Sitting of 17 May 2000

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

  CITY OF LONDON (WARD ELECTIONS) BILL (BY ORDER)
  Order for further consideration, as amended, read.
  To be further considered on Wednesday 24 May.

Oral Answers to Questions
  NORTHERN IRELAND
  The Secretary of State was asked—
  NORTHERN IRELAND

    Security
    Mr. Malcolm Savidge: What steps he is taking to create a more normal security environment. [121142]
    The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr. Adam Ingram): The Government are committed to the normalisation of security arrangements in Northern Ireland, consistent with the threat level. Major progress has already been made. On the basis of his assessment of the overall threat level, and following the recent IRA statement, the Chief Constable last week announced a series of normalisation measures. A further review of possible normalisation steps will be conducted in three months' time.
    Mr. Savidge: Will my right hon. Friend join me in paying tribute to the many casualties of the troubles, particularly those among our armed services? Does he take heart from a recent BBC poll which showed, for the first time, that a majority of people in Northern Ireland believe that the war is over? Can he assure the House that the improved climate of peace can take us a long way to ensuring that the tragic losses of the past need not be repeated?
    Mr. Ingram: I thank my hon. Friend for his questions. He was right to say that there have been far too many deaths and casualties over the past 30 years. We take encouragement from opinion polls showing that the people are heartened and determined to see the peace process through. They are clearly calling on their politicians to find a resolution to the difficulties. People
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    want the improved climate of peace, and they want that peace to last for themselves, their children and the children of future generations.
    Mr. Lembit Öpik: Does the Minister agree that the recent sad increase in paramilitary beatings underlines the importance of progressing with and implementing the main thrust of the Patten proposals, to ensure that the rule of law replaces the lawless, brutal rule of paramilitary groups in some parts of the Province?
    Mr. Ingram: Paramilitary assaults are a gross abuse of human rights and a denial of civil liberties. They have no place in a democratic society and everyone committed to a peaceful future must roundly condemn them. I echo the sentiments expressed by the hon. Gentleman.
    Rev. Ian Paisley: Is the Minister aware of grave concern in my constituency following the announcement that the Progressive Unionist party office was harbouring terrorist weapons, including batons that could be used to beat up people? Will he announce that he is reconsidering the Government's talks with the PUP as a Belfast agreement party? Will he take steps to censure the PUP for its terrible breach of security?
    Mr. Ingram: First, it is correct to congratulate the Royal Ulster Constabulary on its find. As ever, the RUC has been vigilant, and we should pay tribute to its achievements. Secondly, this is a matter for police investigation, and it would be wrong of me to comment while the police are considering what they have found and all that flows from the find. We should not jump to conclusions before we have all the facts. I note the hon. Gentleman's remarks on the implications, but no one should doubt that we will not tolerate paramilitary activity from any side of the community in Northern Ireland.
    Mr. Steve McCabe: My right hon. Friend will be aware of recent speculation about the meanings of "deactivation" and "decommissioning". Can he confirm my understanding that those two processes are not the same thing, but part of a two-stage process to put arms totally beyond use?
    Mr. Ingram: The short answer is "absolutely". They are separate approaches. We hope that we have embarked on the first stage and that we shall move inexorably towards the later stages and the removal of illegally held weapons from Northern Ireland, now and in the future.
    Mr. William Thompson: Does the Minister agree that people would have more confidence in the return of normal security if those who had committed crimes were brought to justice? Does he realise that many of my constituents are deeply concerned that those who committed the Omagh bombing have not been brought to book? Even though the police and the Gardai know who those people were, they appear unable to bring them to justice. Is not some change in the law required so that those who commit such crimes are certain to be brought to justice?
    Mr. Ingram: The hon. Gentleman has touched on an important issue. It behoves everyone who wants a peaceful future for Northern Ireland to co-operate with

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    the forces of justice and law and order. Anyone who has information or evidence should give it to those who have the authority and responsibility for bringing people to justice. It is a great tragedy that no one has yet been made amenable in Northern Ireland for the terrible crime that was committed at Omagh. My earlier comments of course apply to that tragedy, as they do to every other terrorist and paramilitary crime that has been committed in Northern Ireland. It is better that people co-operate with the law than talk about changes to the law.
    Mr. Michael Howard: Will the Minister confirm or deny newspaper reports that the proposals set out in the recent IRA statement had been made previously, were referred to in the unpublished de Chastelain report, and were then rejected?
    Mr. Ingram: I do not think that the right hon. and learned Gentleman expects me to comment on newspaper reports. I am sure that he would not have done so when he was a Minister. We are moving forward much more rapidly than we have hitherto, and progress is being made. I would have hoped that the right hon. and learned Gentleman would have the grace to recognise and welcome that, as his Front Bench has, and to give support to everyone who is trying to make the process work.
    Mr. John M. Taylor: Does the Minister agree that the best way to create a more normal security environment is to obtain the decommissioning of the illegally held arms of private armies? Will he again assure the House that no changes in the security arrangements will be made without the full concurrence of the Chief Constable and the General Officer Commanding?
    Mr. Ingram: I think that I made it clear in my first reply that the answer is yes. The Chief Constable makes his assessment, and he advises the Secretary of State and myself. The General Officer Commanding is also consulted, and the best security advice available is taken. The announcements on the recent normalisation steps were made by the Chief Constable. He indicated that if the threat level improved, further announcements could be made in three months or perhaps even earlier.

    Health (Cross-border Co-operation)
    Mr. John McDonnell: What proposals he has for continued cross-border co-operation on health. [121144]
    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. George Howarth): There has been a long and productive history of cross-border co-operation on health and social services matters, which has brought positive benefits to the people living in both jurisdictions. This will continue across a range of services including health promotion, food safety and cancer research.
    Mr. McDonnell: The all-party group on the Irish in Britain recently considered the matter of health and is keen to encourage the sharing of best practice between clinicians. Will my hon. Friend assure us that cross-border co-operation will enable the sharing of best practice between clinicians north and south, and that there may
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    be some prospect of financial support for organisations, particularly voluntary organisations, that encourage the sharing of best practice?
    Mr. Howarth: There are already significant clinical links between health services, both north and south. I accept that there is scope to develop those links further, particularly when it comes to sharing clinical practices and exchanging information. We believe that such co-operation has the potential to contribute to the quality and effectiveness of services on both sides of the border. Together with Ministers from the south, I have been anxious to promote such co-operation.
    Given the right political climate and the right resources, there is also the scope for the voluntary sector to add to the work that is already under way. There will be opportunities for funding, although as any Minister would say in these circumstances, no guarantees can be given from the Dispatch Box about any particular project. However, I would certainly encourage such a development.
    Rev. Martin Smyth: The Minister has underlined that which is well known. Over the years, long before modern times, there has been good co-operation. It is equally true that when the board in Cork decided to purchase facilities in the Royal Victoria hospital, the local people objected.
    I encourage the Minister to give leadership at the level to which he referred. However, does he agree that too many people may have accommodation addresses in Northern Ireland, and that they benefit from our health budget at a time when there is pressure upon the budget throughout Northern Ireland?
    Mr. Howarth: If the hon. Gentleman has any evidence to support that contention, I would be happy to look at it. He will agree that when someone is ill and needs attention, they do not object to receiving the most appropriate treatment in either the north or the Republic if there are appropriate exchange arrangements. Where one gets the best possible treatment is not an ideological issue, and co-operation is logical and sensible in delivering those objectives.
    Mr. John McFall: Does my hon. Friend agree that the cancer care services agreement signed last autumn with the Republic of Ireland and the Washington-based Institute of Cancer heralds a great future for health services in Northern Ireland and shows that cross-border initiatives are extremely important? Does not that give fresh impetus to the need for the political talks that are taking place in a few days to ensure the restoration of the Executive, so that the people of Northern Ireland can look forward not just to more peace, but to more security and prosperity?
    Mr. Howarth: I agree with my hon. Friend, whom I congratulate on being the Minister responsible for taking that initiative forward. I had the good fortune last autumn to sign the memorandum of understanding between ourselves, the Americans and the Republic of Ireland, which, because of the severe cancer problems in Northern Ireland and much of the south, is a positive development. That is a good example of how co-operation can bring

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    force to dealing with the serious health problems that exist in the north and the south. It is important that we continue along those lines.

    Devolution
    Mr. John Wilkinson: What progress he has made towards the re-establishment of devolved government in Northern Ireland. [121145]
    The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (Mr. Peter Mandelson): As I explained in my statement to the House on 8 May, devolved government will be restored on 22 May, subject to a positive response to the proposals set out in the joint statement issued by the British and Irish Governments on 5 May, and the statement then made by the Provisional IRA.
    Mr. Wilkinson: Does the Secretary of State understand that the cornerstone and sure foundation of any democratic government, be it devolved or national, is the impartial and universal application of the rule of law? In that connection, rather than condoning the maintenance of terrorist weapons, will he insist on their elimination from society at the earliest possible date—because that elimination is infinitely more important than the institution of a Government who are subject to the threats and intimidation that the maintenance of stockpiles of weapons provides? Foreign visitors and inspectors are all very well, but the maintenance of that threat to democracy is deeply perturbing.
    Mr. Mandelson: I need no encouragement from the hon. Gentleman to restate my firm commitment to the rule of law throughout the United Kingdom. I agree that the aim must be for democracy to flourish in all parts of the UK. We need all paramilitary organisations to stand down and all arms—wherever they are held—to be completely and verifiably put beyond use. What is unprecedented about the situation now is that we have the real prospect of returning power to Northern Ireland and of making real and substantive progress on arms. Both objectives are ones for which Unionists have rightly held out. They should seize the credit for the progress that has been made.
    Mr. Harry Barnes: Can the Secretary of State clarify his intention about a name for the police force in Northern Ireland, as that is a matter of considerable dispute? The longer there is without clarity, the greater the problems are likely to be. It would help if we knew what it is to be.
    Mr. Mandelson: Two of Patten's stated objectives were that the RUC should not be disbanded and that the police service in future must be capable of attracting recruits from all parts of the community. We need to judge the future name against both those objectives. The Police (Northern Ireland) Bill requires me to consult the policing board before reaching a final decision on the name. I believe that the sensible way forward is to provide a legal description in the Bill which incorporates the Royal Ulster Constabulary, in effect the title deeds of the new service, while introducing a new name that will be used for all working and operational purposes. The Police
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    Service of Northern Ireland is the best suggestion so far. In that way we should be able to meet both of Patten's correct objectives.
    Mr. John D. Taylor: In view of the further unhelpful intervention this morning from the south of Ireland Foreign Minister, Mr. Cowen, when he condemned the Police (Northern Ireland) Bill which is before the House, does the Secretary of State think that he would enjoy less harassment if, instead of struggling to restore devolution, we continued with direct rule?
    Mr. Mandelson: No, I do not think that it would be in the interest of Northern Ireland or all those in every part the community there for direct rule to continue. For politics to flourish, locally elected and accountable politicians, taking responsibility for local decisions, is by far the best course for Northern Ireland's government in the future. I believe that we now have the prospect of reinstituting the devolved Administration and making real, lasting and permanent progress in the removal for ever of arms from Northern Ireland politics. We should seize that opportunity for fear that, if it slips from our grasp now, we may not be able to recreate it in the future.
    Mr. Eddie McGrady: Does the Secretary of State agree that the only true and lasting basis for the re-establishment of devolution in Northern Ireland would be on the basis of the accord reached between the two Governments and the parties participating? Does he agree that the only accord in existence is that obtained at Hillsborough on 5 May, and that that is the basis upon which re-establishment should take place? Does he also agree that a Government entering into further unilateral negotiations with a single party is creating an element of distrust which is diametrically opposed to the possibility of that accord being sustained in the immediate future?
    Mr. Mandelson: No. I think that it is as well for all politicians, political leaders and parties in Northern Ireland to clarify to the maximum extent exactly what the two Government statements meant and what actions and progress would ensue from the agreement. The Government intend to implement the Good Friday agreement in full. That is what is at the heart of the accord and the joint statements made by the two Governments. It is the essential political context in which we can restore the devolved institutions and make the necessary progress on arms. Implementation of the Good Friday agreement is essential and it is what the Government will press on with come what may.
    Mr. Andrew MacKay: As the Secretary of State is aware, we hope that there will be circumstances that allow for the setting up of the devolved Executive next week. On the assumption that that happens, the House needs to be clear about the right hon. Gentleman's position on suspension. He will be aware that there have been numerous reports in the Dublin press that some deal has been done with the Irish Government so that if there is default, he cannot suspend the Executive, as he rightly did a couple of months ago.
    Mr. Mandelson: I congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on his good news, which we have learned

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    today. It would be churlish of me to say that I am looking forward to his paternity leave. We wait to see what decision he makes.
    In answer to the right hon. Gentleman's question, I can say emphatically that no such undertaking has been given. Obviously, I am planning for success, not failure, following the restoration of the institutions next Monday. I am not planning to suspend the institutions and I do not want to do so, but the power is there if, in the last resort, I have to.
    Mr. MacKay: May I press the Secretary of State further? We want an assurance that he has given no private undertaking that, in the unhappy circumstance of there having been breaches of the arrangements, he will not suspend? May we have a categorical assurance that Dublin has no veto on this or any other matter, and that if it is necessary he will be prepared to suspend the Executive as he rightly did some two months ago?
    Mr. Mandelson: There has been absolutely no agreement or understanding with the Irish Government of the sort that the right hon. Gentleman has described. Obviously, if the worst comes to the worst, I will want to consult all the parties and the Irish Government—I do not intend to act unilaterally, without consulting people, or in a precipitate way—but at the end of the day, if the institutions are collapsing, I must ensure the good governance of Northern Ireland, and I will do so.

    Small and Medium-sized Enterprises
    Mr. Ben Chapman: What assessment he has made of the impact of the Budget on small and medium-sized enterprises in Northern Ireland. [121146]
    The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr. Adam Ingram): There can be no question but that the Budget announcement will help the growth of small and medium-sized enterprises in Northern Ireland, through encouraging competitiveness and innovation and through the use of e-commerce. That, of course, will be on top of the announcement made this morning by LEDU—the Local Economic Development Unit, which is Northern Ireland's small business agency—that more than 3,000 jobs were created and more than 1,200 new businesses were set up last year alone. That is all good news for Northern Ireland.
    Mr. Chapman: Does my right hon. Friend agree that while those Budget measures are beneficial and welcome in Northern Ireland, as elsewhere in the United Kingdom, the Northern Ireland economy needs stability, peace and confidence, and that to that extent the measures that he is putting in place are just as important as those put in place by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor? Does he further agree that in Northern Ireland there is a particular issue about research and development expenditure in the small firms sector, which is lower than in any other region of the UK? What steps does he propose to take to remedy that?
    Mr. Ingram: I agree with my hon. Friend's earlier comments. He is right to talk about confidence and
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    stability being essential to help businesses to grow. Peace is undoubtedly another important ingredient, which we are striving to achieve.
    The R and D tax relief measures outlined in the Budget should encourage innovation by small businesses, helping them to achieve greater competitiveness. That will help not only those businesses but those who are seeking jobs in Northern Ireland, and it will embed the peace process.

    Police-Terrorist Collusion
    Mr. David Trimble: What information he has supplied and what representations he has made to the Irish Government with regard to suspected collusion between members of the Irish police and terrorist organisations. [121149]
    The Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office (Mr. Adam Ingram): The Government keep in regular contact with the Irish Government on security-related matters. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State recently wrote to the Irish Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform following his announcement in the Dail on 13 April of an internal Garda investigation into allegations of Garda-PIRA collusion. That followed previous representations to the Irish Government in November and December last year—[Interruption.] The Government welcome the investigation and hope that it will be concluded thoroughly and speedily. [Interruption.]
    Madam Speaker: Order. I cannot hear the Minister, nor can Mr. Trimble hear the answer. I do not know what is going on. Had the Minister completed his answer?
    Mr. Ingram indicated assent.
    Madam Speaker: Could you hear the answer, Mr. Trimble?
    Mr. Trimble: Yes, Madam Speaker.
    Madam Speaker: Good—because I could not. Let us hear your supplementary question.
    Mr. Trimble: Thank you very much, Madam Speaker.
    I thank the Minister for the representations that are being made to the Irish authorities about the cases in which there is suspicion of collusion between Irish police and paramilitaries. May I refer him to one such case, involving the murder of Chief Superintendent Breen and Superintendent Buchanan, and in particular the report in Toby Harnden's authoritative book, which says that after the incident the RUC had evidence of a telephone call from an officer in Dundalk Gardai station to the IRA, setting up the ambush? Has that information and evidence been supplied to the Irish authorities and, if so, when?
    Mr. Ingram: Those who have the information would of course have supplied it, if it is in the hands of the authorities, through either the Government or the RUC. Clearly, we want a very thorough investigation into that murder and the others of which the right hon. Gentleman is all too well aware. We will monitor those investigations closely because the important aspect is that the killings took place in our jurisdiction in Northern Ireland.

  The Prime Minister was asked—
  PRIME MINISTER

    Engagements
    Mr. David Winnick: If he will list his official engagements for Wednesday 17 May.
    The Prime Minister (Mr. Tony Blair): This morning, I had meetings with ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House, I shall have further such meetings later today.
    Mr. Winnick: Is it not good news that the murderous leader of the rebels in Sierra Leone has been captured and taken to a safe location? Will he be tried for crimes against humanity, as I hope he will? Does my right hon. Friend agree that it would be unfortunate if we were ever to apologise when British service personnel are acting in defence of international law and the authority of the United Nations? Perhaps a few isolationists on the Tory Benches will learn that lesson.
    The Prime Minister: We can be very, very proud of our armed forces and what they have done in Sierra Leone. I believe that they should have been able to perform their task without some of the carping and quibbling from Conservative Members because the whole world is witnessing and applauding their central role in trying to deal with the so-called rebel army, which, in truth, is a criminal gang that has visited the most appalling atrocities on innocent civilians in Sierra Leone. I hope that the whole House is behind our armed forces in their efforts.
    Mr. William Hague: The chairman of the Police Federation has said that the reductions in police numbers in the past 18 months have left some
    communities with no policing at all
    and produced
    a sense of disorder and anarchy
    in some inner-city areas. Why does the Prime Minister think he said that?
    The Prime Minister: I do not believe that policing is in crisis; I do not agree with that. I accept that the numbers, which went down by 2,000 in the last years of the Government of which the right hon. Gentleman was a member, continued to go down in the first three years of this Government. By the end of this year, however, those numbers will be rising again as a result of the additional funds that we have put in—money that he is committed to take away from the police.
    Mr. Hague: So the Prime Minister does not understand why the Police Federation says that. He is meant to be able to cope with these questions now. His office sent a memo around the civil service, a report on which says:
    Rattled Tony Blair has caused fury in Whitehall by issuing new orders to civil servants to stop William Hague making a fool of him in the Commons.
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    The memo from his private secretary says that the "lines to take" prepared for the Prime Minister
    are often unusable and the facts are wrong.
    Well, we have been telling him that for years and nothing has changed. Why is it still the same today?
    The Police Federation has said that because police numbers are down by 2,300, thousands of serious offenders have been released early and crime is rising for the first time in six years. If the right hon. Gentleman has not understood that problem, will he listen to the former Minister for Welfare Reform who said that welfare
    fraud is so serious no Minister
    tells
    the public its true scale
    and the Government have abandoned his attempts to combat it? Why does he think that the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field) said that?
    The Prime Minister: Perhaps I can quote what the right hon. Gentleman's own chief constable has said on crime. The chief constable of North Yorkshire said:
    Our crime figures put into context some of the wild claims that have been made about the supposed wave of lawlessness sweeping rural England. Across North Yorkshire's largely rural two million acres we are driving crime down year after year.
    I have the latest crime figures for the right hon. Gentleman's constituency, and they show a fall of 3.2 per cent.
    On welfare, welfare bills for economic and social failure, which rose under the Tories by 4 per cent. in real terms every year, have fallen under this Government.
    Mr. Hague: The reason that the right hon. Member for Birkenhead said what he did is that welfare fraud is now up to £7 billion. The Prime Minister ought to know that because, after all his broken promises, fraud should be his special subject; he should know about these things. The number of successful prosecutions for housing benefit has been halved, and the Green Paper on benefit fraud has been shelved, but if he does not understand that problem, does he have an answer to the accountants Ernst and Young? They said last week that the burden of direct personal taxation in the current financial year is at the highest level for 20 years. Why does he think that they said that?
    The Prime Minister: The actual report of Ernst and Young made it clear that the tax burden next year and the year after is falling. [Interruption.] Yes, but it is more than that. The right hon. Gentleman's shadow Chancellor was interviewed a few days ago on how he could pay for both his tax policy and his commitments on spending. He said that the Conservatives can do it because now
    fortunately the national finances are good enough.
    Mr. Hague: What the Prime Minister needs to learn about is the family finances of the families of this country. The reason, which he does not know, why Ernst and Young said what it did is that the typical working family is paying £670 more in tax under his Government per year and the overall tax burden has gone up by 8p on the basic rate, or the equivalent of—and he said no tax increases at all.

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    If the Prime Minister does not understand the tax figures, did he understand the comments of the Confederation of British Industry yesterday? It said that the Government's policies
    all add up to the biggest and most damaging overhaul of…regulation for 20 years.
    Why does he think that the CBI said that?
    The Prime Minister: I can tell the right hon. Gentleman why the CBI said that because I have figures here for the CBI and the burden of regulation. The main part of it is the minimum wage. I thought that the right hon. Gentleman was in favour of the minimum wage now. The second part of it is paid holidays under the working time directive. Is he against that? The third part of itߞI have an interest in this—is parental leave. Is he against that?
    Mr. Hague: Once again, wherever they are looking for the facts, they are not coming up with many because £10 billion of extra regulation is the cost without the minimum wage, according to the British Chambers of Commerce. The Prime Minister clearly does not know what is happening in the real world, so does he know what is happening in the Government? Why did the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland yesterday blow open the Prime Minister's real intentions on the euro? Was he speaking for himself, or for the Government?
    The Prime Minister: I do not accept even the premise of the right hon. Gentleman's question. What the Secretary of State said, perfectly rightly, was that, of course, if one is outside a fixed currency area, then one's exchange rate will vary against the currencies inside it. I would have thought that even the right hon. Gentleman could have got that one.
    The right hon. Gentleman asked me about the memorandum from the civil service a bit earlier and all these killer facts. Fortunately, this week, it has given me some things that I would like to tell the House. The system has got better. This is what it says: crime doubled under the Tories—killer fact; unemployment trebled under the Tories—killer fact; interest rates reached 15 per cent. under the Tories—killer fact; child poverty tripled under the Tories—killer fact; there were 40,000 fewer beds in the health service under the Tories—killer fact. Killer judgment—we should not have the Tories back again.
    Mr. Hague: The truth is that the Prime Minister is in office now and responsible for these matters—that is the killer fact. So now we know from him that the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland speaks for the Government on the euro. That will be big news to a lot of people, including the Chancellor. They talk about the euro, but they are out of touch on crime, they are out of touch on tax, and they are out of touch on welfare fraud. We now have a Prime Minister who hears but does not listen, who speaks but says nothing, and who pretends to lead but is going nowhere.
    The Prime Minister: I am afraid I must tell the right hon. Gentleman this. He talked about our record in government, but the killer facts do not stop with his record. Killer fact—inflation is now at its lowest level for
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    25 years; killer fact—there are 920,000 more jobs under this Government; killer fact—1.2 million children have been lifted out of poverty.
    Killer judgment? How about this, from his very, very own—[Interruption.] Yes, this is from that mine of quotations, the shadow Chancellor:
    Well, governments are in a strong position when the economy is doing well, there's absolutely no denying that and I'm not going to go around saying that the economy is not doing well.
    I gave the killer facts and he gave the killer judgment—and so will the British people at the next election.
    Ms Jenny Jones: Like many other Members, from time to time I have to explain to my constituents why their close relatives have not been allowed into this country to attend weddings and funerals. Does my right hon. Friend agree that my task will be made more difficult if Mike Tyson, who has been convicted of a serious criminal offence, is allowed into the country for purely commercial gain?
    The Prime Minister: I am tempted to say that that is a decision for the Home Secretary—and I should be glad about that. Let me simply say, however, that I am afraid I agree with the Home Secretary's previous decision. He will obviously have to make his decision over the next few weeks, and I am sure that he will do so.
    Mr. Charles Kennedy: When the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland said last night that as long as we remained outside the euro we could not protect our industry against an overvalued pound, was he on-message or off-message?
    The Prime Minister: Of course, as I just pointed out to the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague), if we are outside a fixed currency area our exchange rate will vary, but whether we should join a single currency depends on the meeting of economic conditions that we have set out time and again. That is the sensible position.
    Lest anyone should think that the issue of currency stability is new, let me quote from what the Chancellor said in his initial statement to the House in October 1997. He said:
    The potential benefits for Britain of a successful single currency are obvious in terms of trade, transparency of costs and currency stability.—[Official Report, 27 October 1997; Vol. 299, c. 583.]
    He went on to say, however:
    The economic conditions, which are really about sustainable convergence, have to be met.
    That is the position, and it remains the position.
    Mr. Kennedy: As the Prime Minister has had some time to think about the position since the Chancellor's statement, can he give the benefit of his analysis, as of today? When does he expect us to meet the Chancellor's economic criteria, and does he hope that we will meet the Government's criteria? Is it not about time that he began to give a real national lead?
    The Prime Minister: The timetable is as I have set it out many times, and that was repeated by the Chancellor in his statement.

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    There are really three positions on the single currency. One is to rule it out as a matter of principle. The second is to say that we will join immediately. The third is to say that whether we join depends on the economic conditions' being met. But the timing depends on the economic conditions. Unless the right hon. Gentleman believes that we should join now—
    Mr. Kennedy indicated dissent.
    The Prime Minister: In that case, the right hon. Gentleman believes the same as me—that it depends on the meeting of those economic conditions. The sensible position on the single currency is to say that the test is jobs, industry and British investment. The final say is with the people in a referendum, and what would be most damaging would be to rule it out for five years, 10 years or whatever arbitrary period the Conservatives have in mind. The best thing is to keep the option open and to exercise it according to the economic conditions. If that is not the right hon. Gentleman's position, he should say so.
    Dr. Tony Wright: On the question of Europe, could my right hon. Friend tell the House whether he can envisage any realistic circumstances in the foreseeable future in which, having applied all the necessary tests, he might conclude that it was not in the British national interest to join the single European currency?
    The Prime Minister: As I said a moment or two ago, we have already set out the timetable for an assessment of that, as we have said, early in the next Parliament. However, it is the economic conditions that count. [Interruption.] I know that Conservative Members disagree with that, but I believe that in the end the test for the British people—they will have the final say in a referendum—will be what is good for British jobs, British prosperity and British industry. The sensible thing is not to set ourselves an arbitrary time limit, but to say that we should judge it according to the economic conditions. That is precisely what we have done.
    Mr. John Randall: Could the Prime Minister explain why, last week, within hours of giving his personal pledge to this Chamber that Labour Members of the Greater London Assembly would abide by their manifesto commitment not to introduce congestion charges, the Labour Deputy Mayor said that they were possible—that it was just a matter of technicalities? Did someone forget to tell the Prime Minister, or is his word just worthless?
    The Prime Minister: No, the Labour Members of the GLA, as far as I am aware, have made it clear that they do not support congestion charging.
    Mr. Tam Dalyell: If Stella Rimington is to publish her memoirs, can we be sure that they are not selective? Will there be a chapter about 1986, when she acted as an agent provocateur for David Hart and Margaret Thatcher against the National Union of Mineworkers?
    The Prime Minister: First, if the memoirs are not selective, they will be the first ones that I have ever come
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    across that are not. Secondly, anyone who has occupied the type of position that Dame Stella Rimington occupied has to go through a procedure to publish memoirs, and that is the procedure that she is going through now. That is something that will take its course in the normal way. I really cannot comment on what happened in 1986—when, as my hon. Friend probably recalls, we were not in office.
    Mr. Michael Fabricant: Whether or not a commercial broadcaster will cover the Queen Mother's 100th birthday celebrations, does the Prime Minister share my disgust at the BBC's arrogant refusal to provide live coverage of them on either of its two terrestrial channels? If he does agree, what will he do to persuade the BBC to take an alternative course of action, and how will he spell out to it the meaning of public service broadcasting?
    The Prime Minister: I hope that, later, a way through on the matter will be found. I think that everyone would like to see a televised broadcast of the Queen Mother's celebration, because everyone wishes her well. It will be a fantastic event for the whole nation. I therefore very much hope that the matter can be resolved.
    Mr. Christopher Leslie: Is my right hon. Friend aware that, as we have had traffic congestion for decades in the Aire valley, in my constituency, it is extremely welcome news that the Government have accelerated construction of the £60 million Bingley relief road? However, would he take it from me that my constituents are very worried indeed about what would happen to that scheme—about whether it would be scrapped—if the Conservatives' spending cuts guarantee were ever implemented?
    The Prime Minister: My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions tells me that my hon. Friend was extremely active in ensuring that that decision was taken. I therefore congratulate him on the decision, which I am sure is good news for his constituents. Of course, the point that he makes about Tory spending is right. At some point before the next general election, Conservative Members will have to explain how they can go around the country saying that they will chop everyone's taxes at the same time as increasing spending in virtually every single policy area. Their sums do not add up. At some point, they will have to explain them.
    Mr. Malcolm Bruce: Does the Prime Minister understand that the people of north-east Scotland were devastated by yesterday's announcement that RAF Buchan is to be downgraded, with the loss of 350 jobs and almost £10 million a year to the local economy? Does he also appreciate the resentment caused by the fact that, when the number of control reporting centres in the air surveillance system is being reduced from three to two, the two that are being retained are in England, whereas the centre that has been closed is the advanced one, in Scotland? What assurances can he give

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    to hard-pressed Aberdeenshire council on how it will be able to cope with this latest blow to the local economy, which is already coping with cuts and redundancies?
    The Prime Minister: Of course we will do what we can to help Aberdeenshire council, but the changes that are taking place are part of an overall review of how we make best use of the resources that we have. In those changes, there will be things that people find unpopular or unpalatable, but they are necessary to put the service on a sound footing for the future. We will work with those who are displaced to make sure that they are provided for elsewhere.
    Mr. Tony Colman: Is my right hon. Friend aware that one month before the last election, the then Tory Government effectively closed my local hospital—Queen Mary's, Roehampton? Is he further aware that in the past month, the new Queen Mary's hospital has been given the go-ahead for building to start next year? Does he agree that that shows the difference between a Tory Government who closed hospitals and a Labour Government who open hospitals?
    The Prime Minister: That is an important announcement for my hon. Friend's constituency. Although many people want to point to the bad things and the difficulties that the health service has, it is worth pointing out the good news, too. There are many cases throughout the country of change happening on the ground, allowing us to build new hospitals and recruit more nurses. We have seen from the figures today that, although there is a long way to go, in-patient and out-patient lists are coming down. Yes, we have a great deal more to do, but real change is happening and I wish that among some of the coverage of the bad cases and the problems we got some coverage of some of the good news that is happening as well.
    Mr. David Trimble: May I refer the Prime Minister to the recent statement by the IRA? In particular, I refer to the passage that says that it will initiate
    a process that will completely and verifiably put arms beyond use.
    What does "beyond use" mean? Does the Prime Minister agree that a system under which dumps are occasionally inspected would not be a satisfactory outcome? We want proper decommissioning within the terms of the legislation that is on the statute book for it.
    The Prime Minister: Yes, I can give the right hon. Gentleman that assurance. The dumps are an important confidence-building measure, but they are not a substitute for the full action that needs to be taken under the legislation. The legislation refers to arms being permanently unusable. It is very important that people understand that the confidence-building measure is a first step, but no more than that. A re-engagement with the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning also has to be undertaken. We then need to make progress until the weapons are completely, verifiably beyond use.
    Mr. Bill O'Brien: Will my right hon. Friend accept through me the sincere thanks and appreciation of the miners and the mining communities for the initiative and help that he and his
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    Government have given to the mining industry, thereby demonstrating confidence in and loyalty to those communities? Will he consider including clean coal technology along with energy renewables, thereby encouraging investment in the construction of clean coal power stations, which in turn would ensure a long-term future for the miners?
    The Prime Minister: It is important to support clean coal technology. Particularly when there is still tremendous change in the mining industry, it is important that we do what we can to help. That is why the Government provided additional help for the coal industry a few weeks ago. I am pleased to see that unemployment in my hon. Friend's constituency has fallen by more than 20 per cent. in the past year. That is important. Employment is also up in his constituency. That shows that even in parts of the country undergoing economic change, there are other jobs there. We are trying to help people through the process of change and we are on their side. We will do what we can to give the coal industry a secure and environmentally beneficial future.
    Mr. Nicholas Soames: Does the Prime Minister accept that the Conservatives take tremendous pride in the success of British arms in Sierra Leone? It is quite wrong for him to suggest that it should be otherwise. Will he also explain to the House why, in view of his much-vaunted and much-hyped plan for European defence co-operation, not one of our European allies and friends has come to help us in what is a very difficult task?
    The Prime Minister: I absolve the hon. Gentleman entirely from the carping and quibbling that I talked about earlier, although I do not absolve those on the Conservative Front Bench and other Conservative Members. The hon. Gentleman asked about European forces. A UN force is primarily expected to deal with the situation in Sierra Leone and it is natural that forces should have been drawn from India, Nigeria and Jordan. We have played a supporting role. Obviously, we have an interest in Sierra Leone, as the former colonial power, and our troops have made a magnificent contribution. However, we should not necessarily expect that to be right for the European force.
    Mr. James Plaskitt: Parish councils in my constituency have raised with me the issue of rural policing. Police numbers in Warwickshire fell under the previous Government, but they will now rise by 52 over the next two years. Does my right hon. Friend agree that increased police numbers are central to addressing rural concerns, as opposed to the knee-jerk suggestions that we have heard from the crime doublers opposite?
    Hon. Members: Bye bye!
    The Prime Minister: The Conservatives are all shouting, "Bye bye" to my hon. Friend, but I think they have forgotten Romsey. Their memories are very short. My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Not merely has burglary declined by 10 per cent. in his area, but there are 52 new recruits to the police service. It is worth pointing out that in 24 of the 43 forces crime is falling. We shall

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    ensure that because of the extra recruits that will be coming on throughout this year, by the end of the year police numbers will rise again. If we carry on running a sound and strong economy, as the shadow Chancellor would have it, we shall be able to get the money in for the future that will allow those numbers to rise even further over time.
    Jackie Ballard: We have not forgotten Romsey.
    Eight months after the Prime Minister promised access to dentistry for all, not one dentist in my constituency is taking new national health service patients. Earlier today, Government Whips phoned my office to find out what my question was about, so I know that the Prime Minister's response will be well prepared. However, I hope that he does not just tell my constituents that they can phone and go. They are fed up with having to travel 20 miles even for emergency treatment. When will the Government take effective action to end the crisis in dentistry?
    The Prime Minister: The hon. Lady is right to say that I did get some briefing on her question. [HON. MEMBERS: "Are we going to hear the answer?"] I will tell the hon. Lady what it says here anyway. The numbers registered with dentists in Somerset are increasing—they are 5,000 up on last year. However, I accept that NHS dentistry went into steep decline under the previous Government. We are now acting at every single point on the health service, but it will take time. We have set the date for the end of next year to make sure that everyone who wants access to NHS dentistry can have it. The numbers are already up. Up to 800,000 more people have had the opportunity to register with a dentist. Dentist figures in England are up to 18,000, but there is still a long way to go. I recognise that in the hon. Lady's constituency and elsewhere there may be people who still have to be dealt with under the programme, but given time we will do it.
    Mrs. Maria Fyfe: Does my right hon. Friend agree that anyone who invites a convicted rapist and attacker of old people in a road rage incident to star in a boxing match is hardly acting consistently with the Government's message against crime and violence and, in particular, violence against women?
    The Prime Minister: I am afraid that I cannot offer my hon. Friend anything other than what I said in response to the same question a few minutes ago.
    Mr. Martin Bell: I make no apology for returning to the issue of a gratuity for former far east prisoners of war. The Ministry of Defence is said to be against it on the grounds that it would set a precedent. Does the Prime Minister share my view that it is a matter not of precedent but of principle, that we owe these men a debt of honour and that it is a debt that we should pay?
    The Prime Minister: As I think I said to the hon. Gentleman when he raised the matter a couple of weeks ago, it is under consideration. A decision will be announced as soon as possible. It would not be wise for me to say anything more until it is announced.
    Mr. Paul Goggins: Is my right hon. Friend aware that at the 1995 United Nations social summit the previous Conservative Government made a promise to put in place an anti-poverty strategy for the United Kingdom? Is he further aware that shortly afterwards the then Secretary of State for Social Security said that such a plan was unnecessary? Given the appalling scale of poverty that the previous Government left behind, will my right hon. Friend ensure that his Government are not so complacent, and that a full report is given to the social summit when it reconvenes in Geneva next month?
    The Prime Minister: We can be very proud of our record on child poverty. As I said earlier, during this Parliament 1.2 million children will be lifted out of poverty. There has been a 26 per cent. increase in child benefit in real terms, and the working families tax credit is benefiting—by more than £20 a week in many cases—some one and a quarter million families.
    People should know that this is a key dividing line between us and the Conservative party. The Opposition are committed to scrapping every bit of the changes that we have introduced over the past few years. They are against the rise in child benefit, they are committed to scrapping the working families tax credit, and they are committed to scrapping the new deal. Those are three of the best reasons that I can think of for never voting Tory again.

