regard to the provision and enforcement of the current fire safety laws and regulations in England and Wales.
  510
  Mr. Heseltine
  The recommendations of all seven business task forces will be published shortly and the working documents on which they are based will be made available. The recommendations of the construction task force and other views will help inform any wider consideration of fire safety matters.

  Data Protection
  Mr. Cohen
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade whether he will make arrangements for the data protection registrar to inspect relevant contracts with suppliers of IT services that involve the use of personal data held by his Department in order to check whether all appropriate arrangements in relation to the Data Protection Act 1984 have been made, and whether such contracts make provisions for the registrar to make random inspections in order to check the suppliers' compliance in with the eighth data protection principle.

  Mr. Eggar
  The Data Protection Registrar has a wide range of powers, under the Data Protection Act 1984, to ensure that all individuals and organisations holding personal data on computer systems are registered and observe the data protection principles as required by the Act. When IT services are contracted out by a data user, the contractor and the user will be subject to the application of the data protection principles, and to the registrar's powers to promote compliance with them, as provided for in the Act. It is for the registrar to decide how he will use his powers under the Act, and I do not consider that any further arrangements are necessary by this Department for him to discharge his duties effectively.

  Ministerial Cars
  Mr. Alan Williams
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade if he will quantify the cost of the factors which led to an increase in the cost of cars for Ministers in his Department since 1990–91.

  Mr. Eggar
  Factors which led to an increase in the cost of ministerial cars were(a) an increase in the rate of VAT from 15 per cent. to 17·5 per cent. which accounted for an additional £12,000, (b) an increase in the weekly rate charged for cars by the Department of Environment which accounted for £38,500 and (c) the costs relating to two additional Ministers, since April 1992, which amounted to £105,400 for a total increase of £156,000. Against this can be offset reduced expenditure of £210,000 on cars following the amalgamation of the Department of Energy with the Department of Trade and Industry.

  Telecommunications Licences
  Mr. Cousins
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade if he will list all the outstanding applications for new telecommunications licences, together with the date of the placing of the application with him.

  Mr. McLoughlin
  The "Register of Licence Applications" which is published weekly by OFTEL lists all applications for new telecommunications licences which have been made since the publication of the duopoly review White Paper in March 1991. The register does not list the dates on which the applications were made; these are provided in the table for all applications under consideration appearing on the register as at 14 January 1994.
  511
  Since publication of the White Paper, 35 licences for new telecommunication systems have been issued.

  Name of applicant

  Date of application

  National Network Ltd.

  30 July 1991

  Mercury Personal Communications Ltd.

  11 November 1991

  Atlantic Telecom

  19 November 1991

  Millicom Holdings (UK) Ltd.

  4 December 1991

  Atlantic Telecommunications Ltd.

  13 December 1991

  Sprint Holding (UK) Ltd.

  3 January 1992

  Hutchison Microtel Ltd.

  5 February 1992

  WorldCom International Inc.

  11 February 1992

  BRT Ltd.

  28 February 1992

  Taxi Rank Telephones Ltd.

  18 March 1992

  Atlantic Telecommunications Ltd.

  20 March 1992

  Telecom Securicor Cellular Radio Ltd.

  2 April 1992

  SAT-COM

  29 June 1992

  Amera Tela Communications (UK) Ltd.

  22 October 1992

  East Midlands Telecommunications Ltd.

  23 November 1992

  ANT Nachrichtentechnik GmbH

  3 December 1992

  Telstra (UK) Ltd.

  8 January 1993

  Transline Europe Ltd.

  10 February 1993

  Telia International UK Ltd.

  8 March 1993

  INCOM (UK) Ltd.

  25 March 1993

  Midlands Cable Communications Ltd.

  30 March 1993

  AT&T (UK) Ltd.

  15 April 1993

  NORWEB plc

  23 April 1993

  Yorkshire Cable Group Ltd.

  5 May 1993

  Videotron City and Westminster Ltd.

  13 May 1993

  Securicor Datatrak Ltd.

  30 June 1993

  Premium Phone Services Ltd.

  6 July 1993

  Videcom Customer Services Ltd.

  26 July 1993

  United Artists Communications (North Thames Estuary) Ltd.

  27 July 1993

  Racal Network Services Ltd.

  16 August 1993

  INCOM (UK) Ltd.

  27 September 1993

  Midland Network Services Ltd.

  16 November 1993

  Services Sound and Vision Corporation

  1 December 1993

  NEWCO (BT/MCI joint venture)

  23 December 1993

  BT

  *

  Mercury Communications Ltd.

  *

  * Applications for licences to provide terrestrial flight telecommunication services dating from before the Duopoly Review. They are being taken forward following allocation of radio spectrum at the 1992 World Administrative Radio Conference.

  Defence Contracts
  Mr. Cousins
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what was the size of the unused tranche of ECGD support for large defence contracts when this facility was withdrawn in August 1991.

  Mr. Needham
  It was £392 million.

  European Space Year
  Mr. David Atkinson
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade if he will make a statement on the United Kingdom's contribution to European Space Year 1993.

  Mr. McLoughlin
  There was no European Space Year 1993 with which the Government was involved. However, the United Kingdom made a significant contribution to International Space Year 1992, which did much to raise awareness of space through a wide variety of events and activities.

  Radio Frequencies
  Mr. Spellar
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what restrictions are imposed on those allocated radio frequencies regarding hiring these out to third parties.
  512
  Mr. McLoughlin
  Licences issued by the Radiocommunications Agency under the Wireless Telegraphy Acts authorise the licensee to use one or more radio frequencies for specified purposes. Licences are not transferable and do not permit the licensee to hire out radio channels to third parties except for certain types of licences issued to radio dealers and manufacturers to meet the temporary needs of their customers.

  Military Exports
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what was the most recent date on which his Department's export licence unit manual of instructions was revised in respect of weapons or technology used in the manufacture of weapons or military equipment.

  Mr. Needham
  All staff in the licensing units of the Export Control Organisation were issued with new and very detailed working instructions in March 1993. These instructions are continually brought up to date to reflect changing requirements and circumstances. For example, in the context of arms exports they have just been amended to reflect the use of the new standard document required to accompany consignments of arms transferred between member states of the EC. The ECO will also shortly issue to all its staff a new handbook which will, among other things, consolidate into a single volume many existing separate items of higher level guidance on all aspects of the conduct of the ECO's business.

  Nuclear Fuel Reprocessing
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what assessment he has made of the implications for United Kingdom policy on commercial reprocessing of nuclear fuel of the extra-territorial mandate to the United States President, contained in United States congressional resolution 1163 as part of the amended Defense Authorisation Bill 1994 (HR 2401) to take action to encourage the reduction of and cessation of civil nuclear reprocessing world wide.

  Mr. Eggar
  The Government have taken note of this resolution, which is not binding on the United States Administration.

  Company Accounts
  Mr. Redmond
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what was the cost to his Department of the advertising campaign on Classic FM regarding the submission of company accounts; and at whose instigation the campaign was undertaken.

  Mr. Neil Hamilton
  Responsibility for the subject has been delegated to the chief executive of Companies House, for which my Department is responsible. I have, therefore, asked Mr. David Durham to arrange for a reply to be given.

  Letter from David Durham to Mr. Martin Redmond, dated 14 January 1994:

  On 12 January you tabled the following Parliamentary Question:

  "To ask the President of the Board of Trade what was the cost to his department of the advertising campaign on Classic FM regarding the submission of company accounts, and at whose instigation the campaign was undertaken."
  513
  Following the answer given by the President of the Board of Trade, I am replying as Chief Executive of Companies House Executive Agency.

  In the current financial year, Companies House has spent £47,000 on radio advertising with Classic FM with a further £23,500 committed.

  This figure includes VAT and covers radio advertising paid for directly by Companies House. The campaign was instigated by Companies House.

  The introduction of Late Filing Penalties in July 1992 has provided a major boost to the completeness of the company register. However, many companies appear to remain unsure of their filing obligations and continue to file late. Companies House recognises that awareness of the legal obligations, which include dates by which company accounts must be filed, is an important aspect of the process of enabling companies to meet their obligations under the Companies Acts. We see it as our duty to ensure that we use all reasonable means to make the business community aware of the deadlines for filing the accounts and the mandatory penalties which apply. Independent market research is commissioned to monitor the effectiveness of our communications.

  I hope this is helpful to you.

  Monopolies and Mergers Commission
  Mr. Redmond
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade, pursuant to his answer of 6 December,Official Report, column 36, when the hon. Member for Don Valley can expect to receive a list of biographical details and relevant dates of appointment of members of the Monopolies and Mergers Commission.

  Mr. Neil Hamilton
  I have now written to the hon. Member with the information requested. I apologise for any inconvenience caused to the hon. Member by the delay in providing this.

  Heating Bills
  Mr. Redmond
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade, pursuant to his answer of 15 December,Official Report, column 681, in what form information in respect of the annual heating bills to his Department's offices is available.

  Mr. Eggar
  The costs of energy consumption disaggregated by building or by use are not available. Overall expenditure on energy has been:

  £ million

  1990–91

  5·16

  1991–92

  5·95

  1992–93

  5·49

  These figures include estimated apportionments of costs in multi-occupancy buildings, and include former Department of Energy buildings throughout. We do not have comprehensive data before 1990–91 and data for 1993–94 have not yet been collated.

  Market Testing
  Mr. McAllion
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade if he will publish for each service that has been market tested in his Department in 1993(a) the cost of the testing process, including consultancy costs, (b) the result of the test, (c) the name of the successful contractor, (d) the value and duration of the contract, (e) the number of staff involved, (f) estimated annual cost reductions and (g) whether the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 1981 were deemed to apply.
  514
  Mr. Eggar
  My Department is currently analysing the outcome of the 1992–93 "Competing for Quality" programme with the efficiency unit in the Cabinet Office. Much of the information requested in the question will, once it has been finalised, be published in aggregate form in the "Citizen's Charter Second Report". On an individual contract basis, much of the information is commercially confidential.

  Royalties
  Mr. Page
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what would be the expected net inflow to the United Kingdom recording rights owners of a harmonised European private copying royalty on blank tapes and recording equipment.

  Mr. McLoughlin
  The European Commission has not submitted any proposal for harmonised European private copyright royalty, nor is it clear whether or when it will do so. It is therefore not possible to say what money flows involving the United Kingdom would occur, since these would be determined by factors which cannot be known in the absence of a proposal, in particular the rate of royalty and whether payments are to be made to nationals of countries outside the European Union.

  Television Relay Masts
  Mr. Ieuan Wyn Jones
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what is the average cost of(a) erecting and (b) maintaining local low-power television relay masts in the United Kingdom.

  Mr. McLoughlin
  The average cost of erecting a low-power broadcaster's television relay station is in the order of £40,000, with maintenance costs of about £3,000 per year. However, these costs can be markedly affected by factors such as site rental and access, laying-on of electricity at remote sites, and mast erection and equipment housing.

  Thermal Oxide Reprocessing Plant
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade, pursuant to his oral answer to the hon. Member for Carmarthen (Mr. Williams) of 12 January,Official Report, column 167, if he will give the basis for his statement on the number of jobs dependent on THORP.

  Mr. Eggar
  The employment figures given in that answer derive from estimates set out in the British Nuclear Fuels plc document "The Economic and Commercial Justification for THORP". A copy of this document has been placed in the Library of the House.

  Accounts Service Agency
  Mr. Fatchett
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade if he will make a statement on the future of the Accounts Service Agency.

  Mr. Eggar
  I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Hertfordshire, North (Mr. Heald) on 29 October 1993,Official Report, column 805. The review of the Accounts Services Agency has recently been concluded. I hope to make an announcement in the near future.
  515

  Rechar 2
  Mr. Ronnie Campbell
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade if he will make it his policy to support the EU Rechar 2 initiative in areas that have suffered substantial job losses in the mining industry.

  Mr. Sainsbury
  No such initiative yet exists. Precise Commission proposals for the future of the structural fund's community initiatives are still awaited.

  Car Prices
  Mr. Barnes
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what assessment his Department has made of price differentials wthin the European Community between vehicles made by European Community-based manufac-turers; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Sainsbury
  The issue of differences in car prices within the European Community has been looked at by the Monopolies and Mergers Commission and the European Commission. Neither concluded that the difference in prices was the result of anti-competitive practices but both agreed that the market should be kept under review. Car manufacturers now provide details of car prices to the Commission, which publishes comparative EC price lists for selected vehicles twice a year. The latest data relating to the situation on 1 November 1993 indicate that manufacturers have tended to reduce price differentials for most of their models.

  Plutonium Reprocessing
  Mr. Dafis
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what is the Government's policy on the storage of surpluses of plutonium from reprocessing foreign spent fuel at Sellafield and the length of time that those surpluses will be stored.

  Mr. Eggar
  Plutonium recovered from reprocessing by British Nuclear Fuels plc will be stored at Sellafield on behalf of the company's customers until transferred to them under safeguards for recycling or other civil purposes. In the meanwhile, storage will be undertaken subject to stringent safety, security and safeguards procedures.

  GM Buses-North
  Mr. Dobson
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade on what date his Department received the recommendation of the Director-General of Fair Trading regarding the proposed acquisition by British Bus plc of GM Buses-North; what was the substance of the Director General of Fair Trading's recommendation; and when he intends to make a decision on the possible referral of the decision to the Monopolies and mergers Commission.

  Name

  Post

  Salary

  Duration

  Viscount Chelmsford

  Member of the Simple Trade Procedures Board

  Unpaid

  1 November 1992—31 October 1995

  Lord Justice Mustill (now Baron Mustill)

  Chairman of the Advisory Committee on Arbitration Law

  Unpaid

  1985 to December 1989

  Lord Rockley

  Member of the Design Council

  Unpaid

  12 December 1987—20 December 1993

  516
  Mr. Neil Hamilton
  I understand that the proposed acquisition by British Bus plc of Greater Manchester Buses North Ltd. is currently being considered by the Director General of Fair Trading. Ministers in due course shall need to take a decision on whether or not to refer the acquisition to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission, taking account of advice from the Director General. The substance of his advice is confidential. I can, however, assure the hon. Member that all relevant factors will be taken into account in considering the case.

  Post Office
  Mrs. Ray Michie
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what representations he has received regarding the review of the Post Office; when his Department is expected to announce the findings of the review; what consultation his Department has undertaken with other countries during the review; what has been the total cost to date of the review exercise; what is the total number of staff employed and resources devoted to the exercise; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. McLoughlin
  We have received numerous representations on the subject of the Post Office review, including from the Post Office itself, hon. Members, members of the public, other customers of the Post Office, trade unions and other interested parties.

  No decisions on the review have yet been taken. We shall make an announcement when they are.

  In the course of the review Ministers and officials have looked at the experience of a number of countries in the postal sector, including among others the Republic of Ireland, Sweden, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Australia and Canada.

  I gave the outturn costs for consultancy work on the Post Office review and the sale of Parcelforce in 1992–93 to the hon. Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Central (Mr. Brown), Official Report, 5 November 1993, column 513–14.

  I gave the figures for the staff employed on the review in my Department in the reply to the hon. Member for Pendle (Mr. Prentice), Official Report, 25 November 1993, column 111.

  Quangos
  Mr. Meale
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade if he will list the names of all individuals who are or were members of the House of Lords who since 1979 have been appointed to any quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisations, excluding appointments as justices of the peace, giving in each case the title of the post, any salary payable and the duration of the appointment.

  Mr. Eggar
  [holding answer 11 January 1994]: The table sets out the information available:
  517

  Name

  Post

  Salary

  Duration

  Earl of Limerick

  Chairman of the British Overseas Trade Board

  £5,000 per annum

  1979 to March 1983

  Member of the British Overseas Trade Board

  Unpaid1

  November 1984–1991

  Earl Jellicoe

  Chairman of the British Overseas Trade Board

  £7,500 per annum2

  £7,726 per annum3

  £7,988 per annum4

  £10,000 per annum5

  £10,760 per annum6

  £11,515 per annum7

  April 1982 to 1985

  Lord Bridges

  Member of the British Overseas Trade Board

  Unpaid1

  1979–1982

  Lord Selsdon

  Member of the British Overseas Trade Board

  Unpaid1

  1983–1985

  Baroness Miller

  Member of the Monopolies and Mergers Commission

  £12,735 per annum

  3 March 1992–31 December 1993

  1 Unpaid (was able to claim expenses when he attended meetings).

  2 1 April 1983—31 March 1984.

  3 1 April 1984—31 October 1984.

  4 1 November 1984—31 December 1984.

  5 1 January 1985—30 June 1985.

  6 1 July 1985—28 February 1986.

  7 1 March 1986—15 July 1986.

  Regional Assistance
  Mr. Kirkwood
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade when he expects to be in a position to announce the final EC agreement on those areas within the United Kingdom which will be eligible for objective 5b funding; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Sainsbury
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: Shortly.

  Nuclear Review
  Mr. Tipping
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade when he now intends to announce the scope and terms of reference of the nuclear review; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Eggar
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Beckenham (Mr. Merchant) on 16 December 1993, Official Report, column 759.

  British Coal
  Mr. Hardy
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade what is his estimate of the cost to public funds of the support which is to be available to assist private individuals or companies to prepare bids for the purchase of British Coal collieries and property.

  Mr. Eggar
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: We announced on 25 March 1993 that up to £1 million would be available to assist management and employee buy-out teams preparing to bid for pits offered for licence or main privatisation.

  Patenting of Human Genes
  Mr. Fatchett
  To ask the President of the Board of Trade, pursuant to his answer of 7 December 1993, Official Report, column 152, if he will set out those criteria which
  518
  will be used to determine which sequences of nucleotides of specific industrial application, which may be derived from human genes, will be suitable to be patentable.

  Mr. McLoughlin
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: Since the law does not specifically preclude patents for genetic sequences, judgments need to be made on any applications for patents in this area by the patent examiner dealing with a particular application. These judgments will turn on the individual circumstances of the case and the law provides that they can be tested in the courts. It is therefore not possible for the Patent Office to set down specific criteria to determine which sequences may be patentable.

  As explained in the answer of 7 December 1993, normal criteria of novelty and inventive step are used to determine when a sequence of nucleotides is patentable. This means, for novelty, that the sequence must not have been disclosed anywhere before the filing of the application and, in relation to the inventive step, that the patent examiner must make a judgment on the degree of ingenuity involved in locating the gene of interest and any subsequent cloning or sequencing work.

HOUSE OF COMMONS

  Employees
  Mr. Frank Field
  To ask the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed, representing the House of Commons Commission, if he will publish details of the numbers employed full and part time in the Palace of Westminster; and if he will break this down by main divisions.

  Mr. Beith
  Details of those staff employed by the House of Commons Commission are as follows:
  519

  Department

  Full-time permanent staff

  Part-time permanent staff

  Fixed term appointees

  Secondments

  Speaker's Office

  11

  1

  Nil

  1

  Clerk's Department

  170

  17

  15

  5

  Serjeant's Department

  311

  69

  1

  3

  Finance and Administration Department

  105

  2

  5

  1

  Library

  153

  33

  Nil

  1

  Official Report

  94

  5

  13

  Nil

  Refreshment Department

  280

  36

  2

  Nil

  Fire Regulations
  Mr. Clifton-Brown
  To ask the Chairman of the Accommodation and Works Committee when the fire regulations for the Palace of Westminster were last reviewed; and what assessment has been made of their adequacy.

  Mr. Ray Powell
  The Home Office fire service inspectorate recently reviewed the fire precautions in the Palace of Westminster and recommended additional measures. Works are progressing and a new fire certificate is expected to be issued later this year.

NORTHERN IRELAND

  Forensic Laboratory
  Mr. John D. Taylor
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if the site of the former forensic science laboratory at Newtownbreda will be sold; what proposals he has for the future of this site; and if he will make a statement.

  Sir John Wheeler
  It is not known at present if the Newtownbreda site will be sold. The site is no longer required by the Northern Ireland Office and its future use is currently under consideration.

  Defaulters
  Mr. William Ross
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what is the average prison sentence imposed for defaulting on a fine; what is the average period actually spent in prison by such a defaulter in Northern Ireland; and what is the average cost of such a person's imprisonment.

  Sir John Wheeler
  The average prison sentence imposed for fine defaulting in Northern Ireland is 18 days and the average period actually served by such a defaulter is seven days. These figures have remained constant in recent years.

  The current weekly cost of a prisoner, inclusive of all categories, in the Northern Ireland prison system is £1,238. No separate figure for fine defaulters is available.

  Market Testing
  Mr. McAllion
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will publish for each service that has been market tested in his Department in 1993(a) the cost of the testing process, including consultancy costs, (b) the result of the test, (c) the name of the successful contractor, (d) the value and duration of the contract, (e) the number
  520
  of staff involved, (f) estimated annual cost reductions and (g) whether the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 1981 were deemed to apply.

  Sir John Wheeler
  My Department is currently analysing the outcome of the 1992–93 "Competing for Quality" programme with the efficiency unit in the Cabinet Office. Much of the information requested will, once it has been finalised, be published in aggregate form in the "Citizen's Charter Second Report". On an individual contract basis, much of the information is commercially confidential.

  Strip Searches
  Ms Corston
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will refer the practice of strip searching to the Standing Advisory Commission on Human Rights.

  Sir John Wheeler
  No. The issues for consideration by the Standing Advisory Commission on Human Rights must be for the commission to determine.

  Ulster Museum
  Mr. Faulds
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will publish the attendance figures for 1993 reported by the Ulster museum, including its outstations, with the percentage increase or decrease on the attendance figures for 1992.

  Mr. Ancram
  In 1993 a total of 268,300 people visited the Ulster museum and the Armagh County museum—a decrease of 40·5 per cent. on the attendance figure for 1992.

  Irish Broadcasting Act 1960
  Mr. Madden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will arrange for a copy of the guidelines issued by broadcasting organisations in the Republic of Ireland arising from the non-renewal of section 31 of the Irish Broadcasting Act 1960 to be placed in the Library; and how many households in Northern Ireland he estimates are able to receive television and radio broadcasts originating from the Irish Republic.

  Sir Patrick Mayhew
  It is not considered appropriate to place a copy of the guidelines in the Library. It is estimated that approximately 20,000 television sets can receive signals from the Republic in Northern Ireland; radio signals can be received in any interference-free area in Northern Ireland.
  521

  "Next Steps" Initiative
  Lady Olga Maitland
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how the departments of the Northern Ireland civil service and the Northern Ireland Office are responding to the "next steps" initiative; and if he will make a statement.

  Sir John Wheeler
  The response of the Departments of Northern Ireland Civil Service and the Northern Ireland Office to "next steps" forms an important component of the overall programme of civil service management reform in Northern Ireland.

  In the province the important work of the administration has continued in spite of the many difficulties faced by our civil servants, in common with the private sector work force. The "next steps" programme is designed to enhance effectiveness and efficiency, and to improve standards of service and value for money. "Next steps" is the vehicle for providing, through those executive agencies which serve the public in Northern Ireland, the improved quality which is necessary if we are to meet our citizens charter commitments.

  In line with the progress reported by the Government recently in the White Paper on the fourth "Next Steps Review" (Cm 2430), agency coverage in Northern Ireland has been increasing steadily. There are now nine agencies in place covering some 30 per cent. of the work force.

  We have plans to look at the scope to extend this coverage to include the remaining significant executive activities, and in doing so to establish, on a case-by-case basis, that these activities continue to be appropriate for the civil service.

  There is no presumption that every existing business unit must be an agency. We will wish to confirm, by way of prior options studies, that an activity remains necessary, and also to consider whether it should be pursued through privatisation, or contracting out. Four such studies are coming close to completion and are looking in depth at the Public Records Office, the Estate Services Directorate of the Management Executive for HPSS, the Industrial Research and Technology Unit, and the Forensic Science Laboratory. If agency status is agreed for any of these I will make a further announcement.

  The schedule set out lists additional studies for which a timetable is now settled. I am still considering further possibilities, and will make another announcement to the House in due course.

  Schedule

  Dept.

  Departmental proposed completion dates

  DED

  Insolvency Service

  by January 1995

  DED

  Health and Safety

  by December 1994

  DED

  Trading Standards

  by April 1994

  DFP

  Departmental Information Systems Units

  by September 1994

  DFP

  Telecommunications

  by May 1995

  DFP

  Civil Service Superannuation (in conjunction with HPSS Superannuation)

  by March 1995

  DFP

  Business Development Services

  by March 1994

  DFP

  Statistics, Census Office, GRO

  by March 1994

  DHSS

  HPSS Superannuation

  See DFP, Superannuation above

  DHSS

  Health Service Information Systems

  by June 1994

  Dept.

  Departmental proposed completion dates

  522

  DOE

  Roads Services

  by December 1994

  DOE

  Environment Services

  by December 1994

  DOE

  Land/Deeds Registration

  by December 1994

  DOE

  Planning Service

  by December 1994

  NIO

  Prison Service

  by June 1994

NATIONAL FINANCE

  Works of Art
  Mr. Allen
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how much revenue is forgone by having a lower VAT rate of 2½ per cent. rather than 17½ per cent. on imported works of art; and if he will make a statement on the impact of the seventh VAT directive on this.

  Sir John Cope
  At present works of art are exempt from VAT at importation into the United Kingdom. Under a derogation from the seventh VAT directive agreed in principle at ECOFIN on 13 December the United Kingdom will apply the standard rate of VAT to one-seventh of the value of works of art at importation. This is expected to yield in a full year about £2 million. To apply the standard rate to the whole value would yield more if the market were unaffected but in practice the amount would depend on the effects of such a measure on the United Kingdom art market.

  1993 Budgets
  Mrs. Anne Campbell
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will estimate the average percentage loss of annual income due to the March and November 1993 Budgets for the 10 per cent. lowest income group and the 10 per cent. highest income group.

  Mr. Dorrell
  Relative to indexation, the main tax-related measures taking effect before the next Budget will cost the 10 per cent. of households with the lowest net incomes, adjusted for family composition, just over 1 per cent. of their net income on average and the 10 per cent. of households with the highest net incomes just under 2 per cent. of their net income on average.

  Alcohol
  Mr. Pawsey
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is his most recent estimate as to the amount of revenue lost through the purchase of beer made on the continent and sold in the United Kingdom.

  Sir John Cope
  At this stage Customs and Excise estimate that the revenue loss through illegal sales in the United Kingdom of alcohol and tobacco purchased in other EC member states does not exceed £35 million. The bulk of this is on hand rolling tobacco.

  Mr. Redmond
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what considerations underlie the practice of destroying alcoholic drinks confiscated by the Customs.

  Sir John Cope
  Customs destroy seized alcoholic drinks when they judge it necessary to safeguard the
  523
  Revenue, or to protect the market for legitimate United Kingdom traders, and there is no acceptable alternative means of disposal.

  Mr. Pawsey
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what action is being taken to reduce the amount of beer and wine purchased in France for own consumption and then sold in the United Kingdom.

  Sir John Cope
  The law prescribes severe penalties of up to seven years' imprisonment for anyone attempting to defraud the Revenue in this way. In addition, goods imported by offenders and the vehicles used are liable to seizure. Customs and Excise are using excise verification officers to detect and prosecute the individuals involved. A range of controls are applied, which include checks made at retail outlets. In the 11 months to November 1993, EVOs made 1,016 detections involving £1,624,543 revenue.

  Widow's Bereavement Allowance
  Mr. Nigel Jones
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how much the Government will save from the reduction in the tax allowance on widow's bereavement allowance.

  Mr. Dorrell
  At 1994–95 income levels, the full-year yield from restricting the widows' bereavement allowance to 20 per cent. is about £6 million. Restricting this allowance to 15 per cent. as announced for 1995–96, would yield an estimated further £9 million.

  Football Pools Betting Duty
  Mr. Pendry
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will publish a table showing the Government's total income from the football pools betting duty for each of the years 1991–92 and 1992–93 and as a total over the same period.

  Sir John Cope
  Receipts from pool betting duty were as follows:

  £ million

  1991–92

  319·5

  1992–93

  318·2

  Total

  637·7

  Relocation
  Mr. Simon Hughes
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many civil servants were located in Greater London at the beginning of(a) 1964, (b) 1974, (c) 1984 and (d) 1994; and what he expects the figure to be in 2004.

  Mr. Dorrell
  The number of civil servants, full-time equivalents, located in Greater London, was 131,451 at January 1984 and 111,252 at 1 April 1993, latest available. Data for earlier years are not available; nor are projections made by location.

  Unicorn Heritage plc
  Mr. Meacher
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer on what precise grounds(a) Cork Gully recommended that the debt owed by Unicorn Heritage plc be written off and (b) the Treasury accepted that the debt could not be repaid by the directors of the company.
  524
  Mr. Dorrell
  Cork Gully, as liquidator of Unicorn Heritage plc, assessed the assets and liabilities of the company and on 12 October 1990 informed the English tourist board that there was no prospect of any payment of a dividend to unsecured creditors. As a result on 16 April 1991 the English tourist board decided that it would seek approval for the debt to be written off from the Department of National Heritage and the Treasury, and wrote to the Department of National Heritage on 12 March 1992. In the light of the information provided by Cork Gully and the ETB, the Treasury on 14 May 1993 accepted that there was no prospect of a dividend. As Unicorn Heritage plc had limited liability status the directors were not personally responsible for the debts incurred by the company.

  Air Passenger Duty
  Mrs. Ray Michie
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what estimate he has made regarding the revenue derived from air passenger duty per annum in respect of(a) scheduled passenger flights to and from airports in Scotland, (b) charter flights to and from airports in Scotland; and (c) scheduled passenger flights to and from airports operated by Highlands and Islands Airports Ltd.

  Sir John Cope
  On the basis of statistics provided by the Civil Aviation Authority, the total revenue yield from air passenger duty from passengers departing from Scottish airports is estimated to be around £20 million. Around 55 per cent. of this total is from scheduled flights and 45 per cent. from chartered flights. No separate estimates have been made for arriving passengers as this can give rise to double counting. The revenue yield is likely to be similar to that from departing passengers.

  We estimate that around £1 million will be paid from passengers departing from highland and island airports.

  Mrs. Ray Michie
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer which passengers will be exempt from air passenger duty; what types of aircraft will be exempt; what plans there are to exempt users of aircraft flying to and from the Highlands and Islands of Scotland; and if he will make a statement.

  Sir John Cope
  The Finance Bill proposes that passengers will be exempt from air passenger duty if they are on the return leg of a domestic return ticket; if they are transferring at a United Kingdom airport to another aircraft or a further flight on the same aircraft; or if they are under two years of age and are not allocated a separate seat before entering the aircraft. Passengers on aircraft taking off from airports outside the United Kingdom will not be within the scope of the duty. Aircraft will be exempt if they have a maximum take-off weight of under 10 tonnes or if they seat fewer than 20 passengers. There are no plans for an exemption for all passengers flying to and from the highlands and islands of Scotland.

  Grants
  Mr. Flynn
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will list all the grants of over £50,000 for commercial and industrial ventures that his Department has written off as not recoverable in the past three years.

  Mr. Nelson
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: None.
  525

HEALTH

  Primary Care Projects
  Ms Primarolo
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will list the projects in primary care under "London: Making the Best Better" that have been financed by the London implementation group and the cost of each project.

  Dr. Mawhinney
  In 1993–94, £40 million has been made available to fund primary care development plans produced by each of the 12 family health services authorities—FHSAs—within the London initiative zone —LIZ. A list will be placed in the Library of projects contained within those plans which are being progressed in 1993–94. Detailed management and monitoring of development programmes is carried out by FHSAs, and costings for individual projects are therefore not available centrally.

  Pathology Services
  Ms Primarolo
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will make a statement on the private tendering of pathology services in NHS hospitals.

  Mr. Sackville
  It is for trusts to take account of the range of options available for the provision of pathology services, including provision by the independent sector, in securing the best service for patients.

  Ms Primarolo
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what is the time scale for the Government review of pathology services.

  Mr. Sackville
  The strategic review of pathology services began in November 1993, and is expected to report to the Department in June this year.

  Hepatitis B Vaccinations
  Ms Primarolo
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what percentage of surgeons have been vaccinated against hepatitis B.

  Mr. Sackville
  This information is not available centrally, but surgeons have been among the high risk groups recommended to receive hepatitis B vaccine since its introduction in 1982. Guidance to health authorities and trusts was reinforced last August by the issue of the booklet "Protecting Health Care Workers and Patients from Hepatitis B", with accompanying health service guidelines. These guidelines ask provider units to aim to immunise and check the immunity of all surgeons by the middle of 1994. Copies of the booklet and guidelines are available in the Library.

  Air Pollution
  Mr. Chris Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will place a copy of the third report of the advisory group on medical aspects of air pollution episodes, produced in December, in the Library.

  Mr. Sackville
  I refer the hon. Member to the reply I gave him on 15 December at column 720.
  526

  Food Safety
  Mr. Welsh
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what measures are taken in food poisoning investigations to determine sources of infection; and what assessment she has made of the extent to which these measures are adequate;

  (2) when the proposed draft guidelines on the investigation of food poisoning will be released for consultation.

  Mr. Sackville
  It is for the authorities involved to decide upon the structure and priorities of any investigation undertaken regarding an outbreak of food poisoning.

  Guidance on the management of such outbreaks will be released for consultation shortly.

  Mr. Welsh
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will place in the Library the detailed protocols of the research into the incidence and sources of salmonella food poisoning being administered by the steering group on the microbiological safety of food.

  Mr. Sackville
  Copies of a background note summarising the protocol for the steering group's study of infectious intestinal disease in England will be placed in the Library. The study will provide information on the incidence, but not the sources, of salmonella food poisoning. More detailed information about the protocol will be available when the results of the study are published after its completion in 1995.

  Mr. Welsh
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health on what basis the research funding administered by the steering group on the microbiological safety of food has been, or will be, awarded; and whether the research work has been advertised to independent laboratories and research groups, on a tender basis.

  Mr. Sackville
  The steering group makes decisions on the need for new microbiological food safety surveillance projects on the basis of available epidemiological data and other data on food, food processes and food hygiene. Contracts are awarded by officials in the Department of Health and the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food on behalf of the steering group to organisations in the public and private sectors with the relevant expertise. Neither of the national projects currently under way was appropriate for tender procedures, given their complexity. It is envisaged that suitable projects will be advertised in the future and subsequent contracts awarded on a tender basis.

  Television and Radio Interviews
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will list the television and radio interviews, and the topics covered, by her and her departmental Ministers between 18 December and 10 January.

  Mr. Sackville
  The subjects on which Ministers at the Department gave television and radio interviews between 18 December and 10 January are:

  Home Alone Children

  In vitro Fertilisation

  Services for Juvenile Delinquents

  Smoking

  Reforming London's Health Services

  527

  Accident and Emergency Services

  Patient's Charter

  Drugs Campaign Launch

  Family Values—International Year of the Family

  Detailed records of individual interviews are not kept. Ministers responded to requests on the topics listed as they were received.

  In Vitro Fertilisation
  Dr. Spink
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what measures she can take to prevent the use of in vitro fertilisation as a mechanism for social engineering as in the fixing of foetus characteristics such as sex or ethnicity; and if she will make a statement;

  (2) what measures she can take to prevent the use of in vitro fertilisation in respect of post-menopausal women; and if she will use such measures;

  (3) what measures she can take to prevent the use of in vitro fertilisation in circumstances such as the mixing of the ethnicity of donor and recipient.

  Mr. Sackville
  The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority established by Parliament in 1990 under the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act regulates centres carrying out in vitro fertilisation.

  The authority maintains a code of practice setting out its requirements for the proper conduct of licensed activities. The code is approved by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health and is laid before Parliament. It makes clear the age of the prospective parents is one factor which should be considered when deciding whether or not in vitro fertilisation should be offered. Where donated eggs or sperm are used in treatment, it is good practice to try to match the physical characteristics of the donor to those of the couple being treated. The use of sex selection techniques in centres licensed by the authority is permitted only for medical reasons. An essential feature of the 1990 Act and the activities regulated under its provisions is the welfare of any child born as a result of treatment.

  Mentally Ill Patients
  Dr. Lynne Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will order independent inquiries into every death caused by patients discharged under medication from mental illness hospitals.

  Mr. Bowis
  New guidance to the national health service on the discharge of psychiatric patients, issued for consultation on 12 January, states that it will always be necessary to hold an inquiry which is independent of service providers in cases of homicides involving mentally ill people.

  NHS Contracts
  Mr. Miller
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what steps she intends to take in the event of a dispute between a contractor and a national health service trust, when that dispute is outside the terms of the National Health Service Contracts (Dispute Resolution) Regulations 1991, to ensure that the trust has acted wholly within the law.

  Mr. Sackville
  National health service contracts between purchasers and providers are subject to the National Health Service Contracts (Dispute Resolution)528
  Regulations 1991. Where a purchaser or provider contracts with the independent sector these contracts will be legal contracts and therefore subject to the proper legal process.

  NHS Supplies Authority
  Mr. Whittingdale
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what levels of savings in purchasing and administrative costs have been targeted by the NHS Supplies Authority for the years 1994 to 1996.

  Mr. Sackville
  The authority is preparing its business plan for 1994–95, and the national health service management executive has not yet, therefore, agreed purchasing or running cost savings targets with the authority for that or subsequent years. The NHS management executive will, however, require the authority to build significantly on the purchasing savings of £57 million which it is on target to achieve in 1993–94, and further to reduce its warehousing and distribution costs through the new logistics strategy currently being prepared.

  Mr. Whittingdale
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what assessment she has made of the extent to which the NHS Supplies Authority's financial savings and efficiency targets could be improved or accelerated by transfering it to the private sector; and if she will make a statement.

  Mr. Sackville
  After taking independent, specialist consultancy advice, our assessment is that privatisation of the National Health Service Supplies Authority in its present form would not offer the prospect of increased financial savings or increased efficiency, and would risk diverting management effort from the significant service improvements and cost reductions which are being planned. However, the core function of the authority is acknowledged to be purchasing and contracting. Its other activities, particularly warehousing, distribution, and information technology services, could gain added value from more extensive use through market testing of private sector skills, experience and resources. This will be taken forward by the authority as it develops its new logstics and IT strategies.

  Psychiatric Hospital Closures
  Dr. Lynne Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health where published copies of the handbook of good practice in psychiatric hospital closures prepared by the mental health task force are available.

  Mr. Bowis
  The handbook of good practice will be available shortly and copies will be placed in the Library.

  Blood Donors
  Mr. Spellar
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to her answer of 16 December 1993,Official Report, column 811, whether the screening tests required for blood or plasma collected overseas for processing into blood products to be imported are conducted in the United Kingdom.

  Mr. Sackville
  It is a requirement throughout the European Community that all plasma donations used in the manufacture of blood products marketed in the European Community must be screened for hepatitis B, hepatitis C,
  529
  HIV 1 and HIV 2. Such testing is performed in the country of origin. For all products which are to be marketed in the United Kingdom, however, samples of plasma pools are submitted for independent testing in the United Kingdom by the National Institute for Biological Standards and Control.

  Mental Health
  Dr. Lynne Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what progress has been made by the mental health task force towards its strategic objective of developing a vision of the shape of the market for mental health services in years to come.

  Mr. Bowis
  On 4 October 1993, a conference was held at the Queen Elizabeth II conference centre, London on "Mental Health—Visions for the Future". It was organised jointly by the National Association of Health Authorities and Trusts, the Association of Directors of Social Services and the Mental Health Task Force. I gave the keynote address and over 200 health service managers and others attended.

  The task force support group, which includes many of the major interests in the field, held a seminar in November which sought to anticipate developments in mental health services over the next 20 years. The issues identified by participants and suggestions for further work during 1994 are being considered.

  Dr. Lynne Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health when she will publish the report of the review of mental health nursing.

  Mr. Bowis
  Shortly.

  AIDS Support Grant
  Mr. Dowd
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health when is the deadline for London boroughs to apply for AIDS support grant for 1994–95; and if she will make a statement.

  Mr. Sackville
  The local authority circular LAC(94)3, explaining arrangements for continuation in 1994–95 of the AIDS support grant scheme has been issued and invites authorities to submit their expenditure plans to the Department by 18 February. Copies of the circular are available in the Library.

  Oral Health
  Mr. Spellar
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health when her Department commenced work on the proposals for an oral health strategy.

  Dr. Mawhinney
  Work on an oral health strategy started in October 1991, with the setting up of an oral health strategy group, chaired by the chief dental officer.

  Lister Hospital, Stevenage
  Mr. Spellar
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what inquiry she has conducted into the placing of the control by North Hertfordshire health trust to manage the pathology services for the Lister hospital, Stevenage.

  Mr. Sackville
  It is for the trust to determine which source of pathology provision provides the best service for patients, and to specify and monitor the standards to be met in contracts.
  530

  Embryology
  Dr. Spink
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what action she has taken or will take to encourage the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority to prevent research into the use of foetal eggs from aborted foetuses for human reproductive purposes; and if she will make a statement.

  Mr. Sackville
  The consultation document on donated ovarian tissue in embryo research and assisted conception issued on 7 January by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority invites comments on whether eggs or ovarian tissue from foetuses should be used in research. The Government welcome this wide-ranging consultation. We look forward to receiving advice from the authority in due course, when we can consider what further action, if any, is required.

  Health Care, London
  Mr. Corbyn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what funding is being allocated on 1994–95 to regional health authorities to purchase health care in London; and what was the figure for 1993–94.

  Dr. Mawhinney
  Allocations are made to the four Thames regions and it is they who allocate to district health authorities in London. For 1993–94 and 1994–95, the main regional allocations were:

  £000"s

  1993–94

  1994–95

  North West Thames

  1,320,749

  11,352,165

  North East Thames

  1,490,187

  1,561,379

  South East Thames

  1,439,276

  1,519,821

  South West Thames

  1,116,107

  11,163,130

  1The allocations are not directly comparable because of boundary changes.

  In addition, the Thames regions will have received during 1993–94 further allocations for specific purposes, some of which will have been deployed in London. Similar allocations will be made during 1994–95.

  Information on allocations for 1994–95 is not yet available centrally. The 1993–94 revenue allocations to London DHAs are as follows:

  Region and District Health Authority

  £,000's

  North West Thames

  Barnet

  99,709

  Hillingdon

  72,384

  Brent and Harrow

  151,175

  Ealing/Hammersmith/Hounslow

  193,428

  Kensington/Chelsea/Westminster

  127,078

  North East Thames

  Barking and Havering

  118,879

  Camden and Islington

  185,044

  East London and The City

  243,662

  New Rivers

  170,366

  Redbridge/Waltham Forest

  159,278

  South East Thames

  Bexley

  68,422

  Greenwich

  86,135

  Bromley

  97,490

  South East London

  299,968

  South West Thames

  Croydon

  102,565

  531

  Region and District Health Authority

  £,000's

  Kingston and Richmond

  150,538

  Wandsworth

  87,243

  Menon and Sutton

  122,744

  NHS Trusts
  Mr. Battle
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what guidelines she has issued to trust hospitals on their pension fund investment policies.

  Dr. Mawhinney
  None. For an occupational pension scheme to obtain Inland Revenue approval the rules on scheme investment would have to meet Inland Revenue criteria.

  Abortion
  Mr. Tredinnick
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what steps she is taking in respect of re-approval of private sector places to carry out termination of pregnancy under the Abortion Act 1967 when the current approval period ends at the end of January.

  Mr. Sackville
  My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health will be extending by six months from 1 February 1994 current private sector approvals to carry out termination of pregnancy under the Abortion Act 1967, as amended. This will allow the Department of Health to complete a review of current arrangements for approving and monitoring places so approved. Any changes will be introduced from 1 August 1994. All places currently approved under section 1(3) of the Act are being informed.

  Staffordshire Ambulance Trust
  Ms Walley
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will meet employees of the Staffordshire ambulance trust to discuss patient transport services.

  Mr. Sackville
  I have no plans to do so. Employee relations in national health service trusts are the responsibility of NHS trust boards.

  Royal Orthopaedic Hospital, Birmingham
  Mr. Burden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what was the relocation plan on which she approved the closure of the Royal orthopaedic hospital in Birmingham;

  (2) when she gave her approval to the closure of the Royal orthopaedic hospital in Birmingham.

  Dr. Mawhinney
  Agreement to the permanent closure of the Birmingham accident and the Royal orthopaedic hospitals was given on 1 February 1993. In order to effect the closures, trauma, orthopaedic, plastic surgery and burns services were to transfer to the Birmingham general hospital and later relocate to the Selly Oak hospital site. In order to make sufficient space at the general hospital, general surgery and general medicine were to be transferred to the Queen Elizabeth and Selly Oak hospitals.

  Mr. Burden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what representations she has received to change the relocation plan associated with the closure of the Royal orthopaedic hospital in Birmingham; and if she will make a statement.
  532
  Dr. Mawhinney
  Since South Birmingham district health authority put forward suggestions for the closure of the Royal orthopaedic hospital and reprovision of these services on the Selly Oak hospital site, we have received 12 letters from hon. Members and 51 from members of the public.

  Mr. Burden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what response she has made to the South Birmingham health authority financial review into the Royal orthopaedic hospital compiled by KPMG Peat Marwick, a copy of which has been sent to her.

  Dr. Mawhinney
  It is for the South Birmingham district health authority, which commissioned this report, to consider what response, if any, to make to it.

  Mr. Burden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will set out the financial grounds on which she gave her approval to the closure of the Royal orthopaedic hospital in Birmingham.

  Dr. Mawhinney
  At the time the proposal for the closure of the Royal orthopaedic hospital was considered in February 1993, concerns were expressed about a possible loss of income to the hospital as a number of health authorities were signalling their intention of reducing contracts with it. However, the financial position of the hospital was only one of the issues which was considered. The main reason for agreeing the closure of the Royal orthopaedic hospital and reprovision of orthopaedic services on to one site was to improve the quality of care available to patients.

  Hospital Closures
  Mr. Burden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what powers a health authority has to alter a relocation plan for a hospital scheduled for closure under a different plan approved by her.

  Dr. Mawhinney
  When a health authority proposes to make significant changes to proposals for hospital closures and service reprovision which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has agreed, we would expect them to consult on their new proposals.

  Gene Therapy Advisory Committee
  Mr. Fatchett
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will set out the terms of reference of the Gene Therapy Advisory Committee.

  Mr. Sackville
  The terms of reference for the Gene Therapy Advisory Committee are:"To consider and advise on the acceptability of proposals for gene therapy research on human subjects on ethical grounds, taking account of the scientific merits of the proposals and the potential benefits and risks.
  To work with other agencies which have responsibilities in this field, including local research ethics committees, and agencies with statutory responsibilities—the Medicines Control Agency, the Health and Safety Executive and the Department of the Environment.
  To provide advice to United Kingdom Health Ministers on developments in gene therapy research and their implications."

  Crownhill Hospital, Plymouth
  Mr. Jamieson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what was the total cost of converting the former Crownhill hospital in Plymouth into offices for Plymouth and Torbay health authority.
  533
  Mr. Sackville
  Information is available centrally on schemes with a cost of over £1 million. The Crownhill conversion was below this figure and the hon. Member may therefore wish to contact Mrs. Judith Leverton, chairman of the Plymouth and Torbay health authority, for details.

  Health Authorities
  Mr. Burden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health whether each health authority seeks or holds details of the political affiliations of people nominated to or appointed to it.

  Dr. Mawhinney
  We are not aware that any health authority either seeks or holds such information.

  Ambulance Personnel (Retirement)
  Mr. Ieuan Wyn Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what arrangements exist in England to allow ambulance personnel employed by district health authorities or NHS trusts to retire at 55 years.

  Mr. Sackville
  The national health service pension scheme for England and Wales provides for retirement below the age of 60 on grounds of ill health, organisational change, redundancy and in the interests of the efficiency of the service. The employer meets the additional costs involved in cases other than ill health, and resources have been made available in 1993–94 for the ambulance service in England to cover the costs of a limited programme of early retirement.

  Pay Beds
  Ms Primarolo
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what was the number of dedicated NHS pay bed units, their location and number of beds contained in each year since 1990.

  Mr. Sackville
  This information is not available centrally.

  Clothier Inquiry
  Mr. Blunkett
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what external public relations staff from(a) the private sector or (b) other NHS bodies have been employed by (i) Grantham and Kesteven district general hospital, (ii) South Lincolnshire district health authority or (iii) Trent regional health authority to assist with work relating to the Clothier inquiry; and what was the cost of any of these contracts.

  Dr. Mawhinney
  This is a matter for the Trent regional health authority. The hon. Member may wish to contact the chairman of Trent regional health authority, Sir Michael Carlisle, for details.

  Mr. Blunkett
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what has been the total cost to date of the Clothier inquiry.

  Dr. Mawhinney
  Up to 14 January, £96,574.

  Nuclear Weapons
  Mr. Chisholm
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will make it her policy to oppose in the World Health Assembly the withdrawal of resolution WHA4640 of 534
  14 May 1993 on the request to the International Court of Justice for an advisory opinion on the legal status of the use by a state of nuclear weapons in armed conflict.

  Dr. Mawhinney
  The agenda for the May 1994 World Health Assembly has not yet been published. We are unaware of any proposal for a resolution which would negate resolution WHA 46.40.

  NHS Beds (Private Use)
  Ms Primarolo
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will give details of the costs to public funds that arise through the provision of authorised NHS beds for private use, listing each separate budget head, and the total costs thereby incurred by each hospital with authorised beds.

  Mr. Sackville
  Since 1 April 1991 health authorities, on behalf of directly managed units, and trusts have, subject to certain safeguards, been able to determine their own private patient activity. National health service private patient charges are calculated at the appropriate commercial rate generating valuable income for improving services for all patients.

  Ms Primarolo
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what was the location and number of authorised NHS beds for private use in each year since 1990.

  Mr. Sackville
  I refer the hon. Member to the reply my hon. Friend the Member for Loughborough (Mr. Dorrell) gave the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) on 16 March 1992 at columns 857–66 for the latest available information. Since 1 April 1991 health authorities, on behalf of directly managed units, and trusts have, subject to certain safeguards, been able to determine their own private patient activity.

  Health Spending, North Essex
  Mr. Burns
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what will be the percentage increase in health spending in the North Essex health authority area in 1994–95; and if she will make a statement.

  Mr. Sackville
  The 1994–95 revenue cash limit for North Essex health authority represents a 5·3 per cent. increase over 1993–94. The allocation is made by North East Thames regional health authority.

  Brook Hospital
  Mr. Austin-Walker
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health when the South East Thames regional health authority authorised the purchase of a second-hand mobile MRI scanner for use at the Brook hospital; when the authority had paid a non-refundable deposit; what was the total cost paid for the scanner and the amounts borne by(a) the authority and (b) Greenwich Healthcare Trust; when the scanner was delivered to the Brook hospial; when it became operational; how many NHS patients have been scanned with this equipment; what consultation took place with consultants at the Brook hospital prior to the purchase of this equipment; and if she will make a statement.

  Mr. Sackville
  The hon. Member may wish to contact Mr. Peter Barker, chairman of South East Thames regional health authority concerning its involvement in the purchase of the MRI scanner at Greenwich Healthcare national
  535
  health service trust and Mr. Neville Thompson, chairman of Greenwich Healthcare NHS trust about the installation and use of medical equipment at the trust.

  GPs (Suspension)
  Mr. Austin-Walker
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what assessment she has made of whether the actions of the Greenwich and Bexley family health services authority were appropriate and satisfacory in dealing with complaints against the doctor concerned in the recent case raised with her by the hon. Member for Woolwich; and whether the actions of the General Medical Council were appropriate and satisfactory in dealing with the complaints.

  Dr. Mawhinney
  It would not be right to comment on the actions of Greenwich and Bexley family health services authority in this case until proceedings to which the family health services authority is a party have been formally concluded.

  The General Medical Council is an independent statutory body whose constitution and functions are governed by the Medical Act 1983. The council has sole

  See

  Suffragan See

  Bishop

  Date of appointment

  Bath and Wells

  Taunton

  John Lewis

  3 July 1992

  Birmingham

  Aston

  John Austin

  3 September 1992

  Blackburn

  Lancaster

  John Nicholls

  25 April 1990

  Bristol

  Malmesbury

  Peter Firth

  30 November 1983

  Canterbury

  Dover

  Richard Llewellin

  9 October 1992

  Maidstone

  Gavin Reid

  9 October 1992

  Carlisle

  Penrith

  George Hacker

  10 October 1979

  Chelmsford

  Barking

  Roger Sainsbury

  17 January 1991

  Colchester

  Michael Vickers

  2 February 1988

  Bradwell

  Laurence Green

  23 February 1993

  Chester

  Birkenhead

  Michael Langrish

  2 March 1993

  Stockport

  Frank Sargeant

  25 January 1984

  Chichester

  Horsham

  Lindsay Urwin

  30 November 1993

  Lewes

  Ian Cundy

  3 July 1992

  Coventry

  Warwick

  Clive Handford

  5 December 1990

  Derby

  Repton

  Henry Richmond

  30 January 1986

  Durham

  Jarrow

  Alan Smithson

  21 September 1990

  Ely

  Huntington

  Gordon Roe

  1 November 1980

  Exeter

  Crediton

  Peter Coleman

  2 July 1984

  Plymouth

  Richard Hawkins

  29 June 1988

  Gloucester

  Tewkesbury

  Jeremy Walsh

  29 January 1986

  Guildford

  Dorking

  David Wilcox

  1 February 1986

  Hereford

  Ludlow

  Ian Griggs

  1 August 1987

  Lichfield

  Shrewsbury

  John Davies

  5 February 1987

  Stafford

  Michael Scott-Joynt

  1 September 1987

  Wolverhampton

  Michael Bourke

  29 September 1993

  Lincoln

  Grantham

  William Ind

  23 October 1987

  Grimsby

  David Tustin

  25 January 1979

  Liverpool

  Warrington

  Michael Henshall

  1 February 1976

  London

  Fulham

  John Klyberg

  25 March 1985

  Kensington

  John Hughes

  26 October 1987

  Stepney

  Richard Chartres

  22 May 1992

  Willesden

  Graham Dow

  22 May 1992

  Edmonton

  Brian Masters

  20 December 1984

  Manchester

  Hulme

  Colin Scott

  13 September 1984

  Bolton

  David Bonser

  13 September 1991

  Norwich

  Thetford

  Hugo de Waal

  17 January 1992

  Oxford

  Buckingham

  Simon Burrows

  18 October 1974

  Dorchester

  Anthony Russell

  2 February 1988

  Reading

  John Bone

  4 October 1989

  Peterborough

  Brix worth

  Paul Barber

  25 January 1989

  Ripon

  Knaresborough

  Malcolm Menin

  2 December 1986

  Rochester

  Tonbridge

  Brian Smith

  2 November 1993

  St. Albans

  Hertford

  Robin Smith

  25 January 1990

  St. Edmunds and Ipswich

  Dunwich

  Jonathan Bailey

  3 December 1992

  Salisbury

  Ramsbury

  Peter Vaughan

  21 April 1989

  Sherborne

  John Kirkham

  1 December 1976

  Sheffield

  Doncaster

  Michael Gear

  2 March 1993

  Southwark

  Kingston

  Martin Wharton

  3 November 1992

  Woolwich

  Peter Hall

  29 November 1984

  536
  responsibility for the registration and regulation of the medical profession and it would not be appropriate for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health to intervene in the way that it carries out its responsibilities under the Act or to comment on individual cases in which the council has directed the removal of a doctor's name from the register.

CHURCH COMMISSIONERS

  Suffragan Bishops
  Mr. William Powell
  To ask the right hon. Member for Selby, as representing the Church Commissioners if he will list those suffragan bishops for whose salary the Commissioners are responsible, with their dates of appointment, and such suffragan sees as are currently vacant.

  Mr. Alison
  The suffragan bishops whose stipends the Commissioners are empowered to pay and their dates of appointment are as follows:
  537

  See

  Suffragan See

  Bishop

  Date of appointment

  Croydon

  Wilfred Wood

  25 July 1985

  Southwell

  Sherwood

  Alan Morgan

  1 September 1989

  Truro

  St. Germans

  Graham James

  23 February 1993

  Wakefield

  Pontefract

  John Finney

  14 May 1993

  Winchester

  Southampton

  John Perry

  5 February 1989

  Worcester

  Dudley

  Rupert Hoare

  29 September 1993

  York

  Hull

  Donald Snelgrove

  28 May 1981

  Selby

  Humphrey Taylor

  1 September 1991

  Whitby

  Gordon Bates

  9 June 1983

  Europe

  Europe

  Edward Holland

  22 July 1986

  The following suffragan sees are currently vacant but will be filled by the person named on the date indicated:

  Blackburn

  Burnley

  Martyn Jarrett

  2 February 1994

  Manchester

  Middleton

  Stephen Venner

  2 February 1994

  Norwich

  Lynn

  David Conner

  2 February 1994

  St. Albans

  Bedford

  John Richardson

  23 February 1994

  Winchester

  Basingstoke

  Geoffrey Rowell

  2 February 1994

EDUCATION

  Education Assets Board Recommendations
  Mr. Rooker
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education (1) if he will describe in general terms the nature and use of the premises at each educational establishment where his determination of an Education Assets Board recommendations is awaited;

  (2) how many recommendations from the Education Assets Board are awaiting a decision by his Department; if he will list them; and for how long each of them has been with his Department.

  Mr. Robin Squire
  There are 17 cases awaiting determination by my right hon. Friend. They are:

  Institution

  Date received

  Grant-Maintained Schools

  Abbotswood School, Hampshire

  October 1993

  Arnewood School, Hampshire

  November 1993

  Daitford Grammar School for Girls, Kent

  December 1992

  Epsom and Ewell High School, Surrey

  March 1993

  Great Barr School, Birmingham

  August 1992

  Kingsley Park School, Northamptonshire

  September 1992

  Pate's Grammar School, Gloucestershire

  November 1991

  Reading School, Berkshire

  April 1993

  Ringwood School, Hampshire

  November 1993

  St. George's School, Lincolnshire

  July 1993

  Thamesview School, Kent

  March 1993

  Wilson's School, Sutton

  June 1993

  Wymondham College, Norfolk

  December 1992

  Higher Education Institutions

  Falmouth College of Art and Design

  September 1991

  University of Greenwich

  September 1991

  University of West of England; Bath College of HE

  November 1991

  Further Education Institutions

  Lincolnshire College of Agriculture and Horticulture

  December 19931

  1 Appeal received.

  Note: Under the provisions of the Further and Higher Education Act 1992, the Education Assets Board (EAB) may determine the transfer of property, rights and liabilities in respect of further education institutions where it appears that agreement between the parties is unlikely to be reached. Under the 1992 Act both the institution and local authority have the right of appeal to the Secretary of State against determinations made by the EAB.
  538
  Of the 17 cases being considered by my right hon. Friend, 13 involve the transfer of land and/or property. They are:

  GRANT-MAINTAINED SCHOOLS

  Abbotswood School, Hampshire—A dispute with Hampshire county council concerning the ownership of an area of land which acts as an access road to the school and another of the council's properties.

  Arnewood School, Hampshire—A dispute concerning the ownership of a recreation centre and land used by the school and community.

  Dartford Grammar School for Girls, Kent—A dispute between the school and Kent county council over (i) transfer of an area of playing field, (ii) pedestrian rights of access and (iii) transfer of a further area of land.

  Great Barr School, Birmingham—A dispute between the school and Birmingham county council over the ownership of an adjacent sports hall and an area of playing field which is used by both the school and the local community.

  Kingsley Park School, Northamptonshire—A dispute between the school and Northamptonshire county council over the transfer of a gymnasium block in a building on the school site which is also used by another of the Authority's schools.

  Pate's Grammar School, Gloucestershire—A dispute between the school and Gloucestershire county council over the transfer of the site of a former secondary school which had been leased to Pate's grammar school whilst major building work was carried out on their own school site.

  Ringwood School, Hampshire—A dispute concerning the ownership of a recreation centre and land used by the school and community.

  St. George's School, Lincolnshire—The dispute with Lincolnshire county council concerns the ownership of a property the school shares with the county's adult education and library services and an area of land which is also used by a local scout group.

  Thamesview School, Kent—A dispute between the school and Kent county council concerning the transfer of a house occupied by a teacher at the school.

  Wilson's School, London Borough of Sutton—This dispute concerns the authority's refusal to sign documents transferring ownership of property to the school pending clarification of the authority's continued use of a swimming pool owned by the school's Trustees.

  HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTIONS

  Greenwich—A dispute between the London borough of Wandsworth, which inherited ILEA's education responsibilities in the area, and Thames polytechnic (now the university of

  539
  Greenwich) over the transfer of the freehold of property known as Manresa house, and the grounds surrounding this property. Wandsworth use part of Manresa house for adult education.

  Falmouth School of Art and Design—A dispute between Cornwall county council and Falmouth school of art and design over the transfer of properties in Falmouth and Camborne, used by the school.

  FURTHER EDUCATION INSTITUTIONS

  Lincolnshire College of Agriculture and Horticulture—This appeal case concerns the Education Assets Board's determination that ownership of a veterinary investigation centre which was used prior to 1 April 1993 under a lease between Lincolnshire county council and the Minister of Public Buildings and Works should transfer to the college.

  Student Awards
  Mr. Robert Ainsworth
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to his answer of 11 January 1994,Official Report, column 72, if he will publish in the Official Report the comparable figures on the percentage of dependent students receiving full and nil maintenance given in the "Statistics of Education Student Awards" volume for 1988–89 to 1990–91; and what is the reason for the differences between those figures and the data given in his previous answer.

  Mr. Boswell
  Figures on the percentage of dependent students receiving full and nil maintenance published in the Statistics of Education Student Awards Volume show scale 1 and scale 2 contributions as follows:

  Percentage of dependent students receiving full and nil maintenance in England and Wales.

  1988–89

  1989–90

  1990–911

  Scale 1

  full maintenance

  28·8

  27·3

  27·5

  nil maintenance

  30·7

  33·0

  32·4

  Scale 2

  full maintenance

  29·6

  27·4

  27·0

  nil maintenance

  23·1

  25·8

  28·3

  1 Calculated from subset of LEAs able to provide data.

  The figures given in the reply of 11 January, Official Report, column 72 differed from these in that they represented the combination of the two scales.

  Education Costs
  Mr. Redmond
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education what plans he has to issue vouchers to parents to pay towards education costs.

  Mr. Robin Squire
  We have no present plans to do so.

  Higher National Diploma Courses
  Mrs. Dunwoody
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education if he will make it his policy to ensure that students who are entitled to a mandatory grant for a higher national diploma course are allowed to continue to receive that grant for a degree at another institution while continuing to study the same subject.