Police Training and Complaints
3.31 pm
The Minister of State, Home Office (Mr. Charles Clarke): With permission, Madam Speaker, I shall make a statement on two important developments that will help to improve the effectiveness of the police and their accountability to the communities that they serve.
The first announcement relates to the handling of complaints against the police. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is publishing this afternoon a feasibility study of an independent police complaints system. The study was commissioned from the management consultants KPMG in order to take forward recommendations made by the Select Committee on Home Affairs in its report on police disciplinary and complaints procedures, and by Sir William Macpherson's report on the Stephen Lawrence inquiry. The human rights organisation Liberty is also publishing today an independent report on its vision for the future police complaints system, and I welcome Liberty's constructive contribution to the debate on the police complaints system.
My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has previously indicated his sympathy for the principle of an independent system for investigating complaints against the police, and both the KPMG and Liberty reports contain constructive ideas on how that might work in practice. We do not, at this stage, have a preferred model for a new complaints system, but we are clear that if any reform of the current system is to command public confidence, it must involve a greater independent element in the investigation of complaints and greater openness in respect of the result of those investigations.
We are also publishing a consultation paper this afternoon to invite comments on the key issues raised by the KPMG and Liberty reports. That paper is being placed in the Library of the House, along with the two reports. The consultation period will run until 30 June, and in the light of the comments received, we intend to announce by the end of the year more detailed proposals on the way forward.
We are also announcing today a wide range of measures to improve the quality and effectiveness of police training in England and Wales, with a view to improving efficiency, using the most modern training techniques, and strengthening police relations with the communities that they serve and with victims of crime.
On 18 November last year we published a consultation paper that set out ambitious proposals. We want to ensure high quality profession-long training for all police staff. We will put in place common national standards for all staff, which will ensure consistency of service to the public. We want to ensure that police training—which already enjoys a well deserved international reputation—is truly world class.
Training is at the heart of effective and responsive policing. Virtually all those who responded to the consultation paper welcomed the fact that training was being examined and debated. The majority of responses broadly welcomed the proposals. In a Home Office paper available in the Library of the House, I have set out the main comments on each element of the proposals and how we plan to take these measures forward.
We will streamline the existing police training council so that it can advise the Home Secretary more effectively. We will work with the Association of Chief Police
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Officers, the Association of Police Authorities and the relevant staff associations to establish a new police national training organisation to promote skills within the service. A central police college, building on the work done by national police training, will be established. It will be a centre of excellence within the police service and will act as a standard on both the national and international stage.
We will set a mandatory curriculum and qualifications framework, in consultation with the key stakeholders, which will support the achievement of common standards and profession-long learning and recognition. Regional collaboration between forces on training, driven by best value, will maximise the use of resources and ensure that best practice is shared. We will work with forces to ensure that the opportunities to be gained from greater use of IT and of joint training with other services can be fully realised.
Chief officers and police authorities will produce annual plans to ensure the continuous development of all staff. A dedicated training inspectorate, headed by a lay inspector, will be created within Her Majesty's inspectorate of constabulary to support and monitor quality assurance. Finally, the existing powers of the Home Secretary will be strengthened where necessary, to ensure that the new arrangements will deliver real improvements.
There are numerous examples of excellence in police training at present. The measures that we are announcing today are an ambitious programme of work to build on this good practice where it exists and secure changes where they are necessary.
Mr. Oliver Heald: I begin by thanking the Minister for giving me early sight of the statement. He will understand that the Opposition will want to comment in more detail in due course on the documents that he has produced.
The Minister will know that the Police Federation and others have called for a fully independent complaints authority. The Opposition support that in principle, but does he agree that it is vital that any system should command the support not just of the public, but of the police at all levels?
The Minister referred to reports from KPMG and from Liberty. Those documents suggest some very different solutions to important issues. For example, KPMG suggests that most complaints would still be investigated by the police, but that a few high-profile cases would be investigated by an independent agency. In contrast, Liberty suggests many more independent investigations. What is the Minister's view on that crucial issue, which is vital to the proposal?
KPMG suggests that the independent agency teams conducting the independent investigations would include police officers, whereas Liberty proposes a team that is basically civilian. Does the Minister accept that suggestions in the media that people such as journalists might conduct the investigations raise important issues of natural justice? Would not it be more proper to use trained investigators with experience of investigation for that purpose?
Is not it crucial that the new agency should be led by people who are seen to be genuinely impartial, and not by people who have particular axes to grind? Does the

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Minister agree that investigations should be conducted in a highly professional and effective manner, and that the agency should operate in the same way?
The Commission for Racial Equality has proposed recently that it should investigate allegations of racist conduct by officers. Is there not a danger that that could lead to two investigations of each complaint? Would not it be better if the new independent agency dealt with all such cases?
Does the Minister agree that the consultation period, which ends on 30 June, is very short, given the seriousness and complexity of the issue? Is he prepared to reconsider the length of that period?
We welcome the commitment to improved training, but paragraph 7 of the consultation paper states simply that the aim will be to build
a portfolio of skills, knowledge and understanding…
Will the Minister assure the House that the proposal is for training in catching criminals, preparing cases, patrolling the streets and practical policing, and that the training will not merely be an AS-level in sociology?
The Minister spoke of consulting the key stakeholders about the curriculum, but who does he mean? The consultation document talks about regional collaboration. Will he confirm that that is not a step down the road to regional policing? What assurances can he give us about that?
What assurances can the Minister give that police officers will be able to take up these opportunities? With 2,500 fewer officers in Britain now than at the time of the general election, the number of specials down by 3,500, and the sort of crisis that the Police Federation described this week, can policemen be spared from the front line?
Last autumn, the so-called Milburn letter stated that training facilities for the police would be fully stretched in dealing with new recruits. How can the extensive additional training that the Minister proposes today be accomplished?
Although the complaints procedure and training are important, the public will be bewildered because the Government have not made a statement to say that they will restore police numbers to the level that they inherited, explain how they will deal with the rising tide of crime and back the PC on the beat in his job. The uniformed officer is the bedrock of the police service.
Mr. Clarke: I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman's support in principle for an independent complaints system. We welcome that.
The hon. Gentleman's first point was about the extent of independence. As he said, the two reports have different orientations. It is helpful that they have been published together so that we can consider the issues fully. Like both studies, we accept that it is not feasible for the independent body to investigate every complaint. Independent investigation should concentrate on the most serious complaints, which are likely to cover deaths in police custody, police shootings and other cases that involve possibly serious criminal offences.
I agree with the hon. Gentleman's comments about the importance of retaining the confidence of the police throughout the process. He knows that both inquiries consulted the police widely and included representation from the police, whose approach has been very positive.
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The hon. Gentleman is right that the process must be highly professional, and must be seen to be impartial. It is important to meld those two aspects. The reports suggest doing that in slightly different ways. That is why we are consulting on the points that we outlined.
Racist conduct should be tackled by the police complaints process, as it is now. It will be tackled in the overall approach that we described. I agree that there is no case for a further, separate investigatory process.
The consultation period is not too short. We held substantial discussions in the build-up to the reports, the results of which have been published. All the main interests considered the issues and expressed views. Most of the country—and the police—want to reach a resolution about how to progress as rapidly as possible. That is why I am keen to be in a position to announce conclusions by the end of this year.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned training. The "portfolio of skills" contains practical skills for policing. He made a snide remark about AS-level in sociology—a somewhat alien concept. Yesterday, we both attended the Police Federation conference in Brighton, and serious training for serious police skills was a high priority there. That is what we recommend.
The stakeholders are principally the police, but also communities and other elements in the criminal justice system. Regional collaboration is important because it will provide better value, but it is not a stalking horse for regional police forces.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned officers' take-up and made his usual point about police numbers, but I am dealing with training today. That is the way in which I intend to address the problem.
Mr. Robin Corbett: On behalf of the Home Affairs Committee, I thank my hon. Friend the Minister for his positive response to our reports on complaints, and on recruitment and training. Will he confirm that he wants to tackle the needs of the police and the public better by providing a totally independent system for the classes of serious complaint that he mentioned?
Apart from police numbers—I understand the arguments about that—our police need better training so that they are more effective in the performance of their jobs and can thus fulfil the growing demands and expectations of the public.
There is an extremely strong case for a biddable fund to enable police forces throughout the country to bid for specific amounts of money to upgrade their IT systems, and thus have one more tool in the battle against crime.
Mr. Clarke: I pay tribute to my hon. Friend's Select Committee for the work that it has done, which has substantially informed our conclusions. First, we need a complaints system that has the confidence of both the police and the community, and that is what we are working towards. Secondly, training is critical. Both the public and the police are looking for better trained police to deal with a highly modern and rapidly changing environment—whether to deal with technological change, investigative change of the type that has been mentioned, or victims of crime. There are a range of different issues. The police want training. It is our job to provide it.

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There is a case for a biddable fund of the type that my hon. Friend mentioned for information and communications technology. ICT training is an important element in all this. He will be aware of the significant investment—£40 million—that we announced a few months ago, to give proper intelligence systems to all police forces in Britain and to accelerate work on those issues.
Mr. Simon Hughes: Like others, I welcome the Government's progress as outlined in the Minister's two mini-statements. Will he confirm that all complaints will be recorded and investigated, and that doing so will not be at the discretion of the police? Will he also confirm that in the investigations, as well as experts there will be a lay element representative of the ordinary public, so that they may have continuing confidence?
There will be a great cost saving because of the reduction in cases taken up against the police, and that must be taken into account when we cost a decent complaints system. Will the Minister confirm that as a result of this procedure, subject to the usual constraints about the programme, we should be able to legislate in the coming financial year?
Finally, on complaints, will the Minister tell the House whether he still intends to consider matters that have been the cause for complaint in previous allegations, which are regarded as not having been adequately investigated, and are still the cause of considerable disquiet about both the old and the present system?
Of course good training is required, but as we both heard yesterday from the police—as we always do—if we do not recruit and retain enough police officers, all the training in the world is of little worth.
Will the Minister consider seriously whether the Government will accept the royal commission proposal—the idea of a standing conference on police matters, so that we may continuously receive advice from the police, the public and politicians on best training, best practice and recruitment? Will he urgently ensure that an independent review takes place of the police numbers that we need in England and Wales, so that we get the answer before the Chancellor announces the results of the public spending review? It is no good the money being announced if in a year's time, people realise that they really need the 10,000, or 5,000, extra police—genuinely extra—that the public and the police say that they want.
Mr. Clarke: The hon. Gentleman is right about recording all complaints. Both reports deal with that issue, and we need to achieve that system. I agree that we need a lay element in any complaints system. The hon. Gentleman is also right about cost savings. The time that it takes to investigate some cases is simply ludicrous. That would be much improved by having a proper independent system to deal with all these areas.
Legislation is not a matter for me, but the hon. Gentleman is right to say that if we can reach conclusions rapidly, at least the possibility of such legislation being considered for the programme can be raised and discussed. He also made an important point about previous allegations, as is evident from a number of noted
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recent cases. We will have to consider exactly how to deal with those once a completely new system has been established.
On training, for the reasons that have been outlined, the key is to put in resources. Part of the comprehensive spending review process is to find out what commitment we will be able to make in that direction.
I am not sympathetic to the idea of a standing conference or royal commission, although my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary said to the Police Federation that he was prepared to discuss that issue with the federation and others to find out the best way to proceed. I am also sceptical about the idea of an independent review of numbers. There are serious issues concerning numbers, which are commonplace in debate in this place and more widely, and those are matters that must be resolved in that context.
Mr. Tony Lloyd: I give a strong welcome to what the Minister has told us. However, will he accept the following points? One of the problems of the present system is that it simply is not trusted because it is opaque and desperately slow. Obviously, one issue that must be tackled is the speed with which complaints are reviewed. Slow review is almost as bad as no review.
As for cases that are not subject to independent scrutiny, will the Minister address the fact that no one gains from an opaque system—not the complainant, not the police and not the public—if at the end of the process, there is distrust about whether proper investigation has been done? We must therefore open up the process, even for cases in which, as the Minister proposes, investigation will continue.
Mr. Clarke: I agree with my hon. Friend. Perhaps I should have said more about the relationship between training and complaints. The best way of dealing with the issue of complaints is to minimise their number, as the police themselves are dealing well with victims of crime and all those who might otherwise have had a complaint. Strong training is an important element in achieving that. Of course, whatever the process, once a complaint is made, it is critical that all parties, including the police, the victim and everyone else involved, have full confidence in the outcome.
It is true that the opacity and slowness of the system are serious problems. The slowness often increases mistrust. People cannot understand how the process can take so long, and immediately start to draw the conclusion that the police are trying to hide things, when that might not be the case. Everyone will benefit from a much faster process.
Mr. Nicholas Winterton: I am increasingly in favour of the proposal made by the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes) that there should be a standing conference, which would allow a growing exchange of views and an interface between the police, the public whom they serve, and politicians and councillors representing the public.
Will the new complaints procedure give scope to politicians, councillors and ordinary members of the public who are concerned about police decisions to close custody suites without appropriate, proper and full consultation? They are also concerned about the limited

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opening hours of police stations, especially at night, and their effect on the public and their security. Are all those issues covered? I am deeply concerned that the relationship between the public and the police is worsening, and that people have less confidence in the police than at any time that I can remember.
Mr. Clarke: The evidence goes against that, and shows that the public have confidence in the police—rightly so, in my opinion. Locally, the Government have established the kind of interchange to which the hon. Gentleman is referring. In our local crime reduction partnerships, there are exchanges between police and other agencies, individuals, voluntary and community organisations and so on, about precisely the type of matter that he has mentioned. Good discussions often take place and important issues are addressed. That is a perfectly appropriate way to act.
I am rather sceptical about the merits of a national organisation, as I pointed out to the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey (Mr. Hughes). However, for many of the reasons that the hon. Gentleman implied, we have established local channels of dialogue.
Mr. Andrew Mackinlay: I welcome my hon. Friend's announcement on dealing with police complaints in future. However, I reiterate my request for an independent inquiry into the current state of play in the Metropolitan police, against the backdrop of parliamentary replies that he has given me since Christmas and the powerful articles by Laurie Flynn and Michael Gillard in The Guardian. Those articles offer prima facie examples of probable corrupt practice by those who are supposed to investigate complaints against police officers.
I draw my hon. Friend's attention to his parliamentary reply of 16 March in response to my question about the cost of Metropolitan police suspensions in the past 10 years. I asked about outcomes—who had been reinstated, who had been dismissed or disciplined and who had been subject to criminal prosecution. I received an unacceptable reply—I am talking not about my hon. Friend the Minister, but about the rather dilatory Commissioner of the Police of the Metropolis.
My hon. Friend stated:
The Commissioner of Police…tells me that the information requested is not held centrally.—[Official Report, 16 March 2000; Vol. 346, c. 266W.]
That is not good enough. We have a right to know about those costs. One of my constituents has been suspended for more than three years, without any proceedings taking place. Such people are entitled to due process. Keith Green, a policeman, to whom I have referred before, was denied rights to which, like others, he is entitled under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984. Keith Pedder has had property seized, including the manuscript of a book on the Rachel Nickell murder inquiry. There is overwhelming evidence that the stewardship of that matter by the Commissioner is wholly unsatisfactory. I want an inquiry.
Mr. Clarke: My hon. Friend is well known for the commitment of his campaigning in relation to the Metropolitan police. His campaign of parliamentary questions has been entirely appropriate.
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First, there has been a special inspectorate investigation into the Metropolitan police. My hon. Friend will have seen the report, which was published only a few months ago. The investigation raised serious matters of the sort to which he has referred. These issues are being addressed seriously by the Commissioner and by the Government, for exactly the reasons that my hon. Friend is implying.
Secondly, it is somewhat unfair to tar the Commissioner entirely with the brush of those issues. The Commissioner is personally committed to rooting out corruption in the Metropolitan police. Beyond that, he believes that it is critical that the process is carried through successfully if the people of London are to have trust in the Metropolitan police. That is the path that is being taken, and it is one that I wholeheartedly support.
Mr. John Greenway: Is it not clear from these exchanges that unless the changes that the Minister intends to bring forward address the problem of delay, they will not succeed? The inquiry held in Cleveland concerning Superintendent Mallon—a highly respected officer who has been praised by the Prime Minister—took longer than two years and cost several million pounds. Like the hon. Member for Thurrock (Mr. Mackinlay), I have constituents who are senior police officers who have been suspended for almost 18 months. No criminal prosecutions are to be brought, but internal disciplinary inquiries continue. Can the Minister give us some confidence, in the light of the KPMG reports, that the issue of delay will be addressed? The old adage that justice delayed is justice denied works both ways. There are many fine police officers now suspended who deserve justice.
Mr. Clarke: I wholeheartedly agree with the hon. Gentleman. When I took up my portfolio at the end of July 1999 I tried to understand, but it is difficult to see how the process in so many cases could take so long. The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to highlight that. That is why I am personally committed to driving through the reforms as rapidly as possible. That is necessary for everyone involved, including the police. The hon. Gentleman is a former police officer, and he is aware of the debilitating effects on police morale if inquiries hang around. I associate myself with his remarks.
Mr. Martin Linton: Is my hon. Friend aware that the two consultation papers are closely in line with the recommendations of the two Home Affairs Committee reports on disciplinary procedures and on training and recruitment? Is he aware also that the intention to have a larger independent element in the investigation of complaints against the police by people outside the police will be especially welcomed? However, I would not imagine that even my former colleagues in the press would expect such investigations to be conducted by journalists.
Is my hon. Friend also aware that there will be a big welcome for the concept of a central police college—which, I imagine, rather than handing out AS-levels in sociology, will put police training at the level of university degree courses, where it should be? I hope that in so doing my hon. Friend will encourage the involvement of universities, such as Portsmouth, in the provision of degree-level training for the police.
Mr. Clarke: I am second to none in my respect and admiration for the investigative qualities of journalists of

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all types, and for the accuracy with which they report their conclusions. However, I share my hon. Friend's view that to rely on them as a core element in the independent police complaints system might be going just a step too far.
I shall respond seriously to the point about AS-level sociology. It is a weakness of the current training system that the various practitioners within the criminal justice system—lawyers, the police, and social workers, for example—are not trained together to anything like the extent that they need to be. An important element in the new training regime will be to establish practical training for people who will be working together, so that they understand relationships across the criminal justice system. The training will not be a theoretical schoolboy text on AS-level sociology. Instead, it will be practical training that will bring professions together so that the criminal justice system can deliver for everyone.
Mr. Andrew Rowe: Will the Minister ensure that frivolous or malevolent complaints against the police are strongly dealt with? The police are undermined by that kind of unsubstantiated attack.
As a trustee of the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, may I emphasise my agreement that training across disciplines is absolutely indispensable? In the past, the police have been too much cut off from the rest of society. Given that prevention of cruelty to children is one of the prime targets of law and order, I hope that the Minister will employ widely the lessons learned from co-operation with the NSPCC.
Mr. Clarke: I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman's support on the final point. He is well respected for his work in that field, and his support is important.
I agree, too, about frivolous or malevolent complaints. That is one reason why such matters need to be resolved rapidly. A judgment must be made, of course, about what is frivolous or malevolent, and that judgment is not always easy. However, it is important that the system should be more rapid than it is at present.
Mr. Marsha Singh: I welcome my hon. Friend's statement on both fronts. The independent complaints authority that eventually results will improve and promote public confidence in the police, and will be welcomed by the police themselves.
We need first-class training for a first-class police service, but I should like to question the references to AS-level sociology. Our cities contain complex communities and it is important that different communities should see the police force as their own police force. If that is to happen, the police must understand communities and their sensitivities. Unless they do, we shall never reach the position in which everyone sees the police service as their own.
Mr. Clarke: I agree with both my hon. Friend's points. It is critically important that the police should have confidence in the system. From the conversations that I have had with police officers at all levels, I believe that he is right to say that the police believe that an independent system is necessary and will assist their relationships with the communities that they serve.
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As for the point about sociology, I was not talking about the importance of the police understanding their communities, which is essential. I was, I suppose, implicitly criticising the idea that an AS-level sociology course might give the understanding that my hon. Friend rightly identifies as necessary.
Mr. Tony Baldry: If the Minister had been making a statement today on teaching, nursing or another public service, he would almost certainly have paid tribute to the service concerned. The House will have noted, and Hansard will show, that he has at no stage paid tribute to the police service. We shall not recruit men and women into the police unless they feel that it is a valid public service. Perhaps, instead of criticising the police whenever we speak, it is time that we collectively paid tribute to the outstanding public service of policemen and women, often in difficult, and sometimes in dangerous, circumstances. Unless we do so, we shall never persuade young men and women that the police is a profession and a public service worth entering.
Mr. Clarke: I find that an extraordinary remark. My right hon. and hon. Friends and I make it our business frequently to pay tribute to the work of the police. That we should do so is a canon of our existence. The hon. Gentleman should perhaps address his remarks to the Leader of the Opposition and the shadow Home Secretary, who have, in recent weeks, made it their business to undermine the police by attacks and criticisms—something that Labour Members absolutely do not do. I pay total tribute to the police; I simply wish that that was the case across the House.
Mr. Tony McWalter: I welcome my hon. Friend's statement, but I ask him to consider two matters of concern. First, Members of Parliament often receive substantial allegations about the police. Can he assure me that the way in which we can deal with those complaints will be facilitated by the new system? In particular, will we be able to transmit allegations to the appropriate place without it seeming as if we either endorse them or regard them as vexatious?
Secondly, will my hon. Friend assure the House that the new arrangements will protect the police better against malevolent accusations? Some accusations can be co-ordinated, which makes them more plausible than a single, wild allegation.
Mr. Clarke: I can give my hon. Friend the assurance that he seeks on his second point. Having an independent system will ensure that malevolent accusations can be eliminated and dealt with rapidly and effectively.
My hon. Friend makes an interesting point about Members of Parliament, which I have discussed with the police. We all, in our constituency surgeries and elsewhere, receive complaints of various kinds. At present, the options open to us are fairly narrow. There is a case for passing complaints directly to an independent authority. We are considering that in the consultation paper, because it is an important means of ensuring that we carry out our duties effectively.
Mr. David Tredinnick: Does the Minister agree that towns such as Hinckley are examples of places in which the improvements should be most effective in

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regional collaboration and joint training. Hinckley is the main town in my constituency, and lies not just on the edge of the Leicestershire authority area but on the county and regional boundary.
Does the Minister agree that there is a danger that some of the proposals might simply be cosmetic, given that mutual aid arrangements and an existing mechanism are already in place? Is he sure that these are new initiatives, not just existing arrangements that are being dressed up?
Does the Minister accept that the key issue, as seen in Hinckley, is police numbers? When we have problems on Friday night, with the night clubs turning out, mutual aid is often not available across the county boundary.
Does the Minister further accept that the previous Government went a long way towards improving the system of police complaints by getting rid of the Police Complaints Board and replacing it with the independent Police Complaints Authority? I do not think that he will want to ignore that fact.
Finally, I join the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Mr. Corbett), who spoke on behalf of the Select Committee on Home Affairs, in saying: is not information technology a cost-effective way of improving co-operation? Are not police forces notorious for following their own noses and having independent systems that cannot talk to each other?
Mr. Clarke: That is absolutely right. It has been a surprise to me, since I started doing this job, to find out how very different the IT systems are in the various police forces. Furthermore, the six criminal justice agencies—police, prisons, the probation service, the Crown courts, the magistrates courts and the Crown Prosecution Service—all have different systems as well, so ensuring coherence is fantastically important.
The hon. Gentleman is wrong about the proposals being cosmetic. Indeed, I do not think that he was really suggesting that. Our proposals contain major new elements. Co-operation between forces within regional boundaries will be driven by best-value considerations and a series of considerations of rationality. That is an active element in the discussion.
I agree that what the hon. Gentleman's constituents and others are most interested in is the number of bobbies on the beat. However, I do not think that that diminishes the importance of either of the two aspects of policing that I have announced today—complaints and training—in terms of the regard in which the police force is held by the people of this country.

Point of Order
4.9 pm
Mrs. Angela Browning: On a point of order, Madam Speaker. You will be aware that tomorrow morning the House will be asked to consider the part-time work regulations. Last Wednesday, on "Woman's Hour" on BBC Radio 4, the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry spelled out who the beneficiaries of that measure were likely to be. So inaccurate was his information that the following day a spokesman from the Trades Union Congress came on "Woman's Hour" to put the Secretary of State's inaccuracies right. People said, "Poor Mr. Byers, I think he must have fuddled his head because he's had a tough week." That is all very well, but is it not a contempt of the House that tomorrow we are being asked to consider legislation laid in the name of a Secretary of State who clearly does not understand it? May I, through you, Madam Speaker, ask whether the legislation could be deferred until it has been reviewed properly by the DTI, so that we know exactly what the Secretary of State's intentions are?
Madam Speaker: The hon. Lady will appreciate that the Speaker of the House does not determine the business programme. That is the responsibility of the Government in co-operation with the Opposition, and is considered through the usual channels. Perhaps I might refer the hon. Lady to the usual channels, where she may put her request for deferment.

Armed Forces (Minimum Age of Recruitment)
4.10 pm
Mr. Paul Stinchcombe: I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to prohibit the recruitment of persons under the age of eighteen into the regular forces, the regular air forces and the Royal Navy; to prohibit the calling up of members of the reserve forces who are under eighteen years of age; and for connected purposes.
It is estimated that, as I speak, at least 300,000 young people under the age of 18 are involved in armed conflict around the globe. In countries such as Uganda and Sierra Leone, children as young as 12 are forced into conscript armies. There is no greater betrayal of the rights of the child than to force that child to carry arms.
That is going on despite the fact that, in November of last year, we celebrated the 10th anniversary of the United Nations convention on the rights of the child. It is why, in January of this year, an intergovernmental working group agreed a draft optional protocol to that convention to deal specifically with the involvement of children in armed conflict. That protocol would prohibit conscription of those under 18 and require Governments to take all feasible measures to end the deployment of those under 18. If and when that optional protocol is ratified, significant steps in the right direction will have been taken.
Under-18s should not be conscripted, and it is right that their conscription should end. Neither should under-18s be deployed in the theatre of war, so it is also right that all feasible measures are taken to avoid such deployment. The most obvious of those feasible measures is simple: to prohibit the recruitment of under-18s at the outset.
That is not a radical idea; it is not even a novel idea. The minimum age of recruitment into the police force is 18 and a half. In August 1914, at the outbreak of the first world war, the minimum age of enlistment into the Regular Army was 18. Even when conscription was introduced in March 1916, the minimum age remained 18.
There were youngsters under that age who reached the front line, but they did so only if they lied about their age—men such as my grandfather, who joined up when he was 16 or 17 and was shot at 18, and my great-uncle, who had lost his leg by the age of 18.
If recruitment into the armed services below the age of 18 were thought neither right nor necessary at a time of such great peril as the first world war, how can it conceivably be thought right or necessary today? Yet, today, there are nearly 7,000 16 and 17-year-olds in the British armed forces. They are too young to vote and to share in the governance of the country; to be tried in an adult court; to drink in a pub; too young even freely to enter into a contract; but they are old enough to kill or be killed on our behalf. This Bill would prohibit their recruitment into armed services.
The first benefit of the Bill would be that it would save some young lives. Since 1982, more than 90 service personnel aged under 18 have died. It is not just in the theatre of war that these young people are at risk; 25 died in training accidents. That should not surprise us. Military exercises are designed, rightly, to simulate the situations that soldiers would expect to face in real military
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operations. Their training inevitably involves firearms, weapons and explosives; dangerous activities, as the Ministry of Defence rightly and readily acknowledges.
Since 1992, 52 fatalities have occurred in the Army because of firearms. Any one of those could have been a young recruit, because accidents will and do happen, and are more likely to happen with younger recruits. We already know from the road traffic death statistics that young people tend to be less cautious than those who are older. Those young people should not be exposed to training which carries so high and so well-known an element of risk.
The second benefit of the Bill is that it would better protect the fundamental rights of those youngsters while they are alive. It has been recognised for many years that those under 18 require special protection. That is why they were protected by the Factory Acts of the 19th century, and why limitations have been developed upon their capacity to contract. It is why we have specific juvenile courts properly to deal with young offenders in ways appropriate to their age and why European Council directives give them better protection while they are at work. It is why we have the UN convention on the rights of the child.
Those are all measures that comprehend the fact that under-18s need special protection in certain areas. Yet there are inadequate comparable protections for under-18s in the armed forces.
A young adult can make up his mind swiftly and then change it on more mature reflection. That is one of the reasons why we have limits on the capacity to contract. However, once enlisted and after just six months, a young recruit is bound until his 22nd birthday. Although there are discretionary grounds for leaving, there is no discharge as of right. If that young recruit were asked to serve in an area of conflict, there would be no right to refuse. Outside the armed forces, a young person is relatively free to change his mind, but inside, that freedom is necessarily limited.
If that young recruit chose to leave, without permission, the grounds of the military base on which he was based, he would be detained and arrested. Outside the armed services, there are limits on the type of trial to which under-18s can be subjected, but that young recruit would be bound by three service discipline Acts, subject to a separate justice system and, within that system, subject to the same military courts as adults.
I do not believe that that is right. I believe that the best way to resolve the tension that exists between the obvious need for firm discipline within the armed services and the rights of a young person is to prevent that young person from being recruited until he reaches the age of majority. The second benefit of the Bill would therefore be that it would respect the fundamental rights of those under 18 but would not prejudice military discipline.
Indeed, far from prejudicing the armed services, the third benefit of the Bill is that it would positively advantage them. Current UN practice is that troops used for peacekeeping are required to be a minimum of 18, and, ideally, should be over 21. That is because of the skill, experience, patience and discretion needed to do the vital jobs that the armed forces perform on our behalf.
Raising the age of recruitment to 18 would reflect that, bringing the UK into line with the United Nations. Those who are recruited into the armed services in our country would be of the age and maturity necessary properly and better to perform the vital tasks that we ask of them.

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I understand that there are those who are concerned about the Bill, and I respect their concerns. The first concern is that a gap might be created for those youngsters who are committed to a career in the armed services from a young age, who want to pursue it as soon as they can and who may benefit from the special opportunities provided. That is why nothing in my Bill would prejudice the Territorial Army, impact upon cadets or prevent the establishment of specialist military colleges for 16 or 17-year-olds outside the regular armed services. That would enable youngsters to join up on reaching the age of majority but with the benefit of appropriately focused training given within a mature military culture. Their choice would be an informed one and their talents would already be developed.
The second concern is that the Bill might overstretch the armed services. I understand that concern but, if there is overstretch, the answer is not to rely on 16 or 17-year-olds but to recruit appropriate numbers of people of the right age and maturity. That is why the Bill would not come into force for two years and why it vests in the Secretary of State all appropriate transitional arrangements.
The Bill would prohibit the recruitment into the armed forces of those below 18. It would ensure that the highest human rights standards are honoured in this country. It would ensure that the United Kingdom can not only ratify the protocol but take a lead in the country and the world. We would then have leverage in places such as Uganda and Sierra Leone to strive for better standards across the globe. However, the Bill would not prejudice the security of this country. It would not prejudice the professionalism of our armed forces or deny the rights of any of our young adults to chose to serve our country as they wish. For all those reasons, I hope that the House will allow me to introduce my Bill.
4.19 pm
Mr. Andrew Robathan: The hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Stinchcombe) has made a decent, well-argued and, I am sure, well-intentioned speech. The House may well miss him after the general election. Notwithstanding the good intentions—which, incidentally, pave the road to hell—he is entirely wrong.
This is muddled political correctness. The hon. Gentleman said that training for the Army is dangerous. The first thing that one must understand is that, in the armed forces, one is being trained to go to war, and whatever else it may be, war is extremely unpleasant and dangerous.
Sierra Leone and the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda were mentioned. I am not sure whether the two little boys in Burma were mentioned. British young soldiers, sailors and air crew have absolutely nothing to do with those conflicts. For a start, there is no conscription. All 16 and 17-year-olds—and indeed all other service personnel—are volunteers.
The 16 and 17-year-olds whom I remember were keen and determined. They desperately wanted to be soldiers. When we went to Northern Ireland, we could not let them go out on the streets. They had to remain behind, guarding the barracks. They hated it. They desperately wanted to get out there and do something useful. There are severe limitations on what they can do, and that is right. They are not put on the streets in Northern Ireland and they will not be deployed on United Nations tours.
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The hon. Gentleman said that some young people in the forces have been killed, but people are killed in road accidents, too. As he admitted, they are not put in danger if it can be avoided. [Interruption.] There are approximately 6,500 16 and 17-year-olds being trained in the forces, with the vast majority in the Army. They are engaged in training and education. One might regard it as a military college of further education.[Interruption.]
The hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart), who is wittering away over there, might care to go to the Army foundation college in Harrogate, where young men and women are doing foundation courses—studying for national vocational qualifications and the like—and deriving benefit for the future. They give enormous value to the armed forces. Such people serve longer and have a longer return of service, as it is called, so there is a better return on the large investment that is put into training. Much of it is complex, technical training, which many of us would find pretty difficult. The country needs a return on its investment, and that is what it gets from keen young volunteers.
The Army is now shifting the balance of recruitment from adults to juniors, because of the enormous competition for recruits for jobs created by a buoyant economy. There are tremendous demands for people to go into tertiary or further education, and that is competing for young people from 16 to 18. When they reach 18, they are often already in tertiary or further education and are lost to the Army.
What is the purpose of the Bill? The hon. Gentleman said that it was to set a good example. I have seen the photographs of boy soldiers in Sierra Leone and elsewhere. It is disgusting. We will not set a good example to Sierra Leone by not recruiting 16 and 17-year-olds. We will do it by sending out first-class troops to establish some order and help the people there.[Interruption.] I am sorry that I cannot allow the hon. Member for Slough to intervene.
What is the purpose of the armed forces? This is the root of the whole issue. The purpose of the armed forces is to defend the realm—to defend all of us in the House. The hon. Gentleman dismissed overstretch and under-recruitment, but solving those problems is terribly important. We cannot send troops to Sierra Leone or anywhere else if we do not have them. Let the armed forces defend the realm.
We are not breaking the 1989 UN convention on the child, or indeed the protocol that is being introduced this year, which still allows the recruitment of volunteers of 16 and 17. We must ask whether we want excellent, well-recruited armed forces or whether we do not. That is the question.
The armed forces feel much undermined by the politically correct stand of the Government. Labour Members will deny that, but it is true. The authority of military discipline is being undermined. A small point: allowing people to be openly homosexual in the armed forces is undermining military discipline, however much people deny it. The hon. Gentleman referred to special protection for 16 and 17-year-olds. I have not checked the record, but I bet that he voted to remove the special protection for them as regards homosexuality. Homosexual sexual intercourse, whatever else it might do, certainly might harm the people involved. The Bill would prevent them from joining up and doing something useful and honourable. That shows strange priorities.
Question put, pursuant to Standing Order No. 23 (Motions for leave to bring in Bills and nomination of Select Committees at commencement of public business):—
The House divided: Ayes 110, Noes 69

Division No. 199]

[4.25 pm

AYES

Alexander, Douglas

Kumar, Dr Ashok

Allan, Richard

Ladyman, Dr Stephen

Ashton, Joe

Lawrence, Mrs Jackie

Atkins, Charlotte

Lepper, David

Austin, John

Linton, Martin

Barnes, Harry

McCafferty, Ms Chris

Bennett, Andrew F

McDonnell, John

Best, Harold

McFall, John

Brand, Dr Peter

Mackinlay, Andrew

Butler, Mrs Christine

McNamara, Kevin

Cann, Jamie

Mactaggart, Fiona

Cawsey, Ian

McWalter, Tony

Chapman, Ben (Wirral S)

Mahon, Mrs Alice

Chaytor, David

Marsden, Paul (Shrewsbury)

Clapham, Michael

Marshall, Jim (Leicester S)

Clarke, Tony (Northampton S)

Marshall-Andrews, Robert

Colman, Tony

Maxton, John

Corbett, Robin

Michie, Bill (Shef'ld Heeley)

Corbyn, Jeremy

Mitchell, Austin

Crausby, David

Morgan, Ms Julie (Cardiff N)

Cryer, Mrs Ann (Keighley)

Mountford, Kali

Cunningham, Jim (Cov'try S)

Murphy, Jim (Eastwood)

Curtis-Thomas, Mrs Claire

Norris, Dan

Davey, Valerie (Bristol W)

O'Brien, Bill (Normanton)

Davidson, Ian

O'Hara, Eddie

Dawson, Hilton

Olner, Bill

Dean, Mrs Janet

Palmer, Dr Nick

Dismore, Andrew

Pike, Peter L

Donohoe, Brian H

Prentice, Gordon (Pendle)

Dunwoody, Mrs Gwyneth

Quinn, Lawrie

Field, Rt Hon Frank

Reed, Andrew (Loughborough)

Flynn, Paul

Rooney, Terry

Foster, Michael Jabez (Hastings)

Sarwar, Mohammad

Gerrard, Neil

Savidge, Malcolm

Gibson, Dr Ian

Sawford, Phil

Godman, Dr Norman A

Sedgemore, Brian

Godsiff, Roger

Sheldon, Rt Hon Robert

Golding, Mrs Llin

Shipley, Ms Debra

Gordon, Mrs Eileen

Simpson, Alan (Nottingham S)

Griffiths, Jane (Reading E)

Skinner, Dennis

Gunnell, John

Smith, Miss Geraldine (Morecambe & Lunesdale)

Henderson, Ivan (Harwich)

Hinchliffe, David

Starkey, Dr Phyllis

Hopkins, Kelvin

Steinberg, Gerry

Hurst, Alan

Stevenson, George

Iddon, Dr Brian

Stewart, Ian (Eccles)

Illsley, Eric

Stinchcombe, Paul

Jackson, Ms Glenda (Hampstead)

Taylor, Ms Dari (Stockton S)

Jones, Rt Hon Barry (Alyn)

Taylor, David (NW Leics)

Jones, Dr Lynne (Selly Oak)

Thomas, Simon (Ceredigion)

Jones, Martyn (Clwyd S)

Turner, Dr Desmond (Kemptown)

Kelly, Ms Ruth

Vis, Dr Rudi

Khabra, Piara S

White, Brian

King, Ms Oona (Bethnal Green)

Williams, Alan W (E Carmarthen)

350

Wood, Mike

Tellers for the Ayes:

Worthington, Tony

Ms Julia Drown and

Wyatt, Derek

Mr. Marsha Singh.

NOES

Anderson, Donald (Swansea E)

Keetch, Paul

Ashdown, Rt Hon Paddy

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

Atkinson, Peter (Hexham)

Beith, Rt Hon A J

Key, Robert

Bell, Martin (Tatton)

King, Rt Hon Tom (Bridgwater)

Bercow, John

Kirkwood, Archy

Boswell, Tim

Laing, Mrs Eleanor

Brake, Tom

Livsey, Richard

Brazier, Julian

McIntosh, Miss Anne

Burnett, John

McLoughlin, Patrick

Campbell, Rt Hon Menzies (NE Fife)

Moore, Michael

Moss, Malcolm

Campbell-Savours, Dale

Öpik, Lembit

Chope, Christopher

Plaskitt, James

Clark, Dr Michael (Rayleigh)

Randall, John

Clarke, Rt Hon Kenneth (Rushcliffe)

Robathan, Andrew

Robinson, Peter (Belfast E)

Cook, Frank (Stockton N)

Rowe, Andrew (Faversham)

Cormack, Sir Patrick

Russell, Bob (Colchester)

Dalyell, Tam

Sanders, Adrian

Day, Stephen

Shaw, Jonathan

Drew, David

Simpson, Keith (Mid-Norfolk)

Duncan Smith, Iain

Soames, Nicholas

Emery, Rt Hon Sir Peter

Squire, Ms Rachel

Fabricant, Michael

Stunell, Andrew

Fallon, Michael

Swayne, Desmond

Forth, Rt Hon Eric

Tapsell, Sir Peter

George, Andrew (St Ives)

Taylor, John M (Solihull)

George, Bruce (Walsall S)

Turner, Dr George (NW Norfolk)

Harris, Dr Evan

Tyler, Paul

Hayes, John

Walter, Robert

Heath, David (Somerton & Frome)

Ward, Ms Claire

Hepburn, Stephen

Wells, Bowen

Howarth, Gerald (Aldershot)

Winterton, Nicholas (Macclesfield)

Hoyle, Lindsay

Hughes, Simon (Southwark N)

Tellers for the Noes:

Hunter, Andrew

Mr. David Maclean and

Johnson Smith, Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey

Mr. Edward Leigh.

Question accordingly agreed to.
Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. Paul Stinchcombe, Mr. Marsha Singh, Mr. Paul Flynn, Mr. Kerry Pollard, Mr. Michael Jabez Foster, Mr. Fraser Kemp, Ms Oona King, Ms Julie Morgan, Dr. Lynne Jones, Valerie Davey, Ms Julia Drown and Dr. Brian Iddon.

Armed Forces (Minimum Age of Recruitment)
  ARMED FORCES (MINIMUM AGE OF RECRUITMENT)
  Mr. Paul Stinchcombe accordingly presented a Bill to prohibit the recruitment of persons under the age of eighteen into the regular forces, the regular air forces and the Royal Navy; to prohibit the calling up of members of the reserve forces who are under eighteen years of age; and for connected purposes: And the same was read the First time; and ordered to be read a Second time on Friday 21 July, and to be printed [Bill 127].
Orders of the Day
  Royal Parks (Trading) Bill
  Not amended in the Standing Committee, considered.
  Royal Parks (Trading) Bill
    Clause 2

      MAXIMUM PENALTY
      4.38 pm
      Mr. Eric Forth: I beg to move amendment No. 17, in page 1, line 13, leave out "level" and insert—
      "for the first offence level 2 on the standard scale, and for any subsequent offence level".
      Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael J. Martin): With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment No. 1, in page 1, line 13, leave out "3" and insert "2".
      Mr. Forth: The amendment relates to the important question of fines to be imposed on those who commit offences of the nature described in the Bill. I seek to introduce the time-honoured system of imposing different levels of penalty for first and for subsequent offences.
      I was at least partly inspired by what the Minister said in the Second Reading Committee—the rather unusual device that is deployed when a Bill has not yet been debated on the Floor of the House. I welcome this first opportunity to air the important issues that it raises here, on the Floor, as hitherto it has been dealt with only in Committee—a perfectly proper procedure, I hasten to add, but one that means, regrettably, that Members who were not on the Second Reading Committee or involved in the Committee stage have not yet had an opportunity to address themselves to the Bill.
      On 7 March 2000, in that Second Reading Committee, the Minister said:
      fines, however frequently imposed by the courts, do not, as things are, act as an effective deterrent when compared with the income that can be gained from illegal trading.—[Official Report, Second Reading Committee, 7 March 2000; c. 4.]
      In a moment, I should like to return to the subject of income, but first it might help the House if I were to remind hon. Members of the origins of the matter. The section of the Bill to which the amendment applies makes reference to the Parks Regulation (Amendment) Act 1926, in which the matter was dealt with, although not originally. In a moment, I shall refer back to the Parks Regulation Act 1872, in which the concept of fines made its first appearance.
      Suffice it to say that section 2(1) of the 1926 Act stated:
      if any person fails to comply with, or acts in contravention of, any regulations so made—
      which are regulations relating to the parks—
      he shall be guilty of an offence against the principal Act and shall be liable on conviction thereof by a court of summary jurisdiction to a penalty not exceeding five pounds.
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      We therefore know that the level of penalty that was fixed in 1926 was five pounds.
      Subsequently, when I looked at the 1872 Act—which was updated in the 1926 Act—rather to my surprise I found in section 4 the provision:
      If any person does any act in contravention of any regulation contained in the first schedule annexed hereto, he shall, on conviction by a court of summary jurisdiction, be liable to a penalty not exceeding five pounds.
      That is an interesting illustration of the fact that between 1872 and 1926 there was so little inflation that it was not deemed necessary to increase the level of penalty.
      Mr. Desmond Swayne: In fact, in the late 1870s and early 1880s there was significant deflation.
      Mr. Forth: That is helpful—it explains what otherwise, to me, seemed to be a bit of a mystery.
      Mr. Michael Fallon: Of course, an alternative explanation is that there was not the same scale of offences, and that the original fine had proved to be a sufficient deterrent. However, it might be for the convenience of the House—so that we might be better informed—if my right hon. Friend were able, looking at the same Act, to tell us the approximate value, in current terms, of £5 in 1872.
      Mr. Forth: I had rather hoped that my hon. Friend would not ask me that question because I should have to guess, and I do not want to have to get involved in guessing. However, I suspect that if any hon. Member were to nip into the Library while I am speaking, he or she could probably find a pretty good answer and come back to inform us.
      Mr. Robert Sheldon: May I help the right hon. Gentleman? The general ratio—it varies with the various circumstances that one makes use of—for pre-war to current prices is about 40:1.
      Mr. Forth: That is very helpful indeed. It neatly places a £5 fine in 1872 at level 1 on the current scale. That gives us a very good basis on which to consider—as I shall in a moment—the proposals that I am making in amendment No. 17 on levels 2 and 3. I am very grateful to the right hon. Gentleman, whose intervention has been extraordinarily—but not unusually—helpful.
      Mr. John Bercow: I agree that what the right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon) has just told the House is helpful. Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is important to establish whether the fact of no change in the level of fine in that 54-year period was due to no inflation, or whether it was due principally to there being no substantial increase in the annual level of offending?
      Mr. Forth: That is indeed a perfectly possible explanation. I think that we shall come on later—perhaps not in this debate, but on a subsequent group, and certainly on Third Reading—to consider the nature of the

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      trade, which has given rise to the Bill, and of those who are alleged to be carrying out that trade. That will be quite an important consideration when we come to that stage.
      Mr. David Maclean: Bearing in mind the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Mr. Bercow) on the general level of offending, I am sure that my right hon. Friend is aware of all the Home Office research, done under various Governments, showing that since 1945 the average annual increase in criminal offending has ranged between about 4.5 to 5 per cent. It is therefore not the case that there has not been an increase in offending: since 1945, there has been a general average increase of 5 per cent. per annum.
      4.45 pm
      Mr. Forth: Unusually, that intervention was not as helpful as I have come to expect from my right hon. Friend. We were considering the period between 1872 and 1926, and he has suddenly tried to rush me forward to 1945. I shall forgive him, but on this occasion I shall discount what he has said.
      Lest it has escaped the attention of the House, I wanted to remark in passing that section (5) of the 1872 Act makes an interesting reference:
      Any park keeper in uniform, and any persons whom he may call to his assistance, may take into custody, without a warrant, any offender who in the park where such a keeper has jurisdiction, and within the view of such keeper, acts in contravention of any of the said regulations.
      As early as 1872, the provisions were widely drawn. One can easily trace the genesis of the Bill from 1872 through 1926 and, I think, 1997. We will not necessarily debate the powers available, although we may want to reflect on them. I am sure that the Minister will help us later, but I remain to be satisfied that the police and the park employees use to the full all the powers available to them. We should be satisfied of that before we leap to bring in the draconian provisions in the Bill.
      Mr. Sheldon: I walk across a royal park most days and there is a horrible smell of stale fat. That is disgraceful in a royal park and outside Buckingham palace. The police say that they have acted again and again, but that they are wasting their time because they keep having to go to court. They have given up. Anybody who respects our royal parks and our main palaces and places of interest, which people come from all over the country and the world to visit, should want us to maintain the highest standards that we have been able to provide.
      Mr. Forth: That is an elegant statement of the aspirations behind the Bill and it is typical of the right hon. Gentleman, but it does not fully explain why we need the Bill. Just this morning, I took myself down to the London Eye on the embankment south of the river. We have been told again and again that the aim of the Bill is to replicate within the royal parks the excellent powers already available to the police outside them. I gather that that is one of the main arguments, although I have not yet heard it because the Bill has not yet been considered on the Floor of the House. To my astonishment, I counted four hot-dog purveyors within 200 yd of the London Eye.
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      That gave me pause for thought. If the existing powers are so wonderful and effective that we are seeking to replicate them in the royal parks, why did I find four hamburger purveyors, with customers crowding round them? I saw them making purchases and munching happily. I did not see anyone falling to the ground. I hope that that point will be answered, because we have to tease out these issues before the House rushes to pass such draconian legislation.
      Mr. John Greenway: Probably, there were not enough police officers on duty to use the powers available to them to deal with the hot-dog stands to which my right hon. Friend referred.
      Mr. Forth: I am aware that the number of police officers in the Metropolitan area—I think that we shall have to call it something different from July—has fallen dramatically. That partly explains the phenomenon I have described, but it gives rise to another question. Were we to grant the powers in the Bill, would there be sufficient police officers to implement and enforce them effectively in the royal parks? If it cannot be done around the London Eye, why should we be satisfied that it could be done in the royal parks? As well as asking about the powers, we should ask whether the enforcement will match them. The Minister may have to answer that question subsequently.
      Mr. Maclean: I am grateful to my right hon. and erudite Friend for giving way, as is his custom. Was he not rather concerned by the remarks made by the right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon), who seemed to suggest that one of the main reasons for the Bill was the disgusting smell of fast food pervading some of the finer parts of London?
      The logic of that would suggest that one would need huge draconian legislation, applying not just to royal parks but to all the other establishments from which the smell of fast food—or not so fast food—may emanate into public thoroughfares and cause distress to foreign tourists. That is what the right hon. Gentleman seemed to be suggesting.
      Mr. Forth: Indeed. We may have to consider the implications of slow food at some point, but I shall leave that to others as I do not want to prevail on the patience of the House.
      Mr. Swayne: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
      Mr. Forth: Is it on slow food?
      Mr. Swayne: I have never found the smell of fast or slow food unappealing, but I would not wish to tempt my right hon. Friend further down that road. I simply suggest that the issue potentially negates the very reason for his amendment, because it matters not where one is on the scale of offences if the provisions are not enforced.
      Mr. Forth: That is a helpful point to which we shall return; however, I do not want to be deflected from the main thrust of my argument.

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      Before turning to the level of penalties, which is the substance of my amendment, let me add one final point about the 1872 Act, which is germane to the discussion. Section 8 states:
      Every police constable belonging to the police force of the district in which any park, garden or possession to which this Act applies is situated shall have the powers, privileges, and immunities of a park-keeper within such park, garden or possession.
      I add those thoughts to set the scene for the debate that we may have subsequently about the relative powers that the police enjoy inside and outside the parks, which have been so important to the argument that we have not yet had on the Floor of the House because the Bill was hidden away in Committee. We should therefore have the opportunity of exploring it—briefly, perhaps—in the context of subsequent groups of amendments.
      Returning to the substance of the amendment, I hope to persuade the House and the Minister that instead of having one single penalty level, we should have what I think has become much more widespread practice—although my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean) may be able to help me on this—and introduce one penalty for a first offence and a higher penalty for subsequent offences.
      I understand the feelings about the Bill, as just this morning I spoke to a councillor on Westminster city council who left me in no doubt of the anxiety of that council to ensure that the problem in the royal parks was addressed. I reassured her that I did not want to stand in the way of the Bill, but insisted that it had to be properly examined, and that is exactly what we are doing now.
      Mr. Fallon: In proposing to the House that the penalty should increase with the number of offences, has my right hon. Friend given any thought to the fact that the policy might be characterised as "Three fries and you're out"?
      Mr. Forth: It would be unwise of me to attempt to compete with that.
      We are not just talking about the relationship between the level of the penalties for a first offence and for subsequent offence, but are linking that with the words that the Minister used on Second Reading, when he said that
      fines, however frequently imposed by the courts, do not, as things are, act as an effective deterrent when compared with the income that can be gained from illegal trading.—[Official Report, Second Reading Committee, 7 March 2000; c. 4.]
      The mystery is that nowhere in the very brief proceedings on Second Reading, which lasted 43 minutes in total, or those in Standing Committee, which lasted 35 minutes in total, could I find any discussion about the income levels that it is believed these traders enjoy, if that is the right word.
      In most legislation, one attempts to relate the levels of penalties to the nature of the offence—the House will have to decide whether an offensive odour from a hamburger is a serious offence or a less serious one—and to the spoils arising from the activity. Until we know much more about the income—to which the Minister referred in passing, but never in detail—that the traders accrue from their activity, it will be difficult for us to come to a conclusion about the penalties. I assume that there must be some relativity or proportionality between income and penalties, unless the House temporarily takes
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      leave of its senses, gets carried away on a tide of emotion—understandable, perhaps—and determines that the offences are so heinous, so ghastly and so unacceptable that they must be dealt with in a peremptory and draconian way.
      I am tempted, although I am probably not the person to do it—perhaps my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border will help us later—to consider the penalties for other crimes such as violence, theft and the like, and set them in context against the penalties proposed for the generation of offensive odours. We could then see whether there was some proportionality.
      Not enough has yet been said. In a total of 43 minutes of Second Reading and 35 minutes of Committee proceedings, how could the House have had an opportunity properly to examine the relationship and the proportionality between the proposed penalties and the offences that are being committed? I say "committed", although I could have said "alleged". I believe that we have considerable evidence of the offences, and the right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne has just told us that in his daily perambulations in the royal park he experiences odours which he finds overwhelmingly offensive. The matter must be dealt with.
      My amendment No. 17 is not quite the same as my right hon. Friend's amendment No. 1, but in both cases we want to focus the attention of the House on the matter of penalties. I should like to hear more from the Minister about what he knows about the vendors' takings or earnings, to see whether a relationship can be established between the proposed fines and what they are earning from the hapless tourists, who apparently are all too happy to avail themselves of the service provided by these people. Let us not forget that those traders would not continue to do what they are doing if there was no market for their product.
      Mr. Bercow: It would appear that not only do we lack perfect information of the kind that Kant would have thought necessary for a successful debate, but we lack much information. Is my right hon. Friend aware that one of the supporters of the Bill has declared that hot-dog sellers are a nuisance? Does my right hon. Gentleman agree that if it turned out that those traders were doing substantial business—
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman must keep to the amendment.
      Mr. Forth: I shall try to refer elliptically to my hon. Friend's remarks. The four hot-dog purveyors whom I saw this morning in the area of the London Eye—a very successful and attractive item—appeared to be trading successfully with customers, and had apparently not yet been subject to any fines, at least not sufficient fines or penalties to deter them.
      Mr. Swayne: But are the activities of the four vendors whom my right hon. Friend saw illegal?
      Mr. Forth: I am told, and the Minister may be able to help—
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The right hon. Gentleman is doing very well with his amendment and has kept in good order, but whether or not people outside were acting illegally is not a matter for us to consider. We must concentrate on the amendment before us and the changes that it would make to the Bill. The right hon. Gentleman has mentioned the vendors, in passing. We know that there are four of them out there, and we know what they sell and what people buy from them, so we do not need any more detail on that matter.
      Mr. Forth: I am grateful for your protection, Mr. Deputy Speaker. My hon. Friends are keen to interrogate me, but I need your protection, vulnerable as I am. I hope that they will accept your guidance.
      I am coming to the conclusion of my brief remarks.
      Mr. Swayne: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
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      Mr. Forth: I will, but I hope that my hon. Friend's point is relevant.
      Mr. Swayne: I believe that it is. I follow my right hon. Friend's logic, and he is making a powerful case, but I have a difficulty in principle with the amendment. Reducing the punishment for the first offence sends a powerful signal, but dealing effectively with first offences will mean that there will be no subsequent offences. That is known currently as zero tolerance. Is not the amendment offensive to the public desire for zero tolerance?
      Mr. Forth: My hon. Friend hits me on a vulnerable spot. That is why I said a moment ago that I was grateful for your protection, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I still believe in capital punishment, although I did not seek to include such a provision in the Bill. I believe that harsh penalties are desirable, but my argument in this case is different. I am sure that the Minister is a modernist to his fingertips, and the more modern approach is to introduce an escalation in the penalties available. The penalty for the first offence would therefore be relatively low, but the penalties would escalate for subsequent offences.
      I understand that my hon. Friend may want to argue differently, as may my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border, but I hope that I have at least set the scene and posed the important questions. I hope also that the Minister will tell the House how he sees the relationships between the trade, the income accruing to traders, and the penalties that he believes will be effective.
      A further matter is crucial to the question of penalties. If the Minister cannot satisfy us that the police will be able to apprehend traders under the provisions of the Bill, there is little point in a discussion of appropriate penalties, as no penalties will be imposed if wrongdoers are not caught. The Bill wants to apply the legal framework that obtains outside royal parks to people who trade within such parks. I therefore hope that the Minister will tell the House how it is that people outside royal parks will be able to trade freely, while those inside the parks will not.
      A series of interconnected questions are implied by this apparently innocent amendment. They must be answered before we move on.
      Mr. Maclean: I approach the question of the fine level from an angle that is slightly different from that of my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth). I appreciate the argument that a lower fine might be acceptable for a first offence than for subsequent offences. My right hon. Friend advanced a powerful case for that principle, but because we do not know what the consequences of any fine will be, it is difficult to know whether the fine should be set at level 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5.
      Mr. Swayne: For those of us who are not familiar with criminal activity and who therefore have not memorised the scale of fines, will my right hon. Friend spell out what the levels of fine would mean to the ordinary vendor?
      Mr. Maclean: I was going to set out the consequences in cash terms of the various standard fine levels, but I hope that I will not be out of order if I challenge my hon. Friend's statement that he has not come into contact with the criminal law. I seem to remember hearing him tell the House one Friday that he had once been thrown out of a public house and arrested because it had been alleged that he looked too young. Apparently, he was cleared because although he looked excessively young, he was old enough to be there. Nevertheless I trust that that was his only experience of the criminal law.
      Amendment No. 1 would substitute for level 3, which carries a fine of £1,000, level 2 which carries a fine of £500. The Bill would delete level 1, which carries a fine of £200—it would replace a fine of £200 with one of £1,000. That increase is a little excessive and I recommend a maximum fine of £500 as an alternative. My right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst would increase the fine from £200 to £500 for a first offence and up to £1,000 for a subsequent offence.
      I have outlined the main point that we have to consider when we examine the amendments. At least, it is the main point until we consider the fundamental question whether the penalties are at appropriate levels, bearing in mind the income of the perpetrators of the offences. My right hon. Friend reminded the House of that. It is alleged that beggars on the streets of London—we will not discuss their nationality; we went down that route a few years ago—can make £200 or £300 a day if they are in the right spot and bring the right sort of children or dogs with them. Current penalties for beggars or vagrants are inadequate because those people's income is infinitely greater than the penalties they incur if they face court and the rigours of the law.
      Mr. Christopher Chope: Has my right hon. Friend any information about the number of occasions on which the maximum permissible fine is imposed by magistrates under the current system?
      Mr. Maclean: That is a valid question. It is highly unusual for the maximum penalty to be imposed in any circumstances—for first, second or even subsequent offences. Before a magistrates court imposes a maximum sentence, it has to be satisfied about the financial worth of the relevant individual and the gravity of the offence.
      For the benefit of the House, I have brought a copy of Anthony and Berryman' s "Magistrates' Court Guide 2000". The section that refers to sentencing principles for

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      the magistrates court, especially the paragraph that relates to determining the amount of a fine, is relevant. However, it would be premature to pursue that in my opening remarks. My hon. Friend has led me further ahead than I wish to be at this stage.
      Before we can determine the maximum penalties, we must have some idea of the level of the criminality and the nature and extent of the profit that the alleged criminals make. We did not have the benefit of Second Reading because the Government played the trick of convening a Second Reading Committee. It would have been a simple matter to arrange a debate of two or three hours on the Floor of the House—a proper Second Reading, which Bills normally receive. That would have saved us exploring the issues now in the amendments that we had to table.
      We need to know roughly the income of the offenders and to ascertain the inadequacy of the current criminal law. We have read in newspapers general allegations that parks police do not find it worth while to prosecute offenders because when offenders are taken to court the penalty is apparently inadequate and they are back on the street the same afternoon or the next day, carrying on their trade and making more money.
      I have heard that said and I have read it. I have not received any briefing notes from the parks police or the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions to confirm that it is a problem; but if it is and if people are going through the courts on a revolving door basis—paying an inadequate fine and trading again the next day—the House is right to deal with it and the Minister is right to build that provision into the Bill so that we can determine the appropriate level of fine and the confiscation provisions. We will debate those provisions later.
      We are determining what are the appropriate sanctions to be imposed on individuals. The Bill has a twin-track approach: there is a fine or penalty in court and there is confiscation of equipment or non-perishable assets.
      Mr. Bercow: My right hon. Friend is seeking to establish a link between the scale of the fines and the gravity of the offence—this is intellectually relevant. I wonder whether he can clarify for the benefit of the House whether he thinks that the principle determinant of the gravity of the offence is the extent of the profits or the potency, on a third offence, of the smell.
      Mr. Maclean: It is difficult for me to answer that question. The right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon) has said that one of the principal purposes of the Bill is to deal with offensive smells coming from hamburger or hot-dog stalls, and that view has been confirmed in some of the things that I have read or that have been said about the legislation. If that is the case, one can deal with the bad odour. If, on the other hand, the real problem is that these people are making an awful lot of money unscrupulously, illegally or without a licence, we may have to look at a different range of penalties and offences.
      I suggest, Mr. Martin, that if odour is the problem and we do not want people to commit the offence again, the confiscation provisions become slightly more relevant. On the other hand, if the problem is the fact that people are making excessive profits—however the Government may
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      determine that—or illegal profits by trading in one of the royal parks without a proper licence, and you will be aware, Mr. Martin, that there is nothing to stop one trading in a royal park—
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The right hon. Gentleman has overlooked the fact that it is normal to address the Chair as Mr. Deputy Speaker.
      Mr. Maclean: I am rightly chided, Mr. Deputy Speaker. For some reason, I assumed that we were in Committee—a totally wrong assumption. Of course you are Mr. Deputy Speaker and, if I may say so without sounding sycophantic, a good one at that. We always enjoy your presence in the Chair, in particular on Fridays when you show remarkable patience and tolerance.
      Mr. Forth: Does my right hon. Friend accept that because the Committee stage lasted only 35 minutes, he may well have missed it altogether and thought that this was it?
      Mr. Maclean: That is a probable and plausible explanation for my getting your designation inappropriately wrong on this occasion, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I will have to do a suitable penance.
      Mr. Gerald Howarth: I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way as I fear that he is becoming too sycophantic towards you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and I wish to protect him from that fate.
      In dealing with the level of fines, my right hon. Friend posed the question, "What is the income of these traders?" Will he deal with this matter? I understand that this measure has been brought before us in part because, under the City of Westminster Act 1999, the fine was increased, which drove traders from that part of the metropolis into the royal parks where the fine was rather less. Perhaps the income of these people is such that they cannot sustain a £1,000 fine but they can sustain one of £200.
      5.15 pm
      Mr. Maclean: My hon. Friend makes a good point; he may be right. I assume that the Minister will argue that one of the reasons for the legislation and why the proposed fines are appropriate is that they match other legislation on areas other than the royal parks, so as to ensure that traders or vendors do not find an easy loophole in the law. For example, they might be fined £1,000 if they were trading on Millbank pavement, but only £200 if they nip into one of the royal parks. [Interruption.]
      Mr. Deputy Speaker, one of my hon. Friends suggested that my penalty for getting your designation wrong should be at level 3 on the standard scale, or that I should be compulsorily fed a hot dog or a hamburger. Some might allege that that was the greater penalty.
      The point that I was making before my hon. Friend the Member for Aldershot (Mr. Howarth) intervened was that we must determine which provisions are to apply—whether the fines suggested by my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst or by me or those proposed in the Bill are the most appropriate to deal with the alleged mischief. There are already two theories, but they are only theories. The Minister can no doubt expatiate and explain exactly what the mischief is—is it