  Mr. Boswell
  A student who has already received a mandatory award for an HND course and who goes on to study for a first degree will normally be eligible for a further, modified mandatory award for the final year or 540
  years of a designated first degree course, depending upon its duration. Local education authorities can make discretionary payments in respect of any other year. It is for individual institutions to decide whether to give exemption from any part of the course to students enrolling on a first degree course who have already completed an HND in the same subject.

  Further Education
  Mr. Redmond
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education how many(a) 16-year-olds and (b) 17-year-olds in the Doncaster area continued in full-time education in each year since 1988.

  Mr. Boswell
  The numbers of 16 and 17-year-olds in the Doncaster LEA continuing in full-time education in each year since 1988 are shown in the table.

  16 and 17-year-olds in full-time education in the Doncaster LEA Area Age as at 31 August at the start of the academic year

  1988–89

  1989–90

  1990–91

  1991–92

  16 Year Olds

  1,824

  1,873

  1,934

  1,987

  17 Year Olds

  1,280

  1,278

  1,332

  1,444

  Pupil Numbers
  Mr. Robert Banks
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education how many schools in England have fewer than 20 pupils.

  Mr. Robin Squire
  In January 1993, 200 schools in England had fewer than 20 full-time equivalent pupils.

  Data Protection
  Mr. Cohen
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education whether he will make arrangements for the Data Protection Registrar to inspect relevant contracts with suppliers of IT services that involve the use of personal data held by his Department in order to check whether all appropriate arrangements in relation to the Data Protection Act 1984 have been made, and whether such contracts make provisions for the Registrar to make random inspections in order to check the suppliers' compliance with the eighth data protection principle.

  Mr. Boswell
  The Data Protection Registrar has a wide range of powers, under the Data Protection Act 1984, to ensure that all individuals and organisations holding personal data on computer systems are registered and observe the data protection principles as required by the Act. When IT services are contracted out by a data user, the contractor and the user will be subject to the application of the data protection principles, and to the registrar's powers to promote compliance with them, as provided for in the Act. It is for the registrar to decide how he will use his powers under the Act, and I do not consider that any further arrangements are necessary for him to discharge his duties effectively.

  Schools, Wandsworth
  Mr. Spearing
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to the oral answer to the hon. Member for Edinburgh, Leith (Mr. Chisholm) of 14 December 1993,Official Report, column 825, how many children at

  541
  the latest available date in the borough of Wandsworth were (a) in attendance in nursery classes or nursery schools, (b) in reception classes in primary schools under school starting age and (c) in other pre-school groups; how many (i) qualified nursery teachers, (ii) qualified nursery nurses and (iii) other qualified or non-qualified teachers and nurses, were employed in the borough on nursery education at the latest available date; and what is the latest estimate of the number of children aged three and four years currently resident in that borough.

  Mr. Robin Squire
  In Wandsworth, in January 1993 —the latest date for which information on schools is available—there were nearly 2,400 pupils below compulsory school age in maintained nursery schools and nursery classes in maintained primary schools. A further 1,700 pupils below compulsory school age were in infant classes in maintained primary schools. Information on reception classes only is not collected centrally.

  The maintained nursery schools and nursery classes were staffed by 71 full-time equivalent teachers, of whom two were unqualified 75 full-time equivalent qualified nursery assistants and a further 26 full-time equivalent unqualified nursery assistants and other education support staff.

  As regards other pre-school groups, we are informed by the Pre-school Playgroups Association that their member playgroups in Wandsworth had nearly 400 three and four-year-olds in attendance in mid-1992, the latest date for which such information is available. Information on other forms of pre-school group provision, such as day nurseries, is the responsibility of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health. Information on nursery classes in independent or special schools is not collected centrally.

  In January 1993, the estimated three and four-year-old population in Wandsworth was just over 6,000. I should perhaps add that Wandsworth now has a policy of offering a nursery class place to all parents who want one for the year before entering compulsory education. This policy is not yet fully reflected in the figures available.

  University Expenditure
  Mrs. Ewing
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education (1) what amount of university student fees was paid by Her Majesty's Government in the academic years 1990–91, 1991–92 and 1992–93; what is the expected level of expenditure for 1993–94 and 1994–95; and how much was spent per registered student in each of the years;

  (2) what was the level of Government expenditure on student grants in (a) higher and (b) further education in the academic years 1990–91, 1991–92 and 1992–93; what are the expected levels of expenditure for 1993–94 and 1994–95; and how much was spent per registered student in each of the years.

  Mr. Boswell
  My right hon. Friend pays 100 per cent. specific grant to local education authorities—LEAs—in England and Wales in respect of their expenditure on mandatory awards in respect of students who are domiciled in their areas. Mandatory awards, which cover both maintenance grants and fees, are available to eligible students attending full-time or sandwich courses provided by institutions including universities in the United Kingdom and leading to a first degree or comparable qualification, or to a diploma in higher education or the 542
  higher national diploma. They are also available for full-time and part-time courses of initial teacher training. Mandatory awards are not availble for further education courses. LEAs may give discretionary awards to students on such courses and to students who are personally ineligible for a mandatory award but must meet the expenditure themselves.

  Departmental records of expenditure and plans relate to financial years. It is not possible to distinguish expenditure on fees to universities from fees for other higher education institutions. The actual expenditure on mandatory awards and the average expenditure per award holder in the financial years 1990–91 to 1992–93 are shown in the table. The table also shows the total announced expenditure for 1993–94 and 1994–95.

  My right hon. Friends the Secretaries of State for Scotland and for Northern Ireland are responsible for Government expenditure on support for students domiciled in Scotland and Northern Ireland respectively. The table therefore relates to expenditure in England and Wales only.

  Total Expenditure

  Average per Student1

  Fees £ million

  Maintenance £ million

  Fees £

  Maintenance £

  1990–91

  593

  701

  1,228

  1,451

  1991–92

  1,172

  813

  2,178

  1,511

  1992–93

  1,559

  985

  2,467

  1,559

  21993–94

  1,534

  1,098

  31994–95

  1,171

  1,145

  1 Average per award holder.

  2 Announced expenditure including Winter Supplementary Estimate.

  3 Planned.

  Student Loans Company
  Mrs. Ewing
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education how much has been spent on the administration of the Student Loans Company ; how many people are employed by the company; and how many cases of non-repayment have been legally pursued under(a) Scottish law and (b) English and Welsh law.

  Mr. Boswell
  These are matters for the Student Loans Company. I have asked the chief executive to write to the hon. Member.

  Local Education Authorities
  Mr. Byers
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education what was the pupil to teacher ratio as at January 1993 for each local education authority in(a) the primary sector, (b) the secondary sector and (c) overall.

  Mr. Robin Squire
  The information requested is shown in the table.

  Pupil teacher ratios in maintained primary and secondary schools and overall in each local education authority in England

  Primary (including self-governing (GM) schools) (1)

  Secondary (including self-governing (GM) schools (1)

  Overall maintained nursery, primary and secondary schools (2)

  Corporation of London

  15·2

  n/a

  13·9

  Camden

  20·8

  15·6

  16·4

  Greenwich

  20·4

  16·7

  16·6

  Hackney

  19·9

  14·6

  15·1

  543

  Primary (including self-governing (CM) schools) (1)

  Secondary (including self-governing (GM) schools (1)

  Overall maintained nursery, primary and secondary schools (2)

  Hammersmith and Fulham

  19·8

  15·1

  14·4

  Islington

  19·8

  15·0

  14·1

  Kensington and Chelsea

  17·6

  13·3

  14·5

  Lambeth

  19·4

  15·5

  15·9

  Lewisham

  21·1

  16·5

  17·2

  Southwark

  21·6

  16·9

  17·3

  Tower Hamlets

  17·8

  14·0

  14·2

  Wandsworth

  19·9

  14·7

  15·0

  Westminster

  17·2

  14·5

  13·7

  Barking and Dagenham

  22·1

  17·0

  18·0

  Barnet

  21·1

  15·0

  16·1

  Beley

  23·4

  16·7

  18·5

  Brent

  21·6

  15·3

  16·6

  Bromley

  23·3

  16·3

  17·8

  Croydon

  21·5

  16·0

  17·5

  Ealing

  20·7

  15·3

  17·5

  Enfield

  21·3

  16·3

  17·1

  Haringey

  20·8

  14·5

  17·1

  Harrow

  21·3

  15·7

  17·1

  Havering

  22·8

  16·4

  17·4

  Hillingdon

  22·0

  15·8

  17·5

  Hounslow

  20·5

  16·4

  17·2

  Kingston upon Thames

  22·5

  15·8

  16·5

  Merton

  19·6

  15·5

  16·5

  Newham

  24·1

  16·6

  19·1

  Redbridge

  23·0

  17·2

  18·0

  Richmond upon Thames

  20·3

  16·5

  16·8

  Sutton

  23·4

  16·8

  18·3

  Waltham Forest

  22·2

  15·2

  16·5

  Birmingham

  23·6

  16·3

  18·0

  Coventry

  22·3

  15·1

  17·2

  Dudley

  20·9

  15·3

  16·8

  Sandwell

  22·0

  15·5

  16·4

  Solihull

  23·1

  16·1

  18·0

  Walsall

  22·6

  16·0

  17·7

  Wolverhampton

  21·0

  14·9

  16·1

  Knowsley

  23·0

  16·5

  19·5

  Liverpool

  23·5

  15·7

  18·6

  St. Helens

  22·2

  15·2

  17·4

  Sefton

  23·2

  16·3

  18·0

  Wirral

  22·3

  15·9

  17·5

  Bolton

  22·0

  15·1

  17·1

  Bury

  22·9

  16·5

  18·5

  Manchester

  21·9

  14·6

  17·2

  Oldham

  22·9

  15·0

  17·8

  Rochdale

  24·1

  16·3

  18·1

  Salford

  23·4

  15·5

  17·9

  Stockport

  23·5

  15·8

  18·3

  Tameside

  24·0

  16·3

  17·8

  Trafford

  23·9

  15·9

  18·9

  Wigan

  22·3

  15·2

  16·0

  Barnsley

  23·9

  17·0

  19·1

  Doncaster

  22·8

  16·0

  17·8

  Rotherham

  21·3

  15·2

  17·9

  Sheffield

  22·5

  16·1

  17·6

  Bradford

  20·7

  17·1

  16·7

  Calderdale

  23·3

  16·0

  17·5

  Kirklees

  21·3

  15·6

  16·7

  Leeds

  22·0

  16·0

  17·5

  Wakefield

  22·6

  15·9

  17·7

  Gateshead

  21·2

  15·6

  17·0

  Newcastle upon Tyne

  22·4

  15·7

  17·3

  North Tyneside

  22·3

  16·0

  17·2

  South Tyneside

  22·6

  17·1

  18·3

  Sunderland

  22·1

  15·9

  18·0

  Isles of Scilly

  14·9

  7·4

  10·1

  Avon

  22·7

  16·2

  17·4

  Bedfordshire

  21·7

  17·1

  17·1

  Berkshire

  22·8

  16·0

  17·3

  Buckinghamshire

  22·8

  16·6

  18·3

  Cambridgeshire

  23·0

  16·5

  17·6

  Cheshire

  23·9

  16·6

  18·8

  544

  Primary (including self·governing (GM) schools) (1)

  Secondary (including self·governing (GM) schools (1)

  Overall maintained nursery, primary and secondary schools (2)

  Cleveland

  23·5

  15·7

  18·1

  Cornwall

  23·4

  1·68

  18·7

  Cumbria

  22·3

  15·3

  17·3

  Derbyshire

  22·9

  15·4

  16·9

  Devon

  22·8

  16·1

  18·8

  Dorset

  23·2

  17·0

  18·9

  Durham

  22·7

  16·3

  17·5

  East Sussex

  22·3

  15·9

  17·2

  Essex

  23·1

  16·9

  18·3

  Gloucestershire

  21·9

  17·1

  18·5

  Hampshire

  21·9

  16·1

  17·9

  Hereford and Worcester

  21·8

  16·8

  17·6

  Hertfordshire

  22·1

  15·7

  17·7

  Humberside

  23·1

  16·3

  18·0

  Isle of Wight

  22·1

  17·1

  17·5

  Kent

  23·9

  17·0

  18·7

  Lancashire

  22·8

  15·9

  17·7

  Leicestershire

  22·5

  15·8

  18·4

  Lincolnshire

  23·1

  15·8

  17·7

  Norfolk

  21·8

  15·6

  17·6

  North Yorkshire

  22·6

  15·7

  17·0

  Northamptonshire

  22·6

  16·6

  17·1

  Northumberland

  23·8

  17·8

  18·4

  Nottinghamshire

  22·6

  15·7

  17·5

  Oxfordshire

  21·6

  16·7

  17·4

  Shropshire

  22·0

  15·3

  17·2

  Somerset

  22·5

  16·3

  17·6

  Staffordshire

  24·7

  16·9

  19·2

  Suffolk

  21·4

  16·1

  16·9

  Surrey

  21·7

  15·8

  17·9

  Warwickshire

  22·3

  16·2

  17·7

  West Sussex

  22·1

  16·4

  17·5

  Wiltshire

  22·6

  16·3

  17·5

  England

  22·4

  16·1

  17·7

  Note:

  1. Excluding all unqualified teachers and teachers providing short-term cover as well as teachers absent for a term or more but including the latter's qualified replacements, if any.

  2. Including qualified teachers (including those not in schools and teachers providing short-term cover), student teachers, instructors and licensed teachers employed by local education authorities and self-governing (GM) schools.

  Primary School Classes
  Mr. Byers
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education what was the average size of maintained primary school classes taught by one teacher in January.

  Mr. Robin Squire
  In January 1993—the latest date for which information is available—the average size of single teacher classes in maintained primary schools in England was 26·6.

  Quangos
  Mr. Don Foster
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education if he will list the grants given to quasi-autonomous non-governmental organisations by his Department in each year from 1985.

  Mr. Boswell
  The grants given to the executive non-departmental public bodies sponsored by the Department are listed in the table. Those made to the research councils and to the Sports Council, formerly sponsored by the then Department of Education and
  545
  Science and now by the Office of Public Service and

  1985–86 £ million

  1986–87 Cash

  1987–88

  1988–89

  1989–90

  1990–91

  1991–92

  1992–93 Outturn

  1993–94 Estimate

  Business and Technology Education Council1

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Central Bureau for Educational Visits and Exchanges2

  1·831

  1·731

  1·760

  1·813

  2·184

  3·021

  3·498

  3·848

  4·084

  Centre for Information on Language Teaching and Research

  0·359

  0·369

  0·395

  0·383

  0·472

  0·535

  0·652

  0·949

  0·807

  Council for Educational Technology (United Kingdom)

  0·758

  0·998

  0·870

  Merged April 1988 to form National Council for Educational Technology

  Micro-Electronics in Education Support Unit

  —

  2·791

  3·075

  National Council for Educational Technology3

  —

  —

  —

  4·729

  4·227

  4·660

  4·961

  5·658

  4·946

  Council for National Academic Awards4

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  Further Education Unit

  3·495

  3·359

  3·038

  3·525

  2·486

  3·871

  3·129

  3·545

  5—

  National Youth Bureau

  0·483

  0·478

  0·490

  6—

  0·557

  0·571

  7—

  7—

  7—

  National Youth Agency

  8—

  8—

  8—

  8—

  8—

  8—

  1·840

  1·495

  1·706

  Education Assets Board3

  —

  —

  —

  0·770

  0·642

  0·552

  0·500

  0·858

  2·694

  School Curriculum and Development Council

  1·053

  1·140

  1·340

  Wound up August 1988. Replaced by School Examinations and Assessment Council and National Curriculum Council

  School Examinations Council

  2·341

  2·484

  2·339

  School Examinations and Assessment Council

  Established 1988 Wound up 1993

  3·681

  5·250

  7·730

  10·532

  12·383

  10·427

  National Curriculum Council

  5·338

  7·345

  7·340

  7·698

  8·135

  6·400

  School Curriculum and Assessment Authority9

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  3·600

  Teaching as a Career Unit3

  —

  —

  0·513

  0·934

  0·954

  1·487

  1·402

  1·407

  1·182

  Polytechnics and Colleges Funding Council10

  —

  —

  —

  —

  1,113·603

  1,104·255

  993·158

  1,034·601

  —

  Universities Funding Council11

  —

  —

  —

  —

  1,851·661

  1,836·708

  1,782·142

  1,806·426

  —

  Higher Education Funding Council for England 12

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  130·500

  2,806·458

  Further Education Funding Council12

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  1324·417

  2,552·911

  Funding Agency for Schools14

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  —

  132·000

  1 Nil (self-funded body). Became wholly independent and ceased to be NDPB sponsored by Department of Further Education October 1993.

  2 Merged with British Council December 1993. Henceforth sponsored by Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

  3 Established 1988.

  4 Nil (self-funded body). Wound up March 1993.

  5 Subsumed in Further Education Funding Council grant.

  6 Not separately available.

  7 Wound up 1991 and replaced by National Youth Agency.

  8 Established April 1991 incorporating National Youth Bureau and Council for Education and Training in Community Work.

  9 Established October 1993.

  10 Up to April 1989 polytechnics funded by local authorities. Polytechnics and Colleges Funding Council established April 1989, wound up March 1993.

  11 Up to April 1989 grants to universities distributed on advice of University Grants Committee. Universities Funding Council established April 1989, wound up March 1993.

  12 Established April 1993.

  13 Preparatory costs.

  14 To be established April 1994.

  546
  Science and the Department of National Heritage respectively, are published in the appropriation accounts, copies of which are in the Library.
  547

  Home Students
  Mr. Don Foster
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education how many full-time home students in the United Kingdom are over the age of 50 years.

  Mr. Boswell
  In the academic year 1992–93, there were 5,400 full-time, home-domiciled higher education students aged 51 and over in the United Kingdom.

EMPLOYMENT

  Fast Food Industry (Wages)
  Mr. Corbyn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what monitoring is undertaken by his Department of wage levels in the fast food industry.

  Mr. David Hunt
  Information on earnings of workers in catering, including the fast food industry, is collected as part of the new earnings survey.

  Railway Engineering Industry
  Mr. Gunnell
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what is his estimate of the jobs lost in the railway engineering industry since April 1992; and how many of those losses have occurred in Yorkshire and Humberside.

  Miss Widdecombe
  Information is not available in the form requested.

  Departmental Efficiency
  Mr. Thurnham
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what steps he is taking to improve the efficiency of his Department.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  We have embarked on a programme of market tests. Early results are good news for the taxpayer, with savings of 52 per cent. on typing services, 33 per cent. on reprographic services and 42 per cent. on security services.

  Industrial Relations
  Mr. Dunn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment if he will make a statement on industrial relations in the United Kingdom.

  Mr. David Hunt
  Thanks to this Government's reforms of industrial relations and trade union law, the number of strikes is the lowest for over a century.

  Health and Safety Executive (Grant Aid)
  Mr. Flynn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what assessment he has made as to the effect of the proposed cut in grant aid to the Health and Safety Executive on charges to industry.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  I refer the hon. Member to my earlier reply to the hon. Members for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Kilfoyle) and for Leeds, East (Mr. Mudie).

  Statutory Minimum Wage
  Mr. Whittingdale
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what assessment he has made of the effects on employment levels of a statutory minimum wage; and if he will make a statement.
  548
  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  The introduction of a statutory national minimum wage of the kind proposed by the Labour party makes economic nonsense. It could cost up to 2 million jobs and would irreversibly damage the labour market.

  The Government's policies are designed to create the conditions for an effective and flexible labour market.

  Employment, Warwickshire
  Mr. Pawsey
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what are the current levels of employment in Warwickshire; and what they were in 1983 and 1987.

  Miss Widdecombe
  Information by county as opposed to regions is only available from the periodic censuses of employment. Employment in Warwickshire rose from 176,900 in September 1984 to 180,700 in September 1987, and to 186,600 in September 1991.

  Industrial Relations
  Mr. Jacques Arnold
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment if he will make a statement on the recent record on strikes.

  Mr. David Hunt
  In 1979 the United Kingdom lost 1,270 working days per thousand employees; in 1992 we lost 24.

  Employment (Construction)
  Mr. Chisholm
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment how many construction jobs have been lost since the beginning of 1990.

  Miss Widdecombe
  The information is not available in the exact form requested but between March 1990 and September 1993 employment in the construction industry in Great Britain fell by 424,000.

  Statutory Working Week
  Mr. Spring
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what estimates he has made about the cost to United Kingdom industry of a statutory 35-hour limit on the working week.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  A compulsory 35-hour weekly limit would cost United Kingdom industry up to £20,000 million. It would be disastrous for competitiveness, jobs and the economic recovery.

  Youth Training
  Mr. Michael
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what special measures he plans to offer training and employment opportunities to young people in local communities with particularly high rates of unemployment.

  Miss Widdecombe
  Unemployment need not be an option for young people because this Government guarantee a training place for 16 and 17-year-olds who have left full-time education and do not yet have a job.

  Our plans also include the introduction of modern apprenticeships offering young people high quality work-based training leading to higher level qualifications.

  If employers respond, as we hope they will, modern apprenticeships will treble to over 40,000 a year the

  549
  number of young people who qualify at national vocational qualification level 3 or above through our programmes in England.

  Dr. Lynne Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment if he will make a statement on the effectiveness of youth training.

  Miss Widdecombe
  Since 1983, over 3½ million young people have benefited from high quality vocational training by participating in youth training and its predecessors. The increasing availability of youth credits and the introduction of modern apprenticeships will encourage even more young people to train, and to higher levels.

  Building Sites (Accidents)
  Mr. Bennett
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment how many accidents occured on building sites in each of the last five years for which figures are available.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  Provisional figures for the most recent year available, 1992–93, show that 15,885 injuries, including those to members of the public, arose from accidents in the construction industry reported to the relevant enforcing authorities. This is lower than for the previous four years 1988–89 to 1991–92 at 21,509, 22,872, 22,337, and 19,772 respectively.

  Employment Service
  Mr. Bates
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment how many people in the north of England have been placed in work by the Employment Service in the last 12 months.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  A total of 79,600 job placings were made by the Employment Service in the north of England in the 12 month period ending 3 December 1993. More than 70,000 of these placings were of unemployed people. Over 19,000 were people unemployed more than six months, and 2,200 were unemployed people with disabilities.

  Apprenticeships
  Mr. Barry Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what is his estimate of the current number of apprenticeships in England and Wales; and if he will make a statement.

  Miss Widdecombe
  Estimates from the labour force survey suggest that in summer 1993, nearly 190,000 people were undertaking some form of trade apprenticeship in England and Wales.

  Health and Safety
  Mr. Burden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what is the change in the number of health and safety inspectors over the last year.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  Over the 12 months to 1 December 1993, the number of health and safety inspectors employed by the Health and Safety Executive has increased by 70 from 1,533 to 1,603.
  550

  Data Protection
  Mr. Cohen
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment whether he will make arrangements for the Data Protection Registrar to inspect relevant contracts with suppliers of IT services that involve the use of personal data held by his Department in order to check whether all appropriate arrangements in relation to the Data Protection Act 1984 have been made, and whether such contracts make provisions for the registrar to make random inspections in order to check the suppliers' compliance with the eighth data protection principle.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  Under the Data Protection Act 1984, the Data Protection Registrar has a wide range of powers to ensure that all individuals and organisations holding personal data on computer systems are registered and observe the data protection principles as required by the Act.

  The Department is committed to observing the data protection principles when it obtains and processes personal data. Where the Department contracts with a third party for the processing of personal data, the contracts stipulate that the Act must be complied with.

  The registrar's powers to promote compliance with the principles apply to both the owner of the personal data and the service provider. It is for the registrar to decide how he will use his powers under the Act. Further arrangements for him to discharge his duties effectively are not considered to be necessary.

  Access to Work
  Mr. Miller
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what support will be available to a disabled person whose employer refused to contribute as proposed under the access to work scheme.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  In reaching final decisions about the details of the access to work scheme, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and my noble Friend Lord Henley are considering carefully a range of representations made by disability and employer groups, including representations about the proposed employer contribution. My right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State hopes to announce decisions soon.

  Girocheques
  Mr. Redmond
  To ask the Secretary of State for 3Employment (1) what irregularities there have been in the delivery of unemployment benefit girocheques in the Doncaster area during the past four months; and if he will make a statement;

  (2) by what method unemployment benefit girocheques are currently delivered to the Doncaster area.

  Mr. Forsyth
  Responsibility for the subject of the question has been delegated to the Employment Service Agency under its chief executive. I have asked him to arrange for a reply to be given.

  Letter from M. E. G. Fogden to Mr. Martin Redmond, dated 18 January 1994:

  The Secretary of State has asked me to reply to your questions about the method by which unemployment benefit girocheques are delivered to the Doncaster area and what irregularities have occurred in their delivery over the last four months.
  551
  It may be helpful if I explain that the Employment Service (ES) is in the process of updating it's benefit payments computer system. The National Unemployment Benefit Computer (NUBS 1) has been in operation since the mid eighties. We are currently replacing it with NUBS 2; this process will be complete by the end of September 1994.

  For people on Training for Work, Learning for Work and Community Action, payments are made by a different system, the Employment Service Payments system (ESP).

  NUBS 1 girocheques are processed at Reading, and NUBS 2/ESP at Washington, Tyne and Wear. The Royal Mail service for each of these is different.

  It is the objective of the ES to achieve delivery of a girocheque to clients within three working days of attending the local office to make the declaration which generates a payment. Clients are given this information in writing when they first attend to claim benefit.

  Under NUBS 1 girocheques are produced in postcode order and are sorted on the Reading site by Royal Mail staff. They are then transported by rail, road or air depending on the destination. Many of the destinations are served by "direct bags" which go directly to the local Royal Mail delivery office.

  The NUBS 2 girocheques are postcode sorted at the point of despatch (Washington) and delivered direct to the Royal Mail delivery offices via Royal Mail Streamline courier service. This ensures that bags containing the girocheques do not enter the Royal Mail system until the bags reach the destination town and it is only then that they are opened.

  ESP girocheques are sent direct to clients from Washington via the normal First Class post. To support the use of First Class post, offices are loaded onto the Area Computer Centre closest to their own locality.

  Close liaison is maintained between NUBS/ESP management teams and their Royal Mail counterparts to ensure that delivery systems support the ES business objectives and, where problems occur, remedial action is urgently introduced.

  During the last four months there have been 15 delays in the receipt of girocheques reported in Doncaster. Eleven of these were ESP payments and four were NUBS 2. In each case the girocheque was delivered within three days. It appears that clients have reported non receipt after two days as a delay.

  At Mexborough, there have been nine reported delays in receipt of NUBS 1 giros since September 1993. All of these were caused by split responsibility for Mexborough postcodes between Rotherham and Sheffield sorting offices. It has now been arranged for Royal Mail staff at Reading to perform a more precise identification of mail to ensure that it goes to the correct sorting office in future. Again it is confirmed that none of the delays exceeded three days between signing and receipt.

  I hope this is helpful.

  Paternity Leave
  Mr. Harry Greenway
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what plans he has to arrange paternity leave for fathers upon the birth of a baby to their wife; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  None. Matters such as this are best dealt with by agreement between the parties concerned, taking account of their particular circum-stances.

  Labour Statistics
  Sir Michael Neubert
  To ask the Secretary of State for employment how many people in the United Kingdom are in work, as a percentage of the total population of working age; and what information he has as to the figure in each other EC country.

  Miss Widdecombe
  The available information is as follows:552

  Total employment as a percentage of the population aged 15 to 64; 19911

  Per cent.

  Denmark

  76

  Portugal

  71

  United Kingdom

  69

  Germany

  65

  Netherlands

  63

  Luxembourg

  61

  France

  60

  Belgium

  57

  Italy

  56

  Greece

  55

  Ireland

  52

  Spain

  49

  Source: OECD, except United Kingdom (Employment Department).

  1 1991 is the latest year for which comparable data are available.

  Poly Aluminium Chloride
  Mr. Mackinlay
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what regulations exist laying down safety standards for the production and handling of poly aluminium chloride and aluminium chlorohydrate.

  Mr. Michael Forsyth
  The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1992 require employers to make appropriate arrangements to control risks to the health and safety of their employees whilst they are at work. In addition, where there are specific risks from the production, handling or other use of chemical substances, the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 1988—COSHH—will apply. These include requirements for exposure to these compounds to be prevented or, where this is not reasonably practicable, adequately controlled.

  Industrial Relations
  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what guidelines he has issued to large companies concerning their responsibilities under the provisions of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992.

  Miss Widdecombe
  The statutory procedure for handling redundancies, originally enacted in the Employment Protection Act 1975, was incorporated into the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidated) Act in October 1992. The provisions are explained in the Employment Department's leaflet "Redundancy Consultation and Notification". Information and advice is also available from the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (ACAS).

  Memory Lane Cakes, Cardiff
  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Employment (1) what representations he has received concerning the announced redundancies at Memory Lane Cakes, Maesycoed road, Cardiff;

  (2) what notification he received from Memory Lane Cakes, Maesycoed road, Cardiff, under the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992, concerning redundancies over the Christmas and new year period.

  Miss Widdecombe
  Information given to the Department under the redundancy handling provisions is provided in confidence.
  553

SOCIAL SECURITY

  Data Protection
  Mr. Cohen
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security whether he will make arrangements for the Data Protection Registrar to inspect relevant contracts with suppliers of information technology services that involve the use of personal data held by his Department in order to check whether all appropriate arrangements in relation to the Data Protection Act 1984 have been made, and whether such contracts make provisions for the registrar to make random inspections in order to check the suppliers' compliance with the eighth data protection principle.

  Mr. Scott
  The Data Protection Registrar has a wide range of powers, under the Data Protection Act 1984, to ensure that all individuals and organisations holding personal data on computer systems are registered and observe the data protection principles as required by the Act. When IT services are contracted out by a data user, the contractor and the user will be subject to the application of the data protection principles, and to the registrar's powers to promote compliance with them, as provided for in the Act. It is for the registrar to decide how he will use his powers under the Act, and I do not consider that any further arrangements are necessary for him to discharge his duties effectively.

  Child Support Agency
  Mr. Spellar
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what was the level of benefit savings achieved in 1992–93 when the child support unit was acting as a shadow agency taking responsibility for the collection of existing child maintenance.

  Mr. Burt
  The child support unit achieved benefit savings of £313 million.

  Mr. Spellar
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how the Child Support Agency takes into consideration for housing expenditure loans which have been taken out in order to provide handicapped accommodation.

  Mr. Burt
  Where a loan is taken out to purchase a property, the interest and capital repayments are taken into account in calculating the parent's essential expenditure. If the parent or his partner is disabled, there is no upper limit to the amount allowed. The costs of a loan are also allowed where it is taken out for improvements to a property which a child support officer considers reasonable in the circumstances.

  Mr. Spellar
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what consideration has been given to introducing a level of disregard of income from invalidity benefit and disabled living allowance for Child Support Agency assessments.

  Mr. Burt
  Disability living allowance, which recognises the special care and mobility needs of disabled people, is disregarded in full in the assessment of child maintenance. Invalidity benefit, which is payable to people who have been incapable of work for more than 28 weeks through illness, is taken into account in the same way as net earnings would be if the parent were working.
  554
  Our proposed increase in the "protected income" provided for in the assessment of child support maintenance liability means that an absent parent whose only source of income is invalidity benefit will not be required to pay maintenance.

  Mr. Mudie
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many copies of "The Proposed Changes to Child Support Maintenance" were published; when they were printed; and at what cost.

  Mr. Burt
  Five hundred thousand copies of "The Proposed Changes to Child Support Maintenance" were published. These were printed at the beginning of January at a total cost of £21,691—zero VAT.

  Students (Council Tax)
  Mrs. Anne Campbell
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will estimate the annual cost of making students eligible for council tax benefit.

  Mr. Burt
  The vast majority of students are not liable for council tax because they live in student-only accommodation, such as halls of residence, which is exempt for council tax purposes. Only a minority of students will be liable for council tax where they share accommodation with people who are not also students. Many of them are currently able to claim help through council tax benefit if they are vulnerable students, for example, lone parents and disabled students, or part-time students. Council tax benefit can also be claimed by the partners of students and any liable student may claim second adult rebates if he or she satisfies the normal conditions of entitlement.

  No information is held about the number of students who are liable for council tax but are not eligible to claim council tax benefit and it is not possible, therefore, to estimate the additional cost of allowing all students access to council tax benefit.

  Year of Older People
  Mr. Bowden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what contribution his Department made to the European Year of Older People and Solidarity between Generations in terms of financial support, practical support for particular events and the provision of information.

  Mr. Hague
  We have worked closely with the Department of Health, which had overall co-ordinating responsibility for the year. We provided a total of £79,000 to support the funding for the year, together with an officer on secondment to the secretariat at an approximate cost of £11,000. Officials have sat as members of both the European Community and the United Kingdon advisory committees to oversee the varied programme of events. The Benefits Agency produced a new client group leaflet to inform older pensioners and their carers of their benefits rights as part of its continuing improved customer care provisions for older people and, working with the voluntary sector, organised a co-ordinated programme of information activities nationwide.
  555

  Disability
  Mr. Sheerman
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what steps he is taking to ensure that moneys, not taken up by applications to the independent living fund 1993 in the current financial year, will still be earmarked for the living expenses of severely disabled people.

  Mr. Scott
  The independent living—1993—fund receives a grant in aid from the Department of Social Security and the Department of Health and Social Services in Northern Ireland.

  Payments to the fund are made on a monthly basis according to the most recent estimates of its present and future commitments.

  Normal Government accounting rules apply to any unallocated provision.

  Mr. Redmond
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many people are in receipt of each component of(a) disability living allowance and (b) attendance allowance in the Doncaster area.

  Mr. Scott
  The information is not readily available and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.

  Benefit Administration
  Mr. Redmond
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what assessment he has made of the administration from Northern Ireland of Department of Social Security benefits to Doncaster; if this procedure is currently under review; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Burt
  No social security benefits for people in Doncaster are administered from Northern Ireland.

  Retirement Pensioners
  Mr. Bowden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what is his best estimate of the number of people who draw their state retirement pension while continuing to work.

  Mr. Hague
  it is estimated that approximately 663,000 people in the United Kingdom receiving state retirement pension also have income from earnings.

  Source: 1990 and 1991 family expenditure surveys.

  Mr. Bowden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will estimate the number of pensioners who will not receive the full 50p and 70p increases in the pension in compensation for VAT on fuel because they neither qualify for a full state pension nor claim income-related benefits.

  Mr. Hague
  The information is not available in the form requested.

  Housing Benefit expenditure and recipients

  Ealing

  London

  England

  Expenditure £ millions

  Cases 000s

  Expenditure £ millions

  Cases 000s

  Expenditure £ millions

  Cases 000s

  1988–89

  24

  16

  683

  553

  3,099

  3,228

  1989–90

  36

  18

  821

  524

  3,518

  3,122

  1990–91

  42

  19

  1,062

  553

  4,269

  3,214

  1991–92

  69

  17

  1,468

  595

  5,418

  3,368

  Notes:

  Expenditure figures have been rounded to the nearest million.

  Caseload figures are averages and rounded to the nearest thousand. They also include estimates for non-responding authorities.

  Information is supplied for rent rebate and rent allowance cases only—rate rebate cases are excluded from the figures for 1988–89 and 1989–90.
  556
  At 31 March 1993, 937,610 retirement pensioners resident in Great Britain received a pension at less than the standard rate, 135,940 of whom were in receipt of income support, and both benefits were paid by a combined order book.

  Information regarding the number receiving income support and retirement pension at less than standard rate where payment is made separately is not available.

  Information regarding the number receiving retirement pension at less than standard rate and an income-related benefit other than income support is not available.

  Mr. Bowden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what is his best estimate of the number of people who retire from paid employment each year.

  Mr. Hague
  The information is not available.

  Mr. Bowden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will give the proportion of(a) men and (b) women who deferred drawing their state pension in each year since 1988 for which figures are available.

  Mr. Hague
  The information is not available in the form requested.

  The table shows the estimated percentage of men aged 65 to 69 and women aged 60 to 64 in Great Britain who were not in receipt of retirement pension, invalidity benefit or widow's benefit in the years 1988 to 1993. Included in the percentage figures are those who did not have underlying entitlement to retirement pension and therefore were not deferring drawing state pension.

  Year

  Percentage of men aged 65–69 in Great Britain not in receipt of Retirement Pension or Invalidity Benefit

  Percentage of women aged 60–64 not in receipt of Retirement Pension, Invalidity Benefit or Widow's Benefit

  1988

  6

  26

  1989

  6

  28

  1990

  2

  26

  1991

  3

  25

  1992

  3

  24

  1993

  2

  23

  Housing Benefit
  Mr. Harry Greenway
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how much is paid in housing benefit, to how many households, each year in(a) Ealing, (b) London and (c) England; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Burt
  The available information is in the tables.
  557
  Mr. Redmond
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many(a) 16-year-olds and (b) 17-year-olds currently receive housing benefit in the Doncaster area; and what percentage this represents of those in receipt of housing benefit.

  Mr. Burt
  The information is not available.

  Housing Allowance
  Mr. Robert Banks
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what is the maximum amount of weekly housing allowance paid to a single unemployed person in London.

  Mr. Burt
  From a 1 per cent. sample of cases, the maximum weekly amount of housing benefit found in 1992 in London, where the claimant was single and unemployed, was £134·21.

  Notes:

  (i) The data has been obtained from a 1 per cent. sample of cases, therefore, the figure is the maximum in the sample and the highest amount payable may not have been included.

  (ii) "Housing Allowance" has been assumed to mean housing benefit.

  (iii) "Unemployed" has been defined as those in receipt of unemployment benefit.

  (iv) "London" has been defined as the inner and outer London boroughs.

  Data Sources:

  The housing benefit and community charge benefit management information system and the income support annual statistical inquiry. The enquiries are a 1 per cent. sample of cases in Great Britain in May 1992.

  Fuel Bills
  Mr. Redmond
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will list by location, for each of his Department's properties in the Doncaster area, the annual fuel heating bills by year for the last four years.

  Mr. Burt
  Information is not available in the form requested. Such information as is available is in the table.

  Annual fuel bills for DSS offices in Doncaster

  Year

  Amount £

  Doncaster District Office

  1990–91

  19,515·17

  (Castle House)

  1991–92

  20,464·16

  1992–93

  18,812·07

  Doncaster Branch Office

  1990–91

  15,940·80

  (St. Peters House)

  1991–92

  15,274·41

  1992–93

  16,811·42

  Doncaster Medical

  1990–91

  178·66

  Examination Centre

  1991–92

  202·87

  1992–93

  200·12

  Doncaster Medical

  1990–91

  1,506·37

  Adjudication Centre

  1991–92

  1,694·74

  1992–93

  2,084·30

  Thorne Caller Office

  This is a building jointly occupied and as the Department is the minor occupier no figures are available.

  Notes:

  1. Prior to April 1991, fuel and utility charges for the Government estate were met by the Property Services Agency and details are,
  558
  therefore, not held by this Department.

  2. Fuel bills include a range of energy use, such as hot water, lighting and air conditioning and it is therefore not possible to identify the heating element of each bill.

  Mr. McAllion
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will publish for each service that has been market tested in his Department in 1993(a) the cost of the testing process, including consultancy costs, (b) the result of the test, (c) the name of the successful contractor, (d) the value and duration of the contract, (e) the number of staff involved, (f) estimated annual cost reductions and (g) whether the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 1981 were deemed to apply.

  Mr. Scott
  This Department is currently analysing the outcome of the 1992–1993 "Competing for Quality" programme with the efficiency unit in the Cabinet Office. Much of the information requested in the question will, once it has been finalised, be published in aggregate form in the "Citizen's Charter Second Report". On an individual contract basis, much of the information is commercially confidential.

  Family Benefit
  Mr. Redmond
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what is his current estimate of eligible households in the Doncaster area which do not claim family benefit; what means are used to improve the take-up rate; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Burt
  Take-up figures for family credit are not available on a regional basis. The latest estimates for take-up of family credit for Great Britain for 1991 are that 64 per cent of families eligible to receive the benefit were claiming it, and that 71 per cent of available benefit was being claimed.1As at 24 December 1993, 2,876 families in Doncaster were receiving family credit.

  There have been family credit advertising campaigns every year since 1989 which have stimulated claims and increased awareness. Over this period, the case load has increased from 280,000 in 1989 to around half a million now. The 1993 campaign was aimed at helping the unemployed understand how in-work benefits could help them to return to work. We have introduced special fast track procedures for people just starting work which enable the vast majority of urgent claims to family credit to be cleared, and payment issued, within one week. These special arrangements, in both employment and DSS local offices, help with completing the claim form and ensure that people starting work are aware of family credit. The family credit helpline, launched in April 1993, receives over 30,000 calls a week.

  A continuing aspect of family credit awareness is the personalised message in the child benefit order book—or notification of automatic credit transfer payment—which tells the family concerned how much income they can have and still be eligible for family credit. A further stimulus to take-up of small amounts is the introduction from October 1993 of lump sum awards of family credit for awards of £4 a week or less. This provides one-off payments of up to £104, encouraging more people to claim and helping with back-to-work expenses.

  Note:

  1 "Families, Work and Benefits"—Policy Studies Institute, June 1993.
  559

  Bed-and-Breakfast Accommodation, London
  Mr. Robert Banks
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many people claiming unemployment benefit are living in bed-and-breakfast accommodation in each of the London boroughs; and what are the costs to the Exchequer at the latest available date.

  Mr. Burt
  The information requested is not available.

  Raynaud's Disease
  Mr. Nigel Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what specific help with increased heating and fuel bills will be available to those with Raynaud's disease after the imposition of VAT on fuel.

  Mr. Burt
  Those with Raynaud's disease may be entitled to receive any of the wide range of social security benefits which are available, subject to individual circumstances. Details of the extra help in respect of VAT on domestic fuel were given in reply to the hon. Member for Gainsborough and Horncastle (Mr. Leigh) on 30 November 1993 at columns 437–38.

  Unemployment Benefit
  Mr. Khabra
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will list by parliamentary constituency in London the number of people who will be affected by the decision to reduce the entitlement to unemployment benefit from 12 months to six months.

  Mr. Burt
  Information on the rates of benefit received by unemployed people residing in a particular parliamentary constituency is not available and no estimate can be made of the numbers in each London constituency who may be affected by the introduction of jobseeker's allowance in April 1996.

  Labour Statistics
  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what information he has on the numbers of(a) males and (b) females leaving the unemployment register in the latest statistically convenient recent time period (i) because of loss of unemployment benefit without succeeding to eligibility for income support while remaining without work and (ii) loss of eligibility for income support due to spouse finding work.

  Mr. Burt
  The information requested is not available.

TRANSPORT

  Supplementary Grant
  Mr. Dobson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport (1) if he will list for each(a) county council, (b) metropolitan district and (c) London borough a summary of the transport supplementary grant made available for each of the past five years, broken down into (i) committed major schemes (gross), (ii) newly supported major schemes, (iii) bridge works, (iv) principal roads carriageways, (v) local safety schemes, (vi) packages, (vii) scheme specific, including bus priority, (viii) bus priority alone, (ix) minor works, (x) European regional development fund schemes and (xi) Industrial Development Act schemes;
  560
  (2) if he will list for each (a) county council, (b) metropolitan borough and (c) London borough in England a summary of the transport capital expenditure settlement for local authorities for each of the past five years, broken down into (i) committed major schemes gross, (ii) newly supported major schemes, (iii) bridge works, (iv) principal roads carriageways, (v) local safety schemes, (vi) packages, (vii) scheme specific, including bus priority, (viii) bus priority alone, (ix) minor works, (x) European regional Development fund schemes and (xi) Industrial Development Act schemes.

  Mr. MacGregor
  I am placing the information in the Library. Tables 1 to 5 show the amounts of expenditure accepted for transport supplementary grant under the various categories. Grant is payable at 50 per cent. of accepted expenditure.

  Airport Regulation
  Mr. Haselhurst
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will review the system of economic regulation of airports.

  Mr. Norris
  I have asked officials to review the system of economic regulation of airports established under the Airports Act 1986. This review will include examination of the role of the CAA and MMC, the frequency and cost of reviews of designated airports, and the benefit of any alternative systems. The aim is to produce a discussion paper in spring 1994.

  Christmas Drink-drive Campaign
  Mr. Peter Bottomley
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what were the results of the Christmas drink-drive campaign(a) in 1993 and (b) in previous years; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Key
  The results this year show continuing good progress in reducing drink-driving.

  I am very grateful to the police for the excellent support they have given. In England and Wales they conducted nearly 11 per cent more breath tests than in the 1992 Christmas campaign. I am also grateful to all those who supported the campaign through sponsorship or publicity at national and local level.

  Final figures for England and Wales show that the proportion of drivers tested who were over the legal limit was 6·8 per cent., compared with 7·2 per cent. in the 1992 Christmas campaign and 7·9 per cent. in the 1991 campaign. This is a significant reduction, bearing in mind that progress must become more difficult as the problem is reduced.

  It is clear, therefore, that if we are to keep up this rate of progress we must maintain our efforts to get the message across that drinking and driving wrecks lives.

  Light Rapid Transit Schemes
  Mr. Tipping
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will list the bids for financial assistance for light rapid transit schemes that he is currently considering.

  Mr. Freeman
  Bids for financial assistance for light rapid transit schemes are submitted by local authorities as part of the annual local authority transport expenditure round. The outcome of the 1993 bidding round, covering
  561
  expenditure in 1994–95, was announced on 15 December 1993, Official Report, columns 699–706. Bids for expenditure in 1995–96 will be invited later this year.

  Light rapid transit schemes may be eligible for grant under section 56 of the Transport Act 1968. Applications for section 56 funding are under consideration in respect of light rapid transit schemes in Birmingham—Midland Metro—Leeds—Leeds Supertram—and Nottingham—Greater Nottingham light rapid transit.

  Mr. Tipping
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what budget provision he has to support light rapid transit schemes in the current and future financial years.

  Mr. Freeman
  There is no budget provision specifically reserved for light rapid transit schemes. Future

  (£ million)

  1988–89 and 1989–90

  1990–91

  1991–92

  1992–93

  11993–94

  Manchester Metrolink

  Credit approval

  16·88

  31·25

  23·00

  6·00

  —

  Grant

  5·88

  27·68

  20·75

  1·75

  —

  Midland Metro

  Credit approval

  —

  —

  0·75

  3·46

  —

  Grant

  —

  —

  0·40

  0·44

  —

  SY Supertram

  Credit approval

  —

  8·70

  14·10

  22·60

  35·30

  Grant

  1·10

  2·95

  6·40

  20·50

  14·50

  1 Original allocation subject to adjustment in the course of the year.

  As part of the local authority transport settlement announced on 15 December 1993, Official Report, columns 699–706, we have made further provision of £54·71 million for the funding of South Yorkshire supertram in 1994–95.

  Vehicle Excise Duty
  Mr. Andrew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what steps he is taking to cut the amount of uncollected vehicle excise duty.

  Mr. Key
  The number of VED evaders brought to book has steadily increased in recent years following the implementation of the recommendations of an efficiency scrutiny, the introduction of new technology, and the continuing programme of joint local campaigns with the police. Last year over 435,000 evaders were penalised with £37·5 million in revenue recovered. In addition, an estimated 180,000 evaders relicensed as a direct result of enforcement action, recovering an extra £14 million. This trend is set to continue.

  Mr. Andrew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many convictions there were in each of the last 10 years in respect of non-payment of vehicle excise duty.

  Mr. Key
  The figures for successful prosecutions and out of court settlements are set out in the table.

  Out of court settlements

  Successful prosecutions

  Total cases successfully completed

  1984–85

  123,000

  167,000

  290,000

  1985–86

  136,000

  179,000

  315,000

  1986–87

  159,000

  186,000

  345,000

  1987–88

  173,000

  183,000

  356,000

  562
  proposals for funding of such schemes will be considered as part of the package approach to local transport expenditure.

  Mr. Tipping
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will list the light rapid transit schemes to which he has made financial contributions; and if he will detail the total amount contributed and the amount paid in each financial year.

  Mr. Freeman
  The Government have made funding available for the Manchester Metrolink and South Yorkshire Supertram schemes, and for some preliminary expenditure in connection with Midland Metro. The figures are as follows:

  Out of court settlements

  Successful prosecutions

  Total cases successfully completed

  1988–89

  185,000

  187,000

  372,000

  1989–90

  190,000

  180,000

  370,000

  1990–91

  223,000

  163,000

  386,000

  1991–92

  243,000

  177,000

  420,000

  1992–93

  242,000

  193,000

  435,000

  11993–94

  237,000

  213,000

  450,000

  1 Projected.

  Mr. Andrew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many staff, and how much staff time, was invested in tackling non-payment of vehicle excise duty in each of the last 10 years.

  Mr. Key
  The staff figures, expressed in man years, are as follows:

  Man years

  1984–85

  900

  1985–86

  908

  1986–87

  943

  1987–88

  973

  1988–89

  975

  1989–90

  973

  1990–91

  983

  1991–92

  936

  1992–93

  957

  1993–94

  992

  Mr. Andrew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what is his estimate of the amount of vehicle excise duty uncollected in each of the last 10 years; and what estimates he has made for the current and future years.
  563
  Mr. Key
  Estimates of the revenue loss through evasion of vehicle excise duty in Great Britain are as follows:

  Revenue loss £ million

  Car VED rate £

  1984–85

  80

  90

  1985–86

  85

  100

  1986–87

  90

  100

  1987–88

  95

  100

  1988–89

  100

  100

  1989–90

  105

  100

  1990–91

  105

  100

  1991–92

  105

  100

  1992–93

  130

  110

  1993–94

  145

  125

  130

  Estimates are derived from periodic roadside surveys. Details of the most recent survey can be obtained from the transport statistics report "Vehicle Excise Duty Evasion in Great Britain in 1989–90", which is available in the House of Commons Library. The next survey is planned for later this year.

  Airports (Baggage Reconciliation)
  Mr. Dobson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will publish a table showing the names of all airports in the United Kingdom where trials on potential baggage reconciliation technology have taken place over the past five years, or are currently taking place, the date on which each trial commenced and was completed, the nature of the technology involved, the company undertaking the trial, the commissioning organisation for each trial, and whether the results of the trial were published or made available to his Department; and if he will place details of the trials in the Library.

  Mr. Norris
  Though the Department of Transport has stated its requirements for baggage reconciliation, known as accounting and authorising for carriage, it is not the commissioning agent for trials of baggage reconciliation technology as its requirements can be met in a number of ways. Technology trials are therefore conducted as a result of commercial arrangements between airports, airlines, handling agents and the suppliers of baggage reconciliation systems. To the Department's knowledge, such trials have taken place or are under way at Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted and Manchester airports, and there may be or may have been trials at other locations.

  For reasons of commercial confidentiality and security, the Department is not able to provide the details requested of the trials without the consent of those involved.

  Chelmsford Bypass
  Mr. Burns
  To ask the Secretary of State for Transport when he expects work to begin on widening the A12 Chelmsford bypass; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Key
  Subject to the present review of the trunk road programme we hope to consult the public about our proposals for widening the A12 Chelmsford bypass later this year. Further progress will depend on the successful outcome of subsequent statutory procedures and the availability of funds.
  564

ENVIRONMENT

  Franchise Rights
  Ms Short
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment (1) if he will make a statement on the role of local authorities in the operation of markets;

  (2) what plans he has to abolish market franchise rights.

  Mr. Curry
  The Deregulation Bill published today includes provision for the abolition of the rights of local authorities which own market franchises to object to any proposal to establish a new market within a six-mile radius of their own.

  Ms Short
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will meet representatives of the National Association of British Market Authorities to discuss the abolition of market franchise rights.

  Mr. Curry
  Ministers will be happy to meet representatives of this association to discuss our proposals for legislation on this issue.

  Ms Short
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many responses his Department has received in response to the consultative paper on market franchise rights; how many of the responses were in favour of the proposal and how many opposed; and if he will place them in the Library.

  Mr. Curry
  The Government have received a total of 2,322 individual responses to this consultation document, of which 273 supported our proposal. The categories of responses received and the numbers in each category were as follows:

  Support

  Oppose

  Neutral

  Local authorities

  8

  174

  2

  Market traders

  240

  1,568

  —

  Others (including consumer groups and private individuals)

  25

  340

  8

  Copies of the responses from those bodies that agreed that their comments could be made public will be deposited in the Library as soon as possible.

  Mr. Corbett
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment (1) if he will list the names of the organisations which responded to the consultation paper of 16 August on market franchise rights;

  (2) if he will place in the Library copies of responses to the Government's consultation paper of 16 August on market franchise rights;

  (3) how many responses he has received in response to the consultation paper of 16 August on market franchise rights; how many supported the proposal; and how many opposed it;

  (4) if he will meet representatives of the National Association of British Market Authorities before he comes to a conclusion on the future of market franchise rights;

  (5) if it is his intention to include the future of market franchise rights in the forthcoming Deregulation and Contracting Out Bill.

  Mr. Curry
  [holding answer 16 December 1993]: I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave earlier today to the hon. Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Ms Short).
  565

  North Circular Road (Land Contamination)
  Mr. Dobson
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what account he took when he issued exchange land certificates in November 1990 for land on and immediately adjoining one of the exchange land sites for the north circular road east of Falloden way, of a report commissioned in 1988 by Barnet council on the contamination of the land; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Atkins
  The 1988 report is unknown to both my Department and the Department of Transport. A small area of contamination was discovered in June 1993 during preparation of the land to be given in exchange for land required for the trunk road improvement between east of Falloden way and east of high road, Finchley. As a result, the whole site was systematically tested. The Department of Transport has sent the report of the test, including recommendations for the treatment of the land, to the London borough of Barnet and its response is awaited. The treatment of the exchange land for the adjacent improvement of the trunk road at Regents Park road is the subject of negotiations with the borough.

  Habitats and Species Directive
  Mr. Denham
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list the dates of the meetings planned by his Department with the statutory nature conservation advisers Scottish National Heritage, the Countryside Council for Walks and English Nature on the subject of the transposition of the EC habitats and species directive; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Atkins
  I refer the hon. Member to the answer given to the hon. Member for Southwark and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) by my hon. Friend the then Minister for the Environment and Countryside, on 16 December 1993,Official Report, column 821.

  Biodiversity
  Mr. Bayley
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many countries had by 29 December 1993 ratified the biodiversity convention drawn up at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development.

  Mr. Atkins
  On the basis of notifications to the United Nations legal office in New York, 38 countries and the EC had ratified the biodiversity convention by 29 December 1993.

  Mr. Bayley
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment when the United Kingdom will ratify the Rio summit's biodiversity convention.

  Mr. Atkins
  We have made it clear that we intend to ratify the biodiversity convention subject to satisfactory progress towards securing safeguards against our concerns about its financial provisions. We have made some progress towards such safeguards and are considering what further progress can be made before we take a final decision on ratification. In the meantime, we remain fully committed to the aims of the convention as demonstrated by our "Action Plan on Biodiversity", to be published later this month, and by the Darwin initiative.
  566

  Imported Waste
  Mr. Michael Spicer
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what amounts of industrial and household waste were imported during the last 12 months for which information is available; and what quantities of this waste were buried or processed in the United Kingdom.

  Mr. Atkins
  The only data available are for hazardous wastes covered by the Transfrontier Shipment of Hazardous Waste Regulations 1988. In the 12 months ending April 1993, the United Kingdom imported 46,948 tonnes of hazardous waste, 98 per cent. of which was imported into England and Wales.

  None of the imported waste was landfilled without treatment. Twenty-four thousand one hundred and eighteen tonnes received some form of treatment to reduce the hazard before landfilling, 19,168 tonnes were incinerated and a further 3,662 received some other form of treatment of which 3,474 tonnes were recovered or reprocessed.

  Radioactive Waste
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what information he has with regard to the disposal of radioactive waste at Lumms lane, Agecroft in Greater Manchester.

  Mr. Atkins
  The only company currently authorised under the Radioactive Substances Act 1960—now 1993 —to dispose of low-level radioactive waste at Lumms lane is Magnesium Elektron Ltd.—MEL—which is authorised to dispose of solid waste to the on-site landfill, liquid waste to the River Irwell and gaseous waste to the atmosphere. Environmental monitoring data are collected from around MEL's landfill site as part of Her Majesty's inspectorate of pollution's national environmental monitoring programme. I will arrange for a copy of the annual report of this programme to be made available in the Library of the House.

  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, pursuant to his answer of 11 January,Official Report, column 6, what deadline has been set for the Radioactive Waste Management Advisory Committee to reply on nuclear waste substitution.

  Mr. Atkins
  No deadline has been set for the committee's advice.

  Waste (Brazil)
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what information he has received from the Sao Paulo State Environment Protection Agency in Brazil with regard to the return to the United Kingdom by the Produquimica company of Brazil of a consignment of copper, arsenic and cadmium wastes in December 1993.

  Mr. Atkins
  I presume that the question refers to material exported by London Metals Ltd. to the Produquimica Company in Brazil, which was recently returned to the United Kingdom.

  My Department has received no information or other communication directly from the Sao Paulo State Environment Protection Agency—CETESB. However, information received indirectly may be summarised as follows.
  567
  The Produquimica Company has claimed that it returned the material to the United Kingdom on the grounds that the terms of the original contract had not been fulfilled. CETESB joined in recommending re-export on these grounds: at this stage its own analysis of the cargo was not complete. The shipment left Brazil on 21 December 1993.

  Subsequently, CETESB carried out an analysis of a sample from the cargo, which showed its composition to be largely zinc—44·9 per cent.—with some copper—8·25 per cent.—a substantial amount of moisture—14·3 per cent. —and trace amounts of metals such as cadmium and arsenic—in total about 1 per cent. CETESB concluded that the material should be classified as "ash and residues, principally containing zinc". Under Brazilian regulation No. 138—of 22 December 1992—such residues can be imported into Brazil only after prior authorisation from IBAMA—Federal Environment Agency—and DECEX—Department of Foreign Trade. Produquimica is not registered with IBAMA. CETESB therefore took the view that the import was in breach of this regulation, and formally demanded the return of the cargo to its place of origin. This demand was made only after the shipment had already left Brazil.

  Thorne and Hatfield Moors
  Mr. Kevin Hughes
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment (1) when he now expects the agreement between Fisons and English Nature over Thorne and Hatfield moors to be signed;

  (2) what information he has on the legal complexities preventing the signature of the proposed agreement between Fisons and English Nature over the future of Thorne and Hatfield moors.

  Mr. Atkins
  Conveyancing work and other legal matters have been time consuming but conditions associated with the proposed lease back are now mostly resolved. English Nature and Fisons hope to conclude matters shortly.

  Mr. Kevin Hughes
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment (1) what percentage of the total budget for English Nature was spent on work on Fison's peatlands on Thorne and Hatfield moors in each of the years since 1991;

  (2) how much money was spent by English Nature on work on Fisons' peatlands on Thorne and Hatfield moors in each year since 1991.

  Mr. Atkins
  The information requested, which includes money spent on the Thorne Moors national nature reserve owned by English Nature, is set out:

  Approvals/allocations to co-operative housing associations in greater London 1990–91 to 1994–95

  Approvals/allocations (see note)

  As percentage of total Housing Corporation programme

  £ million

  Units

  £ million

  Units

  1990–91

  18·33

  152

  6·96

  4·06

  1991–92

  20·51

  208

  3·23

  1·94

  1992–93

  9·01

  145

  1·02

  0·79

  1993–94

  4·06

  92

  1·23

  1·29

  1994–95

  2·86

  178

  0·62

  1·38

  Notes:

  For 1990–91 to 1992–93 figures represent approvals, i.e., allocations taken up.

  For 1993–94 and 1994–95 figures are for allocations.
  568

  Year

  Expenditure on work on Thorne and Hatfield moors £

  Percentage of total budget Per cent.

  1991–92

  3,077

  0·01

  1992–93

  70,401

  0·2

  11993–94

  40,148

  0·1

  1 To 11 January 1994.

  Condoms (Pollution)
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what assessment he has made of the pollution effects of used condoms discarded into the sewage system.

  Mr. Atkins
  The discharge of used condoms and other sewage-related debris in effluent has unsightly effects. Most of this material is intercepted and dealt with effectively by the sewerage system. Improvements planned for outfalls and treatment works will further reduce this form of pollution.

  Radwell Motorway Services Station
  Mr. Heald
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment when he expects the outcome of the planning inquiry into Radwell motorway services station to be announced.

  Mr. Baldry
  The inspector's report into this planning appeal has yet to be received, although I understand it is almost complete.

  Depending on the complexity of an appeal, we normally expect to be able to issue a decision within eight weeks of receipt of a report. In this case, I expect the Secretary of State's decision to be issued by early April.

  Co-operative Housing Associations
  Mr. Raynsford
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will publish a table showing the allocation of Housing Corporation approvals to cooperative housing associations in London over the financial years 1990–91 to 1994–95, indicating the financial allocation, the number of homes to be created and the proportion of the total programme allocated to cooperatives in each year.

  Sir George Young
  The table below sets out the requested information on allocation of Housing Corporation approvals to co-operative housing associations in London over the financial years 1990–91 to 1994–95. The Housing Corporation also makes significant and increasing allocations to other housing associations for housing which, when developed, will be either owned or managed by co-operative housing associations.
  569

  Local Authorities (Northamptonshire)
  Mr. William Powell
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list by local authority in Northamptonshire the total value of asset sales, excluding houses and flats, for each year since 1986–87.

  The value of asset sales, excluding housing, since 1986–87

  £'000

  1986–87

  1987–88

  1988–89

  1989–90

  1990–91

  1991–92

  1992–93

  Northamptonshire CC

  4,143

  6,800

  28,420

  4,767

  8,741

  1,629

  4,815

  Corby

  960

  1,024

  3,464

  4,841

  55

  1,211

  86

  Daventry

  382

  751

  1,295

  3,767

  3,009

  2,106

  2,161

  East Northamptonshire

  6

  626

  195

  0

  0

  0

  0

  Kettering

  321

  9,689

  1,905

  1,479

  409

  981

  374

  Northampton

  122

  175

  332

  21,725

  11,076

  12,368

  146

  South Northamptonshire

  1,357

  7

  9,013

  157

  2

  12

  1900

  Wellingborough

  3,450

  3,668

  9,082

  6,459

  2,275

  480

  2,628

  Source: Local authority returns.

  1 Provisional.

  Waterways
  Mr. Chris Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list those rivers and waterways recommended by the National Rivers Authority for priority clean-up under the Water Act 1989; and which of these waterways will receive treatment during the next six years.