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      the offensive smell, or the fact that people are ripping off tourists or trading illegally in the parks and making a profit?
      The discussion so far has been about hot dogs, hamburgers and food stalls. However, that is not the only form of trading in the parks on which DETR wants to crack down. I have read that other sales take place. One is told about Rolex watches at £1.50 or Chanel No. 5 perfume at 50p a bottle—the smell of that perfume may be even more offensive than that of hot dogs or hamburgers. Such goods are regularly sold from suitcases on Regent street or Oxford street.
      If people are selling goods that are not food or perishables and are not in themselves creating an unpleasant odour—offending the sensitive nostrils of the residents of Kensington and Chelsea and residents near other royal parks, whose nostrils the House should wisely defend on all occasions—we need to know about it. In those circumstances, the financial penalties may need to be greater than the Minister suggested. The profits of those traders may be even greater.
      On the other hand, we may not need the confiscation provisions—to which I merely allude in passing, Mr. Deputy Speaker, because they occur in another part of the Bill. Those provisions would certainly deal with the smell problem. The items would be taken away and the traders could not use them again. However, we do not need to confiscate goods—the fake Rolex watches, or other cheap or counterfeit products—to deal with the problem of smell, so a financial penalty might be appropriate in such cases.
      On the determination of the amount of any fine and the principles behind it, the House is asked to accept three options. The Minister's option is to delete the £200 fine and to hit everyone with a maximum penalty of £1,000. My right hon. Friend's suggestion is to delete the £200 and hit everyone with a £500 fine on the first offence, jacking it up to £1,000. My suggestion is that a maximum of £500 would be appropriate.
      Anthony and Berryman advise that, in accordance with the sentencing principles of the Criminal Justice Act 1991, the court must ensure that the penalty is commensurate with the seriousness of the offence for which it is imposed. Anthony and Berryman note that the court must assess carefully the gravity of the offence, having regard to the circumstances and to any mitigation. The court's assessment of the seriousness of the offence should then be reflected in the fine imposed.
      That relates to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr. Chope). I do not have the magistrates courts sentencing guidelines with me, but no doubt the Minister will confirm that, under those guidelines, a fine is regarded as the least desirable option on many occasions. I think that the guidelines suggest searching for other options, including community sentences, rather than slapping fines on offenders who will not be able to pay. If an offender has difficulty paying, the easiest course is to ignore the fine and not pay it. The bad debt accumulates, the Lord Chancellor's office does not get the money and the law sinks further into disrepute. That is why the previous Government, this Government and earlier Labour Governments considered community sentences. I think that many Governments
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      have spent considerable time trying to find alternatives to fines and imprisonment. These options have included community sentences, which impose penalties that are likely to be put into effect.
      Mr. Bercow: I do not want to prevent my right hon. Friend from proceeding with his argument, but there is still some uncertainty about the nature of the trade to which the graduated fines would apply. Is it the intention that they would apply to the sale of hamburgers and hot dogs and, for example, umbrellas, chestnuts, tee-shirts and baseball caps?
      Mr. Maclean: My hon. Friend is right. The Bill's main provisions gives Ministers power to designate certain specified provisions of the Parks Regulation (Amendment) Act 1926 as park trading regulations. The Bill is all about creating a new and specific trading offence from existing trading regulations.
      For the benefit of the House, I have a copy of the Royal Parks and Other Open Spaces Regulations 1997, which are the most recent. Regulation 4 lists the acts in a park for which written permission is required. Although they would assist in the presentation of my argument, I shall not go through them because I think that you would rule me out of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. However, activities prohibited in parks include cycling, noise, interfering with plants and fungus and treading on flowerbeds and shrubberies, for example.
      I assume that the Minister will say that those examples are not trading offences. When the Minister introduces regulations after the Bill is enacted, I assume that he will have referred to regulation 4 and have selected specific references to trading offences. Regulation 4(6) refers to the carrying on of
      any trade or business in a Park.
      Regulation 4(3) refers to the operation of
      a metal or mineral detector.
      There is reference also to the organisation of or taking part in an assembly, display or performance. That may be a theatrical or artistic performance, which in a way may be trading.
      We are considering a wide range of activities that is not confined to selling goods. I suspect that when DETR is producing a list of so-called trading offences to which the Bill will apply, it will not select only references to carrying on a trade or business. Instead, it will select some of the ancillary items that can also be regarded as trading offences that will be subject to a £1,000 penalty, including taking photographs of "still or moving subjects" as part of a professional activity by a body "corporate or unincorporate" or taking part
      in any assembly, display, performance, representation…review or theatrical event.
      These, too, could be park trading offences.
      The House should ask itself whether these activities, including taking part in producing photographs for The House Magazine, should incur a £1,000 penalty. The House will be aware that many of us—well, some of us are less often involved now, thank goodness, since we are no longer in positions of any importance—including Ministers, are often invited by the media not only to College Green but into the royal park that is opposite 4 Millbank to participate in photographic experiences, shall

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      we say, and to be interviewed. That, according to my reading of the regulations, is illegal. If being interviewed by the BBC on a royal park is regarded as participation in a trade and is contrary to clause 1, a penalty of £1,000 could be imposed.
      Mr. Forth: My right hon. Friend could, if he had wished, have used the Royal Parks and Gardens Act 1872 to build on his argument, although I do not press him to do so. As far as I know, it has not been repealed, and it states:
      No person shall drive or wheel into a park any vehicle, barrow, truck or machine not admitted therein by the rules of the park.
      As long ago as 1872, many, if not most, of the activities that we are discussing would have been covered by the first schedule to that Act.
      Mr. Maclean: My right hon. Friend is, as usual, correct. The only difference is that the penalty specified in the 1872 Act and in the Parks Regulation (Amendment) Act 1926—extremely good reading, which I am sure you will wish to peruse once you have vacated the Chair, Mr. Deputy Speaker—was £5. We have just heard from a distinguished parliamentarian, the right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne, whom, as a former Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, we can expect to be able to do his sums, that the ratio to allow for inflation between pre-war legislation and that of today should be 40:1. The pre-war penalty of £5 should therefore be upgraded to £200, which, it so happens, it already is. Yet the Minister proposes to increase that penalty fivefold to £1,000. That may be the right amount to deal with the evil or mischief—whatever it may be—of offensive odour or offensive profit-making by person or persons unknown.
      Mr. Michael Fabricant: I apologise for not having heard the opening speeches. I was involved in a Greater London Authority statutory instrument Committee with my hon. Friend the Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson). May I correct a misapprehension that these matters stem back to the 1872 Act? In fact, they go back to the Crown Lands Act 1702.
      With regard to photography, is Parliament square considered to be a royal park? Recently, there was a dispute between the Metropolitan police and the parks police over those of us who visited Winnie the pig in her valiant fight for British pig farming. Was I committing an offence by going there?
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. Those matters are not before us. Where parks are located has nothing to do with the narrow amendment before us.
      Mr. Maclean: I was attempting to confine myself narrowly to the amendment, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and was not going to be led slightly astray by my hon. Friend. I am slightly surprised that he has not studied the second schedule to the Royal Parks and Gardens Act 1872, which lists the royal parks. If he cares to reach behind him, I shall allow him to study it briefly in order to educate him in that regard. I can assure him that Parliament square is not, in fact, included.
      Mr. Fallon: It may be for the convenience of my right hon. Friend if he notes that the second schedule to the
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      1872 Act, and indeed the first schedule, to which my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) referred, were, sadly, repealed by the 1926 Act.
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I must keep the House to the amendments before us. The matters being raised may have something to do with the Bill, but we are currently debating the amendments tabled by the right hon. Members for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean) and for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth).
      5.30 pm
      Mr. Maclean: I am grateful, as ever, for your protection, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I wish to bring my remarks to a conclusion.
      Mr. Gerald Howarth: I am not clear whether I have sufficient information about what my right hon. Friend proposes. He is proposing a fine of £500. He talked about the income of rogue traders. Is there any evidence, from prosecutions under the City of Westminster Act 1999, about what level of fines was imposed? We know that there is a maximum fine of £1,000.
      Perhaps the Bill should provide for variable fines, depending on which park was concerned. After all, those who trade in Richmond park will not be able to command the same fees for their burgers or ice creams as people trading in St. James's park, who have the whole Japanese and American tourist market available?
      Mr. Maclean: My hon. Friend makes a valid point. It brings me nicely back to sentencing principles, the point on which I wanted to conclude. If a person is found guilty before the court and the court is trying to assess, as the sentencing principles suggest, the gravity of the offence, having regard to the circumstances and to any mitigation, it will have to take into account where the offence was committed. Was it way out in Richmond park or was it in Hyde park or St. James's?
      There is also a sentencing principle that states that the court must inquire into the offender's financial circumstances and ability to pay before setting the fine. That brings us back, fair and square, to the point before us. Should the fine be £200, £500 or £1,000 maximum? In some ways, it does not matter what the maximum is because the court cannot slap a maximum fine on anyone before it, willy-nilly. The court is under a duty; indeed, magistrates would be appealed immediately to a higher court if they attempted to impose a maximum fine without inquiring into the offender's financial circumstances and ability to pay.
      Mr. Bercow: In proposing the graduated series of fines, has my right hon. Friend taken account of the fact that the Bill treats differently, or appears to treat differently, the vendors of different types of goods, given that there is a power to confiscate non-perishable goods but not perishable goods?
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman has been a Member of the House for a reasonable time now. He must know that we are talking not about the Bill in its

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      entirety but about an amendment to it. The amendment deals not with confiscation but with fines, so any intervention needs to be about a fine.
      Mr. Maclean: I hear my hon. Friend's point, and no doubt it is something that we will address when we debate the third group of amendments, which we will reach shortly.
      Under the sentencing guidelines, the court will be able to take into account, when deciding the level of the fine, the fact that one person may have had all his equipment confiscated while another may have been sent home with bags of loose hamburgers and fried onions and therefore still has some assets. I am certain that his defence solicitors—if he has defence solicitors—will plead all those arguments. The main one will be, "You cannot impose this level of fine; it is far too high. My client does not have that sort of money."
      Also, if there is an order before the court to confiscate equipment, which may be worth £1,000, £5,000 or tens of thousands of pounds, defence lawyers are bound to argue that if the court is to exercise its confiscation powers, it should impose a very low level of fine because anything else would be far too much for their poor client.
      Mr. Fabricant: My right hon. Friend is very generous in giving way to me for a second time. In my earlier intervention I mentioned Parliament square, and he asked me to look at the Royal Parks and Gardens Act 1872. Apparently, Parliament square garden is considered to be a royal park. Therefore, would the proposals contained in amendment No. 17 apply to Parliament square?
      Mr. Maclean: I assume that they would. I assume that when the Bill is enacted, the Government will produce regulations creating the trading offences. I have studied all the possible offences that could be designated as park trading offences. In addition to selling hamburgers or hot dogs, a whole range of other activities could be regarded as trading activities, including posing for photographs in the park if companies make money out of it, as the BBC and other organisations may do. A range of activities under regulation 4 of the 1997 regulations could be regarded as trading activities, in the widest possible sense. To ensure that the measure contains a catch-all for all trading offences, I suspect that parliamentary draftsmen will designate every one possible, and the penalty of £1,000—or £500, as I suggest—will apply.
      In conclusion, unless the Minister convinces me otherwise, I think that jumping from a fine of £200 to one of £1,000, plus introducing, for the first time, the right to confiscate all equipment, is very draconian. A penalty of £500 would still be twice the rate of inflation. The much-respected right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne suggested that the fine should be only £200 if it were to keep pace with inflation since before the war. I am proposing a much higher penalty than the level of inflation would suggest, but the Government are demanding a very high one indeed.
      We need to know why the Minister has reached that determination, how it has worked outside the parks in Westminster and what is the level of trading activity. Are we talking just about food and perishables, or is a whole
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      range of odd, assorted goods—perhaps of good quality—being sold as well as counterfeit ones? How does the Minister envisage confiscation working with regard to fines and penalties, and what will the effect be on the court? Only if we know the income that these people make from their activities and the extent of the mischief can we come to a proper, sensible determination about which of the amendments we should vote on today, or whether we should accept the Government's proposals.
      Mr. Greenway: For the avoidance of doubt, I wish to state that the official Opposition support the Bill, which began as a private Member's Bill introduced by my right hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mr. Brooke).
      I remind right hon. and hon. Members that I have personal experience in these matters. As a police officer at West End Central, policing Soho and Mayfair in the 1960s, it was my privilege and duty to arrest many a hot-dog seller. I assure my right hon. Friends the Members for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) and for Penrith and the Border (Mr. Maclean), who have tabled these amendments, that even in the 1960s it was not unusual for hot-dog sellers to have £100 or more in cash in their pockets when arrested. There has been much discussion about inflation since the 1920s. The result of inflation since the 1960s would mean that £100 then would be worth considerably in excess of £1,000 now.
      I cannot agree that the level of fines in a Bill dealing with offences in the royal parks should be different from those in the legislation that deals with offences in the City of Westminster. Whether the level of fines is correct is a separate matter, and I have some sympathy with some of the comments that have been made on that subject.
      Reference has been made to enforcement, and I pointed out earlier that the reason why several vendors were selling hot dogs within the vicinity of the London Eye this morning may have been that the police on duty had other things to do. However, inadequate policing is surely not a reason for failing to provide proper levels of penalty and sentence when offenders are caught and successfully prosecuted.
      On the contrary, if the scale of offending is such that only a crackdown or blitz by police officers forsaking all their other duties would make any meaningful difference to the level of illegal trading, surely we should ensure that the courts have adequate powers to impose stiff penalties, to make that crackdown worth while. That must mean a combination of heavy fines and confiscation.
      Mr. Chope: Will my hon. Friend deal with the argument about displacement? The London Eye is situated in the London borough of Lambeth. Does he agree that there may be so much activity there because fines there are lower than in the City of Westminster? How will that disparity be addressed by the Bill? Will not the Bill exacerbate it?
      Mr. Greenway: I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who has anticipated my next point. One of the difficulties created by the provisions in the City of Westminster is that they have displaced illegal trading from the streets into the royal parks. He rightly states that the south bank of the River Thames is in a different London borough. That in no way suggests that the House should not pass the Bill and

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      send it to the other House for consideration, but my hon. Friend's argument about the rest of London needs to be addressed by Ministers. Perhaps the matter could be drawn to the attention of the new mayor of London, the hon. Member for Brent, East (Mr. Livingstone), and the newly elected Greater London Assembly.
      The reason why the Minister and I are in the Chamber this afternoon is that the royal parks are under the jurisdiction, or departmental responsibility, of the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. Normally we would expect such issues to be considered by Home Office Ministers, or Ministers from the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions. I am sure that the Minister will draw the attention of his colleagues in those Departments to the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Mr. Chope).
      We require the Bill to deal with the displacement into the royal parks of illegal trading that was previously carried on within the city of Westminster. I suggest to right hon. and hon. Friends that the very fact that illegal trading appears now to have been displaced to the south bank adds fuel to our argument that we need to provide adequate protection for the royal parks.
      Mr. Bercow: My hon. Friend has referred to the scale of allegedly objectionable activity in the royal parks. Can he tell the House how much less he would expect to accrue to public funds from the fines proposed by my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean) than from those proposed by the Government?
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      Mr. Greenway: That is an interesting question, to which I have no answer. However, that is not the issue; the issue is whether the fines and the confiscation would be a deterrent.
      My right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border asked about the scale of incomes. I have already alluded to my experience of 35 years ago, which suggested that those street traders made substantial incomes from their unlicensed sales. Obviously, they have no overheads and charge relatively high prices for relatively low-quality food or items; reference has been made to counterfeit goods being sold. For many, the fines that traders pay have traditionally been seen as being in lieu of the rent that they would have had to pay if they were trading from a recognised market or other premises.
      The House needs no more evidence of the scale of income being derived from this already illegal activity than the widespread reports of Mafia control of the very people who are trading illegally within the royal parks. These so-called pitches are considered to be extremely valuable. My right hon. Friends are entirely right to ask the House to consider whether the penalties are correct, but it would be wrong for us to agree to an amendment which would reduce the level of fines permitted by the Bill. The courts will have flexibility, but in my judgment, the maximum should be higher.
      Mr. Fabricant: I am intrigued by my hon. Friend's use of the word Mafia, and I am persuaded by much of his argument. Is he suggesting that there is an element of organised crime, or is it merely individual capitalism by the vendors?
      Mr. Greenway: My hon. Friend puts his point with his usual eloquence. I think that organised crime is involved;
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      that advice has come from the Metropolitan police. There have been several incidents of violence, as the Minister has mentioned. We are not dealing simply with hot-dog sellers, but with organised crime and acts of violence that we should not tolerate within the royal parks. That is why this activity must be stamped out and brought under control by proper licensing. That is why the maximum penalties should be even higher.
      However, we are perfectly content to trust the Minister's judgment. Clearly, it makes sense for the magistrates courts that deal with such matters—whether they are in the royal parks, the City of Westminster or the City of London—to have the same penalties available to them. I hope that on reflection, my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst will seek leave to withdraw the amendment.
      Mr. Fallon: I shall be brief, because this is the Report stage.
      The House faces an unenviable choice between the amendment tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) and that tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean). My right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst prefers a lesser penalty for the first offence. He described that as modernisation. I would call it sociology, but let us rest on that definition. My right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border described his amendment as a compromise.
      As true Conservatives, we are faced with a choice between modernisation or compromise. In reaching a decision, we should look a little more carefully at how to judge the effectiveness of the fines.
      I hope that my right hon. Friends will forgive me if I say that it is all very well to criticise the Minister or the Bill for the lack of evidence on which the Minister's proposed fines are based, but I did not hear any countervailing evidence from them. I wonder whether my right hon. Friends based their amendments on discussions with the Association of Chief Police Officers or the Magistrates Association, or whether they took evidence from representatives of the royal parks. It is crucial that the level of fine should be evidence based. I regret that I did not hear in either of their excellent speeches any greater evidence in support of the levels that they would prefer than we have heard so far from the Government. If the House is to spend prime time fixing penalty levels, we should do so on the basis of discussions with those at the sharp end, such as chief police officers, magistrates and so on.
      The second criterion for judging the two interesting amendments is which is likely to be the most effective deterrent. Today's debate has been useful because it has raised the concept of displacement. Something that used to happen in the City of Westminster has been pushed into the royal parks because there is a different penalty there. It has also been pushed across the river to the south bank. If we get the level of fine right, the vendors might be driven to the millennium dome and drum up some custom for that attraction.
      I am not convinced by the debate that any of the suggested fines will be a deterrent—and I am far less convinced when I hear from my hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) that the Mafia is involved. The idea that the Mafia will be deterred because the fine

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      has been increased from £200 to £1,000 does not bear serious examination, and would not bear serious examination on the streets of Palermo in Sicily. A mere £800 will not stop the violence of which my hon. Friend spoke. I need a lot more convincing about the right level for an effective deterrent.
      If we want to drive this activity—or, as the right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon) described it, this smell—out of the royal parks, we must have an effective fine. However, I am tempted to conclude that all three of the suggested levels have been arrived at by simply making up a number. My right hon. Friends seem to think that the problem can be solved by increasing the level of the fine, but they are not sure that it will be an effective deterrent.
      Mr. Bercow: I have always regarded my hon. Friend as a libertarian. Does he agree that if one were to argue for a much heavier fine than the Government or the Opposition are proposing, there would be a risk of arguing the doctrine that the ends justify the means and abandoning the notion of proportionality?
      Mr. Fallon: I agree. I am not advocating a heavier level of fine than that already proposed. My right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst seems content with an increased level for the second and third offence. He may wish to return to that idea when he replies to the debate.
      I am not advocating any particular level of fine. I need to know why the House is debating this Bill in the middle of the afternoon when there are so many other matters for which we are told there is no legislative time. It is for the Government to defend their chosen level. I am pointing out that the two alternatives do not seem, on first inspection, to be any more solidly evidence based than what is in the Bill.
      The third criterion that might be useful is to consider the alternatives. As none of us has confidence in any particular level of fine, are we sure that we have considered all the alternatives? There may be more moderate punishments, such as some form of community service, which might take the vendors off the street.
      Mr. Swayne: For the Mafia?
      Mr. Fallon: My hon. Friend the Member for New Forest, West (Mr. Swayne) might be about to propose more serious penalties, which might involve the vendors never returning again.
      Mr. Swayne: I am attracted by the idea of the Mafia being involved in purveying hamburgers. That is something that we should encourage. If the Mafia can be tied up in distributing hamburgers, society might be enhanced.
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. This is wide of the debate on the amendments.
      Mr. Fallon: There is an absence of rationale here, Mr. Deputy Speaker. If we are to criticise the Bill for overreacting to a problem, or coming up with a solution that is not based on a particular rationale, we must be honest and apply that same critique to amendments Nos. 17 and 1.
      I have said that this is a difficult and agonising choice for those of us who wish to support either or both of my right hon. Friends. However, when they reply to this important debate, it is incumbent on them to demonstrate that their amendments are better rooted in evidence and based on a more reasoned framework than the Bill that they seek to amend.
      Mr. Chope: It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Mr. Fallon) because I share some of his scepticism.
      My right hon. Friends the Members for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) and for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean) have done a great service to the House and the country by ensuring that we have an opportunity to debate this matter. When speaking to clause 2 in Committee, the Minister justified the clause in just a few words. He said:
      The current maximum penalty…carries a fine of £200. Magistrates courts generally impose much lower fines, but even the maximum fine of £200 is no deterrent. The courts need to have much higher penalties available to them.—[Official Report, Standing Committee G, 21 March 2000; c. 7.]
      He did not explain why or how higher maximum penalties would deter that activity. The best deterrent is the certainty of conviction.
      On Second Reading, the Minister said that those seeking to enforce the legislation in the royal parks were subject to strong-arm tactics and violence. In other words, offences were committed against them for which there are substantial penalties, including imprisonment. If the presence of those penalties on the statute book is not sufficient to deter this activity, why does the Minister think that a maximum fine of £1,000 might be?
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      There is a real concern about this piecemeal legislation and the displacement effect. The Government argue that the Bill will equalise the royal parks with the City of Westminster, but those of us who, when we are in London, live on the south bank, as I do, in the London borough of Lambeth, will justifiably ask why the displacement should cause a proliferation of the illegal activity in our area. The Minister has not addressed that point.
      Probably the best answer would be to have fixed penalties, decided by local authorities, just as they choose the level of parking fines. Fixed penalties and the certainty of conviction might be a much more effective deterrent than maximum penalties.
      Mr. Fabricant: There is a powerful argument for fixed penalties. Does my hon. Friend agree that, in order to avoid displacement, they should apply equally to the royal parks and gardens as well as to places that do not come under the provisions of the 1872 Act?
      Mr. Chope: That is a powerful point.
      The Minister admitted in the Second Reading Committee that he had been
      advised that interviews by the immigration and social security authorities have elicited that many of those operating these food carts say that they are asylum seekers.—[Official Report, Second Reading Committee, 7 March 2000; c. 5.]
      That shows that the Government will never achieve their objective of reducing that illegal activity through the Bill.
      I do not know whether the Minister has consulted the new chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality on whether he thinks that the legislation is discriminatory, but if those people are indeed asylum seekers, that further demonstrates the knock-on effects of the Government's inadequate asylum policies. Is it not unthinkable that maximum fines of £1,000 should be imposed on asylum seekers, who will justifiably be able to say that they have no source of income? How will the courts be able to impose £1,000 fines on asylum seekers, and how will asylum seekers be deterred from this unlawful activity by the provisions in clause 2?
      Mr. Swayne: I do not yet know whether I am in favour of, or against, the amendments. That depends to some extent on what the Minister will say. I want briefly to rehearse my dilemma and to crystallise what has emerged. One has to decide which side of the fence to come down on. I want to rehearse the argument that has erected that fence for me.
      I think that my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) undermined the force of amendment No. 17 when he suggested that it might not be profitable to spend a great deal of time discussing the level of fines when those fines were unlikely to be enforced.
      My hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) dismissed that argument with powerful logic, but both he and my right hon. Friend relied on one piece of evidence: the four traders next to the London Eye to whom they referred. The key point is that we might be doing those traders a huge disservice, because no one has yet produced any evidence to persuade us that they are trading illegally, yet they were used as the example to prove that the fines would not be enforced. Without that evidence, no such issue can be decided.
      The thrust of the remarks of my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst and those who followed his logic was that the fine had to be proportionate to the offence. If I understood him and my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean) correctly, they did not believe that these offences were quite as heinous as some might portray them to be—reference was made earlier to the offensive smells that might emerge—and my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst therefore wanted to reduce the fine in respect of the first offence.
      I understand the force of those arguments. These vendors do not force their products on unwilling customers. They provide a service. If it constitutes a nuisance, we must be proportionate in our response. That is one side of the fence—the argument for the amendments.
      The argument against the amendments is the argument for zero tolerance—that the fines should be severe and there should be no reduction for the first offence on the
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      grounds that, if we deal severely with the first offence, there will not be subsequent offences. The argument is that, if one takes these issues seriously, one deals with the problem rather than having a running sore.
      That might be countered by the proportionality argument—that it is ridiculous to deal with such trivial offences in so draconian a way—but the benefits of the zero tolerance approach are felt not in respect of those particular offences but in respect of all offences. The experience in New York is that dealing with minor offences such as street begging or illegal trading in a severe way has a knock-on effect on much more serious crime throughout the city. That is a powerful argument that we should consider.
      However, I have at the back of my mind a reservation, which sprang from a telephone call that I received last week from a constituent, complaining that he had reported a burglar alarm ringing next door to him to the police, only to be told that it was the policy of the police in Ringwood not to respond to burglar alarms. Here we are, discussing additional fines to pursue the purveyors of hamburgers, and I wonder whether we have lost our sense of proportion.
      I refer again to the remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale, who suggested that the hamburger trade had been sewn up by the Mafia. It may bear repeating that if we could confine gangsterism to the purveyance of hamburgers, we would be doing very well indeed.
      The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (Mr. Alan Howarth): I am happy to respond to the debate on the amendments. I am grateful to all who have participated. It is proper that we should debate the proposals in the spirit of satisfying Parliament that the legislation proposed by the Government is necessary, well framed, proportionate—that has been mentioned several times—and therefore fit to proceed speedily on to the statute book. I hope that right hon. and hon. Gentlemen are increasingly satisfied that that will be the case.
      The Bill has been considered carefully by Opposition Front Benchers, and I place on record my appreciation of the responsible attitude of the hon. Members for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) and for Richmond Park (Dr. Tonge). I assure those right hon. and hon. Gentlemen who have cast a scintilla of doubt on whether Parliament's scrutiny of the measure has so far been adequate that I have been subjected to a rigorous and searching interrogation—more importantly, so has the legislation—by the hon. Gentleman and the hon. Lady. None the less, it is appropriate to proceed as we are this afternoon, and I shall address myself to the amendments. In so doing, I shall deal more gently with the right hon. Members for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) and for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean) than did the hon. Member for Sevenoaks (Mr. Fallon), who made some shrewd criticisms of the amendments—in the interests of opening up such issues for debate, I presume.
      This straightforward measure is intended to deal with a pretty clear-cut problem—unauthorised, and therefore illegal—trading in the royal parks. Indeed, the Metropolitan police and the Royal Parks Constabulary have advised us that such illegal trading is very much a manifestation of organised crime of an unpleasant nature.