  Mr. Atkins
  A list of the water quality schemes in England and Wales recommended by the National Rivers Authority has been placed in the Library of the House. These schemes are still under review as part of the wider review of water company investment and charges by the Director General of Water Services.

  Protected Species
  Mr. Morley
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will give details of licences issued under section 16 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 to destroy protected species in 1991, 1992 and 1993.

  Mr. Atkins
  Details of licences issued under section 16 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 in respect of wild birds are contained in the reports by the United Kingdom to the European Community on derogation under article 9 of the directive on the conservation of wild birds—79,409/EEC—for the years 1991 and 1992. Figures for 1993 are not yet available. Copies of the derogation report are held in the Library of this House.

  Set out is a table of licences issued in England, Scotland and Wales in 1993, and those issued in Scotland and Wales in 1991 and 1992. The figures for England for those years cannot be provided without disproportionate costs being incurred, as English Nature—the licensing authority—only has manual records prior to 1993.

  Licences under section 16 are also issued by the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, and the Secretaries of State for Scotland and for Wales. I will write to the hon. Member when details are available.
  570
  Mr. Baldry
  The information is given in the table.

  Species

  Number of specimens licensed for taking

  Issed under subsection

  1991

  Rainbow leaf beetle

  small sample

  16(3)(a)

  Killarney fern

  small sample

  16(3)(a) and (c)

  Foxtail stonewort

  small sample

  ditto

  Freshwater pearl mussel

  100

  ditto

  Freshwater pearl mussel

  3 kilos

  16(3)(a)

  Young's helleborine

  1

  16(3)(a) and (c)

  1992

  Crayfish

  100

  16(3)(a)

  Pipistrelle bat

  30

  ditto

  1,000 young

  Allis shad (see note 1)

  100 adults

  ditto

  1,000 young

  Allis shad (see note 1)

  100 adults

  ditto

  Fen orchid

  5

  16(3)(a) and (c)

  Floating water plantain

  small samples

  16(3)(a)

  Spiked speedwell

  100

  ditto

  Killarney fern

  small samples

  16(3)(a) and (c)

  1993

  Medicinal leech

  1

  16(3)(a)

  1,000 young

  Allis shad (see note 1)

  100 adults

  ditto

  1,000 young

  Allis shad (see note 1)

  100 adults

  ditto

  Swallowtail butterfly

  20

  ditto

  Beetles

  2

  ditto

  De Folin's lagoon snail

  40

  ditto

  Natterjack toad eggs/tadpoles

  5,000

  ditto

  Natterjack toad

  50 tadpoles

  ditto

  Natterjack toad tadpoles

  175

  ditto

  Lagoon sandworm

  unknown

  ditto

  Lagoon sand shrimp

  unknown

  ditto

  Starlet sea anemone

  unknown

  ditto

  Lundy cabbages

  10

  ditto

  Floating water plantain

  unknown

  ditto

  Foxtail stonewort

  unknown

  ditto

  Note 1: Licences issued for maximum take over a three-year period

  Imported Building Materials
  Mr. Rooker
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list by value the major 25 imported building materials in the latest year stating the import as a
  571
  percentage of the United Kingdom market; and what were the comparable figures by value and import penetration five years ago.

  Mr. Baldry
  The table gives the estimated value of building materials imported during 1992, the latest year for which comprehensive information is available, together with the equivalent figures for 1988. Reliable information on import penetration will not be available until the information on United Kingdom production has been harmonised with overseas trade using the new PRODCOM classification; the first results of which are expected to be available this autumn.

  £ millions

  1992

  1988

  Sawn and Laminated Wood

  1,050

  1,452

  Builders Ironmongery

  321

  264

  Plastic Sheets and Profiles

  209

  179

  Structural Steel Components

  158

  131

  Electric Wires

  144

  100

  Air Conditioning Units

  122

  102

  Metal Sheets etc.

  116

  111

  Glazed Ceramic Tiles

  116

  107

  Lamps and Fittings

  114

  82

  Central Heating Boilers

  88

  51

  Wooden Doors

  82

  85

  Paints and Varnish

  72

  62

  Steel Tubes and Pipes

  66

  47

  Hardboard and Fibreboard

  64

  57

  Mastics, putty etc.

  62

  36

  Nails, Screws etc.

  56

  52

  Building Stone

  49

  50

  Concrete Reinforcing Bars

  49

  62

  Radiators

  47

  57

  Ordinary Portland Cement

  46

  33

  Structural Aluminium Components

  45

  67

  Plastic Floor Coverings

  43

  41

  Plastic Doors, Windows, Shutters and Fittings

  41

  35

  Mineral Insulating Materials

  35

  37

  Wood Veneers

  32

  46

  Defective Housing
  Mr. Battle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what is his Department's estimate of the repair bill to local authority properties designated as defective housing.

  Sir George Young
  That information is not available in the form requested.

  Mr. Battle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many(a) local authority and (b) private properties are designated as defective housing.

  Sir George Young
  Local authorities report some 128,000 designated defective dwellings in their ownership, and some 31,000 with private owners eligible for

  Member

  Position

  Dr. Elizabeth Nelson Chairman

  Former Chairman of Taylor Nelson A.G.B. plc.

  Mr. Kenneth Miles Deputy Chairman

  Director General, Incorporated Society of British Advertisers Ltd.

  Mr. Tim Brown

  Information and public relations officer for the National Society for Clean Air and Environmental Protection.

  Professor Roland Clift

  Professor of Environmental Technology and Director of the Centre for Environmental Strategy, University of Surrey.

  572
  assistance under part XVI of the Housing Act 1985. The number of defective dwellings in private ownership but where the owners are ineligible for assistance is not known.

  Public Bodies
  Mr. Kilfoyle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will name the members currently appointed to the Commission for the New Towns.

  Mr. Baldry
  The current members of the Commission for the New Towns are:

  Sir Neil Shields, MC—Chairman

  Lord Finsberg, MBE—Deputy Chairman

  Lord Bellwin, JP

  Mr. R. B. Caws, CBE

  Mr. F. C. Graves, OBE, DL

  Sir Brian Jenkins, GBE

  Ms W. Luscombe

  Mr. W. J. Mackenzie, OBE

  Mr. M. H. Mallinson

  Lady Marsh

  Sir Gordon Roberts, CBE, JP, DL

  Mr. J. R. Trustram Eve

  Mr. Kilfoyle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment who are the members currently appointed to the Countryside Commission.

  Mr. Atkins
  The current membership of the Countryside Commission is:

  Sir John Johnson—Chairman

  Mr. David Fletcher

  Mrs. Sarah Ward

  Sir Richard Carew-Pole

  Professor Allan Patmore

  Mrs. Rachel Thomas

  Mr. Rodney Swarbrick

  Lord Denham

  Mr. Kilfoyle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment who are the members currently appointed to the Advisory Committee on Hazardous Substances.

  Mr. Atkins
  The members currently appointed to the Advisory Committee on Hazardous Substances are:

  Professor P. Calow—Chairman

  Mr. A. Brown, CB

  Dr. D. Ball

  Dr. I. F. Carney

  Mr. P Chave

  Dr. B. Crathorne

  Dr. J. F. Duffus

  Mr. M. Gittins

  Professor T. M. Roberts

  Mr. M. Wadsley

  Mr. R. Young

  Mr. Kilfoyle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment who are the members currently appointed to the United Kingdom Ecolabelling Board.

  Mr. Atkins
  The current chairman and members of the United Kingdom Ecolabelling Board are:
  573

  Member

  Position

  Ms Anne Foster

  Director of the Scottish Consumer Council.

  Ms Julia Hailes

  Director of Sustainability Ltd., author of "Green Consumer Guide".

  Dr. Keith Humphreys

  Chairman and managing director, Rhone—Poulenc Ltd.

  Ms Pippa Hyam

  Senior Associate, PDA International.

  Mrs. Harriet Kimbell

  Consumer laywer and law lecturer.

  Dr. Melanie Miller

  Expert on environmental and consumer issues working for the Sustainable Agriculture, Food and Environment Alliance.

  Miss Jyoti Munsiff

  Company Secretary, Shell Transport and Trading.

  Mr. Derek Norman

  Director of Environmental Affairs, Pilkington plc.

  Dr. Richard Pugh

  Director, Tesco plc.

  Mr. Lew Scott

  Manufacturing director, Hoover Ltd.

  Miss Catherine Whitehead

  County trading standards officer, Staffordshire county council.

  Mr. Nigel Whitaker

  Executive director, Kingfisher plc.

  Mr. Kilfoyle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment who are the members currently appointed to the London Docklands development corporation.

  Mr. Baldry
  The members currently appointed to the London Docklands development corporation are:

  Michael Pickard—Chairman

  Lord Cocks—Deputy Chairman

  Viscountess Cobham

  Sir Christopher Foster

  Cllr Janet Ludlow

  Cllr Conor McAuley

  Cllr John McTernan

  Peter Mead

  William Jack

  Eric Sorensen

  Neil Spense

  Mr. Kilfoyle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment who are the members currently appointed to the Advisory Committee on Releases to the Environment.

  Mr. Atkins
  The members currently appointed to the Advisory Committee on Releases to the Environment are:

  Professor J. E. Berigner—Chairman

  Professor E. M. Cooke

  Dr. P. J. Dale

  Dr. A. Garland

  Dr. C. J. Gliddon

  Ms J. Hill

  Dr. J. Kinderlerer

  Mr. J. MacLeod

  Professor D. Onions

  Professor L. Partridge

  Professor N. J. Poole

  Dr. D. J. Robinson

  Mr. Kilfoyle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment who are the members currently appointed to the Local Government Commission for England.

  Mr. Baldry
  The Local Government Commission currently has 15 members:

  Sir John Banham—Chairman

  David Ansbro

  Professor Michael Chisholm

  Christopher Chope, OBE

  Sir Kenneth Couzens

  Ken Ennals, CB

  574

  Professor Malcolm Grant

  Brian Hill, CBE, DL

  Margaret Hodge, MBE

  Mary Leigh

  Ann Levick

  Robert Scruton

  David Thomas

  Lady Wilcox

  Clive Wilkinson

  Mr. Kilfoyle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment who are the members currently appointed to each rent assessment panel.

  Sir George Young
  There are approximately 440 members appointed to the 13 rent assessment panels in England. I have arranged for a copy of the most recent list, showing the position at 31 December 1993, to be placed in the Library.

  Mr. Kilfoyle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list the members currently appointed to the British Board of Agrément.

  Mr. Baldry
  The current members of the Board of the British Board of Agrément are:

  Mr. W. J. W. Courtney, CBE—Chairman. Chairman, Southern Water plc

  Dr. P. C. Hewlett, PhD, BSc, CChem, FRSC, FInstCeram, APRI, FInst Conc Tech—Director

  Mr. N. M. Chaldecott, OBE, Director General, National Council of Building Material Producers

  Mr. A. M. Cooper, FCIOB, Hon. FIAS, consultant to the National House Building Council

  Mr. R. F. Gainsford, MITSA, DCA, DMS, assistant chief executive of the local Authorities Co-ordinating Body on Trading Standards (LACOTS)

  Mr. T. Henney, MBE, M Arch(MIT), DA(Edin), RIBA, FRIAS, FCIOB, FBIM, an architect, practising in Edinburgh

  Mr. D. C. Leonard, FCMA, ACIS, managing director of British Gypsum Ltd. and a director of BPB Gypsum Industries Ltd and Westroc Ltd.

  Mr. T. P. O'Brien, MA, BSc. Director, Ove Arup Partnership. Technical Director within the Arup Research and Development

  Dr. A. C. Paterson, CBE, DSc, FEng, FICE, FIMechE, FIStructE, consultant partner, Bullen and Partners, consulting engineers

  Mr. A. J. Peach, MCIM, JP, former marketing director and now a non-executive Director of Catnic Ltd.

  Mr. D. W Quinion, BSc, FEng, FICE, FIStructE, consultant to Tarmac Construction

  575

  Mr. C. A. Rackliffe, FIBC, building control manager, Waverley borough council

  Miss P. R. Tindale, architect, chairperson of the HNBC RIBA housing design awards and a trustee of he Building Conservation Trust

  Mr. J. W Turner, CBE, FCIOB, former chairman of the Building Regulations Advisory Committee. Former chairman, E Turner and Sons Ltd, building contractors, Cardiff. Past president of Building Employers Confederation and Concrete Society

  Mr. C. A Wilson, MA DA(Manc), Dip Arch, RIBA, MRTPI, director of development, Lancaster city council

  Mr. Kilfoyle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment who are the members currently appointed to the Letchworth garden city corporation.

  Mr. Baldry
  The constitution of the Letchworth garden city corporation makes provision for a board of six members. Four—including the chairman—are appointed by the Secretary of State for the Environment, one by North Hertfordshire district council and one by Hertfordshire county council. The current members of the board are as follows:

  E. Lyall, CBE—(Chairman)

  A. R. Atherton, CB

  P. W. Harkness

  P. E. McMenemy

  Mrs. L. A. Needham

  F. Peacock

  EC Environment Strategy
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will make a statement on the implications for United Kingdom environment policy of the environment strategy released by the Greek presidency of the European Union.

  Mr. Atkins
  We welcome the announcement that the Greek presidency intends to encourage measures to prevent environmental damage and improve the quality of life and look forward to discussing more detailed proposals in the coming months.

  Urban Development Corporations
  Mr. Byers
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how much has been spent by each urban development corporation since their inception on acquiring land and buildings; and what money has been received by each urban development corporation for the sale of land and buildings.

  Mr. Baldry
  Expenditure and receipts in respect of the acquisition and sale of land and buildings for each urban development corporation from inception until 31 March 1993 are as follows:

  Expenditure (£ million)

  Receipts (£ million)

  Bristol1

  26·911

  2·709

  Black Country2

  86·119

  4·946

  Birmingham Heartlands

  3·311

  —

  Central Manchester

  13·224

  0·608

  Leeds

  23·918

  5·909

  London Docklands

  168·000

  319·000

  Merseyside

  37·711

  8·745

  Sheffield

  34·348

  1·167

  Teesside

  63·004

  36·683

  Trafford Park

  49·898

  10·462

  Tyne and Wear

  37·758

  7·603

  1 Includes £10,332 million expenditure for the Bristol spine road.

  2 Includes £15,449 million expenditure for the black country spine road, and £6,099 million for open space.

  576

  Council Housing
  Mr. Battle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many council leaseholders there are in each local authority.

  Sir George Young
  Information on the number of council leaseholders in each local authority is not held centrally.

  Mr. Hardy
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what is the total number of applications for council housing now held by local authorities in England.

  Sir George Young
  Local authorities provide information on the numbers of households on their council housing waiting lists on their annual housing investment programme—HIP1—returns.

  At 1 April 1993, the latest date for which figures are available, a total of 1,208,800 households were reported as being on council housing waiting lists in England.

  Homelessness
  Mr. Battle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what discussions his Department has had with the Department of Health on the progress of the homeless mentally ill initiative; and if he will make a statement.

  Sir George Young
  Officials of my Department meet with those of the Department of Health from time to time to discuss issues relating to the homeless mentally ill initiative, and in particular the contribution which the Housing Corporation is able to make to the provision of move-on accommodation.

  Mr. Battle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many homeless people are estimated to have used each of the cold weather shelters so far this winter.

  Sir George Young
  As part of the rough sleepers initiative, the Government are funding seven cold weather shelters this winter, providing a total of 353 places until 31 March 1994 for people who would otherwise sleep rough on the streets of central London, as follows:

  Location

  Bedspaces

  Managing organisation

  Male

  Female

  St. John Street, EC1

  76

  15

  English Churches Housing Group

  Tudor Street, EC4

  30

  —

  Salvation Army

  Albert Street, NW1

  —

  25

  Camden Borough Council

  Soho Square, W1

  20

  20

  Centrepoint Soho

  Page Street, SW1

  60

  10

  St. Mungo's Association

  Tooley Street, SE1

  50

  10

  Crisis

  John Street, WC1

  26

  11

  Riverpoint

  The shelters have had high occupancy rates since they opened early in December. On the night of Thursday 13 January, 313 bedspaces were occupied. More detailed information about the people using the shelters will become available from reports which the managing organisations are due to send to the Department by 31 May 1994.

  Lambeth Council
  Mr. Fraser
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he has now received the audited accounts of Lambeth council's direct labour trading divisions; and
  577
  what conclusions he has reached as to whether each of those divisions shall continue to provide services to the local authority.

  Mr. Baldry
  The London borough of Lambeth has provided my right hon. Friend with accounts relating to the council's direct labour organisations—DLOs. These cover the financial year ending 31 March 1993 and earlier years, going back in the case of some activities to 1985–86.

  The accounts have been certified by the authority's internal auditors but await certification by the district auditor. The internal auditor has qualified some of the accounts in respect of matters already made public in reports issued by the authority's former chief executive and the district auditor.

  The accounts were specifically required as a result of directions given, on 23 July 1993 by my right hon. Friend, under section 19B of the Local Government, Planning and Land Act 1980 and section 14 of the Local Government Act 1988.

  Subject to any changes which might be required by the district auditor the accounts show that the following defined activities met any necessary financial objectives; sports and leisure management, welfare catering, other cleaning, refuse collection and street cleaning, building cleaning, and grounds maintenance.

  Losses were made in relation to general highways work. Under the terms of the relevant direction, the authority must cease carrying out the work, except for work of an emergency nature, snow clearance and gritting, as from 1 April 1994. Losses were also made on new construction work. The authority has now ceased to carry out such work.

  Heavy losses have also been recorded for building maintenance work. The relevant direction already required work to be retendered by 1 April 1994 and my right hon. Friend's consent will be required before any new building maintenance work can be awarded to the authority's own DLO.

  Lambeth has been notified of my right hon. Friend's views on these matters.

  Protected Tenancies
  Mr. Harry Greenway
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many households have protected tenancies in(a) Ealing, (b) London and (c) England.

  Sir George Young
  There is no information available centrally on the number of protected tenancies in Ealing. Provisional estimates from the first half year of data collection from the new survey of English housing are that in 1993 there were around 70,000 protected tenancies in Greater London and 350,000 in England.

  Central Heating
  Mr. Gordon Prentice
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list for each district council in England(a) the number of houses without central heating and (b) the proportion of the area's housing stock such homes constitute.

  Mr. Baldry
  Information on the number of houses without central heating in each district is not available. The number of households without central heating in each district can be found in Office of Population Censuses and Surveys, General Register Office for Scotland,"1991
  578
  Census, Housing and Availability of Cars, Great Britain", London: HMSO, 1993—table 3, Housing characteristics —copies of which are in the Library.

  Home Energy Efficiency Scheme
  Mr. Robert Ainsworth
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many low-income households will have received assistance under the home energy efficiency scheme programme by 2000; and how many low-income households will remain unassisted at that date at the current level of funding.

  Mr. Atkins
  On current plans the total number of households receiving grants under the home energy efficiency scheme—HEES—in the United Kingdom is expected to be almost half a million a year in the three years from 1 April 1994. Because Government expenditure plans for later years have yet to be agreed, it is not possible to make a firm estimate of the number of households which will receive assistance by the year 2000.

  Nor can a realistic estimate be made of the number of households which will remain unassisted in the year 2000. The number will depend not only on the numbers of households eligible for and assisted under HEES. It will reflect the number of households which already have basic insulation measures and those which will be insulated by the year 2000, either by householders themselves or through the other schemes which are improving energy efficiency.

  Housing Management
  Mr. Battle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what is the maximum number of local authorities' properties that can be included in proposed compulsory competitive tendering of housing management packages.

  Sir George Young
  The local government Acts do not set limits for contract sizes for compulsory competitive tendering. We have indicated that we would not normally expect comprehensive area-based housing management contracts in large authorities to exceed 5,000 dwellings. It would, however, be acceptable good practice for small authorities with up to 7,500 dwellings to proceed on the basis of one contract, provided that reasonable competition can be secured.

  Environment Council
  Mr. Barnes
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, pursuant to his answer to the hon. Member for Langbaurgh (Mr. Bates), of 17 December 1993,Official Report, column 1106, what was the voting record of each member state on (a) the packaging directive and (b) the UN framework convention on climate change.

  Mr. Atkins
  The common position on the packaging directive was agreed by qualified majority vote without the agreement of Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands. As my hon. Friend the Member of Suffolk, South (Mr. Yeo) stated in the answer he gave on 17 December last, although the United Kingdom strongly supports Community ratification of the climate change convention, we abstained on the formal resolution because of doubts about the choice of legal base.
  579

  Local Government Commission
  Mr. Tipping
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment whether it is his intention that in an area reviewed by the Local Government Commission short-term start-up costs will be offset by future savings.

  Mr. Baldry
  We have said on our guidance to the commission that change to the structure of local government should be worthwhile and cost-effective over time. Cost-effectiveness cannot be measured purely in financial terms, but for most review areas we would expect structural change to produce financial savings.

  Mr. Tipping
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment whether the Local Government Commission is precluded from recommending an option which results in transitional costs which are not offset by future savings.

  Mr. Baldry
  The policy guidance which we issued to the commission in November 1993 provides that the commission"is not precluded from recommending an option which would be marginally more expensive than the status quo if the extra cost would be outweighed by other considerations."

  Mr. Tipping
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment (1) how any net transitional or ongoing costs are to be met in areas reviewed by the Local Government Commission if future ongoing savings are not identified;

  (2) how the additoinal ongoing costs in respect of options, put forward by the Local Government Commission in areas reviewed, which are more expensive than the status quo, are to be met by the new local authorities.

  Mr. Baldry
  We expect recommendations which would be more expensive than the status quo, or which would not lead to ongoing savings, to be the exception. We shall look at the issue of any additional ongoing costs in the light of particular recommendations. We are currently considering the treatment in years after 1994–95 of all aspects of transitional costs.

  Waterlogged Soil
  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what consultations he has had with the Housebuilders Federation, the Council of Mortgage Lenders, the National Federation of Housing Associations and local authority associations concerning the implications for housing and planning policies of the confirmation

  Local Government, Planning and Land Act 1980

  Local Government Act 1988

  Compulsory Competitive Tendering Statutory Action Bulletin England

  4th Quarter 1993 (October—December)

  4th quarter 1993

  Total for 1993

  Total from January 1989

  Notices served relating to anti-competitive behaviour

  3

  20

  57

  Calderdale MBC—Ground Maintenance

  Harrow LB—Other Catering

  Langbaurgh on Tees BC—Ground Maintenance

  Notices served relating to financial failure

  0

  80

  88

  Nil

  Directions given relating to anti-competitive behaviour

  3

  12

  30

  Birmingham CC—Building Maintenance

  Bradford MDC—Highways and Sewers

  Warrington BC—Ground Maintenance

  580
  of the positive correlation between winter waterlogging of soils and the level of infant mortality; and what further action he proposes to take.

  Mr. Atkins
  None.

  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what consultations he has had with the chairman of the National Rivers Authority on the relationship between the level of infant mortality and winter waterlogging of soils; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Atkins
  None.

  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what proposals he has for commissioning research into the positive relationship between winter waterlogging of soils and higher levels of infant mortality.

  Mr. Atkins
  My Department has no plans to commission such research.

  Mr. Morgan
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will make a statement on land drainage policy in relation to the effect of winter waterlogging on the level of infant mortality.

  Mr. Atkins
  Land drainage policy is a matter for my right hon. Friend the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food.

  Compulsory Competitive Tendering
  Mr. Heald
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will issue the latest details about statutory action taken against local authorities in relation to compulsory competitive tendering of local council services following publication of the position as at the end of September 1993.

  Mr. Baldry
  The table lists the authorities against which statutory action was taken in the period 1 October to 31 December 1993. It also gives a cumulative figure for the number of notices and directions given under the Local Government Act 1988 and the Local Government, Planning and Land Act 1980 for 1993 as a whole, and since 1989 when the anti-competitive provisions were brought into effect.
  581

  4th Quarter 1993 (October—December)

  4th quarter 1993

  Total for 1993

  Total from January 1989

  Directions given relating to financial failure

  7

  16

  48

  Bedfordshire CC—Ground Maintenance

  Camden LB—Building Maintenance

  Canterbury CC—New Construction £50k

  Castle Point BC—Ground Maintenance

  Hillingdon LB—Other Catering

  Manchester CC—New Construction £50k

  South Bedfordshire DC—Refuse Collection

  Local Government Finance
  Mr. Forman
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what representations he has received on his proposed notional amounts for capping in 1994–95; and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Curry
  We have received a small number of representations from authorities, including new information and revised data, which we are considering carefully. However, we have now reached preliminary views on all these representations, and we are today informing authorities of our current proposals reflecting these preliminary conclusions. I am arranging for a table showing our current proposals for notional amounts to be placed in the Library.

  Mr. Bates
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, pursuant to his answer of 29 November to the hon. Member for Erewash (Mrs. Knight),Official Report, column 380, if he has reached any decisions on the Local Government Commission's final recommendations for Cleveland: and if he will make a statement.

  Mr. Gummer
  I have today written to Sir John Banham, chairman of the Local Government Commission, giving my decisions on the commission's recommendations for Cleveland as set out in its report "Final Recommendations on the Future Local Government of Cleveland and Durham".

  After considering the commission's recommendations and the representations made, I have concluded that effective and convenient local government in Cleveland would be achieved by abolishing Cleveland county council and establishing four unitary authorities for the area—commission recommendation 1—and that this would reflect the identities and interests of local people. I have accepted in principle that the county of Cleveland should be abolished, but I shall defer a final decision until I have reached decisions on the commission's forthcoming recommendations for Durham and North Yorkshire.

  The remaining recommendations for Cleveland have been accepted as submitted, except that I am still considering the proposal that I direct the commission to undertake a further parish review.

  In agreeing with the establishment of unitary authorities based on existing districts, I have given careful consideration to representations which I received about the implications for those services and functions currently performed on a wider basis. My decision is based on a presumption that the authorities which are to become unitary will work together to plan for these services and functions, and will forge working links with other bodies such as health authorities.
  582
  The boundaries of the four proposed unitary authorities, which I intend to establish in April 1995, correspond to those of the existing district councils. Where the boundaries of unitary authorities and existing authorities coincide in this way I propose as a general rule to consult the local authorities concerned about the desirability of holding elections for the whole council in the May preceding the 1 April reorganisation date. Accordingly, I am now consulting the majority and minority groups on each district council, and Cleveland county council, to seek their views about whether or not elections should be held in May 1994. I will make a further announcement about the outcome of that consultation.

  An order giving effect to the commission's recommendations for Cleveland, with the aforementioned modifications, will be laid before the House in due course. A copy of my letter to Sir John Banham has been placed in the Library.

  Urban Development Corporations
  Mr. Kilfoyle
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list the members currently appointed to each urban development corporation.

  Mr. Baldry
  The members currently appointed to the urban development corporations are as follows:

  1. Birmingham Heartlands Development Corporation

  Chairman:

  Sir Reginald Eyre

  Deputy Chairman:

  Sir Richard Knowles

  Members:

  Albert Bore

  Randal Brew, JP OBE

  David Brooks

  Fred Chapman, JP

  Ms Hazel Duffy

  Mrs. Cath Finegan

  Reg Hales, JP

  Paul Sabapathy

  Jim Shedden

  Michael Wilcox, JP

  2. Black Country Development Corporation

  Chairman:

  Sir William Francis

  Deputy Chairman:

  Christopher Hawkins

  Members:

  James Antill

  Mike Bird

  Roger Burman

  Bill Clarke

  John Edwards

  Ian Flanagan

  583

  Dr. Diana Green

  Hugh Ellis Rees

  Rupert Nabarro

  Michael Worley, JP

  3. Bristol Development Corporation

  Chairman:

  Christopher Thomas

  Deputy Chairman:

  Andrew Reid

  Members:

  Mrs. Stella Clarke

  Phillip Gregory

  Geoffrey Matthews

  Lady Merrison

  John Portch

  Graham Robertson

  Sir Robert Wall

  David Yorke, FRICS

  4. Central Manchester Development Corporation

  Chairman:

  Dr. James Grigor, OBE

  Deputy Chairman:

  Derek Boothman

  Members:

  Ken Alford

  Ms Deborah Buchanan

  Peter Carmichael

  Jack Flanagan

  Raymond Gerrard

  Mrs. Joyce Hill, OBE

  Sir Robert Scotts

  Graham Stringer

  5. Leeds Development Corporation

  Chairman:

  Peter Hartley

  Deputy Chairman:

  John Hardman

  Members:

  Andrew Carter

  Edward Holroyd, FCA

  John Jackson

  Baroness Lockwood

  David Richardson

  Jon Trickett

  Brian Walker

  6. Merseyside Development Corporation

  Chairman:

  Sir Desmond Pitcher

  Deputy Chairman:

  Clive Lewis, FRICS

  Members:

  Leslie T Byrom, FRICS IRRV

  Eric Clarke

  Mrs. Muriel Downs

  John Hale, IPFA

  Dr. John Handley

  Professor Michael Parkinson

  Geoff Prince

  Mrs. Paula Ridley, JP

  Harry Rimmer

  Dr. Protasia Torkington

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  7. Plymouth Development Corporation

  Chairman:

  Sir Robert Gerken

  Deputy Chairman:

  John Ingham

  Members:

  Mrs. Nicola Cutts

  Simon Day

  Tudor Evans

  Philip Hamilton

  Johnathan Harris, FRICS

  Mrs. Jacqueline Gourlay

  Mrs. Jean Nelder

  Tom Savery

  8. Sheffield Development Corporation

  Chairman:

  Hugh R. Sykes

  Deputy Chairman:

  Norman Adsetts, OBE

  Members:

  Ms Jenny Bacon

  Mike Bower

  Mike Buckley

  Mrs. Janet Cohen

  Frank Eul

  David Heslop, OBE

  Peter Newman

  Derek Nice

  Professor Gareth Roberts

  Alfred A. Wood, CBE

  9. Teeside Development Corporation

  Chairman:

  Ron Norman, OBE

  Deputy Chairman:

  Lord Dormand of Easington

  Members:

  Sandy Anderson

  Mrs. Susan Bush

  Michael Carr

  Alan H. Cherry, MBE

  Lady Diana Eccles

  Bryan Hanson, OBE

  Roger Kingdon, CBE

  Ian Mathieson

  John Sutcliffe

  Lawrie Wild, JP

  10. Trafford Park Development Corporation

  Chairman:

  Bill Morgan

  Deputy Chairman:

  Anthony Russell, JP

  Members:

  James Barker

  Peter Collins, JP

  Ms Beverley Hughes

  Geoffrey Lord

  William Moores

  Hugh Richards, FRICS

  Derek H. Roberts

  Colin Warbick, MIMI

  11. Tyne and Wear Development Corporation

  Chairman:

  Sir Paul Nicholson

  585

  Deputy Chairman:

  John Ward

  Members:

  John Barnsley

  Eric Bramfitt

  Jane Darbyshire

  Tony Flynn

  Ian Gibson, CBE

  Ian Gordon, OBE

  Professor Patsy Healey

  Dr. Ralph Iley, CBE

  Joe L. Mills

  Chris Sharp, CBE

  Frank Sharratt

  Dearne Valley City Grant Project
  Mr. Hardy
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment (1) when he expects that all toxic materials lying within the Dearne valley city grant area will have been removed or property contained;

  (2) what is the total area of land reclaimed as part of the city grant project in the Dearne valley ; and what area of derelict land remains to be reclaimed;

  (3) what has been the total payment from central funds in support of the city grant project for the Dearne valley to date; and what is his estimate for the total spending in the current year and in 1994–95.

  Mr. Baldry
  [holding answer 17 January 1994]: The three current city grant projects in the Deane valley involve the reclamation of about 220 acres of derelict land. One site has now been fully reclaimed, and the reclamation of a second site is expected to be completed in about three months time. The remaining site accounts for around 80 per cent. of the total area covered by these projects and its reclamation is expected to be completed by the end of
  586
  1994. On completion of the projects, the toxic materials will either have been removed from the sites or contained in an appropriate manner.

  Grant payments by my Department in support of the projects have to date totalled £6·9 million. In 1993–94 payments are expected to total about £2·4 million, with around a further £1·1 million to be paid in 1994–95.

  Housing (Flood Risks)
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what assessment he has made of the effects of the construction of housing on river flood plains exacerbation of recent floods in the south and east of England.

  Mr. Jack
  I have been asked to reply.

  In December 1992, the Ministry together with the Department of the Environment and the Welsh Office, issued updated guidance to local planning authorities on the need to take account of flood risk due to increased run-off from new developments and the need for measures to be taken to alleviate this as a condition of granting planning permission. The National Rivers Authority provides advice to local planning authorities on application for developments in flood risk areas.

  The Ministry has an ongoing programme of research into the flood response of rivers to rainfall and the development of design procedures which can take into account changes within river catchments such as urbanisation. Changes in flood run-off can be assessed in a number of ways, including by reference to 1975 flood studies report by the Institute of Hydrology, which has been substantially updated through Ministry-funded research. It is for the National Rivers Authority and the other responsible flood defence bodies to assess the causes of flooding on individual rivers using these techniques.

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

Lord Nolan
The Right Honourable Sir Michael Patrick Nolan, Knight, a Lord Justice of Appeal, having been appointed a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary and created Baron Nolan, of Brasted in the County of Kent, for life—Was, in his robes, introduced between the Lord Rawlinson of Ewell and the Lord Templeman.

GATT: Sugar Regime
2.47 pm
Lord Mottistone Lord Mottistone asked Her Majesty's Government:
What are the implications of the GATT settlement for the sugar regime of the common agricultural policy.
The Parliamentary Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Earl Howe): My Lords, GATT requires cuts in internal support, in tariff and equivalent measures against imports and in the volume and value of subsidised exports of sugar. The Commission is to make proposals to achieve the necessary targets, but consideration has yet to be given to the desired balance between measures affecting volume and price.
Lord Mottistone: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for his Answer to the Question. I must declare an interest. I was sorry to read in an Answer that my noble friend gave to a Written Question last week that the sugar regime is to be rolled over for another year. Does my noble friend agree that the delay in bringing the sugar regime up to date has been disgraceful over the past few years? Does he also agree that it is particularly important, when the matters about which he spoke come to be discussed, that it is price reduction upon which there should be concentration?
Earl Howe: My Lords, my noble friend is right. The Council agreed in December to a further roll-over of the current sugar regime until 30th June 1995. We were disappointed at yet another roll-over, but it was understandable, in part, given the timing of the GATT conclusion. We shall press the Commission to address urgently the long-delayed reform of the regime and the measures necessary to implement the GATT deal.
Lord Carter: My Lords, as the existing UK sugar quota provides for only half of our domestic sugar consumption, while France, Belgium, and Denmark, for example, have quotas which are twice their domestic consumption, will the Minister assure the House that the Government will firmly resist any proposals to reduce the UK sugar quota after the GATT settlement?
Earl Howe: My Lords, I can give the noble Lord the assurance that we shall do everything in our power to resist that. The EC's subsidised exports, as a whole, have to be reduced, but we see no justification for a cut in the UK quota. The UK is about self-sufficient in sugar: half of it comes from beet and the other half from cane. We are not causing problems on world markets and the focus of attention should therefore rest elsewhere in the Community.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, will the noble Earl give the House an indication as to how the Government propose to bring pressure to bear upon the Commission? What ability have they to bring pressure to bear on the Commission?
Earl Howe: My Lords, much in the same way as we have done in the past with great success in many areas. The changes that we want to see can be summarised very simply: a substantial cut in prices, which is a priority; reduced production, but as I have just said not at the expense of the UK; and proper integration of the arrangements for beet and cane. We also want a number of technical changes and ultimately the abandonment of quotas.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, the noble Earl said in reply to his noble friend that he agrees that a price reduction is important. Can he say what suffering there is among the manufacturers of sweets? Are they roaming the streets applying for relief, or anything like that?
Earl Howe: My Lords, it is perhaps for the manufacturers of sweets to answer for their own performance. We have long and consistently argued for a price cut in sugar. EC sugar support is out of line with that for other sectors. The regime should be reformed as rigorously as other parts of the CAP, not least to bring about some benefit to consumers but also to bring about a better balance in the arable sector as a whole.
Lord Monkswell: My Lords, in response to a supplementary question the Minister said that Britain was self-sufficient in sugar, and then said that half was from sugar beet and half from sugar cane. Can he explain to the House where in Britain sugar cane is harvested?
Earl Howe: My Lords, the Community has an agreement under the Lomé Convention with ACP countries for the import of sugar cane. Those arrangements were built into the sugar regime some years ago. It so happens that about 85 per cent. of the sugar cane imported into the Community comes into the UK and is refined here.
Lord Dormand of Easington: My Lords, under the arrangements which are now being made, what are the Government doing to safeguard the interests of those Commonwealth countries which produce sugar?
Earl Howe: My Lords, as I have just said, the Commonwealth countries with which we have an agreement under the Lomé Convention will be protected under that sugar protocol. It is not a matter that the

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GATT deal can affect in any way. However, there may be changes in the price arrangements which will obviously have to be negotiated with the ACP countries, but not in terms of the volume which we are committed to taking.
Lord Dormand of Easington: My Lords, perhaps the noble Earl will forgive me, but there appears to be a contradiction there. The Minister said that we would not be affected in any way and then went on to say that the price might be affected. That is a very important aspect of the agreement.
Earl Howe: My Lords, I should like to qualify what I said. I think that I did so, but I should not have said "in any way". There may well be changes to the price of sugar, as the noble Lord is aware, but not to the volume.

Steel Industry: European Competition
2.53 p.m.
Lord Ezra Lord Ezra asked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether the agreement reached in Brussels on 17th December 1993 will resolve the steel problem in the European Union.
The Minister of State, Department of Trade and Industry (Lord Strathclyde): My Lords, the decision is a useful step towards dealing with the industry's problems.
Lord Ezra: My Lords, I recognise that this was a useful step towards dealing with the industry's problems. Perhaps I may draw the attention of the noble Lord to the fact that British Steel, which is generally regarded as the most efficient steel producer in the whole of Europe, is extremely anxious that as a result of that agreement, out of the 30 million tonnes of surplus capacity which needs to be closed, only 5 million tonnes is to be closed in the state-aided capacity, and the remaining 25 million tonnes will fall on those producers which are not state aided. That situation has been exacerbated, as the noble Lord may have seen, by the situation in Bremen. Is he aware that the steel works in Bremen, which are producing some 3 million tonnes of hot rolled product which is totally uncompetitive, are likely to be rescued by the city of Bremen, therefore exacerbating the situation and operating much to the disadvantage of such competitive enterprises as British Steel?
Lord Strathclyde: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Ezra, is quite right to draw the attention of this House in his Question to this very grave problem facing the European steel industry. I am grateful for the way in which he has done so. So far as concerns the situation in Bremen, my right honourable friend the Minister for Industry has drawn this case to the attention of the relevant commissioner. Reports suggest that the commission itself is not satisfied with the German Government's response and that a formal investigation is imminent. That of course will be very helpful.
Viscount Mersey: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that the Italian steel industry is at the moment in debt to the tune of 5.5 billion ecus? Does he not fear that the Italian Government might attempt to shore up their industry using taxpayers' money, which would be contrary to the Treaty of Paris?
Lord Strathclyde: My Lords, indeed, it was precisely such a situation that the agreement reached in December was intended to avoid. There were three aspects of that agreement. First, the proposals themselves have been tightened up. Secondly, there was an agreement that there would be no further aid after that agreed in December. Thirdly, there would be more vigorous monitoring of what happens in individual member states to make sure that there is no unfair competition.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: My Lords, is it not intolerable that British Steel, which has cut its workforce from 250,000 to 40,000 and is once again profitable, should be placed in a situation in which it is meeting unfair competition from subsidised steel firms abroad, especially in Germany? Why does this country always have to lose out in these negotiations? Is it not absurd that industries in the EC are being subsidised to produce steel which nobody wants? We seem to have a common steel policy which is becoming just as bad as the common agricultural policy.
Lord Strathclyde: My Lords, I share and understand the noble Lord's anxiety on this issue. However, if we had not reached an agreement in December the situation in the future could have been considerably worse than I believe it now will be. The monitoring network that will be put in place will ensure that the aid which has been agreed will be used solely to facilitate restructuring and not to allow unfair pricing. That allows British Steel to remain the most efficient and productive steel manufacturer in the whole of Europe.
Lord Geddes: My Lords, is my noble friend satisfied that the unfair competition emanating from Spain either has been or, as a result of the December agreement, will be eliminated?
Lord Strathclyde: My Lords, in Spain in the case of CSI, the relevant Spanish company, a firm date for closure of the Ansio plant has been agreed. I believe that that will go a substantial way to implementing the agreement to which Spain signed up in December.
Lord Peston: My Lords, does the noble Lord agree that the matter is really very simple: if there is excess capacity then the high cost producers are the ones which ought to go out of existence? What ought not to happen is that under the guise of restructuring—an expression one has heard many times in many contexts—the high cost producers are kept in existence and, as my noble friend points out, the low cost producers are then placed at a disadvantage.
Is the noble Lord not aware that the use of the word "monitoring" always frightens your Lordships because it is another way of saying that we will do nothing? More directly, is there anything that the British Government can do or propose to do that corresponds to

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action that would lead to British industry being able to compete fairly and foreign industry, which has high costs, going out of existence?
Lord Strathclyde: My Lords, on a point of principle, of course I agree with the noble Lord. But we have to deal with member states of the European Community in such a way as to allow British Steel the best opportunity to compete fairly. I believe that the agreement that was signed in December goes a long way to solving this particular problem.

EC: Financial Management
2.59 p.m.
Lord Benson Lord Benson asked Her Majesty's Government:
Having regard to the criticisms in the report of the Court of Auditors on the Community accounts for the financial year 1992 and similar criticisms in reports of earlier years, whether they consider that remedial action on the lines proposed in Select Committee Reports H.L.27-1 of 21st February 1989 and H.L.44 of 16th December 1992 would now be desirable.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Employment (Lord Henley): My Lords, the Government have, and will continue to pursue, policies which seek to secure sound financial management of the Community's finances. To that end the Government have been instrumental in developing the Community's fight against fraud in ways which reflect the Select Committee's recommendations.
Lord Benson: My Lords, does the noble Lord agree that the financial administration of the Community is now in such a serious state that it would be appropriate for the Council of Ministers to recommend to the European Parliament that it should not discharge the 1992 budget?
Lord Henley: My Lords, I believe that there has been some improvement in the finances of the Community. I think it is an interesting suggestion that the noble Lord makes. I would not like to speculate on exactly how we will react to such a suggestion at the next meeting of the Council of Ministers, the next meeting of ECOFIN. I shall certainly pass on the suggestion that the noble Lord has made to my honourable and right honourable friends.
Lord Barnett: My Lords, I note the general actions that the Government have in mind or are taking. However, I am sure that the noble Lord will have seen the Court of Auditors' report dated 16th November 1993 which refers to more than two years of action supposedly being taken, with no subsequent improvement. Our own House of Lords Select Committee sub-committee, as long ago as nearly five years, produced a list of recommended remedies in paragraph 183 of its report. Will the noble Lord say, first, whether he agrees with the remedies and, secondly, what specific action is being taken to implement them?
Lord Henley: My Lords, the Government have made quite clear that they generally support the recommendations of the Select Committee. But I think that all noble Lords ought to recognise, as I should be the first to do, that fraud will continue to be a major problem. But as the Select Committee made quite clear, any anti-fraud policy has to be a long-term policy in terms of requiring constant efforts. All member states have to take an active part in that.
What we have seen is an increase in the interest that all other member states take in their role in preventing, detecting and pursuing instances of fraud. Her Majesty's Government will continue to apply appropriate pressure, but in the end it has to be a question of political will by all member states. Her Majesty's Government, I believe, are in the lead on this and we will continue to apply appropriate pressure on other member states.
Lord Boardman: My Lords, can my noble friend give some indication as to when the measures which he has in mind are likely to show some effect in curbing the mass of abuses to which the Court of Auditors referred? When shall we start seeing some benefits?
Lord Henley: My Lords, without in any way wishing to sound complacent, I believe that we are already seeing some improvement. What I am saying is that these matters are long-term and require constant supervision and constant vigilance not only by this country, not only by the Commission, but by all member states. We have seen a change in the political will in all other member countries and the commitments made, for example, at the Copenhagen summit. We hope that in time that will lead to improvements.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, in the course of his reply to the noble Lord, Lord Benson, the Minister said that the Government were considering what attitude to take in determining whether or not they should recommend to the European Parliament that the Commission budget be discharged. Will the noble Lord reconsider that? It is quite monstrous. Surely he will agree that, on reading through the report, there should be no question about the attitude which the British Government should take. Will the noble Lord give the House the assurance that when the matter comes to be considered, either by COREPER or by the Council itself, the British Government will insist that the recommendation be that the Commission does not receive a discharge in the matter?
Lord Henley: My Lords, what I said, if the noble Lord listened to me, was that I would pass on what was a very interesting suggestion to my right honourable and honourable friends. It is certainly something which they will have to consider before the next meeting of the Council of Ministers.
Lord Harmar-Nicholls: My Lords, is not my noble friend convinced by now that all the circumstances surrounding the matter are so extreme and so well known that the advice given by the noble Lord, Lord Benson, is the only practical step to take? Will the

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Government use the powers they possess to ensure that such advice is given to the European Parliament so that it can be put into effect?
Lord Henley: My Lords, all I can say is that I note what my noble friend has had to say. I have given the assurance that I shall pass on to my right honourable and honourable friends the views that have been expressed. I am also sure that the European Parliament will note what my noble friend and other noble Lords in this House have had to say. It will be a matter for the European Parliament then to consider what the Council of Ministers recommends.
Baroness Robson of Kiddington: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for his replies to the previous questions. However, do the Government agree with the views expressed in paragraph 205 of the Select Committee's 1989 report that enormous sums are being lost due to fraud and irregularity in the Community and that those losses are borne by taxpayers and honest traders in Europe? Do the Government agree that it strikes at the roots of democratic society? It is a public scandal and, five years after that report, government action is long overdue.
Lord Henley: My Lords, the Government have taken a great deal of action. We have seen dramatic changes in attitudes. What I am trying to say is that I do not think there is room for complacency. We are grateful for the work of the Select Committee and its sub-committee and we shall continue to build on their ideas. The fight against fraud will obviously continue in that way. But there are no overnight solutions for dealing with the very extensive fraud that has occurred in some of the European institutions.
Lord Campbell of Alloway: My Lords, may I ask my noble friend why he says it is a matter for the European Parliament? Is it not surely a matter for the Council of Ministers and also primarily, so far as we are concerned, for Her Majesty's Government to take the initiative in the affair?
Lord Henley: My Lords, first, Her Majesty's Government have taken the initiative. Secondly, it is a matter for Her Majesty's Government, as one member of the Council of Ministers, to consider these matters. It is then a matter for the Council of Ministers to recommend to the European Parliament what action it should take. It is for the European Parliament then to discharge or refuse to discharge the 1992 budget.
Lord Eatwell: My Lords, can the noble Lord elaborate on the actions that Her Majesty's Government have taken? Is he aware that paragraph 62 of the Select Committee report states that,
"it is essential that the Commission should have all the powers necessary to carry out its well accepted responsibilities for ensuring sound financial management"?
Can the Minister tell us what steps have been taken to provide the Community with appropriate greater powers in the UK since that report was published?
Lord Henley: My Lords, since that report was published, we have seen the Maastricht Act and further
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powers being granted to the European Commission. For example, Article 206, as amended, extends the European Commission's duties and powers in this field. In terms of what actual concrete things have happened and what changes there have been, perhaps I may give two examples. First, the changes to the Structural Fund expenditure. There will not now be expenditure in this field without prior appraisal of projects, as happened in the past. Secondly, I think the reforms to the CAP, with the integrated control and administration system which is designed to help pick out fraud, are again concrete examples of the progress that has been made both by the Commission and on the initiative of Her Majesty's Government.
The Earl of Lauderdale: My Lords, will my noble friend say whether the matter will be decided in the Council of Ministers by the unanimity rule or by qualified majority voting?
Lord Henley: My Lords, I believe that I am right in saying that it will be a matter for the unanimity of the Council of Ministers, in terms of the decision it reaches, as to what it recommends to the European Parliament. It is then a matter for the European Parliament to make its decision as to whether or not it discharges the budget.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware that his replies so far—to some of us anyway—sound very complacent indeed?
Noble Lords: No!
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: My Lords, I said "to some of us", not "to all of us". Is it not a fact, and can the noble Lord confirm, that we are talking about huge sums of money—some £2.5 billion—which makes the Westminster shenanigans pale into petty insignificance? In the light of the huge sums involved, is it not incumbent upon Her Majesty's Government to insist that immediate action is taken to reduce and, indeed, eliminate such fraud, which, quite frankly, in this country would be met with prosecution, trials and, we hope, gaoling?
Lord Henley: My Lords, I totally reject the allegation that we have been complacent. I have been trying to make it quite clear that we are in no way complacent and that we are at the forefront of the fight against fraud within the Community. We also hope to persuade noble Lords—but I dare say that we shall never persuade the noble Lord opposite—that the fraud damages the reputation of the Community itself. Those of us who believe in the Community, believe that it is therefore in the interests of all member states to help eliminate fraud so as to prevent that damage to the reputation of the Community.
Lord Harmar-Nicholls: My Lords, is my noble friend aware that when he quotes the Maastricht Treaty as being a new means of dealing with this problem, there is no need for the Maastricht Treaty to be brought in at all, since in 1981 the EC refused to discharge a budget for reasons which were minor compared with the problems expressed in the report?
Lord Henley: My Lords, I do not think that my noble friend and I will agree over the Maastricht Treaty. But I believe that all noble Lords will agree that the treaty did extend the powers of the Community in terms of its ability to fight and to deal with fraud of this sort.

EC: Legislative Cuts
3.10 p.m.
Lord Bruce of Donington Lord Bruce of Donington asked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they will publish the proposals to which the Foreign Secretary referred in a signed feature in the Sunday Times of 2nd January 1994, where he stated that "last month the Commission proposed cuts affecting some 25 per cent. of existing EC legislation"; and what is their view of those proposals.
The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Chalker of Wallasey): My Lords, the proposed cuts were referred to in the Commission's subsidiarity report to the Brussels European Council in December 1993. A copy of the report has been made available to the House and can also be obtained through HMSO. We welcome the Commission's proposals.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, is the noble Baroness aware that I hold a copy of that report in my hand, and have read it? Is she further aware that this particular document contains the greatest amount of waffle on the subject—to use the Prime Minister's term—that has ever been inflicted on the Community; and that there are no specific proposals whatever contained in it, merely a mass of generalities which are mainly useless?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I would never expect the noble Lord to come to this Chamber without an EC report somewhere about his person. I must say that, like many noble Lords, I find some documents that emanate from Brussels exceedingly wordy. Wordy they may be, but the point is that by going through the legislation the 25 per cent. figure which is found on page 8 of the Commission's report shows that some legislation will be repealed completely; some will be replaced by a smaller number of simpler measures. If we are to pursue what was a success for the United Kingdom, then we must make sure, together with our partners, that subsidiarity works—the EC not acting in some areas and acting as lightly as possible where there is a case for EC legislation. The report reflects both cases, and I hope that we shall continue to have the same success as we have already had with the first 16 out of 24 items on the Anglo-French list.
Lord Tugendhat: My Lords, will my noble friend agree that while every effort must be made to encourage the Commission down the road of this Question, the best thing that could be done to reduce the volume of legislation in the Community would be to persuade the
456
governments of member states—that even sometimes includes our own—not to press for legislation in areas where it is not absolutely necessary?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I entirely agree with my noble friend, who has great experience in these matters. I believe that there are many areas which we shall be able to reduce in terms of directives and simplify in terms of others. I can assure the House that the Government intend to see that that is done.
Lord Richard: My Lords, can the Minister confirm two points? First, are the Government satisfied that the Commission is taking this exercise seriously? Secondly, will she confirm that in the Government's view the Commission's efforts so far deserve commendation rather than condemnation?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I certainly commend the Commission for the work that has been done so far. But I have learnt in this House never to be satisfied with anything. That lays one open immediately to the accusation that one is perhaps being self-satisfied about the matter. Therefore we shall make sure that we continue to monitor and to find new areas where the subsidiarity rule must apply which just might not have been discovered in Brussels.
Lord Peyton of Yeovil: My Lords, is my noble friend aware how pleased I was to hear her answer to my noble friend Lord Tugendhat? Is she further aware that if she could possibly communicate some of the sentiments contained in that answer to a number of her noble friends with a view to some legislative economy here, it would be very welcome indeed?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, my noble friend puts the case very well. But given that a number of my noble friends are with me in the Chamber today, I am sure that they will note what my other noble friend has just said.
Lord Bruce of Donington: My Lords, is the noble Baroness aware that, although she quoted from the Commission's document to the extent of agreeing that it contained the phrase "25 per cent. of existing EC legislation", she herself did not offer any opinion as to whether that observation was correct? Is she satisfied that on the basis of this document the Commission's existing proposals will affect some 25 per cent. of the existing legislation? Is she further aware that as long ago as 24th September 1992 the Prime Minister himself promised to give specific examples of where legislation would be repealed in the light of subsidiarity? There emerged at Copenhagen some seven proposals. How many have emerged in specific terms in the document to which she has referred?
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, the document does not go through the specific cases, but I am sure that the noble Lord is already aware that a fisheries directive has been amended on subsidiarity grounds—perhaps not as much as we would like, but it has nevertheless been amended. We have had a check done on the 25 per cent. estimate from the Commission and find it accurate. That has been done not by looking

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at the numbers of legislative Acts but by counting the number of pages of legislation, so that we are sure that we are reducing legislation as a whole, as my noble friend Lord Peyton requested just now.

Hereditary Peerages Bill [H.L.]
3.16 p.m.
Lord Diamond: My Lords, I beg to introduce a Bill to amend the law relating to hereditary peerages. I beg to move that this Bill be now read a first time.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a first time.—(Lord Diamond.)
On Question, Bill read a first time, and to be printed.

Police and Magistrates' Courts Bill [H.L.]
3.17 p.m.
The Lord Chancellor (Lord Mackay of Clashfern): My Lords, I beg to move that the Bill be now read a second time.
The most substantial provisions in this Bill are in Parts I and IV. Part I will reform the structure of the police service in England and Wales. Its purpose is to improve the management and organisation of the police service, so that it is better able to combat crime. The reforms in this part were foreshadowed in the White Paper on police reform which was published in June last year. Part IV will strengthen and modernise the administration of magistrates' courts. Parts II and III make changes affecting the police in Scotland and Northern Ireland respectively.
The organisation of police forces in England and Wales is based on the tripartite structure of chief constables, police authorities and the Home Secretary. The Bill will strengthen that structure by making the changes necessary to provide effective policing into the 21st century. Our objective is to establish a framework for the management and structure of the service which will allow police men and women to tackle crime and to protect local communities in the most effective way.
The present arrangements involve too many controls by the Home Secretary and central government over the details of local expenditure. They prevent the best use being made of the available resources. We propose to abolish those controls and to give more power to local police authorities and to chief constables, whose business it is to provide a service to their local communities.
Each police force will be maintained, as now, by a police authority. We intend to strengthen local police authorities so that they are better equipped to carry out their responsibilities. Clause 2 provides for the establishment of the new police authorities outside London. They will, in future, be smaller bodies. They will be free-standing with their own money and their own standard spending assessments. Decisions about policing will be taken by the police authority. They will not be taken by a committee of a local authority which can be overruled by the local authority. It will be possible for local people from any background who
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have relevant skills or expertise to be members of the authority. Each will have a total of 16 members. Of those, eight are to be members of relevant councils, three are to be magistrates and five will be independent members appointed by the Home Secretary. The Home Secretary made an announcement in another place yesterday about how those members will be appointed. My noble friend Lord Ferrers also set out the details of this announcement for your Lordships. I hope that the detailed arrangements involving a published job description and personal profile, and short-listing by regional panels, will help to allay concerns about the independence of those members. Rules governing the appointment of members, including eligibility for appointment, tenure of office and allowances, are set out in Schedule 2 to the Bill. This also provides for the appointment of the chairman to the authority, who will be chosen by the Home Secretary from the overall membership.
Clause 3 sets out the general functions and duties of the new police authorities. The primary duty of each police authority will be to secure the maintenance of an efficient and effective police force for the area. This duty is slightly different from the duty under the 1964 Act as it stands, which is to maintain an adequate and efficient force. This small but important change will ensure that police authorities give priority not only to achieving value for money with the resources available, but also to ensure that the results are consistent with the objectives that have been set. Similar changes are made by the Bill to other references in the 1964 Act to efficiency. In the 1990s, and beyond, we should equally be concerned with effectiveness.
For the first time, there will be a duty on each local police authority to produce a costed local policing plan, setting out its priorities for the forthcoming year. They will do this together with the chief constable, and in so doing they must take account of the views of local people. The Bill requires this plan to be published. Each police authority will also be required to publish an annual report, assessing how far the plans for the previous year have been achieved. Local people will be able to see clearly what their local police are doing with their money and how well they are doing it.
The Government believe that these changes in the Bill will help the police to deal with those things which are of greatest concern to local people. This is not centralisation of policing, as is often suggested. It is precisely the reverse. It is giving away to police authorities and to chief constables various powers which the Home Secretary presently has. It is making those local police authorities stronger, more independent and more influential. It is enabling policing to be done locally, to be the responsibility of local people, and for policing to be accountable to local people.
The Bill makes no changes to the existing pattern of police forces, nor to the areas which they cover. I can make it absolutely clear that the Government have no plans for police force amalgamation. We have no predetermined view that a particular size of police force is better than any other. We would only wish to make changes if there were good arguments that it would lead to more effective policing. However, we intend that the

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legislation should lay the basis of policing for many years to come. It is, therefore, sensible to allow for the possibility of change in the number or shape of forces, should any alterations become necessary in future.
Under Clause 10 the Secretary of State may make changes to police force boundaries by order. This includes changes to the Metropolitan Police district. But the clause places a requirement on the Secretary of State, if he decides that a change is desirable in the interests of efficiency or effectiveness, to consult interested parties, to give his reasons for any proposed change, and to consider objections to the plan. A change proposed by the Secretary of State can only be made if it is approved by both Houses of Parliament.
Clauses 2 to 8 are crucial in giving local police authorities and chief constables defined responsibilities and in enabling them to get on with the job without unnecessary interference. The Bill also ensures that there will be a clear framework for setting police priorities and measuring performance. Clause 11 enables the Home Secretary to set key objectives for policing and to require police authorities to set performance targets for measuring the achievement of these objectives. The clause also enables him to issue codes of practice relating to the exercise of police authority functions.
The Government are confident that all police authorities will be well equipped to ensure that the force provides a high quality service. Some provision needs to be made, however, for the eventuality of a police authority which fails to meet its obligations. Clause 11 also enables the Secretary of State to direct a police authority to take remedial measures, where a special inspection report indicates that a police force is not efficient or not effective. The power will only be available as a last resort, where there is independent evidence from an inspector of constabulary that a police authority is failing in its duties.
Part I also puts into place a new system of police funding. Clause 13 replaces the current provisions on police grant, under which the Home Secretary refunds 51 per cent. of police expenditure. In future, each police authority will receive a cash limited amount of police grant The Secretary of State is required to report in another place on how he proposes to allocate police grant and he must secure the approval of that House to his proposals.
The new police authorities will also receive funding through revenue support grant, non-domestic rates and the council tax. Clause 22 establishes the new police authorities as major precepting bodies for local government finance purposes.
The Bill will also reinforce the independent scrutiny of police performance. It makes important changes to the role of Her Majesty's inspectors of constabulary. Clause 16 extends their statutory responsibilities to the inspection of the Metropolitan Police. Clause 17 requires that all inspection reports are published and that every police authority publishes a response. This will help to provide much greater openness about what the police are doing and how well they are doing it.
Part I of the Bill also implements those of the Government's proposals, in relation to police rank
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structure and conditions of service, which require primary legislation. Clause 5 has the effect of abolishing the rank of deputy chief constable. The abolition of chief superintendent and chief inspector ranks will be achieved be regulations. Clause 14 allows for greater flexibility in regulations relating to conditions of service. It also ensures that regulations concerning fixed term appointments may not be made for officers below superintendent rank.
Part I of the Bill paves the way for procedures to deal with police officers whose performance is unsatisfactory and for simplified procedures for dealing with misconduct by police officers. These provisions give effect to the results of the consultation process which followed the publication of the Government's proposals on police discipline last year. The Bill does not itself establish new procedures for police discipline. But the provisions of Clause 14 and Clauses 29 to 33 enable revised procedures to be introduced, and Clause 15 and Schedule 3 make provision for new appeals tribunals to be established.
I turn now to Part II of the Bill. Part II contains purely Scottish provisions on the police. The Bill has no provisions on courts in Scotland. It may assist your Lordships if I explain that the Bill does not deal with police areas in Scotland, nor with the composition, nor constitution, of Scottish police authorities. Part II of the Bill makes various amendments and additions to the Police (Scotland) Act 1967 in pursuit of the Government's policy for reform of the police service. A number of these make provision for Scotland comparable to that made for England and Wales in Part I of the Bill. These include provisions to give greater management responsibility to chief constables, and to give effect to the Government's proposals on police ranks and conditions of service, including discipline.
The Bill also makes various provisions which are relevant only to Scotland. These relate to such matters as subjects to be included in chief constables' annual reports; and the requirement for forces to work together to prevent or detect crime with maximum efficiency.
Part III of the Bill makes changes to the Police Act (Northern Ireland) 1970, to give effect in Northern Ireland to the Government's decisions on police rank structure and conditions of service. The changes introduced by the Bill are comparable to those being made in Great Britain to enable greater flexibility in making regulations, while taking account of the special and different circumstances of the Royal Ulster Constabulary.
Part IV of the Bill deals with the Government's proposals for the reform of the magistrates' courts service in England and Wales. These reforms relate to the management of the service. They will not affect the judicial decision taken in individual cases.
The 1989 scrutiny on the administration of the magistrates' courts found some serious and fundamental flaws in the management and organisational structure of the service. It concluded:
"There is no coherent management structure for the service. At the national level, the role of the Home Office is so uncertain, and its powers so limited, that it might be truer to say that there are 105 local services, each run by a committee of magistrates. But the local structure is just as confused, with 285 justices'

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clerks enjoying a semi-autonomous status, under committees which are fundamentally ill-suited to the task of management. It is impossible to locate clear management responsibility or accountability anywhere in the structure".
The scrutiny proposed a radical solution, that the magistrates' courts service should be restructured as a single national service, operated as an executive agency. We rejected this option. It had little support in the service, which broadly opposed the ending of local management of the service. However, the weaknesses identified by the scrutiny still needed to be addressed. We published our proposals for this in a White Paper in February 1992.
There are three key objectives behind our proposals. First, magistrates' courts committees, who are responsible for running the service locally, should be better able to fulfil their responsibilities. Secondly, there should be a clear line of management accountability from the courts to the magistrates' courts committees at local level. I am in turn accountable, as the responsible Minister, to your Lordships and the other place, for the administration of the magistrates' courts service. I therefore need some means, consistent with the local nature of the service, of discharging that accountability. This is not the type of direct line management accountability exercised by the magistrates' courts committees. It is of a more general nature. Nevertheless, it needs to be clear if I am to undertake my responsibilities. Thirdly, we want to ensure, in case there is any doubt that the proposals might do otherwise, that the independence of judicial decisions made by magistrates in individual cases remains secure.
Although it is evident from what I have already said, it is worth my emphasising that it is no part of my intention to seek direct managerial control. Had the proposals in the original scrutiny been implemented, I have no doubt that a wide range of detailed controls would have been necessary. As it is, the proposals in this Bill will do no more than provide me with the minimum level of control consistent with my accountability to Parliament.
There are a number of provisions in Part IV of the Bill to which I should like to draw your Lordships' attention. Clause 62 will enable me to amalgamate magistrates' courts committees. There are at present 105 magistrates' courts committee areas. Some are very small, covering for example, the smallest counties and metropolitan districts. Many are much larger. The largest area has over 400 times more work than the smallest. I have published to the service my preliminary conclusions as to the geographical areas of the new committees. I do not propose that all magistrates' courts committee areas should be of the same size. But many of the smallest committees cannot use their resources as flexibly as the larger ones, and this results in a loss of potential for improved value for money, and lower levels of service to the public than would otherwise be possible. I propose that there should be local consultation before making particular orders. The object of such a course is that full account can be taken of local circumstances.
The constitution of magistrates' courts committees needs to be better structured to fulfil the task of
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providing strategic direction for their local service. Committees will be smaller than at present. They will no longer be primarily representational bodies, but their members will be appointed by a selection panel made up of representatives of local benches, to ensure that the choice of committee members will continue to rest firmly with the local magistracy. They will be able to co-opt up to two members who may be, but need not be, magistrates. If there is a clear weakness in a committee's membership which they decline to rectify by co-option, I envisage that I could do so by making up to two appointments myself.
Magistrates' courts committees comprise volunteers giving their services in their own time. It is not easy for them directly to manage the staff of the courts. Therefore I propose that they should have the assistance of a single head of service, to whom they can delegate much of the day-to-day administration of the service. The head of service will be the line manager of all the committee's staff. Without this managerial control, there will continue to be no proper accountability to the magistrates' courts committee from the staff delivering the service, which was one of the important weaknesses identified by the 1989 scrutiny. I can think of no other public service which does not have a single head who is accountable to those responsible for delivering the service.
This principle is already recognised in some parts of the service and those magistrates' courts committees who have already appointed a head of service in advance of this legislation have, I believe, secured benefits.
All chief justices' clerks and justices' clerks should have a contract of employment with their committee. This is clearly much more satisfactory than the present arrangements under which justices' clerks hold office (and can be dismissed) at the pleasure of the committee. I also want to be sure that magistrates' courts committees have in place a proper framework for managing their staff.
I accordingly propose that contracts between magistrates' courts committees and senior staff should contain certain broad provisions. I envisage that these provisions will include the fixing of a term to the contract—although this may be rolling—and provide for an element of remuneration to be linked to performance. None of these provisions will affect existing office holders, and I do not seek any powers to vary contracts of service between magistrates' courts committees and their staff once they are in force.
I know that in clarifying the accountability of justices' clerks to their magistrates' courts committees in administrative matters, some people fear that the independent advice given to magistrates in court will be undermined. Having given this matter considerable thought, I am satisfied that those fears are groundless. For example, where the justices' clerk is also the head of service, there is no evidence or suggestion that there has been any interference with judicial independence. As confirmation of this and to put the matter beyond doubt, I propose that it be declared, as appears on the face of the Bill, that in giving advice to magistrates in court, or in exercising the delegated functions of a single

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justice, justices' clerks may not be subject to management direction, either local or national. That provision is incorporated on the face of the Bill and would govern any exercise of delegated powers under it.
The Magistrates' Courts Service Inspectorate has, following the White Paper, already been set up and I propose in this Bill to place it on a statutory footing. The inspectorate's remit will extend only to the administration of the magistrates' courts service, not the judicial work of the courts.
I also propose to issue in directions the standards of performance that I expect the magistrates' courts service to achieve. The inspectorate will examine the performance of the service against these standards. If the required standards are not achieved, or the service is unsatisfactory in other ways, the inspectorate will provide guidance on how improvements can be made. I expect that the vast majority of problems will be resolved in this way. As is normal for any organisation, there needs to be some reserve powers for use on those very rare occasions when a committee, without reasonable excuse, continues to fail in its duties. This Bill therefore proposes a number of incremental steps that I can take in these unusual circumstances. Clearly, the circumstances would be exceptional and all other remedies would have been tried.
Many of the reforms proposed in this part of the Bill are already in place in one area of the country or another, in so far as that is possible within the existing legislative framework. Various committees have appointed either a single justices' clerk to be the head of the staff, or have appointed an equivalent of the chief justices' clerk. The benefits of flexible organisation within larger magistrates' courts committee areas have been exploited by many committees, who have, for example, concentrated their administrative support in a few locations. A number of employees of the magistrates' courts service have fixed-term contracts. Where the reforms I propose have been brought into effect locally, they have been shown to bring benefits to the management of the service.
The police parts of the Bill will help the police tackle crime and protect the public. They should also enable the public to see their local force tackling the things that matter most. No one realises more acutely than the police that they must have the full confidence of local people if they are to deal effectively with the ever-increasing demands placed upon them. This Bill will result in a police service which is better able to respond to what the public wants because it is better organised and better run.
The Bill also brings the administrative structure of the magistrates' courts service, which has remained essentially unaltered for the past 50 years, up to date. The reforms will better enable it to deal with the challenges that the service now faces without undermining its local nature, and they will not interfere with the independence of the magistracy. I commend them to your Lordships.
Moved, That the Bill be now read a second time.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
3.49 p.m.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, my respect for the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor is such that I have an instinctive predilection to agreeing with what he says and to accepting that his arguments are well thought out and persuasive. My instinctive predilection has only been dispersed over recent weeks by the virtually unanimous opposition of every organisation representing those who take part in the work of the police service or of the magistracy to significant parts —indeed, I would say to crucial parts—of the Bill to which the noble and learned Lord has just proposed giving a Second Reading with his usual clarity and courtesy to the House.
On the police side, we have the unanimous opposition of all the representatives of police authorities, the members of the local authority associations of all political parties, both in England and in Wales. We have the unanimous opposition of all the police service—from the Association of Chief Police Officers through the Superintendents' Association to the Police Federation, which represents ranks below superintendent. We have similar unanimous opposition from all of the comparable organisations representing the Scottish police. I have not received any representations from Northern Ireland, but in so far as the same provisions are proposed for Northern Ireland, I would not be surprised if there were opposition there and I do not doubt that as the Bill proceeds there will be representations from Northern Ireland also.
Why is there such unanimous opposition from those who know in their daily lives what the police service and the magistrates' court service are like? I think that it is because what is being proposed here is the overturning of not just a few years of the constitutional history of this country, but of many years of its history. The involvement of local authorities in the police service does not just date back to the Police Act 1964 and to the Willink Royal Commission which preceded it; it goes back as far as the Municipal Corporations Act 1835. At all stages, it has been recognised by those who have been involved in the service and in controlling the service that local authorities play a crucial part in an accountable police service. When I say "accountable", I hope to show to your Lordships that that also means an effective police service.
The Willink Commission which preceded the 1964 Police Act deserves quoting at some length. In paragraph 142, the commission stated:
"The basic soundness of our present police system is not due merely to the fact that reasonable people operate it successfully—though that is certainly true. Nor, again, is the system sound merely because it follows a tradition of local policing which is traceable back for many centuries—though that also is true. In our opinion the present police system is sound because it is based upon, and reflects, a political idea of immense practical value which has gained wide acceptance in this country, namely the idea of partnership between central and local government in the administration of public services. This idea, working itself out in a variety of ways in our education, health, housing and other services, admirably suits the British temperament. It gives free rein to discussion and ample scope for compromise, thus promoting the growth of an enlightened and mature public opinion".

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Earlier in the report, at paragraph 22, the commission stated:
"We attach importance to the principle that the ratepayer, through his elected representatives, should have a vote in the scale and cost of the policing of the community in which he lives".
In paragraph 230, the commission specifically rejected what is now proposed with these words:
"It would be inappropriate to assign to the Secretaries of State complete responsibility for the police service in that Ministers cannot in our view be responsible for the acts of individual policemen or for the day-to-day enforcement of the law".
From the speech from the noble and learned Lord, it would not appear that that is what is proposed; but it is, indeed, what is proposed because the composition of the police authorities, as proposed in the Bill, will no longer be the tripartite system enshrined in the 1964 Act whereby the Home Secretary, the police authority and the chief constable all have a say in policing, and whereby any dispute between any two of those parties can be resolved with the help of the third party. No, what is now proposed is that the Home Secretary—central government—shall have the power to appoint his own nominees to the police authority who, together with magistrates, will equal the number of local authority members. He will have the further power of directly appointing a paid chairman. That means that a majority of members of the police authority will no longer be members of the local authority. Therefore, instead of having a tripartite system, the proposals put the Home Secretary in command both of the police authorities and, as I shall show by my examination of the Bill, of the chief constables also.
That is shown clearly when we consider the proposals on amalgamations. The noble and learned Lord has assured us that the Government have no plans for amalgamations. If that is the case—and I accept what the noble and learned Lord says—why does Clause 10 provide for the Home Secretary to make orders for amalgamation of his own volition and without waiting for the police authorities to recommend that? Why can those orders make,
"provision as to the membership of a police authority"?
Why do they provide for amending Schedule 1A, which is the list of police authorities, and "any other enactment"? If that is not a Henry VIII clause, I do not know what is. Why do they provide that if the order makes a hybrid instrument, the instrument,
"shall proceed … as if it were not such an instrument"?
What on earth are we doing providing in advance that the protection of the hybrid instrument procedure shall be abolished by legislation on the decision only of the Home Secretary without any parliamentary intervention whatsoever? Finally, why is it that the proposed clauses in the consultation procedures take away the obligation which has existed until now, that when any amalgamation is proposed there should be a public inquiry? If there are no plans to amalgamate police authorities, this is a very strange way of not making any plans.
We are talking about more than just the boundaries of the police authorities. What is at stake here is, in effect, control of the police authorities themselves through the Home Secretary's control of the chairmanship and a
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substantial part of the membership of the police authorities. Without saying so, that means, in effect, that we are moving in the direction of a national police force. There are perfectly good arguments for some elements of national involvement in policing. There are perfectly good arguments about why, for example, the national police computer facilities and those parts of the service dealing with terrorism, serious fraud and drugs offences should be put on a national basis, but this is not the way to do it. The Bill proposes that all elements of policing, including local and community policing, shall come under the increasing control of the Home Secretary.
If we needed any persuading on that point, those of your Lordships who were present at the meeting upstairs last week which was organised by the noble Lord, Lord Knights, will have heard Sir John Chatfield, the former Conservative chairman of the Association of County Councils, arguing cogently against these provisions in the Bill. He gave the example of the miners' strike. It appeared to the police in the mining areas of this country that to preserve public order they needed reinforcements on a very much larger scale than would have been available from their own resources, so they asked the police authorities and chief constables in other parts of the country for their assistance. That assistance was voluntarily given. Sir John argued—I fear that this is true—that if there had been a government order that that assistance be given, that would in effect have meant that the Government centrally had been setting out to break the miners' strike. There are some of us who feel that there was an element of that in what happened, but the procedure that was adopted meant that the Government did not have the power or the responsibility to undertake such an operation. What is now proposed is to abolish that provision entirely. The Home Secretary can give directions not just to all authorities but to individual authorities that they will assist in any particular operation of this kind. Sir John rightly feared that this would be extremely damaging to the independence from government of policing in this country.
I turn now to the issue of the membership of police authorities. If it is suggested that local authority members do not have an involvement in their community, all I can say is that the provisions which are now proposed, and which were suggested in the Written Answer given yesterday by the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, do not carry much conviction. After all, many local authority members—38 per cent. of them according to a recent survey—have business interests in their local authorities. Some 62 per cent. of them are school governors. All of them are involved in the other activities of the local authority which have to inter-relate with policing.
They are involved with the safety aspects of highways, the social services, education and with the presence of police as regards training in schools, with crime prevention, with the youth service and with other activities. They are responsible and accountable to their electors for all aspects of their activity including their police activities. Yet the Home Secretary now proposes that it should be a responsibility of the police authority to ensure that there are effective arrangements for consulting local communities about policing and for

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reflecting their views. The members of a police authority will be expected to act on behalf of local people as the customers of the service which the police force provides. They will be expected, if you please, to consult the public about the work of the police and help to build a partnership between the police and the local community.
It appears that the Government, having totally abandoned any idea of local democracy, are distorting the use of the word "community" in an attempt to take its place. We have a community system in this country and our community is comprised of many activities by voluntary organisations and by local democracy and by popularly elected local councillors. These are the councillors who can provide the links with the community and these are the people who can consult the public about the work of the police. These are the people who, unlike appointed members of a police authority, will be accountable if the public are not satisfied with the work of the police.
If we look at many of the aspects of policing, notably crime prevention, it is quite clear that this will not be assisted by having even the most well meaning of volunteers putting themselves forward, being short listed by a management consultant and by two persons who are supposed to be independent of government—however, we have learnt the meaning of independence from government on many other occasions—and then chosen from the short list by the Home Secretary.
There are many other aspects of the police part of this Bill which I have barely time to do more than touch on. I note the emphasis which the noble and learned Lord gave to performance targets. Clause 11 of the Bill provides that performance targets may be imposed not just on all authorities—in other words, on general principles—but on,
"one or more particular authorities".
Clause 11 also provides that different conditions for different authorities may be applied. If that is not detailed control of the work of the police authorities, I do not know what is.
Let us consider the financing of the police. There may well be aspects in which the Home Office is giving up detailed control of certain kinds of expenditure, but fundamentally the Bill is proposing that the precept on local authorities needs the approval of half the total membership and five out of eight local authority members. That means that the nominated members of the police authority, plus the chairman placing his casting vote, can block a precept on the local authorities in the area. In any case the Home Secretary has the power to increase any precept which is made. We are moving here into the mad system of local government finance and I should have thought that the Government have had enough sad and bitter experience of the inadequacy of our local government finance procedures not to introduce hypothecation, cash limiting, individual standard spending assessments and capping budgets. Some people never seem to learn.
The noble and learned Lord talked about the independence of chief constables. I remind him that the chief constables will now be on fixed-term contracts. They will be on performance related pay and they will
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probably be sitting in the next office to a Home Secretary-appointed chairman of a police authority who will himself be paid. How that can be squared with increased independence for chief constables I cannot imagine. There are even more absurdities. Clause 21 proposes that there should be commercial sponsorship,
"of any activity of the police authority or of the police force maintained by it".
What does that mean? Does it mean that Group 4 will run the police cells, or that there will be a Maxwell memorial pension fund, or a Shirley Porter blueprint for police housing? The idea of sponsorship is absurd and it should not have a place in this Bill. The Police Federation has made strong objections to the proposal in Clause 4 that the Secretary of State's approval should be required for the appointment of a chief constable. That, again, is a provision which we shall have to take out of this Bill as it is clearly a centralising measure.
I have little time to refer to London but I remind the House of what Mr. Kenneth Clarke said when he was Home Secretary in response to a Parliamentary Question. He stated:
"I think that London needs a police authority, and the arrangement whereby the Home Secretary is in theory the police authority for London is not adequate if we are to hold the Metropolitan Police to account, as happens with other police authorities, and if we are to assist them by giving clearer guidelines on priorities".
That was the view of Mr. Kenneth Clarke and indeed it was the view of the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, as stated in this House on 26th May 1993. What has changed? We shall seek to put back a police authority for London in accordance with those views.
The Scottish police are deeply dissatisfied with Part II of the Bill. They are dissatisfied with the provision in Clause 45 that the Secretary of State can direct all chief constables to participate in a campaign or operation. That is the analogy in Scotland of the miners' strike to which I referred earlier. The Scottish police are dissatisfied with Clause 54 which states that the Secretary of State can require police forces to participate in a common service, whether that is a computer service or any other. They are dissatisfied with the proposal that the inspectorate can direct chief constables to re-examine a case. They claim that there has been no consultation on many of the proposals which are put forward in Part II of the Bill.
I turn now to the magistrates' part of the Bill. I must remind your Lordships that magistrates are responsible for 97 per cent. of cases in this country which go before the courts; that their cost out of a total criminal justice budget of £6 billion is approximately £350 million, of which they recoup £269 million in fines. It is difficult to understand why there should be this enormous concern about the management of magistrates' courts. After all, they are responsive. They cannot drum up business if they are under occupied. They have to deal with the cases that come before them. The difference between 105 and 60 magistrates' courts committees is not all that great to justify this quite drastic legislative proposal. What is proposed here is that the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor himself can initiate amalgamations of his own volition, whether or not there is a proposal from a magistrates' court committee. At the very least

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one would have thought that before putting forward a proposal of that kind there should be a costed business plan.
The noble and learned Lord referred to the need for a greater strategic direction of magistrates' courts. I do not understand what that means. I may be naive but I have worked in business all my life where I have been concerned with strategic business plans. But what strategic direction can there be for a magistrates' court system which responds to the need of the cases brought before it? What we have here is another example of centralisation. In the past the magistrates—as the noble and learned Lord clearly said—were independent in every way, but now the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor and the inspectorate between them have a vastly increased control of the chief justices' clerks and of the magistrates' courts committees. I do not say that without evidence.
So far as the chief justices' clerks are concerned, the Lord Chancellor can specify that there should be a contract and what the contract should contain. He has the right to approve or disapprove a short list for the appointment of a chief justices' clerk, and the same applies to a justices' clerk; and he has an inspectorate now given statutory powers, although not independent of his department, which can intervene in the management of magistrates' courts.
So far as control of the magistrates' courts committee is concerned, the Lord Chancellor has the power, as he rightly said, to make two co-options of his own without any intervention from the magistrates' courts committee itself. His approval has to be obtained for the election of a chairman by the magistrates' courts committee. He can give directions on the administrations of the court. He has to approve any communications between the magistrates' courts committee and the management.
In almost every way the power of central government is being increased as regards magistrates' courts. The Magistrates' Association has given a detailed critique of those extra powers. It opposes the power in Clause 62 for the Lord Chancellor to amalgamate courts of his own volition, and it demands a costed business plan. It opposes the power in Clause 63 for those co-options, and says that it should require the agreement of the magistrates' courts committee. On Clause 65, it says that the appointment of a chairman should not be subject to the Lord Chancellor's approval. The consultation exercise showed 96 per cent. of magistrates opposed to that particular provision in the Bill. The Magistrates' Association opposes the chief justices' clerks provision, which it sees as being an extension of the power of the Lord Chancellor's Department, in favour of an administrative chief executive.
The noble and learned Lord has given us an undertaking on Clause 71 which we shall read with great care. He says that the proposals for independence in an individual case will be extended more widely. We welcome the indication of his concern about the Bill as drafted, and we shall read his proposed amendments with great care.
In all of these matters there has been much talk of accountability. Accountability not only means giving an
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account of one's actions—and the Bill quite properly does that in many cases—but also means being held to account. Under the provisions of the Bill neither the police authorities nor the chief justices' clerks respectively, nor staff of a magistrates' courts committee, will be held to account by anybody except central government. Being held to account is a characteristic of local authorities who are up for re-election at regular intervals. It is not a characteristic of free-standing quangos such as are proposed by this Bill.
I suggest to your Lordships that this Bill is a direct denial of accountability in both of those senses. It is a denial of policing with the consent of the community. It is a denial of the principle that justice should not only be done but should be seen to be done. We shall be very critical indeed of the Bill as it proceeds through your Lordships' House.
4 p.m.
Lord Harris of Greenwich: My Lords, we are debating today a Bill of major constitutional importance. We have before us a measure which gives Ministers powers over both the police and magistrates which would have been unthinkable a decade ago.
Before I come to the substance of the proposals before us, perhaps I may say that I think it is objectionable that we are being invited to discuss both issues within a single Bill. They involve matters of such importance that they should have been proceeded with separately: one a Bill dealing with the police and a second dealing with the magistrates' courts. But the Government have decided otherwise.
I say at the outset that the Bill raises issues of such constitutional significance that a prolonged and detailed examination of its provisions is essential. We should not be invited to discuss these issues late at night in a thinly attended House simply because not enough time has been allocated for debate. We have made our views on this clear to the Government through the usual channels.
I have been involved in one form or another with the police service for the last 20 years. Therefore I propose to devote most of my speech to the effect of this Bill on the British police service. In no way does that imply that I find the Government's proposals on magistrates' courts as other than most undesirable, for they involve a huge transfer of power from an independent magistracy to a government department. Perhaps I may give two examples, one of which was referred to by the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh of Haringey.
The noble and learned Lord is inviting us to agree that he and his successors should be entitled to reject the appointment by a magistrates' courts committee of its chairman. On what conceivable grounds can this extraordinary power be justified? Why should a magistrates' courts committee in Northumbria, in West Glamorgan or in Norfolk have to wait around to discover whether the Lord Chancellor of the day is prepared to agree to the appointment of its chairman? And how can it be right for a justices' clerk, the person who provides independent legal advice to lay magistrates, to be subject to a fixed term contract with performance-related pay to be determined in part by the

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assiduity with which he follows the views of a government department? That is wholly wrong, and we shall resist it.
I turn now to the Bill's provisions relating to the police. I propose to discuss three issues: force amalgamations, national objectives and performance indicators, and lastly the character of the new police authorities.
First, on the question of the amalgamation of police forces, as I indicated to the House on 26th May last year in the debate which we initiated, I am not opposed in principle—nor, I think, would any reasonable person be—to some force amalgamations at some stage in the future. Some may be entirely justified. But this can already be done under the terms of the Police Act 1964. Indeed, it was under the terms of that Act that my noble friend Lord Jenkins of Hillhead carried through a major programme of police force amalgamations between 1966 and 1967. But he and his advisers had to justify those proposals before independent local inquiries when they were opposed either by local authorities or local police authorities.
What is proposed in this Bill is significantly different. It gives the Secretary of State absolute power to carry through amalgamations without any need for a local inquiry. He will be able to amalgamate forces without any requirement for him to justify his plans before an independent inspector. Why? Why should a police force with strong local links with the community be wiped out and amalgamated with others by the stroke of a ministerial pen? Ministers have given no justification for that proposal, and nor did the noble and learned Lord when he spoke on this matter a few minutes ago. We are simply being asked to give a Minister of the Crown unqualified authority to do anything he likes. We believe that this is wrong, and we shall oppose this clause of the Bill.
I turn next to Clause 11 which gives the Home Secretary power to set a list of national objectives for the police service and specific performance targets to test their ability to meet those objectives. Neither of those powers has been found to be necessary by any previous Home Secretary to Mr. Clarke, who was the initiator of these plans and not the current Home Secretary, Mr. Howard. We are told that the Home Secretary intends to instruct the police to make their two principal objectives crimes involving violence and burglary. At first sight, that may appear to be quite reasonable. However, in reality, it is foolish. Offences of violence include a wide variety of criminal acts from murder to a minor physical conflict between two neighbours who have become rather cross with one another.
In the Government's performance indicators, the clearing up of the murder will achieve precisely the same score as the minor assault. Indeed, the arrest of both angry neighbours will score twice as heavily as that of the murderer, though the offences involving the neighbours will probably have required the attendance of a police officer for half-an-hour whereas the conviction of the man accused of murder may require detailed examination and investigation by detectives for many weeks.
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How are these arbitrary, statistical judgments to be justified? How can they be described as a test of police efficiency, or command the respect of the police service? I must tell the noble Earl, Lord Fevers, who is to reply to the debate, that I have yet to meet a policeman who regards that approach as other than daft. It has nothing to do with the real world in which the police operate. However, in many respects, it is worse than daft.
The list of national objectives determined by the politician who is for the moment Home Secretary has several objectionable features. By obtaining the annual reports of every chief constable the media will, thanks to performance indicators, be able to construct a police league table. Those forces which follow the Home Secretary's national objectives most slavishly will, of course, appear at the top of the league table, and those that do not will appear at the bottom. The suggestion will be made that forces which appear at the top of the league are efficient while those at the bottom are not. That is nonsense.
Let us say that a chief officer and the local community that he serves are deeply worried about the extent of heroin and cocaine trafficking in the police force area concerned. Heroin and cocaine kill. They destroy families. Moreover, their availability has grown to a most dangerous degree. The United States customs assumes that it intercepts somewhere in the region of 10 per cent. of the heroin and cocaine which is destined for the American market. I know of few policemen in this country who believe that we are more effective in dealing with heroin and cocaine shipments to the United Kingdom.
During the first six months of 1980, heroin and cocaine seized by our Customs had a street value of £2 million. In the first six months of last year, the figure was not £2 million but £34 million; that is, 17 times as much. If we apply the 10 per cent. seizure calculations, it means that somewhere in the region of £340 million worth of heroin and cocaine entered the UK market during that period of just six months. This danger is now widely recognised. Presumably, that is why the Department of Health is about to launch an advertising campaign directed at publicising the threat to young people which is provided by drugs.
However, those chief officers who devote substantial resources to dealing with drugs may find that their force will be rated as less efficient than those which have an impressive record in charging significant numbers of young men with common assault, the least serious charge so far as offences of violence are concerned. That seems to me to be quite absurd. There are scores of other areas of police activity which will be disregarded in the performance indicators. I have in mind the hours of police time spent in dealing with people's domestic disputes, or with missing persons, lost children, the elderly and the infirm or in policing major events; or, indeed, in using large numbers of policemen to carry out checks at times of threatened IRA terrorist attacks.
What is the point of all of that? Why should a politician in Whitehall impose his order of priorities on chief officers whose areas range from scattered rural communities in Cumbria and Dyfed Powys to the

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inner-city areas such as Handsworth and Tower Hamlets? Why should not each chief police officer make his own decision on operational priorities in his force area as is now the case, taking account of the views of the local community? The Government appear to believe that the Minister in Whitehall always knows best. We do not.
I turn now to the third issue that I want to raise this afternoon. I refer to the proposed new police authorities which were mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh of Haringey. Let us be quite clear on what it is about: it is the first major step towards the creation of a national police force. As the House is aware—indeed, the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh of Haringey, reminded us—ever since the passage of the Municipal Corporations Act 1835, the Local Government Act 1888 and the Police Act 1964, our system of policing has been based on a tripartite system between chief officers, local police authorities and the Home Secretary. We have avoided the over-centralisation of power that we have seen in a number of countries on the Continent in which the police are responsible to a powerful Minister of the interior, and the situation in the United States where mayors appoint their senior police officers and are enabled to dismiss them at will.
I have had the opportunity of visiting police forces in five countries in the European Community and about 12 police departments in the United States. They contain many senior officers of considerable ability. However, in conversation with them, what is most significant is the immense regard that they express for the structure of the British police service. They have told me how lucky we are in this country that we do not permit an all-powerful politician to run our police service. They have added that that is why, despite all the great difficulties through which we have passed in recent years, they believe that our police service has such a high international reputation.
I am glad to say that the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, appears to share that judgment. Speaking in this House on 26th May last year during a debate on the police service, the noble Earl said:
"In the 30 years that have passed since the previous police Act became law the old tripartite structure, which consisted of police authorities, chief constables and the Home Secretary, has provided an effective police service which can still truthfully be described as not only the best in the world but also the envy of the world".—[Official Report, 26/5/93; col. 345.]
I emphasise the words,
"the envy of the world".
Those are the words of the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers. Well, if the system is as good as that, why have the Government decided to destroy it? That is what the Bill does. It has been done without any independent form of inquiry and without any group of people with knowledge and experience in the area agreeing to support it. So far as I am aware, it is a proposal with virtually no friends whatever. For the first time in this country's history, the Home Secretary has been given the power not only to appoint members to the authority but also its chairman who, as the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, pointed out, will be paid. Every police authority whatever its size will have precisely the same
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number of members: 16. The elected members, of whom there will be eight, will come from different political parties.
Last night we were told that nominees for the Home Secretary's appointments would be put before him by a personnel selection consultant and by Lord Lieutenants. I am sure that if that duty is imposed upon them they will carry it out in a conscientious manner. But the question of who draws up the list of nominees is of secondary importance. The question is: who makes the decision about whom to appoint and whom to reject? We all know the answer to that: the Minister in Whitehall will make the decision. We can all be quite clear about what is being proposed. If the Bill is passed in its present form there will be a paid political appointee of a Minister in every operational police headquarters in this country—in Exeter, Durham, Preston, Colwyn Bay, Penrith, Bridgend and all the rest. He or she will be supported by up to five other political appointees.
These provisions have nothing whatever to do with the efficiency of the British police service; they have to do with the power of a Home Secretary in future, whatever his party may be, to put his political friends in control of every police force in this country. The risk to the independence of chief officers, which is the bulwark of our present system, is obvious. Henceforth, senior officers will be on limited term contracts which will be extended or not at the discretion of the new police authorities. Similarly, they may be awarded performance-related bonuses.
At present, if the chairman of a police authority were to urge a chief officer to make a politically convenient decision on how to handle an operational issue, be it an industrial dispute or a problem involving new age travellers, the chief officer would say that it was a matter which only he could decide. In my view, that is absolutely as it should be. That is why the operational independence of a chief officer is the best guarantee of the political independence of the police service. That will end if the Bill is passed in its present form, for the chief officer will know that if his limited term contract is coming up for renewal and he takes a firm stand about political pressure of that kind he may find himself without a job. Similarly, he will know that if the new government chairman of the police authority indicates to him that the Home Secretary will find it helpful if he makes a particular type of statement at a politically sensitive time he will be taking a risk if he ignores that pressure. It is because the heads of police departments in the United States and continental Europe have in the past experienced just such pressure that they admire the system of policing in this country and its political independence.
The measure before us today raises issues of the utmost constitutional gravity. We are asked to destroy the carefully constructed balance of power that has existed for a century and a half between local communities, chief officers and the Home Office and create a situation whereby the political independence of the British police service will be at risk of being fatally undermined. That is not only my opinion but the view of every chief officer of police with whom I have

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discussed this issue. All of this is taking place without the British public having been consulted at a general election. This country does not have a written constitution or a constitutional court. This House is the final guardian of the liberties of the British people. I hope that the House will insist on exercising its authority to strike out these repugnant provisions from the Bill.
4.25 p.m.
Lord Taylor of Gosforth: My Lords, I do not wish nor is it appropriate for me to comment on the proposals contained in Parts I, II and III of the Bill which deal with the Government's intentions to reform the police. Nor do I wish to address all the matters concerning the magistrates' courts committees contained in Part IV of the Bill. Contrary to what may have appeared in the press, I have no desire to clash with the Lord Chancellor in this area. Indeed, I support him in seeking to secure greater efficiency in the magistrates' courts by amalgamating some committee areas and establishing an inspectorate to report to him on the organisation and management of magistrates' courts. I apologise to the House in advance for having to leave the debate early on account of a previous commitment.
I wish to address the impact of the Bill on the judicial independence of the magistracy—a matter to which I know the Lord Chancellor attaches great importance, since he has thought it necessary expressly to provide for it in Clause 71. He has told us today that it is one of his three objectives. My concerns are directed not only at the independence of lay and professional magistrates but also of their clerks who, whilst not strictly members of the judiciary—a large part of their work consists of court administration and the management of resources—nevertheless have important judicial functions. In my view, those functions fall into two categories. I say "in my view" because, although I have asked the parliamentary secretary to the Lord Chancellor what he considers those judicial functions to be, he has written to me that he
"doubts there is much to be gained from attempting to define which of the functions of justices' clerks are or are not judicial ones".
I find that observation astonishing. Since the Lord Chancellor attaches sufficient importance to the principle of judicial independence to enshrine it in a specific clause in the Bill one may have expected him and his department to have taken care to identify the traditional functions which need to be protected.
This matters a great deal. The first category of judicial functions to which I refer is the provision by justices' clerks of advice to the Bench on what the law is and how it should be applied to the facts of a particular case. This function is closely akin to that of a judge in a criminal trial who directs a jury as to the law that it needs to know to decide the case. I would be surprised if anyone, lawyer or layman, sought to cast doubt on whether this was in effect a judicial function. What else could it be? It would clearly not be administrative. In addition, justices' clerks exercise some judicial functions in their own right, which is my second category. For example, in certain cases they can
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grant adjournments, renew bail, extend the time allowed to pay fines and (very importantly) grant or refuse legal aid. They also have important responsibilities in family cases under the Children Act. Moreover, the trend is towards devolving to them further judicial functions. Soon they will also be empowered to commit actions by consent to the Crown Court and to issue distress and attachment of benefits warrants.
It is absolutely fundamental that nobody providing legal directions or advice to a tribunal of fact, or who is taking decisions which affect the rights or liabilities of parties to proceedings, should be or appear to be susceptible to outside influences of any kind.
What then does the Lord Chancellor propose? In Clause 70(3) he is to be empowered to require by order that a contract made between a justices' clerk and his employing committee shall contain such terms as he, the Lord Chancellor, may specify. Therefore, so far as primary legislation is concerned there is a hidden potential agenda. What will that agenda be? Paragraph 28 of the White Paper A New Framework for Local Justice clearly signals what the provisions will be. It states:
"These contracts should be for fixed terms … They should provide for remuneration to be related to performance".
A cult seems to have developed and to be invading the whole of the public sector whereby fixed-term contracts and performance pay are seen as the panaceas which will give us managerial efficiency. They may indeed be useful tools in a purely managerial context, but in a judicial context, or where there exists a judicial element, they can have no place.
I suspect that the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, will, in replying to this debate, say that those elements of the contract are intended merely to affect the way in which justices' clerks discharge their administrative responsibilities, and that their independence in respect of their judicial functions is safeguarded by Clause 71. I can only say that I would regard such an answer as a pious hope, but unrealistic. A clerk is a single officer with a single contract of employment. The terms should be a matter between him or her and the employing committee. It should not be required to contain terms inimical to the proper exercise of judicial functions by virtue of ministerial direction.
There is a further aspect of this part of the Bill which I find unacceptable. That is the proposal that each area committee should be required, by Clause 68, to appoint a so-called "chief justices' clerk" from a list approved by the Lord Chancellor. Chief justices' clerk is an inappropriate misnomer. Until now I had believed that the Chief Justice's clerk was my clerk. It is a misnomer for more substantial reasons than that.
There is often a real need for an area committee to be assisted by an able professional officer in the management of the staff and financial resources for which the committee is responsible, which can be considerable. Nobody questions that. I believe that some committees have already taken that very sensible step. They have usually designated their appointee as "chief executive" because that is what he is. What they need in

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that role is a manager, not a lawyer. What is now proposed is that this new official who is to manage the justices' clerks in the area is to be:
"capable of exercising any of the functions of a justices' clerk"
and to have the duty to:
"promote discussions relating to the law, practice and procedure"
among the justices' clerks for whom he or she is responsible. I find that last phrase chilling. The chief justices' clerk will also be on a fixed-term contract incorporating performance-related pay.
There are very real dangers here. I cannot overstress that to insert a clause proclaiming judicial independence, even if it were written in capital letters or red ink, will be no guarantee of such independence if specific provisions elsewhere in the Act, or in the Lord Chancellor's blueprint for clerks' contracts, in fact operate against judicial independence or appear to do so. What is sought to be done is this. One puts in place provisions which would obviously create a grave danger to independence, so obviously that one recognises that one has to do something about it. What does one do? One does not change the provisions so as to prevent that danger arising but waves a wand and puts in a clause which simply says that that danger shall not arise.
It is not hard to postulate how the danger may arise. One of the key objectives which justices' clerks will have, and upon which a proportion of their pay will no doubt depend, is to maximise the throughput of cases in their court. That will also be the objective of their boss, the chief justices' clerk, who will also be trying to speed cases through all the courts in his committee area. How, in such circumstances, are litigants to have confidence that applications for adjournments will be considered independently and on their own merits? Similarly, another of the objectives will be the economic use of resources. Justices' clerks, and more especially their bosses the chief justices' clerks, will be at pains to economise. How are litigants to have confidence that applications for legal aid will be considered independently and on their merits in such circumstances?
That pressure, or the fear or suspicion of pressure, could not arise if the new officer were a manager pure and simple, a chief executive, since there would be no possibility of his attempting to influence the way in which justices' clerks apply their professional expertise, any more than there is of a health service manager trying to interfere in the clinical judgment of an independent doctor. He would truly be and should be styled a chief executive to the area committee. But again, his terms of employment should be a matter for the employing committee, not the Lord Chancellor on the Woolsack.
The reservations that I have expressed are not peculiar to me. The magistrates themselves are seriously concerned that the proposals will prejudice the independence of their courts. The noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack must be well aware of that since their views were very vigorously expressed to him when he spoke to the Magistrates' Association on 9th October. I remind the House that, as has already been mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, the magistrates cope, without being paid, with 97 per cent. of criminal cases in this country. I am surprised that the
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Lord Chancellor should embark upon a programme of such radical change to their court system despite their objections, and continue to pursue it.
It is a truism that justice should be seen to be done as well as be done. It follows from this that the arrangements we make for justice to be administered must serve not only the requirements of justice itself but also the way the public perceive its institutions and those who work in them. We shall fail in our duty if we allow this Bill to pass in a way which allows the impression to be given that the advice magistrates receive or the judicial decisions taken by their clerks are no longer a matter of their own discretion, but are instead liable to influence by the executive, either through the terms under which they are employed or because they may feel under pressure from a superior officer as to the way in which they exercise them.
I fear that I have detained your Lordships too long in a consideration of only two or three clauses in what is a lengthy and detailed Bill covering two very important topics. But I believe the questions that I have raised to be of vital importance. I was encouraged to note that the Lord Chancellor said on the radio this morning that he would approach today's debate with an open mind. I hope that he will bring forward amendments which address the anxieties that I have raised before we come to consider these clauses in Committee. If he does not I shall feel constrained to oppose those clauses.
4.39 p.m.
Viscount Whitelaw: My Lords, I am always glad to have a judge on my side. On this occasion, the Lord Chief Justice opted for the magistrates' courts part of the Bill. I shall take the opportunity—I hope in the interests of all the future speakers and indeed of the House as a whole—to opt out of the magistrates' courts side, in the opposite case from him, and to go straight to the police legislation.
I believe that the Government are wise to introduce a police Bill at the same time as a criminal justice Bill when revising legislation for the protection of our citizens. I also welcome the introduction of this Bill into your Lordships' House, which is well equipped to consider and promote the delicate balance required in the political handling of the police service. In fact, I do not know where in Parliament it could be done better than in this House. That is why I have great faith in this House tackling a particularly difficult Bill with the very difficult problems of handling in regard to the political situation.
I am also very grateful to my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor. I am pleased that he will take part in the whole of the Bill because I believe it can equally be of immense importance when we come to look at some of the most difficult parts of the Bill. I thank him very much for the interest he has taken in it.
Four years as Home Secretary and three years before that as Opposition spokesman, when the noble Lords, Lord Jenkins of Hillhead and Lord Merlyn-Rees, were Home Secretaries, have convinced me that understanding between the political parties on police matters is of great value, and that disagreements can be damaging to sensible policing. I also believe that political agreement

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between parties on the principles of policing has been a crucial factor in the high standing of the British police service over the years.
Of course, there should be no complacency about our police service when, like all other nations in the world, we are faced with a very serious crime problem—the more serious because its character is constantly changing. In these circumstances our response as a nation should be to give our policemen and policewomen every encouragement and the necessary backing to adapt themselves to new and unexpected challenges.
It really goes without saying that they have a most difficult and, indeed, often dangerous task. Of course, policemen and policewomen—like the rest of us—make mistakes, sometimes inexcusable mistakes. No doubt, too, on occasions they are not as effective as they should be in dealing with criminal activities. But I do wish, on the other hand, that their critics would give them credit when it is due. I shall give one example from my experience as Home Secretary. The riots in 1981, particularly those in Brixton and Liverpool, faced the police with a major new problem. They found themselves with two contradictory roles. At one time they were the traditional friendly and helpful British bobby. At the next they were facing street battles which, it was clear, were very dangerous. It was also absolutely clear to me that they had to be trained and equipped for their task with helmets and riot gear.
There were those in the police service, and certainly in the public, who said that the police would not be able to carry out such contradictory roles. But in the years following they have succeeded. That has been of great importance to our society as a whole. The capability of being a complete police force, doing all those roles together—so rare in the world—has been of great value and great importance; and, indeed, of great credit to our policemen and policewomen. I have, therefore, considerable confidence in our policemen and policewomen and their leadership.
The purpose of the Bill must be to provide them with an administration and a legislative framework which will help them to improve their effectiveness. Therefore, at this stage, in the interests of the very many speakers to follow me, I intend to concentrate briefly on two of the major issues involved. There are many others and they can be discussed, of course, in the Committee stage. These that I wish to discuss concern the future structure of the police authorities in each police area.
The most important of those—indeed, the most controversial—is set out starkly in paragraph 7 of Schedule 2 to the Bill, which states that:
"The Secretary of State shall appoint one member of each police authority to be its chairman".
At first sight, this proposal appears to upset the political balance which has been so carefully preserved over the years. The chairman will surely be regarded as the Home Secretary's man, particularly in moments of stress in policing operations. This arrangement would surely run the risk of involving the Home Secretary directly, as other speakers have said, in police
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operations and that, if I may say so, has always been carefully avoided in the past and, I pray, will always be carefully avoided in the future.
At the very least, there would be accusations of interference in the operational independence of chief constables. Such controversy would surely be undesirable on politically sensitive occasions and very dangerous indeed to our policing service. I am delighted, if I may say so, to see that I am followed by the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, who, after all, outstripped me for so long when he was Home Secretary as to make me seem almost a very young small boy. But I am very grateful indeed to see him here to give his view of the experience of Home Secretaries. I think that is important. We may, of course, as a body be wrong. We may as a body be silly, but we have kept the tradition of our country in police services over many years which I think should be recognised as being right. All of us have done so. That is why I fear so much a controversy which would be built up on politically sensitive occasions.
I am glad, therefore, that it was announced in Parliament yesterday that my right honourable friend the Home Secretary has appreciated this danger. The new proposal of selection panels will no doubt be dealt with and discussed at the Committee stage, but at present the complete and final power of the appointment of the chairman of the police authority still rests, and apparently will continue to rest, with the Home Secretary.
Therefore, I am sure that my noble friend the Minister of State will understand if I put to him a question. I ask him please to explain the reason for this major change in the whole history of policing in this country. Why is the Home Secretary—who, with his announcement yesterday, has now recognised the danger—still determined to seek that power, with all the risks which his predecessors have deliberately and carefully avoided over all these years? I really think we are entitled, as we go through the Bill. to have a clear and plain answer to that.
After all, Home Secretaries do not have to seek trouble, they get it quite easily themselves. It cannot be helped. Therefore, the reason cannot be that this is being done in order to give the Home Secretary more trouble. That I cannot believe. I think it is an important factor and I hope that my noble friend will be able to give us the reason why. It is very hard, after one has left the job, because one does not know everything about it. However, one is entitled sometimes to ask, "I wonder why?" That is what I am asking today. I should like to know from the Home Secretary, or anyone else in the Government who will tell me, why they really want to make what I consider to be a very dangerous move indeed.
The changes proposed for the membership of the new police authorities also need to be questioned. Some may be right, but they certainly need to be questioned. Is it really wise substantially to reduce their size in every case? Is it really wise to replace local authority members with the Home Secretary's nominees? Will the

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nominees really know more about local policing and more about their areas than the people from local authorities already do? It is extremely doubtful.
This morning I looked very carefully through the list of all the tasks to be performed if one is to be one of those splendid gentlemen. Well, they are not very different from what everybody else has to do in all areas of their lives. So I am not quite sure what the difference is. However, is it wise? Is it wise particularly at a time when community policing is being rightly stressed? Is there not a danger that local councils would tend to lose interest in their police forces? That would certainly be a loss. I know from experience that many of those councils are proud of their police and are closely interested in their local force. Going round the country as Home Secretary I found—and I say this truthfully—many, of all political parties, who had that pride in their police service and in their local force. I found that very striking indeed. It existed in some very surprising places, and I admired them all the more for that.
Is there not also the fear of a loss? I know that those councils will be sad and very upset at the idea. How will the balance work in those police authorities which have several councils in their areas, such as Greater Manchester and Merseyside—two very important police areas. Noble Lords will not be surprised to know that I had very considerable knowledge of them at one time in my life. Does it really make sense to reduce all police authorities to the same size, irrespective of some of their areas of responsibility? I find it hard to believe so.
I have sought to explain my anxiety about two major changes in this Bill. Far be it for me to be difficult and tiresome about a measure proposed by the party that I support; but when I find that I am anxious and worried it must surely be my duty to speak out firmly, and that I am doing.
Of course there is much more to be discussed. We are very lucky in this House to have the guidance of my noble friend Lord Ferrers, who commands such wide respect. That is of enormous importance.
I believe that this Bill is a most important measure, which, carefully considered and modified—and, inevitably, amended—can be of great value to the British police service in the future. I hope that it will be remembered that it is also a Bill for the police. In my judgment it should command broad all-party support when it leaves Parliament and receives its Royal Assent. That will be in the very best interests of our police service in future.
4.53 p.m.
Lord Callaghan of Cardiff: My Lords, we have listened to a number of remarkable speeches. I hope that the Government Front Bench has taken note of some of the remarks that have been made. It is so long since I was Home Secretary that I must say to the noble Viscount, Lord Whitelaw, that I claim no special knowledge or authority in what I have to say. Over a quarter of a century conditions have changed very much indeed. But I cannot be quite so kind to the Government
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as he was in expressing dissent. He seemed to imply that perhaps they had brought this Bill before this House out of some measure of wisdom that affected them, knowing the greater knowledge and experience that would enable us to review the Bill. If so, I can only say that they must have fallen into virtue by accident. I cannot believe that, by design, they brought in a Bill which they expected to be thoroughly torn apart—as indeed it has been this afternoon.
The noble Viscount, Lord Whitelaw, gave his explanation. I must say that mine is a rather different one. We have had so much second-rate legislation during this Parliament which has had to be corrected in such a remarkable way that I believe we are suffering from a wilful and ambitious group of young Ministers who flit across the political scene from department to department, supping the honey as they go and moving on quickly before their misdeeds catch them out. I am bound to say that I think that is particularly true of the Home Secretary in the Bill that has been produced here today.
I say to noble Lords that if they take up what has been said in the very remarkable speeches that we have heard on all sides, then we have a function which can be of great use—not to the Government alone, who are not my concern, but to the country.
Normally when a Bill of this nature and this constitutional importance comes before us, it comes with the sanction of the Commons. When it comes with that sanction there is a natural reluctance on the part of noble Lords to make substantial alterations unless they feel absolutely outraged by what is taking place or feel that the other place should be asked to think again. We are not under that restraint on this occasion. Whether out of wisdom or accident, the Government have sent the Bill to us; this is the first House to look at it. Therefore we need be under no restraint in what we put forward as amendments, and in carrying them if we believe that they will improve the quality of this legislation. Then it will be for another place to consider whether this is the way to proceed. I believe that it will strengthen another place, where there is a great deal of common sense which is unfortunately so often subordinated to the needs of the Whips and the majority of the Government.
If the Bill were presented to Members of the other place in the form in which it might emerge from this House, they would be able to say to the Whips: "Look, there is no point so far as we are concerned in trying to restore the Bill to how it stood when it went into their Lordships' House". We therefore have an opportunity to play a very important part, not an obstructive part, but a very constructive one, in putting this Bill into a shape in which it will command maximum support. I echo entirely the view of the noble Viscount, Lord Whitelaw, that, as far as is possible, it should command all-party support. The essence of the legal system of this country, and of the police authorities, should be of such a character that neither party should want to upset it in a way that would create political disturbances. It has been one of the great supports of this country.
Perhaps I may tell a little personal story which I hope I have not mentioned before. It concerns the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hailsham, and I hope that he will not

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object to it. On the day that we were defeated in 1970 and it was possible that he might have become Home Secretary while I was the outgoing Home Secretary, the noble and learned Lord rang me up. He said to me: "If I should he appointed Home Secretary, what points do you think I ought to look for? What is it that I ought to lake account of particularly?". I endeavoured to be as helpful as I could to him on that occasion—although it was unnecessary because he occupied a much more distinguished post—
Lord Hailsham of Saint Marylebone: My guardian angel saved me from a bed of nails!
Lord Callaghan of Cardiff: My Lords, I thought then, and I repeat it now, that it was of significance that on a matter of law and order of this kind the outgoing and incoming Ministers were able to communicate in that way. I very much regret that during the past decade, for reasons into which I need not go, those kinds of discussions and that kind of relationship were cut off. However, we are now out of that particular area.
It is for that reason that I question, as others have done, the proposals to alter the constitution and make-up of the police authorities and the appointment by the Home Secretary of a chairman. It has met with a round of opposition from more quarters than I can remember—quarters which rarely come into conflict with the Government. I wonder whether the Government are made up of sadists or masochists, or perhaps both: sadists because they continue to offend as many of their own supporters as they can; masochists because they insist on bringing forward legislation which will not be acceptable.
I echo what was said by the noble Viscount, Lord Whitelaw. What is the point, as one police authority has said to me in one of the many letters I have received, of requiring a police authority which at the moment has 30 members—which is performing satisfactorily, which has a broad representation of the community it represents, about which there has been no complaint, and which wishes to continue as it is—to reduce its numerical membership by nearly one half to 16, so that in this case a very large county will have only eight councillors to represent a population of 1.5 million? Can we have some explanation as to what has led the Government to fit police authorities into this procrustean bed where everyone must be of the same length whether they fit it or not?
What is the Government's view? What has gone so wrong that they must transfer the power to appoint the chairman of a police authority from the members of that authority to the Home Secretary? How will it reduce crime? The Government have produced no evidence. We are entitled to he sceptical until we hear much better reasons than we have heard, with respect to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor, so far. I say to him and to the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, that police authorities are totally disbelieving in this matter.
According to the Bill, the cost of implementing these changes will be £21 million. It would be far better to spend that money on putting more constables on the beat. Ministers have become past masters in the art of declaiming that their changes are intended to put more
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power into the hands of local people. But when they are examined carefully, so often we see, as in this case, that the result is to centralise more power in their own hands. We have seen this on more than one occasion. The Home Secretary was one of the master minds of the poll tax. In his first White Paper he said that he did not propose to establish any formal procedure for the appointment of the chairmen of committees. It was to be left entirely to him. That is contained in paragraph 4.27 of the White Paper. I looked it up myself this morning.
The White Paper stated quite boldly that the Home Secretary would appoint these additional members. But yesterday there was a change. Yesterday, the day before this debate was to take place, at the first sound of gunfire, the Home Secretary took a step backwards. I must say that that should be a great encouragement to the noble Viscount, Lord Whitelaw, and to the Lord Chief Justice in calling for further amendments to be brought forward before we reach the Committee stage of the Bill. It will certainly make the task of Ministers and of the very popular noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, much easier if the Government listen to what has been said not only by others outside but by those in the House this afternoon.
Perhaps I may ask one or two questions as to the way in which the Bill stands after the retreat—the partial retreat—by the Home Secretary yesterday afternoon. We are told that local recruitment consultants and Lords Lieutenant are to prepare short lists and submit them to the Home Secretary. The Home Secretary will then appoint. I have one question. In the light of our experience in the case of hospital trusts and other bodies, is his choice restricted to the names on the short list? In the hospital world we have seen that names submitted for appointment have been disregarded on occasion. He is supposed to choose someone from the short list. But will his nominees be restricted to that? I think that we should have an answer —perhaps not today but certainly when we get to the Committee stage.
The people who are to be appointed as chairmen are to act as customers of the police. I object to this word "customers". Again it is based on the idea that there is no such thing as public service in this country. It is a phrase that the Government might well drop as quickly as possible. Surely councillors and magistrates on police authorities at the present time represent very fully the ordinary members of the public. The Home Secretary wishes his new appointments —the five so-called independent members who are to be appointed—to have discussion and consultation with the public. What machinery will be required and needed for that? How are these five independent members to set up their own consultative machinery? It is already done by councillors and magistrates. They have discussions with members of the public and with their constituents every day of the week. Despite what the White Paper says, I think it unlikely that they will be drawn from all the community.
The Home Secretary emphasises in paragraph 4.22 of the White Paper that they will be drawn from those with financial or management experience. I do not quite see that that covers the whole range of human experience or knowledge. I have every respect for Lords Lieutenant,

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many of whom I know. They do a splendid job. They meet a circle of local people. Of that there is no doubt. But I am not absolutely sure that they have the same credentials for knowing what happens on the housing estates as do the local councillors. They certainly live in areas usually that are far removed from the housing estates. I say that without any disparagement. It happens to be the fact. But it is in the housing estates and in the industrial streets that the largest amount of local crime takes place. That is where the experience is to be found, and that is where it will be most useful.
I very much echo what has already been said that for the Secretary of State to have the power to select the chairman, as he will do, of this local body and pay him a salary will undoubtedly sever the local ties, whether the chairman lives in the area or not. It will seem to transfer the allegiance of such a chairman from the local community to the Home Secretary. It will be to his patronage that the chairman will be regarded as looking, whether he does so or not.
We have already had complaints about hospital chairmen. It would be a great misfortune if the same complaints were made about the appointment of the chairmen of these authorities. If under a Conservative Government Conservative chairmen had been appointed, there would be a feeling of revenge—I would hope that it would not take place—and of "We'll out them all when we get into power and replace them by Labour chairmen". Where shall we all be then? I say to Ministers with all seriousness: it must not happen. We must not allow it to happen. I urge very strongly that the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor and Ministers should listen very carefully to the great strength of feeling that is founded not on sentiment but on what is best for the future welfare and government of our people and their respect for law and order.
I would ask one question about Clauses 14, 15, 30, 47 and many others. Perhaps the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, can give me an answer. These clauses concern the conduct and efficiency of police officers, police discipline, fines on constables, reprimands and dismissal. To what extent have they been discussed and agreed with the three police organisations? It would be very unfortunate if they were to come before the House without there being either a large measure of agreement or, alternatively, without some explanation being given as to why there is no agreement on this matter.
I was surprised to hear on the radio this morning, when the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor was giving his views, Mr. Freen, chairman of the Justices' Clerks' Society, say that he could recall examples of pressure being brought to bear on justices' clerks by civil servants—presumably civil servants at the Home Office—about the conduct of court cases during the miners' strike. It was a most serious allegation to make. I do not know whether it was true, but it was made by the chairman of the Justices' Clerks' Society. It means that we must examine very carefully the strength of Clause 71 on this particular matter. I say to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor that I hope that it is not an example of the Executive encroaching on the judiciary. I say to him in all
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truthfulness that it could not have happened a quarter of a century ago. There would have been such a roar of protest if that had happened. All of us who were Home Secretaries, certainly in the 1960s and 1970s, were extremely careful in the way in which we, as Home Secretaries, spoke about the functions of the magistrates' courts and the higher courts. I say to the Government that we shall need to look very carefully at Clauses 70 and 71.
In conclusion, it seems to me that Ministers have become too comfortable and too used to their offices. They have become careless in the use of power and their patronage and often unreasoning in their ambitions. The Lord Chancellor is one of the most reasonable of men, but this morning, when he was questioned on the radio about the case for altering the conditions of service of justices' clerks and placing them on short-term contracts, I found him less than totally convincing. I did not understand what the reasons were, having listened to him. Therefore, I trust that he, as a Member of the Cabinet, will fight very hard to ensure that when this Bill comes to Committee there will be amendments tabled which will meet not only some of the anxieties which have been expressed, but others which will no doubt arise. If he is convinced, as I hope he is, then he may have to battle very hard in Cabinet to make changes against a wilful and ambitious Home Secretary. I hope that he will fight that battle on our behalf.
5.12 p.m.
Lord Lester of Herne Hill: My Lords, the Government keep telling the public that they intend to get back to basics. That is what I suggest we should do in considering this Bill. We should examine the large powers which the Home Secretary and the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor seek to be given by Parliament to see whether those ministerial powers threaten to infringe constitutional basics—that is, the constitutional principles and traditions on which the separation of powers between central and local government and the police and between central government and the local magistrates, have traditionally been based. As the noble Viscount, Lord Whitelaw, and the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan of Cardiff, have just observed, we should also consider whether the Government can show any pressing need for such a radical and unprecedented extension of Whitehall direction and control.
In the absence of any supreme written constitutional law, the main safeguard against the enactment of legislation infringing the basics of the British constitution is a willingness by Parliament to exercise its sovereign powers by withholding consent from unconstitutional measures.
I submit that, if enacted in its present form, this Bill will indeed threaten to infringe our basic constitutional principles and traditions in its adverse effect on two vital public interests—first, democratically accountable local community policing and, secondly, the independence of the magistrates' courts in administering justice. Those constitutional principles protect us all, not in the Government's words as "customers" but as citizens of this country.