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      The right hon. and hon. Gentlemen, who are strongly committed to upholding good law and order, would certainly want the Government to deal with such crime.
      Mr. Fabricant: The Minister says that he agrees with my hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) that this is indeed a problem of organised crime. The word "Mafia" was used. Therefore, does he think that a level 3 penalty, which is suggested in clause 2 and is the subject of the amendments, will be adequate to deter the Mafia or others involved in such organised crime?
      Mr. Howarth: I shall address the specific point that the hon. Gentleman properly raises in a moment, but right hon. and hon. Members want to know the nature of the problem, so I shall respond on that general point before dealing with the fines and other remedies and penalties that may be appropriate.
      We suspect that such activities are organised, but even if they are not, they involve ripping off the many visitors who come to enjoy the royal parks on a scale that should shock us all. I am advised that the illegal traders who have been arrested and charged with offences have told the police that they make approximately £1,200 a day—a lucrative trade indeed. However, they do not always have that sum on them because they use a system of runners to take the money back to those who control them. It is clear that significant penalties, including fines, are needed if we are to address the problem.
      I was asked about the incidence of such offences. In 1999, about 1,500 illegal traders were prosecuted for activity that occurred in St. James's and Green parks, so we are dealing with a large-scale problem that causes widespread offence. Licensed traders are losing a significant amount of business. Their turnover has been substantially reduced—by about 50 per cent. since the mid-1990s. A further effect is that The Royal Parks agency is deprived of the revenue that it would otherwise receive from the licensed traders, so a clear public interest is involved.
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      Apart from the financial aspects—the money made by the unauthorised traders and the sum lost by those who should benefit—we have seen a set of practices that I can only describe as squalid. We have seen episodes of violence. Unauthorised traders have gone at one another with knives as they contended for particular pitches. On one occasion, they went at one another with iron bars just outside a park. Hot fat was poured over a police officer who sought to prevent them from carrying on that trade.
      Mr. Forth: What puzzles some of us is that the Minister is describing criminal activity. Presumably, the criminal law extends to the royal parks. He used the phrase "we have seen", so presumably the police must have also seen those activities. Is he telling us that the police will not or cannot deal with the criminal activities that he describes, let alone the trading and the creation of offensive smells?
      Mr. Howarth: We must deal with those who are engaged in the criminal activity that we find on the spot.
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      The right hon. Gentleman is perfectly right to press me on that point because, of course, the police should make every effort to get at the racketeers who lie behind the trade. We are talking about practical measures to get at the roots of the problem as well as at the individuals who commit such offences in the parks.
      Mr. Fabricant rose—
      Mr. Bercow rose—
      Mr. Howarth: I shall make a little more progress and then respond to any point that hon. Members want to make. I am dealing with the nature and scale of the problem because only when we understand that can we judge the appropriateness of the fines proposed.
      Amendment No. 17 would limit magistrates courts to imposing a fine not exceeding £500 for a first offence. They would be empowered to impose a fine not exceeding £1,000 for a subsequent offence. We heard an interesting history of inflation between 1872 and 1926, and we were all grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon) for his authoritative intervention. We also heard some interesting speculation about the rising incidence of criminality. In fact, the penalties that we introduce must be effective, not disproportionate or draconian.
      Mr. Fabricant: Will the Minister give way?
      Mr. Howarth: Not yet. Amendment No. 1, which was tabled by the right hon. Member for Penrith and The Border, would reduce the maximum fine that magistrates courts could impose for a park-trading offence to £500. There is no reason why we should stipulate that the courts should impose a more lenient penalty on an illegal trader for a first offence. Given the scale of the problem, the offences perpetrated and the rewards that the unauthorised traders enjoy, his proposal to impose a level 2 fine is not appropriate.
      A particularly important consideration—the point was helpfully made by the hon. Member for Lichfield (Mr. Fabricant)—is the need for consistency; that theme has emerged during the debate. The right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst drew attention to the activities of traders on the south bank. As we debate the matter now, we have no idea whether those traders were licensed, so we cannot generalise usefully from the observation that he made, but we do know that, as far as possible, we should have available to us a consistent regime and a consistent range of penalties.
      It seems to me—I am grateful for the support that I have had on the point from the hon. Member for Ryedale—that it is obviously sensible for the regime that we create for the royal parks to be consistent with the regime that Parliament has created for the City of Westminster. The City of Westminster Act 1999 was passed only last year. We can ask all sorts of questions—they were asked in the debate—about whether there are alternatives to fines. Possibilities were proposed such as community service, but, unless we deal consistently with the same offences in neighbouring areas, we will continue to see the displacement effect, which has caused the state of affairs in the parks to deteriorate so badly, particularly since we introduced that Act.
      Mr. Bercow: I hope that the Minister is not implying that there is a causal link between deplorable violence and

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      thriving trade. I assume that he accepts that the trade that is taking place is voluntary. In seeking to justify the fines that he proposes, what exactly does he mean by the term "ripping off'?
      Mr. Howarth: I am advised that some high prices for what I would think were unappetising hot dogs and hamburgers are being extorted from innocent visitors to parks. The hon. Gentleman, who is deeply committed to the unalloyed free market, would no doubt applaud such conduct. He would say good luck—caveat emptor—but, having responsibility within Government for The Royal Parks agency and for good conduct in, and good presentation of, the royal parks, I am concerned that we should not endorse the violations of hospitality that such practices involve, so I do not agree with him on the matter.
      Mr. Fabricant: The Minister says, rightly, that there needs to be consistency between the level of fines in the royal parks and the level of fines in the City of Westminster to avoid displacement, but, before a fine can be levied, there must be an arrest. What worries me is that, earlier, he spoke about crimes of violence that are against the criminal code and where there have not been arrests. Is he convinced that there are sufficient parks police—there are certainly not sufficient Metropolitan police—to ensure that such arrests can be made?
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. That is going wide of the amendment that is before us. The amendment is about fines. Therefore, we should restrict ourselves to that.
      Mr. Fabricant: But the person must be arrested before he can be fined.
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order.
      Mr. Howarth: I am grateful to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
      Let me pay tribute to the Royal Parks Constabulary because it is trying hard and doing its best to acquit its responsibilities in difficult circumstances. I believe that the force is sufficiently staffed for it to be able to carry out its responsibilities, but there need to be the sanctions and the penalties, which are available to the courts. Otherwise, the problem will grow and grow. At the moment, it is simply too easy for people to make a lot of money out of illegal trading, so the problem is liable to overwhelm the Royal Parks Constabulary, but I am glad to say that that is by no means the case at the moment. However, it is under a pressure that it should not be under. It is one of the reasons why we need that level of fines.
      Mr. Maclean: Will the Minister give way?
      Mr. Howarth: No. I should like to carry on a little further.
      Fines alone will not be sufficient. The scale of profiteering that I have described shows that, so we need the panoply of measures that Parliament has already provided the City of Westminster, including fines, powers of seizure and the power of the courts to order forfeiture. We need to see the fines in that broader context. The
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      evidence is that the array of penalties available to magistrates to use for offences committed in the City of Westminster is working satisfactorily.
      We have had much debate about what the level of fine should be. That is a proper concern for the House to have, but let me remind right hon. and hon. Members that the Bill still leaves magistrates courts discretion to impose a lesser fine. The right hon. Member for Penrith and The Border underlined that it is not just a discretion. There is a duty to exercise that discretion—magistrates have a duty to take account of the circumstances of each case—so the concerns about proportionality are well met.
      The offence in question is not, as was suggested, merely the generation of offensive odours. We have an array of much more significant offences. It is right that we should have those powers to deal with them. I hope that, on that basis, the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst will be willing to withdraw his amendment and to agree that what we have in the Bill is, after all, appropriate.
      Mr. Forth: I am grateful to the Minister for taking the trouble to answer the debate in such detail and with such courtesy. I am conscious of the passage of time. I think that we have had a proper and thorough debate.
      In view of what the Minister and, in particular, my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Mr. Fallon) have said, I now realise that my amendments were probably misplaced and even misdirected. I feel properly chastened. On the basis of their remarks, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
      Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

    Clause 3

      OFFENCE BY BODY CORPORATE
      Mr. Forth: I beg to move amendment No. 18, in page 1, line 16, after "the" insert "knowledge,".
      Mr. Deputy Speaker: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 3, in page 1, leave out lines 17 and 18.
      No. 2, in page 1, line 23, leave out from beginning to end of line 3 on page 2 and insert—
      '(a) a director or company secretary described in the articles of incorporation, and
      (b) a person purporting to act in either of the capacities above.'
      No. 4, in page 1, line 25, leave out paragraph (c).
      No. 20, in page 1, line 25, leave out "secretary" and insert—
      'company secretary (in the terms defined in the Articles of Incorporation)'.
      No. 21, in page 2, line 2, leave out "purporting" and insert "authorised".
      No. 31, in page 2, line 2, leave out "purporting to act" and insert "acting".
      Mr. Forth: In the light the debate that we have just had, I am tempted to designate this part of the Bill the "Mafia clause". I can conclude only that the description of the clause, "Offence by body corporate", must refer to the Mafia. It has not been suggested yet by the Minister

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      that anything that would usually be known as a body corporate—a corporation or a company—is involved in that activity, but he has suggested, and seems to believe, that he has sufficient proof that the Mafia or some other organised crime organisation is behind it. I say that not in a spirit of levity, but to suggest that the thrust of the clause is either misdirected or directed for reasons that we have not yet been told by the Minister.
      In restricting my remarks and in making them as succinct as possible, in order that we may make progress, I wish to explore whether the Minister is satisfied that the words in the clause are sufficient. That is the reason for our amendments. They are part probing and part designed—I hope that he will accept it—genuinely to strengthen the clause. However, it will be up to the Minister, as ever, to satisfy me and my right hon. and hon. Friends and to say whether that is the case. The amendment would add the word "knowledge". We want to be able to demonstrate within the clause that the offence has been committed not just with consent or connivance, but with the knowledge of an officer. That is important to make full sense of the provision.
      There are references in the clause to the "director", the "manager" or the "secretary". Again, our concern was that the term "secretary" could be misconstrued and could draw into the net of the offence persons who perhaps should not be drawn in. We suggest the phrase "company secretary", which would provide the necessary elucidation or further expansion suggested by my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean).
      6.30 pm
      We are rather puzzled by paragraph (e), in which the word "purporting" appears. Unless the Minister tells us that the word has a specific meaning and will be specifically effective in terms of the Bill's aims, we propose the substitution of the word "authorised" for the word "purporting"—or, indeed, "acting". We want the legislation to be made more specific and therefore, as we would argue, more effective. I fear that the word "purporting" may not be strong enough or sufficiently focused to give the Bill the effect that I know everyone wants it to have.
      Mr. Fabricant: I understand why, in his introductory remarks, my right hon. Friend described this as the Mafia clause, but does he now accept that it would not apply to organised crime unless it was committed by a body corporate? Surely it is highly unlikely that any crime organisation would incorporate itself in the United Kingdom. On that assumption, there would be no company secretary and, indeed, no officer of such a corporation.
      Mr. Forth: That helpful intervention simply exposes the fact that my suggestion that the Mafia might be caught by the clause was somewhat wide of the mark, and I do not want to pursue it unduly. However, one issue lingers. We must know, by the time we have completed the Bill's Report stage and Third Reading, whether it will deal with the Mafia problem—as the Minister introduced it to the debate—and whether the confiscation of hamburger carts will be sufficient to deal with that problem. We will discuss confiscations later, but we are currently dealing with the body corporate.
      378
      I suspect that, like me, my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border wants to be satisfied that the clause as it stands, or as amended if the Minister feels able to recommend any of the amendments, is drafted well enough not just to deal with a problem whose existence we all now acknowledge, but to ensure that there is no risk that an innocent employee might be caught up in a way that was not intended. I am thinking of, for example, the use of the word "secretary". I assume that the Bill means officers rather than employees. I have doubts about the use of the term "manager", but I think the Minister will be able to explain that.
      The amendments are intended to be partly probing and partly helpful. I hope the Minister will accept them on those terms.
      Mr. Maclean: I was very surprised by the drafting of this part of the Bill. I never say that drafting is sloppy, because that usually constitutes unfair criticism of parliamentary draftsmen, and sometimes constitutes unfair criticism of the civil servants who issue those draftsmen with instructions. On this occasion, I simply say that the drafting is slightly odd or obscure. I see what the Minister and the Government are getting at; I just wonder whether the terminology is right to catch the people whom they want to catch. I fear that it could lead to an unfair interpretation in court. I am thinking particularly of the use of the term "secretary" rather than "company secretary", which denotes a legally defined person. My right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) mentioned that.
      Amendment No.2 proposes the omission of the examples cited in clause 3(2)—"director", "manager", "secretary", "another similar officer" and
      a person purporting to act in any of the capacities listed
      in the paragraphs… My amendment would substitute the words
      a director or company secretary described in the articles of incorporation, and…a person purporting to act in either of the capacities above.
      I think that, according to a proper interpretation of company law, my amendment uses the more appropriate terminology. In all company law, the people responsible are the directors of the company involved. When companies are incorporated, they must have directors, and I believe that they must have company secretaries. The company secretary is usually qualified: indeed, I think that a company secretary must be legally qualified under the law.
      Mr. Fabricant: Will my right hon. Friend give way?
      Mr. Maclean: I will give way to my hon. Friend, who is about to correct me.
      Mr. Fabricant: My right hon. Friend is right in saying that a company secretary ought to be qualified, but most company secretaries are qualified in accountancy or are members of an institute. They tend to be accountants rather than lawyers.
      Mr. Maclean: I am grateful for that correction, but it does not undermine the thrust of my argument that a company secretary is generally a recognised person with a professional qualification—in accountancy, I now

      379
      gather, and no doubt in company law, rather than that person being a lawyer. There is, however, a world of difference between a company secretary—according to the definition that I understood to be correct and what my hon. Friend informs me is correct—and a secretary. I think that, as drafted, the Bill could lead a court to convict a person who just happened to be a secretary—not a legally qualified company secretary or a company secretary qualified in accountancy; not a shareholder in the business; and not someone who has the authority of a director responsible for the management of a company and for ensuring that its accounts are filed and Companies Acts requirements are complied with; but a girl who just happens to be in a typing pool. I do not mean to be derogatory to ladies in the typing pool—
      Mr. Forth: Or men.
      Mr. Maclean: Indeed.
      I am led to my conclusion by the fact that the word "manager" appears before the word "secretary". "Manager" is not a term used in Companies Acts either. I think that if the rules of interpretation of courts were applied, a court would conclude that clause 3(2) was trying to catch ordinary employees. It catches the director, then it catches managers of any description. They could be managing directors, but they could also be sales managers, store managers, floor managers, people in charge of hamburger barrows, or cold-store managers. If the Bill catches people who fall under the general description of manager, as opposed to director, the courts could easily assume that it catches people who just happen to be secretaries.
      Mr. Fabricant: My right hon. Friend raises the spectre of a worrying situation, but I wonder whether he has overlooked the use of the word "officers" in subsection (2). Surely that would rule out the secretary in a typing pool. The reference in subsection (2)(c) to a secretary means an officer of a body corporate, who would be the company secretary under the terms of the Companies Acts.
      Mr. Maclean: I beg to disagree with my hon. Friend. The Bill says:
      For the purposes for this section the following are officers of a body corporate.
      It then refers to a "director", a "manager", a "secretary" and "another similar officer". It says that, for the purposes of the Bill, those people are now to be regarded as officers of a body corporate, which is not the normal interpretation.
      I understand some of the reasons behind the legislation. The Government have concluded that some of those involved in this trade are not just big limited companies but partnerships and other funny little businesses, one-man bands, or outfits in which one person is the boss and a few other staff are working for him or her. Some of those other staff might be secretary types or manager types, but they are equally involved in criminality or illegal activity. The Government intend subsection (2) to catch all who are taking part in, or encouraging, such activity. However, if that is the case, the Government should use different terminology.
      It would have been acceptable if, in clause 3(1), the Government had used the terminology "with the consent or connivance of any other staff, managers or workers."
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      What is unacceptable to me is the mucking around with the usual interpretation of company law, suggesting that the officers of a body corporate can include those who are rather loosely described as managers, secretaries or other similar officers. What officer is similar to a director, manager or secretary? In the Companies Acts, one knows what "another similar officer" is in relation to a director or a company secretary. The rather vague terminology used in the Bill does not help us on the matter.
      As I do not want to take too much time on this group of amendments, I shall move on to my first amendment, No. 3, which is more of a probing amendment than anything else. I can accept the first three lines of clause 3, although, in paragraph (a)—as my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst suggests—it might be appropriate to add the word "knowledge" to "consent or connivance". I perfectly well accept that, when an offence is committed as a deliberate act, with connivance or consent, the officers involved—as well as the body corporate, the limited company—should face the penalty.
      I do not understand, however, how the offence can be attributable to neglect by an officer. I do not know in what other spheres of the criminal law someone could find themselves in a criminal court because of neglect to comply with an aspect of company law, although I know that, under company law provisions, someone who fails to file accounts or value added tax returns faces the penalty. In this case, however, we are talking about a criminal offence, and potentially an attaching criminal record, because someone in a company—the secretary, the manager or a director—was neglectful in some way in allowing the offence to be committed.
      I can envisage circumstances in which someone's trading licence for a hamburger stall has come through for Green park, but not yet for St. James's park, and some manager or secretary says to their people with wheelbarrows or carts, "Off you go—you're off to St. James's park; it's all right, you have a licence there", but gets it wrong. I would say that that was not deliberate connivance—it might be a lack of knowledge—but a simple mistake. Yet, because of the neglect of that secretary in mistakenly directing a staff member to the wrong park, for which she thought that the company had a licence from the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, she might suffer the full penalty of a criminal conviction and a fine of up to £1,000. She would face that penalty because the body corporate and she as a secretary have negligently committed that offence.
      The Minister may rightly say that the court would take that into account, and that the police may not charge them but take a sensible view. I am always happy to ascribe to police, including park police, a view that they will always operate with common sense. The only exception to that—this is merely an aside, Mr. Deputy Speaker, or you would promptly rule me out of order—is when one sees pictures of park police on roller-skates, which is their latest device for catching Mafia in the park. I have a such a picture—from the Evening Standard of 13 April—which I may pass to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for inspection. Therefore, one sometimes has to question the wisdom of park police—although I am told that the roller-skates are very effective.
      Mr. Forth: What if the Mafia put on skates?
      Mr. Maclean: They will no doubt evade the police.
      Nevertheless, although we shall give police all credence for having common sense on whether they prosecute a poor secretary because she makes a little mistake in sending the guy to the wrong park and commits an offence, it is our duty as legislators not to give police the opportunity to get it wrong initially. We should not build into the legislation a provision that will lead to police catching the wrong people—those who are not the real ringleaders, company directors or masterminds who may be making £1,200 a day. I may be tempted, in the summer recess, to ask the Minister how one can apply for a licence to sell goods in the park, as it sounds a rather lucrative profession.
      6.45 pm
      My final amendment, No. 31, deals with "purporting to act", which I think should be substituted by "acting". As my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst said, it would not be right to prosecute a company because someone falsely claims to be acting in any of the capacities listed earlier in the clause.
      It is perfectly right to catch those who are not company directors, managers, secretaries or—if the Government wish—other similar officers, but who are acting in that capacity, actually doing it. Someone in the business may be called "the doorkeeper", "the doorman" or "the garage hand", although those titles are only a cover for his having a very powerful say in the company and the fact that he is the mastermind. In such cases, that person is acting in one of the listed capacities—he is the boss, although he may not have that title.
      Someone who is acting in a listed capacity should be caught. What concerns me, however, is that there may be people who falsely claim to be acting in the capacity of boss. I cannot understand the wisdom of simply adding the word "purporting" when I think that the Government really want to catch people who are genuinely doing the acting and perhaps passing themselves off as someone else.
      It is a small group of amendments, and we have not dealt with them at great length; there is much more that we could say. There are, however, a few serious points in them. I summarise those points by saying that I am still intrigued by the terminology that the Government have decided to use in the legislation, particularly in clause 3(2). I should like reassurances on the matter from the Minister, who was exceptionally kind and courteous in replying to the first group, thereby persuading my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst and I not to press them to a vote. We were persuaded by the strength of the Minister's arguments, which shows the importance of having exploratory amendments and a good ministerial reply.
      I hope that the Minister will be able to convince us on this occasion also, so that we shall be able to make some progress—especially as there are some considerable things that I should like to say in speaking to the third group of amendments. There may be issues in that group that we wish to press further. Now, however, I should be happy to hear the Minister's reply.
      Mr. Alan Howarth: I appreciate the spirit in which the amendments in this group have been dealt with by the right hon. Members for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) and for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean). I think that, principally, once again, they are seeking clarification and reassurance that the terms in which the Bill is drafted are appropriate.
      In amendment No. 18, the right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst has actually sought to strengthen the Bill's provisions. I put it to him that his amendment would be excessively draconian—to use a term that we used in our first debate—in its effect, because it would make liable to prosecution an individual who had any knowledge of a certain state of affairs, regardless of the extent to which that individual could be held personally responsible. It could render officers of a company liable to conviction in cases in which it is unreasonable that they should be punished at all.
      The type of cases that amendment No. 18 would add are ones in which a person had attempted, unsuccessfully, to prevent a misdeed—although they knew about it, they were ineffective in being able to deal with it—and various other cases in which someone who had some knowledge was powerless to be effective. I think that that would be unreasonable. I believe—as I hope to persuade Opposition Members—that, as drafted, clause 3(1) covers all the levels of action or inaction by an officer that are appropriate to prosecute.
      The right hon. Member for Penrith and The Border has just spoken to amendment No. 3, which he explained was intended as a probing amendment. We need to make provision to deal with negligence. The amendment would restrict the circumstances in which an officer of a company may be convicted of a park trading offence to those in which he has consented to or connived at the commission of the offence by a body corporate. Clause 3(1) provides that if a body corporate has been convicted of a park trading offence and an officer is proved to have consented to or connived at it, or the offence is proved to be attributable to the neglect of the officer, that officer will be liable to prosecution. That additional provision is important.
      The amendment would weaken the Bill by excluding from prosecution an officer or body corporate who was negligent. The negligence might be in failing to realise that the body corporate was committing an offence, albeit that the officer concerned was in a position of responsibility within that body corporate. The officer could equally not be prosecuted if he knew that the offence was being committed but did nothing to prevent it. I see no good reason why those who have been negligent should get away with it.
      On amendment No. 2, the right hon. Gentlemen were concerned that the language that we have used may not be consistent with the ordinary terminology of company law. The amendment would create a loophole, allowing officers who do not hold the formal title of director or company secretary, but who carry out such responsibilities, to escape liability. It would preclude the possibility of prosecuting a manager or anyone purporting to act in such a capacity for the commission of a parks trading offence. Furthermore, it would remove the important flexibility that is currently written into clause 3(2) that provides for the possibility of prosecuting those who do not precisely fit the categories of director,

      383
      manager or secretary, but who hold similar positions that have effectively the same functions even if they are not formally so styled.
      Amendment No. 20 would not add anything to the Bill, although I assume that it was intended to clarify matters. I am advised that the word "secretary" would be interpreted by the courts to mean company secretary in this context. The amendment would create a loophole by defining the term "company secretary" only by reference to the articles of incorporation, with the result that someone who was effectively company secretary but was not formally styled as such would fall outside the scope of the Bill and would escape criminal liability.
      Mr. Fabricant: Will the Minister give way?
      Mr. Howarth: No. I should like to carry on because we have a little business to transact before 7 pm and the hon. Gentleman has already spoken a certain amount.
      Amendment No. 21 would restrict the class of person who may be considered to be an officer of a body corporate by excluding those who were purporting to act as a director, manager or secretary but did not have the authority to do so. The right hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst seeks to change the word "purporting" to "authorised". The amendment would achieve nothing positive. The persons authorised to act in the capacity of officer are already provided for in clause 3(2)(d). The amendment would preclude the possibility of prosecuting those who purport to act as an officer without the authority to do so. I cannot see why such individuals should escape liability.
      Finally, amendment No. 31 would not improve or clarify the Bill. Persons acting in the capacity of officer are already provided for by clause 3(2)(d). Like amendment No. 21, it would preclude the possibility of prosecuting those who purport to act as an officer without the authority to do so. It is again unclear why such a category of individual should escape liability.
      Having heard those explanations, I hope that the right hon. Gentlemen will not press their amendments.
      Mr. Forth: When I looked at the clause and set about drafting my amendments, I suspected that I might get into difficulty because I was encroaching on a narrow, legalistic area. My right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean) may have felt the same, although he has much more expertise in this area than I have, given his distinguished ministerial experience in a previous existence.
      The Minister confirmed my suspicions in the most helpful and positive way. I tried to follow his arguments—he quite properly gave the House a carefully drafted reply of the kind with which some of us are very familiar. He reassured us that clause 3 has been carefully drafted; it is intended to cover all conceivable possibilities in this area. We may want to return subsequently to the Mafia point because I am not sure that the clause would cover it, but it was not intended to do so. The clause is intended to cover more organised operations, rather than sole practitioners or single-person enterprises. I accept the spirit in which that explanation was offered.
      384
      The Minister has gone a considerable way to reassure us that our unhappiness about the use of the term "secretary" was misplaced, because it is a term of art. My attempt to define it more accurately could have misfired and unduly narrowed the Bill or caused it to lose its focus. I did not quite follow the argument, but I gather that the same was true of the word "purporting", which appears also to be a term of art that I had not fully understood.
      We can be reassured by what the Minister has said—that clause 3 strikes a reasonable balance, being broad enough to cover those who should properly be encompassed within the Bill and avoiding being too narrow to miss those whom we might wish to catch. I thank the Minister again for his care and courtesy in replying to the amendments. In the light of what he has said, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
      Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
      Mr. Maclean: I beg to move amendment No. 6, in page 2, line 4, leave out clauses 4 and 5.
      Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord): With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: Amendment No. 28, in clause 4, page 2, line 13, at end insert—
      '(4) Where a park constable exercises his powers under subsection (1) above he shall—

      (a) ensure that he provides facilities for the safe removal from the park of any perishable material by the person having possession or control;

      (b) give to the person having possession or control a document, in an appropriate language, setting out the reasons for the seizure, itemising the things seized and informing the person of his rights and liabilities under section 5; and

      (c) not remove any article until he has performed an assessment under the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations that the removal of the thing or things would not create a hazard for his or others' health and safety.

      (5) The document referred to in subsection (4)(b) above shall comply with the model in Schedule (Document relating to seizure of property).'.
      Amendment No. 22, in clause 5, page 2, line 20, after "at", insert "or before".
      Amendment No. 23, in page 2, line 26, at end insert—
      '(3A) Proceedings arising from subsections (1) to (3) (including appeals) shall be concluded within a period of three months, after which the charges shall be withdrawn, or appeal deemed to have succeeded.'.
      Amendment No. 24, in page 2, line 30, leave out from first "of" to second "of" and insert—
      '60 days beginning with the date of the initiation'.
      Amendment No. 25, in page 2, line 35, at end insert—
      '(5A) If the Secretary of State has retained a thing under subsection (3)(b) for the period of 60 days from the initiation of proceedings relating to the offence (including any appeal), he shall return it to the person from whom it was seized.'.
      Amendment No. 7, in clause 6, page 3, line 2, leave out from "anything" to end of line 8 and insert—
      'which the court believes to have been used in commission of the offence to be forfeited and dealt with in a manner specified in the order.'.
      New schedule 2—'SCHEDULE—

      OFFENCE BY BODY CORPORATE

        Document Relating to Seizure of Property
        '(1) Appropriate Language.
        An appropriate language in section 4(4)(b) is one of the following:

        English

        French

        Spanish

        Albanian

        Arabic

        Armenian

        Azeri

        Belarussian

        Bulgarian

        Croatian (the western variant of Serbo-Croat—also called Croato-Serb)

        Estonian

        Georgian

        Greek

        Hungarian

        Kurdish

        Latvian

        Lithuanian

        Macedonian

        Romanian

        Russian

        Serbian (the eastern variant of Serbo-Croat)

        Serbo-Croat

        Slovak

        Slovene

        Turkish

        Ukrainian.

        (2) Reasons for Seizure.
        The reasons for the seizure are that the person having possession or control has committed a Park Trading Offence, namely (insert offence).
        (3) List of Items Seized.
        (List the items seized)
        (4) Rights and Liabilities.
        The person having possession or control and from whom the thing or things were seized shall be informed that—

        (a) the Secretary of State may retain the thing or things until the conclusion of court proceedings;

        (b) the Secretary of State may sell the thing or things and use the proceeds to pay his costs if the person having possession or control is found guilty of an offence;

        (c) the court may order the thing or things to be forfeited and destroyed if found guilty of an offence;

        (d) the person having possession of the thing or things may make representations to the court about their disposal before the court makes an order.'.

        Mr. Maclean: It is a pleasure to make such considerable progress on the Bill. We are now beginning to gallop. It is a pity that our proceedings have to be interrupted shortly, because we could polish the Bill off in another hour if only we had the time.
        Mr. Forth: We started late.
        Mr. Maclean: Had it not been for the statement, we might now be concluding Third Reading.
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        My right hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Mr. Forth) and I have always been keen to ensure that we get the Bill on the statute book at the earliest opportunity, following proper parliamentary scrutiny. It is excellent to see the House operating properly, as the Parliament of this country has consistently operated over the years, giving excellent scrutiny to a Bill that will make a fundamental difference to the state of affairs in the royal parks, about which many hon. Members on both sides are concerned.
        My first two amendments are considerable—No. 6 would delete clauses 4 and 5. They are exploratory amendments, although there are others in the group that I may wish to pursue more vigorously. I, too, pay tribute to the Minister for his courtesy and consistency and for the detail of his replies, which has enabled us not to press our amendments, having been persuaded of the merits of the case. However, if his reply to these amendments is less satisfactory than his replies have been so far, I shall unfortunately have to pursue them to a Division. I hope that we can avoid that.
        I do not wish to pursue the first two amendments to a Division, because I do not wish to delete provisions that may be essential to the proper enforcement of the Act. However, it is right to explore, in the Minister's words, the other section of the panoply of legislative sledgehammers that he and his Department feel it necessary to take to those who sell hamburgers, hot dogs and other goods in stalls in the royal parks. We have already dealt properly with fines and explored how effective the Government's proposal of level 3 on the standard scale—a £1,000 fine—would be. We did not press our proposals for a £500 fine; we are happy with £1,000 and consider that reasonable and sensible. We must now turn our attention to whether the parks police should have the additional power to seize all the property of those committing the offences and to retain and dispose of that property—
        It being Seven o'clock, and there being private business set down by direction of THE CHAIRMAN OF WAYS AND MEANS under Standing Order No.20 (Time for taking private business), further proceedings stood postponed.
        Mr. David Heath: On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. You will be aware that this afternoon, in a written answer, the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food divulged the rather alarming information that genetically modified crops had been planted in this country during the past two years, contrary to Government policy, on the basis of recent information from Advanta Seeds UK. Perhaps you are not aware that the Minister then provided further information to journalists to the effect that 14,000 hectares of GM crops had been sown and that the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions became aware of that on 17 April.
        Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I should be grateful if the hon. Gentleman would put a point of order to the Chair.
        Mr. Heath: First, have you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, had any approaches from the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions or the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food at any time during the past four weeks seeking to make the House aware of that information? Secondly, is it in order for a Minister inadvertently to give

        387
        the House partial and perhaps misleading information in the form of a written answer and then provide much fuller information, which is essential to an understanding of the case, to the press but not to right hon. and hon. Members?
        Mr. Deputy Speaker: Obviously, the Chair cannot comment on the contents of answers to questions tabled by hon. Members, but no doubt the Government and the House will have heard the point that the hon. Gentleman has made.

  Kent County Council Bill [Lords]
  Order for Second Reading read.
  7.2 pm
  Mr. Paul Clark: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
  We are here to debate the Kent County Council Bill, but hon. Members will be fully aware that an identical Bill, the Medway Council Bill, relates to the Medway unitary authority. The purpose of the two Bills is to cover the administrative area of the county of Kent. Therefore, it will be for the convenience of the House if, in speaking to the Kent County Council Bill, I refer also to the Medway Council Bill.
  Together, the Bills seek to reduce the levels of acquisitive crime such as burglary by making it harder to dispose of stolen goods and turn them into cash. The Bills have cross-party support on both councils and are a good example of inter-agency working and a co-operative approach to issues under the Crime and Disorder Act 1998.
  Mrs. Fiona Jones: As we are considering two Bills tonight, can we have some clarification? Will we be voting on both Bills, or will we have a vote on one Bill and then consider the other Bill?
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord): Order. Before the hon. Member for Gillingham (Mr. Clark) responds to that, let me inform the hon. Lady and the House that although we are dealing principally with the Kent County Council Bill, it will be in order for hon. Members to refer, where appropriate, to both Bills.
  Mr. Clark: I could not respond to that intervention as it was clearly a point of order for the Chair. However, as the two Bills are identical in purpose, it would not be untoward to refer to them both.
  The Kent County Council Bill follows a two-year period of consultation with business, commencing in 1998. The promoters have taken into account many of the comments that were received and have amended the Bill considerably to ensure that it properly recognises how the businesses that it covers work and to minimise its administrative impact on those businesses.
  The Bill seeks to regulate the unregulated second-hand trade. Home Office research supported by police intelligence shows that a large proportion of stolen property passes through the unregulated second-hand market. During 1997 and 1998, more than £105 million worth of goods were stolen in Kent and the recovery rate was only 25 per cent.
  The scope of the proposed legislation will jointly provide Kent county constabulary and local authority trading standards officers with a comprehensive intelligence picture enabling effective enforcement. Burglary and car crime are Home Office and Kent police priorities. The recording provisions in the Bill would lead to an increase in intelligence and allow stolen goods to be traced through the supply chain to identify dishonest businesses.
  I have a particular interest as my constituency falls in the Kent policing area of Medway. In autumn 1999, my right hon. Friends the Prime Minister and the Home

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  Secretary launched an initiative called Radium, funded by the Home Office. A main thrust of the initiative is to investigate the disruption of markets for stolen goods.
  Police and trading standards officers have encouraged local second-hand dealers to subscribe to a voluntary scheme requiring them to keep records to identify those selling goods to the dealer. As a result of this and other crime reduction strands of Operation Radium, the level of acquisitive crime in Medway has fallen by 19 per cent. Specifically, Operation Radium has supported the Home Office evidence and shown that a substantial proportion of stolen goods are disposed of locally through the second-hand trade. Although bona fide dealers have supported the voluntary scheme, there are a number of dealers selling goods of a type which are often stolen who will not participate or co-operate fully in that voluntary scheme.
  There are particular types of businesses such as second-hand car parts shops that are particularly unwilling to operate the scheme. If a car is stolen and not recovered, what happens to it? How are the parts disposed of?
  There is some confirmation of how some of these stolen goods are laundered. It comes directly from those involved in the thefts. When asked, "How do you dispose of your stolen property?", criminals responded to Kent police in this vein:
  Cheques and credit cards to a female…antiques to a handler in Herne Bay and jewellery to a second hand shop in Margate.
  Another contributor sent goods
  to friends and known handlers in the Deal area and second hand shops in Dover…
  The final contribution to the research stated:
  Burglaries are committed between nine in the morning and two in the afternoon and property is sold to second hand shops later the same afternoon.
  It is against that background that the Bill seeks to assist in tackling the problems. It addresses two main aspects—dealings in second-hand goods and occasional sales, and the relatively new activity of squat trading.
  I turn now to some of the specific provisions of the Bill to ensure clarity of understanding. The need to register will apply only to persons dealing in second-hand goods in the course of a business. It will not apply to private individuals. Case law from other statutes indicates that there is scope for amateur collectors to dabble in the acquisition and disposal of goods without necessarily being treated as a trader.
  Dealers will be required to register themselves and their business premises. To reduce the burden on businesses, registration is free and lasts for three years, and a single registration will cover both councils. There are exemptions because we recognise the issues involved. They include registered charities, for example. There are also exemptions for businesses already covered by similar provisions such as scrap-metal dealers and pawnbrokers. There are also exemptions for those dealing in goods in respect of which police statistics show that there is no particular problem, such as second-hand books.
  Mr. A. J. Beith: Has the hon. Gentleman taken sufficient account of the legitimate
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  architectural salvage trade, which can achieve considerable savings in energy by the re-use of materials? Is he willing to consider that matter in Committee?
  Mr. Clark: The right hon. Gentleman raises an important point. The Bill contains a provision to exempt those involved in recycling processes. The promoters and those who oppose the Bill will have an opportunity to discuss such details in the Select Committee.
  Registered dealers will have to keep records detailing the name and address of the person from whom articles were acquired, the date of the transaction, a description sufficient to identify the articles and, in the case of motor vehicles, a record of the odometer reading. The promoters have taken note of comments from opponents of the Bill, and plan to introduce an amendment that will exclude items if the dealer has reasonable grounds to believe that they will be sold for less than £10. The legislation allows for that figure to be increased with the approval of the Secretary of State at the request of the council.
  The provision will exclude a substantial number of low-value items from the record-keeping requirements, and will be helpful to businesses such as those that carry out house clearances as they effectively will not need to record the details of any goods that they expect to be sold for £10 or less.
  If an article is sold for a price exceeding £100, the name and address of the purchaser must also be recorded. Consultation has shown that there are concerns about the purchaser of valuable items disclosing his personal details to an unknown dealer. An amendment has been incorporated to allow other details to be accepted—for example, payment by credit card or cheque, with the details being recorded, and for cash transactions, other forms of personal identification such as a driving licence or passport number.
  As Operation Radium has shown, a substantial number of stolen goods pass through dealers' premises. However, there are other means of distributing stolen goods, including occasional sales and boot fairs. As a result, the legislation seeks to provide intelligence to the enforcement agencies to identify dealers and to obtain advance notice of such sales.
  Both the owner and occupier of the premises on which the sale is to take place and the person operating the sale must give 21 days' written notification to the council. Operators of occasional sales will be required to keep a register of all sellers and their vehicle registration numbers. That will allow the police or trading standards officers to check on individuals attending sales, to see whether there is a pattern that suggests a trade status. The requirement to record a registration number is intended to reduce the likelihood of false information being given.
  As I commented to the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith) on Second Reading, we are considering the underlying principles of the Bill. The detail is a matter for the Select Committee.
  There have been four petitions against the Kent County Council Bill, with duplicate petitions against the Medway Council Bill, with the exception of the petition from the Ashford cattle market, which relates solely to the Kent County Council Bill.