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The preservation of the peace is a primary function of any state. In this country the administration of the police has always been on a local basis. The office of constable is ancient, older than that of justice of the peace. It was originally associated with the village. The powers of a constable are exercised by virtue of the office and not on the responsibility of anyone else, nor as a delegate or agent of the state or of any Minister. The status of police officers derives from their special constitutional position. They occupy a civil office of trust enshrined almost three centuries ago in the Act of Settlement. The independence of chief constables is of very great constitutional importance. In carrying out their duty of enforcing the law they have wide discretionary powers with which the courts will not normally interfere.
The close link with local government is also essential if the police are to serve the particular needs of their local communities and to retain the confidence of the public in the areas where they operate. It is that vital local link, together with the tripartite relationship between Home Secretary, chief constables and local police authorities, which ensures that the police are democratically accountable to the police authorities of the communities which they serve rather than being a national police force under the political direction and control of the Home Secretary and his civil servants.
As my noble friend Lord Harris of Greenwich has so powerfully explained, together with the other speeches which your Lordships have heard already, these historic constitutional principles and traditions are violated by this Bill. The former chief constable of Devon and Cornwall, Mr. John Alderson, points out in an important violations paper published today by Charter 88 that, for the first time since Cromwell's hated major-generals divided the realm into 12 police districts, taxed the locals to pay for police services and preached their back-to-basics moral creed, England and Wales are to have a minister of police at the Home Office able to control and direct police authorities and chief constables.
Mr. Alderson rightly recalls the wise words of a great Conservative Home Secretary, Rab Butler, when, in 1962, he faced the same range of problems as does the present Home Secretary. Rab Butler said:
"I am quite convinced that it would be wrong for one man or for one government to be in charge directly of the whole police of this country. Our constitution is based on checks and balances. This has kept our liberty throughout the generations".
I am sure that the two very distinguished former Home Secretaries who have already spoken from opposite sides of the House and my noble friend Lord Jenkins of Hillhead would fully endorse those wise words. Would the present Home Secretary do so? I doubt it.
It is difficult to believe that these proposals would have been introduced in the teeth of such opposition from every level of the police service and from across local government had the Conservative Party not lost control in 36 out of 41 local police authorities. They are driven by a combination of party politics, bureaucratic centralism and Treasury accountancy. They will not improve the morale of the police service or police efficiency or public confidence in policing. They do not deserve parliamentary support.
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I am sorry to say that Part IV of the Bill, dealing with magistrates' courts, is equally objectionable in constitutional terms. The experience which most people have of our system of criminal justice is in the magistrates' courts. Above all, they are the people's courts and, like the office of constable, justice of the peace is an office of great antiquity with proud, historic traditions. The justices' clerks are vital public officers exercising judicial as well as administrative functions. They hold office during the pleasure of the appointing magistrates' committee and they may not be dismissed without the consent of the magistrates of their division and with the Lord Chancellor's approval.
Part IV of the Bill threatens the practical, if not the formal, independence of the magistrates' courts and the justices' clerks. There is, of course, no threat of government interference with the judicial process in individual cases. Happily, that would be quite unthinkable in this country; and Clause 71 puts the matter beyond doubt. The threat is more subtle. It was warned about by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Browne-Wilkinson, in a prophetic lecture on the independence of the judiciary delivered six years ago. The noble and learned Lord explained that he saw an insidious threat to the independence of the legal system, as opposed to the judges who operate it. The threat arises, as he pointed out, by reason of the Executive's control of finance and administration. The noble and learned Lord referred to the reorganisation of the court system, which has produced a very substantial shift from the judges to the civil servants in the Lord Chancellor's Department, some of whose officials perceive that department's role as being far wider than is consistent with any concept of judicial independence. He explained that it is the lack of any clear demarcation between the functions to be performed by the judiciary and the functions to be performed by the administrators which has given rise to stresses.
The noble and learned Lord also referred to the change of governmental policies towards public spending. The Treasury is no longer concerned simply with fixing the amount that a department receives from public funds. It supervises and monitors how each department spends its money. Departments are under a duty to show "value for money".
That system is applied to the Lord Chancellor's Department in just the same way as to any other department. But the requirements of judicial independence make the Lord Chancellor's Department wholly different from other departments of state. It is not for the Executive alone to determine whether or not a particular judicial procedure provides "value for money". In the noble and learned Lord's memorable words:
"Justice is not capable of being measured out by computer".
Nobody, he said, is trying to erode the independence of the legal system; it is happening unperceived and unappreciated.
In a minor way, I have had personal experience, sitting as a Recorder and as a Deputy High Court judge, of that insidious erosion. One is aware, as a judge, of subtle administrative pressure to deal with criminal and civil cases with despatch, to increase the disposal rate and to reduce the backlog. We have not yet reached the

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stage where staff in the High Court or the Crown Courts receive a bonus for the speed with which cases are dealt, but I wonder what may happen in future.
Part IV of the Bill involves a major erosion in response to Treasury demands to show value for money. It creates a new layer of unnecessary bureaucracy and seeks large powers of administrative direction for the Lord Chancellor's Department over magistrates' courts' committees and over justices' clerks. Of course the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor should have some control because of the need to account to Parliament for public expenditure. But the powers that he seeks in Part IV are quite excessive.
In a well-informed article in today's Times, Paula Davies, a very experienced chairman of an Inner London family proceedings court, points out that justice is not just another product and that a legal service cannot be measured like a manufactured product. The Government seek, as we have heard, to make all justices' clerks work under fixed term contracts of employment, incorporating performance standards and performance-related pay. The Lord Chancellor is to be given default powers if any service underperforms without sufficient remedial action.
What is especially worrying, as the article indicates, is that the performance of the magistrates' courts is to be used in calculations for cash limits for magistrates' courts committees. Paula Davies has visions of magistrates throughputting hundreds of television licence cases to get "brownie points" in one court while another court struggles through a complicated lengthy committal with one defendant.
I have long been in favour of the creation of a robustly independent judicial and legal services commission (of the kind contained in many Commonwealth constitutions) to act as a bulwark against Executive erosion of judicial and professional independence. This Bill shows the real need for greater protection of the independence of the legal system. Meanwhile, the best protection is the willingness of our Lord Chief Justice and his senior judicial colleagues to stand up and be counted and the critical opinion of noble Lords on all sides of this House of this measure.
5.27 p.m.
Lord Carr of Hadley: My Lords, it must be something of a bore to your Lordships to have to suffer and to listen to no less than a third former Home Secretary among the first eight speakers in this debate. Let me hasten to assure your Lordships that I shall concentrate entirely on police matters and be as brief as I can. I can be helped in being brief by saying at the outset how strongly I agree with and support what my noble friend Lord Whitelaw said a little while ago. I shall try to reinforce what he said rather than repeat it. Perhaps being naturally somewhat less statesmanlike than my noble friend, I shall reinforce some of his points rather more bluntly than he originally put them.
However, to begin with I wish to say something which may appear to be in favour of the Bill because I feel that it needs to be said. As far as the police are concerned I can see in the Bill many proposals that will
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improve the efficiency of policing in this country and which I should like to support provided—and only provided—that they can be set in the right framework of power. What is wrong is the framework of power in which it is proposed that they be set at the moment.
Good and effective policing needs efficiency, but it needs much more than efficiency. To be truly effective, good policing must carry a natural authority with the people whom it is serving. My main concern is with the police authorities, but I shall return to them. At this stage I should say that I welcome what was said yesterday by the Home Secretary and repeated in a Written Answer today by my noble friend Lord Ferrers. I welcome it because it shows that the Government have heard what has been feared and that they are prepared to listen. However, I shall explain later why I think that they should listen even more carefully and go rather further.
To begin at the beginning, the police must be firmly based within the community. They must be "our" police rather than "the" police. To the majority of residents, they must appear to be "one of us" and not "one of them". They must be the people's police, not the Government's police. The police must never be politicised. We must never forget that a truly non-political police force is one of the most essential pillars of a free democracy. So far, we have achieved that in Britain not solely but most importantly by refusing to have a national police force.
When I became Home Secretary in 1972 we were completing a process of reducing the number of police authorities by a process of mergers throughout the country. A good many people were fearful about that. I was convinced that it was necessary and, on the whole, I think that we got it about right. I am glad that that process is not being taken further in this Bill and that the police authorities are being left as they are. However, I would agree to this extent with the noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, whom I see frowning at me, that at a later time we shall need to inquire carefully into the way in which the power that is being taken in this Bill further to merge police authorities will be initiated and activated. I shall need quite a bit of assurance—and perhaps more than verbal assurance—on that point.
We will still depend—I am glad of this—largely on local police control as the basis of keeping the police non-politicised and keeping them in touch with the varying needs and wishes of differing local communities and areas. That is good in principle but—I wish to emphasise this strongly—the control of each force must indeed be truly local. This is where this Bill in its present form raises grave fears in my mind as well as in the minds of many other people.
Let me analyse briefly the new police authorities. Personally, I approve of them provided we can get one key area right. I welcome an attempt to reduce their size. Anyone who has served in a Cabinet or on a board of directors of a large company knows that 30 people constitute too big a body in which to have meaningful, good quality, deliberative consultation. I believe that that figure is too high and therefore I am glad to see a reduction. To put it mildly, however, I am doubtful whether a single fixed figure of 16 is appropriate. It may

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be good to aim at that figure where it can be reasonably achieved, but I believe there must be flexibility to go above that in certain circumstances, particularly perhaps, but not only, in those police areas where there is a multiplicity of local authorities. In those areas I believe that without an enlargement of the figure I have mentioned, one may be in difficulty.
I am not so fussed—as many traditionalists seem to be—about reducing the percentage of seats occupied by local authority representatives. If we were to start from scratch, and we were to have an assurance that 50 per cent. of the members of every police authority were local councillors, that would seem to be a pretty substantial representation of the local authority in the area. I am not persuaded that 50 per cent. is necessarily too low a figure, but again one has to think of the total numbers available in certain areas. I believe the introduction of independent members could be helpful. Like the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, I believe there are skills other than business skills that are of value in the world. I have spent quite some time as a manager in industry myself, but I welcome the injection of skills other than business skills even into business. However, business skills are needed too.
The people we are discussing must be genuinely local people and genuinely locally appointed and locally based. That matter is particularly important as police authorities are going to have more responsibility than they have been accustomed to having in the past. That increases the sensitivity of the relationship between the authority, and particularly the chairman of the authority, and the chief constable. As has already been said, I believe that is the single most sensitive point in the whole of these proposals, and one which will need close attention.
I think on the whole that if, but only if, we can get this matter of the choice and the appointment of the independent members, and above all their chairman, on to a sound basis, I do not find anything to complain about—on the whole I find something to welcome—in the general structure proposed. However, the key to this matter is the appointment of the independent members. I find the present proposals totally unacceptable. If they cannot be changed fundamentally they will be a stumbling block to my giving my support to any part of the Bill. If the proposals can be changed—I am encouraged by what has happened in the past 24 hours to believe that the Government may have an open ear on this matter—I believe we shall make some real progress. I repeat that I was encouraged by the Home Secretary's statement in a Written Answer yesterday which was repeated by my noble friend Lord Ferrers in this House today.
What has been achieved is a beginning, which I warmly welcome, but to my mind it is by no means the end of the process of adaptation of these proposals which must be made. We must look at this most important matter as a challenge to our ingenuity and determination. If I were still Home Secretary today I would not accept the offer of powers of this kind. I would resign rather than accept them as I believe they are totally inappropriate for any Home Secretary to hold. I believe they must be changed. We shall have to
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engage in a great deal of thought and ingenuity to change them. We must have the changes not just in terms of assurances. They must be placed on the face of the Bill. I urge the Government to table some amendments of their own in this area before we start the Committee stage of the Bill in this House. I, and many others, would also welcome amendments to reduce the degree of centralisation which many speakers have already referred to, not just as regards the police but in many other areas too.
I end by doing something which I suspect is rather old-fashioned nowadays However, I have been encouraged by what the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, and my noble friend Lord Whitelaw have said. I end by appealing to the Government, and also to the Opposition parties, to make a strong effort to reach consensus on this Bill before it leaves your Lordships' House. I hope it was conscious wisdom and not just good luck—if it was good luck, I welcome it—that this Bill is starting in your Lordships' House. That is a most fortunate matter. If we can send it to another place having achieved a real consensus on it here we shall do a great service to the future good of policing in this country. I believe the Opposition spokesmen went a little overboard in some of their opposition, but let me say in the same breath that I believe the Government have gone overboard in some of their proposals. I make an appeal to both sides to come back on board, get on the same deck and stick on the same deck until they have reached a consensus of agreement.
5.36 p.m.
Lord Knights: My Lords, this, I believe, could well be an extremely sad day in the history of policing in this country. As I see it, if this Bill is enacted in its present form, this debate will mark the end of a system of policing which has existed here for something like l400 years or so. As your Lordships will be well aware, since Anglo-Saxon days at least the maintenance of law and order and the preservation of the peace have been regarded in this country as matters for local communities. This philosophy was confirmed by Parliament when the first paid professional police forces were instituted in the early Victorian years and endorsed by the detailed inquiries which preceded the great police Acts of 1920 and 1964.
The concern of the Crown in these matters has beer in the main to see that the local authorities maintained efficient forces in their areas, rather than to exercise direct control over them. As the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, said, it is a system which has been admired and envied across the world. Indeed I understand that at this present moment representatives from the newly-liberated countries of Eastern Europe are seeking assistance and advice in this country on how they should remodel their own law enforcement systems.
This approach has enabled central government and local authorities to work together, generally reasonably amicably, as partners to provide the resources and facilities necessary for an efficient police service. As regards the police themselves, they were described by the 1920 Desborough Committee as acting,

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"not as agents of Government, exercising powers derived from that fact, but as citizens representing the rest of the community, their powers resting on the support, both moral and physical, of their fellow citizens".
This position has enabled them to be completely impartial in the performance of their duties, and manifestly to be seen to be so. I believe that it is this fact, taken together with the ability of the chief constable to exercise an entirely independent judgment in operational matters, and the part played by local authorities, which has legitimised the police in the eyes of the public over the years. Much of this philosophy is now to be changed, if not totally removed.
In examining the Government's proposals as set out in the Bill, which I submit go directly to the roots of our present system, I am sure your Lordships will agree that it will also be essential to consider the effect the changes could have not only on the ability of the police to continue to exercise their responsibilities with the consent and support of the public, which is so vital to their effectiveness, but also on the checks and balances currently in place to prevent any abuse of power on the part of any one particular member of the organisation.
The fact that the system has existed for so long is no argument for saying there is no room for change. Indeed, some of the provisions in the White Paper and in the Bill are very much to be welcomed, but if fundamental reform is to be undertaken I am sure the House is entitled to know what is thought to have gone wrong with the present system, and why it is felt necessary to so disturb the existing arrangements.
I have to say that I do not find the reasons set out in Chapter 2 of last year's White Paper to be at all persuasive. While to some extent it may be true, as paragraph 2.22 of the White Paper says, that
"Overlapping responsibilities, unnecessary controls, and confused lines of accountability frustrate the ability of the police service to meet the needs of the public",
I believe that could be remedied without the root-and-branch reform in the constitutional position of the police which is now being advocated.
A more detailed and a little more persuasive argument for change was included in a Report on Practical Police Co-operation in the European Community, which was presented to Government by the Home Affairs Committee of another place in 1990. Their recommendation was:
"That the Government should now publish a consultation document on the organisation, funding and accountability of the British police. It should seek the advice of those with policing, management, finance and civil liberties expertise and then come forward with White Paper proposals for a police structure for Britain which will suit the needs of the 21st century".
Last year's White Paper, although it borrowed the phrase, "Police Service for the 21st Century", and this Bill are clearly not a response to that call. Neither addresses the problems identified by the Select Committee. It is a pity that the procedure that they recommended was not followed in their preparation, which might well have led to a much more acceptable Bill.
So what has prompted the current proposals? I am left wondering whether the answer is not really to be
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found in paragraph 2.14 of the White Paper where it comments, when dealing with the suggested defects of the present system:
"The Home Secretary is expected to answer to Parliament for a service for which he has no direct responsibility".
One could argue that that may not be strictly true, but whether it is or not, one has to acknowledge that law and order and the problems of rising crime now have a much higher political profile in the light of the demands they make on the country's resources and the effect they have on the electorate's view of the Government, who are being called politically and publicly to account for them to a much greater extent than we have known before.
It follows that it must be very frustrating for a Home Secretary to be faced with a situation such as that in Derbyshire, when a recalcitrant county council denies adequate funds to its police committee. But in seeking—as I believe this Bill does—to reverse the situation and positively to give direct responsibility for the police to the Secretary of State, in that sense the Bill goes much too far.
In particular, in common with previous speakers, I find Clause 2 dealing with the new police authorities extremely worrying. It will remove completely from local authorities any responsibility for the maintenance of law and order in their areas, and this at a time when the Government's crime reduction strategy concentrates on the part which should and can be played by local communities. Local authorities will merely receive a bill once a year from a quango for expenditure which in general they will have played no part in agreeing.
I believe the new police authorities, despite what the Bill may have to say about consultation, will be as remote from the communities in their own areas as are the members of the regional health authorities, and the extent to which they will be able to represent local people hardly bears examination.
Given the Home Secretary's powers to issue directions and to produce prescribed codes of practice for them to follow, they will inevitably be seen as representing the Government much more than local people, and as being motivated by political considerations rather than by the needs and wishes of their communities, of the local people whom they are said to represent.
My second worry is the position of the chief constable in all this. His current constitutional position was described by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Denning, in the Court of Appeal in 1968 in the case of R v.The Metropolitan Police Commissioner ex parte Blackburn and others when he said, supported by his two colleagues:
"The responsibility for law enforcement lies on him. He is answerable to the law and to the law alone. It must be for him to decide on the disposition of his force and the concentration of his resources on any particular crime or area".
Under the Bill he will now be required to prepare a draft plan for the policing of the area to be considered by his police authority. It will have to contain the core objectives set out by the Home Secretary together with those of the police authority, who will then consider the plan and presumably alter it if they think fit with no provision being made for the chief constable to be consulted on this, and they will then publish it. Clearly,

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this seems to set aside Lord Denning's judgment completely, and the chief constable's independent position is completely destroyed. Is that really what the Government are seeking to do? If it is, I suggest that we are entitled to know why. Add to that the fact that he will be on a fixed term appointment, the continuation of which is in the discretion of the police authority, and through it that of the Home Secretary. One can imagine the political pressure that could be placed on him as he gets towards the time of the renewal of that appointment. On his formal independent judgment there will be pressures which we have never seen before and which I do not believe are in the best interests of policing in this country.
In his opening speech, the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor said that the intention of this Bill was to improve the organisation and the management of the police so that they are better able to combat crime. I believe that this Bill opens the way to a political control of the police and, rather than help the police to combat crime, it may well have the opposite effect. In this respect police efficiency turns very largely on the help given to it by communities. Here I do not mean physical help, but the readiness to provide information to the police to enable them to identify, isolate and subsequently to arrest offenders. If that flow of information should cease because the police and the communities have grown apart, then, as I said, the Bill will not help the police to combat crime, it will positively prevent it.
5.50 p.m.
The Lord Bishop of Norwich: My Lords, my right reverend Brother the Bishop of Guildford was originally named to address the House at this point. It is very good to have him sitting beside me but, sadly, he is suffering from laryngitis and his doctor has imposed a vow of silence upon him. Some of your Lordships might wish that that injunction also applied to other bishops. So it is largely the words of the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Guildford that I shall be delivering today. However, I am not just a kind of episcopal ventriloquist's dummy; his lips are not moving and I endorse with conviction everything that he wished to say to your Lordships.
When the Bill was published last December, the Home Office press release began with the statement that it,
"lays the foundation for a new partnership between the police, the Government and the public".
Whether you are talking about Surrey or Norfolk, both the police and the local community would agree about the centrality of the word "partnership"; that is, its centrality to an understanding of the work of the police. It is that fundamental principle which should form the background for our examination of the Bill.
Law cannot be just what legislators think to be an ideal: effective law has to be what society will accept. If law does not have public consensus, it is unenforceable—we have seen that with Sunday trading and the poll tax. Effective law has to be worked out in association with society as a whole. The police are not an arm of the Executive enforcing what it wants; the
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police are a part of society securing what society as a whole has accepted in law. So the police are not primarily or essentially to enforce law and order determined by the Executive. They are an arm of society which desires to secure its own liberties and order. Without genuine partnership, both the law and the police fall into disrepute.
There is a great deal in the Bill which moves firmly towards the better operation of the police. A chief constable will have greater freedom of movement within his overall financial constraints, and he will be able to deploy his officers with greater flexibility both as to rank and to improving performance. However, there are other aspects of the Bill that militate against the partnership which the Home Office and the police believe to be essential. I should like to draw your Lordships' attention very briefly to just three of those aspects.
The first concern is the provision for the chairman of the police authority to be appointed by the Home Secretary. I shall not dwell on the matter because it has been eloquently and forcefully questioned by three former Home Secretaries. It represents a radical change for which there is no justification. It is a change which puts an unnecessary power into the hands of the Secretary of State and a change which, if there were to be a shift of government to the hard Left or Right, could prove to be an extremely dangerous power.
The second concern is perhaps even more serious. I refer to the reduction in the representation of local councillors on the police authority. That proposed change has to be seen in a broader context. Local government is being steadily eroded. The local authority now has far less responsibility in relation to education, where the real decisions are being passed up to London or down to the local schools. In the educational field, local government is starting to fade. Alongside that, local government reorganisation seems to be moving towards unitary district authorities rather than counties, and so their geographical areas of responsibility will be much smaller.
Now it is proposed that local government will have significantly less responsibility in relation to the police. The cumulative effect is the diminishing of local democracy. Of course, there is a general rule that the smaller the responsibilities the less the abilities of the people who stand for election and of the staff who serve them. By those changes, local democracy is set on a downhill course. I fear that the consequences may be a growing sense of disillusionment. When people do not feel that they can gain access to authority; when they feel powerless to change anything; and when they feel unheard and unnoticed, they are more likely to look around for extreme solutions.
I believe that we should pause now and assess the cumulative and long-term effect of what we are doing to local democracy. Of course, there are worrying details in the Bill which allow for non-elected members of the police authority to determine the payment from local government funds, and the power of the Secretary of State to remove even elected councillors from the authority. There are matters here that I suggest must be amended.

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My third area of concern relates to national objectives. It is right to have objectives, and performance indicators can be a stimulus. But for those to be set nationally gives too little recognition to variations in the different areas of the country, not to mention the variation in the types of crime mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich. For example, to set as a national objective, as the Secretary of State has already done,
"the number of burglaries detected per 100 officers",
does not allow for variation in density and size of houses. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Guildford notes that in Surrey they have one or two substantial residences, "standing in their own grounds" as the estate agents would say, and they are close to London and the M.25, both good for getaway purposes. That means a significantly different situation in type and extent of burglary from a denser housing area in the north west of England. I might add that in Norfolk we have not one or two but one or two hundred substantial residences standing in their own grounds, as well as more mediaeval churches per acre than anywhere else in Europe which are proving happy hunting grounds for thieves, especially with improved communications to East Anglia.
The Chief Constable of Norfolk—and he must be speaking also for his colleagues in other areas—is generally happy with the priorities set nationally, particularly those which refer to the prime importance of tackling crimes of robbery and violence. But he believes that national objectives by themselves are not satisfactory and that objectives should be negotiated with each chief constable to take account of the widely differing situations in various parts of the country. Those agreed objectives could be checked out by the inspectorate but, as the Bill stands, too much is yet again being determined in London.
We have much work to do to restore and sustain confidence in the police. Much in the Bill actually does that, but there are some crucial parts which are deeply worrying. Edging the police towards becoming an agent of the Executive will damage the necessary partnership. Reducing still further the effectiveness of local democracy could build up in the longer term yet more trouble for the police. The police are not there just to produce impressive crime detection statistics, important though that is. The police are an essential element in the sustaining of, a stable society, and for that reason should be accessible and accountable to the local community. Sound though the Bill is in some respects, there are many matters which must surely be amended.
5.59 p.m.
Lord Elton: My Lords, I believe we have reached that stage in the evening when short speeches are always welcome. I shall try to oblige your Lordships, first, by not speaking about the magistrates' court part of the Bill; and, secondly, by restricting to a single issue my remarks on the part of the Bill that relates to the police. I shall be brief because the latter has already been dealt with. However, I wish to declare my own position on the matter and to try to persuade your Lordships to share it.
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I have chosen that issue partly because I spent a year as the Minister for Police at the Home Office under the guidance and authority of my then right honourable but now noble friend Lord Whitelaw and also because I am, in part, by training an historian and I regard the present always as a legacy of the past and the future as a legacy of the present. I am very concerned about that legacy.
The matter which concerns me principally is the power which is to be given to the Home Secretary to appoint, and, crucially, not to reappoint, chairmen of police authorities. Those appointments can be made from among members appointed to those authorities by the Home Secretary himself. Those committees will in turn have the power to appoint, or, crucially, not to reappoint, chief constables on short term contracts.
It is unpopular to tell one's friends that one believes they are wrong on a matter. Subject to the answer which I am sure we shall hear at the end of the debate to the question uttered by my noble friend Lord Whitelaw and echoed by the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, as to what object will be achieved by the change or what ill it is designed to cure, I believe that they are wrong. However responsibly the new system is operated—and I am sure that it is intended that it shall be responsibly operated—inevitably the public perception is bound to be that referred to by my noble friend Lord Carr of Hadley: namely, that the police will be seen less and less as our police and more and more as their police—that is, the police of central government; in other words, a national police force.
In the short term that may be only the appearance. There may be short term ills such as those described by the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, of repetitive political appointments. Much more serious is what will happen in the more distant future when I believe that the perception may become reality. It is unpopular to tell one's friends that they may be wrong but it is sometimes necessary to do so. However, it is more unpopular but essential to tell them that they will not always be there. My party will not hold power for ever. I look on this legislation as a legacy for our successors. I am not thinking of the immediate successors which I know the noble lords opposite aspire with confidence to be, though I discourage them from thinking that that will happen in the near future. I look to the more distant future when the Benches opposite, if they are occupied by anybody and are not covered by dust sheets because everything is conducted at the other end of the corridor, may be occupied by members of a party at the extreme end of the political spectrum. It does not really matter which extreme it is; it will be totalitarian. That is the danger against which we have to guard.
The legacy to which I refer will be a police service with common national objectives across the country set by the Home Secretary. It will be maintained by police authorities chaired by people appointed by the Home Secretary and led by chief constables appointed on short term contracts by those authorities. They will set both the policing plan and the policing objectives of the force, and the chief constable will have to meet those objectives and fulfil that plan if he is to be reappointed. What a legacy that will be, coupled with a prosecution

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service which is also the responsibility of central government, to a government of an extreme political party!
Like my noble friend Lord Carr of Hadley, I see merits in other parts of the Bill. I believe that there is a great deal to be achieved in improving efficiency both in the magistrates' courts and in the police, and that there are ways by which that can be achieved within the Bill. I am a bad curate because I have concentrated on the bad parts of the egg. I assure your Lordships that I believe parts of the egg to be good but I shall not detain your Lordships, much as I am tempted to in order to get a little way back into the good graces of my noble friends on the Front Bench and the Woolsack. However, I believe that I do have a duty to join those of your Lordships who have warned against the distant but very real danger of a national police force eventually emerging from this embryonic move in that direction. Like my noble friend Lord Can of Hadley, I hope that eventually the parties can agree on the way forward, and that my words have been a little helpful in that direction.
6.5 p.m.
Lord Stoddart of Swindon: My Lords, so far the speakers in the debate have been senior and distinguished. All of them have either criticised the Bill or expressed reservations about it. We have heard from three former Home Secretaries, one of whom became Prime Minister and another of whom became Deputy Prime Minister. We have heard from the Lord Chief Justice, a bishop and a former chief constable. All of them have in one way or another criticised the Bill. The noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor will realise that the Bill will have a very hard passage through the House. It may be just as well if the Government were to withdraw it and reconsider the many aspects of it which have been commented upon by so senior a section of this House.
Just after I decided to speak in the debate I heard one Mr. Portillo speak on television. It was a resumé of a speech that he was to make. In effect, he said that there was a British élite undermining the country's institutions from the Royal family to Parliament. I have some sympathy with what he said. It is true that many of our institutions have been undermined. For example, local authorities have been reduced to mere enablers; the health service is no longer democratically accountable but run by accountants; Her Majesty the Queen is now a taxpayer and citizen of the European Union; and Parliament itself has been robbed of many of its powers by the increased use of enabling Bills and the transfer of legislative powers to Brussels. Who is this élite? The élite is Her Majesty's Government, of which Mr. Portillo is a distinguished member. It is the same elite who through this Bill now seeks to centralise the police into a national police force, to centralise the administration of justice and interfere with the process of delivering justice. I say that despite what the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor said in his opening speech.
Mr. Portillo has called for a new crusade to rebuild confidence in our established institutions. If he really means what he says, he can start by persuading Her
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Majesty's Government to drop this Bill which constitutes a real threat to the independence of two of our most important institutions that deal with law enforcement and the delivery of justice. I can assure him of my full support if he does so. I also feel that he will get the support of many others.
Small police authorities of only eight elected members to serve wide areas is the very antithesis of democratic participation and accountability. It is yet another example of sacrificing democratic control to the centralist managerial mania that has gripped the Government. The proposal that the chairmen of these new authorities should be appointed by the Home Secretary is frightening. I say advisedly that it is frightening that the Home Secretary should have such power. It is dangerous and undermines the principle of the police as part of and under the control of the local community. It ends the concept of the tripartite control of the police and tilts the balance of power in favour of centralised control by the Home Secretaty.
Of course we shall be told that Home Secretaries are upright and cautious people who will use their new powers wisely and with discretion. But would the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor be happy with this Bill if there were in prospect an extremist party which might take power in the future and which, under this Bill, could quickly and legally bend the forces of law and order to its own will and purposes? I hope that he will answer that question because it needs to be considered. It was raised initially by his noble friend Lord Elton.
Then there is the provision in Clause 10 for the Secretary of State, by order, to alter existing police areas outside the City of London. That can only mean that the Government intend that there should be fewer and larger police authorities and greater powers of control by the Home Secretary. Furthermore, large size does not guarantee better service or more efficient administration.
In the 1960s I was a member of a watch committee which delivered policing efficiently and effectively in the Reading area. Along came the government of that time. I am sorry to say that it was a Labour Government. The noble Lord, Lord Jenkins, was Home Secretary and said that that was not good enough, we must have a much bigger authority. Therefore, in spite of opposition, he amalgamated the forces of Reading, Oxford, Oxfordshire, Berkshire and Buckinghamshire into the Thames Valley Police Authority. That has not meant better policing in any of the areas, and certainly not in Reading. Indeed, the crime rate has gone up inexorably and the solving of crimes has gone down significantly. Therefore a larger authority does not mean a better authority. I hope that the noble Earl who winds up the debate will take that into account.
I fear that this Government are not content simply to wrest control of the police from democratic institutions and chief constables. In this Bill they seek also to centralise and managerialise the local justice system administered by lay, unpaid magistrates. In Cmnd. 1829, A New Framework for Local Justice, it says in paragraph 2 on page 2 that one of the objectives is:

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"to yield improvements in the efficiency and effectiveness of the service, as measured by the time taken to complete cases coming before the magistrates' courts, the unit costs of those cases, the collection of fines and compensation ordered by the courts and the quality of service provided to the public and professional court users".
As my noble friend and others have pointed out, the magistrates' courts account for only £350 million—4 per cent.—of the total cost, £8,800 million, of the criminal justice service. Again, as my noble friend pointed out, they collect some £270 million in fines and deal with 97 per cent. of all criminal cases. In the light of those facts and figures it is absurd to suggest that the magistrates' courts system is inefficient and needs a dose of amalgamation and centralisation to make it more efficient. In any event, it is the Government's own policy which has caused an increase in the unit costs of our courts because there have been many fewer cases coming before the courts, and many court hearings have had to be cancelled and so the cost per case has gone up. Therefore, if there has been inefficiency it is the Government's own fault.
To pretend, as the White Paper does, that the measures in this Bill are intended to guarantee the judicial independence of magistrates and their legal advisers is a sick joke. The Government, through the Lord Chancellor, will be able to interfere in the membership, the chairmanship and the actual working of magistrates' courts committees in a way that they have not done hitherto. In my view such interference is inimical to the independence of the judiciary and is yet another dangerous twist of the ratchet towards a completely authoritarian state.
Furthermore, fixed contracts and performance related pay must constitute a threat to the provision of local justice since the system is bound to encourage cutting corners and may lead to miscarriages of justice as a result.
There is no question in my mind, and I believe that the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor will not deny, that this is the thin end of the wedge for the lay magistracy. I believe that in the Lord Chancellor's Department they do not like the lay system and are determined in the long term to replace it countrywide with a stipendiary system. If that happens yet another of our great institutions, indeed one of the oldest, will bite the dust and democracy will be further impaired. Yet another stride will be taken towards the undemocratic throttling bureaucracy which threatens to overwhelm our country, as Mr. Portillo pointed out over the weekend.
This is not simply a bad Bill. In my view it is an evil Bill. The Government have no proper mandate for it. I was tempted to divide the House today because I am so opposed to it. However, I have been persuaded by my noble friend on the Front Bench, Lord McIntosh, that the better course is substantially to amend the Bill in Committee. That I sincerely hope we can do. If we do not I fear for the future of policing and justice in this country.
6.16 p.m.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, I rise to speak about Clause 2, which contains the provisions for the police in Scotland. I am no expert in these matters. It is not my subject. I am a simple farmer, and I have lived for many years in Angus in that great country, Scotland.
I am pleased with the police. The police have been very good to me. Apart from being a little unreasonable about the speed of my motorcar on occasions, they have served me well and, as far as I can see, they have served the citizens of Scotland well. There is a very good example. Some years ago the Scots football supporters were the hooligans of Europe. Today, as a result of wise policing and good rules about drink and so on, that role has been taken over by the English and the Scots are welcome all over Europe while the English are not. That appears to me to be a major step and to be of great credit to the Scottish police. I am perfectly serious about this. Football hooliganism is one of the major problems today.
I do not believe that we should alter many of the existing conditions, although improvements can be made. Clauses 45 and 54 particularly disturb the Scottish police associations, which have sent me a very good brief. I have had meetings with them and I appreciate their anxieties. Their concern is that under those two clauses, far from seeking the co-operation of the various police authorities, the Secretary of State will be able to direct them to take part in a campaign which may be entirely unsuitable for a district such as Angus or Grampian but which may be of great relevance in Glasgow, Edinburgh and places of that sort. That co-operation can be obtained and is obtained in any case where a serious effort has to be made for a concerted policy throughout Scotland. The chief constables and police authorities have co-operated and will co-operate with the Secretary of State. The same applies to Clause 54.
In Scotland we also have a procurator fiscal. We have had him for a long time and complaints about criminal behaviour by the police go to him as a separate authority. It appears to be unnecessary and it appears to our friends in the police that that needs a new procedure. In fact, the new procedures appear to me to have great dangers, as has already been said. The Government have authoritarian ideas, but they are alleviated by the Government's incompetence. It may well be that we shall have an authoritarian, competent Government and they would be a great danger in regard to the powers that they might seek from time to time.
The great point about the police in our area is that they attract good people, good young men. They go into the police and if they work for 30 years and contribute a high proportion of their pay they receive a good pension while they are quite young. That is a great incentive and, so far as I can see, the Government are on the road to stopping that incentive for quality in police recruits. That is important.
As to other provisions, the Bill states that there are no financial implications for Scotland. Why the devil do we go about abolishing the ranks that have worked

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extraordinarily well? On big occasions like demonstrations and big football matches I know that we need a chain of command which is absolutely firm so that people know where they are. If lots of people are looking at the seniority list to see who is in command we shall not get the quick action which is required on the many occasions which the police handle extraordinarily well in Scotland.
I do not wish to say much more, but I should like to give a small example of how important local policing and local conditions are. I tell this story a lot. It is true and it is of a certain Sergeant Kippen who was in charge of the police in Kirriemuir; two constables in Kirrie and one or two outside. There are none living there now. Sergeant Kippen ran the town of Kirriemuir with 4,000 people and the surrounding district as a personal fief, more or less. He knew all the problem families. He was fond of gossip which provided him with the necessary intelligence. The people of Kirriemuir trusted him—so much so, that at our annual agricultural dinner, where there was apt to be a little alcohol taken, he used to come to the door of the hall. He would stand there and as the farmers left in various stages of inebriation he would say: "Goodnight, Willie, Tam. If I was you, I'd tak' a taxi". No one ever let him down, he had a complete understanding of them.
I know that that is local policing, which we cannot have everywhere, but the basis is still there. It can only be there if there is a strong local representation with power from the people. If we destroy that and put power into the hands of the Secretary of State, the Government will he destroying something very valuable. In my view, the Bill starts to do that and we should heed the wise advice of the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, and send it back to the Commons a very different object; in fact, an object of which even the Government might be proud.
6.24 p.m.
Baroness Macleod of Borve: My Lords, it is a delight to follow the noble Lord, Lord Mackie, and I agree with everything he said. I too could tell a story or two about the Scottish police, for whom I have great respect.
So many noble Lords are speaking on the Bill that I have decided to be brief rather than comment on its clauses. I think we shall probably spend many days on amendments to the Bill because so many of us have points we wish to discuss.
Despite the eloquent way in which, as usual, my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor introduced the Bill, I find it highly contentious. It is also quite difficult to understand at some points. Not only is that so, but I feel strongly that there should be two Bills. Two great departments of state, headed by two overworked Ministers, deserve to have two Bills which make sense not only to both Houses of Parliament, but to the public. Other noble Lords are more knowledgeable about the police than I am. Suffice it to say that their tireless dedication to duty earns our respect and our gratitude.
Having been a magistrate on a very busy Bench for 30 years, I want to comment briefly on the proposals in the Bill in that regard. There are over 27,000 magistrates
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in the country who are unpaid, who work hard and are responsible, as has been noted, for trying about 97 per cent. of all cases which come to court. This work they have done for over 700 years.
Under the Bill as it stands, that precious and vitally important independence will be undermined. It seems quite extraordinary that the Lord Chancellor of the day, having appointed the magistrates through the Lord Chancellor's advisory committee, on which I used to sit, quite blatantly does not trust them to carry out their duties, he having already appointed them. That will have a particularly adverse effect on the local people when it is realised that the Lord Chancellor will assume a massive increase in direct control and influence over the magistrates' courts. In my experience, this must be wrong.
That leads me to wonder whether those who have drawn up the Bill have ever sat in a magistrates' court. If they had, they would have realised how invaluable are the clerks to the justices. There is a mutual respect and a working relationship which oils the wheels of justice. But if their status is changed, so will their work. Their loyalty and independent advice is given to the magistrates, but if they have continually to look over their shoulders to see whether they are measuring up to performance levels which they probably do not understand anyway, their commitment will inevitably change and we will all suffer.
I have not heard this afternoon the cost of the changes. The new and to my mind totally unnecessary post of chief justices' clerk is advertised at £65,000 a year, plus car allowance. It is suggested that there should be 50 chief justices' clerks. They will all need offices, secretaries and equipment in those. offices, at an estimated total of £5,775,000. I understand that some are being appointed before the Bill has been considered by Parliament. That must be wrong. Those figures may be too small, and if the Crown Prosecution Service—useless as it is—is anything to go by, the sums will have to be redrafted. The estimated initial running costs of the CPS were £4 million a year in 1986. By 1992 they had risen to £226 million.
It is with a heavy heart, and I think it is the first time in my 23 years as a Member of this noble House, that I have had to disagree with my party as much as I do tonight. I very much dislike doing so. I hope that my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor and my noble friend Lord Ferrers will not take anything that I have said personally. But the centralisation of power in the hands of officials is alien to all that we stand for in this country. It is vital that justice must be seen to be fair and independent.
6.30 p.m.
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, the arguments which have been addressed to this House have been massive, overwhelming and all one way. The speech of the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chief Justice was such an act of dissection and demolition in respect of the changes to the magistrates' courts system that one wonders how even this Government could possibly mount a convincing reply.

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For most of my professional life at the Bar I worked in close contact with police officers of every rank. I know that that experience is shared by the noble Lords, Lord Hooson and Lord Thomas of Gwydir, and my noble friend Lord Archer of Sandwell. I think we would all say that the overwhelming majority of police officers in this country are people of dedication and diligence who are informed and activated by a sense of public service and duty. Why is it therefore that police officers of every rank from every police authority are united in their objection to these changes? I entirely agree with what was said by the noble Lords, Lord Elton and Lord Carr of Hadley. We should strive not to be partisan about these important matters. They are too important for partisan party politics.
When the writer Dorothy Parker visited a particularly dismal part of the American Mid West, she said:
"When I got there, there was no there there".
I have made a much more recent and modest pilgrimage, and my search (my journey) was this. I was looking, as an innocent mind, for any sign of a coherent political or philosophic basis, within either the Home Office or the Lord Chancellor's department, for these latest alleged reforms. When I got there, there was no "there" there.
It is not invariably true that bad motive produces bad legislation—not invariably, but normally. The motivation for the change to the police authorities is the removal of local control, the erosion of accountability and the bringing into being of a centralised political control. Three former Home Secretaries have spoken in this House with eloquence of a different type but of a uniform quality. Not one of them could support the changes. The questions posed by each of them in different ways will not go away. I respectfully repeat that those questions are much more important than the party political advantage of a day, a week or a year.
Why does the present incumbent of the Home Office need to have such a large proportion of the police authorities nominated by himself? We had hoped that the day of the placeman, the political creature, had vanished from our country. If the members of a police authority are competent to discharge those heavy public responsibilities which their appointment implies, are they not to be trusted to elect their own chairman?
I turn quite shortly to the magistracy. These proposals are —and it is no good pretending the opposite, however honeyed the pretence may seem—an attempt to take to central authority powers over a part of the judiciary. As noble Lords have earlier pointed out, that part of the judiciary does most of the criminal work in this country, and it has the power in total of imprisoning citizens of this country for up to one year. We are not speaking of an insignificant body of people with limited powers. These changes are not wanted by the magistrates; they are not needed by the system; and they are bitterly resented by everyone who has anything to do with the administration of the magistrates' courts. Surely one casual glance at the list of speakers before and after what I have briefly to say would cause even the most stubborn of administrations to wonder whether on this occasion they had got it entirely right.
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The noble Lord, Lord Stoddart of Swindon, and I very rarely agree on anything. We are both obviously getting old because I am about to agree with him. We share one characteristic. We share the characteristic that we both had Welsh fathers. Obviously, both our fathers told us to do the same thing: "Read up a text before you deliver your sermon". So I have done exactly the same as the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart of Swindon. I took the trouble to read what the present Chief Secretary to the Treasury wrote. I take it that the present Chief Secretary must reflect at least a part of present government thinking, on the basis that at least the right hand ought to know what the right hand is doing. I quote:
"Americans still believe in the American dream".
Any attempt in America to control the police service or a part of the judiciary centrally would be the subject of amazed disbelief and savage derision.
I quote again:
"Most Britons are proud of their nation and love its distinctive features".
I profoundly agree. Its "distinctive features" have been for over a century in modern form and terms local control by local people, chosen, overseen and subject to recall by other local people. I suggest, with respect to your Lordships, that that is one of the distinctive features that Britain offers, and it is one which is certainly cherished and admired by a large number of us.
I quote one final word from the Chief Secretary:
"We need to assert the value and the quality of the British way of life and British institutions".
Yes, indeed. The British way—rightly, I suggest—rejects and mistrusts authoritarian central control. It cherishes democratic accountability. These are not simply the mottoes of the moment. They reflect something which I believe is central to the belief of all of us who have the honour of sitting in this House. We must not throw away those deeper verities for the limited ambition of the present incumbent of the Home Office. None of those three former Home Secretaries treated that office, which is in many subtle ways the most important great office of state, as a political plaything. I regret to say that I cannot say that about the present incumbent.
The Chief Secretary spoke of two great institutions. One has always been, and presently remains, a locally accountable police force; and the second has been an impartial magistracy trusted by the people and wholly contemptuous of any attempt to direct it by central authority. With one Bill this present Administration are doing their best to subvert both of those great institutions. We owe the public servants in the police service and the magistracy our duty. I believe our duty is that in these two central respects this Bill must be amended so that these vices are withdrawn from it.
6.40 p.m.
Lord Ackner: My Lords, it is a very remarkable, deeply depressing and much to be regretted fact that since 1989 the Government have managed to antagonise virtually every component part of the administration of justice. Through my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor and his department, they have alienated the Bar, the solicitors and the professional judges. They are

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now bent on alienating the lay judges—the magistrates—who, without fees or other remuneration, deal efficiently, as we have been told, with 97 per cent. of our criminal cases. In addition they are intent on affronting their legal advisers, the justices' clerks, by destroying their time honoured autonomy.
Not to be outdone by this sorry achievement, the Government, through the Home Secretary and his department, have alienated the police, the probation officers and some, if not a majority of, prison governors and officers; and most recently, as a specious Christmas present, the victims of violent crime, the White Paper published last month savagely reducing the compensation to which in future they will be entitled.
The result is the product of twin driving forces. These are, first, pursuit of power and, secondly, using as a yardstick for decision-making, financial value for money rather than the interests of justice. What constitutes financial value is determined by the Executive and not by judicial decision.
Let me give two examples of how the first of those two driving forces—the pursuit of power—has manifested itself in practice. In January 1989 the Government's Green Paper entitled The Work and Organisation of the Legal Profession was presented to Parliament by my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor and was first debated in April of that year. It was produced at the behest of a Cabinet sub-committee on competition, chaired by the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Nigel Lawson, who was warned by my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor that it would be bitterly opposed by the judges. I refer to page 612 et sequitur of the noble Lord's biography View from No. 11 —not quite the genesis given by my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor in the debate. It was described by the noble Lord, Lord Beloff, as another attempt by the Civil Service to establish its control over what had hitherto been an independent and separate part of our national life.
One of its central proposals, which the Government were later obliged somewhat to modify, was the so-called Lord Chancellor's Advisory Committee, a lay dominated committee staffed by civil servants of the Lord Chancellor's Department, of whom all the members were and are appointed at the whim of the Lord Chancellor:
"an instrument"—
said my noble and learned friend Lord Oliver of Aylmerton—
"by which the Executive can in very large measure control a legal profession which was previously self-regulated and by which it can, by the creation of new classes of practitioner in the courts, secure an ever greater control than it enjoys at the moment over the composition and, of course, ultimately, the conduct of the judiciary at all levels".
In the same debate, my noble and learned friend Lord Lane, the then Lord Chief Justice of England, warned in trenchant terms that the growth in the powers of the Executive and therefore of the Government over the administration of justice had steadily increased in recent years. He said:
"The signs are that it will extend still further, and one asks whether we are now seeing tools being fashioned which by some
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future, perhaps less scrupulous, government may be used to weaken the independent administration of justice" —[0fficial Report, 7/4/89; col. 1331.]
If I may comment, a highly prophetic observation.
That was some four years ago. Perhaps I may remind the House of a more recent example, which was to be found in Clause 25 of the Judicial Pensions and Retirement Bill 1992 —all tucked away there. Under that clause, power was to be taken by my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor, at his sole discretion, to continue the senior judiciary in office beyond the new compulsory retirement age of 70, from year to year, up to a period of five years—a system referred to as "judges on contract". I do not need to expand upon how that power could have been abused. Other jurisdictions in warmer climates can provide plenty of examples, past and present.
What apparently my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor or his department ignored or overlooked was that more than 50 years ago that concept was rejected by a Royal Commission—the Peel Commission—of which Sir Claude Shuster, as he then was, an outstanding Permanent Secretary in my noble and learned friend's department, was not only a member but specifically and firmly endorsed the rejection of such a proposal. In the debate on Report on 29th October 1992 my noble and learned friend Lord Simon of Glaisdale expressed his astonishment that,
"this unconstitutional provision ever appeared in the Bill".—[Official Report, 29/10/92; col. 1262.]
The offending clause was at the last minute removed.
I shall give but one example of the Treasury's concept of value for money taking precedence over the interests of justice. At least for the past four years there has been a plain, incontrovertible and unsatisfied need for a substantial increase in the number of High Court judges. I shall not weary your Lordships with a recital of the requests that were made, crescendoing in a speech by my noble and learned friend Lord Lane, as Lord Chief Justice, at the Mansion House dinner given by the Lord Mayor to the judges some three years or so ago. In that speech he referred to the "critical situation" and said that the administration of justice was "in peril". That was followed by a similar such speech made by his successor, my noble and learned friend Lord Taylor of Gosforth, who in terms said that the position 'was gradually becoming a national disgrace. A Starred Question was raised by the noble Lord, Lord Mishcon, Where the abuse by the Lord Chancellor of his powers under Section 9 of the Supreme Court Act 1981 in the over-use of deputies was stressed and a debate was subsequently instituted by the noble Lord, Lord Irvine of Lairg. Ultimately 10 judges were provided. The excessive use of deputies continues and I do not think that I am putting the matter too high in saying that on this subject the Treasury placed the Lord Chancellor, responsible for the administration of justice, in a deeply humiliating position by resisting this clear demand over a period of four years.
The matters to which I have referred I hope demonstrate to your Lordships how strongly the tide towards Executive domination is flowing—a tide which is eroding judicial independence, so fundamental to the protection of democracy. What is in essence proposed in

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this Bill in relation to the magistrates, is to transfer the control of justices' clerks from the judiciary (that is, the magistrates) to the Executive, which is the Lord Chancellor's Department. The Government have taken the concern which has been expressed sufficiently seriously to seek to make special provision in Clause 71. According to the side note, it preserves the,
"Independence of chief justices' clerk, justices' clerk … in relation to legal functions".
That provision, which wrongly presupposes that a firm line can be drawn between legal and administrative matters, is particularly noteworthy for two quite separate reasons. First, that it should ever have become necessary in an Act of Parliament to provide a specific assurance that what the Act provides is to have no impact on the independence of the judiciary underlines the very danger of the provisions which have necessitated that assurance. Secondly, the magistrates and their clerks are totally unmoved by the Government's assurance to be found encapsulated in this clause. They remain convinced that the Executive will use its control of their clerks to manipulate the judicial decision-making process. Speaking entirely for myself, I have every sympathy for the magistrates and their clerks taking such a view.
In the debate on 10th May 1993 on the Maximum Number of Judges (No. 2) Order, I drew specific attention to the then recent prospectus issued by the Lord Chancellor's Department headed A Programme for the Future and to the observation at the foot of page 3, which reads:
"As the head of the judiciary, the Lord Chancellor is at all times concerned to safeguard the Judiciary's … independence from the other branches of [professions]".
I express my respectful doubts as to whether that is the present perception of the judiciary. The reaction of the magistrates and their clerks to this Bill, and in particular to Clause 71, shows that it is not.
It will doubtlessly be protested that all the anxieties are fanciful. But can it really be sensibly suggested that the Lord Chancellor's veto of the appointment of the chairman of that all-important magistrates' courts committee, to be found in Clause 65, and the power of the Lord Chancellor to give directions to that committee requiring them to meet specified standards (Clause 66) are not capable of affecting the independence of the justices or that the power of the Lord Chancellor (Clause 80) to remove the chairman of that committee and even remove members and replace the committee with his own appointees, is not capable of interfering with the independence of justice?
Can it be realistically doubted that the provisions that justices' clerks and chief justices' clerks (both of whose appointments have to be approved by the Lord Chancellor) have to be on fixed-term contracts with terms of service to be laid down by the Lord Chancellor to include performance-related pay schemes (Clauses 68 and 70) cannot redound to the detriment of justice? Is it really open to question that the close monitoring by an inspectorate in the Lord Chancellor's Department and by the chief justices' clerks of the performance of the magistrates' own legal adviser, whose personal career future—and indeed that of the Chief Justice's
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clerk—hangs upon gaining a satisfactory report from the Executive, cannot but create centralised expediency inimical to the provision to the magistrates of independent advice?
If I am to be accused of fantasy then I am certainly in good company in this House and I think I am so outside it. Perhaps I may draw your Lordships' attention to a recent little book entitled Managing Criminal Justice, a copy of which is in your Lordships' Library. It has been written by two lecturers at Birmingham University. In a chapter with the title, Judicial Independence and Justice Under Threat?, commencing at page 137, the authors refer to the concern which has been expressed that the changes which are now being proposed will put at risk the independence of the lay judiciary inasmuch as their clerks will in future be under great pressure to act as the Executive might expect rather than as the local Bench, to which they have traditionally been accountable, might wish.
They quote from a response in 1992 by a clerk to the justices of St. Helens, Mr. Green, to the proposal that magistrates' clerks should become in future essentially servants of a multi-faceted Executive. He says this:
"There will be many ways in which the Justice's Clerk can use the influence he has with his magistrates to assist the Executive, compromise the rights of defendants and members of the public, and render sterile an oath which requires decisions to be made without fear of or favour to, inter alia, the Executive".
He gives examples,
"Speaking as your Clerk,"
he might say,
"I would advise you to grant legal aid were it not that as the Lord Chancellor I must think of the cost to the Legal Aid Board. Or to commit the accused to trial or sentence, were I not aware as the Lord Chancellor that the local Crown Court is too busy. Or that you fix his trial for hearing in 21 days, were it not as Attorney-General I wish the CPS to have 8 weeks for preparation of the case. Or that you fix the hearing for 8 weeks hence, were it not that as Home Secretary I cannot allow the Chief Constable to incur the expense of a police witness on a rest day. Or that you try the accused, were it not that as Attorney-General I recognise a binding over to be the cheaper course. Or that you should order the prosecution to pay wasted cost, were it not for the embarrassment this would cause me as Court Manager when I next chair the Court User Group. Or that you order a pre-sentence report to be prepared within two weeks, were it not that as Home Secretary I require four. Or that you commit the accused to prison, were it not that as Court Manager I could not take the risk, by increasing the Court's percentage of custodial sentences, of disqualifying myself when as Lord Chancellor I consider the renewal of my contract."
Time does not allow me to address myself to the provisions in the Bill which propose a substantial move towards centralisation of policing and away from the tripartite relationship of police, Home Office and local police authorities. This tripartite relationship is clearly a constitutional safeguard of enormous importance which prevents policing falling under national political control. Central appointments, combined with the placing of the chief constable on short-term contracts and performance-related pay, clearly carries a danger of replacing the operational independence of the chief constable with effective control of policing by the Home Secretary. Its provisions, super-added to those in the magistrates' courts section of the Bill, emphasise the Government's obsession with central control.
Like my noble and learned friend the Lord Chief Justice, my breakfast cereal today was coated with

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assurances given on the radio that the Government have an open mind and will listen sympathetically to any valid criticism of this Bill. Of course, as ever, hope springs eternal but in the present context the lift-off is barely perceptible.
7 p.m.
Lord Gisborough: My Lords, Acts relating to the police appear every 30 years or so and it is important that when there is a change it should be well thought out and able to stand for the next 30 years. The last Act was preceded by three years of consultation and the result was that no further Act was needed until now. This Bill has been preceded by little or no consultation with the Police Federation and much, but by no means all, of the Bill is opposed by the federation as being detrimental to policing.
The constitution of policing has always been based on the separation of power between the Home Secretary, the police authorities and the chief constable. If that balance is now upset, as is proposed in the Bill, it would allow the police to be nationally controlled and would lead to the politicisation of the police, something that has always been anathema to all parties. That point has been stressed and warned against by many speakers already.
It will certainly upset committees for them to have thrust upon them a chairman whom they do not want appointed by the Home Secretary and it could cause permanent warfare within a committee. The subsequent fights and antics of the committee will provide interesting and exciting reading in the local press, but it will not do much good to the police or to the furtherance of law and order. However, there are occasions when committees choose Bloggins, because it is his turn to be chairman, or some political and vociferous firebrand who may well not be thought suitable by the Home Secretary. There are times when committees seem to have been taken over by extremes of one party or another.
However, the introduction of appointed men will do little to help. Perhaps one could argue that one could even up the committees with magistrates. They at least have hands-on experience of what is going on in the police and the courts to match the elected members who have hands-on experience of what is going on in the communities, as of course have many of the magistrates. Greater representation by the magistracy would be a good thing. Magistrates combine a strictly non-political office and outlook in the courts with a purposely chosen cross-section of background and politics.
Under the Bill, civil servants in Whitehall would wield very increased experience in setting national policing objectives and in advising Ministers who will appoint their own nominees to the new police authorities. It is hard to see how civil servants in London should be better able to add value to the services delivered to a particular community that may have a special problem.
Some chief constables feel that if the Bill were to become law their operational discretion would be fettered in such a way that they would not be able to respond in a balanced way to local problems without
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breaching their duty to pursue national policing objectives, police authority objectives and their relevant performance indicators. That would inevitably inhibit their ability to respond to local problems and could not possibly be in the interests of the people living in their local communities.
There is little in the Bill that makes the police more efficient, and yet the growing efficiency in the force that is taking place at the moment may well be jeopardised by it. Surely the principal objective of the police is the reduction and prevention of crime. Their constitution and organisation should be arranged with that in mind. With all the reservations which the police, not to mention the justices' clerks, have about the Bill, surely the sensible thing would be to take it back to the drawing board, to tell the police what the Government want to achieve and to work out a mutually agreeable way of achieving it.
Turning to the magistracy, it is strange to see this measure dealing with the courts being attached to a police Bill. The whole direction of British justice has been to separate the police from the magistracy in the eyes of the public. Therefore, it seems an odd and retrograde step that this important Bill about the magistracy should be attached to a police Bill.
Some parts of the Bill are good: for example, the transformation of magistrates' courts committees into boards of management with comparable powers to those of boards of directors is a useful step forward which has been advocated for some time. But there are other parts, the implications of which are disturbing and I refer in particular to three.
As the Lord Chancellor will know, the imposition of fixed term contracts has been the subject of copious representations to him. It is opposed by clerks, magistrates, and judges alike. It undermines the independence of the office of justices' clerk by exposing him to central direction from London and the pressures to conform thereto. The independence of the office has been the secret of its success and that of the magistracy which it serves. Our forebears went to some pains to secure that independence, as they did, and they thought it important to do so. The Lord Chancellor assures us that Clause 71 of the Bill will protect the position. It reads:
"When exercising [his] functions [as a justices' clerk] or giving advice to justices of the peace in an individual case … a justices' clerk shall not be subject to the direction of the magistrates' courts committee, the chief justices' clerk or any other person".
That is fine so far as it goes, but while I accept that it will deter an overt attempt to influence, I am extremely sceptical if it will be proof against an attempt of a subtler kind which, by a nice blend of damns and faint praise, suggests that future renewal of contract will depend on something more than present performance. That will supply a powerful incentive to a luckless clerk to subordinate the interests of justice to his own self-interest or that of his Bench and advise accordingly. As a magistrate myself, I do not want to believe this but I should be less than frank if I did not say that it is a distinct possibility, having considered the pressures that will be applied to justices' clerks under the new system in the interests of management efficiency.

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Then there is the question of funding the new arrangements. I am told that the Government confidently predict that the cost can be accommodated within the existing budget levels but steadfastly refuse to reveal the figures upon which they base that prediction. I have therefore had to have recourse to the Management Information System statistics—the M.I.S. figures, as they are called—to estimate whether this is likely to be so. The figures for 1992 are most instructive. They show that in counties like Dorset, Northamptonshire and Cheshire, which have already gone some way down the road suggested by the White Paper and unified their management structures under one justices' clerk for the whole county, the cost per case is much greater than in counties like my own, Cleveland, which have not done so. In Dorset, the cost per case is £29.40; in Northamptonshire it is nearly £31 and in Cheshire it is £31. The cost in Cleveland is still just under £24. This comparison suggests that the Government may be over-optimistic in their estimate and that there will be a similar disparity between actual and estimated cost as there was when the Crown Prosecution Service was set up some eight or nine years ago. Needless to say, I shall await the publication of the first annual report of the new magistrates' courts service in 1996 with much interest.
Finally there is the magistrates' courts service itself. Parliament is the trustee of a unique institution. When it was re-organised by the Justices of the Peace Act in 1949, Ministers enthused about it, hoping that it would attract lawyers of quality to its ranks—and it did. There were then just over 800 clerkships and there was a good chance of a young lawyer of quality getting a clerkship after an apprenticeship of five or six years.
Sadly, those odds have lengthened over the years and with this latest contraction to 58 chief justices' clerkships and about the same number of justices' clerkships, the service in the last years of the 20th century is likely to be far less attractive than it was in the 1950s and 1960s. This will be detrimental to the good state of the service and I urge the Lord Chancellor to do what he can to prevent it happening should the symptoms become more conspicuous. We owe it to a service that has served the country so well to be concerned for its future well-being.
The Bill is not all bad. It has good points, but it will need a lot of major surgery.
7.10 p.m.
The Earl of Winchilsea and Nottingham: My Lords, as the police service is largely an operational service, I should like to focus my remarks at this stage of the Bill on some of the operational worries and concerns that have been expressed to me by everyone—and I mean everyone—who has an interest in this, the first police Bill for 30 years. At this point it is right that I declare an interest as the representative in your Lordships' House for the Police Superintendents' Association of England and Wales. However, all three police staff associations have united in their opposition to many of the proposals in the Bill. It can be said, therefore, that I do not speak only for the
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superintendents. Their concern, which I profoundly share, is for the operational catastrophe which could result from the implementation of some of the proposals.
As well as being extremely worried about the Bill and its signposting into the future, the police are very angry. They are angry at the breathtaking lack of any meaningful consultation between them and the Home Secretary and his advisers before publication in June of the Government's White Paper on police reform. At that time, the Home Secretary had been in his new post for just two months. He had hardly got his feet under his desk, yet here he was announcing his intention to make drastic changes to the way this country is to be policed!
There has been very little, if any, consultation with police officers who have consistently demonstrated their enthusiasm to embrace constructive and productive change. They have immense experience, some of them having served for 30 years and more, and know what they are talking about. Instead of being consulted, they have been insulted. Quite clearly, this is a case of nanny knowing best. But nanny cannot know best with so little knowledge and experience.
The most sinister of all the proposals are those which seek to halt the unique system of policing which we all enjoy in this country and which has evolved over the years—policing by consent. That system is the envy of the world. Yet here we have a Home Secretary doing his best to destroy it by taking control of police authorities and making them answerable to him and his successors. Our police service is to be politicised. The chief constable of each force will lose his or her operational independence. They will be required by statute to comply with directions given to them by the police authorities but which have been handed down by the Home Secretary.
Another serious matter is that of police discipline. The new disciplinary procedures, as proposed in the Bill, remove the civil rights of police officers. They weaken and curtail the right of appeal against disciplinary findings and legal protection.
Police officers are easy targets and they deserve special consideration due to the nature of their work and a tendency of criminals and mischief makers to level malicious complaints against them. It may interest your Lordships to know that such a case is under consideration now, involving a policeman stationed at the Palace of Westminster, and it is causing him great distress.
From an operational point of view, consider the highly likely outcome should the proper safeguards be removed. An officer will think very carefully before enforcing the law in difficult circumstances or against someone who is known to be in the habit of making complaints against the police. The result of many of those malicious complaints can be worse than suffering a serious physical injury because the resulting inquiry can drag on for months. That inevitably has a most damaging effect on the officer's morale. It can leave just as bad a scar as any violent attack. Quite obviously, due to the powers available to police officers, it is vital that they are brought to book if they violate those powers.