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  I shall deal briefly with the substantial issues raised by the petitioners.
  Mr. Michael Clapham: Can my hon. Friend tell the House whether the Bill is based on any other regional legislation that is currently operating in the United Kingdom?
  Mr. Clark: There are substantial precedents in existing private legislation—about eight Acts. The provisions of the North Yorkshire County Council Act 1991 are the closest to those of the Bill.
  One of the main contentions of those who oppose the Bill is that such legislation should be on a national scale and should not be specific to one area. Although the promoters may agree with the petitioners about that, the simple fact is that the problem exists now in Kent for the 8,200-odd households that were burgled last year.
  As I said, it is not as though precedents do not exist. Eight local authorities have similar powers. On Third Reading of the Bills in another place, Lord Mayhew commented on the claim that piecemeal legislation was wrong. He said:
  If so, that "wrongness" seems to have eluded Parliament over the past 10 years in a large number of instances.—[Official Report, House of Lords, 18 January 2000; Vol. 608, c. 1057.]
  I have already referred to Operation Radium in Medway. I hope that Home Office evaluation of that scheme will act as a springboard to achieve national legislation. Unfortunately, there appears to be no immediate prospect of that.
  There is a further contention from the petitioners that the Bill will restrict competition. The promoters have taken a number of steps as a result of the consultation to ensure that the burden on businesses is reduced. That is why there have been so many amendments to the original Bill.
  In addition, amendments have been moved to modify the impact on dealers who are based outside Kent and Medway if they occasionally sell items in Kent, and to remove them entirely from the scope of the legislation if they only occasionally buy items in the area.
  Mrs. Fiona Jones: Does not that discriminate against the trade in Kent? Would not the outcome be that people who were not legitimately trading would simply trade outside the Kent area?
  Mr. Clark: I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. The evidence suggests that such legislation would not have that effect. I can tell you that as a result of the North Yorkshire County Council Act 1991, there are 8,100 registrations on the books this year, and I can tell you that 51 per cent. of those are organisations outside the North Yorkshire county council area, so there is an almost equal split. The legislation has not created any difference between operators in the area or outside.
  It has been argued that the bureaucracy required by the Bill will impose too great a burden on business. However, the proposed legislation would require dealers only to keep good records, which is best business practice. Indeed, in the antiques trade there are codes of practice supported by LAPADA, now the Association of Art and Antique Dealers, which represents about 700 dealers nationally, and COPAT, the Council for the Prevention of Art Theft.
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  Those codes of practice are aimed at reducing the possibility of a trader selling stolen goods. Both codes suggest the need for accurate records showing where a dealer purchased goods and to whom they were sold.
  Mrs. Jones: Can you inform the House whether—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Lady must use the correct parliamentary language and must not use the word "you", as the hon. Gentleman did a few moments ago.
  Mrs. Jones: I apologise, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Will my hon. Friend tell us whether LAPADA supports the Bill?
  Mr. Clark: I take note of your guidance, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
  My hon. Friend raises an important point. LAPADA has been involved in discussions and has referred information to the promoters of the Bill. It has not directly given support to the Bill.
  LAPADA's code of practice, like that of other trade associations, rightly suggests that for their own protection its members should follow good business practice and keep records. The understandable recommendation is that records should be kept of the names and addresses of people from whom they buy and to whom they sell. The codes of practice contain suggestions that go far beyond the requirements of this Bill.
  Mr. David Heath: The hon. Gentleman is doing a good job of explaining the Bill, but will he say how it will apply to people who are enthusiasts rather than strictly commercial sellers? My constituent Mrs. Pope of Pitney has written to me, on behalf of the Vintage Motorcycle Club, about the two large autojumbles that the club holds at the Bath and West showground each year. She is worried that if the Bill were applied nationally, it would be impossible to get casual sellers of motorcycle parts to attend because of the bureaucracy and restrictions involved. Will the hon. Gentleman comment on that, and give my constituent reassurances?
  Mr. Clark: That is an important point. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that sales held for charitable reasons, for example, will be exempt from the terms of the Bill. As for people who dabble occasionally in such sales, the key question is whether they do so in the course of the conduct of a business. As I said earlier, substantial precedents exist in other legislation and its interpretation to suggest that people who dabble in such matters would not be affected by the Bill. The possibility of the Bill applying nationally is not a matter that is in my hands.
  I was speaking earlier about the records already kept by businesses, and mentioned the codes of practice of the trade associations. I should also mention that many operators in this sector operate a scheme for value added tax purposes that is called the margin scheme. It requires dealers to produce and maintain numbered purchase invoices that must include the name and address of the seller, the dealer's name and address, the stock book number, the date of transaction, a description of the goods that must include any unique identification number, and

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  the total price. That information must be recorded for the VAT margin scheme that is often in operation among dealers in second-hand goods.
  It has been said that the legislation will be unenforceable. Enforcement resources must always be used wisely. Police and trading standards officers are used to working in an environment where intelligence is used to focus resources for maximum effect. For both agencies, the Bill will act as a tool to achieve business targets effectively. Indeed, Operation Radium has demonstrated that similar voluntary provisions are operated with current resources in Medway.
  Finally, I turn to the application of the Human Rights Act 1998 to this Bill, which has been the subject of some discussion with the promoters of the Bill. The purpose of the Act is to give further effect in the United Kingdom to rights guaranteed under the European convention on human rights. Many of the provisions do not come into force until October, but section 19 of the Act requires that a Minister of the Crown in charge of a Bill must, before Second Reading, make a statement in writing that in his view the provisions of the Bill are compatible with the convention rights. If the Minister is unable to make that statement of compatibility, he or she must supply a written statement to the effect that the Government wish the House to proceed with the Bill regardless.
  The provisions of section 19 do not apply to private Bills or to private Members' Bills. As a result, it is impossible for the promoters of private Bills to comply with the procedure laid down in section 19. An amendment was suggested to provide that the Bill would have no effect until the Secretary of State had stated that in his view the Bill complied with the rights given under the convention. However, the amendment could not be accepted, as the promoters of the Kent County Council Bill and Medway Council Bills have no idea about whether—or even when—the Secretary of State would be prepared to consider making such a statement.
  The promoters undertook to obtain a legal opinion on the compatibility of the provisions of the Bill with the convention. They have obtained that opinion, in which counsel stated that
  on the assumption that the amendments now proposed are incorporated in the Bill, I am of the opinion that if this was a public Bill and section 19 of the Human Rights Act applied, the Secretary of State would be in a position to provide a statement of compatibility.
  To add just a little detail to that statement, I can tell the House that the amendments referred to are to be made to clause 14, which deals with the powers of entry. They would ensure that a warrant would be required in every case where powers of entry were exercised, in relation to private dwellings.
  Mrs. Fiona Jones: I am slightly confused by the application of clause 14. As I understand it, the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 allows police to enter private or business premises if they can present to a magistrate sufficient reason and cause for such entry. They would be able to satisfy those conditions in relation to serious criminal cases. Is my hon. Friend suggesting that the provision should be made wider in Kent?
  Mr. Clark: I had hoped that I had made it clear that the Bill would enable police and local trading standards
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  officers to enter private properties. That would not be possible if officers could not prove to magistrates that a warrant was required.
  Mr. Beith: The hon. Gentleman may have misheard or misunderstood the question that I asked, which had to do with the architectural salvage trade. People trade in bricks, staircases, tropical hard woods and all sorts of items that can be re-used. The re-use of such materials provides a considerable saving in terms of energy and scarce resources. That trade is not exempt from the provisions of the Bill, and I hope that the hon. Gentleman and the Bill's promoters will bear in mind that they need to ensure that the trade can continue to operate in the beneficial way that it does at present.
  Mr. Clark: I am grateful for that clarification, and recognise the importance of the business to which the right hon. Gentleman refers. I am aware that a similar problem arises with Kent pig tiles, for example. The issue is under active consideration, and further amendments to the Bill may be needed.
  The promoters of the Bill have sought to reach agreement on practical issues and to amend the Bill in a way that will assist all concerned. However, the Bill's essential purpose will not be compromised. The process has demonstrated the partnership that exists in Kent between local authorities, police forces and other agencies. That partnership wants to make communities safer for residents, traders and consumers.
  I ask the House to support the Bill. It will help to stem the tide of burglaries and offer support to legitimate traders and businesses in the county of Kent. Above all, it will help to close down outlets for stolen goods.
  7.29 pm
  Mr. Michael Howard: It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Gillingham (Mr. Clark). I congratulate him on his initiative in sponsoring the two Bills—the Bill before us and the Medway Council Bill—on behalf of the two local authorities. There is cross-party consensus in those authorities in favour of the measures. It is encouraging that the Bills at least begin their consideration on the basis of such consensus, although some of the noises off suggest that it may prove short lived.
  When I became Home Secretary in 1993, I was given a briefing by Home Office civil servants. They showed me a graph, which clearly displayed the trend in crime. It vividly demonstrated that crime had increased inexorably, relentlessly and almost without interruption under Administrations of all political complexions for 50 years. They said, "This is what's happened to crime in the past 50 years and what will continue to happen in the next 50 years. The first thing you must recognise, Home Secretary, is that there is nothing you can do about it. Your job is to manage public expectations in the face of the inevitability of rising crime."
  I did not take that advice. In the four years during which I held the office of Home Secretary, crime fell by approximately 18 per cent. [Laughter.] I am glad that Opposition Members believe that that is a laughing matter. Nearly 1 million fewer crimes occurred in 1997 than in 1993. It is the overriding duty of Government to do all they can to reduce crime, and increase people's safety in their homes and on their streets.

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  The Bills deal primarily with people's safety and that of their property in their homes. My home is in my constituency in Kent, therefore I, too, declare an interest. The main purpose of the Bill is to reduce burglary by making it more difficult for burglars to get rid of the property that they steal.
  Mr. Andrew Rowe: Does my right hon. and learned Friend agree that, in being tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime—to coin a phrase—the Bills go some way towards attacking the causes of crime?
  Mr. Howard: My hon. Friend is right. Every hon. Member should prize the Bills' objectives. However, when reducing crime—and, as my hon. Friend said, the causes of crime—it is no good willing the end without willing the means.
  Mrs. Fiona Jones: How would the Bills reduce the causes of crime? I did not hear a clear explanation of that. I appreciate that they might make it more difficult for people to place goods in the hands of those who sell them, but I do not understand why they would reduce the causes of crime. They might displace crime. One of the criticisms of the measure is that it is a local Bill, confined to Kent. It might therefore—
  Mr. Brian Sedgemore: Export crime.
  Mrs. Jones: Exactly. It might export crime to areas outside Kent.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The hon. Lady was making an intervention.
  Mr. Howard: I am not sure whether the hon. Member for Newark (Mrs. Jones) was invited to the briefing that the chief constable of Kent gave this afternoon. The hon. Member for Gillingham nods. If she had accepted that invitation, she would have heard a clear explanation of the way in which the Bills would affect the causes of crime. He explained that professional, prolific burglars operate on a rational basis. They take account of the ease with which they can profitably dispose of the property they steal.
  Mrs. Jones: Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman give way?
  Mr. Howard: The hon. Lady must wait for the answer to her first question before she asks another. If burglars find it more difficult to dispose of stolen property because of measures such as the Bills that we are considering tonight, they will think twice about committing burglary, because there is so much less in it for them.
  The hon. Lady made a point about burglars' ability to dispose of property in the same way in places other than the county of Kent and Medway. There is not a great deal of evidence from other parts of the country that that happens, but if it did, other areas have the remedy in their hands. Councillors in those areas could introduce similar measures. Doubtless they would have a similar effect.
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  There are only two relevant questions for hon. Members to consider when determining their attitude to the Bill. First, will it work? Secondly, are the burdens that it will impose on legitimate as well as illegitimate businesses justified? I have considered the evidence, and I believe that the answer to both questions is in the affirmative.
  Evidence shows that such a measure has worked in North Yorkshire, which has enforced the legislation that is most similar to the Bills. There has been some dispute about the figures, but I am satisfied. I have seen correspondence with those who have the responsibility for implementing the legislation in North Yorkshire. During the period when it has been fully enforced and effectively used, there has been a considerable reduction in the burglary figures for the county.
  As the hon. Member for Gillingham said, if one considers the evidence from Medway, where similar arrangements have been in force on a voluntary basis, one sees that there has been a fall in burglary there greater than that for the county of Kent as a whole. In addition, great weight should be given to the views of the chief constable of Kent, for whose leadership I have the greatest respect. He believes that the measures will be effective and make a difference.
  Mr. Jonathan Shaw: I, too, attended the presentation by the chief constable of Kent. I was struck by the words of Mr. Alex Dalziel, the chief executive of Cash Converters. Does the right hon. and learned Gentleman agree with Mr. Dalziel that the Bill will be good for business? The survey that Cash Converters conducted showed that people were reluctant to go to its stores because they believed that many of the goods were stolen. The Bill will therefore be good for business.
  Mr. Howard: The hon. Gentleman makes a telling point, and I agree with him.
  Are the burdens justified? Clearly, there is scope for argument about many of the details in the Bill. The cut-off point may need to be amended, and there may well be circumstances in which those burdens should be eased. However, if we are to make a determined assault on crime, and do all we can to achieve what should be the primary objective of the policy—safety for citizens in their homes—the burdens that both Bills impose are justified.
  Many of the opponents of the two Bills, including the hon. Member for Newark, have argued that such measures should not be introduced piecemeal and that we should have national legislation. That is a seductive argument. However, there is great merit in local experimentation. We should take advantage of the fact that the House can give local government powers to ascertain whether schemes work.
  Many of the most imaginative innovations in criminal justice and social policy in the United States have resulted from local initiatives by individual states. We do not have a federal system and I would not want such a system to be introduced. However, where there is scope within our present constitutional arrangements for local innovation and experimentation to be introduced, it is something to be welcomed and used to our advantage and it is something that the Bill would provide. For all those reasons, I commend it to the House.
  7.40 pm
  Mr. Derek Wyatt: When I first got wind of this Bill I was sympathetic, but on reflection I have changed my mind—hon. Members may call it a U-turn if they like. After studying the philosophical aspects of the Bill, I have come to the conclusion that it is wrong in principle. It is not that I am in favour of supporting burglary; of course we want crime to decrease and sensible efforts to reduce it must be welcomed. Burglary is theft, usually, from houses or dwellings. The Bill deals with the passing of stolen goods.
  This Bill and the Medway Council Bill would deal with the problem of stolen property in the county of Kent. They are not a new initiative, as other hon. Members have said, but are based mainly on the North Yorkshire County Council Act 1991. I suspect that there is not an hon. Member in the House who has not been burgled in one way or another. I have had seven burglaries and am still counting—it gets very emotional. However, I want to detach myself from those experiences to consider how the Bill would help to reduce crime in Kent, whether the ends justify the means and whether it would have any real impact on the passing of stolen goods in the local area.
  As well as considering how the legislation would work in practice, I wish to end on a positive note. Like every responsible citizen, I want a reduction in crime—I am still open to argument.
  A balance of reasonableness must be struck between setting rules for the responsible conduct of a business and binding it so tightly in legislative bureaucracy that it is no longer able to conduct its perfectly legitimate business.
  Dr. Stephen Ladyman: I entirely accept my hon. Friend's wish that crime be reduced, and I know that he would only oppose the Bill if he saw a key matter of principle in it. How does he square his view with the fact that the Bill would be no more onerous for the businesses affected than the industry's voluntary code of practice? How can he argue as a matter of principle, therefore, that it would impose burdens on them?
  Mr. Wyatt: I wish that it were more than a voluntary code—that is the point. The voluntary code is not often practised. I will deal with the burden of that, if my hon. Friend will allow me to pursue my argument.
  The two Bills have escaped any requirement for assessment, by being private Bills. Although, as hon. Members have said, they have been out to tender, as it were, and what people in Kent believe has been taken into account, I could show the House five or 10 letters from people who have not been consulted—especially people in the antiques trade, on which the measure would have an especially negative impact.
  We do not know the financial or the proportional costs, and we cannot yet say what the significant benefit would be. Indeed, the two Bills might meet the description in the Government's better regulation taskforce report of two weeks ago, as being regulations heaped upon regulations, with no thought of how they might be implemented and practised by small businesses, especially those in the antiques trade.
  It is fair to say that there was no consultation in the drafting of the two Bills and there has been little meaningful dialogue with the antiques trade since. The sheer quantity of paperwork that the Bills would demand
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  of traders is extraordinary. An accurate description of the purchase of any items costing more than £10 would now have to include such things as—I take my examples from this week's edition of the magazine Loot—a used mattress, a pair of shoes, two office chairs and an eight-month-old neutered Himalayan rabbit called Barney.
  Hon. Members should consider the example of the sale of the contents of a deceased person's house, which might well contain 400, 500 or 600 items to be catalogued for sale. We all know how much we gather in our lives. Much of the material does not have much value, but most individual items are worth more than £10. In the case of even one house, those detailed descriptions would run into hundreds of records. Let us think of the many records that would have to be collated in Kent; add them all up, add in purchases from individuals, check the fairs and go outside the county to check with dealers registered outside who deal inside the county. Hon. Members will appreciate that a mountain of paper would accumulate.
  It will take the police an enormous amount of time to compile and store such records if they need access to them. The resources that will be required to catalogue, collate and inspect such a mass of information are much greater than we are being led to believe. When I talked to the police in Kent, I suggested that one solution would be to use software to enable everyone to do this, but that suggestion fell on stony ground.
  Mr. Paul Clark: My hon. Friend should have sold it to them.
  Mr. Wyatt: Perhaps I should.
  Some records at some time will always be useful to the authorities. However I cannot believe that anyone could defend placing such a bureaucratic burden on small businesses. The importance of precisely and accurately targeting only essential information is well illustrated by the newspaper advertisement that read:
  Farmer aged 38 wishes to meet unmarried woman in early thirties who owns a tractor: please send photo of tractor.
  Dr. Howard Stoate: I understand my hon. Friend's concerns about bureaucracy. We all have concerns about heaping yet more bureaucracy on people—but how on earth are we to know whether the goods in a second-hand or antique shop are stolen? Clearly, if they are stolen, they have been taken from someone's house and there has been a break-in. Surely, therefore, the bureaucracy is a relatively small price to pay for what could be an enormous reduction in the number of burglaries and in the heartache and anguish caused to families when someone breaks into their house for gain.
  Mr. Wyatt: I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. That is the principle that I am trying to suggest. If it is of such fundamental importance, why is it being introduced piecemeal? If seven—perhaps eight—counties have such legislation and it is so important for reducing crime, it ought to be introduced by the Government and not in a back-door way in a private Bill.
  Dr. Ladyman: Will my hon. Friend give way?
  Mr. Wyatt: If my hon. Friend does not mind I will just get going.

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  I mentioned small businesses because that is largely how the antiques trade works, and it may be difficult for hon. Members to understand that. Most stolen goods are of low value, for quick sale, and are drug and juvenile crime related. The Bill does not deal with that problem because such goods are not offered for sale to responsible second-hand traders. The dishonest traders will not register themselves with Kent county council, nor will they give their names and addresses when they sell, or keep descriptions and records.
  Mr. Paul Clark: The whole reason for the Bill is to close down the market for those stolen goods. Does my hon. Friend not accept the evidence on a market reduction approach that is stacked up in the Home Office, and is available from the Kent police authority? His constituency is covered by that authority. Does he not accept that evidence that much stolen property ends up in the second-hand market? We are told that by the criminals themselves. Does he not agree with their evidence?
  Mr. Wyatt: I think that that was a speech rather than an intervention, but I will try to answer the questions. Boot sales are one of the central issues. The Bill is a catch-all to try to get to the bottom of what is going on in boot sales throughout the country, but in this instance in Kent. A simpler way to deal with the problem would be for the car boot sale organiser to register the car and the number plate as each car goes in. The Bill does not go about dealing with the problem in the right way.
  Furthermore, as Kent has no bordering county to the east or north, the Bill will push this trade to Essex or Sussex—or, more probably, to south London. We all know that anything of real value that is stolen is immediately removed as far from the scene of the crime as possible. No burglar is likely to sell valuable stolen property on his doorstep. The Bill is likely to encourage the export of stolen goods, as others have said. That, for me, is the issue. If the legislation is so important, let us introduce it nationally.
  Dr. Ladyman: I am grateful for my hon. Friend's patience. Surely the point is that if the Bill is as successful as many hon. Members think it will be, the likelihood is that after an experimental period—to which the right hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard) referred—the Government of the day will almost certainly adopt it and introduce it nationally. I will make my hon. Friend an offer. In a year or two, when the legislation is a success, I will join him in encouraging the Home Secretary to introduce it on a national basis.
  Mr. Wyatt: Again, I think that was probably a speech.
  The measure relating to Yorkshire was passed in 1991. I take issue with the right hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard), as my figures for Yorkshire are slightly different from his, and I may discuss that in a minute. However, if the Yorkshire measure was so profound in 1991, why is there no follow-up Act in 2000? That is not the way to go. If I am correct and the Bill is based on improving the Yorkshire legislation, it is up to the Minister to introduce it as a major Bill.
  Mrs. Fiona Jones: May I just—[Interruption.] It is interesting that a former Home Secretary, the right hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard), is speaking in our debate. The Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 provides for the police to enter private premises. It appears to me that if one strips away—
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I remind the hon. Lady again that she must frame her intervention in the form of a question and be brief.
  Mrs. Jones: I apologise, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
  Does my hon. Friend agree that the 1984 Act makes provision for the police to enter people's premises? Therefore, it is debatable whether the Bill makes any provision differing from that of the Act?
  Mr. Wyatt: I confess that I do not have profound knowledge of the 1984 Act, so I take my hon. Friend's word that that is the case.
  The Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport, of which I am a member, is examining the rather larger issue of stolen artefacts. If one buys a second-hand car, one gets a logbook; if one buys a house, one gets information. Therefore, when one buys an antique, why cannot it be logged? That is so fundamental as to be a national issue.
  Hon. Members have referred to the Yorkshire experience and the legislation passed in 1991. I am happy to argue about figures, but mine show that there were 4,971 burglaries, and 4,806 last year. That is a reduction of only—
  Mr. Howard rose—
  Mr. Wyatt: I see that I am about to be given more figures.
  Mr. Howard: The hon. Gentleman may not have had the opportunity to consider that matter in more detail. However, the officer in the North Yorkshire force responsible for the implementation of the legislation has written a letter in which he states:
  It was only later in 1995/96 and championed by the Crime Managers in the Force that the Police in North Yorkshire revealed the potential of the Act… This was the case in 1995/96 which saw a proactive approach to policing this Legislation.
  Is the hon. Gentleman aware of that? The officer goes on to provide figures. In 1995, there were 7,190 burglaries from dwellings in North Yorkshire. In 1998, there were 4,801 burglaries in North Yorkshire.
  Mr. Wyatt: I accept the source of those figures. However, I got mine from a library. As the right hon. and learned Gentleman knows, figures are used with great discretion in this place. I accept his, although they weaken my case. However, I am not pursuing the burglary element of my argument, but am trying to finesse the part on antiques.

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  In conclusion, these two private Bills on local matters are well meaning, but are philosophically flawed in principle and, for antique traders, oppressive in practice. I quote my constituent Georgina McKinnon of Newington Antiques who said:
  The antiques trade in Kent is valuable and this will certainly do us damage. The Bills are wrong in the way they have been devised with no chance of succeeding. They will only serve to alienate the honest dealer from the authorities who try to carry out this ridiculous and unworkable legislation and it is not possible to make wrong right.
  7.54 pm
  Mr. Roger Gale: I do not propose to detain the House for long. I shall not oppose the Bill as I believe that it should proceed to Select Committee and be thoroughly examined there. However, several significant questions remain to be properly answered. I hope that the Select Committee will get to grips with that job.
  The reasons and thinking behind the Bill are perfectly apparent. Hon. Members on both sides of the House have pointed to the effects of burglary on individuals, and to the fact that most of us have probably had a property burgled. They highlighted the sense of intrusion and loss, especially in relation to items of intrinsic value, but not great commercial worth, which is traumatic for many people. Anything reasonable that can be done to curtail what is often drug-driven burglary and theft must be a good thing.
  Kent police have taken significant steps on that and shown great courtesy in trying to explain the thinking behind the measure to those—including, I confess freely, me—who have expressed concerns about the Bill. Faced with representations from antique dealers in my constituency, it seemed to me, initially, that the Bill was using a sledgehammer to crack a nut and was over-bureaucratic. I still have some misgivings, despite the explanations that the police have given me.
  The Bill's promoters would have done themselves a favour if they had consulted more with antique dealers in the county. In my constituency, several reputable people—I know that they are reputable because I know their businesses—feel that they have not been consulted and that their views have not been considered. They are genuinely concerned about giving names and addresses and are anxious about the kind of record that they will be required to keep.
  Such concerns may well be allayed. However, they are genuine and must be properly addressed. To date, those people do not feel that they have been treated with the courtesy which I, at least, feel they deserve.
  My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard), the former Home Secretary, described as beguiling the argument that the scheme should be nationwide. As is his wont, he then proceeded to deploy an even more beguiling argument, attempting to persuade the House that there was some purpose and magic in experimenting locally and allowing matters to develop. He said that, if the scheme was good for Kent, in time, others might follow. The hon. Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey (Mr. Wyatt) said, correctly, that the Yorkshire measure which has been prayed in aid came into force in 1991. Frankly, if it was
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  that good and the previous Government—of whom my right hon. and learned Friend was a member—were going to get on with it, or if the present Home Secretary was going to get on with it, why is there not a national scheme?
  Lord Bassam of Brighton, who is Under-Secretary at the Home Office, gave the Bill virtually unqualified support when he spoke on Third Reading in the House of Lords. Why, then, is the Bill not a Government Bill and why is there not a national scheme? It is apparent to everyone, in the House and outside, that burglars have learned how to ride bicycles and travel. The mere fact that something is stolen in Margate does not mean that it cannot swiftly be sold in Sussex, for instance. Indeed, it will be.
  That brings me to the North Yorkshire County Council Act 1991, which, as I said, several colleagues have prayed in aid. With the courteous assistance of my hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway) and the North Yorkshire constabulary, I have probed the matter a little further. A few moments ago, my right hon. and learned Friend produced some impressive figures, as if producing a rabbit from a hat. I do not know which member of the constabulary he spoke to, but I have spoken to a detective constable to whom I was introduced by the chief constable, so he does not have an axe to grind, other than in favour of the constabulary—if I can put it like that. The officer was very candid, and said that the 1991 Act is difficult to enforce on car boot sales.
  We are told that the Bill will get to grips with car boot sales. However, an officer responsible for enforcement told me that it is pretty darned impossible to enforce. We are told that all the good antique shops are already doing what the Bill proposes. I shall deal with the plus side of that in a moment. We are after rogues, who find it extremely easy to trade after hours and to circumvent the Act. They do not keep records. The back door opens and the loot goes in. Later, the loot comes out through the same back door. The Act does not deal with that activity. That is a weakness in the much vaunted North Yorkshire Act. I am not saying that that weakness cannot be corrected in other legislation. Indeed, perhaps that Act can be improved upon. However, given that the Bill is virtually a carbon copy of the Act, it seems that none of the lessons has been learned.
  I am told by my informant that inadequate resources and only limited time are available to the hard-pressed members of the North Yorkshire constabulary to implement the Act. There are one or two other issues with which they are dealing. Given the manner in which the Government have treated Kent county council's finances, I do not see adequate resources being provided to enable the Bill to be implemented if it is enacted. Sadly, there are no signs from the Government that they are interested in properly financing Kent for this or any other purpose.
  Antique dealers in my constituency have expressed real concerns to me about the manner in which names and addresses will be taken. However, the North Yorkshire constabulary has told me that, while it is true that they will be taken both on purchase and on sale, depending on the value of the goods, no identification will be necessary. Indeed, there is none. We do not have a national ID card. No one will have to present a passport, birth certificate, marriage certificate or council tax records to prove who he is. Michael Mouse will be able to trade cheerfully throughout Kent under the Bill. No one will be able to

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  gainsay whether it is Michael or Minnie Mouse. That is not very satisfactory. Indeed, it is another weakness in the proposed legislation. It can probably be dealt with, but with no identification I fail to see how a name and address and a record will be of much real value.
  I have mentioned that burglars cross county boundaries. The person who was extremely candid with me—that was the brief, and I am extremely grateful for the information, as, I hope, is the House—tells me that it is possible to drive from York to Leeds, even with traffic congestion, in 20 minutes. The crooks who are committing burglary in York jump in their motors, hop off to Leeds and flog their goods there. That is because the North Yorkshire Act has no remit in Leeds. Is that sensible? I cannot believe that it is.
  Sadly, no longer does any constabulary throughout the country—not even the Metropolitan police—have a dedicated antiques unit. I stand to be corrected. The police do not have people who really know and understand what they are looking for. However, the burglars know. They identify the stuff and they burgle to order. They know exactly what they are going for. They leave the cheap stuff and the tat, but take the hallmarked goods and the pretty little things that will sell. The constabulary cannot provide identification because resources are not available to establish a dedicated antiques unit. However, such units will be needed if the legislation that is proposed, whether national or local, is to be properly enforced.
  I note that my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe shakes his head. I shall be delighted to give way to him if he disagrees with my argument.
  Mr. Howard: I know that my hon. Friend's argument has been advanced by those who are opposed to the Bill. It is true that there is no longer a dedicated antiques unit. However, in the view of professionals in these matters—I am not one of them—there are officers based at headquarters who are in possession of the intelligence that they need to get to grips with the problem. They are capable of operating more effectively under the Kent police model, with which I am sure my hon. Friend is familiar, as we all are. As a result, they are able to operate more effectively in dealing with the crime that we are discussing than those officers who implemented the old-fashioned approach, which had a certain resonance about it. An antiques squad sounds very good, but it does not necessarily work as effectively as the current methods, which are being operated successfully by the Kent police.
  Mr. Gale: I am grateful to my right hon. and learned Friend, but it will not help too much if the person investigating the crime does not know whether he is dealing with Georgian silver or EPNS.
  Mr. Howard: He can ask someone.
  Mr. Gale: I am surprised that my right hon. and learned Friend is quarrelling with me. I believe that there is a strong case for resourcing police forces properly so that they can have dedicated units that know what they are doing and what they are looking for.
  There is a credit side to what I have heard from north Yorkshire. It would be improper of me to draw attention to the down side without putting the credit side on the
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  record, and I think that the credit side is compelling. As I have said, I am not opposing the Bill. The North Yorkshire constabulary has established good links with reputable antiques shops through its officers. That has led to a two-way traffic of information and co-operation between those dealing honestly and those going about their proper policing business, seeking to prevent crime and recover stolen goods. Officers are able to provide lists of identifiable goods—we come back to whether people know what they are talking about—to antique shops so that the dealers know almost in advance, if possible, what they are likely to be looking for. They will know what has been stolen or what is hot, and what can be recovered and returned to its rightful owner. We hope that that process will lead to the prosecution of the thief. Those are two significant pluses.
  In the main, antique shops in north Yorkshire have installed video cameras. I understand that dealers have become quite adept at keeping people who they suspect of trying to pass on stolen goods talking while they angle them so that there is a good shot on camera. That sounds as if it is helpful to the police, and it probably helps to solve crime. That is a plus.
  I am told that there are emerging patterns. The police are now adept at tracing those who tend to specialise in second-hand and compact discs, for example. They know the outlets that are likely to handle them, and they are having considerable success. I do not quarrel with the figures of my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe, and if there has been such a dramatic reduction, it is probably in this area. As I have said, there are many pluses.
  I do not want to see the baby thrown out with the bath water, or the best becoming the enemy of the good. However, if the case is proven at all, I believe strongly that it is proven nationally as well as merely locally. We should be getting to grips with the problem of crooks crossing a county boundary and passing on their goods somewhere else.
  We should have a nationwide scheme embodied in a Government Bill, not a private Bill. If we are to treat the issue seriously, resources for enforcement must be made available. As the people of north Yorkshire have found, there is no point in having legislation on the statute book if it is not properly resourced.
  8.8 pm
  Dr. Stephen Ladyman: My parliamentary neighbour, the hon. Member for North Thanet (Mr. Gale), has made some fair and constructive points. He appeared to be arguing for due diligence in Committee to try to improve the Bill. However, if something is not ideal and does not create a perfect world, that is not necessarily a reason for not proceeding. If it represents a step forward, let us take that step. I believe that the Bill offers us that. If it reduces the number of people who are burgled, even by only a few in the hon. Gentleman's constituency and in mine, I suspect that we shall have many happy constituents.
  Like many other right hon. and hon. Members, I have been burgled in recent years. Fortunately, I have been able to replace virtually everything that was stolen. The exception is the greatest hits of Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers. If any hon. Member can help me identify the source of that estimable CD, I shall be delighted to

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  hear from him. I suspect that I was the only person to buy it in the first place, and that the only person who has a copy of it now is the person who stole it.
  Consultation took place before the Bill was drafted. Trade bodies that councils and trading standards officers believed would be interested were consulted, as were local chambers of commerce, town centre managers, district councils and some Kent Members. I was not consulted before the Bill was drafted, but others were. The police, obviously, were heavily involved in drafting the Bill, and several press articles stimulated debate in the county. That consultation has continued with the Association of Private Market Operators, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, the Incorporated Society of Valuers and Auctioneers, the Antiquarian Booksellers Association, the Provincial Booksellers Fairs Association, the Registered Antiques Dealers Society and LAPADA—the Association of Art and Antiques Dealers, formerly the London and Provincial Art Dealers Association. I do not say that all those organisations support the Bill, but all have been consulted. It is not fair to say that there has not been wide consultation.
  Some Members have expressed concern about bureaucratic burdens. I draw their attention to the book "Buying and Selling Art and Antiques—the Law", by Brian W. Harvey, a legal consultant to LAPADA. That book sets out the voluntary code of practice that the industry is supposed to adhere to. It requires vendors to provide their name and address and to sign a form identifying items for sale, and confirming that they are the unencumbered property of the vendors who are authorised to sell it.
  The form must be dated, and there must be some verification of the identity and address of new vendors. Details must be recorded, and traders are asked to be suspicious of any item for which the asking price does not equate with market value. If they have any reason to be suspicious, they are expected to take a series of steps. If requested, they are expected to submit catalogues to the local police. For sales of £500 or more—single items, or accumulated amounts—special steps are expected to be taken. Vendors are expected to check registers for stolen property.
  The industry has voluntarily signed up to that list of burdens, which in my view is no less burdensome than the Bill. My hon. Friend the Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey (Mr. Wyatt) said that many vendors do not adhere to the voluntary code, and he wished that they would. When the Bill is enacted, the code will be adhered to in Kent, and we shall have done the industry a favour by taking a step forward.
  Dr. Stoate: Does my hon. Friend agree that the example of a voluntary code of practice that is not being adhered to is a precise reason why we need a statutory code? If dealers do not adhere to a code that seems stricter than that proposed in the Bill, action is needed. Even if we do not reduce crime by a factor of Avogadro's number, the Bill will have a significant effect on crime reduction in Kent and, we hope, across the country.
  Dr. Ladyman: My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Even if crime is only marginally reduced, we shall do a
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  service for our constituents. If only one other owner of Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers can be saved from the tragedy of losing his copy, we shall have taken a step forward.
  I hope that the Bill will eventually become Government legislation. I should like my hon. Friend the Minister to watch the experiment in Kent and Medway with great care, and, in a year or so, if it is the success that we believe it will be, to introduce a Bill covering the whole country. I should like him to say that he will do so, and if he does not, when the Bill is enacted and shown to be a success, I shall badger him to adopt it for the whole country.
  8.14 pm
  Mr. Brian Cotter: Like many others, I have mixed feelings about the Bill. Its ultimate aim of crime reduction is admirable and a cause that we all support, but that does not absolve us of our responsibility to scrutinise it. The Bill raises some difficult questions.
  When the Bill was introduced in the other place, my noble Friend Lord Thomson of Monifieth expressed concern that it was being discussed in the dinner hour, which did not imply that there would be a great deal of scrutiny or discussion. The other place welcomes the fact that we shall give it more discussion than it received there.
  I should like to make some points about red tape, a much-discussed matter.
  Dr. Ladyman: May I point out that the Bill began its consideration at 7.39 pm in the other place? The House of Lords was in session, and there was a thorough debate. The hon. Gentleman may have been misinformed by whoever told him that there was not.
  Mr. Cotter: I thank the hon. Gentleman, but I was not misinformed. It was clearly stated in debate in the other place that it was regrettable that the Bill was taken during the so-called dinner hour so that there was not sufficient discussion. That is on the record, and I refer the hon. Gentleman to Hansard.
  I was about to discuss red tape. Clearly, the Bill will create some extra work for dealers in Kent and Medway. The local Federation of Small Businesses stresses that the vast majority of companies engaged in second-hand business are small or micro-businesses that do not have the resources to allow them easily to adapt to the heavy administration that the Bill would require. As it is a private Bill, there is no requirement for an impact assessment, as there would be with a Government Bill, and that is a shame. Perhaps an impact assessment would dispel some concerns.
  My second difficulty is over civil liberties, a perennial problem with Bills directed against crime. I am concerned that the balance of the Bill may go too far against liberty. The identity requirements attached to purchase and the powers of entry granted to the police both cause some concern. The fact that the powers will be localised seems pernicious. I accept the principle of private Bills, and consequent regional variations in criminal law, but I am far from convinced that such significant changes to rights should be made purely locally. Many Members have referred to the hope that the Bill could become a national measure rather than one restricted to a particular area. If I have any real concern about it, that is it.