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But it is also vital that they are given support and backing provided they act reasonably and within the law.
I turn now to the question of future ranks within the police and the proposals to eliminate both one of the two inspector ranks and one of the two superintending ranks as well as that of deputy chief constable. Operationally, that would leave only one rank between inspector and assistant chief constable. That is far too big a gap.
The police service is a uniformed, disciplined service and its ranks are not unlike those of the military. Can your Lordships imagine only one rank between that of leading seaman and rear admiral? Where would the chain of command, levels of authority and lines of responsibility be in the navy if that were the case? Where would that leave the learning process? The same can be said for the police service; and I shudder to think of the operational consequences at major incidents.
The proposals for the abolition of ranks might look good on paper and they might also look politically attractive provided that one does not look too deeply. It might appear that by eliminating those ranks, considerable savings would be made which could be spent on putting more bobbies on the beat, thereby satisfying one of the most often heard cries from the public. In actual fact, the reverse would be true: more work would be placed on the lower ranks which had once been done by the eliminated ranks. Someone has to do the administrative work; and it cannot all be done by non-police personnel.
The police service is very much an operational one and present ranks are needed to maintain operational viability. No evidence exists to counter that claim. Indeed, there is plenty of evidence to show how badly things go wrong where that has been tried. For example, in New Zealand police two ranks were removed which led to confusion and a drop in efficiency. It also led to the creation of 17 grades which replaced the original 10 ranks—not a brilliant slimming down exercise, my Lords.
Although I share the relief felt by all three police staff associations that some of the dottier recommendations contained in the Sheehy report have been dropped by the Government—I refer to performance related pay and 10 year work contracts for police constables, and the 40 year qualification for full pension—I also share their concerns for much that remains.
Quite simply, what is at stake in the Bill is the very bedrock on which our entire police service is based. The Bill seeks to eliminate the close, democratic accountable ties with the local community that it serves and to replace it with a distant, undemocratic and unaccountable political commissar in Whitehall. Is that what we really want? Well, yes it is, according to the Government. After all, do not forget that nanny really does know best, even though she does not listen to anyone.
Finally, I believe that the Government are to be congratulated on one thing. They have successfully united all those who have anything whatsoever to do with our police service in their opposition to the Bill.
7.18 p.m.
Lord Harmar-Nicholls: My Lords, all except one of the points that I wished to make have already been made with more authority and clarity than I might have mustered. It would be unfair—we have already had 19 speakers, and there are 19 more to hear—to continue more than is absolutely necessary. I shall certainly not repeat any of the points that are already on the record.
However, perhaps I may seek assistance from my noble friend Lord Ferrers who represents the Government in this Chamber. He knows already—he needs no reminding—that out of 19 speakers, 18 have already made it quite clear that they believe the Bill as it stands is unacceptable. That point will not have been lost on either of my noble friends. I know that they will want to react to it. We should therefore try and guide them to a way in which they can face up to that fact without having to jettison their Bill entirely.
In opening the debate my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor said that the Bill would better equip the police to carry out their functions in fighting crime. He said also that the Bill would enable them to meet local feeling. Those are good points. We still need a Bill which will achieve that. This Bill can be altered without anyone in any way losing face to achieve what my noble and learned friend said the Government want to achieve.
The first bit of luck that my noble friends have is that the Bill is starting in your Lordships' House. Every time I come to this Chamber I am impressed by the breadth of its elasticity in being able to face up to unexpected problems. By the Bill starting in this House the elasticity of our procedures, which have centuries of experience behind them, will enable us to enact the Bill without any real problems. To begin with, the Salisbury Rule means that we do not vote on Second Reading. That would not happen in another place. But here it means that all of the criticisms that have been expressed and that are upon the record do not have to be accepted and the Bill signed, sealed and delivered, which would be the effect of a vote. Therefore we do not have the encumbrance of overcoming a vote in this House against the main features of the Bill.
Anyone who has played any part in Government—the Executive as distinct from the Parliament which approves legislation—knows that a government's duty is to produce legislation. That is why we have Whips and so forth. It is important that, having given a great deal of thought to what they should do in the form of legislation, their duty is then to enact the Bill. Parliament's duty is to examine it so that before the Bill becomes an Act where it starts affecting people it is in a form which will achieve what it set out to achieve—in this case better to equip the police for carrying out their functions in fighting crime and, secondly, to meet local feelings.
At Second Reading the principles of the Bill are accepted. But the details which exist in the Bill are clearly not acceptable. We know that the real work on it will be done in Committee. It is at Committee stage where the real power is given to any objections that we may have, and the Committee stage is still some way off. My advice to my noble friend who will be winding

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up today's debate is this. Whatever speech he had planned in commending the Bill to this House—it would need to be a speech which ensured that the Bill was passed—I ask him to amend; to leave himself as free as possible to meet the different views expressed. That can be done without any loss of face. It is the correct working of the parliamentary system and it is that kind of elasticity and common sense which properly allows us to arrive at legislation which will affect people.
I commend that suggestion to my noble friend. It is the proper and correct thing to do in the circumstances of today's debate; it is also the commonsense thing to do. Perhaps he can find some way of not opening the door for all the criticisms to get through, but to leave the matter in such a way that when we reach Committee stage the amendments will face up to the advice given from so many authoritative sources. I refer to an ex-Prime Minister who was Home Secretary, my noble friend Lord Whitelaw, who was well known and famous as a Home Secretary, my noble friend Lord Carr, who also served in that office, plus many chief constables.
The authority behind the criticisms directed against the Bill is too formidable to be overlooked. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Ackner, is an ex-Lord of Appeal who can speak with all the authority and experience of one of our Lords of Appeal. His criticisms should be taken into account. My noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor will be doing a great duty in facing up to the message so clearly put forward. He has the instrument of the House and the elasticity of its procedures to help him and I hope that he will find ways and means of doing so.
I said that all the points I had it in mind to make had been made, but one was not made. It is not as important as some of the others but I should like to place it on record. It relates to the disciplining of policemen. As matters stand at present, a policeman is not convicted of a disciplinary offence until the offence is proved beyond reasonable doubt. That is the procedure at the moment. The case must be proved beyond reasonable doubt before a policeman can be convicted. Under the Bill the reasonable doubt is replaced by general employment tribunal procedure. That is not fair. The police have a special and dangerous part to play and they face a lot of prejudice and criticism. When my noble and learned friend is considering, as I suspect he already is, the kind of amendments that he can table at Committee stage to meet the criticisms of the House, I hope that he will take into account the point I have just mentioned; that is, that reasonable doubt will remain one of the tests.
For what it is worth I hope that that advice will be taken. I believe that we shall eventually finish by turning the Bill into an Act of which we can be proud and one which will achieve what my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor said at the opening of the debate he wanted to achieve; that is, to better equip the police to carry out their functions in fighting against crime.
7.30 p.m.
Lord Archer of Sandwell: My Lords, the noble Earl who is to reply to the debate may be forming the impression that this is not a popular Bill and that it may be subject to detailed scrutiny at later stages. If in the interests of brevity I confine myself to venturing some comments simply on the general principles, I hope that he will not draw any false comfort from me. It is simply that to everything there is a season.
Inevitably at this stage in a debate contributions will echo comments which have already been made. They may be none the worse for that. As my noble friend Lord Callaghan pointed out, it may be important to emphasise the breadth of the consensus in this House.
Perhaps I may begin by echoing a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, and others. This is the Police and Magistrates' Courts Bill. I understand why the Government may wish to have a police Bill, though it is hoped not this one, and I understand why they may wish to legislate about magistrates' courts. However, what still requires explanation is their wish to include both subjects in one Bill. First, that is bad legislative practice. If the Bill reaches the statute book and some future magistrates' clerk wishes to ascertain the matters on which he is subject to direction, or if some future chief constable requires clarification on how far the Home Secretary may tell him how to do his job, each will require a document which is more expensive, bulky and complicated than would otherwise have been necessary. It is not immediately clear how that facilitates the administration of the police or of magistrates' courts.
Of course, if the Government legislate on subjects two at a time, they may push through more business, because I doubt whether the business managers in either House will allow twice as much time for each stage. On that principle perhaps we are to have a Road Transport and Control of Agricultural Pesticides Bill. But it is not simply a matter of legislating on two apparently unrelated subjects. In this instance the Government are sending a signal which runs contrary to a principle that successive governments have tried to establish since the Summary Jurisdiction Act 1848. It has taken a long time.
In the early years of this century magistrates' courts were known as police courts. Some still carry that name; it was carved over the entrances when I first came to the Bar. Admittedly, that is not a period which can plausibly be included in modern history. The courts were often part of a building which was shared with the police station. The police were very much in evidence. Some of my noble friends will remember that. The list of cases was in the possession of a police officer. He would put a case back or take a case out of turn for those he favoured. He would call out the name of the case and another police officer would rise to present the prosecution. It was a police court in more than name and it was perceived as part of the police process. It was expected that the evidence of police officers would be believed as a matter of course. Defendants did not expect the court to intervene between the police and themselves in the interests of justice.

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During the years there has been a process of dissociating magistrates' courts from the police. In recent years they have where possible been built a suitable distance from police stations. Now the Government bring police and magistrates' courts together again in one Bill. To put it at its lowest, they do nothing to reinforce the message which everyone has devoted so much effort to emphasising during the years. And, to my knowledge, many magistrates and their clerks are troubled by this juxtaposition.
There is one characteristic which both parts of the Bill share in common: each part has been prepared without consulting those who might have expected to be consulted. Neither part of the Bill represents proposals put before the electorate in the form of an election manifesto. The associations representing the various ranks of the police service came to see some of us here last Tuesday. They all said the same: that they regretted that they had been driven to a position of lobbying Parliament because they did not see that as a function of the police service. They said that they had not been accorded any consultation with the Government. They pointed to the Police Act 1964, which was passed after a Royal Commission and three years of consultation. They drew a sad contrast with the present Bill.
The Magistrates' Association and the Justices' Clerks' Society say the same: that the Government issued the White Paper, A Framework for Local Justice, and proceeded to offer consultation not on whether the proposals should be implemented but on how they should be implemented. It was not a Member of the opposition parties who first used the expression "an elective dictatorship". Whatever the constitutional principles, if a government hope for co-operation from those for whom they are providing legislative instructions there are wiser ways of proceeding.
I propose to devote the remainder of my comments to Part IV of the Bill and respectfully to echo much of what was said by the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chief Justice and the noble Lord, Lord Lester. That part of the Bill addresses a problem which I concede is not easy, and I fear that it simply exacerbates it. When I began to practise, judicial administration made no great demands on anyone. Administrative discussions were of a simple kind and no doubt if a judge gave an instruction it was carried out. Magistrates' clerks ran their courts with no intrusive philosophy. If an administrative question arose it depended on the relationship between the chairman and the magistrates' clerk. I remember that before the Beeching Report and the Courts Act 1971 Quarter Sessions were run by barristers' clerks who called in the chairman of sessions or the recorder if that was required. He was probably part of the same chambers.
After Beeching there was much moaning at the Bar because lists were arranged by a new kind of administrator who, it was said, did not know what was entailed in preparation for a case and could not estimate how long a case was likely to take. I believe that we overreacted; obviously, we had to come into the present world. But I believe that it then became clear to the profession that there was a whole new science of judicial administration which entailed a theoretical and practical range of questions about the interface between
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the judicial function and the role of the administrator. Of course, we all recollect the debate about whether the Parliamentary Commissioner might inquire into the courts and the formula which was finally reached in Section 110 of the Courts and Legal Services Act 1990.
Certainly, in this more complicated world we require greater consultation between the judges and the administrators. Usually that runs smoothly because their personal relations are good but sometimes a question arises as to whether a decision is judicial or administrative. The noble Lord, Lord Lester, referred to the well-known lecture of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Browne-Wilkinson. For budgetary purposes it is agreed that a judge should not be an accounting officer. But let us suppose that he makes a decision which makes a demand on resources. Let us suppose that he says, "I will not hear another case today because no jury should be called on to concentrate at this late hour". That may represent his view of what justice requires but, of course, it has repercussions for resources and, now, for performance targets.
The problem is how to maintain the distinction in a particular case. In the case of magistrates' courts, the problem is exacerbated by a further distinction. Lay magistrates are dependent on advice tendered to them by their clerk. He is part of the judicial process. He must advise them on the law and on the correct procedure and, of course, on the consequences of their decision for administration. He may say, "If you adjourn this case it will be a month before we can fit it into the list again".
How does one ensure that that advice does not spill over into recommending one judgment rather than another? Clause 71 appears chiefly to rest on the distinction between advice in a particular case arid general administration. But even in a particular case the Government need to maintain some sensitivity in ensuring that magistrates and their clerks are not inhibited from giving proper effect to considerations of justice. The White Paper announced that the Government were concerned about limiting unit costs and measuring performance in that context. It promised the introduction of cash limits. Now we have the formula which takes account of such factors as the time taken to deal with cases and efficiency in enforcing fines. Today we have heard examples from the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chief Justice and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Ackner.
From time to time magistrates have to decide whether it is in the interests of justice for a case to be adjourned. But if performance is to be judged partly by the time taken to deal with cases—with throughput—may they not feel that they will be rewarded for refusing an adjournment even if justice cries out for an adjournment? Sometimes they are called on to decide judicially whether a fine defaulter should be accorded a measure of mercy or visited with a draconian sanction and what instalments he should be called upon to pay. But if they are to be awarded brownie points for efficiency in enforcing fines, may they not believe that the more that they can squeeze out of the debtor, the better they will be considered to have done their job?
Those are not theoretical problems. There is a real danger that the Government's obsessive belief that the

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value of everything can be translated into profit and loss accounts will blur those issues of justice which are the essence of a judicial system.
Into that sensitive area enters the inspector. Let me say at once that I am not shocked by inspectors. I am privileged to chair the Council on Tribunals, which investigates and reports on over 60 systems of tribunals. The council has no difficulty in delineating those matters which are within our jurisdiction and those relating to specific judicial decisions.
What are the inspectors to investigate? According to Clause 78, it is "organisation and administration". Does that include performance indicators, how many adjournments have been refused, how many fines the magistrates have squeezed out of people who want to explain some financial difficulty? Those matters come very close to an invasion of judicial objectivity. They are not easy questions but they certainly call for careful scrutiny. I hope that the Government's business managers will allow adequate time during the succeeding stages of the Bill for that to be done, bearing in mind that, with the Government's curious twinning of two distinct subjects, we shall be dealing not with one Bill but with two.
7.42 p.m.
Lord Bethell: My Lords, in the years that I have been a Member of your Lordships' House I have never known it to be so unanimous in its disapproval of a Government Bill. I wonder whether my noble friend Lord Ferrers is thinking at the back of his mind that it might save us all a lot of grief if, at the end of the day, he were to withdraw his Motion for a Second Reading. I doubt whether he contemplates that course, but I very much hope that, with his customary diligence, he is noting all the points which have been made and the inexorable criticism that has emerged from speeches so far this afternoon. I hope that he is thinking very carefully of what amendments can be put down.
It seems to be the view of your Lordships that the Bill has somehow gone wrong and that it provides far too much centralisation in the administration of law, order and justice in this country. It seems to be the view that too much power is given by the Bill to the Home Secretary of the day. The point has been made and should be made more than once that it is not particularly the present Home Secretary whom one has in mind. One has to think of future Home Secretaries who may be less careful of their duty to the public than is the present incumbent.
I feel inhibited from speaking for too long and will not do so because these points have been made many times by earlier speakers. At the outset I declare my own interest in that I am an adviser to the Police Federation of England and Wales. The police are only one of many interest groups which have complained today, through various noble Lords, that they have not been properly consulted. That seems to be one of the main problems lying behind the birth of the Bill. I am told that various proposals were put before the Police Federation less than a year ago with a request for immediate response (within a few days) and that then decisions were taken
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on matters of great concern to the police; namely, on matters concerning police authorities—who should be in charge of them, who should be appointed to them, what powers they should have and what their numbers should be—and on the issue of police discipline, without any further consultation. The latter is a very important point to which I shall turn later. The same complaint has been made by members of the legal profession and other interest groups.
The complaint does not come only from the lower ranks of the police who belong to the federation. Many noble Lords will have seen the letter from Sir John Smith, president of the Association of Chief Police Officers, in today's issue of The Times. He says tellingly that this Bill is contrary to the national interest and gives far too much power to the Home Secretary. I believe that my noble friend will consider that point very carefully.
One has to be very cautious indeed about giving too many powers to any Home Secretary—or Minister of the Interior, as he is called in other countries. We know from our studies of contemporary history what a Minister of the Interior can do if he is given too many powers. I am sure that the instinct of many noble Lords is to curb Home Secretaries. They have enough problems of their own, as former Home Secretaries who have spoken today have made clear. They should not be empowered to commit more mistakes than they can legitimately commit in the course of their tenure of office.
I want to concentrate on a point which has not been dealt with in very great detail, though the noble Earl, Lord Winchilsea, touched upon it; namely, the matter of police discipline. In the list of the contents of the Bill, it is stated that certain sections of the 1984 Act will be repealed:
"to pave the way for regulations to introduce less formal discipline procedures".
That is something which the police view with the greatest alarm.
It is all very well to talk about "less formal discipline procedures". But how would any of us feel if we were the subject of a less formal discipline procedure that could deprive us of our livelihood and our job in the police service and, what is more, make it very difficult for any one of us found guilty under such an informal procedure to find any other job in the sector in which we were trained to work: the sector of security. No one wants to employ a bent copper. Once out of the police force one is more or less out of work for the rest of one's natural life. That is why I believe that the police are quite right to say that they do not want less formal disciplinary procedures. They want the most careful disciplinary procedures to be maintained, as they properly were in the 1984 Act.
I am told that there are no fewer than seven ways in which the Government propose to make those procedures less formal or, as the police would say, more likely to create injustice against the police. We all know that there are certain sections of society where a complaint against the police is the rule rather than the exception when one faces a police problem. A few

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people will automatically make complaints against the police simply in order to provide themselves with a bargaining counter.
At the moment, when a policeman appears before a disciplinary board he may be legally represented at his own expense. I am told that under these proposals he will lose that right to be legally represented. He will also lose the right at a hearing on discipline to cross-examine hostile witnesses who may come forward against him. He will lose the right to have a staff representative present to advise him and to cross-examine witnesses. He will be permitted to have only what is called "a friend" with a watching brief and no power to take part in the proceedings. If he takes the matter to appeal after being convicted of a disciplinary offence, there will be no staff representative on the appeal board. At the moment, a staff representative sits with the chief constable and others on the appeal tribunal.
It is proposed that only officers dismissed or asked to resign, and not those reduced in rank, should have the right of appeal to an appeal tribunal. What will be the position under that proposal of someone who is severely and humiliatingly reduced in rank from, say, chief inspector to constable? One could imagine that a senior police officer might be reduced in rank merely to avoid the possibility of an appeal, because it is known that were he to be dismissed or asked to resign an appeal would be forthcoming. As I am informed, under the present proposed procedures an officer severely reduced in rank will have no right of appeal. A convicted officer will have to pay for an appeal out of his own pocket. Again, that will have the effect of reducing seriously the number of appeals by police officers found guilty of disciplinary offences. Not many of them will have the money to pay for their own appeals. And, of course, as my noble friend Lord Harmar-Nicholls said, the burden of proof is to be reduced sharply. At present, under the 1984 Act, a police officer must be proved guilty beyond reasonable doubt of the offence with which he is charged. Now a much lower criterion of proof, or probability, will be used to decide whether he is in the wrong or the right.
I should be grateful if my noble friend the Minister would comment on the seven points I have made, but if he does not have time this evening, in what no doubt will be a complicated speech, perhaps he could write to me about them. I have to apologise to him for the fact that I shall be unable to be here at the end of the debate because I have to catch an aeroplane.
I hope that it will be possible for your Lordships to fulfil your constitutional function and put this Bill into the sort of shape that when it goes down the corridor it could be accepted on an all-party basis. I agree with my noble friend Lord Whitelaw on that score. Matters of this kind are best dealt with on an all-party basis and with all-party agreement. I trust that such all-party agreement will also be acceptable to the various professional bodies representing the police service. In that case, the Bill would be able to go forward and be approved by this Parliament.
7.54 p.m.
Viscount Tenby: My Lords, perhaps I may begin by declaring my interests, in so far as concerns the Bill, as a magistrate, a member of a police authority, a member of the Magistrates' Association and as someone who represents the Justices' Clerks' Society of England and Wales in the House. I should perhaps say that that considerably litany does not herald the fact that I shall be on my feet for a considerable time. The views I express today are, however, my own.
Because of the great interest in the Bill, and therefore the long list of speakers I propose to confine my remarks to some aspects of only two of the clauses. Other matters, some constructive and others not, are of course of great importance, but I prefer to concentrate upon those proposals which seem to me to pose the greatest threat to our traditional form of government.
The Bill has already attracted criticism, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Archer of Sandwell, said, irrespective of its contents because two major constitutional sets of proposals, in areas not obviously linked, are presented not separately but in the same Bill. In one way, however, that impatience or economy—whatever it may be—has backfired, because it brings into sharp relief far better than can any words of mine, the underlying themes of both initiatives; namely, the inexorable move towards central control at the expense of local democracy and local government. For a government who are said to espouse the cause of self-regulation, nanny in Whitehall has never been in more robust and interfering health.
I have already spoken on the proposed composition of police authorities in a debate in the House as long ago as last May. Until about that time, my own authority was very much under Conservative control. Despite that, I could not find one member who thought well of these proposals which were already in embryonic form, and that is putting it extremely mildly so as not to offend your Lordships' susceptibilities. The present composition of the body is 36—slightly above the national average of 31—but it includes the Isle of Wight. Two-thirds of its members are elected councillors with the remainder being unelected magistrates. On the presence of the latter, I had an open mind for many years for, after all, they are unelected—a state not entirely unfamiliar to some of us in this House—but I have since Come to accept their presence for a number of reasons. First, the police believe strongly that their input is both expert and useful. Secondly, in my experience they are genuinely independent and vote on the merits of any particular case. But, above all, they do not have a majority, and rarely, except in some legal matters, vote as one.
Those were the good old days. We are now to have a fixed membership of 16 on all police authorities, whatever the size of the area involved, only eight of whom will be elected. The more than halving of elected members in, for example, an authority such as Devon and Cornwall, comprising nearly 4,000 square miles, will have a devastating effect on local representation, and all experts agree that local representation is the key to effective policing. It is quite frankly preposterous to

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talk of these proposals as likely to produce better results in the fight against crime. Most crime as any policeman will say, is highly localised, and it is precisely because of that that the contribution which local councillors provide, with their additional expertise in education, social services and the like, is so important. That fact has been recognised implicitly since the days of the watch committees and is thereafter enshrined in the Police Act 1964.
In setting out yesterday, in a Written Answer in another place, the objectives for future police authorities, the Home Secretary listed as one of them to:
"Help to build a partnership between the police and the local community".—[Official Report, Commons, 17/1/94; col. 376.]
It might be more appropriate to rephrase that to take account of the Bill along the lines of, "to help to build a partnership between the police and the local community recently destroyed by government action", but, be that as it may, the effrontery—I make no apology for using that word —of dismantling a relationship which has existed for many years and then, amidst the wreckage, to talk about building a partnership, is breathtaking.
So why have the Government decided to damage fatally the tripartite relationship between Home Secretary, chief constable and local authority? I may not be as charitable as the noble Lord, Lord Knights, who put forward one theory. Another one is that I suspect that a few authorities have, at some time or another, misbehaved and that memories are long. But democracy has a habit of being inconvenient, and long may it remain so.
There are other contentious issues in the police side of the Bill: the appointment of authority chairmen; his or her relationship with the Home Secretary, with the chief constable, and with the authority itself; the question of the precept issued on a local authority, and so on, but all have been covered adequately here today.
I turn now to the second barrel of what is a distinctly dodgy shotgun—the proposals intended to improve the performance of magistrates' courts. It is undoubtedly true to say that the past administration of such courts, via the magistrates' courts' committees, has left much to be desired. Professionalism in management was markedly absent and membership of the magistrates' courts committees owed more to popularity or seniority than anything else. The appearance of the Le Vay scrutiny in 1989, however, concentrated minds wonderfully, not just the minds of Whitehall mandarins but also of those forward looking magistrates who wanted a service of which they, and the public they served, could be proud Consequently, many magistrates' courts committee areas put their houses in order. Costs have been substantially reduced, strategic objectives set, administration streamlined, computerisation fully implemented and much, much more. But it was not enough to stop the inexorable and lumbering advance of the government juggernaut. Now after much consultation, but one has to say regretfully little meeting of minds and even less concession than hitherto, the Government have enshrined in this Bill their view of the way forward.
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Although there are a number of points of great importance in sections of the Bill—for example, the right of the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor to merge magistrates' courts committee areas after consultation and to amend the constitutions of magistrates' courts committees—the two principal constitutional issues lie, first, in the proposals to appoint a chief justices' clerk for each magistrates' courts committee area and, secondly, to put justices' clerks on fixed term contracts.
Let me start with the first. The concept of a chief executive answerable to the magistrates' courts committees for the efficient and cost effective running of the area is one which must attract the support of anyone who wishes to see the service reach the highest standards of management; but we are talking here of the management of resources and it would in my view be most damaging and counter-productive for them to interfere in legal matters or to have individual court clerks answerable to them in matters of law. This would seriously compromise the independence of the advice which they give to their Benches. And this is no mere scaremongering. Even under the present system in recent years we have experienced government influence; for example, in effect saying, "Send miscreants to prison then, once the prisons become full, please punish them in the community". Now we appear to be back at square one. Further, when the unit fine system in the previous Criminal Justice Act became discredited, magistrates were urged to jump the gun before the revised provisions were enacted by Parliament.
At that time our clerk was able to urge us to stand our ground and not bow to political expediency. I wonder whether he would have been able to do that with a chief justices' clerk breathing down his neck or with his career tied up in a fixed term contract—with his local magistrates' courts committee to be sure, but with that organisation responsible to the new inspectorate which in its turn is answerable to the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor. So the temptation to persuade is already there. How much easier it will be to succumb wholly to it under the new arrangements. Let the Government make one conciliatory gesture at least by confining this new executive role to administration matters only, and to reinforce that by calling him or her the chief executive.
Now I turn to the contracts of court clerks. It is proposed that these will be with the appropriate magistrates' courts committees on a fixed term and performance related basis, the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor having the power to determine the terms contained therein. Quite apart from what many would see as the undesirability of trying to equate the operation of justice with piecework, as I have already mentioned, the path of control, though tortuous, eventually leads to the door of the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor.
It is all very well saying that the independence of a clerk's advice to his Bench will be safeguarded (an independence, incidentally, which it has not hitherto been thought necessary to guarantee over the past 600 or so years) but if you are a clerk with a young family to

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bring up and with perhaps a promising career to protect, the incentive to toe the party line will be powerful indeed. The solution might be for individual magistrates' courts committees to arrange the conditions and terms of the contract, perhaps within a framework supplied by the central council of magistrates' courts committees.
This is an unusual Bill—unusual in that all the principal players who have a role to play in implementing its provisions oppose it in one way or another. It creates in both the police and local courts a degree of central control which is unacceptable. I do not attribute to this Government a deeper and more sinister meaning to this, but I believe they are profoundly mistaken and I beg them to look again, in the light of all the informed opposition ranged against them, at the wider long-term implications of certain of these measures. After all, as the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, has already said today, once the structure has been put in place, a less benign—let us be quite frank about this—and more efficient government of the extreme right or the extreme left will have the launching pad they need. We must pray that that never comes to pass and it will not do so if wiser counsels yet prevail.
8.6 p.m.
Lord Finsberg: My Lords, I commence by apologising for missing some of the opening speeches but I had long-standing engagements that I simply could not break. I should perhaps apologise for being about to break the golden thread which has run through the debate so far and to say that I might perhaps claim an entry in the Guiness Book of Records because I do not see all these sinister things that have been attributed to this Bill. Of course it is not a perfect Bill; no government have ever produced a Bill that is perfect. However, the Bill is certainly nothing like as evil or as bad as most noble Lords who have spoken have implied.
I first read the Bill during the Christmas Recess and I read it again on the plane coming back from Brussels yesterday. I have also taken soundings amongst friends who are in the police, or who are magistrates or in local government, and I must confess that I found it somewhat difficult to relate some of what I have read in the press and heard here today with what I understand the Bill to say. Indeed I wondered whether, having heard all these speeches, I should speak and, as I say, break the tenor of opposition, but I genuinely believe that the Bill is an honourable attempt to blend justice and efficiency. I decided therefore that I would maintain my decision to speak.
I must say that we would be making a great mistake if we thought that there was not immense sympathy amongst the general public for the concepts in this Bill. I do not think anyone who has been in touch with the general public would deny that. Of course many organisations who do not like change will be mustered against the Bill, but in the end it is the duty of a government to try to protect the general public. I believe there is an opportunity here to do that. What people want is to have an idea that Parliament is trying to assist them. I believe they will accept that if it is done in a genuine way.
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I spent 10 years on the bench as an active JP and I accept the assurances given by the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor on the question of interference, non-interference and independence of the justices' clerks. Perhaps that is natural because, when I was a Minister, I never said anything that I did not intend or that I did not believe. I am quite sure that that thread runs through this Government too. Therefore I do not believe that many of the charges can be or should be sustained. For example, the new composition of the police committees is practical. I do not believe that it provides centralisation to the degree that is spoken about. We must not dismiss all ideas of centralisation because we have repeatedly heard demands from the public and elsewhere that something should be done to get the police to work more closely together than they do in these days of growing crime and the speed with which it is possible to get by motorway from one end of the country to the other.
I carefully read the parliamentary Answer yesterday on the police authorities and the question of the appointment of independent members. I can see nothing in that proposal that would indicate to me that only placemen are to be appointed. I believe that the skills that are likely to be produced are those which should not be lightly dismissed. I would hope that what is said in the last paragraph of the Answer, that the Lord Lieutenants would be involved, would doubly reassure most people that the independence of the people selected would be genuine. My understanding of the proposals is that the Secretary of State or the Lord Chancellor can only select people from the list that has been drawn up of what I would call the independent, great and good, people not connected with any party machine, and that there is no question of the man from Mars being imposed from outside as chairman.
I very much welcome the fact that the City of London police are to remain as a separate force and that their future is safeguarded. I am delighted that the nonsensical idea of a police authority for London has been removed. As one who spent 44 years of elected service in London, I know that that idea was never wanted by ordinary people; it was only wanted by politicians, and occasionally politicians can be proved to be wrong. I am delighted that my noble friend has removed that particular clause.
I hope that there will be similar treatment for the idea that would provide in the Bill for the amalgamation of the City of London magistrates' courts committee with the rest of inner London. I do not think that that would be particularly helpful.
I have some sympathy with those who would have preferred two Bills, and I agree that this Bill should not be examined in a party political spirit. I would certainly repudiate the attack made on the Home Secretary for what he has produced.
There is a very good practice—it is not adopted enough in another place—of being able to send a Bill to a special standing committee. I feel that if the Criminal Justice Bill had come here first, and if this Bill had gone to the other place and been subjected to the special standing committee process—and I went through that when I was a Minister dealing with mental health

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legislation in 1982—it might have ironed out some of the difficulties that many noble Lords have pointed out to us. At least we should have been able to find the right solutions if matters were raised in that way, but clearly it is now too late for that to happen.
I hope that as the Bill proceeds, and as my noble friend Earl Ferrers responds, some of the misunderstandings and misconceptions that I have heard uttered this afternoon will be cleared up so that the public does not get the wrong impression of this legislation.
8.15 p.m.
Baroness Fisher of Rednal: My Lords, following what the noble Lord, Lord Finsberg, has just said, perhaps I may say that if greater consultation by the Government had taken place some of the points that he raised in his final words need not have been expressed. The folly is that there has been no consultation. The Government made up their mind, as they made up their mind on education and on other matters, that we all have to get into a little trough and be called good performers. We have to be measured on our performance almost as though we were some theatrical stars putting in for an Oscar.
It was in 1989 that the Le Vay Report started off the scrutiny of magistrates' courts and obviously sowed the seeds for some kind of reorganisation, and perhaps it is as well for us occasionally to see if we can do things better and more efficiently. The magistrates' courts took that report very seriously and implemented many of the recommendations. Most justices' clerks and their staff now have professional management qualifications. They have attended courses and seminars to improve their skills in the area of the courts, not only in managing people, which means to say the client population as well as the magistrates, but also in managing budgets.
Therefore the main concern which all court users will have is the threat from this Bill to judicial independence. That is causing considerable worry. If the Government's intentions become law the day will not be far away when magistrates' courts will be urged to dispense justice with their eyes firmly fixed on the public purse. We are finding this in all realms, and we must look at it seriously. Perhaps the only people who are not supposed to take it seriously are those hospital authorities, among which I include Wessex and the West Midlands.
I am at a loss to understand how courts can speed up the legal process on the grounds of cost effectiveness. There are many decisions in divisional courts and the Court of Appeal which constantly remind justices that, although delays are undesirable and put a strain on the public purse, the main factor is to ensure that justice is done by all the parties. I am sure that the noble and learned Lord sitting on the Woolsack would agree. If delays have to take place so that justice prevails, that is a system which we all want to uphold. In order to follow this principle, it will be necessary for courts to grant further adjournments to give both sides the opportunity of being heard.
I know that the Lord Chancellor has been requested to cost the new structure. There may be good reasons
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why he does not want to do that, but it seems that the requests have been refused on the grounds that the greater efficiency expected of the new management will result in savings in real terms. We have heard that on many occasions, but it never really works out in practice. Reading between the lines—and this is the worry for justices' clerks—it seems that massive redundancies may take place in the future to save costs.
Many noble Lords have suggested that there are some dangerous centralising proposals in this Bill. I would agree. We almost have a Gilbert and Sullivan opera taking place, where the Home Secretary becomes the Lord Chief Constable, then the Lord Chief Sentencer, and then the Lord High Executioner to police and magistrates' committees if they do not act the play correctly. That is the way I see it. However, perhaps we should not take the theatrical performance analogy further.
As other speakers have said, the police and the magistrates are being dealt with together. We have not yet received a reason as to why the Government made the decision to deal with two important bodies under the same Bill. Such matters are important not only for the people employed but also for ordinary people. The people who go before the magistrates' courts are not those we see coming out of the higher law courts under the glare of television lights because they have won their cases. Those who appear before magistrates are, in the main, people who cannot afford justice. Moreover, many of them are being denied it now because of the cutbacks which are taking place as regards legal aid applications. I am talking about real things that affect ordinary people. Therefore, what we are seeing is a disregard of the Citizen's Charter and all that that was supposed to give ordinary people. As one noble Lord said, we have come back to the precept that Whitehall knows best.
The important question is: will increased management of courts reduce crime? It may in fact have just the opposite effect as regards the prison population. If brownie points are to be obtained for sending people down, it may mean that one will try to get the efficiency factor going up the scale when the inspector comes around by putting more people away.
If we are to have performance-related pay, I hope that the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor will, in Committee, spell out clearly what kind of performance is necessary. Performance-related pay is, I suppose, the modern word for what was once called "piecework" in manufacturing industry. Coming from Birmingham, one knows about manufacturing industry. The worker's related pay was based on what he produced. Therefore, they counted how many cars went off the ramp or how many boxes of chocolates were made. Thus, you were paid according to how much you produced: if you produced 10 boxes you received x amount of pay. In other words, what was produced could be seen and counted.
However, as regards the proposed performance-related pay, what will be counted? What will be its important aspects? I fail to understand what is proposed because nothing will be visible; it will be some kind of hypothetical product. Therefore, I hope that the criteria

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will be clearly defined in Committee. For example, will it be the amount of money as regards fines collected, the number of people sent to prison or the number of poll tax payers who have not paid their bills and whom we have made cry in the courts because they cannot afford to pay in any event? What are we to judge in assessing performance? I think that my noble friend the Chief Whip is looking at me now and is probably saying, "Well, the performance ought to end now, Doris", or something like that.
Lord Graham of Edmonton: No, my Lords.
Baroness Fisher of Rednal: My Lords, perhaps I may now return very clearly to home. I was appointed a magistrate in Birmingham in 1961. I feel sure—and the noble Earl who is to reply to the debate will correct me if I am wrong—that Birmingham is the largest magisterial Bench in the country. There are over 400 magistrates and just over 40 magistrates sit every day on a fortnightly rota, with two courts sitting on a Saturday. Perhaps that is an indication of the amount of crime that goes on in that great city. Of course, it is not all crime; many people who appear before the courts these days do so because they cannot pay their bills. So I have some knowledge of magisterial functions. I have always felt proud that the Birmingham Bench is very competent—and, rightly so. It should be.
However, the fact that worries me is that the Birmingham magistrates' court committee will no longer be able to stand as an entity in its own right in the future. I understand that Birmingham, Solihull and Coventry are to be joined together. The idea is that the expenses can be shared and so many Birmingham cases can, perhaps, be sent to Coventry or Solihull. That sounds all right on paper, but the people who appear before magistrates' courts are not the most wealthy in our society and the cost of travel from, say, Birmingham to Coventry will be quite considerable. If one looks at a map of the motorway, it looks as though Coventry is only half an inch away from Birmingham. But the cheapest journey from Birmingham to Coventry, by whatever means of transport, will cost between £3 and £3.50. It will be unfair if people appearing before the courts are to be asked to travel greater distances. It is an important point to bear in mind if one is thinking of transferring cases from the Birmingham courts to others.
I am aware that other speakers have talked about what is proposed as a centralising measure. I agree with that view. However, I also think that it has ominous party political overtones. I say that because, if we look at the metropolitan districts in the country, it will be seen that they are places such as Birmingham, Coventry and all the others in the North. All of them are controlled by a particular party; namely, the party to which I belong. Moreover, not one of those metropolitan districts will have an independent magistrates' court committee. It seems to me to be quite ominous that such a separation should be taking place. I ask the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor to look at that
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implication quite seriously. Not only is it a centralising measure, but to my mind it has very ominous party political overtones.
8.27 p.m.
Lord Mottistone: My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Fisher, because she talks in practicalities and brings us back to earth. She talks about such matters as piece rates, whereas I believe that, perhaps, some of the people who invented parts of the Bill have no such experience. At the outset, I have to say that, notwithstanding the customary excellent introduction by my noble and learned friend who sits on the Woolsack, I believe the Bill—that is, especially so far as concerns magistrates—to be unnecessary and potentially seriously damaging to the fair and impartial administration of local justice.
I do not have such strong views about the part of the Bill which relates to the police because I do not have the same close relationship with and, thus, understanding of that important law enforcement body, as I do with the magistrates. However, I have much concern about certain clauses in the police part of the Bill and I propose to pursue those in Committee together, I now know, with many other noble Lords who will be pursuing the same points.
I should add that I know that my noble and learned friend is aware of my view that Part IV of the Bill is inappropriate for the Isle of Wight in particular because of its geography. I am most grateful to my noble and learned friend for his repeated emphasis that, in the event of the Bill becoming law, he will give serious consideration to the express wish of the Isle of Wight to retain its independent magistrates' court committee. However, I want to impress upon your Lordships the fact that, quite apart from the unsuitability of most of it for the Isle of Wight, it is a thoroughly unwelcome Bill for England and Wales as a whole.
The magistrates were full of hope that their affairs would be looked after by a government department which would understand their needs and their peculiarities better when the responsibility for their administration was transferred from the Home Office to the Lord Chancellor's Department. That was because the Lord Chancellor's officials concerned with the appointment of magistrates really did understand them—and still do understand them—so well. Unfortunately, the difficulties that we have experienced with the Home Office seem to have occurred with the change in departmental responsibility.
Part IV of the Bill is a product of what was called the Le Vay Report which was commissioned by the Home Office five years ago. I draw to your Lordships' attention two features of that report. First, the officials who conducted the inquiry never visited the county of the Isle of Wight, and in other parts of the country they refused to meet chairmen of the Bench, chairmen of magistrates' courts' committees or any experienced magistrates. They appear to have met only officials. Secondly, the report was universally condemned by the majority of the people it would have affected.
The contrast between that behaviour in conducting a local inquiry and that of the Local Government

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Commission in its study into the possible creation of a unitary authority in the Isle of Wight and many other places is striking. That commission went out of its way to seek advice from all those who might be affected by change. A good example of how it did it can be found in paragraph 98 of its recently published progress report dated December 1993. That report as a whole should be compulsory reading for all central government officials who seek to change any form of local administration. The Local Government Commission specifically recommended that the Isle of Wight retain its own magistrates' courts committee. Subsequently, the Secretary of State for the Environment approved that recommendation.
Both subjects of this Bill—police and magistrates—are matters which for centuries have been found by Englishmen and Welshmen—and, for most of the time, central government—to be best administered at local level on behalf of the Crown. I refer to the Crown and not the Government. For most of those centuries the Crown was being served. When I was in the Navy I served the Crown, not the Government. By that process the administration of justice has been in keeping with local feeling and is as effective as practicable in the local environment. With that background of long-established, well-tried practice we need to take special care not to upset it unnecessarily. Over the years, Conservative Governments in particular have been well known for their caution in not upsetting well-proven practices.
Why therefore do this Government—whom normally I support — wish to make changes which in different ways will increase the centralisation of both police administration and that of magistrates? I suspect that it stems from Ministers who over the past 14 years have encouraged central government officials in all departments to take greater responsibility for their actions, including the handling of public money. At first sight, this appears laudable as a general aim. However, it seems to me to have had the effect that officials say to Ministers that they will try to take greater responsibility for spending public money but they can do so only if they and Ministers have greater control over those outside Whitehall who have a hand in spending it. With the greatest respect to Ministers, they have fallen for that. Thus, we have been faced with the dangers of creeping centralisation—it has crept a long way—that even the Soviets have realised does not work.
One aspect of the Bill, which has been the subject of an Answer to a Question, is the appointment of "discovered" local people by central government officials instead of locally-selected JPs and locally-elected councillors, who have volunteered in the first place for their respective positions, in order to constitute some of the committees.
I turn to the effect of those matters on Ministers who are responsible for the administration of magistrates. Mr. Le Vay was asked to see how the Home Secretary could have greater control over magistrates' courts. Referring to paragraph 3 of his summary, Mr. Le Vay found that they dealt with 95 per cent. of all criminal proceedings and provided a relatively quick, cheap service costing about £200 million a year to run. That
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sounds pretty good. The cheapness is not unexpected. Magistrates are unpaid and their travelling expenses are less than your Lordships are allowed. In my experience, the quality of those magistrates is also good. They are carefully selected. Many are public-spirited, intelligent and experienced people who volunteer for the task. However, the sting was in the tail of the paragraph in Mr. Le Vay's report which said that the service was highly fragmented. I doubt whether that is strictly true. My magistrates' courts committee has been very tightly managed ever since the retirement of a justices' clerk. We had to recruit a new one before Le Vay was on our doorstep.
The noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, suggested that the improvement in efficiency came about because Le Vay was travelling around. We started to increase efficiency not only before Le Vay but before my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor took up office and started issuing documents so fast that we could hardly keep up with them. Our efficiency depended upon getting a new young clerk. I suspect that over time that has happened to everybody.
Mr. Le Vay went on to propose a series of centralising modifications to the process of administration which would cost £600 million a year to operate—three times as much as the so-called locally-based fragmented system. My noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor is not going the whole way with Mr. Le Vay's detailed proposals, but sadly he picks up his advice about centralised management. In his latest pamphlet on the reforms, which has been described as propaganda, he says that the magistrates' courts now cost £300 million. He does not mention the £270 million that comes in in fines. One is not allowed to talk about those because they may encourage people to have more fines. The pamphlet says that as the new arrangements settle down value for money gains will more than offset initial costs.
The noble Baroness who spoke before me said that people had asked what those money gains would be and got the same answer. There is absolutely no proof of such a gain, whatever that statement means. If it means what I think it means, earlier experience of other government changes certainly refutes it. The likely long-term result of taking away the administration of the courts from local areas conducted by committees of JPs, with a strong element of local businessmen among them all selected locally by fellow magistrates, will be that the quality of volunteers for the magistracy will diminish, the new remote administrators, who will report more directly to central government, will be less effective in managing the local affairs of the magistrates' courts and the relevant local authorities will have less say in how local money is spent. As other noble Lords have said, there is also a strong risk of the independence of local justice being eroded notwithstanding Clause 71 of the Bill.
In his new pamphlet my noble and learned friend makes various claims about practices which are either currently in effect, mainly due to the initiative of local JPs and administrators and their clerks, or unnecessary. I understand that much the same could be said of that part of the Bill dealing with the police. Examples in the

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Bill of practices which are currently effective without further legislation are subsections (1) and (2) of Clause 62 and the whole of Clauses 63 to 71. The only useful parts of the Bill are Clauses 78 and 79 setting up an inspectorate, and my noble friend has already implemented that without waiting for legislation. Therefore, I imagine that legislation is not necessary.
Examples of unnecessary bossiness are found in subsections (3) to (7) of Clause 62. A careful study of the 1979 Act shows that in that Act my noble and learned friend has all the authority which he says in his pamphlets he needs. An enormous amount of authority is built into the 1979 Act. I had no idea just how easy it was for the Secretary of State to intervene if he felt like it. Happily, Secretaries of State have not done so to any great extent.
As suggested by other noble Lords, is it too late to ask my noble friend who is to wind up to withdraw this Bill today in view of what he has heard in this debate? The only noble Lord who has spoken wholly in favour of it is my noble—and if I may put it this way—and urban friend Lord Finsberg. To withdraw the Bill would spare us much unnecessary legislative time, much potential unpopularity for the Government and a lot of really hard work traipsing through the Division Lobbies. implore my noble friends to think seriously about that suggestion.
8.41 p.m.
Baroness Hamwee: My Lords, I apologise to your Lordships for having been unable to hear all of the opening speeches in this debate, although I was able to hear the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor. Reports of powerful opposition to the Bill made their way quite swiftly into the Moses Room, where I was attending a Committee.
Like other noble Lords, I do not consider it necessary at this time and after so many speakers to echo all the disquiet and criticisms that have been expressed. There has been both quality and width in that regard.
I had not intended to refer at all to the police, although I share the views of those who are concerned about further quangoisation and the further leaching of democracy. However, I cannot resist remarking on the references by the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor to efficiency and effectiveness. Those, of course, have been the twin objectives of local government for many years and indeed have been successfully achieved by many local authorities. It is ironic that the police authorities will be decoupled from the local authorities in order to try to attain those objectives.
I shall confine my remarks to Part IV of the Bill regarding magistrates or, as many of your Lordships have noted, the Bill within the Bill. Like other noble Lords I was sad to see the two very different subject matters dealt with in one Bill. I fear that it is not becoming for the sections dealing with magistrates to be introduced at the same time as the police Bill. That seems to me to be a conjunction rather than a separation of powers.
I shall refer only to some parts of Part IV, but that should not he taken to mean that I approve of the rest.
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Others of your Lordships are both more expert and more learned—in the way in which we use that term in this House—with regard to the separation of powers, but I too subscribe to the view that they should not merely be separate but should be seen to be separate.
I understand the anxieties that have been expressed: the threats to judicial independence, not just with regard to the role of the chief justices' clerk, although the understandable human response to the role will be to feel pressured by central government; the whole question of cash targets and requirements, no doubt, to dispose of cases cheaply, possibly out of sequence—and many of your Lordships will have heard references to what happened during the miners' strike; the issue of performance related pay, which is fashionable these days although I suspect that it is a fashion which will not endure; and performance targets. The hardest performance target to assess is that of quality. That can easily lead one to concentrate on what is more readily quantifiable, and in this context that would be a great pity.
The noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor referred to the scrutiny having identified flaws in the structure of the magistrates' courts and a lack of coherence. Does that really matter? Why is there an urge to centralise? The noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, referred to inexorable centralisation. It is clear from today's debate that your Lordships are prepared to stand out against that centralisation and it cannot be taken for granted. The magistrates' courts service is inevitably a demand led service. No doubt there will be a question of cash limits, and cash limiting must change the thrust of the work. Efficiency is important but it is by no means all.
I have to confess that I am not clear whether costings of the changes have been prepared. No doubt there will be no new money. There is another irony, in that in 1985 the outer London courts saved a layer of administration. If that is to be reimposed it will have to be paid for, probably from existing limited budgets.
The magistrates have been very open-minded about the prospects of an inspectorate but they are right in calling for it to be truly independent. Its role will be diminished if it is not independent. The inspectorate could achieve savings without changes to the magistrates' courts committee. Again to refer to outer London, the magistrates regard the changes made in Outer London in 1985 as having achieved substantial benefits. Proper local control has been achieved, with the magistrates' courts committee working in partnership with the local authority. Coterminosity has meant cost-effectiveness and efficiency and has saved the salaries of the full-time clerks to four outer London committees and their support staff.
Of course I welcome the commitment to local consultation before the proposals proceed, but one must feel that already there has been an adequate response to the proposals as they have been known so far. It is sad that there is not greater optimism among those who work in the service that their reactions have been taken on board.
In outer London the proposals involve an area from Hillingdon to Havering, from Richmond to Bexley. To

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put it another way it is an area which stretches from Heathrow to way down the Thames. The communities which comprise those areas are not related—other than quite loosely geographically—administratively or in any other way. Those who live in the extreme west regard the east as a foreign country. The whole culture and ethos of the magistracy is that it is local justice. I am advised that not only will a cultural change be required but there will be practical problems. Magistrates who are required to relate to a wide area may be deterred. New recruits may be deterred. There may be resignations because of the travel and the distances involved. Members of the committees are thought likely to have to be full timers in order to cover the area. Currently they have jobs and reflect their communities.
Are the magistrates trusted? Surely they are. If they are trusted why is it necessary for one, the chairman, to be approved? The very job of being a magistrate must involve assessment of personality. I would imagine that that is the day-to-day work of those sitting on the Bench. I would expect that magistrates could apply that in choosing their own chairman.
The political message to the cynics among us reeks of yet another placeman and I believe that it reflects no credit on the Lord Chancellor and it is unfair to suck magistrates into the controversy. We are told that many of the reforms are already in place in different parts of the country. Exactly so. The magistrates have the common sense, the intelligence and the energy to put reforms into place, to deal with their own work in the most effective way for their own local circumstances. They can and should be autonomous and I believe that they can be trusted to apply changes where they are needed. Similar points could be made with regard to the Lord Chancellor's default powers.
It is clear that there is a will among the magistracy to co-operate, but there is a distinct resistance to being compelled. I cannot help but compare the situation with that of local authorities where the same kind of energy and drive for efficiency exists, but there is a distinct dislike of being told what to do by central government. Dare I say that magistrates are even more respectable than members of local authorities?
In these days of deregulation, I do not understand why the Government are impelled to make changes which are clearly so unpopular and, I believe, so unnecessary.
8.51 p.m.
Baroness Seccombe: My Lords, I do not intend to detain your Lordships for long. There are many measures in the Bill which I welcome as an initiative to ensure that we have modern, efficient police and magisterial services. Tonight, however, I wish to confine myself to magisterial matters and to concentrate on one or two points which are troubling me.
I have had the privilege of being a magistrate since 1968. We sat in an out-of-date court house and I well remember that cut into the stone over the main entrance were the words: "Police Court". The clerk of the day explained that thinking had changed and they had tried
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to obliterate the words without success, because now it was a magistrates' court. That is the way I have always seen it and that is the way I wish it to stay.
I joined a Bench of 26 and since that time we have grown to 150. When I compare the modus operandi of those days with today, it could not be more different. We have, over the years, developed; training is now a high priority and since the Le Vay report, the magistrates' court committee has become highly professional, attracting those members who have managerial and specialised skills.
The contribution that is made by magistrates—over 29,000 nationwide—must never be underestimated nor taken for granted. In my experience, there has always been a very positive response to new initiatives and, when intensive training has been required, magistrates have generally given weekends and evenings to comply with the demands.
There are many magistrates who have made great sacrifices to work on the Bench. Promotion for some has been denied because of their absence from work. Others have lost pension rights involving large sums of money. But this they have done without complaint, feeling that it was a worthwhile contribution to the community.
It is therefore with great sadness that I hear their views today. I have had many letters and calls expressing fears for the future of the service. There seems to be a unanimity of feeling that there is a centralising thrust and a generalised approach of legislation by regulation with control of practically every aspect in the hands of the Lord Chancellor's Department. Magistrates see their work today as a serious and creatively serious job and just cannot understand why there must be such a radical change. For me, one of the most exciting events in my life was when my colleagues elected me chairman of the Bench. We, no one else, had just appointed a young, enthusiastic and highly efficient clerk. I like to think that, during my term of office, we worked as an efficient team. I had trust and faith in him and I know that he had complete loyalty to the Bench and his magistrates.
It therefore concerns me that this partnership may not exist in future in the same way. Fixed-term contracts and renewals confirmed or rejected by the Lord Chancellor take away that special link. I can well imagine the difficulties a justices' clerk would face in serving two masters: first, the bureaucrat and administrator from some higher authority based miles away; and secondly, the magistrates he serves. Local democracy would be lost.
My second point has already been raised by other noble Lords, but I feel I must repeat it, if I may ask for the indulgence of the House. I find it very difficult to understand the proposal that the chairmanship of the courts committee would have to be confirmed by the Lord Chancellor. As we have heard before, all magistrates have, after all, been appointed by him. I believe that members of the committee are quite capable of choosing the right chairman and should continue to do so with their usual know-how.
In the past 25 years, I have often been invited to speak to groups about the role of a magistrate. One of my main points has been the independence of the

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judiciary. I have always felt this to be of paramount importance and now I have grave concern whether it will continue to be so.
People who perform voluntary service as magistrates care deeply about their work, otherwise they would not continue. I fear that the changes proposed would be damaging and result in fewer people coming forward and in those currently serving wondering whether the work is worth while. I shall listen to my noble friend the Minister most attentively and I hope that he will be able to reassure me and all my fellow magistrates that the proposed legislation will not alter the basic concept of an independent, voluntary lay magistracy.
8.57 p.m.
The Earl of Carnarvon: My Lords, I think that the House has been exceptionally lucky to listen to some wonderful speeches today, three from Home Secretaries, a brilliant one from my noble and learned friend Lord Ackner and a specialist speech by the noble Lord, Lord Knights. I shall speak only for a short while on one particular point in Schedule 2.
I am bitterly opposed to the alterations in the Bill affecting the membership of the police authorities and to the powers of the Secretary of State to appoint the chairman and five members. If the Bill is not altered, in my county of Hampshire the police authority would consist of just 16 members, of whom only eight would be elected from Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, to represent 1.5 million people. At the moment, there are 25 elected members and 12 magistrates.
I should like to quote from an excellent speech given by the noble Lord, Lord Moyne, at the Mansion House on 6th January this year, only a week or so ago. He said:
"I believe we must be reminded, all of us, of the importance in a healthy democracy—of a degree of diffusion of power away from the Centre: of the importance of a certain level of local government autonomy: the necessary checks and balances of a free society".
I agree wholeheartedly with the local government associations that it is entirely a matter for the local authorities concerned to decide which of their members should serve on the police authorities. I hope very sincerely that the Government will look again at their proposals which I believe have little or no support at all in the country at large.
8.59 p.m.
Baroness Miller of Hendon: My Lords, due to pressure on legislative time, two amending topics have been compressed into this one Bill. Personally, like so many other noble Lords and in particular my noble friend Lady Macleod of Borve, I wish that they could have been kept separate or at least that the Title had been the other way round, so that it had become the Magistrates' Courts and Police Bill.
Magistrates' courts are still sometimes colloquially and incorrectly called "police courts". I was most interested to hear what my noble friend Lady Seccombe said about when she started in her court. They are most certainly not police courts. They are independent from the police and from the Government. The fact that they are not the rubber stamp of either cannot be emphasised too strongly.
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With that very mild criticism of my own, perhaps I might mention that I have listened this afternoon and early evening to a long, long stream of criticisms. I am only sorry that I was not in the Chamber to hear my noble friend Lord Finsberg, who, I understand, welcomed several parts of the Bill.
I remind noble Lords that the police find some parts of the Bill useful and welcome, as indeed do many of our magistrate colleagues. However, having listened to so many criticisms this afternoon—and certainly I do not wish to take up the time of the House emphasising anything that I have heard before—as a relative newcomer to this Chamber I crave the indulgence of noble Lords when I say that I shall take all my courage into my hands and emphasise those parts of the Bill that I believe are welcome. I have heard so many noble Lords give very interesting advice to my noble friend Lord Ferrers. If the Bill has to go away for further consideration, I should like some of its good points also to be considered at that time.
As to the police, the Sheehy Report was not a Government White Paper; it was an independent study which Parliament is free to accept or reject in whole or in part. This country is not governed by Royal Commissions or committees of inquiry, however eminent their members, and thank goodness for that! The fact that the Government have carefully listened to those representations that were made to them about the report before drafting this Bill is not a U-turn, as some media pundits instantly dubbed it. It was a reasonable course for which the Government, and the responsible Ministers, ought to be commended.
It was inevitable that there should be an instant outcry from some quarters—some of them not previously noted for their support for the police—against the Bill, even before its terms were published. I must confess that I particularly commend the proposals to strengthen police authorities by the introduction of outsiders to be nominated by the Home Secretary under the very stringent qualifications that were announced yesterday. This proposal does riot reduce the independence of the police in conducting their operations. It simply adds to the authority people who are not active politicians as members to the supervisory body. I have to confess that I am glad that the supervision of the police will not be totally in the hands of councils whose schools have refused to allow policemen in to talk about road safety, or councils who take a detached view—to put it absolutely mildly—about truanting, which is the seed-bed of juvenile crime.
The Bill does not diminish the democratic local accountability that the noble Lord, Lord Lester, who, I notice is not in his place, called for in his article in The Times on 17th December. On the contrary, Clause 3 of the Bill requires local authorities to participate in setting local policing objectives and targets. More significant is the requirement in Clause 9 for local authorities to include police matters on their agenda; for one of the members to be responsible for answering questions on police matters; and for the police authority to be summoned to attend meetings of councils to answer questions,
"on the discharge of the police authority's functions".

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If that is not "democratic accountability", then plain English has lost its meaning.
I now turn to the courts part of the Bill. Here I speak from my 23 years' experience as a magistrate. Our lay magistracy is justifiably proud of the part that it has played in our judicial process for some 700 years. It provides a very effective and, in these days of value for money, an inexpensive system of justice which deals with about 90 per cent. of all criminal cases and about 7 per cent. of matrimonial and other types of work. To foreign friends, to whom our use of lay magistrates who are not lawyers is somewhat puzzling, I always explain, with massive over-simplification, that we in the magistracy are a sort of jury that has the power to fix the punishment. The wide cross-section of the public from which magistrates are now recruited has disposed of the misconception that the bench is filled with retired colonels and matrons in flowery hats. Of course, being human, magistrates sometimes go wrong, or they say or do foolish things. But the very low percentage of successful appeals against magistrates' decisions shows that largely they work very well and very efficiently.
The clerks too are conscientious professionals, although I have to say that occasionally one is found who needs to be reminded that his or her function is to advise on the law when required to do so, and is never to interfere or even seem to interfere with the fact finding process.
However, despite the many qualities of the magistrates' courts, everything needs to change. Everything needs to evolve with the times. My colleagues on the bench were almost universally relieved at the Government's rapid U-turn on the ill-considered unit fine system which used doctrinaire egalitarianism and rigid mathematical formulae in place of what we know to be judicial common sense and experience.
There were the same concerns about the exclusion of consideration of previous convictions. Any experienced magistrate could have explained that it is not a question of punishing a person twice for the same offence. Someone who commits the same crime after having been punished is committing a more serious crime the second time. It is as simple as that.
It is also a great step forward in the administration of justice that the hitherto secret proceedings of the magistrates' courts committees will be made public. I have not heard anyone mention that this afternoon. There is no reason why matters which go wrong and which are then dealt with by the committee should be concealed from the public gaze. Nor is there any reason why its administrative decisions should not be announced openly. I welcome that. I also believe that the creation of a chief justices' clerk —which I know many noble Lords have found difficult to accept—who is responsible for a whole district will not only provide uniform administration but will improve the running of individual courts. I am sorry, however, that the opportunity has not been taken to- provide for magistrates' training to be centralised. That would help with securing consistent sentencing. Equally, it would prevent local magistrates' clerks from indoctrinating
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new magistrates with their own personal views, which I am sorry to say does sometimes happen. Not all courts are as perfect as the ones which so many noble Lords have been describing. I hope that my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor will consider implementing this suggestion under his administrative powers.
I am also particularly glad to see that the subsequent Act will provide for the clerks to be under contract to the committee, and for fixed terms. At the present time it is only with great difficulty that a court can get rid of a clerk with whom it is not happy. I believe that the proposed courts inspectorate will be welcomed by all magistrates, because at the very least a report with no complaints will be equal to a seal of approval.
On the basis of what I have heard today and what I have said —I suspect that it is like a report that is given on children in school: you will have to try to do a little bit better—my seal of approval has been reduced from nine out of 10 to seven out of 10.
9.9 p.m.
Lord Plant of Highfield: My Lords, along with the vast majority of other noble Lords who have spoken in the debate I have very considerable doubts about the wisdom of the Bill. Most of my worries have been covered in the speeches of other noble Lords and I shall try not to repeat what they have said. I shall confine my remarks to the police aspects of the Bill while at the same time endorsing the views about the excessive degree of centralisation of magistrates' courts to which other noble Lords have given their attention.
The first thing I want to say is that while it might be argued by Government Ministers that this Bill is on a par with other reforms in the public sector that they have undertaken since 1979—for example, in the case of health or education—I feel that there is in fact no analogy at all between those reforms and the proposals of the present Bill. Many commentators on other public sector reforms have argued that where they were centralising it was with a view to dispersing power subsequently to other groups. For example, education reforms took power away from the LEAs and gave it to parents, governors and so forth. That is a rather charitable view of those reforms, but it is a point of view and one sincerely held. However, the present Bill does not take power to the centre to redistribute it; rather it keeps it at the centre—in the power, for example, of the Home Secretary in regard to the composition of police authorities and in respect of his prescriptive role in relation to the objectives of policing. What this Bill and the other reforms that I have mentioned do have in common is a kind of critique and distrust of professionalism and the idea of service and a desire to replace service by contract and the professional exercise of discretion by constraining performance indicators.
As many noble Lords have said, drawing from great experience, greater effectiveness in the operation of the police, which we all want to see, cannot be secured at the cost of the link between the police and the local community. The Bill operates with a rather mechanical view of effectiveness which it hopes to be able to quantify. However, as the noble Lord, Lord Knights, argued, effectiveness is critically dependent upon the

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support of local communities. That is both central but intangible and certainly not quantifiable. Despite what the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor said in his speech at the beginning of the debate, I cannot but feel that the effect of the Bill will be to distance the police from the communities in which they have their roots and which they serve and from the citizens from whom they draw consent.
There is a curious contrast between the assumptions about the scope and capacity of government embodied in the Bill and assumptions which Conservative Ministers have adopted since 1979; for example, in relation to the role of the state on the one hand and the economy on the other. Ministers have argued since the mid-1970s for limited government in relation to the economy because Ministers and civil servants have limited, fragmentary knowledge and government actions are full of unforeseen and unintended consequences. What is it that changes in relation to policing? How is it that the Secretary of State, in Clause 11, can determine the objectives and performance targets for all police authorities however diverse they might be? How is it that he has the knowledge to appoint members of an authority without knowing about local and diverse needs and to appoint its chairman without knowing whether that person will carry the trust and the confidence of the authority over which he or she will preside?
How is it that he knows that all police authorities should be the same size irrespective of local needs, the size of communities, as the noble Earl, Lord Carnarvon, said, and the diversity of the areas to be covered? These are all massive assumptions about what central government can know, which are undermined by the very critique of those assumptions that are embedded in Conservative Party approaches to other views of the relationship between the state and other areas of public policy. That is wholly inconsistent.
I turn now to performance indicators since, like the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, I believe that that is the area in which the unintended consequences of centralised directives will show themselves in both a large scale and in a dramatic way. I speak with some feeling because about five years ago I was misguided enough to publish a pamphlet with the Institute of Economic Affairs on another topic but which, in passing, advocated performance targets for the police and fixed-term contracts for chief constables.
I now regard my own views then, as the result of a subsequent five years of work and reflection, as being naive and mistaken, or "daft" as the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, would have described such performance indicators. There are many technical reasons why I believe that the arguments I put forward then, which in some senses parallel what is in the present Bill, are mistaken. Some of them are technical reasons. But the two other reasons which do carry weight are these: first, if performance targets could be set in a wholly objective and technical way, then there might indeed be a lot to be said for them. But that cannot be the case. These targets embody policy choices and those choices are going to be politically controversial. If judgments about the effectiveness of a police force are
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to be made in terms of such targets, then the judgments of effectiveness are going to be politicised just because the targets will reflect policy preferences which are also politicised.
Secondly, since advocating that view five years ago, I have worked under a régime of performance indicators in a university in relation to research performance. That has led me to see the truth of the argument of the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich; namely, that people have all sorts of devices to meet performance targets. If one has a set of performance targets one has every incentive to maximise the kind of behaviour which will satisfy them and relatively neglect most of the other things one is supposed to do. The noble Lord, Lord Harris, gave a long list of those this afternoon. I thought that what he had to say was entirely plausible arid has certainly been borne out in my own experience having to operate as an academic in terms of a set of tightly drawn performance indicators.
Of course, human ingenuity being what it is, people can devise ways to meet performance targets in—to put it at its mildest—a not wholly transparent way. That is very dangerous. If there are centrally imposed performance targets, as Clause 11 of the Bill says, the consequences of that, if they go wrong could be quite catastrophic and large scale just because they are highly centralised. Obviously there are local performance targets in other parts of the Bill; nevertheless the Secretary of State has the power to direct and determine performance targets for the police and I think that that is a very dangerous thing. I wholly endorse the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich.
I am in favour of requiring a chief constable to be as explicit as possible about how he exercises his discretion and being prepared to defend the way that discretion and his policing priorities are arrived at and the justification for them. He should obviously be asked to report on efficiency and effectiveness. But these cannot be turned into quantitatively measurable targets.
It is also important that the delivery of police services should be concerned not just with efficiency and equity—the two mantras of modern public administration—but crucially, in the case of the police, with equity; of treating like cases in a like manner and treating all people equally before the law. Indeed, in a diverse society it seems to me that equity and fair dealing between various groups is part of what effectiveness and efficiency must actually mean. These things cannot be quantified in any very straightforward way and yet they are vital to both securing the consent of the communities over which the police exercise authority and in terms of their effectiveness within those communities.
So my overall point about performance indicators which I feel strongly about—having, as I say, argued in favour of them at one time—is that I am now wholly convinced that to turn these politically controversial and nationally defined performance indicators into measures of effectiveness and to link the future appointment of a chief constable to them would be politically disastrous and very bad for public confidence in the police in this country.
9.19 p.m.
Lord Trevor: My Lords, as a magistrate of 34 years' standing and as a member of the North Wales police authority for 11 years, I wish to put forward that authority's views which are shared by the chief constables and the authorities of the other three forces in the Principality; namely, Dyfedd Powys, Gwent and South Wales. One of our main concerns is the proposal to reduce the membership of the authorities to 16 persons. Membership varies throughout the country. Currently our authority has 32 members from the two counties of Clwyd and Gwynedd, made up of 20 elected members and 12 magistrates. Two-thirds of the members are democratically elected and are representative of the population of 700,000 which rises to approximately 1 million with the seasonal holiday influxes. The magistrate members represent 16 petty sessional divisions. Reducing those numbers, particularly the number of magistrates, cannot possibly be fair as the magistrates will not be representing the views of those residing in their areas.
The Home Secretary's proposals to appoint the chairman, particularly if he is to be paid, and five members of the authority have inherent dangers. We feel that they will be government nominees, and as the strata from which they are to be selected were unknown until today, we still think that they could lack knowledge of the problems facing the force, particularly in the more remote areas. Furthermore, we are unclear about whether the appointed members will be governed by the same rules of practice and codes of conduct as the elected members currently are. In addition, they will lack the background information in many fields; for instance, of the unfortunate but necessary need to close many rural police stations where the incidence of crime is relatively low and to transfer that manpower to the more populated and troublesome areas to reinforce their colleagues who have to deal with a very high caseload of crime. Furthermore, it is unlikely that they will appreciate the need for air support units to transfer additional officers speedily to serious incidents—to say nothing of the frequent use of helicopters to transfer seriously injured persons (whether from mountaineering accidents or road traffic accidents in remote places) to hospital for speedy and specialist attention. Frequently, by the use of that transport seriously injured patients can be in hospital within 20 minutes instead of sometimes having to undergo a difficult and tedious ambulance operation lasting upwards of two hours.
On the amalgamation of forces, three of the four forces in the Principality cover very sparsely populated areas with long and difficult lines of communication. Increasing the size of those areas will, we think, exacerbate the problems and cause enormous difficulties for any members of the force should they have to transfer for any reasons to an area far removed from their family and friends. That will cause further serious undermining of morale, which is already at a low level. The needs of the rural forces are totally different from those which have very heavily populated and primarily urban areas.
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The fixed-term contract for a period of four years for chief constables, and the abolition of the rank of deputy chief constable and other ranks but with the ability to appoint an assistant, is to be deplored. It automatically reduces rank structure, lessens the field of experience and could be seriously detrimental to future promotion prospects.
Finally, we understand that the proposed changes could cost up to £21 million during the first year. That sum of money would enable an additional 1,000 constables to be placed on the beat nationwide. We feel that that would be preferable to making such drastic changes to an organisation that has worked so satisfactorily for many years, and would help considerably in arresting the ever-increasing rise in crime, thereby enhancing the prospects of a higher detection rate which, in the majority of forces, is at a very low level.
These views are also those of the Association of Metropolitan Authorities, the Association of Chief Police Officers, the Police Federation and the Association of County Councils.
9.25 p.m.
Lord Dixon-Smith: My Lords, after more than six hours of debate it is not my intention to trawl yet again over ground that has already been well trawled by those far more experienced and eloquent than myself. I cannot help feeling some sympathy, however, with my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor and my noble friend the Minister who have honourably fulfilled their job in bringing the Bill before the House and, as a result, have had perforce to listen to a sustained and almost completely unanimous attack the like of which I, in my innocence, had not expected. One lives and learns.
I cannot help but speculate what the tenor of the discussion on the Bill might have been if it had not been for the proposals for constitutional change—in other words (I discuss the issue in the context of the police authorities although there are parallel points with regard to magistrates) if the proposals had left the police authorities as they are or had merely confined change to such change as is necessary to accommodate the consequences of the Local Government (Wales) Bill, the Local Government etc. (Scotland) Bill and, in due course, the recommendations of the Local Government Commission for England. We need to recognise that local government is in a phase of transition and that that transition will have to be accommodated.
However, had the constitutional changes been so confined, then I suspect that local government would have welcomed much in the Bill. To deal locally with police planning, local standards of service and levels of police manpower have been powers which local government have sought for many years. It remains the fact that in the discussion today the deeper and more serious constitutional implications have rightly taken precedence over those managerial problems.
Policing has always been a matter of delicate balance in management and control. The tripartite arrangements between the Home Office, the police authorities and chief constables have worked and served this country well. They have enabled the police forces to serve their

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communities and to police their communities with the general consent of those policed. The anxiety expressed today is that that balance is changing. I hope that in his response to the debate the Minister will indicate that he will consider how best to respond to matters raised in the debate before the Bill is before the House again. If not, I foresee many long and difficult sittings. However, if my noble friend does so indicate, then this House will have done a remarkable job. Not only will we have seen a change with regard to this Bill but, to use the words of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Ackner, for once the tide of executive domination will have been stilled. That may be something which, speaking as an old local government man, we would wish to see; that is, local government once more taking a stronger place in the affairs of this nation.
9.30 p.m.
Viscount Hanworth: My Lords, at the outset I must apologise to the House. I came by train and if I stay until the end of the debate I shall almost certainly not arrive home tonight. However, my speech will be extremely brief.
Both aspects of the Bill relating to the magistrates and to the police have unfortunately much in common which has been criticised. In both there is a substantial cost in the introducing of paid government officials who will have powers of affecting policy.
In the case of the magistrates, whatever the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor may argue, the Bill seeks to extend government power and influence to such an extent that the independence of that service could be deeply compromised. What was always intended to be a locally managed service would be replaced by central direction from the Lord Chancellor's Department. Why is that? Is it because the proposals are based on an old 1980 report on the magistracy which recommended some changes, most of which have already been taken into account and implemented? Is it because some overall centralisation and common approach throughout the country is thought to be desirable? If so, is that a distorted view of efficiency, overlooking the much vaunted principle of subsidiarity and the need for justice in real life to be attuned to local conditions? Or is it unrealistic fantasy on the part of civil servants and Ministers which drives them to do something new at all costs? Or perhaps it is to meet the political need to be seen to be doing something about our crime wave.
Associations representing all those who work in the courts are united in their opposition to the proposals. They are the practitioners. Why were they not adequately consulted? They recognise the need for some change, but it should be effected only after proper consultation, proper costing of the changes and careful consideration of the impact on judicial independence.
Whatever the motives, let us look back for a moment on the failures of this Government's policy on, for example, education and national health, to mention but two. Surely they should have learnt their lesson by now, after more than a decade, that only very gently should existing practice be disrupted, and even then each step taken gradually.
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I do not propose to deal with the Bill in detail. However, I am dismayed by the assumption by the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor of discretion over so many matters. For instance, they include direct control of magistrates' courts committees. No fewer than eight clauses introduce those new powers. Then there is the notional appointment of chief justices' clerks with attendant new responsibilities to their statutory master; the introduction of five-year contracts for justices' clerks and others. I hope that those officers cannot seriously be assessed on the commercial concept of performance—a truly fantastic proposal.
There are many further provisions of the Bill which other noble Lords raised in the debate. I say only this: the Government have shown in so many ways that the Ministers and their advisers are really not very clever—I need quote only the muddle over graded fines. They should not presume to interfere so easily with a system of magistrates' courts in England and Wales which is in the main running efficiently and cheaply. It has worked well for centuries and we are justly proud of the quality of lay justice. Those who support and advise our lay justices must do so without the fear that some future government, perhaps even more centralising than this one, will interfere with and manipulate the judicial process.
I am afraid that I condemn this Bill as it stands root and branch as being an inroad into common sense and once again a case of government interference which is not justified and will lead to a nonsense. The study of its provisions raised the question of whether, notwithstanding all conventions, one should put forward a Motion to oppose the Second Reading. I eventually decided not to do so, but I remain tempted to believe that that might have been the correct course to adopt.
9.36 p.m.
Lord Monkswell: My Lords, like the vast majority of noble Lords who have spoken tonight, I argue that the centralising tendencies in the Bill in respect of both the police and the magistrates will be detrimental to the fabric of our society. I do not wish to spend a great deal of time going through the Bill chapter and verse as it relates to those centralising tendencies but I wish to comment on the risks involved, bearing in mind recent history. I also wish to identify some of the problems that We face and the opportunities that we have.
One cannot stress too much the risk of alienating the police and the magistrates from the local communities which they serve. The centralisation of power and control which is exhibited in the Bill, using the police and the magistrates as mechanisms of the central control of society, are doomed to failure. The risks of the breakdown of social order, and of violence to the police and to magistrates by local people and by the police towards local people, is too horrific to contemplate.
During the early 1980s society faced great tensions predominantly as a result of government policies which gave rise to a recession and escalating mass unemployment. Those social tensions blew up in Brixton, Toxteth and Moss Side. They involved conflicts between local communities and the police who

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were seen to be instruments of social control. Local councils expressed great anxiety about the behaviour of the police.
We almost reached a total breakdown in the relationship between the police forces in our large urban conurbations and the local councils representing the communities. That relationship was held together as a result of the Stirling work which was undertaken by people who believed in the cohesion of society; for instance, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Scarman, Gay Cox, who was a county councillor in the Greater Manchester area and chair of the Greater Manchester Police Committee and many other people. In the face of great difficulties, they developed a positive relationship between the police and local communities. That developing understanding was thrown into great stress again by the whole business of the miners' strike in 1984–85 when the police were perceived by many people as being used as an instrument of the state to destroy or at least repress the miners. As I said, a lot of work was done by some very significant people in seeking to make the police more responsive to local communities.
Another factor in the mid-1980s was the emergence from recession and the expansion of the economy with the reduction in unemployment. That reduced the pressures. There is, too, the ultimate risk. We can see only too clearly what has happened in Northern Ireland where, in recent history, going back 25 years, we have seen the breakdown of trust in whole sections of the community and the police force which is supposed to serve it, leading to violence on a horrific scale and the loss of life which is so objectionable to us all. That demonstrates the ultimate risk from which we must draw back.
What in fact has changed in the last couple of years? In probably the last 10 years we have seen a growth in what has been described as the underclass. That is a significant minority of our community who appear to have no stake in the community, owe no allegiance to society and feel that they get nothing from it. They are alienated.
We must also contend with the increasing use of firearms in the inner cities. Let me give the example of Moss Side. In the area in Wythenshawe that I represent as a local councillor, firearms have been appearing quite regularly. We need to be very careful about those two factors: the rise in the underclass and the availability of firearms. If, over that, we lay the perception that the police force and the magistracy are under centralised control and direction, I feel that we are almost lighting a trail to a powder keg. Those are some of the risks to be faced if the Bill goes through unamended.
I was very interested in the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Dixon-Smith. He identified some of the factors that need to be taken into account. The changes that are taking place in the structure of local government are bound to have an effect on the relationship between local government and the police forces and an effect on the areas of magistrates' courts committees. Those effects need to be taken into account. The problem which concerns me is whether the Bill can be amended
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in such a way as to get rid of the risks and address those significant changes that are taking place. I am not sure that it can. I suspect that it would require an enormous amount Of hard work by your Lordships effectively to change the Bill radically to do what it needs to do and to prevent it from doing what it must not do.
I am very tempted to go along with the views of the noble Lord, Lord Mottistone, and ask whether the Government could withdraw the Bill as it stands, take it away and redraft it to address the genuine needs that exist. Could they not bring back a Bill with a similar title but radically different? In that way it would alleviate the burden on your Lordships' House and on Parliament in general. There is a need radically to revise the Bill that we have in front of us.
9.45 p.m.
Lord Borthwick: My Lords, I wish to say just a few words about what happens at home. In the old days we always had lieutenant colonels coming along to be chiefs of police. Then we had no trouble. Things seemed to go along very well. I do not know why they have disappeared. There may be a reason somewhere. We no longer have a chief of police running our force at home. They should come back. They are trained men. We should save money on training. I have heard complaints today about people having to pay for the training of the police. We have a body of men, properly trained, who understand the job, but we do not use them. At the end of their military service, they took on five or 10 years as chief of police. We had no trouble then and everything went well. I should like that system looked at and perhaps reintroduced.
9.46 p.m.
Lord Hooson: My Lords, I fear that the Bill has few friends. I have been in the Palace of Westminster, either in the other place or in your Lordships' House, for 32 years. I do not recollect a Bill receiving a greater blitzkrieg than this one has, and by heavy bombers at that. I refer not just to the three distinguished former Home Secretaries who have spoken. Almost everyone who has spoken in the debate has great experience of police authorities, the magistracy, and so on. The noble Lord, Lord Finsberg, and the noble Baroness, Lady Miller, were valiant in their efforts to support the Bill. The noble Baroness, Lady Seccombe, criticised the Government more delicately than others have done, but the criticism existed nevertheless. The Bill really has no friends. That creates a serious situation. It embodies potentially—I shall come to the reasons why at the end of my speech—the makings of a serious constitutional crisis, because of the decision to introduce the Bill in your Lordships' House. I shall come to the consequences of that decision in a moment.
I am sure that I am not alone among your Lordships in having reflected during the course of the debate on the difference between reform and change. Reform is something that is called for. A service often cries out for reform, but here it seems to me that we have change almost for change's sake. There has been no great

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demand for any of these measures. The proposals contained in the Bill indicate an ideological rather than a practical, pragmatic approach.
As has been pointed out during the debate, two Bills are encompassed here. Each subject matter, as noble Lords rightly emphasised, merits separate consideration. But the undoubted concerns that have been expressed are, in reality, common to both parts of the Bill. Your Lordships are rightly worried about unacceptable centralising tendencies with regard to both services, as encompassed in the Bill, and appreciate that the proposals involve the setting up of a framework concerning, respectively, a control of the police and the magistracy which could in the future—I emphasise "could" and not "would"—lead to the politicising of both services. Therefore there is a feeling of unease throughout your Lordships' House that there is a real threat to the independence of both the police and the magistracy involved in some of the key provisions of this Bill.
Anxiety has also been expressed on a large number of other aspects of the Bill—for example, the disciplinary provisions in relation to the police and the financial implications of the proposed reforms to the magistracy. The noble Baroness, Lady Macleod, in particular mentioned those matters. I have made inquiries in my rural area of Wales, which has a small population. It has a perfectly adequate magistrates' service but a new centralised magistrates' court is now being built at a cost of £3 million. These and other matters will obviously have to be scrutinised with great care in Committee. However, in this winding-up speech from these Benches I wish to concentrate on what I regard as the core issues.
As the noble Lord, Lord Carr, said, there may well be constructive changes proposed in this Bill but essentially we are primarily concerned and engaged in what I believe he designated as the framework of power—that is a fair way of putting it—in relation to both aspects of this Bill. The noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor made an interesting opening speech which, I am bound to say, concealed more than it revealed. What is meant by the phrase "the strengthening of police authorities"? The most strengthened authority one can have is a dictatorship but that is unacceptable. What is meant by "the strengthening of police authorities"? The claim the noble and learned Lord made in relation to the police is the reverse of centralisation. With the greatest respect to the noble and learned Lord, I am bound to tell him that I could not follow that point at all.
The noble and learned Lord also said in relation to magistrates' courts that there was no coherent magistrates' structure. However, there is such a structure and it has worked for years. It is not a blueprint or a scientifically presentable structure but it exists and it has worked perfectly well. "Coherent" is a buzzword—I hear it used in reference to business and other matters—and it often conceals a great deal. The police and the magistracy are integral parts of the criminal justice system. In their present shape and form they are, like so many other things in this country, the result of evolutionary processes. The police and the magistracy are the result of an evolutionary process that
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has occurred over a large number of centuries. I had not realised, until I heard this debate today, that the police have evolved over a longer period than has the magistracy. In my initial notes I had it the other way.
However, both services are essentially locally based and controlled though they are co-ordinated on a national basis, and this has involved a delicate balance being struck over the years in these two vitally important and sensitive areas. If there is ever a case for a broad consensus approach in politics, I believe that this certainly is such a case and it is uniquely important that it be adopted on these two subjects. We have a heavy duty in the longer term interest of this country and its people to get the balance right and to avoid the danger not of acceding to an ambition to control the magistracy and to control the police—that ambition may not be there—but of providing the means whereby political control can be subtly introduced into our police forces and into the magistracy over the years.
The magistracy is a vitally important part of our judiciary. As has been pointed out, it deals with some 97 per cent. of all criminal cases in our country. As the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chief Justice has pointed out, not only must the magistracy be independent of government but it must feel independent of government and it must appear to be independent of government. The same applies to the police. A former Home Secretary has spoken in the debate today of his experience of industrial unrest when the. police were called upon to preserve law and order in difficult circumstances, and often in the full glare of television cameras. If the chairman or chairwoman of some of the police authorities involved could have been accused of being a placeman or placewoman of the government of the day, what hay the people wanting to undermine our system would have made of it. I think it would have created an impossible position for any Home Secretary.
The Government give the impression, which they may not intend to do, when they deal with the public either in the form of elected local government representatives or even the magistracy, that they are dealing with a potentially irresponsible body of people That is totally incorrect. The magistracy and the representatives of local government are quite capable of carrying out the duties imposed upon them without government interference. I totally refute this approach of the Government, which two very distinguished ex-Home Secretaries on their own side have refuted today.
In recent times we have surely learnt enough to appreciate that some of the placemen of our time sometimes have ideas about the discharge of public duties which fall short of the traditional standards of public duty in our country. All I need say is that the record of the police authorities and of the magistracy is at the very least as good as the record of some directly appointed government appointees.
The impression made upon me is of a government largely in the hands of young men in a hurry, ideologues who think that business and marketing management techniques can be imported willy-nilly into our public services. We have performance related pay. That is all very well if you are in business. If you are selling oil,

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motor cars or clothes this may be a very important factor, but the public are not customers of the police force; they are not customers for their security; they are not customers asking for or buying justice. There should be a considerable limit, if I may put it that way, on the importation of ideas of management which are perfectly valid for business—the noble Lord, Lord Carr, has great business experience himself—as distinct from those that are valid in a public service.
Perhaps I may now turn to the specific and to those provisions which deal with the police. We surely have the right to hear from the Government at this stage in the light of the thread that has run through so many speeches in this debate as to the fear that they are laying down the foundations for what could eventually be political control of the police.
If we look at Clause 2(1) of the Bill, why should there be only three magistrates on all police authorities, whereas the Secretary of State is going to have the right to appoint five directly? What is its justification? I do not think that the Secretary of State should be allowed to appoint any people to the police authorities. I think that the magistrates should be entrusted with appointing eight. Why is there need for these placemen and placewomen? We are going back in history. What is the experience of the Home Office that pushes the present Home Secretary, or his predecessor, in that direction? Or is it simply that he wishes so far as he can to control the police authorities?
If we turn to Schedule 2 paragraph 7, why should the Secretary of State appoint the chairman of each police authority? What is the possible justification? Surely when this debate is replied to by the noble Earl he must deal with this. What is it in Home Office experience that justifies this departure?
I have already posed the question of what effect this might have had during a miners' strike, but has the Home Secretary considered its consequences long term? If so, what does he consider those consequences are likely to be? Referring to paragraph 10 of Schedule 2, why should the Secretary of State have the power to determine that a member of a police authority should serve for a shorter term than four years? He is given the right to appoint for such a shorter term as he,
"may determine in any particular case".
Why should the Secretary of State have that power?
In the reply to the debate, I believe that we are entitled to be told—and the question has been asked many times—what experience the Home Office has had that makes it necessary or desirable to have such powers. There are other matters involved which I shall not go into at this late stage, but which will need to be asked in Committee.
I have already expressed the view, which I believe is widely held in your Lordships' House, that police authorities should appoint their own chairman. If so, surely those should be the people to have the power to remove that person from office if it is in the interests of efficiency or effectiveness of the police authority to do so.
With regard to the magistrates' courts, again, the greatest concern is that too much power is going to the
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Lord Chancellor's Department. Throughout the Bill there is an insidious tendency to undermine the independence of the Bench. I emphasise the word "insidious". I do not regard the powers in the Bill as an attempt by the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor to undermine the authority of the magistrates' courts and the independence of the magistracy; it is the insidious effect of those powers that will undermine their independence.
I now turn to Clause 71 of the Bill, to which the noble Lord the Lord Chief Justice referred. If it was not for the insidious nature of the powers that the Lord Chancellor is taking to himself, Clause 71 would not be necessary in the Bill. It has never been necessary in any other Bill, so why is it necessary here? Human nature being what it is, if the power of intervention is given the inevitable effect would be a possible reduction in the independence of the justices' clerk. As regards many occupations—certainly business—it is my view that performance-related pay and fixed-term contracts may have a particular relevance. However, we must remember that we have public services in this country which, over centuries, have proved to be second to none in the world. On those subjects, I should have thought—and I am not usually one to say so—that experience and knowledge are very important. I cannot think of any debate where the experience and knowledge of former Home Secretaries, chairmen of police authorities and chief constables are more relevant than here.
Some people react well and perform their best under the influence of either the carrot or the stick; but there are an awful lot of people who do not. Many people perform quite as efficiently and sometimes more successfully than their counterparts in business or in industry simply through a high sense of duty. I have among my friends—and, indeed, in my own family, as I am sure do other speakers—persons who are at their best when put under pressure and others who perform their best when they are not under pressure. I suspect that many of our best judges and magistrates are those who are at their best when not performing under pressure. The same is true of magistrates' clerks. Likewise, I think that most barristers, as I am sure the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor will agree, perform best when under pressure. Therefore, often when they go up on the Bench they prefer to be rid of the pressure.
Shot through the Bill are the tendencies to increase the powers of intervention of the Lord Chancellor's Department and the power to influence the views, approach and performance of justices' clerks through the influence, which eventually could easily become an insidious influence, of the chief justices' clerks, with both the justices' clerks and the chief justices' clerks being on performance-related pay. How does one judge the performance in his duties of a magistrates' clerk? How does one weigh them up?
Almost without exception at the Bar, and I am sure in the solicitors' profession as well, the factor one always looks for in a magistrates' clerk, certainly in my experience, is his independence. He is there to guide the Bench on the law as he sees it. I am bound to say that the best magistrates' clerks whom I knew in my

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experience were great eccentrics who very often did not care a button for the Bench, the Bar or anyone else: they gave their views quite independently.
It is totally unacceptable that justices' clerks should be on fixed term contracts and performance-related pay. Are they to be judged by the amount of fines they get in, the speed with which they deal with cases, or the least number of adjournments granted by their Bench? Are they to be judged by national standards? The noble Lord, Lord Trevor, in expressing the views of his police authority, referred to what happened in the Principality. Socially, historically and geographically things are different in different parts of the country.
The view of those sitting on these Benches is that these subjects are the wrong matters for an ideological as opposed to a pragmatic approach. The experience and cumulative wisdom of this House has been expressed in many directions. I refer to what I said at the outset of my speech. I believe that there is potentially a very serious danger of a constitutional crisis arising in this matter. The noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor will correct me if I am wrong, but the provisions of the Parliament Act 1911 do not apply to a Bill that is introduced in the House of Lords; they apply only to Bills introduced into the House of Commons and come thereafter to the House of Lords. I have checked this matter with the Clerks. If that is so, the restraints imposed by the Parliament Act do not apply to this Bill.
If one turns to the Salisbury doctrines which have been advanced, they apply only to matters which are manifesto commitments, and neither of these matters is a manifesto commitment. Therefore, if the fears and concerns of the House are not met, in my view it is quite in order for this House to throw out the Bill. That can be done without invoking any of the powers which belong to the Government by convention or the specific provisions of the Parliament Act.
It is important to have a consensus approach on such a vital matter as the police and magistracy. I refer to the suggestion made by the noble Lord, Lord Carr—I think with the approval of the noble Viscount, Lord Whitelaw, and the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan—that there should be a meeting to consider this debate and its possible effect on the passage of the Bill before it proceeds further in this House. Though it has been suggested on the Government Benches that this Bill be withdrawn, I believe it is better to have the kind of meeting indicated by the noble Lord, Lord Carr. If the crucial objections to the Bill can be met there may be hidden in the Bill very sensible reforms, and no doubt a consensual approach can be obtained. Such an all-party meeting can be on Privy Council terms since there are enough Members on the Benches to enable that to happen. But it seems to me that, unless the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor and the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, are able to persuade the powers-that-be to move amendments without such a meeting, we will go headlong into what is potentially a very serious but avoidable constitutional crisis. It is vitally important that the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor and the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, convey to the Government the feelings of this House and insist that those fears are met.
10.9 p.m.
Baroness Hilton of Eggardon: My Lords, this has been a long and interesting debate. Concern has been expressed on all sides of the House about the contents of the Bill and the proposed seizure of power by the Home Secretary over the police service, and by the Lord Chancellor over justices' clerks and magistrates. As the noble Lord, Lord Hooson, has just said, that seizure of power may not in the short term have sinister connotations, but with a change of regime in the years ahead it might be disastrous for the unwritten constitution of this country.
We have heard excellent contributions from many noble Lords, including three ex-Home Secretaries and other noble Lords who have direct experience of the police service and the magistracy. Almost all have expressed universal disquiet about the provisions of the Bill, except the noble Lord, Lord Finsberg, and the noble Baroness, Lady Miller. As my noble friend Lord McIntosh said, there was also universal opposition by practitioners outside this House—police officers, magistrates, local police authorities, justices' clerks—who are all opposed to the centralising arid politicising provisions of the Bill.
As has been said by many noble Lords in the House this evening, the Bill effectively presages a national police force for this country, without proper consultation, against the tide of public opinion and, as my noble friend Lord Archer said, with no electoral commitment. The present tripartite system has begun to work well over the past few years. It has matured and has created innovative ways of dealing with and preventing crime on a local police basis.
Democracy, of course, can be uncomfortable, and there are stresses and strains within any system which has to be run by more than one person. It may be that the Home Office has been unable to cope with the reality of democracy in the past few years, and that is why simplistic solutions are being sought and attempts are being made to scapegoat the police service for the rise in crime in this country.
As my noble friend Lord McIntosh said, a case could be made for centralised control of some national police functions. For example, countering terrorism, serious drug problems, serious fraud and perhaps motorway policing could all be placed on a national basis. One could also lay down rules for common and standardised equipment for radios, computers and motorcars. All of those could provide savings in time and money. However, that is not an argument for a national police force, and it is certainly not provided for in this particular Bill.
Almost all crime, all public order and traffic problems are local. That has been stressed by several noble Lords, including the noble Viscount, Lord Tenby, and the noble Lord, Lord Lester. The noble Lord, Lord Lester, in particular stressed that the local nature of policing has been an important and historic element of our constitution going back to the Middle Ages. The noble Lord, Lord Carr, said that local police are a pillar of democracy. The noble Lord, Lord Mackie, gave us some vivid examples of local policing in Scotland.

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My noble friend Lord Callaghan, from his position as an elder statesman, described the last two Home Secretaries as wilful and ambitious young men. The noble Lord, Lord Hooson, referred to them as young men in a hurry. I believe that it is also unfortunate that the last two Home Secretaries were trained as barristers. The only sort of crime that they have encountered is the sort of crime that goes to Crown Courts. That gives a distorted view of the work of police and magistrates' courts where, as we have heard from many noble Lords this evening, 90 per cent. of crime is dealt with. That 90 per cent. of crime is local, petty crime, which causes problems for people within their local community. It is not the sort of crime which normally hits the national headlines.
Crime prevention and crime control essentially are local matters. As the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich said, these can be dealt with effectively only in partnership with the local community and the local authority. It is those partnerships, in many of the most difficult parts of the country and many of the most difficult high rise estates, which have recently been producing some encouraging results in the reduction of crime and of drug taking.
The noble Earl, Lord Winchilsea, also said that policing requires local consent to be effective. There are many hopeful projects throughout the country where the local community has begun to back the police, to come forward as witnesses, and so crime has levelled off and in some cases been reduced.
Perhaps I may turn to Clause 11 which gives the Home Secretary power to set national objectives. Some of the draft national objectives have been set for the current year and they are necessarily generalised and meaningless when set at such a high national level. As the noble Lords, Lord Plant and Lord Harris, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich said, setting objectives at this level can often be counter-productive, particularly when they result in league tables and performance indicators which are often nonsensical at ground level.
The first set of objectives which has just been published includes response times, for example. Police have known ever since the police service began that it is desirable to arrive rapidly at the scene of incidents, so the setting of response times is not exactly an original or innovative idea. But if it is set as a national objective with the pressures of league tables, comparisons and media attention to response times, I am sure it will lead to more police accidents, more accidents in which innocent people are involved. If the emphasis is on speed, it will lead to more police officers in cars, fewer foot patrols, and less time will be spent on victims of crime and such matters as domestic violence, child abuse and education in schools. Above all, I believe that, as has also been pointed out by some noble Lords, the times will be fiddled. Over 30 years ago, when I was a constable in Stepney, when the fire brigade arrived at the scene of a fire, officers would say: "Show that we were called at such-and-such a time and we arrived at
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such-and-such a time". Times were always fiddled in the past, and I am sure that they will be fiddled in the future, regardless of computer dispatch and so on.
Another objective which has been set as a national objective during the current year is the clear-up rates for burglary and violent crime. Clear-up rates, not arrests. I have known clever detective inspectors who could produce 60 per cent. clear-up rates without any increase in crimes solved or offenders arrested. If those are a sample of the kinds of objectives that will be set in future years at national level, I think they are a nonsense. They will not work and reported crime will continue to rise. In a way, the Home Secretary will be left without any excuse in future because he will be the man or woman who is directing the police service of the country. It will be impossible to find any other scapegoats for the rises in reported crime.
More serious, in some ways, than the setting of national objectives for the police service is the move to centralised and, effectively, political control of the police service. Many noble Lords have spoken against the provisions of Schedule 2 to the Bill on the composition of police authorities, the appointment of so-called independent members and the appointment of a paid chairman. Even more sinister, perhaps, is the provision which is also contained in that schedule which gives the Secretary of State the power to disbar members from police authorities, including elected local authority members. That is a prescription for political distortion of police authorities.
The noble Lord, Lord Harris, saw the provisions of Clause 11 as the first step to a national police force. The noble Viscount, Lord Whitelaw, said that the new arrangements would upset the balance of power. Both of my noble friends Lord Callaghan and Lord Stoddart said that 16 members was far too few to be representative of a police authority area. At present there is an average of 31 members. The noble Lord, Lord Knights, said that the police authorities would inevitably be too distant and unrepresentative of the people whom they served. Only eight elected councillors, for example, for the whole of that vast West Midlands conurbation cannot be expected to represent the interests of the people of Birmingham, West Bromwich and the other towns that make up that vast area.
The Home Secretary mysteriously said that the new police authorities would be more representative of local people. Does he mean by that that there will be more women appointed, more people from ethnic minorities and more people appointed from crime-ridden local estates? I doubt it.
The current police authority's members comprise 38 per cent. who have business experience; 62 per cent. who are school governors; and one-third who are magistrates. That provides a reasonable spread of experience and local knowledge. The arrangements published yesterday for finding the five centrally appointed members give a pivotal role to lord lieutenants—who are all male and all white; many of whom come from military backgrounds; and many of whom are declared Conservative Party supporters. It is unlikely that they are the people who will be finding more representative members of police authorities.

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Many noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Can, my noble friend Lord Callaghan and the noble Viscount, Lord Whitelaw, have expressed their concern about the power that the Secretary of State has taken to himself to involve himself in operational policing and to politicise control of the police service. An example of the dangers that that may bring about are exemplified by the Metropolitan Police, in which, as noble Lords know, I served for some 34 years. The symbiotic relationship that exists with the Home Office has inevitably over the years muzzled Commissioners of the metropolis. They cannot speak out against their police authority because they are of necessity required to maintain good relationships with the Home Secretary. They cannot do that if they set themselves up in opposition to him. On occasion, that role has been adopted by police authorities when arguing with the Home Office under the present tripartite system; but the Metropolitan Police have had no such barrier between themselves and the Home Office. It is interesting to note that the one senior officer who has not publicly resisted the proposals in this Bill is the one senior officer in the country who has the Home Secretary as his police authority. I fear that this is a portent of things to come when all chief constables are on short-term contracts and are answerable to a police authority chairman who is the paid appointee of the Home Secretary. As the noble Lord, Lord Carr, said, that is a totally inappropriate arrangement. Many other noble Lords were also concerned about the political appointment of the chairman of the police authority.
The Home Secretary has claimed that these measures will bring police forces closer to the community, and that they will give greater freedom to chief constables. I think that the Home Secretary, like Humpty Dumpty, believes that when he uses a word it means just what he chooses it to mean.
Centrally appointed police authority members cannot be closer to the community than elected councillors or local magistrates. As for "freedom for chief constables", they will be working on short-term contracts to Home Office and police authority objectives within cash limited budgets. Despite some relaxation of Treasury rules, the main freedom will be to divert police pay into capital expenditure, thus leading to fewer, not more, policemen on the beat.
There are other provisions in this Bill which give cause for concern in relation to the police. My noble friend Lord Callaghan, the noble Lord, Lord Bethell, and other noble Lords have drawn attention to the new arrangements for disciplinary procedures, which under Clause 14 will become more informal in future. They may speed things up, but there are the twin dangers not only of rough justice for police officers but also of the possibility that abuses of power may be shuffled under the carpet.
Another matter of concern is the powers given in this Bill to amalgamate forces without a public inquiry. The noble Lord, Lord Harris, and my noble friend Lord Stoddart, expressed concern about that.
In relation to magistrates' courts, we see the same desire, as my noble friend Lord Williams of Mostyn has said, to centralise power in the misguided belief that
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centrally run bureaucracies are efficient. The noble Lord, Lord Harris of Greenwich, and the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chief Justice, expressed concern about the new arrangements, which threaten the independence of justices' clerks and magistrates in the discharge of their judicial functions. If chairmen and members of magistrates' courts' committees are appointed by the Lord Chancellor, it will inevitably undermine the independence of the magistracy, which is an important plank of our democracy.
The noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Gosforth, was also scornful about the merits of short-term contracts and performance related pay, as were the noble Lord, Lord Gisborough, and my noble friend Lady Fisher. By placing justices' clerks on short-term contracts within a hierarchy that leads ultimately to the Lord Chancellor's Department, power is being given to politicians to run the judicial system of this country.
I suspect also that people will be less willing to volunteer as magistrates if they are as demoralised as was suggested by the noble Baronesses, Lady Macleod and Lady Seccombe. If they are made to feel mere cogs in a vast bureaucratic machine, then the whole principle of a lay magistracy may be undermined.
As my noble friend Lord McIntosh said, there is one major missed opportunity in the Bill—the provision of a police authority for London. That was proposed in the original White Paper but ironically it was abandoned because of fears of political control by Labour councillors. In view of the provisions in the Bill for political control by the present Government, I find that truly astonishing. Nor have we seen much sign of the feeble "advisory body" proposed instead by the Home Secretary.
In conclusion, the contents of the Bill have been almost universally condemned. They are a recipe for the political distortion of operational policing and of the running of the magistrates' courts of this country. It is unfortunate, in my view, that our last two Home Secretaries were trained in the combative and adversarial systems of the Bar. Like Humpty Dumpty, they believe that "glory" consists in having "a nice knock-down argument" regardless of the evidence or the underlying principles. The evidence is that local policing works well when in partnership with local people. The underlying principle, as my noble friend Lord Williams of Mostyn so effectively affirmed, is that the police service and magistrates' courts should be subject to local democracy and not to centralised political control.
In the light of the almost universal criticism of the Bill I would hope—and, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Ackner, said, "Hope does spring eternal"—that the noble Earl the Minister will take up the suggestion of the noble Lord, Lord Mottistone, arid many of his, noble friends and withdraw the Bill.
10.26 p.m.
The Minister of State, Home Office (Earl Ferrers): My Lords, when one comes to reply to this debate it is nice to feel that one is among friends. I admire the ingenuity of the noble Baroness, Lady Hilton of Eggardon, and of my noble friends Lord Mottistone and

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Lord Bethell—even the noble Lord, Lord Hooson, tried to jump on this bandwagon—in suggesting that we ought to withdraw the Bill. I like to accede to their requests whenever I can but they know perfectly well that that is not a realistic option. We have an important Bill here and it is right that it should be discussed.
I welcome the observations that have been made this afternoon because policing is very important. I agree with my noble friend Lord Carr who said that they must be regarded as "our" police and not as "the" police. It is important that we should discuss these matters.
Lord Hooson: My Lords, I thank the noble Earl for giving way. He obviously misunderstood my suggestion. I did not suggest that the Bill should be withdrawn. I said that I did not think that it would be withdrawn. I wanted him to accede to the suggestion of the noble Lord, Lord Carr.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, if I have interpreted the noble Lord's suggestion incorrectly, I apologise. I had made an incorrect note and that was my mistake.
In a forthright speech the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, said that he thought that what we have in the Government is a group of young, ambitious Ministers flitting from department to department and sucking the honey from wherever they go. I have never been a young, ambitious Minister. Of course the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, was, so he probably recognises it. All I can say to the noble Lord is that I cannot think why anyone would want to suck the honey out of the Home Office because the bees there make some pretty rum stuff.
A number of noble Lords talked about power as if my right honourable friend the Home Secretary wants power. The noble Lords, Lord Stoddart and Lord Harris, referred to it and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Ackner, used that phrase too. The noble Lord, Lord Williams of Mostyn, said that this was making the Bill a political plaything. If your Lordships' reaction to the Bill is an example of the thrills and the adrenaline of power I can only say that my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor and my right honourable friend the Home Secretary must have a very curious sense of enjoyment.
It is important for the Bill to be discussed and I was sorry that the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Guildford was not able to participate, as he had wished, because of an indisposition. I can understand the feeling. I was going to make an intervention from the Back Benches on the Ordination of Women Measure but I landed up in hospital with a torn achilles tendon and was not able to do so. I merely concluded that the Almighty must have thought that if I was going to make that kind of speech I had better get out of the light. The right reverend Prelate was given only laryngitis. I wonder what kind of speech he was going to make. When the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Norwich made the speech for him and embellished it with some of his own remarks, I thought that the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Guildford had not done anything really bad. But I hope that he does get better.
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I am also grateful to my noble friend Lord Harmar-Nicholls. He always gives one good advice. He suggested that I should not deliver the speech that I was going to deliver, but as he did not know what I was going to deliver I cannot understand why he advised me not to deliver it. But I take that in good heart. I am grateful, too, to my noble friend Lord Finsberg for "breaking the golden thread", as he put it. I thought that it was a piece of rusty barbed wire which he had broken. But I am grateful for his help and that of my noble friend Lady Miller of Hendon who drew attention to the good measures in the Bill. There are many parts which are good.
Your Lordships quite rightly homed in on the anxieties. I come back to the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, my noble friends Lord Whitelaw and Lord Carr, and others, that it is very important over matters of policing to get as far as possible a consensus view. It is not always possible. If one makes any change there are bound to be some people who say that it is wrong. There is a great sense of contentment in familiarity and in what one knows.
This legislation has been described by my right honourable friend as the biggest change for 30 years. It is not surprising, therefore, that people are concerned that there should be change. They are also concerned as to what that change might bring. It is right that people should be concerned about policing. They are concerned about it and they are also concerned for the police.
I wish to pay my own tribute to the police. I believe that they are a fine body of people. They work hard and often dangerously in a society, some parts of which are becoming increasingly contemptuous both of the law and of the police. They carry out their duties with great professionalism and great courage, frequently with great bravery and almost always with great friendliness. I never cease to be amazed at the most appalling and vicious treatment to which they are sometimes subjected.
Despite all that—and the fact that they know that that is part of the risk which they take on when they become police officers—they still smile and take pride in their job. Therefore, my respect for the police is boundless. Anything which this Bill does is not in any way a reflection on the men and women in the police service. It is really an attempt to reorganise the structure of the service in which they operate so that their efforts and their talents, as well as the resources which are put at their disposal, can be used to better effect.
If this is the biggest change for 30 years I accept that it is not possible to achieve that without some kind of hurt and anxiety. It is up to Ministers to try to explain what the reasoning is. I shall endeavour to do that but I shall not be able to answer all the points which your Lordships have raised today.
One of the most important points which has been made is that there is a centralising of control. The noble Lords, Lord McIntosh, Lord Harris, Lord Stoddart and my noble friend Lord Elton, all referred in various ways to the possibility of there being a national police force. The noble Baroness Lady Hilton described the measure as presaging a national police force. The noble Lord, Lord Hooson, referred to it as the political control of the

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police. I would defer to no-one in my opposition to a national police force. It could be quite wrong and wholly undesirable. The Bill does not do that, neither does it presage it. It does not provide a stepping stone for a national police force. That just does not enter the frame.
The Government cannot and do not want to direct policing. Chief constables must have operational freedom. That is explicit in Clause 4 which places police forces under the direction and control of chief constables. I would be the first to say that centralisation of control over the police service would be a disaster. I do not believe that that is the right thing to do, nor that it would be the effect of the Bill.
However, I understand the concerns. The fact is that the Home Secretary is responsible for the annual expenditure of some £6,000 million on the police service and has to account to Parliament for that expenditure and, ultimately, to the public for the state of law and order. The Bill provides and alters—yes, alters—the framework under which the Home Secretary can do that while at the same time allowing policing to be carried out in the locality by local people —by the police authority; by the chief constable.
In future, the Home Secretary will no longer decide how many police officers a force will have. That will be decided by the chief constable and the police authority. They will have to decide how to use their money and whether to spend it on constables, vehicles, plant, equipment, computers or whatever. That is their responsibility. Police authorities will be free-standing bodies. They will not be police committees which discuss things with the chief constable and then have to go to the local authority where they find their recommendations overturned. The police authorities will be free-standing bodies and will have the responsibility for policing in their areas. They will produce their own policing plans. That is not centralisation.
The Bill provides for the devolution of a lot of managerial responsibility to chief constables. In the same way, police authorities will have a larger role and one which will, I think, be the most significant. The Bill places on them a new duty to take into account the views of local people about policing in their area. That will concentrate much more power in local hands.
This is a process of giving some of the powers of the Home Secretary away—down to the police authorities. However, we want to see smaller police authorities because smaller authorities have a sharper cutting edge. It is proposed that they should consist of eight councillors, three magistrates and five independent people. It was never intended that those independent people should be the placemen of the Home Secretary or party hacks. That was the last thing that my right honourable friend had in mind. One must remember that in the past 30 years the local councils have not had the prerogative of running police authorities. Independent members have always been there in the form of magistrates. The independents are a very valuable group of people. In order to make it clear that they were not
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going to be my right honourable friend's placemen arid that they would be independently chosen, my right honourable friend made the—
Lord Harris of Greenwich: My Lords, with great respect to the noble Earl, they are not to be independently chosen; they are to be independently nominated. The decision will be that of the Home Secretary.
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, the noble Lord wants to start splitting hairs -
Noble Lords: No!
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I said that they would not—I forget what I did say now. They will be selected by an independent body—
Noble Lords: No!
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I am sorry, but your Lordships have asked me, as a Minister, to try to explain what the Bill is about but when I try to explain it, your Lordships are kind enough to say "No".
The independent members will be selected by the independent bodies which we hope will be run by the Lords Lieutenant who will submit short-lists of names to my right honourable friend. He will then make the choice, but that is not appointing party hacks or placemen. In order to make that clear my right honourable friend made the statement yesterday, whereupon the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, said that at the first whiff of gunfire my right honourable friend goes running. I thought that that was a bit tough. Because there was an area of doubt, my right honourable friend made the matter clear. If he had not made it clear, the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, would have said, "This is intolerable", but when he does make it clear, the noble Lord says that he is on the run. All that my right honourable friend is doing is being a listening and understanding Home Secretary who is trying to make the matter perfectly clear.
Many noble Lords have expressed concern about the appointment of the chairman. I readily recognise that the matter is controversial. The noble Earl, Lord Carnarvon, objected to it. But who does the Home Secretary choose the chairmanship from? He chooses it either from the councillors, over whom he has no control, from the magistrates, over whom he has no control, or from the independents, who will have been chosen by an independent body. Therefore, the chairman will not be an individual, as it were, parachuted in to some local police authority in order to run it. He will be chosen from the people who are on the committee. He will not be paid; he will receive allowances and expenses.
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, will the Minister indulge us with an answer to a simple question? Why is it necessary for the Home Secretary to choose the chairman?
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, if the noble Lord had contained himself for half a minute longer I would have provided him with the answer and we should all have got along a little more quickly.

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The noble Lord may not like this, but the fact is that £6,000 million is being spent per year on policing. Ninety per cent. of it comes from Government. It is not unreasonable that the Home Secretary, who is responsible for law and order—and he doesn't half get stick when people complain about the state of law and order—should have some say in ensuring that money spent by the police authorities will be spent by an authority which is under proper control and is well run.
Lord Williams of Mostyn: My Lords, that is not the question I put. I have contained myself for a further half minute.
If the committee is competent to carry out these important functions, is it not to be trusted with choosing its own chairman?
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I do not think that that was the noble Lord's original question. I believe that he asked why it was necessary to appoint the chairman. If the noble Lord did not ask that, plenty of other noble Lords did. I have explained why it is considered desirable for that to happen.
A number of noble Lords referred to the independent members. The noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, asked, under the selection arrangements which were announced, whether the Home Secretary would be free to choose someone not on the selection committee's short list. As a matter of law, that is so. As a matter of fact, that will not happen. If he felt unable to appoint five members from the names on the short list he would probably invite the selection committee to come forward with a few additional names.
The noble Lord, Lord McIntosh, referred to the police authority membership. He said that in taking together five independent members, three magistrates, and the chairman, there is a majority of non-local government members on the police authority. That is not true. The chairman will be drawn from the membership and the local government members will always retain half of the membership.
The noble Lord, Lord Harris, asked about amalgamations. They can be done at the moment. The reason that amalgamations are dealt with in the Bill is because the present system is lengthy. It can take up to 18 months or two years with a great deal of uncertainty.
My noble friend Lord Trevor said that the money being spent could buy 1,000 more police officers. Of course, the reforms will create the framework that will allow the 128,000 police officers and the 40,000 civilian staff to provide a better and more effective service. The small start-up costs in relation to that will be greatly outweighed by the long-term benefits.
The performance indicators were considered by the noble Lord, Lord Harris, as daft. The noble Lord, Lord Plant, was worried about them. Performance indicators should be a method by which the police can test themselves and by which others can know what the performance is and whether or not the methods are successful. I do not see that that is a wrong thing to do. I believe that it is perfectly reasonable for any
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organisation which is responsible for dealing with a lot of money to be able to show to others that it is doing the best that it can; and if not, why not.
The noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, and my noble friends Lord Harmar-Nicholls and Lord Bethell referred to the discipline cases and the burden of proof. The issue to be determined by police managers is whether or not the person concerned acted properly as a police officer. Any question of criminal activity would be a matter for the Crown Prosecution Service and the courts would have subjected them to the same level of proof as for any other citizen. Police managers must see whether police officers behaved as they should behave, and, if not, what is the appropriate response. It is appropriate, when determining that question, to have regard to the same level of proof as would be appropriate to outside employment.
10.45 p.m.
Lord Hooson: Will the noble Earl allow me to intervene? I have been waiting patiently for him to deal with the question of what the deficiencies are in the present service that make the changes necessary. On a number of occasions I have asked, as have other noble Lords, why the changes are necessary. What is the raison d'être?
Earl Ferrers: I am now talking about discipline changes.
Lord Hooson: In my speech I set out the provisions in the clause and the schedule to which I was referring, which go to the heart of the matter. What are the reasons for those changes? What is the reason for the need for centralised control?
Earl Ferrers: That is where I part company with the noble Lord, Lord Hooson. It is not centralised control. The onus is to give local people the responsibility for running their own police authorities and the chief constable for running his show; and to allow the chief constable and the police authorities to decide how they intend to spend their money. In return for that, the Home Secretary must obviously have some kind of control.
Lord Hooson: If the noble Earl objects to the term "centralised control", perhaps he can simply say what are the reasons for these specific changes.
Earl Ferrers: I am happy to answer that question. It is probably more a matter for Committee stage if we are to keep interrupting, but I am happy to answer.
Ever since I have been in the Home Office there has been a constant desire from everyone, including the police, to see change. One of the reasons is that people considered that the Home Secretary had too many powers and controls over the police. Now he is releasing some of them. He wants to see local people running their own local show. Noble Lords may splutter, but the fact is that many police committees are committees of local authorities.
The noble Lord, Lord Monkswell, shakes his head, but I can give one example. In Derbyshire this year the chief constable wanted a budget of £86 million; the police committee agreed that it would submit a figure of

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£83 million to the local authority, and the local authority turned it down and said £80 million. How does the chief constable then function? In future, that police authority will have its own money and be able to decide how to spend it.
I had perhaps better turn to Part IV of the Bill, which relates to the magistrates' court service. Its purpose is to rectify the fundamental problems in the magistrates' courts service which were outlined by the scrutiny of 1989. It would be inconsistent with the responsibilities that my noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor has for the service if he did not seek to address those problems.
The service is hampered by the fact that it has to operate in the 1990s within a statutory framework that was designed to meet the needs of the 1940s. Many changes have occurred in the intervening half century. The demands now made on our system of local justice make reform of that framework imperative.
I am the first to acknowledge the long and proud history of the magistrates' court service. The reforms imply no criticism of the efforts of the people who are dedicated and committed magistrates and court staff. The service will continue to be locally based and run by committees which will be made up almost entirely of local magistrates. That is the answer to my noble friend Lady Seccombe, who asked whether they would still continue to be lay and voluntary—and I forget her third point; but they will be all three of those.
A subject which has worried many noble Lords is that of judicial independence. Some, including the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chief Justice, have said that they fear the judicial independence of magistrates may be threatened by the provisions in the Bill. The noble Baroness, Lady Fisher, said that the Bill would centralise control and that there would be party political overtones. I hope not.
Noble Lords fear that if justices' clerks have fixed-term contracts and performance-related pay they will no longer be able to advise their magistrates without the encroachment of management considerations. They fear that justices' clerks, with the chief justices' clerk breathing down their necks, will advise their magistrates to apply the law in such a way as to meet the committee's targets, or to save the committee's budget, or to follow a directive issued by the Government. I do not believe that that will happen. My noble and learned friend the Lord Chancellor is, of course, sensitive to any possibility that the independence of the judiciary is in danger. He is second to none in his concern to preserve and protect that vital part of our constitution. However, he sees nothing in Part IV of the Bill which will threaten that independence.
There are, in fact, elements of the reforms which will strengthen the independent role of justices' clerks in giving advice to their magistrates. For the first time, justices' clerks will be protected by full employment law, which they will be able to use if they are dismissed for exercising their independence in advising their Bench. To put beyond any doubt the fact that the fears which have been expressed are unfounded, Clause 71 contains the statutory declaration that was promised in the White Paper, A New Framework for Local Justice.
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That clause provides that management may not direct justices' clerks in the advice which is given to individual cases. I can also state unequivocally that this aspect of their work will be excluded from the appraisal of their performance which is required under the Bill. It will also be possible for clerks to gain extra protection by negotiating that the terms of Clause 71 should be reflected in their contracts.
The noble Lord, Lord. Harris of Greenwich, was concerned that justices' clerks will be subject to fixed-term contracts and performance-related pay determined by how they follow government directives. While justices' clerks' contracts and performance-related pay will depend on them following the directives of their employers, that will be the magistrates' courts committee and not the Government. Performance-related pay will not be related to the legal functions which are protected by Clause 71.
The noble and learned Lord the Lord Chief Justice said that the chief justices' clerk's responsibility to promote the discussion of legal matters is chilling. In the course of the consultation on the reforms, the Justices' Clerks' Society proposed that there should be a statutory forum in each area in which the chief justices' clerk and justices' clerks could discuss legal matters. Such a forum is not appropriate for establishment in statute but the impetus for it is contained in Clause 68. The chief justices' clerk will not be able to direct the advice which justices' clerks give to their magistrates in individual cases.
Many points were made that I should have liked to answer, but I do not believe that I should be approved of if I wearied your Lordships any longer. In all this we want to—
Lord Archer of Sandwell: My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for giving way. Will he at least satisfy the curiosity of those of us who asked why the Government are legislating on subjects two at a time when for 140 years successive governments have tried to distance magistrates' courts from the police?
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I expect that the simple answer is efficiency and effectiveness. I realise that it has its inconveniences but, on the whole, it was considered that this would be the best way—if I may so put it—of killing two birds with one stone. I realise that that is a most unattractive simile but it is a way of dealing with two matters. The noble Baroness, Lady Fisher, laughs but my noble friend Lady Seccombe said that she sat in a magistrates' court which was called a police court. There is a connection between the two and it was considered that this would be the best way of dealing with it
Lord Callaghan of Cardiff: My Lords, I am obliged to the Minister. He has put up a good defence of the Bill and I believe that he is reaching the end of his remarks. However, it is disappointing because this morning the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor said on a radio programme that he intended to listen to what was said in this House with an open mind. With respect, what the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, has done is give a perfect defence of the indefensible without any

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indication of an open mind in any way. I have heard no concession by him to any of the criticisms that have been made from his own Benches, the Liberal Benches, the independents or the Benches on which I sit.
This is no twopenny-ha'penny Bill. It is a Bill of major importance. It is one of the major planks in the Government's legislative programme for the current session. It cannot simply be wished away even by a gallant defence by the noble Earl. I regret that the Leader of the House is not present. I do not criticise him. I am sure that he is engaged on other business. But he is the figure who in the Cabinet is the only one, with respect—I do not know what role the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor plays; no doubt some holders of the office play a different role from others—who can convey to the Cabinet the sentiment of this House today when a major constitutional Bill and one of the major Bills in the Government's programme has been almost friendless.
I want to ask the noble Earl, for whom I have a great deal of respect, how it will be conveyed to the Cabinet that, had their major Bill been subjected to a vote today, it would have been very hard to obtain a majority. How do they intend to steer the Bill through the House from now on? Do they intend to adopt the view of the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor of listening with an open mind, or are we to continue to hear very gallant defences from the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers?
Earl Ferrers: My Lords, I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, will continue to hear gallant defences from the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers. If I may say so, I think that he is being slightly unfair. He has criticised the Bill
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and so have a lot of other speakers. It is slightly unfair to expect government Ministers to stand up and say, "I am so sorry and I quite agree that the whole thing is an absolutely stupid Bill." Of course the noble Lord would expect me to defend the Bill and put the Government's case. But because one puts the Government's case it does not mean that one has a closed mind. I do not have a closed mind and neither does my noble and learned friend. The noble Lord, Lord Callaghan, may be in some doubt as to how the message of this Chamber will be conveyed to my right honourable friend, but I shall see that it is conveyed to him. I can give him that assurance.
I had a few wonderful remarks with which I intended to finish. However, I merely say that I realise that this is a controversial Bill. I realise too that over matters of policing and matters of the judiciary one wants to obtain as broad a consensus of opinion as possible. But I also recognise, as I am sure will all fair noble Lords, that, if a change is going to be made, some things will alter from the status quo and become something different. It is right to be apprehensive about what that difference will be. We will have the opportunity to discuss that at the Committee stage.
I believe that it is right, when affairs and matters have changed after so many years—in the magistrates' courts case it is about 40 years and in the case of the police about 30 years—to try to make the changes necessary for the future. I am grateful to your Lordships not always for what has been said but for the way in which the majority of noble Lords have said it. I can assure the House that we will take note of what has been said. I commend the Bill to the House.
On Question, Bill read a second time, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House.