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  The right hon. and learned Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard), and other speakers, said that previous examples of such Bills exist. Indeed, they do. We have had time to assess such Bills and to see what is good and what is bad about them. There have been, I think, six such Acts, with slight variation in each case. If something is not done on a national basis, we have the prospect of a further 200 pieces of legislation clogging up the House when the issue could be dealt with nationally.
  There has been talk about consultation. The hon. Member for South Thanet (Dr. Ladyman) referred to a long list of organisations that had been consulted. Part of the consultation was with ordinary members of the public in Kent and Medway, who were asked whether they liked the proposals or not. Many said that it was good news without really understanding what the Bill said. I am not saying that this Bill is particularly difficult to understand, but when it comes to consultation, it can be difficult for the general public to pick up on the pros and cons of a Bill. People might say that the Bill is good because its objective is good, without taking on board the detail. I know that concerns have been raised that trading standards officers and the police might be overburdened as a result of these provisions.
  A strong case has been made for the issue to be addressed on a national basis, and I hope that that will be done in due course. I do not wish to stand in the way of a Bill that has such strong local support, but I think that it is right that the issue has been raised. Were the Bill to apply nationally, it could be refined further, with far more discussion taking place to ensure that the problems that I have touched on peripherally are no longer problems.
  I repeat that I do not wish to obstruct the Bill although I am unhappy that this is a local Bill rather than a national one that will cover everybody.
  8.20 pm
  Mr. Michael Fallon: I am sorry that the hon. Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey (Mr. Wyatt) is no longer in his seat, because he began his speech by saying that he was originally in favour of the Bill and was now against it. I wanted to tell him that I have been on the opposite journey.
  When I first heard about the Bill, I was somewhat suspicious. I had three principal concerns—the first was the additional cost to the county council, as more expenditure will be involved. My second concern has been touched on so often—why does the Bill apply only to Kent and not elsewhere? I speak as a Member whose constituency is bordered by Surrey and by the Metropolitan police area to the north and west. Thirdly, I heard concerns expressed about the level of consultation. Let me take those concerns one by one.
  I inquired about the costs and had a letter back from the county council as long ago as October 1998. It said that there would be some start-up costs—promoting the Bill, of course—and then there would be the cost to the authority of appointing and maintaining the five enforcement staff. The cost of doing that was estimated, in 1998, to be between £120,000 and £130,000 a year. Those are substantial costs, and they need justifying. I think that they can be justified.
  As for why the Bill applies only to Kent, I will come back to that a little later. On consultation, I have discussed the Bill with the promoters. I have had four
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  representations from members of the antique trade in my constituency. I sent them the promoters' revised guidance document on the Bill, and have not, so far, heard further from them.
  It is important not to lose sight of the fact that the Bill applies not only to the antiques trade—it will apply also to the stolen car trade. I have been told that some 30 per cent. of all stolen cars in Kent are never recovered. There is a huge amount of crime in Kent, and it is not all to do with antiques.
  Let me deal with the objections to the Bill that have been raised so far. First, there are those who believe that the Bill should be avowedly compatible with the Human Rights Act 1998. I am perfectly satisfied with the opinion that was read to the House by the hon. Member for Gillingham (Mr. Clark), and the issue can anyway be tested further in Committee. Therefore, that objection need not delay us.
  Secondly, it has been suggested that this is inappropriate material for a private Bill. Those who argue that have already ceded the point that there have been seven previous Bills, and we have had much discussion about the North Yorkshire County Council Act 1991. I hope that it is not suggested that there is any further technical impropriety in the Bill—after all, it has been examined properly in both Houses.
  There is a subsidiary point on the issue of the appropriateness of legislation as to whether there is any prospect of Government legislation being introduced. There clearly is not—nothing has been brought forward, despite the good experience in North Yorkshire. On that basis, the promoters of these Bills are perfectly entitled to ask leave of the House to introduce these schemes in Kent and Medway. There are always competing demands on legislative time, although that seems an odd point given that we have spent most of the afternoon dealing with the problem of burger carts in St. James's park.
  The real reason I am not concerned about propriety is that I do not object to different approaches locally; indeed I rejoice in them. If it turns out that, as a result of putting these measures on to the statute book, Kent becomes a tougher place for criminals to operate in than East Sussex, Surrey or the Metropolitan police area, that is good news for Kent. It is up to those other authorities to learn from that and replicate the scheme elsewhere—if it is a success.
  That may answer my hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet (Mr. Gale), who referred to burglars driving from York to Leeds in 20 minutes. It is open to West Yorkshire to follow the example of North Yorkshire. It would be interesting to hear from the Minister whether other authorities are going down that route. I believe that some experimentation and difference is the essence of local democracy. I believe also that there is a significant advantage in a competition in ideas.
  The scheme may not be successful in Kent; there is no guarantee. However, if it is successful, it can be copied elsewhere, just as those drawing up the Kent proposals have learned from the experience of North Yorkshire. That is a healthy development; it is stimulating and decentralising.
  Will there be some inconsistencies? Will traders in Kent have to keep records of transactions outside Kent? As I understand the Bill, that will apply only to those traders who do most of their business in Kent. That seems logical to me.

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  It has been suggested that the Bill will result in more red tape, and that objection we should take most seriously. There is common cause on both sides of the House that, as the better regulation taskforce has reported, the burden on business is growing. I should be concerned about that, because I spent three years on the forerunner of that taskforce, the deregulation taskforce. I gave up half a day a week in the Cabinet Office—unpaid, I have to tell the House—trying to tackle red tape, and that requires needs constant vigilance.
  Are we happy to increase slightly the burden of red tape in this instance, given the greater prize that we are assured may result? I welcome the concessions made on the £10 limit, those who do not trade principally in Kent and so on. It is important to remember that the Bill does not apply to private sales; that the registration process will be free; that charities and booksellers, for example, are exempt; and that the purchaser's name and address will be required only if the value is over £100.
  As to the other objection concerning red tape—the burden on businesses of registration—let me say that at least half of all antique dealers are already registered for VAT. I cannot see that this would be any more significant a burden than registering every antique on some form of a national register, or supplying a name and address when one enters a car boot sale. The red tape argument cannot be sustained.
  The promoters of the Bill have appeared to be flexible, and if there is further consultation to be done with the antiques trade or others, that is still possible. If further amendments can be agreed in Committee, I am sure that the promoters would be willing to consider them.
  In the end, it comes down to the fact that burglary is far too easy. It is no use us moaning at the magistrates, griping at the police or chafing at the Crown Prosecution Service. We need to find more ways of tackling the problem at source. Burglary is easy and popular. The chance of being caught or imprisoned is relatively slight and burglars know that they can cash in the results. If they cannot cash in the results, why do they concentrate on silver, jewellery, pictures and so on? That is why I find the special pleading by some of the antique fairs rather hypocritical.
  I am delighted to see the hon. Member for Newark (Mrs. Jones) in her place. When the church warden in my village was burgled just before Christmas, she was advised by Kent police to go straight to the Sunday antiques fair in Newark. She did that and recovered some of her stolen property, yet, we have perhaps all had a letter from DMG Antique Fairs in Newark banging on about the erosion of civil rights. Burglary victims have civil rights as well.
  It may be that Mr. Hamden has written to us all because he feels that the Bill would hurt his business. However, if his business is not being underpinned by the proceeds of burglary, he has nothing to fear.
  Mrs. Fiona Jones: I am interested in the proposed legislation because the international antiques fair is held in my constituency. The legislation applies only to dealers and businesses from Kent. That is why it is unfair and unenforceable. That is the point made by representatives of the antiques fair in Newark. The hon. Gentleman must
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  address the fact that dealers from the Kent area will be disadvantaged when they come to the international antiques fair. How does he propose to address that?
  Mr. Fallon: I have heard some special pleading in my time. I am not bothered about whether those who attend the Newark antiques fair will be disadvantaged. I am sure that there are reputable antique fairs in Newark. It is odd that this is the only group of antique fairs that seems worried about the Bill. I am concerned about the pleading over the erosion of civil rights. I do not believe that fences and dodgy dealers have civil rights.
  I want to tell the House about another burglary that took place in my constituency just before Christmas. Commander Davidson, who lives in Seal, is a retired naval officer. He gave years of service to his country but burglars took almost everything dear to him. They took all his mementoes and naval objects, including his barograph, which had been collected over a lifetime of service to his country. What have we done for him? Police officers have called on him and he has received his letter from Victim Support. I have written on his behalf to the chief constable but he knows, as do we, that there is no chance of him recovering all the property that was stolen—an entire collection of a lifetime's service.
  As my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard) said, if we will the end of reducing burglary, we must be prepared to will the means. The Bill is a means, although it is only one, and the promoters have done enough to convince me that it should be supported.
  8.34 pm
  Mr. Andrew Rowe: The war against crime is a war not of the great gesture but of the constant little step here and there, trying to catch up with or to keep a step ahead of the burglary fraternity.
  Many of the anxieties sparked by the Bill are misplaced. I understand that any respectable business that knows that what it does is wholly honest and scrupulous naturally feels that any further record keeping or opening of its books to outside inspectors is a further threat, but it is interesting to hear from the Medway towns that those respectable businesses that have signed up to the voluntary code of conduct have not found the paperwork particularly onerous. They have been pleased to think that they have done all that they can to ensure that when people buy something from them it cannot later be expropriated because it has to be given back to the person from whom it was stolen. Instead of being open to a series of bad debts, they have done as much as they can to ensure that what they sell is above board.
  Dealers who refuse to join the voluntary scheme open themselves to having the provenance of their merchandise questioned. If they cannot answer the question, it clearly opens the possibility that the stuff that they are dealing in is dodgy. That is important. The fact that the police and the county council enforcement officers are likely to be understaffed provides a much greater security against oppression, because they will concentrate only on those dealers whom they have reason to suppose are in the dodgy trade.
  The most difficult thing for the police in the fight against crime—and we all know it—is when they know virtually for certain that certain shops or individuals are

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  crooked but cannot enforce any action against them. That drives them crazy. It drives my constituents crazy. A group of my constituents came to me and named a whole host of shops and dealers in my constituency that they know not only receive stolen goods but, in some cases, commission their stealing.
  I went to the police, thunderstruck by that information, and asked whether it could really be true or whether my constituents were romancing. They said that it was absolutely true but that they found it almost impossible to get any evidence on which to proceed against the dodgy dealers. I believe that the Bill will do a small amount to make it harder for such people to continue in business.
  There are plenty of highly sophisticated criminals around who, as my hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet (Mr. Gale) said, can tell a genuine picture from a fake and can distinguish between George III silver and electro-plated nickel silver at the drop of a hat, and who know exactly where to go, how to steal the goods and how to get them out of the country. In Kent, that is only too easy: they can get across the channel in hours and may well be stealing to the order of some Dutch or Belgian fence. They are very hard to proceed against, and the Bill will do little to stop them.
  The police and the criminal statistics tell us all the time that a vast proportion of the burglaries that cause so much distress to our constituents are carried out by a very small number of repeat burglars. They offend repeatedly because they have no difficulty whatever in travelling five miles down the road to flog off what they have stolen. They are not like the burglars who travel from York to Leeds or into the Metropolitan police area. They reckon that someone round the corner—in Deal, Dover, Folkestone or Canterbury—will take their stuff. The police often have a good idea who receives such goods, but boy is it difficult to pin that down!
  The Bill will play a small but convincing part in making such people's lives a little more difficult. If a petty burglar who causes huge distress to many people in a lifetime of crime can be discouraged because his market has been taken from him, it is well worth supporting.
  8.40 pm
  Mr. Julian Brazier: As a number of colleagues on both sides of the House have put the case so strongly, I shall be extremely brief.
  To take us back to first principles, I refer to intelligence-led policing, of which David Phillips, our splendid chief constable of Kent, was a pioneer. It involves a shift, which is fundamental to both Bills, from targeting crime to targeting criminals, and from solving a crime after the event to identifying and following known criminals until they can be caught on the job and convicted. Most burglaries are carried out by a relatively small number of extremely active people, a growing proportion of whom are drug addicts, and the logic of the measure is to duplicate that searchlight by focusing on fences in the same way that intelligence-led policing focuses on burglars.
  We need the Bill to target fences: although it is relatively easy to discover who they are, it is extraordinarily difficult to prove that somebody has deliberately and knowingly handled stolen goods. Incidentally, there is some misunderstanding in the House as the hon. Member for Newark (Mrs. Jones) referred to
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  criminalisation. We are dealing with a civil offence. A relatively modest civil fine of up to £2,000 will be available, and repeatedly so, for those who do not adhere to a code that is voluntary at present and underpinned by many organisations, but which will become compulsory. The police will have a way to hit back at known fences. Intelligence-led policing has already led to a staggering 70 per cent. reduction in burglaries in Kent over the past few years, and we shall be able to harvest even more of its fruits.
  I want to focus on the measure's local nature as there is a danger of us becoming confused. I would support its introduction nationally, but that option is not before the House and we can introduce it only for the county of Kent and the Medway area.
  Mr. Rowe: My hon. Friend is an historian. He will no doubt recall that the civil servants of Charles V, who tried to administer his far-flung empire, remarked to one another, "If death came from Spain, we should live for ever." Does he not think that there is a similar likelihood of obtaining national legislation on this issue?
  Mr. Brazier: Indeed. My hon. Friend is learned in these matters. He anticipates unconsciously the point that I was about to make. One of the differences between British local government when it was set up in the Victorian era, and its competitors in many continental countries was precisely that it was locally based and volunteer led, rather than centrally administered and bureaucratic. However, essentially the point is that we do not have an option to introduce the scheme nationally, but we do have an option to introduce it for Kent and for Medway.
  I strongly support those colleagues, including my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard), who I am so pleased has joined us—the only Home Secretary in the past 50 years to achieve a substantial reduction in crime—who have said that it is worth having local initiatives. The whole point of a diverse system of local government is that local people's locally elected representatives should be able to experiment in such areas. I ask the House to give Kent and Medway that opportunity.
  Still on the issue of the local nature of the measure, we should put to bed the red herring about displacing crime. When I became co-ordinator of one of the first neighbourhood watch schemes in London, people said, "All you are doing is displacing crime," but we hugely reduced the level of crime in our area. There is some anecdotal evidence that some of it was displaced, but that has not stopped successive Governments embracing neighbourhood watch as a successful concept.
  Such a case with regard to the Bill, however, is much weaker than that on neighbourhood watch because we are not displacing burglaries. All we are displacing, in theory anyway, is the ability to fence goods, but if we compel every burglar to put his goods into a motor vehicle—and not every drug addict feeding his habit has access to a motor vehicle all the time—and to drive them a long way across a county boundary, that will give the police another opportunity, with the intelligence-led approach, if they are watching that chap to catch up with him, so I welcome the measure. It obviously does much to cut his margin.
  For all those reasons, like many colleagues on both sides of the House I urge the House to support the measures.
  8.47 pm
  Mr. Nick Hawkins: I can be brief. The fascination of private business is that one sees differences of opinion within the parties and on different sides of the House. There is no doubt that we have had additional fascinations tonight.
  Before coming to the debate, I was aware that different views were held by members of both the main parties on the issues. I knew that some Members representing Kent constituencies on the Government Back Benches supported the Bill and others, as we heard from the hon. Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey (Mr. Wyatt), opposed it.
  I was also aware that, among my right hon. and hon. Friends, some were strongly in favour, some had reservations and some were against, but we have had yet further variations on that theme. We have heard that the hon. Gentleman started off as a supporter of the Bill and has now turned against it, whereas my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Mr. Fallon) has moved in the opposite direction, having previously been against it. He has now spoken in favour.
  We have had the even greater fascination of the reference to Emperor Charles V. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Faversham and Mid-Kent (Mr. Rowe), I studied that period of history. I welcome his use of that particular quotation, but one never knows what one will hear in dealing with private business.
  Perhaps because of the many differences of opinion among my right hon. and hon. Friends and, indeed, among Members on the Government Benches, Opposition Front Benchers can remain largely agnostic. It is for the sponsors of the Bill to make their case. I understand why my hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet (Mr. Gale) has expressed some reservations. For myself, I always want to express some scepticism when further legislation is being contemplated, particularly if it puts burdens on small businesses. I am a deregulator by nature and by instinct.
  Before I was on the Front Bench, I frequently said that if I was ever lucky enough to win a high place in the ballot, the Bill I would introduce—perhaps one day I will have the chance to do so—was the automatic repeal of legislation Bill, under which, for every new page of statute, we should find at least one page of existing statute to repeal. Perhaps we could follow that by repealing 10 pages for every new page.
  The trouble with any Government, regardless of party, is that there is a constant flow of legislation. For many years, I was one of the vice-chairmen of the small business bureau. I know that the hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (Mr. Cotter) shares my interest in these issues. He referred to another national organisation, the Federation of Small Businesses. I think he would agree that those and other organisations representing small business would have similar concerns.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks referred to letters that many of us have received from a gentleman who runs an antiques fair business in the constituency of the hon. Member for Newark (Mrs. Jones). I was particularly concerned by one of the points made in the accompanying documentation about the London and Provincial Antique Dealers Association.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr. Brazier) spoke of displacing crime. As a Surrey Member, I have an interest in ensuring that we try to
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  tackle crime throughout my constituency and my county. Everyone in Surrey is well aware that mobile criminals using the motorway network—in particular, the M25 and the M3—are frequently involved in burglary and other crimes. It is well known to my chief constable and all his officers in Surrey that a large amount of crime is committed by people outside our own county. The issues mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury, who strongly supports the Bill, in relation to the displacement of crime are of concern to every county. Is it possible that those who have expressed reservations about private Bills and suggested that we should wait for national legislation have a point?
  I was particularly struck by what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for North Thanet. He said that the reasons for some of his personal reservations about Bills such as this were based on his discussions with our hon. Friend the Member for Ryedale (Mr. Greenway), relating to his experience in North Yorkshire. There are clearly different opinions—we have heard different opinions in the debate—about what the North Yorkshire experience actually means. If there is more than one view about the North Yorkshire experience, we need to take care before we impose yet further burdens on small businesses.
  As the London and Provincial Antique Dealers Association has said, Bills such as this would undoubtedly impose burdens if they became law. It suggests that, given the demand for detailed records of every second-hand purchase that takes place either in Kent or anywhere involving dealers registered in Kent, between half a million and a million records would have to be made each year, and then thrown away after three years. Everyone who has traded in Kent would keep those records—not only traders based in the county, but traders scattered across Britain. Moreover, we should consider the extra burden imposed by red tape on law-abiding and legitimate small and medium-sized businesses.
  This has been a fascinating debate, not least because of the number of Labour Members who supported my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Howard). I echo what my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury said about his having been the most successful Home Secretary in terms of tackling crime. It is a change to hear so many Labour Members support my right hon. and learned Friend. No doubt he welcomes that, as I do. We used to hear very different comments.
  I would be reluctant to oppose what my right hon. and learned Friend and chief constables say will help to tackle crime, but there are undoubtedly balanced arguments, which is no doubt why members of the same party on both sides of the House have taken different views. This has been a fascinating debate, but not one that prompts the official Opposition to feel it necessary to come down on one side or the other.
  8.54 pm
  The Minister of State, Home Office (Mr. Charles Clarke): As the hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Mr. Hawkins) said, this has been a most interesting and illuminating debate. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Gillingham (Mr. Clark) both on prosecuting it and on the way in which he put his case. It is conventional in this type of debate for Governments to be neutral rather than to take a particular side, but there are one or two observations that I should like to make.

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  First, I should like to state that the Government did have objections to parts of the Kent County Council Bill, which were set out in our report of 17 March 1999, when the Bill was being discussed. I should like to place on record, however, that the Government are content that the Bill's promoters have taken on board our comments satisfactorily, so that the points covered in the report have been appropriately and properly met.
  Secondly, I should like to join in the general tributes that have been paid to the chief constable of Kent. Not only does he chair the Association of Chief Police Officers crime committee, but my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary appointed him to be the vice-chair of the taskforce, which I chair and which deals with crime reduction. As the hon. Member for Canterbury (Mr. Brazier) described very well, the chief constable has led the whole drive towards intelligence-led policing not only in Kent but across the country. He has developed many of the approaches that we are now seeking to roll out across the country.
  I myself have not spoken to the chief constable about the Bill but I am very keen to pay tribute to his work, and it is the case—I thought the hon. Member for Canterbury put it extremely well—that the chief constable's focus on sources of criminality, hot spots and patterns of behaviour is a model to us all in how crime should be fought. As Members on both of sides the House have described, the Bill reflects that type of approach to addressing such issues.
  I therefore confirm on behalf of the Government that we understand the chief constable's support for the Bill, and understand that he supports it not only as chief constable of Kent but because he understands many of the wider issues that have been raised in the debate and sees advantages in it.
  Various hon. Members have asked whether there should be national legislation in this sphere. The argument that we should await national legislation before acting has even been used as an argument against the Bill. However, I assure my hon. Friend the Member for South Thanet (Dr. Ladyman) that although I cannot follow him in his musical tastes, the Government will watch operation of this Bill and practice in other areas very closely for precisely the reason that I have just given—namely, to decide whether it would be appropriate to consider national legislation in that context. It is valuable to have this type of experiment, and to understand the issues and how they are being addressed. That is why we want to examine very carefully what is being done.
  As the hon. Member for Sevenoaks (Mr. Fallon) said, it is true that there are always competing pressures for legislative time. That is certainly true in the Home Office, in dealing with the various items of legislation that the House is considering in this Session. Nevertheless, it is important that we examine what is happening, learn what we can from it and consider the desirability of appropriate national legislation.
  The hon. Member for Surrey Heath was right to say that we always have to strike a balance between the burdens on industry, which he described, and the crime solution benefits that we can achieve in that regard. That will be a matter to be taken into consideration by the Government.
  In answer to the question asked by the hon. Member for Sevenoaks, I am not aware of other examples in other parts of the country or of other police authorities and
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  forces that are essentially queueing up behind the Bill with their own initiatives. However, I shall look into the matter, and if I am wrong in that I shall write to him. He made an entirely appropriate point.
  I was interested in the comparison with Emperor Charles V used by the hon. Member for Faversham and Mid-Kent (Mr. Rowe). Although my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary has in his recent life had to bear many comparisons with particular types of historical figures, I do not think that Charles V has previously arisen as a role model for him. However, I shall certainly draw the comparison to his attention and ask whether he needs to bear in mind any particular aspects of the emperor's behaviour in thinking how he should conduct his duties and meet his responsibilities.
  I simply counsel hon. Members against making the best he the enemy of the good in discussion of the need for national legislation versus the need for local legislation. Obviously, there are real arguments about the advantages of national legislation, and the travelling arguments that have been made are real and substantial. However, that does not of itself convince that one should necessarily resist a particular item of legislation, regardless of whether one wants to follow the particular argument advanced by some hon. Members on the benefits or otherwise of local legislation.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey (Mr. Wyatt) raised some points about the Human Rights Act 1998 in a letter to me a few weeks ago. The situation is complicated. Private Acts are not exempt from the Human Rights Act 1998, which applies equally to public and private Bills once they are enacted. A higher court will be able to issue a declaration of incompatibility in respect of a private Act, just as it can for any primary legislation. However, Parliament has decided that under section 19 of the Human Rights Act 1998, if a Minister of the Crown is in charge of a Bill, that Minister must make a statement of opinion on the Bill's compatibility with the convention rights. As my hon. Friend the Member for Gillingham made clear, that section does not apply to private Bills because there is no Minister in charge. Some problems arise as a result of that.
  Section 19 applies to a Government Bill or a consolidation Bill, but it does not apply to private Members' Bills or private Bills because there is no duty to make a statement about their compatibility with convention rights. However, concerns have been expressed about the Government giving a view about the compatibility of private Bills. We are considering the issue urgently and I hope that we may be able to make an announcement in the next few weeks, because there are important issues involved.
  My hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General made the position clear in the House on 13 April in response to a question from my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock (Mr. Mackinlay). Accepting that my hon. Friend had raised a serious point about private Bills, my hon. and learned Friend said:
  The concerns that he has expressed on previous occasions have been taken on board. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is considering them seriously.—[Official Report, 13 April 2000; Vol. 348, c. 496.]
  I can confirm that we are considering those important issues seriously.

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  I have tried to set out the Government's approach. We are conventionally neutral on such Bills and I hope that I have not said anything to suggest that we are anything other than neutral on this Bill. However, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Gillingham on the way in which he introduced the debate. It is important to look at all possible ways to combat crime and this offers many aspects of interest.
  9.2 pm
  Mr. Paul Clark: With the leave of the House, I should like to respond to the debate, but I shall not detain the House for longer than necessary.
  In my opening statement, I said that there was cross-party support for the Bills on both councils in question. I am delighted that there is also cross-party support in the Chamber. I appreciate the contributions that have been made from both sides. At one point, we were concentrating on antiques. The hon. Member for Sevenoaks (Mr. Fallon) drew attention to other aspects of the legislation, which also covers motor vehicle thefts and burglaries. Those issues have not all been covered in as much depth.
  Several hon. Members asked whether there had been enough consultation. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for South Thanet (Dr. Ladyman) for listing all the consultation that had gone on in trade journals and papers. The number of amendments that the promoters have made to the original Bill shows that they have listened to the trade to ensure that the Bill is not overly burdensome, but still meets the essential requirements of reducing the market for stolen goods in the second-hand trade.
  My hon. Friend the Member for Sittingbourne and Sheppey (Mr. Wyatt) made an interesting speech, but I was concerned by his point about the concept behind the Bill. We are seeking a market reduction which will help to reduce the incidence of burglaries and so on. However, it has to be seen as part and parcel of the overall approach.
  The hon. Member for Weston-super-Mare (Mr. Cotter) asked whether the Bill was practical and enforceable. When the Bill was considered on Third Reading in
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  another place Lord Bassam, the Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department, responded to those who had raised the issue as follows:
  I feel bound to say…that I find it hard to believe that a measure prepared and promoted jointly by the local authority and the police could not be effectively enforced.—[Official Report, House of Lords, 18 January 2000; Vol. 608, c.1054.]
  Hon. Members on both sides of the House have expressed admiration for the chief constable of Kent. That should be borne in mind in relation to the practicality and enforceability of the legislation.
  The hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Mr. Hawkins), among others, referred to the burden of keeping records. Many of the amendments to the Bill have sought to reduce the burden on legitimate businesses. Codes of practice within the trade require businesses to keep records for far longer. The Bill proposes that records should be kept for only two years; the codes of practice require them to be kept for six or seven years. The records have to be kept for financial purposes such as VAT. One amendment that has been agreed by the councils is that almost any record will be acceptable, so there is no need for dual recording.
  I am grateful for the speech by my hon. Friend the Minister of State. I particularly noted his comment about the chief constable. The reservations in the report and guidance from my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary have been taken on board. It is useful to have clarification of the human rights issue involved and I reaffirm that the promoters of the Bill have taken counsel's opinion and produced a statement of compatibility.
  Finally, I thank hon. Members for contributing to a positive and interesting debate. In Newark, the antiques liaison officer, DC Austin O'Driscoll, said that he supports the legislation wholeheartedly because so often one finds stolen goods but the chain goes cold. The Bill is about being able to set up a paper chain, to return stolen property to its rightful owners and to reduce the market for turning stolen property into quick cash. I urge hon. Members to support the Bill.
  Question put and agreed to.
  Bill accordingly read a Second time, and committed.

  MEDWAY COUNCIL BILL [LORDS]
  Read a Second time, and committed.