Sudan
10.58 p.m.
Baroness Cox Baroness Cox rose to ask Her Majesty's Government what is their policy with regard to recent developments in Sudan.
The noble Baroness said: My Lords, I am most grateful for this opportunity to raise in your Lordships' House the tragedy of Sudan. I know that many noble Lords have a deep concern for that land and for its people. I am especially grateful that the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury will speak, following his courageous and profoundly appreciated visit to Southern Sudan. Having by coincidence followed in his footsteps a few days after his visit, I can testify to the enormous encouragement that he and Mrs Carey gave to those whom they met and to all the people in the South who had felt largely forgotten by the international community, and especially by the international Christian community. Also of course, copies of the debate will be distributed widely in Sudan, and the contributions of all noble Lords taking part, particularly at this late hour, will bring great comfort to countless people who will know that people here care for them in their desperate situation, a situation which may soon deteriorate from desperate to catastrophic.
In opening the debate I wish to address four themes: a brief overview of developments since the previous debate in your Lordships' House in December 1992; the urgent humanitarian needs; human rights violations and the suffering caused by military offensives; and some ways in which the international community might help efforts by bringing about a solution combining peace with justice.
My first involvement in Sudan was as a nurse, working in desert areas in North Kordofan in 1986, developing an immunisation programme for the Moslem communities in remote villages. I returned in 1992 to the South with Christian Solidarity International, a human rights organisation which tries to be a voice for those with no voice, speaking on behalf of victims of repression, regardless of their colour, creed or nationality.
We found people in Southern Sudan fighting for physical survival against the military offensives and blockades imposed by the Khartoum Government, and for religious and cultural survival against that Government's policies of Islamisation and Arabisation. Of course, their suffering was sadly exacerbated by fighting between factions of the SPLA. We documented our concerns, and many were put on record in the debate in your Lordships' House in December 1992.
I subsequently received an invitation to the Sudanese Embassy in London. I was invited to hear their Government's position. Of course, keen to hear both sides, I accepted gladly. I also requested permission to go to the North to visit places about which concern had been widely expressed, and which had been generally inaccessible. The Sudan Government agreed and CSI sponsored that visit last July. I must express appreciation that the Khartoum Government kept their word. They arranged for us to visit all the places and to
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meet all the people we requested, and to conduct our meetings with no inhibiting official presence. We met senior representatives of the regime, and we visited Juba, Kadugli and Dilling in the Nuba Mountains, El Obeid and a camp for the displaced near Omdurman.
We met many Christians in those areas, and we also met political opposition leaders. I have since heard from some of those whom we visited, and I am glad to say that they had suffered no reprisals. That visit gave us an opportunity to raise issues of concern with the Government. Suffice it to say that, while we welcomed the Khartoum Government's willingness to allow us access, and also reports that the treatment of Christian communities had improved somewhat, we had to express grave concern over many issues. Those included human rights violations, not just of Christians but of Moslems who do not support the National Islamic Front regime, and of other political opposition members. Reports of detention and torture in ghost houses and prisons, policies of enforced Islamisation—for example, by making the distribution of food or medicine conditional upon the recipient's conversion to Islam—and the brutal forced relocation of displaced southerners in harsh desert conditions outside Khartoum. Time does not allow a fuller account now, but I shall put reports of our previous visits in your Lordships' Library.
This January, CSI sponsored another visit to the South. I regret that I have to report that the Khartoum Government have begun their dry season military offensive, with heavy fighting reported in three areas while we were there: around Wau, Yei and the southern Nuba Mountains. They have also been bombing civilians with Antonovs, targeting, for example, a church on a Sunday morning, a market and a hospital. There are reports of a massive build up of forces all along the frontier, with convoys of barges with military equipment on the Nile, and trainloads of soldiers, including Mujahadeen, converging for an all-out assault as soon as weather and ground conditions permit, probably within the next few days and weeks.
Everywhere we went, including Yambio, Nzara, Nimule, Akot and Ler, people are expecting to have to flee if government forces overrun their areas. If the SPLA cannot hold its positions, there could be a million more displaced people, adding to the 5 million already displaced. If the Government seal the borders, as they have threatened to do, the administrative infrastructure now maintained by the SPLA might break under the pressure and anarchic confusion develop, with all the horrors of a Somalia-like catastrophe.
As I have said, the civilian population has also suffered from fighting between the factions of the SPLA. I am therefore pleased to report that recently the two SPLA factions signed an agreement under the auspices of the Inter-Governmental Authority on Drought and Development, or IGADD, in which those leaders agreed to a cessation of inter-factional hostilities. We met the leaders of the two factions, Dr. John Garang and Dr. Riek Machar, and they both hope that this agreement will help them to withstand the onslaught from the North as well as to reduce the civilian suffering caused by inter-factional fighting. If it

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holds, that agreement is one ray of light on the dark horizon of Southern Sudan, but that horizon is dark indeed.
In terms of humanitarian need, there are vast numbers of people in dire situations receiving no help at all. Despite the valiant endeavours of many aid and relief organisations, to whom I must pay great tribute, shortages of resources prevent many in need from receiving any help, and others are inaccessible for political or logistical reasons. For example, in areas such as Nzara and Nimule, where much excellent work is being done, there are still inadequate resources to deal with growing numbers of TB cases and many are dying for lack of treatment. In other areas many people are completely unreached by aid of any kind—food or medicine. Of particular concern are the Nuba Mountains which have been effectively sealed off by the Khartoum Government. There is not a single doctor in that vast area behind SPLA lines, with up to 2 million people, and we were told that the people are so desperate that they will sell a cow in order to obtain a dose of penicillin.
But even in areas which are being served by massive relief operations, there is concern that there will continue to be a shortfall. For example, a senior official of the UN's Operation Lifeline Sudan (OLS) Southern Sector told us that Southern Sudan will require over 15,000 tonnes of food, medicine, seeds, tools and basic equipment over the next six months, and that it will cost 15 million dollars to transport that by air. Those figures are based on present needs and do not allow for increased needs caused by an escalation in military offensives—an escalation which is already occurring. The official also emphasised that OLS is prevented from meeting many urgent needs in the South, even where it has a mandate to do so. For example, in September 1993, the Government in the North withdrew permission for relief flights to Pariang, thereby suspending all relief work in that remote area; and the OLS was unable to gain access to Malakal for seven months in 1993, while reports reached Nairobi of many people dying for want of essential supplies. The official also confirmed that the OLS has no mandate to provide any aid at all to the Nuba Mountains.
I wish to draw particular attention to the plight of the people of the Nuba Mountains. They have been so cut off that a delegation, including Christians and Moslems, walked for 70 days to reach one area which we visited. In addition to their reports of the appalling lack of essential supplies, we also heard eye-witness accounts of atrocities inflicted by government forces. They described in convincing detail the way in which government troops attacked and burnt villages and their inhabitants; how their children had been taken into slavery and had been sold for between 300 to 500 Sudanese pounds per child in the open markets at Lagawa, El Daien and El Tabun; how churches were burnt and many people, including priests, pastors, catechists and elders killed. One witness from the Dilling area claimed 61 churches were burnt in 1991, giving details of locations; another witness from Um Durain described government attacks on villages, in which troops mowed down those who could not escape;
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burnt crops, causing approximately 12,000 people to die of starvation, and slaughtered Christian leaders, including Pastor Matta El Nur and Pastor Harun, who was found in his church in El Nugra and was crucified on 5th June 1990.
Other accounts of atrocities included the attack on Urn Sardibba, where reportedly government troops killed all the old people and Sheikh El Kumbulu Kori and Ibrahim Shai'i were crucified and had their ears cut off. Both are reported to be still alive. If so, there is evidence that crucifixions have been carried out on live victims, not just post mortem as had been previously suggested.
Other speakers gave examples of torture used in government detention centres, which they had suffered and/or seen inflicted on others. They included those procedures which have been consistently reported by victims leaving government detention centres in Southern Kordofan, for example, the "bag" method, in which the victim's head is put in a sack dusted with pepper and securely tied at the neck —the victim dies by inhaling the pepper—and the so-called "Mig" method, in which the victim is tied by the feet and hands behind the back and beaten until he makes a false confession or dies; and the torture and killing of detainees in front of relatives.
I have given some details to illustrate the kinds of very disturbing evidence submitted to us; I could give many more. I will also place a report of this visit which contains more details in your Lordships' Library. But before I leave the Nuba Mountains, I should like two of their people to speak for themselves:
"I witnessed these things for myself … And we are dying of famine and a complete lack of medicines. 3,960 people have died in Heiban area (alone) of starvation; another 2,000 have died of disease."
And another witness:
"The Nuba people feel neglected by the rest of the world. No country in the world is ready to support us, even with food."
Those words must constitute a challenge to us all. They are true. The people of the Nuba Mountains are entirely cut off and their plight is even worse than that of the desperate predicament of people suffering elsewhere in Sudan.
With this challenge, I turn to my final theme: a plea to the international community to step up its response to the crisis in Sudan as a matter of great urgency. In so doing, I hope that my noble friend the Minister may be able to respond sympathetically to the requests which I have been asked to convey to the British Government. They have been made in the belief that Britain has a special responsibility for the situation in Sudan, given the arrangements made prior to independence; and also, very positively, in the belief that the British have a unique understanding of the people, the cultures and the history of Sudan.
First, there is an urgent need for the international community to put pressure on the Khartoum Government to stop its military offensives against the people of the south and in the Nuba Mountains. We received many requests to ask the British Government to raise this issue as a matter of urgency at the UN Security Council; to consider an oil and arms embargo;

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the establishment of an air exclusion zone, to protect civilians against aerial bombardment; and the provision of safe havens and protected air/land corridors for aid.
Secondly, could the Government consider providing political and practical support (such as some resources for a secretariat) for the current IGADD initiative, to enable it to continue to try to support the peace agreement between the SPLA factions and to work towards a peace agreement between North and South.
Thirdly, many people in Sudan hope that the Government will fulfil their perceived historical responsibility by helping to find a solution which can bring peace and justice to Sudan. They hope that the British will understand that the people of the South and of the Nuba Mountains cannot continue in subjugation to the Khartoum Government, who are trying to annihilate them physically and/or to destroy their religions and their cultures. They hope for an opportunity to determine their own future, which they were denied at the time of independence.
Fourthly, would the Government support the endeavours of the UN Special Rapporteur for Human Rights, Dr. Gaspar Biro, and of other human rights agencies to gain full access to all parts of Sudan, especially to the Nuba Mountains, and to all prisoners of war and other prisoners, to try to stop the brutal maltreatment which has been so widely reported?
Fifthly, could the Government encourage the international community to put pressure on the government in Khartoum to ensure that areas which have been cut off, such as the Nuba Mountains, receive humanitarian aid before their people suffer genocide, or are forced to leave their land in order to survive? And could Britain do all in its power to encourage the international community to respond adequately to the growing need for more aid in Sudan, without which many hundreds of thousands more people will die? In that connection, may I say how much I welcome and support the Archbishop's appeal for help with humanitarian aid, and wish it great success in helping to meet the many unmet needs in Sudan today.
Perhaps I may finish with an appeal to the international Christian community. CSI invited the Roman Catholic Bishop of El Obeid to accompany us on our visit. He had been exiled from Sudan for three years. His return was a very moving experience for him and for all whom we met, for he is much loved and respected by Sudanese of all Christian denominations, as well as by many Moslems. I will never forget the rapture with which he was greeted as our plane touched down on one of those remote little landing strips and the ecstatic joy with which the people in Ler, who had not seen a bishop for 10 years, welcomed him.
I plead to the international Christian community not to forget their brothers and sisters in Sudan. Wherever we went, we received urgent pleas for help—for food, medicines and educational materials; but, above all, for resources to help the growing Church. The Christian Churches are growing very fast, despite, or perhaps because of, persecution. For example, one Presbyterian pastor whom I met had baptised 3,004 people in the previous two days. But wherever we went, people asked for resources to meet their spiritual needs even more
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urgently than those for physical survival. One pastor asked me to give this message to fellow Christians throughout the world:
"Please give hymn books, Bibles, blackboards, exercise books. Evangelists preaching the gospel have no shoes; when they walk at night they are bitten by snakes".
I returned from Sudan, troubled and yet inspired—deeply troubled by the suffering already so prevalent and the fear of worse to come; but deeply inspired by a people who endure their suffering with serenity and with the famous Sudanese smile. But I pray that we may respond to their needs so that soon they may be able to smile with joy, celebrating the peace and the justice for which they yearn.
11.17 p.m.
The Archbishop of Canterbury: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness for tabling the Unstarred Question which focuses on the critical condition of Sudan and what Britain might or might not be able to do as a friendly and concerned country. I wish to pay tribute to the remarkable contribution that the noble Baroness continues to make in bringing relief and humanitarian aid not only to the Sudan but also to other needy parts of the world like Nakorno-Karabakh and elsewhere. The work represents the best traditions of your Lordships' House in harmonising political leadership with compassionate care for those in need. I should like to express my gratitude for the noble Baroness's excellent speech.
I should like to say first how sorry I am that my planned pastoral visit to Northern Sudan was aborted. I have made it clear to the Sudanese Government that I hope such plans can be reinstated. Members of your Lordships' House may like to hear my own account of the sequence of events that led me, reluctantly and regretfully, to cancel that part of my visit on this occasion. I am, of course, very sorry that that decision also triggered off diplomatic difficulties between Her Majesty's Government and the Sudanese regime. I should like to make it clear that, although I am profoundly grateful for the unstinting practical help and advice of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office when I go overseas, I go solely as a representative of the Church, not of the Government. I make my own decisions and take full responsibility for them. It is wrong to blame the Foreign Office or anyone other than myself.
It is my invariable practice to go overseas only as the guest of the local Church; but I always seek to go with the agreement of the government of the country concerned. Planning for the Sudan began on that basis. Assurances were received from the Government of Sudan that my visit to the Church, South and North, would receive their good will and support. I wanted them to be in no doubt that I intended to be with my fellow Christians in the rebel-held South, as well as with those living in Khartoum and other places under government control. My programme and arrangements for the visit were developed in consultation with the Sudanese Goverment representatives. I was also glad to receive an invitation to meet the President which, again, is an opportunity which is normally offered to me and

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one which I am always pleased to accept. Arrangements were agreed accordingly, and visas were issued for me and my party.
Less than two weeks before my scheduled departure I was informed that the Sudanese Government insisted on my going as their official guest. I judged that to be inappropriate. No reasons were given for their sudden change of plan, and there were no guarantees that I would be free to carry out my pastoral duties as I wished. I sent an urgent letter to the President asking that that unprecedented reversal of plan should be reconsidered. I received no reply. On the day before I was due to leave I called off my visit to the North and prepared for my departure to Southern Sudan as planned. To have cancelled my visit to the South would have been an unwarranted and cruel blow to people who felt forgotten and looked to me as a spiritual leader. By going to the South I was able to visit a people in great need.
The situation in Sudan is dire, as the noble Baroness has explained. Over 5 million people have been displaced by the war and factors connected with it. Some 263,000 people live in camps for the displaced in Uganda, Kenya and elsewhere. Their number grows all the time. One of our bishops, Bishop Seme Solomona, recently led 100,000 displaced people into Uganda to seek refuge and help. But the colossal human price which these figures represent is not entirely due to the war between North and South. Unfortunately, the internecine warfare between the two main factions of SPLA has exacerbated the plight of many. I pray that the current ceasefire may hold. I am grateful to the noble Baroness for giving an up-to-date picture of the position of the two factions.
Starvation and famine through prolonged warfare has blighted a beautiful and fertile land. It is almost impossible to comprehend the vast numbers of those who have perished or become homeless and rootless, the children who have been orphaned and the women who are without menfolk. In the South very few viable structures of society survive. The Church is virtually alone in providing a network of care. I was delighted to see how well the Anglican, Roman Catholic and other Churches worked together.
I believe that Sudan is crying out to the world for help, which in part is humanitarian help. In this country we have a wonderful tradition of care. We have already responded to that cry. I pay tribute to what government, voluntary agencies and the public have already contributed. But the need is still urgent, as all the agencies in this country will underline. Starvation is a daily reality in the Sudan, especially during the present dry season.
As the noble Baroness recognised, I have recently launched a fresh appeal to the general public with the support of my colleagues in the Roman Catholic, free and orthodox Churches in this country. The appeal is administered by Christian Aid, Cafod and the Church Missionary Society. The money will go to the Sudanese churches to meet the humanitarian needs of people in
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both the North and South regardless of religion and race. I trust that the British people will welcome this further opportunity to do something to help.
But Sudan also cries out for justice. It is wrong to think that the struggle between the North and South is a religious conflict. Religion comes into it but it is not the reason why conflict has continued to rage for 30 years. It is not a fight between Christians and Moslems. They have been living together in Sudan for hundreds of years without conflict. I met several SPLA commanders who were Moslem. The issue is very much bound up with the kind of society and nation that people want. The people of the South and many in the Nuba mountains resist, and will continue to resist, what they see as domination by the North, if that domination means the imposition of religious law as binding upon all. Evidence produced for the United Nations and the recent report by Dr. Gaspar Biro, the Special Rapporteur, shows that human rights have been infringed in Sudan. Dr. Biro does not condone SPLA atrocities, but the sobering conclusion of his analytical report is that the Sudanese Government are responsible for the most far-reaching infringements.
I was myself told again and again that the Khartoum regime had committed all sorts of human rights violations falsely in the name of Islam. We all know that there are different strands of Islam, as there are of Christianity. I am myself totally committed to dialogue and mutual respect between these great world religions. The approach of many Moslems in the Sudan, I am sure, is totally different from the approach adopted by the more fundamentalist elements in the Government. The problem is fundamentalism and intolerance.
This is what one community leader said to me in Nimule. He wrote these words down for me to keep:
"Fundamentalism is not only a threat to the integrity of Sudanese society but indeed a threat to world peace. Our war is not a war of ideologies. We are fighting in self-defence for survival. We have been oppressed and degraded enough. In our struggle we dream of a day when our people will live in peace with dignity. We dream of a day when our children will be well nourished and getting education in plenty".
In my opinion, those words have a definite ring of truth about them. The people of Sudan are crying out for those primary human realities which we in this country take for granted: freedom of religion, freedom of speech and equality of opportunity. Those fundamental rights we are glad to acknowledge, and we are glad that they enjoyed by religious minorities in our country. Surely we must point out that such rights are universal and reciprocal. In our concern for the Sudanese people's physical survival, to which we respond generously and quickly, let us not ignore their cry for justice and human rights.
A curious irony is bound up in Britain's relationship with the Sudan. Our imprint is still very noticeable in Sudanese life and structures. They speak with great affection of the role we played in their country and they feel that their country and ours are bound in a brotherhood which still continues to this day. However, they wonder why we do not care for them any longer. Perhaps some of them do not grasp fully the realities of the post-colonial world. Indeed, the very thing they are

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asking us to do—to intervene on their behalf—is something we can no longer do so easily in this changed relationship.
Nevertheless, we have a continuing obligation to ask ourselves constantly what more can we do, going beyond humanitarian aid, to assist the many people in the Sudan, North and South, who are deprived of the very values which are essential to the human condition. It is not for me, as an Archbishop, to answer that question with authority. However, I am deeply unhappy that the international community seems powerless to do anything effective to advance the prospects of peace, human rights and religious toleration in the Sudan. I have, of course, made arrangements to brief both our own Government and the United Nations about what I have heard and seen, and have urged them to leave no stone unturned.
Obstructions to the flow of humanitarian aid throughout the Sudan must be tackled. Vigorous efforts should be made to lend fresh impetus to peace talks by every possible diplomatic channel. The Security Council should surely be pressed to discuss the report of the United Nations' Special Rapporteur and to take practical steps to follow it up. All this is immensely difficult, but we cannot give up on it. I can assure Her Majesty's Government and the United Nations that they can count on the continuing support of the Churches in any constructive moves to ease suffering and persecution and to advance the prospects of peace.
11.30 p.m.
Lord Cocks of Hartcliffe: My Lords, I rise tonight to pay tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, for the diligence and care with which she pursues her interests in minorities abroad. I think she is a shining example to us all of care, consideration and compassion, and also effective advocacy. I am privileged to follow her lead in speaking about the subject tonight.
I have raised the subject of the Sudan over several years in your Lordships' House and have had contact with a group of Sudanese in London over this time who have kept me informed of developments and the problems there, including Stephen Baak and Dr. Deng.
I also pay tribute to the most reverend Primate because in the past I have been critical in your Lordships' House about some of his colleagues on the Bishops' Bench. Indeed, on 17th April 1991, if I may weary your Lordships with it, at col. 1496 of Hansard, having discussed the plight of the Kurds, in whose interests the noble Baroness has also spoken frequently in this House, I mentioned that some of us had been trying to draw attention to the problems of the Christians. I said that the Bishops' Bench had for some years made no mention of the problems of their fellow Christians in Africa. I went on to say:
"I hope that the inauguration of Archbishop Carey will usher in a new interest and concern not only for the social and moral welfare of the people of this country but also for our Christian brothers and sisters abroad in many lands who need our continuing support".
So it is a great privilege and pleasure for me tonight to congratulate the most reverend Primate on his visit to the Sudan, with his wife. In one of his television interviews, I heard him say that he hoped that his visit
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had put the question of the Sudan's problems higher up on the international agenda. I am absolutely sure that it has done that. When he talks about the world community taking action, one of the prerequisites for that is that the subject moves up the international agenda. Unfortunately there are many problems which are of concern now in the international community, but he has done that. He has given the Sudan a much higher profile. I am much more confident now that some resolution of the problems may be reached. His visit has given renewed hope to those of us who have been pressing the case and I very much welcome what he has done. I wish him all the best in any future endeavours he may undertake. It is a great pleasure to see such an active person in his position.
11.33 p.m.
Lord Avebury: My Lords, I should like warmly to echo what has been said by the most reverend Primate and the noble Lord about the work which has been done by the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, in regard to the Sudan, Armenia and many other parts of the world where human rights problems have arisen. It is a great privilege to follow her in this debate, as I did 13 months ago when she last dealt with the serious problems that we face in the Sudan.
One is sorry to note that there has been no improvement over that period. In fact, if anything, matters have got worse, as the noble Baroness showed, and as the most reverend Primate also illustrated from his remarkable journey to the South. I wish to congratulate him on it, as the noble Lord, Lord Cocks, did. I think it would be helpful if more visits of that kind could be undertaken by the Church. There are many other parts of Africa which would benefit from the rare visits of the Bishop, as the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, has expressed it. I am sure that one could think on other occasions of places which would benefit enormously from the highlighting which the visit of the most reverend Primate has given to Southern Sudan. There is no doubt at all that television cameras will follow him, or any other prominent leader of the Church who goes to areas where human rights are being violated and where humanitarian relief is a serious problem.
Sudan is afflicted with two huge problems which are unlikely to go away so long as the military dictatorship of General Omar al-Bashir rules in Khartoum—the imposition of the Sharia in a particularly rigid way and the civil war in the South which has raged ever since just after the country attained independence in 1956, except for a decade after 1972 when the South had autonomy and its own internal government.
Those problems might have been solved by the coalition government which had been democratically elected if it had not been for the June 1989 coup by the present dictator, which was aided and abetted by the National Islamic Front of Dr. Hassan al-Turabi and which destroyed those hopes and instituted the darkest period in Sudan's history.
The military Islamists destroyed all the institutional structures which underpinned the democratic system in Sudan: free trade unions; professional associations; independent courts; autonomous universities; and a free

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press. They established a militia and a security apparatus to enforce the decrees of the dictatorship, and they tortured and murdered their opponents. They imported huge quantities of weaponry from Iran and China and tried to achieve a military solution in the South, as well as putting down unrest in the Nuba Mountains with the utmost brutality, as the noble Baroness has shown.
It is for those reasons that Sudan is universally condemned by democratic states, and why the United Nations appointed a Special Rapporteur, Dr. Gaspar Biro, to report on the gross and persistent violations of human rights which are still continuing. He has just produced a lengthy report which I had some difficulty in obtaining. It would be interesting to know whether the noble Baroness, Lady Chalker, when she comes to wind up, will be able to say that she has read the report. When I asked in the Library yesterday for a copy of it, they did not have one and there was no copy in the Foreign Office. It was not until this morning that, by some device, they managed to fax me a copy of Dr. Biro's report, which is apparently so difficult to obtain.
I must say that that happens very frequently with United Nations documents. They do not appear in the UN information office in London; they do not get to our Library in the House of Lords nor to the Library in the Commons at the other end of the corridor; nor do they seem to reach the Foreign Office, which is the place of last resort when the Libraries do not have them. I should be grateful to the noble Baroness if, when we come to debate these matters in future, she would ensure that any United Nations documents which are relevant to the matters that we are discussing are available slightly earlier than the morning of the debate in question.
In the South, the sufferings of the people have been compounded by the internal dispute that has been mentioned between the Torit faction under John Garang and the Nasr faction under Riak Machar. That has resulted, according to the US committee for refugees, in an estimated 1.3 million people perishing in the South in the past 10 years. The year to May 1993 was the worst so far. The World Refugee Survey, as has been mentioned, quotes 5 million Sudanese as being internally displaced by the conflict and by natural disasters; and the UN Secretary-General's representative on internally displaced persons told the Commission on Human Rights that half a million had been forced to seek refuge in neighbouring countries, a figure which does not tally with the 263,000 which was also quoted by Dr. Gaspar Biro, as was mentioned by the most reverend Primate. The Sudanese have drawn attention to that discrepancy, on which the noble Baroness might like to comment in her winding up.
However, an agreement was reached between the SPLA factions in November. It broke down almost immediately but was put together again finally with the help of President Moi of Kenya, to whom we should be most grateful. The parties said that self-determination for the people of South Sudan is the cornerstone of their position, but that was a restatement of a previous agreement made in June 1992.
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It is essential that the factions now reach a long-term peace settlement so that the killings of civilians, the crop burning, the cattle raids and other crimes committed by the armed groups themselves may be stopped and the prospects of a deal with the Government in Khartoum may be enhanced. The groups in the South may have their own political agendas and if peace is restored then a democratic process could be initiated to allow the peoples to choose which of the policies they prefer. In the meanwhile the groups should respect each other's right to exist and to lay programmes before the people. That might be embodied in a formal agreement committing them to respect international norms on freedom of expression and freedom of assembly. They might also, in such an agreement, concede the right of free transit through areas they control for humanitarian supplies, and they could establish mechanisms for co-ordinating their positions in any negotiations with the Government in Khartoum.
I believe that Britain could take a more active role in peace-making in the South. We know the region and its people from our experience as colonial administrators, and Britain is still very widely respected in the whole of Sudan, if not by the military rulers. I do not think that we should rely entirely on the efforts of the presidents of Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda and Eritrea to stimulate dialogue between the parties of the civil war, as the noble Baroness, Lady Chalker, told me in a letter of 23rd December, because the nature of the regime in Khartoum is such that it is very difficult for it to compromise.
The former Deputy Speaker of the Parliament, Mr. Aldo Ajou Deng, one of about 60 southerners in the Assembly, who fled the country on 15th December and is now seeking asylum in Britain, told me this afternoon that he despaired of any hope of an agreement, and that in the areas of the South which they control the Government are now extending the Islamisation programme into the schools, the judiciary and other sectors of public life. Although in the Abuja 1 agreement the regime had committed itself to the idea that the Sudan was a multi-lingual, multi-ethnic, multi-religious, multi-cultural state in which the diversity of peoples should be respected and upheld, the doctrines and ideology of the NIF were being imposed everywhere without discussion or negotiation.
So Britain should concentrate on shoring up the agreement between the SPLA factions and promoting whatever dialogue it can between them and the Democratic Alliance, the organisation which brings together the Umma Party, the DUP and other smaller democratic bodies. At the same time we should be organising preventive diplomacy to stop the offensive against the South which, the noble Baroness has said, Khartoum is about to begin. Could not that matter be referred to the Security Council as a threat to peace, and could we not warn Sudan that if that genocidal attack is launched it could lead to penalties?
I realise that there are some difficulties in getting a tough resolution through the Security Council and that the inclination of Moslem states would be to close ranks, while some others would be nervous of any move which appeared to them to infringe the principle of

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non-interference in the domestic affairs of member states. But an arms embargo might be a possibility. It has been alleged by the Sudanese Human Rights Organisation that Italy has been selling militarised tractors to the regime and that Germany has sold it ammunition for the GM3 small arms used by the Sudanese infantry. I do not know whether or not those allegations are true.
I draw your Lordships' attention to the agreement that was reached by the CSCE on "principles governing conventional arms transfers" on 23rd November 1993, in which the participating states agreed to take into account, in considering proposed arms transfers,
"the respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms in the recipient country; the internal and regional situation in and around the recipient country, in the light of existing tensions or armed conflicts".
States agreed to avoid transfers which would be likely to,
"be used for the violation or suppression of human rights…prolong or aggravate an existing armed conflict… be used for purpose of repression [or] support or encourage terrorism".
So I believe that it would be possible for the CSCE to agree that on all these criteria it is inappropriate to sell to Sudan weapons or technologies which could enhance the regime's military capability. But since non-CSCE states, including Iran and China, are Sudan's main suppliers an effective embargo would have to be imposed by a mandatory resolution of the Security Council, as the noble Baroness has proposed.
It might have been possible for Sudan to remain united and peaceful with a secular, liberal decentralised constitution. With a rabidly Islamic government in Khartoum which oppresses Moslem and Christian alike, there is not much likelihood of an accommodation between North arid South. Personally, I think that the best hope would be for the people of the South to get de facto control of the region and formally to declare their independence. That would at least enable some of the 3 million people who have been displaced to return to their homes and to begin the process of reconstruction. It would also allow the humanitarian agencies to gain access to many of the worst affected areas.
I point out that boundaries have always been liable to change throughout recorded history. The question is whether they will go on being changed only by violent means, as in the past, or whether the United Nations has the wisdom and the humanity to develop means of promoting peaceful change where there is an evident demand for it. That is a point which I know was being made by Madame Mitterrand on her visit to London last week. No doubt she made it personally to the noble Baroness, Lady Chalker, when they met on Thursday.
One million of the displaced, mainly Southerners, are living in squalid camps outside Khartoum to which they were forcibly relocated by the state. The last time we debated Sudan secular humanitarian agencies were being denied access to those camps. Perhaps the noble Baroness can say whether that is still the case. Have we any more information about the condition of those people and could not the Special Rapporteur do more to publicise their treatment by their own government?
The Special Rapporteur was in Sudan for a short visit in December. While he was at the UNDP offices in
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Khartoum, a group of women came to present a memorandum to him and were beaten and manhandled by the security staff. One woman did speak to Dr. Biro and told him about the case of her husband who was dismissed from the Petroleum Corporation, detained, tortured and had some of his assets arbitrarily confiscated on 14th December, while Dr. Biro was in Sudan. This is a repeat of what happened on the rapporteur's previous visit in September, when four women who came to see him were arrested outside the UN office. He himself describes how he saw two women being dragged along the street and forced into a police vehicle, and a few minutes later the police arrested another 25 persons, mainly women, who were waiting in front of the UN offices to see Dr. Biro.
The Special Rapporteur is said to have visited Kober Prison in Khartoum North, where he listened for an hour to an account by Brigadier Muhammad Ahmad al-Rayah of the tortures he suffered, and the brigadier also gave him the names of other torture victims. The Parliamentary Human Rights Group, of which I am chairman, received a copy of a complaint by the brigadier about the tortures he suffered, dated 14th August 1993. We sent that to the Sudanese Ambassador on 16th September. He replied that the matter was being submitted to the Attorney-General, and he would let us know when any further information was available. We wrote again on 7th November reminding the ambassador of his promise. On 16th December we wrote a third time, having learned that a vehicle in which the brigadier was being transferred from Suakin Prison to Port Sudan Hospital for medical treatment had been intercepted by one Captain Mohamed al-Amin, and diverted to Port Sudan security headquarters.
Also in the vehicle were a number of other people including Mr. Abdel Rahman Abdalla Nugdalla, former Minister for Religious Affairs. All the prisoners were further tortured at the security headquarters, it is alleged. Mr. Nugdalla, a leader of the Umma Party and an MP up to the dissolution of Parliament in the June 1989 coup, had been arrested in August 1991 and sentenced to life imprisonment. I told the Sudanese ambassador that an informant had seen him in Kober Prison in November, but since then he had been removed to an unknown location. We are still waiting for information about his whereabouts, but in the meanwhile we have referred the case to the Inter-Parliamentary Union. Its Committee on the Human Rights of Parliamentarians will no doubt make its own investigations.
I mention the case of Mr. Nugdalla because it seems that the military regime is targeting people who played a role in the democratic system before the coup. Mr. Sadiq al-Mahdi, the former Prime Minister of the democratically elected Government, was detained and interrogated for about eight hours on 11th November at the security headquarters after he had met the US ambassador, Mr. Donald Peterson. His wife, Ms Sara al-Mahdi, a prominent member of the Umma Party, was interrogated for 10 hours at security headquarters, mainly about a party discussion paper on self-determination. Mr. Abd al-Mahmud Haj Salih, a former prosecutor general, and three other lawyer members of

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the Umma Party were arrested, also in December, as was Mr. Sidahmad al-Husayn, deputy leader of the Democratic Unionist Party.
I heard from the Sudanese embassy this afternoon that the Chief Justice announced last week the formation of a judiciary committee to investigate the allegations of torture made by the brigadier. The problem is that now the judges in Sudan are not independent—they are members of the National Islamic Front and will do as they are told by the Government. The proposal is also open to the objection that, unless all the persons accused by the brigadier in his statement are legally represented and have the right to cross-examine and to make statements on things said by the other witnesses, the rules of natural justice may not be observed, as I am sure the noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe, would agree. If the regime had been minded to look into the brigadier's complaints, and for that matter any of the other victims, they could have had him medically examined, taken a proper statement, obtained the names of witnesses and taken statements from them, and, finally, decided whether there was enough evidence to justify prosecuting the torturers.
The Special Rapporteur no doubt receives information about all these and other arrests and cases of torture, but he is only on the spot for a few days each year on each of his two visits. It would be useful if he were to have an assistant permanently based in Sudan, so that he could receive first-hand accounts as soon as complaints arose, and also so that he could visit areas where gross violations of human rights are being perpetrated or are impending. He did get to the Nuba Mountains, where he visited government-held areas between 17th and 21st September 1993, although security considerations prevented him from going to the SPLA-held area. Dr. Biro heard a great deal of evidence about murder and other crimes against civilians in the region, by the army, the People's Defence Force and the SPLA. It should be noted, however, that the Dutch Minister of Development, Mr. Jan Pronk, who was in the Nuba Mountains from 23rd to 27th October, said that the situation there had improved. As the noble Baroness has said, 2 million people are effectively sealed off from the outside world, and it is particularly disturbing that the UN relief operation cannot get in there. Could we not try to persuade the Government and the SPLA to allow the ICRC to station representatives in the Nuba Mountains, with a view to ensuring compliance with common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions?
Sudanese refugees living in Britain say that the regime in Khartoum is irredeemably dangerous, both to its own people and to neighbouring states. I am disposed to agree with that conclusion. They accuse the military fundamentalists of sponsoring terrorism in Egypt and other countries in the region, an allegation which is also made by the US State Department on the basis of its intelligence reports. Sudan is impervious to pressure by the international community.
We must hope that in the end the people themselves will get rid of General al-Bashir, Dr. al-Turabi and all their works. In the meanwhile, the noble Baroness and the most reverend Primate have shown the people that,
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outside Sudan, there are those who care for them. They look forward to the day when they will enjoy the benefits that we have of democracy and freedom.
11.55 p.m.
Viscount Brentford: My Lords, I, too, should like to thank my noble friend Lady Cox for initiating this debate at this opportune moment. I warmly congratulate her and the most reverend Primate on their courageous journeys into the depths of Sudan. Undoubtedly both visits have had a great effect, as I am sure will the visit of Bishop Englehard of the German Lutheran Church, who I understand is in Sudan today.
The position is extremely serious. The problems of Sudan do not go away. I quote:
"Relations between the United Kingdom and Sudan have undergone a period of pronounced strain. This is not of our volition".
That statement seems to be applicable today, but it is actually a quote from the speech of my noble friend Lady Trumpington in our debate 13 months ago, on 9th December 1992, at col. 303. Nothing changes.
As I understand the position in Sudan today, the main priority is the peace process. As everyone has stated, it is not just a religious war, although I understand that many of the government forces are told that this is a jihad so that they have nothing to fear if they die in the war. However, this is not simply a war between Moslems and Christians; it is a much more complicated situation.
Perhaps I may first comment on the problems of the two factions in the South of Dr. Garang and Dr. Riak Mackar. It is vital that there is a united southern voice. My understanding is that the issues between the two men are resolved but that there remains the fear of each for the other. I believe that there is a lack of trust between them. Each fears the dominance of the other and what his own position will be.
I ask the Minister whether our Kenya High Commission can continue its influence in Sudan. While it is obviously impossible to give both of them any guarantee, perhaps our influence in that area may ease the problem between the two men in order to ensure that they will continue to work together.
My second point relates to the war between the North and the South. I was glad to learn about the report of the Special Rapporteur. I am not clear how far he went through the Sudan. Perhaps the Minister could clarify that point if she is aware of the contents of the report, as is the noble Lord, Lord Avebury. It seems valuable for the rapporteur to report as widely as possible to the world about the situation in the Sudan. I hope that his journeys are not being inhibited by the Khartoum Government.
Is this the right moment at which to raise the issue of Sudan with the Security Council? I know that the United Kingdom Government were instrumental in gaining the appointment of the rapporteur by raising the issue with the UNHCR. But is not now the moment to raise the matter in the Security Council with a view to obtaining a proposal through that body?
The Sudanese Government's military offensive has now begun because the dry season has arrived. The

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refugees are pouring over the border at the rate of 1,000 a day. The situation is deteriorating in the refugee camps and on the border. The Kenyans are fearful of the position deteriorating further because of the military offensive along the border with Kenya. I suggest therefore that, in view of the need of the adjacent countries, this is the right moment to raise the matter with the Security Council.
Leaving the peace process, which to me is the cardinal issue at the moment, I turn to talk about aid. There are two heads of aid, one of which is in Sudan itself about which quite a lot has already been said. In many parts of the South there is no infrastructure except for what the Church offers. The two regimes in the South do have some infrastructure, but in other parts it is only the Church. As has been said, there is exciting growth going on in the Church, in spite of all that is happening. In one diocese alone there have been 40 new churches established in the past 10 years and we need to encourage them. I hope that the Minister will be able to tell us about more government support going to the UN ventures and also to the NGOs which are working there.
The other deeply worrying issue is that of the refugee camps. There is a problem in analysing just how many there are. The numbers are increasing all the time and therefore some numbers are always out of date. But there is also a great need in those refugee camps and I hope that both charities' aid, including that which was recently initiated by the most reverend Primate, as well as the Government, will feed money in to provide the necessary supplies of food and medicine.
My third point concerns education, which has been mentioned but not touched on. In many parts of South Sudan at the moment there are no schools or books. A whole generation of Sudanese are growing up not knowing how to read and receiving no education at all. That is extremely serious, and I hope that the Government will be able to look at the question of education as well. I appreciate that food, the spiritual needs and medicine are crying out as being most important, but there is also a great need for education. I was even asked whether we could do something about a teacher training college in the South. I am not sure where that could be sited at the moment because I do not have the necessary information. But that question was raised in order to try to meet the problem of lack of education in the South of Sudan.
If I may use an overworked phrase, I believe that there is now a window of opportunity in Sudan because of the visits that were made and the start of the military offensive. The Sudan war is in the public eye and we should be doing what we can—I shall be glad to know what other action can be taken—in order to bring peace with justice to the Sudan.
12 midnight
The Earl of Longford: My Lords, I shall be extremely brief, as befits someone who has not been to the Sudan since 1950, and then only briefly. I am happy that my noble friend Lord Judd is to wind up from these Benches. He is not only an expert, as indeed is the noble Baroness, on all matters concerning overseas aid, but he is chairman of the Oxford Diocesan Board for Social
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Responsibility and preached last Sunday, I believe, on courage. I am sure that he will be the first to salute the courage of the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, who has had so many connections over a number of years, and also the moral courage—if I may respectfully say so as a lapsed Anglican of 50 years standing—shown by the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury under what must have been extremely trying conditions. It must have been extremely difficult to decide on the right course—and we must all agree that he chose what was the perfect course—in the circumstances. We are therefore most grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, the most reverend Primate and the other speakers.
My reason for speaking is that, as a Roman Catholic, it is as well to underline the fact that in this matter there is complete union between the Churches in this country and elsewhere. I inquired whether there was any distinct Catholic message. It would be wrong to say that there is. The one message is that heart and soul the Catholic Church is working together with the Church of England and the other Churches.
Time prevents me from reading the message of the Catholic Bishops. I shall confine myself to reading the message from the Pope, with which they conclude their letter. The prayer of the Pope was,
"that God's gift of peace will become a reality in your midst, that harmony and co-operation between North and South, between Christians and Muslims, will take the place of conflict, that obstacles to religious freedom will soon be a thing of the past".
That was the message of the Pope, with which I am sure everyone, Christian and otherwise, can heartily concur.
Several years ago President de Valera, who has always been one of my heroes, called on the Irish people to do what one small nation can do to heal the wounds of suffering humanity. Tonight we have heard a great deal about suffering humanity. Britain is a much larger country than Ireland but in the world picture it is only one country with a population of 50-odd million. I believe that all noble Lords who have spoken believe that we can do more and we have heard various suggestions. It would be impertinent of me to try to improve on what was suggested by the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, and the most reverend Primate. I am glad that they have taken this initiative and I believe that great good will result.
12.7 a.m.
Lord Robertson of Oakridge: My Lords, I should like to start by thanking the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, for initiating this debate and for bringing the situation in Sudan to our attention once more. I should also like to pay tribute to her courage in making yet another visit to South Sudan.
I listened with great interest to the account given by the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury of his visit to South Sudan early this month. His visit was also an act of considerable courage on his part and, of course, no less on the part of his wife. Furthermore, be brought Sudan into the headlines and that can only be for the good.
I wish to offer a few thoughts on the tragic situation in Sudan, to which there are no easy answers. First, as we know, Sudan is a huge country, divided into two

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parts which are completely different in people, religion, traditions and geography. The only common factor is their extreme poverty. They should never have been joined together under the same rule. The Sudanese Government are determined to keep them together, a policy which is being implemented with ruthlessness and much abuse of human rights. In particular, they are trying to bring the whole nation under the Sharia law, which, with its punishments of floggings and amputations and with its strong bias in favour of Moslems against members of other religions, is abhorrent to the people of South Sudan.
Secondly, I turn to South Sudan and the SPLA. We may need to remind ourselves of the extent to which, as so often in Africa and elsewhere, tribal factors bedevil the issue and cannot be ignored. The SPLA has split on tribal lines and there is a ferocious rivalry between the larger Dinka tribe and the Nuer and Shilluk tribes. Colonel John Garang, who formerly led the whole SPLA, now leads only the Dinka majority element.
Thirdly, I wish to draw attention to the disastrous economic situation and to the constant threat of famine in the event of a drought. That is made worse by the terrifying amount of soil erosion and deforestation, whose effects on the country will remain for a very long time.
Fourthly, I draw your Lordships' attention to the fact that the provision of humanitarian aid from outside is hampered by the absence of demilitarised corridors and by impassable roads into and through the South. That means that aid has to be delivered by air. The actions of the Sudanese Government exacerbate the situation. Regulations are changed, permissions are refused in both the North and the South and the bombing of relief centres has intensified.
We have no quarrel with either the government or the people of Sudan. Our only interest is the welfare of the Sudanese people who are the victims of the power struggle which has brought about the situation that we have been discussing this evening. What more can Her Majesty's Government do? Clearly, military intervention is out, although I presume that we have a contingency plan to evacuate British nationals if it ever became necessary. Sanctions would probably only aggravate the situation.
I believe that it is vital to maintain the flow of humanitarian aid, even if some of it goes astray. Pressure should be continued to be applied on the Sudanese authorities not to obstruct relief aid. The Sudanese Government should be urged to undertake not to impose Sharia law on the South but to allow freedom of religion. The leaders of the SPLA factions should be encouraged to implement the peace agreement between them which was signed last October. Any general solution would have to take into account tribal considerations. The IGADD initiative by neighbouring African states, which provides a ray of hope, should be supported. Lastly in this section I suggest that accurate information should continually be reported to the international community in order to maintain real
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pressure on the Sudanese Government. That should include a formal approach to the Security Council at the next opportune moment.
I end by saying that we should make it plain that we have a real and ongoing concern for the people of Sudan, especially the people of South Sudan. They will remain in our thoughts and our prayers. I look forward to the Minister's reply.
12.12 a.m.
Lord Judd: My Lords, it is clear that the whole House is deeply indebted to the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, for having tabled this Question tonight. Her deep compassion for the Sudanese and, indeed, if I may say so, her personal courage are an example to us all.
The most reverend Primate spoke with wisdom and sensitivity this evening. I found his reflections particularly telling. Of course he was right to change his travel plans in the circumstances that he described. However, we all trust that before long he will be able to visit the North. Perhaps I might just add that in his brief intervention I believe that the noble Earl, Lord Longford, made a powerful challenge on behalf of the Roman Catholic community, of which he is such a scion.
The tragedy that we are debating is of special significance because of the particularly good relations which used to exist between the United Kingdom and Sudan. It grieves us all to see that nation racked by drought, civil war and famine. Sadly, recent events have indicated no easing of the abysmal cycle.
The grim reality is that in all but 10 years since independence in 1956 Sudan has enjoyed no peace. Between 1 million and 2 million men, women and children have died or starved to death as a result of bitter civil war. Of a total population of between 20 million and 25 million, as many as 7 million suffer as displaced people in North and South, as refugees in neighbouring countries or as persecuted ethnic and religious groups. More than three-quarters of a million people live in unbelievably bad conditions, which I myself witnessed, around Khartoum. They are destitute and dependent upon assistance provided by non-governmental organisations.
Grave human rights abuses against civilians in the South have been committed—we must face it—both by the Sudanese army and by the SPLA. Ferocious feuding between the SPLA factions has aggravated the suffering. In the North serious human rights abuses have been committed by the Sudanese Government against critics in all religious and many political groupings—brave Moslems as well as Christians—and the notorious so-called "peace camps" to which the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, referred are cruelly used to pressurise dissenters.
I believe that the international community must remain firm in pressurising both the Sudanese Government and the SPLA to put an end to military abuses against the civilian population and to ensure that all parties to the conflict uphold and respect the principles enshrined in the Geneva Convention. Those measures are obviously no substitute for a full ceasefire, but until such a ceasefire can be achieved they would at

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least go some way towards offering a degree of protection to a civilian population which has borne the brunt of the carnage.
Amnesty International, in a recent report on the situation in Sudan, has described the assault on the civilian population by both government and SPLA forces as ruthless, and the consequence of a deliberate strategy, in a conflict which has claimed the lives of many thousands of people. Indeed, Amnesty has stated that the warring factions have shown:
"a flagrant contempt for human life",
and have committed the systematic abuse of human rights.
More generally, to make matters worse the extension of inappropriate large-scale farming systems has devastated much of Sudan's environment: 7 million hectares have lost their topsoil; erosion has accelerated; and, as the noble Lord, Lord Robertson, has just reminded us, about 95 per cent. of the forest of east Sudan has been lost; and some 14 million small farmers have lost their livelihood. Economic conditions in the North have deteriorated sharply. Inflation, currently estimated as perhaps as high as 200 per cent., is rising steeply, and many goods are in short supply.
Recent reports indicate that a new famine, caused by drought, is imminent in areas of the North as well as the South. There may be a shortfall of 1 million tonnes in the North alone, while parts of the South East, near the Kenyan-Ethiopian border, are already suffering the worst drought since the 1940s. The prospects of a mid-1980s famine are real. I hope that the Minister will be able to demonstrate tonight her determination to provide the emergency relief for which the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, called so powerfully tonight, in time and in the quantities necessary.
The most reverend Primate and the noble Viscount, Lord Brentford, were surely right to stress that the terrible crisis caused by misgovernment, war and natural disaster is far more complex than just a conflict between Christians and Moslems or between North and South. As they argued, its roots lie in a variety of ethnic, linguistic, cultural, religious, political and historical differences. It concerns all marginalised groups, including those of East and West. All Sudanese suffer under a harsh dogmatic government, and the related economic and political consequences of war.
Of course Islamic reaction to Western Christianity arid its ethos is a factor. Undoubtedly, the Islamic government will argue that Christians have in the past used resources to promote the spread of Christianity and are likely to continue to promote their evangelism through the distribution of relief and humanitarian services. The Sudanese Government will argue that they must prevent that. That may well be a genuine conviction. It illustrates the imperative for perseverence at building a new understanding, and for Christians in Sudan and elsewhere to make it plain beyond question that their relief services are for people in need, irrespective of race, religion, ethnicity and culture, and are never a means for evangelism.
It is essential to work also at inter-religious ecumenical dialogue aimed at the promotion of mutual understanding. Christians should be freed from the
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misconception of Islam as a religion of violence—that will require tangible evidence—and should themselves, whatever the contrary historical and current evidence elsewhere, demonstrate constantly their desire for peace in Sudan at least.
What is the role that the international community and the British Government should play? We on this side of the House recognise the Minister's concern. We welcome the Government's support for UN action to monitor abuses of human rights. That is a vital initiative, and Dr. Biro, the UN Special Rapporteur who has recently reported to the UN General Assembly in November, should continue to receive all possible British support, not least in ensuring, as the noble Viscount, Lord Brentford, argued, that his findings are considered by the Security Council.
We support the withdrawal of development aid from the Sudan and, equally, we strongly endorse the continued provision of emergency humanitarian aid through non-governmental organisations, the European Union, the UN's Operation Lifeline Sudan and the UN specialised agencies. We are glad the Government supported the appointment of Mr. Taxler as the UN Secretary-General's special envoy for humanitarian affairs in Sudan. We also take this opportunity to applaud the dedicated and imaginative service of Mr. Streams as an outstanding public servant in his post as ambassador to Sudan, and we deeply regret the action of the Sudanese Government in expelling him. It was entirely understandable that in response the British Government felt it necessary to expel the Sudanese ambassador to Britain, although we would be interested to hear from the Minister tonight how much co-ordination there was with our European partners on all this, and how far their ambassadors actively supported Mr. Streams. We hope, however, that this recent breach in diplomatic relations between the United Kingdom and Sudan will riot dampen the Government's resolve to play an active role in promoting a peaceful settlement. Before this breach happened we had been encouraged by the Government's efforts, for example as evidenced in the EC troika visit to South Sudan in 1992, to promote peace talks.
Nevertheless, while emphasising the common ground between both sides of the House, I hope the Minister will forgive me if I seek clarification on her position in two respects. Does she or does she not believe, as some have suggested, that a sustainable settlement cannot be reached in the short term? If not, why not? Is she or is she not, again as some have suggested, determined to keep a cap on humanitarian aid because of a belief that the need for relief will see no end while war continues? And, if she is so determined, how does she reconcile this position with allowing need and need alone to determine her humanitarian response? In asking these questions I am not suggesting cynicism on the part of the Minister. She is not a cynic. What I fear is that she may be allowing Whitehall's self-styled realism to cramp her natural humanitarian instincts. That would be sad in the midst of so much misery and suffering.
For aid to be effective the international community must continue to exert all possible leverage on the

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Sudanese Government, and on both factions of the SPLA, to allow the distribution of food aid to the civilian population and to ensure all parties to the conflict refrain from using emergency aid as a weapon of war. It is also crucial to seek to ensure that the Government of Sudan honour the agreed list of airstrips where relief planes can land under Operation Lifeline Sudan, and to call a halt to the bombardment of these airstrips, and that all sides agree to allow relief vehicles road access into Southern Sudan without being hampered by mining or other troop activity. But the most critically urgent priority of all is that the British Government should take all possible action to help get the peace process back on track. Time is the enemy, and the longer the international community vacillates, the more likely it is that people will die from the effects of drought and famine. This is the supreme challenge we must meet, as a matter of urgency, with our European Union partners and through the United Nations.
It would be most helpful if the noble Baroness could this evening brief the House about the latest situation on the ground with respect to the fighting, and confirm whether there have been any recent negotiations between the Government of Sudan and the leadership of the two SPLA factions. Can she also tell the House if the members of IGADD, the inter-governmental authority on diversification and development, have planned further meetings still further to promote the tentative peace between the until recently warring SPLA factions and to facilitate dialogue between the government and both parts of the SPLA? Does she agree that the IGADD committee, bringing together as it does the governments of adjacent Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya and Uganda, could well provide the best mechanism for making progress in achieving a ceasefire and eventual political settlement, and that the British Government and other Western governments should therefore provide the committee with all possible diplomatic and practical support to achieve these aims? As in all conflict situations, we must never forget that lasting solutions can only be made by the parties to the conflict themselves. The contributions by outsiders can only be to facilitate. Those outsiders must always be wary of disempowering the parties on which the future depends.
An effective ceasefire and negotiated settlement to end the fighting in Sudan are central to the very survival of the Sudanese people. These factors are self evidently the essential preconditions for the reconstruction and development which will be necessary to rebuild Sudan's war-shattered society and economy. Short of such an overall settlement, what is the Minister's response to the recommendation by the aid organisations that donors increase the capacity of local NGOs to develop effective systems to deliver relief aid and to begin the work of reconstruction in those communities which are comparatively stable? The NGO staff in the field face almost unimaginable difficulties, stemming from the fact that they are faced with virtually complete socio-economic and infrastructural collapse in many parts of the Sudan.
In April 1991 the Prime Minister pledged:
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"We shall not allow the plight of the African countries to be sidelined".
That pledge is being tested across the African continent, but nowhere more than in Sudan. The Government will have the full-hearted support of the Opposition if they are able to demonstrate an unyielding commitment to the people of Sudan, both by humanitarian relief efforts and by a determination to work for peace. As peace is achieved, the Government will again enjoy the unqualified support of these Benches if they demonstrate a resolve to play the most positive part possible in the reconstruction of that war-devastated land.
In conclusion, perhaps the House would permit me one more strategic observation. Why are we in this impasse at all? How will history judge us for having allowed so much death, suffering and destruction to happen—and this in the age of the supposed new world order? It is calculated that still for every £1000 of expenditure by the world on armaments, less than £1.50 is spent on peace-keeping, and only a fraction of £1.00 on conflict resolution and pre-emptive diplomacy. Looked at by an intelligent being from another galaxy, this would be the clinching evidence that whom God would destroy he first sends mad.
The real lesson of Sudan, as of Somalia, Angola, Yugoslavia and elsewhere, is that, with our responsibilities as a permanent member of the Security Council, the British Government should be in the vanguard of strengthening the role of the Secretary-General and the Security Council and the resources available to them to pre-empt collapse into chaos. Why is it that the post-Cold War world is still geared to preparing for war and, however inadequately, its consequences, but almost not at all to preparing for the prevention of war, and geared to coping with refugees but not at all to preventing the circumstances which generate refugees? The humanitarian challenge is clear, but I believe the economic case is overwhelming.
12.30 a.m.
Baroness Chalker of Wallasey: My Lords, I know that I speak for us all when I express my warm thanks to my noble friend Lady Cox for stimulating this debate. The fact that we are all more aware of the human tragedy that is unfolding in Sudan is due in no small measure to her tenacity, fortitude and courage. She has heightened public awareness, and she has played a real part in alleviating the suffering of the innocent, not only in Sudan but in many other places too. We owe her a very great debt of gratitude.
Others, too, are playing an invaluable role in bringing to our attention the terrible plight of the Sudanese people. I have not in my experience in this House seen our gallery so well attended at this late hour. I think that that speaks volumes for the concern that the nation has about the Sudan.
Perhaps I may thank the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury and two Members of another place, Mr. Robert Banks and Mr. Tony Worthington, for their visits. Caring people all over the world want to help Sudan. By his example in visiting Southern Sudan, the most reverend Primate, like my noble friend Lady

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Cox, has shown the way which, as we heard in the debate, is now being followed by other religious leaders. I know the real difficulty involved in the visit of the most reverend Primate and his wife. We are immensely grateful to them, and to my noble friend Lady Cox for her recent visit.
I am extremely sad that over a year since the problems of Sudan were last debated in your Lordships' House the situation is as grim as ever and, in a number of areas like the Nuba Mountains, is even worse than it was a year ago. The humanitarian crisis seems likely to deepen in the coming months. But, as many speakers have observed tonight, what makes the suffering in Sudan so heart-rending is that it is due predominantly to the hand of man. I do not exclude the problems of climate and lack of food. I shall return to them later. But it is the continuing civil war that is central to Sudan's problems. Peace remains elusive. Moreover, as the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, reminded us, the human rights situation is a cause for profound concern.
The relationship between the peoples of Sudan and Britain remains as close as ever. That continues to encourage us to remain engaged in these most difficult circumstances in three principal areas: the search for peace; the provision of humanitarian assistance; and pressure for respect for human rights. However, our ability to help has been further tried by the attitude of the Government of Sudan. As the noble Lord, Lord Judd, remarked, our relations with Khartoum have long been strained but they are particularly strained at present. I am grateful to the noble Lord for the remarks he made about Mr. Peter Streams, our ambassador to Khartoum.
The expulsion of Mr. Streams was symptomatic of the total inability of the Government of Sudan to tolerate hearing views which do not mirror their own. I should like to say just a few words about our ambassador. Some noble Lords have met him. I am sure that they will agree with me that he is a man of integrity, energy and fortitude. He faithfully and professionally conveyed the concerns of the British Government and of both Houses of Parliament to Khartoum, particularly as regards its human rights performance. He properly tried to keep in touch with and report the range of political opinion in Sudan, which was neither a very easy nor safe thing to do.
The regime's principal charges against him were organising an EC boycott of the anniversary celebrations of the 1989 coup d'état; the arrangements for the visit of Tony Worthington and Robert Banks (by which, we presume, Khartoum means the meetings he set up with opposition figures); and his role in the visit of the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury. On the first, Peter Streams participated in a collective discussion of EC heads of mission in Khartoum, the majority of whom decided for themselves not to attend the celebrations.
On the second, Mr. Streams was rightly ensuring that Robert Banks and Tony Worthington were introduced to the full range of political opinion. On the third, the most reverend Primate has said himself that his decision not to visit the North was his own, arrived at reluctantly but for clear reasons which we all understand. So the
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regime's conclusion that those three actions of Mr. Streams constituted interference in Sudan's internal affairs and a consequent breach of its sovereignty, speaks for itself. We utterly reject such a conclusion.
The countries of the European Union have also rejected Khartoum's position. Our 11 partners have summoned the Sudanese heads of mission accredited to them to express their deep regret at the expulsion of Mr. Streams. The view of our European partners is that the explanation for his expulsion is completely unsatisfactory. They have told the Sudanese representatives that the action of the Government of Sudan in expelling Peter Streams will have an adverse effect on relations between the European Union and the Government of Sudan. In response to Mr. Stream's expulsion we have requested the withdrawal of the Sudanese Ambassador in London. At present we have no plans to nominate a successor to Mr. Streams, nor will we agree to the appointment of a successor to the Sudanese Ambassador.
But we wish to try to have a dialogue with Khartoum, although the behaviour of Khartoum now makes that very difficult. Our embassy there will continue to support the international humanitarian effort and monitor the political scene. It will pay particular attention to human rights issues. As my noble friend Viscount Brentford reminded us, our High Commission in Nairobi is doing all it can to help with the factions in the South.
We are deeply concerned about the Government of Sudan's lack of commitment to the international relief effort which is designed to help their own people. Early last year they pledged to provide 153,000 tonnes of sorghum for the relief effort. So far, they have met only half of it, despite continuous pressure from the UN and the donors. Nor do the Government of the Sudan facilitate the relief effort. International NGOs face problems in obtaining visas and permits to work in Sudan. The Churches and NGOs have great difficulty in gaining access to areas in severe need if the Government of Sudan decide to intervene. Even if the NGOs are able to start work they are frequently hampered by the unlawful requisitioning of their equipment and supplies.
The complaints about impeding aid are not restricted to the Government of Sudan. A number of people have commented that all SPLA factions in the South have at times also been guilty of obstructing relief efforts or redirecting supplies to their own ends. However, in time, of war that is almost inevitable. We regularly raise our concerns both with the Sudanese Government and SPLA. We emphasise that allowing the United Nations and NGOs to operate unhampered offers the best hope of stability and at least some return to normality in the South. We shall continue our efforts and very much welcome the support of others in the field.
The noble Lord, Lord Avebury, asked me about displaced persons round Khartoum. While there are some signs of improvement in the approach of the Government of Sudan to the needs of the displaced in the camps, those people remain living in absolute misery. We continue to press for international NGOs to have better access. In the past year we provided

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£640,000 specifically to help meet the needs of the Khartoum displaced, but it is not easy to reach and help them, willing as we are to try.
Your Lordships asked about action at the Security Council, which is most important. We should be conscious that there are limits on our influence, but in the past we have discussed in your Lordships' House whether Sudan should be raised in the UN Security Council. My learned friend Baroness Cox suggested a number of specific measures that would require the mandate of the UN Security Council, including the establishment of safe havens, an air exclusion zone, corridors of tranquility and an oil and arms embargo. The most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury suggested that the Security Council might discuss the findings of the human rights Special Rapporteur. We have been active particularly in the past year in exploring all the possibilities of using the UN in different ways to keep Sudan under international focus. To achieve the right outcome from the Security Council the circumstances must be right. We must ensure that our action does not rebound and thus set back the cause of peace.
Despite the comments of my noble friend Lord Brentford, I am not yet convinced that all Security Council members would agree that the situation in Sudan constitutes a threat to international peace and security, but I understand the point that he makes. Certainly failure to act and to bring a resolution will indeed be a cancer within that part of Africa so long afflicted by the problems of Somalia and previously by problems in Ethiopia, Eritrea and even in Kenya and Uganda some years ago.
We must not place our arguments in a way that makes people believe that there is some sort of campaign between the Christian West and the Islamic world. That is an outcome which I am sure we all wish to avoid. Divisions in the Security Council which, as the noble Lord, Lord Judd, knows, one fears from time to time or, worse, a failed resolution in the Security Council, could unravel all the work of the past months in putting diplomatic pressure on the government in Khartoum. Therefore I hope that your Lordships will understand that we will do everything we can to resolve the situation but we must at times go a little more gently than might seem to an outside observer to be desirable. But I will not rest on this issue. It is too serious and it is too threatening.
As the noble Lord, Lord Judd, said, our development programme to Sudan closed in 1991, but we are a major bilateral donor of humanitarian assistance. We have committed over £50 million bilaterally since September 1990 when the food crisis began. That includes our efforts as one of the largest bilateral donors of emergency food aid, with commitments of nearly 123,000 tonnes in that time. Since 1st January last year we have pledged over £13 million, including some 25,000 tonnes of food aid. Most of that has already been allocated through the international agencies and the voluntary organisations.
The noble Lord, Lord Judd, asked me whether we were prepared to help with the new humanitarian crisis.
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The answer is: yes, yes, yes. I have already anticipated the need to ensure that food is available in the next few months while donors are considering the 1994 appeals. Last November I approved another 5,000 tonnes of food for Kordofan and we are ready to do more. Indeed the NGOs know that. Our aim is to provide the essentials to sustain life for those in the greatest need. That assistance has been predominantly food aid, shelter materials, medicines and other essentials. But we wish to encourage a return to self-sustainability where conditions permit. As a first step we provide seeds and tools to those who are able to resume subsistence agriculture and fishing.
We are also providing funds through the European Union. Last year the European Union provided transport costs for 74,000 tonnes of local sorghum as well as 37,000 tonnes of non-cereals through the World Food Programme and the NGOs. We have already committed 25,000 tonnes of food aid for delivery early this year. We have initiated and participated in a visit by the EC troika of humanitarian Ministers to Sudan in June last year. That directly conveyed the concern of European opinion at the human suffering throughout the country. There is no question of capping our humanitarian aid. We will help in every way we can.
We have, too, to help them deal with the problem of refugees. As my noble friend Lord Brentford said, the plight of those refugees and the burden they place on neighbouring states is a matter of grave concern. I discussed this matter with President Moi some three weeks ago and we have already helped the Sudanese refugees in Kenya and Uganda and we shall continue to be ready to help.
My noble friend also asked me about education. It is an OLS priority for 1994 and we will see how we can help through the SEPHA appeal. But we have also encouraged British non-governmental organisations to put proposals to us to help with the basic educational needs, for this situation is so serious in Southern Sudan.
We very much welcome the most reverend Primate's new appeal to help the people of Sudan through the Church organisations. All those organisations are working for mankind, regardless of belief. Although we already work with many of the organisations, I shall keep in close touch with the progress of the most reverend Primate's appeal.
There is great affection in Britain for Sudan, and a number of noble Lords have reminded us of that this evening. I know that for many Sudanese there is a hope that Britain can somehow step in and sort out Sudan's problems. As I have intimated, we have consistently supported regional peace efforts. The Prime Minister has been in contact with President Moi over the East African initiative. I have discussed the plight of the Sudanese people personally with all four of the East African presidents involved in the IGADD initiative in order to encourage their efforts. I have conveyed to them the United Kingdom's wholehearted support for their work. We keep in close touch with them and with our European Union partners, and the Union is adding its diplomatic weight behind the IGADD initiative, urging the parties, including, as the noble Lord, Lord Judd, and

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my noble friend Lord Brentford have suggested, the factions of the SPLA, to participate positively and constructively in the search for peace.
I understand the concern that we should take new steps in addition to those already taken—for example, giving the IGADD countries practical support with their work—and we are discussing possibilities about that in Brussels later this week.
One of the other points of which we need to be aware is that there needs to be a negotiated settlement which can allow all Sudanese to live in peace. It is not for Britain, or indeed the European Union, to define what that settlement should be. I do not believe it would advance the peace process were we to do so. So I will not seek to prejudge the outcome of future constitutional talks. But I will do all that I can to include all the people in those and to give them the support that they need. I believe that the people in the region are best placed to try to achieve the breakthrough that is so sorely needed.
In the past year we have seen no lull in the fighting in the South. Much of the misery was indeed due to fighting between the factions of the SPLA, as my noble friend Lady Cox has told us. But there have been efforts; although the Nigerian peace initiative failed to achieve a breakthrough. That is where, as I mentioned, the Presidents of Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia and Eritrea are seeking to assist, and we are backing them in their efforts. I was glad to see on 6th January that the leaders of the main SPLA factions had signed a joint declaration outlining their position on an agenda for peace talks. We now have to help them to hold those talks and to make sure that they bring real peace to the people.
There is not the success we would like to see. The East African leaders will go on working and I believe that there are at the moment fears amongst all those East African leaders that, before they are able to achieve some success, the Government of Sudan are planning a dry season offensive, as a number of noble Lords have mentioned. There are already some ugly reports of government bombing of civilian targets in the South. The problems of Southern Sudan will never be solved by military means. The Government in Khartoum claim to agree. But I may say that the international community will riot understand if their actions on the ground contradict their professed commitment to peace and negotiations. So I urge the Sudanese Government to heed this and to attend any meetings which the four IGADD countries may call in order to bring peace to Sudan.
It would be easy to talk for a whole half hour about the human rights situation. It is very dire, as the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, and many other noble Lords have told us. We make our concerns plain on each occasion: in Khartoum, to visiting Sudanese Ministers in London,
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and to the representatives of the SPLA. As noble Lords know, we have worked hard over the past year in the UN human rights institutions. We secured the appointment of Dr. Gaspar Biro as the special rapporteur.
I am sorry that the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, received a copy of Dr. Biro's report only this morning. I shall ensure that at least one copy is placed in the Library, because that is where it should be for your Lordships' access. His report makes depressing reading. We strongly supported a further resolution at last year's UN General Assembly highlighting the situation and commending Dr. Biro's work. It was interesting that it was passed by an unusually wide margin of 111 votes to 13. We must keep up the pressure at the spring session at the UN Commission on Human Rights in Geneva arid we shall work to ensure the renewal of the mandate for the special rapporteur.
I wish to make one general point. Our concern for human rights in Sudan is universal. It is not confined to the rights of Christians, the rights of Southerners or the rights of any particular group. We make representations to the SPLA as well as to the Government, so I assure your Lordships that there is no conspiracy against the Government of Sudan. We are not falsifying or exaggerating the problem. We and other members of the international community have a genuine concern and we expect the Sudanese Government to take this seriously. Above all, we want the UN Special Rapporteur and other observers to have full and unhindered access throughout Sudan, including, as my noble friend Lady Cox highlighted, to the Nuba Mountains.
I am deeply grateful to my noble friend for bringing this sad issue before us today. We are determined to press for an improvement in the situation, both through the continued, targeted provision of humanitarian relief and by pressing for political progress arid a better human rights record. The prospects are gloomy, and the chances of a peace breakthrough are not high. International opinion has an important role to play. I know that many Sudanese observers will take comfort from the concern which noble Lords and the most reverend Primate have expressed tonight, and from the detailed knowledge which is repeatedly shown in your Lordships' House about Sudan. For the Government's part, we shall continue to work as best we can to help bring the needless suffering in that country to an end. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Judd, when he says that we need more conflict resolution. And above all we need more prevention of war and conflict. I hope that before very much longer we shall see relief too for the people of Sudan.
House adjourned at seven minutes before one o'clock.

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