  Royal Parks (Trading) Bill
  Not amended in the Standing Committee, again considered.
  Amendment moved [this day]: No. 6, in page 2, line 4, leave out clauses 4 and 5.
  Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Alan Haselhurst): I remind the House that with this we are considering amendments Nos. 28, 22 to 25, 7 and new schedule 2.
  9.10 pm
  Mr. Maclean: You will recall, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that, as you were taking the Chair, I was beginning my introduction to the amendments. We have dealt with important private Bills in the past two hours, but, as I said earlier, if we had not had the Government statement today, I am sure that we could have polished off the important business of the Royal Parks (Trading) Bill before the private business commenced at 7 o'clock.
  Amendment No. 6 would delete clauses 4 and 5. I stressed that I did not intend to press that amendment to a Division because I suspect that, as the Bill is constructed, those two clauses may be essential to the panoply of penalties that the Minister wants. Nevertheless, in order to explore whether the seizure of property was necessary, and some of the rules incorporated in clause 5 on retention and disposal, the best parliamentary device available is to suggest deletion of the clauses, and to let the Minister persuade the House that it is essential to retain them.
  Clause 4 allows a park constable who reasonably suspects that a person has committed one of the park trading offences to seize property of a non-perishable nature. There are a couple of points on which the Minister must comment.
  The first point is the nature of these park trading offences. The Minister was expansive in his earlier replies to the amendments proposed by my right hon. and erudite Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst and myself, but he did not say what he envisaged would be the park trading offences in future. It may be more appropriate, and I hope entirely in order, if, in discussing the deletion of clause 4, I pressed the Minister to explain to the House which offences he envisages will be designated as park trading offences in future.
  I quoted to the House from regulation 4 of the Royal Parks and Other Open Spaces Regulations 1997, which listed a series of offences that may take place in the royal parks. Those offences include stepping on the shrubbery, stepping on the flower beds and playing music. One offence, specified in paragraph (6), is trading in a royal park and selling goods and services. When the Minister makes regulations on park trading offences and designates certain offences, I anticipate that regulation 4(6) of the 1997 regulations will be lifted entirely or redrafted.
  I mentioned that the 1997 regulations specified other offences, such as taking photographs for commercial purposes. If that were designated as a park trading offence, there is a possibility that colleagues who go across to the royal park opposite Millbank studios and have their photographs taken by the BBC and other august organs of the state—or even less august organs of the state than the BBC—may be committing an offence and subject to a £1,000 penalty.
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  Other activities in royal parks, such as displaying posters, advertising the millennium dome, displaying billboards, or putting on reviews, shows or theatrical events, could be a trading offence if done for commercial purposes.
  We understand from what the Minister said earlier and from what we read in the London local rag that the main thrust of the Bill is to deal with the hamburger and hot-dog sellers. I well understand that 99 per cent. of the action is directed against those who are selling those foods in parks. That seems to be where the bulk of the offence is committed and what the bulk of the trade is. However, it would be helpful if the Minister would say whether other items that are listed in the regulations are being sold, illegally and without a licence, in the royal parks. In what other commercial activities do people indulge without a licence, under the third of the 1997 regulations? Will the Minister list what he envisages will be the future park trading offences that he wishes to create under the Bill?
  My second point has to do with the seizure of non-perishable items. Hamburgers, hot dogs and chestnuts are all sold in our royal parks. One cold December day, I enjoyed some hot chestnuts that I had purchased in Westminster gardens on my way to the House. I had no idea that I was aiding and abetting a serious criminal offence, or that I was buying the local Mafia's nuts. I can understand why park constables should be empowered to confiscate the carts or barrows of the people who sell such commodities, and that those constables would not want to have to deal with a great many hot dogs, hamburgers and fried onions.
  However, the little wheeled carts or barrows used by food sellers in parks are often red hot, thanks to the fire that burns inside them. They also contain red-hot fat in which to cook the items, and any park constable who tries to seize such a cart clearly risks injury—to himself and to others. However, clause 4 makes it clear that the Government do not want park constables to take the edible material—cooked chestnuts, half-cooked hamburgers and hot dogs, fried onions and fat—when they seize the barrow and the rest of the equipment.
  In those circumstances, what are the park constables to do? I do not want to be facetious, but to make a genuine little point.
  Mr. Forth: I think that my right hon. Friend makes a genuinely big point. In Standing Committee, the Minister was asked a similar question, to which he replied:
  The Royal Parks Constabulary will follow the same procedures as City of Westminster council officials, who offer the unlicensed trader the opportunity to take the perishable goods away. Almost all traders accept that invitation—[Official Report, Standing Committee G, 21 March 2000; c. 9.]
  In other words, there is no answer to the question, according to the Minister's response in Standing Committee. Thank goodness, therefore, that we can do the job properly on Report today. I hope that my right hon. Friend will press the Minister hard for a satisfactory answer now.
  Mr. Maclean: I have been stirred up by my right hon. Friend on a point that I may, negligently, have glossed over as minor. The mind boggles when one tries to imagine how traders take their goods away. This morning,

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  I tried to purchase—for academic and scientific reasons—a hot dog and/or a hamburger from the two chaps at the House of Lords end of Westminster gardens.
  Mr. Forth: Without onions?
  Mr. Maclean: No; they smelt rather good. The two men were selling their goods when I passed at 10 o'clock this morning. It would be out of order to comment on the quality—we have already discussed the smell and whether the stink may be objectionable to local people. Clause 4 gives park constables the right to take the equipment: the barrow, or sort of stainless steel and aluminium cart that the chap at the House of Lords end had this morning. He looked as if he was in his 90s—I cannot imagine that he was a Mafia person. I am not trying to make an ageist remark—I hope that, if the Government set up a commission for age equality, it will not prosecute me.
  The old boy who was selling hamburgers and hot dogs at the House of Lords end this morning had a large bag of unpeeled onions and a large bag of sesame seed rolls. As I passed, he had a fry-up on the go. It smelt rather good at 10 o'clock. The hot dogs, the hamburgers and the onions were on the griddle. If the park constable had arrived and used his powers under clause 4 to seize anything of a non-perishable nature, he would have taken the aluminium cart and barrow, but he would not have been empowered legally to take the bag of unpeeled onions or the bag of sesame seed rolls. Doubtless, the seller could return those. What on earth would the constable do with the food that was sizzling away on the griddle, ready for the tourists to eat?
  Mr. Forth: Perhaps the answer is to include a grandfather clause in the Bill.
  Mr. Maclean: I am one of the few hon. Members who, many years ago, passed their articulated truck driving qualification. I believe it was called the national certificate of competence in road traffic management—those are the correct words, but they are not necessarily in the correct order. Doubtless those in the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions could advise. Having done the qualification, I should be better able to advise my right hon. Friend. However, I had better not go down that route.
  It may appear that I have been slightly facetious, but there is a genuine problem, which the Bill does not address. I hope that the Minister will deal with it in his reply. Parks police will have to devise extra legal measures to deal with the problem. The Government have given them no help in the Bill. I shall not vote against the clause, but the Government will give the police powers to seize non-perishable goods but no powers to deal with perishable goods, which constitute 99 per cent. of the problem, given that the food sellers cause the main difficulty. What will happen to them?
  Clause 5 states:
  The Secretary of State may retain anything which has been seized under section 4 until the end of the period of 28 days beginning with the date of the seizure.
  Subsection (3) applies where before the end of that period an information for a park trading offence is laid.
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  Subsection (3) allows the Secretary of State to "retain the thing"—or things—until the court case is over. If an award is made, the Secretary of State can hang on to "the thing seized" until the costs have been paid.
  The clause uses standard forfeiture terms that may appear in other legislation. The fact that the parks constables have seized the items and the Secretary of State has hung on to them means that their value instantly diminishes. If the person buys the goods new, they become second hand as soon as he uses them. By the time that they have been confiscated by the parks police, they are third hand. The value declines immeasurably. The retention and disposal provisions make it impossible for the Secretary of State to get a fair price for the goods.
  Perhaps that is part of the penalty. If the Government say that it is, I have no qualms about it. Part of the penalty that we parliamentarians are building into the legislation is that a parks constable may seize the cart, the barrow, the brazier, and all the rest of the stuff, which are perhaps worth £500. However, the second that they are seized by an organ of the state and are sold off at a warrant sale or a disposal of surplus Government junk and property, they are worth only a tenner—that seems to be standard practice. Are we saying that we are happy with that and that it is another penalty that the person has to suffer when his goods are confiscated? He has not a hope in Hades of getting anything like the real value or a fair market value. With Government sales of surplus property and surplus equipment, or at sales at Waterloo station of all the equipment that people leave on trains, including umbrellas and wooden legs, one gets a fantastic bargain. People do not like going to such a sale because things have been handed in or they may have been stolen and, although they are dirt cheap, it is all awful and tacky.
  If the Government confiscate the property, when it is sold on behalf of the people who have committed the offence, the Government will get nothing like its real value—the people from whom it has been confiscated will get nothing like its value.
  If that is the case, let us be honest with the House. Then we will know that we are passing yet another sanction. We dealt with the fines in clause 2. Another part of the penalty will be the fact that the goods will be sold for a song and people will have to suffer that penalty as well.
  Mr. Christopher Gill: My right hon. Friend will doubtless have seen recent press reports that suggest that bailiffs should no longer sell off the goods and chattels of people who have committed some offence. The argument is that the goods and chattels have so little value nowadays that it is not worth the effort of seizing them. Does he agree that, if the equipment that is be seized under the Bill is re-sold—as he said, it will have a low value—it is likely to be sold back to the same sort of people who are committing the offences in the first place?
  Mr. Maclean: My hon. Friend makes a good point. I was concluding my remarks on the amendment and I was about to mention bailiffs and warrant sales. It is a fact that, if one is unfortunate enough not to have paid one's bills and bailiffs seize one's property, one never gets anything like its real value. That is a good allusion to what may happen under this clause. One may purchase a new television for £300 today, but the second that one takes it out of the shop, it is second-hand. If the bailiffs seize it tomorrow, they may get £50 for it, if they are lucky.

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  The same is true of the hamburger stalls, although they may be of greater value to the sort of people who are in the business than to my hon. Friend and me, who do not want to purchase a hamburger stall, or to the general public. The specialists who trade in the business may pay slightly more for them. I do not think that the Government would want to sell them back to the sort of people from whom they confiscated them, unless those people had got a licence in the meantime.
  The main amendment in the group is No. 28, which would provide that the constable ensured that there were facilities for the safe removal from the park of perishable material by the person in possession or control. I will not again discuss the problem of the burgers, the sausage rolls and what one does when someone takes the trolley that they are on but not them.
  Amendment No. 28 suggests a solution to the Government. If they are going to give the park constables the powers under clause 4 to seize the fellow's cart and barrow, under my amendment they must stipulate that the park constables and police must have facilities for the safe removal of the perishable materials. If the hamburger seller usually takes away his stuff when the police tell him to move on, he will want to take it with him. For example, the sack of unpeeled onions that I saw this morning must have been worth a few pounds. The seller would want to take it with him—no problem. He would want to take his buns with him, but I bet that he would not take his semi-cooked hot dogs and half-fried onions with him. That would not make sense. So what will happen to them?
  The royal parks are meticulously kept. It was a tragedy to see the damage in the park at Millbank after the millennium celebrations. The garbage left behind was appalling. I felt sorry for the park staff as they tried for days to clear up. Nevertheless, Mr. Haselhurst—I mean, Sir Alan—Mr. Deputy Speaker—there have been so many occupants of the Chair tonight—
  9.30 pm
  Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. That is one of the quickest promotions that I have ever received.
  Mr. Maclean: It is well deserved, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
  I will not discuss further the problem of garbage in the park after the millennium celebrations. However, such problems could be increased, if the park constable exercised his powers under subsection (1) of the clause and had to dispose of the material. He cannot take it with him, because he is not empowered to remove non-perishables. He would probably not want to touch them; they could be dangerous or a health hazard—discuss that matter later. The person from whom he has removed the property would not want it. Those apparent Mafia types are hardly likely to want to put their semi-fried onions into a poly bag to take them away—they will just chuck them into the bushes. They will dispose of them in the easiest possible way. If their non-perishable equipment has been confiscated, they will dump the semi-cooked burgers and hot dogs.
  We need to ensure that, when a constable exercises such powers, he brings with him a bucket or a dustbin or insists that there is some facility for getting rid of the
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  perishable material that the person conducting the illegal or criminal activities is ready to dump in the park. My amendment states that the constable
  shall give to the person having possession or control—
  of the thing or things to be seized—
  a document, in an appropriate language, setting out the reasons for the seizure, itemising the things seized and informing the person of his rights and liabilities under section 5.
  My rough attempt at a model schedule sets out what the person whose property has been confiscated should be told. Some colleagues may have found some parts of that schedule amusing, because I listed the languages that are used by many of those sellers—or so I am informed. It has been pointed out that many people engaged in such activities were of eastern European origin—some were asylum seekers. Under normal police rules and PACE, when people are taken to police stations and charged, the normal procedure is for interpreters to be employed and for people to be informed in their own language of their rights, duties and obligations and of the reasons for the charge.
  That is a fundamental principle; it would be a breach of the convention on human rights to take people who are not English to a police station and charge them in English when they do not have a clue about what is going on. The police are under an obligation to make sure that such people understand.
  The Minister, with all his excellent advisers, may tell me that my schedule is not perfect or inappropriate—it may contain too many languages. I may have the wrong languages; it might be condensed or improved. However, it is a rough attempt to say that a person arrested in a park who has his property seized should be told what is happening in a language that he understands. I have included English, French and Spanish and many eastern European languages, which the Library of the House of Commons kindly provided for me. I shall not go through them.
  Mr. Forth: Why not?
  Mr. Maclean: The new schedule speaks for itself. I offer it merely as guidance for the Minister and hope that he will accept the concept in principle and tidy up the details later. The other place, which is, of course, much closer to the illegal hamburger sellers than we are, may wish to concentrate on refining the schedule.
  The new schedule also provides that the person should be given the reasons for seizure, which is common practice, for example, when a health and safety at work notice is issued warning someone of a prohibition, or when an inspector sets out reasons in an improvement notice. In this case, the reasons for seizure should be set out so that the person involved may take them to his lawyer, or whoever.
  There should also be a list of the items seized. There is nothing fancy or posh about that; it is a simple form of receipt, which will protect the park constable. If the people involved have criminal links with organised crime, the next new racket will be suing the parks constables for the equipment that they have confiscated. It is a source of distress and annoyance to me that one of the best rackets going is suing the Metropolitan police for no good reason. People who trip over pavements sue the Met. I can see people getting into the same racket with claims that the

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  police have confiscated equipment worth tens of thousands of pounds. The parks police will have to spend a fortune defending the allegation and proving that they were right. A receipt would provide protection for the constabulary.
  Finally, my model new schedule, to which the Minister or other hon. Members may wish to add, suggests that the person should be told his rights and liabilities. The Minister may say that they are set out in the Bill and that the person could read clause 5 or clause 6. However, when police officers stop and search someone, they tell the person that he has been stopped and will be searched and they give him his rights and liabilities under the PACE rules.
  I have tried to replicate that so that a person will be told all his rights—I hope that I have listed all of them, but I may not have. The person will be told that the Secretary of State may hang on to his barrow and trolley until court proceedings are finished. He will be told that the Secretary of State can sell them off and keep the proceeds until costs are paid, and will then return the remainder, if there is one. He will be told that the court may hang on to his goods and that they may be forfeited or destroyed if he is found guilty. He will be told that he has the right to make representations to the court before the court decides how to dispose of his goods.
  Mr. Owen Paterson: My right hon. Friend has taken advice from the Library on the relevant languages. Why did he miss out German and Italian? There are significant German minorities in eastern Europe, and many poorer people from the Mezzogiorno in southern Italy try to come to the UK.
  Mr. Maclean: That is a good point. I deliberately missed out languages that I thought were not used by those involved. Perhaps not many English people are involved, but it is a common language, and a parks constable must serve a notice in English when he arrests anyone. I included the languages of people who, I had heard or read or been instructed, might be involved in the activity. I was not aware of many Italians or Germans being involved. It may be best simply to have a schedule of the main United Nations languages: English, French, Spanish, German—American is not a United Nations language, is it?—and some of the main Indian or eastern European languages.
  Dr. Jenny Tonge: Esperanto?
  Mr. Maclean: I respect those who participate in Esperanto and recently attended a national conference on it in my constituency, but I did not think it appropriate to the new schedule.
  I was speaking about the part of amendment No. 28 that deals with the proposed new schedule. I consider amendment No. 28 to be terribly important, and I hope that the Minister will be able to reassure me that he will accept some of it in spirit or in context.
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  The final part of amendment No. 28 relates to the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 1988. Under proposed subsection (4)(c), the constable
  should not remove any article until he has performed an assessment under the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations that the removal of the thing or things would not create hazard for his or others' health and safety.
  This is a slightly different point from disposing of obnoxious hamburgers. Disposal of the hamburgers into the bushes may cause an environmental hazard. If the constable grabbed the red-hot chestnuts and the burning brazier, he would injure himself. I refer not to the burning Brazier from Canterbury—my hon. Friend the Member for Canterbury (Mr. Brazier)—but the burning brazier containing charcoal and chestnuts.
  Park constables will be expected to take such articles. Apart from obvious things such as hot fat and burning charcoal, there will be heavy trolleys which may be of an odd construction. Some of the barrows may be built of steel and various contraptions on them may be dangerous to the health of someone who does not know how the barrow is constructed. If the constable takes possession of a mobile cart, which has a steel frame and is covered by a parasol, and he does not know how to collapse that parasol, fold the barrow, load it on to his parks' department vehicle, he could suffer a serious back injury or other injury.
  The amendment suggests that, in those circumstances, before the park constable and the police take possession of these contraptions, they perform a quick assessment that doing so will not injure their health and safety or the health and safety of others who may have to do so. The amendment refers to performing an assessment, but I think that in reality it would be a checklist—a simple page of A4, with a list of items that the park constable can run through and tick off. If he is then satisfied that he can confiscate the red-hot chestnut trolley with the burning charcoal brazier with no risk to his health or that of others, he can carry on.
  The Minister may pooh-pooh this idea, or say that it is not necessary to include it in the law. I am not a betting man, and one should not, in any case, lay a bet on the Floor of the House of Commons. However, I am willing to bet that, when the Bill becomes an Act and the police have to operate its provisions, they will perform a COSHH assessment before carrying out any of the requirements specified. The requirement to perform health and safety assessments before making any police decisions bogs down the rest of the civil constabulary. It will take only one bobby or one park constable to be injured for a claim for £500,000 to be made, and then the Department will have to ensure that these actions are carried out safely.
  Amendment No. 28 is my main area of concern. I will not speak to amendment No. 7. It makes sense to me, but it would make sense to others only if various other amendments were grouped with it. As those other amendments have not been selected for debate, I do not wish to speak to it.
  I hope that the Minister can reassure me that clauses 4 and 5 are essential, tell us more about what park trading offences he envisages being designated, deal with the problem of perishable goods, mention COSHH and say what facilities there will be for the safe removal of perishable materials. I hope that he will also be able to

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  reassure me that there will be procedures for telling these people—who apparently include many asylum seekers and foreign nationals—in their own language, whatever that may be, about their rights, obligations and duties.
  9.45 pm
  Mr. Forth: I want to reinforce some of the remarks of my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean), and then cover some other points. I share my right hon. Friend's anxiety about a lacuna in the Bill as drafted. In Committee, my right hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Mr. Brooke) said:
  It would be helpful if the Minister could give a more graphic account of what will happen to perishable goods.
  That is the thrust of what my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border has said. I confess that I posed a trick question to my right hon. Friend earlier, because I quoted the first part of the Minister's reply. The Minister said:
  The Royal Parks Constabulary will follow the same procedures as City of Westminster council officials, who offer the unlicensed trader the opportunity to take the perishable goods away.
  That concerns the man with the hot nuts who is running off in the opposite direction. In fairness to the Minister, he went on to say:
  The trader is asked to sign a form acknowledging that he is either taking or refusing to take the perishables, whichever applies.
  We now have some documentation entering the scene, although none of that is in the Bill. He went on:
  If he refuses to take them, it is on the understanding that they will be destroyed by the enforcing authority to protect environmental health and the general amenity of the surroundings.—[Official Report, Standing Committee G, 21 March 2000; c. 8–9.]
  That raises more questions and, at best, is a partial answer to the problem. Never mind that the trader is being offered options, or that documents are being filled in, seemingly on the spot; it raises the question as to how or when the goods will be destroyed by the enforcing authority. So we have a Mafia man with his cart in the middle of a royal park, peddling hot dogs and hamburgers. His collar is felt by the constable, and documents are then filled out in the middle of the park. Then, the enforcing authority appears mysteriously to take away the offending items. That does not sound right to me, and we will have to hear more from the Minister. That is not a credible sequence of events, but it is all we have on record from the Minister in the 35 minutes of the Committee.
  I am not happy with the proposal, which is why I am attracted by amendment No. 28. The amendment proposes that when the park constable is exercising his powers, he must ensure that he provides facilities for the safe removal from the park of the perishable materials. That is an explicit requirement, which, at the moment, I cannot find in the Bill, and which we are being asked to take on trust.
  Mr. Swayne: I am concerned by the use of the word "safe". What are the hazards consequent upon hot nuts, either environmental or otherwise?
  Mr. Forth: My hon. Friend knows about the hazards because my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border explained them. We are talking about the definition of heated items. We are talking about heated hamburgers, heated hot dogs and hot fat. Those are all
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  perishable and potentially dangerous. They are a hazard to health and a danger to whoever handles them. That is where the COSHH regulations arise, which were correctly mentioned by my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border under amendment No. 28.
  I recall dealing with this in the past when I had certain responsibilities for the Health and Safety Executive. There is an attempt under the regulations to try to ensure that in the workplace—ironically, this is a workplace of sorts—we do whatever we can to ensure that unnecessary hazards are not met. There could be a hazard for the Mafia man, with whom we are becoming familiar—or even fond—the officer and any members of the public in the vicinity. Let us not forget that this is a public area. We have a responsibility to ensure that, as far as possible, all those people are protected. That is why I support my right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border. Enough of that.
  My amendment No. 22 seeks to strengthen the Bill. I thought that there was a risk that the drafting of clause 5(2)(b) may be unduly restrictive. Subsection (2) says:
  Subsection (3) applies where before the end of that period an information for a park trading offence is laid—

  (a) against the person from whom the thing was seized, and

  (b) in respect of his activities at the time of the seizure.

  It occurred to me that the words,
  at the time of the seizure
  may be unnecessarily and unfortunately restrictive.
  My amendment seeks to insert the words "or before". It occurred to me that a narrow interpretation of the current drafting could unnecessarily restrict the powers available to the precise moment of seizure. To be more effective, the subsection needs to be broadened to encompass activities that may have occurred before or just before the time of seizure. I am trying to be helpful. I have identified what I believe is unduly restrictive wording and I hope that the Minister can reassure us or, who knows, accept this modest but helpful amendment.
  Amendments Nos. 23, 24 and 25 touch on what I believe is an important area. Throughout the Bill we are talking, necessarily, about a tension or conflict between the understandable desire of the authorities and the House to deal with what everybody perceives to be antisocial, unpleasant and unfortunate while also dealing with individuals who have rights, who are attempting to run a business and who own property in the form of perishable or non-perishable materials.
  The Bill introduces some draconian powers. Indeed, clause 4 is entitled "Seizure of property" and clause 5 is entitled "Retention and disposal". One of the main arguments in favour of the Bill—it is argued by the Minister—is that, in addition to mere fines, which were discussed earlier, the ability to seize or confiscate property will be one of the most potent new weapons available to the authorities.
  Given all that, and accepting the thrust and the principle of the Bill, what bothers me is that we must make sure that we strike the appropriate balance between our desire to do all the necessary seizing, confiscating, punishing and stopping of illegal trading while considering the proper rights of the individual. We live in an age where we are sensitive, perhaps overly so, about the powers of the police and the possibility of giving them more.

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  I bet that, in a different context, the Chamber would be full of people frothing at the mouth at the suggestion that we should give the police any more powers, yet the Bill gives the police considerable extra powers and there is little frothing. I am puzzled as to why such powers should be given almost casually in this case, when in other circumstances there would be widespread concerns.
  My modest amendments are an attempt to strike a proper balance between the increase in powers and the rights of individuals, by putting reasonable time limits on the process, so that if someone is deprived of his livelihood and it turns out, after rapid due process, to have been an injustice, he will at least be deprived of it for only a minimum, reasonable time. We all know that the wheels of justice tend to grind somewhat slowly. If such draconian powers are introduced, some innocent individuals may be deprived of their livelihood almost indefinitely, or at least for too long.
  Mr. Swayne: Under some of the amendments, including No. 28, for which I know my right hon. Friend is not personally responsible, the police may actually lack powers. I am not persuaded of the hazardous nature of many of these comestibles—they are for consumption—but if we accept the force of the amendment, that they are hazards, under proposed new subsection (4)(c) they are not to be removed; they are to stay in the park. What agency is to remove them thereafter?
  Mr. Forth: That thought is even less palatable—if I may use that word—than what we had before. My hon. Friend illustrates the alarming element of doubt in everyone's mind about what is to happen to these hot, unpleasant perishables when the cart has been seized. Are they left in the park? Are they taken away, and by whom?
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  Where are they put as a matter of safety? The Minister may have satisfied the Committee—it went so quickly that nobody would have noticed whether he did—but he has not yet satisfied us. We are now properly fulfilling our role on Report, and he will have the time carefully and comprehensively to answer our questions.
  I tabled my amendments to raise those questions and to probe. I hope that we will get full answers, because I am very attracted by amendment No. 28, which contains much that is valuable and would strengthen the Bill. We will listen very carefully to the Minister's response before deciding how far to proceed. If necessary—if we are not satisfied—my right hon. Friend may want to press amendment No. 28 to a vote.
  Mr. Chope: I support amendment No. 6. My right hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Mr. Maclean) said that it was designed to probe. My worry is that clauses 4 and 5, which it would delete, might have unintended consequences—not an unusual effect for the legislation that we discuss.
  The rationale for the Bill is succinctly expressed by a source at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, as reported in The Daily Telegraph on 4 February. He said:
  The Royal Parks should be a showcase for Britain. They should not be ruined by a dodgy geezer selling a burger on a dirty old trolley.
  Clauses 4 and 5 could mean that there are more people selling burgers on dirty old trolleys than on clean new ones. Those who sell such goods should, in the interests of public hygiene, have equipment to refrigerate the uncooked goods, separate cooked and uncooked meats and ensure that the cooking is done to an adequate temperature to kill the vile bugs that the Food Standards Agency—
  It being Ten o'clock, the debate stood adjourned.
  Debate to be resumed tomorrow.

  Manufacturing Industry
  Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Dowd.]
  10 pm
  Mr. Laurence Robertson: During this Adjournment debate, which I am pleased to have secured, I hope to talk about matters equally as interesting as hamburgers, of which I am a great eater. I thank the Minister for attending, especially as manufacturing industry was discussed at length yesterday. I shall try not to repeat any of those remarks.
  I have initiated the debate because I have a manufacturing background, although I have no interest to declare these days. However, I have worked for about 80 different companies as a consultant. Most were manufacturing companies and a lot were in the textile industry. I want to consider the background to manufacturing, discuss the problems that the industry faces and perhaps touch on a couple of local issues that affect my constituency.
  Since the industrial revolution, the wealth of this country and individual prosperity have increased greatly because of developments in manufacturing such as automation and mechanisation. It is relatively difficult to improve the productivity of a restaurant or of service industries, but increased wealth can be achieved by improving manufactured goods industries and through the world trade that that facilitates. Service industries are not easily traded internationally, but it is relatively easy to trade manufactured goods, although it is crucial to be efficient in world terms. In other words, better manufacturing performance makes goods relatively cheaper and makes us all better off. That is the battleground and, therefore, that is where we must concentrate.
  Manufactured goods also represent about 63 per cent. of our exports, so they are extremely important in terms of national earnings and the relative wealth that is created for the people of this country. However, I am concerned by some manufacturing industry statistics which suggest relative decline. Indeed, some are startling. The manufacturing industries employed 8.3 million people in 1950, and that figure remained relatively stable for about 20 years. Today, they employ only 4 million. To put that into perspective, manufacturing employed about 41 per cent. of the work force in 1950. I do not want to be party political, but the Government have said that 160,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost since the election and the percentage of those working in manufacturing has fallen from 18 to 16 per cent.
  There are other problems. Companies find it difficult to recruit school leavers, who find the computer, high-tech and financial services industries far more attractive. Many potential recruits have been lost over the past 20 years or so because at one stage employing young people became expensive. That mistake should not be repeated, and I shall return to that point.
  We have to accept that productivity increases and mechanisation have in part caused the decline in the number of people employed in manufacturing industry, and manufacturing's share of gross domestic product represents another depressing statistic. In 1950, manufacturing provided about 37 per cent. of GDP.
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  Today, that figure is 20 per cent. and falling. It would be easy to say that industrial workers have been very greedy. At times, that has been the case, but, using the same dates, in 1950, wages in manufacturing were about 104 per cent. of the average wage—slightly above average. Today, they are about 99 per cent., so it is not true that manufacturing workers have priced themselves out of work.
  Some of the decline that I have spoken of is relative. It is due to the growth in service industries. However, the demand for manufactured goods is on the increase. These days, many families do not have just one car. Quite a few have two, or sometimes even more. There are colour televisions not just in one room in a house, but sometimes in two, three or even four. Likewise, computers, mobile phones and pagers—mine is being a nuisance at the moment—are commonplace, so there is a great call for manufactured goods. There is a market for more and more goods. The saturation point with manufactured goods is much higher than that for the service industries.
  All that is borne out by the level of imports. Twenty years ago, manufacturing made up about 50 per cent. of all imports. Now, the figure has risen to 67 per cent. At the same time, although there has been greater demand for services domestically, the level of services imported has been static because it is more difficult to import services. Because of that, we are retaining service industry jobs but losing manufacturing industry jobs. However, it is manufacturing that creates the added valued. Manufacturing has not declined because there are no orders, or because no one wants manufactured goods—far from it. It has declined for other reasons.
  May I suggest several ways in which the Government might help manufacturing industry? First, it has been right to concentrate on the car and coal mining industries recently, but there are many other industries in the country—perhaps not high profile and perhaps a lot smaller, but they require recognition of what they contribute to GDP and, indeed, to the wealth of the nation. Thousands of jobs in, for example, the textile industry, my old industry, have been lost recently.
  Secondly, it is essential that instead of increasing taxes, the present Government—indeed, all Governments—should cut taxes. Taxes stifle enterprise, put up costs and drive jobs abroad. A particular example is petrol in the United Kingdom, which I understand starts off as the cheapest in Europe, but, when tax is added to it, ends up the dearest.
  Thirdly, some countries that are far less efficient than us are catching us up because they are less regulated. Again, many regulations that have been introduced by the Government, although well intentioned, will not help. Companies stopped employing and training youngsters, as I have said, because it became too expensive to do so, partly because of the wages councils that existed at that time. I would not want further regulation and burdens to cause industries to employ even fewer youngsters.
  Fourthly, it is important that we understand industry. It is extremely difficult to make things. Deadlines are tight and margins are low. The quality of manufactured goods, rightly, must be very high. Fifthly, we should ensure that European competition rules are not being broken by other countries on the continent when we try to comply with them so strictly. Sixthly, we should pursue policies that would enable interest rates to be reduced and, therefore,

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  the pound to fall in value, although it seems that the weakness of the euro as a currency will always be a problem—at least it will be for the foreseeable future.
  While I am on Europe, my final suggestion is that the Government should avoid economic and monetary union at all costs. We should be more competitive than Europe and not the same as Europe. If we are just the same as Europe as regards add-on costs for industry, employing people, tax, wages and everything else, why on earth should companies come to the periphery of Europe? They would build factories in the centre of Europe. We must be different from Europe and, indeed, better than Europe.
  I want to mention two local issues that are to do with manufacturing industry and of which I have given the Minister notice. A company in my constituency called Ultra Hydraulics has employed 252 people. It is owned by an American company—a joint venture between Commercial Intertech and its partner Parker Hannifin in Ohio. One of the partners has been systematically transferring work from Tewkesbury to Chemnitz in Germany, with the consequent loss of 252 jobs.
  The parent company blames sustained losses, the strength of the pound and the prevailing economic conditions in this country, but it also blames the incentives being offered to it by the German Government to relocate there. Will the Minister consider those incentives? Are they legal? I should like an assurance from her that she will look into the matter.
  My second point, on a slightly more positive note, concerns the A400M airbus project. I welcome the long-awaited decision to order 25 of those planes, should the project go ahead. British jobs—again, many jobs in my constituency—will depend on it, but they will also depend on fair competition rules. We need to ensure that any help that is afforded to companies in France particularly, but on the continent generally, is also available to companies here. British companies should not be disadvantaged in this respect. In the case of aerospace-type work in particular, the set-up costs are very high. Our Government should give at least as much help to our companies as, say, the French give theirs. The Minister must persuade the Europeans to follow suit and pledge to support the project. Otherwise, the project simply will not go ahead, and, obviously, jobs will be created and safeguarded only if it does go ahead.
  I am not asking for intervention or state control in manufacturing industry. The industry made itself great, and Government interference is often the problem rather than the solution; but Governments can create the right conditions, which I am asking this Government to do. I am looking for a recognition of the value of manufacturing to the economy and to our wealth generally. I am looking for an understanding of how hard it is to manufacture goods. So much can go wrong, and, as I have said, the margins are so slim, especially when some workers in the world are earning trifling amounts in wages and yet producing the same goods. I am looking for lower taxation and less burdensome regulation, and I am looking for a determination to make British manufacturing prevail again.
  10.12 pm
  The Minister for Small Business and E-Commerce (Ms Patricia Hewitt): I congratulate the hon. Member for Tewkesbury (Mr. Robertson) on securing a debate on an extremely important issue. It is important not just to his and, indeed, my constituents but to our country.
  As the hon. Gentleman readily acknowledged, we had a full debate on manufacturing industry only yesterday. In that debate, he referred to statistics, as did the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Mrs. Browning). Let me remind the hon. Gentleman that although 160,000 manufacturing jobs have indeed been lost since the election three years ago, that compares with an average loss of 140,000 manufacturing jobs a year under the Conservative Government whom he supported.
  Although some manufacturing jobs have indeed been lost over the past three years, for reasons that we well understand, total employment in our country is higher by more than 900,000. Nearly 1 million more people are employed now than have been employed since records began. We have a sound, proud record of rising employment and rapidly falling unemployment.
  We may not agree on the statistics, but I can at least agree with the hon. Gentleman about the importance of manufacturing industry. I am increasingly concerned about the tendency of much of the press and some commentators to talk of the new economy and the old economy. That is very misleading. Most of the time, such talk brings with it an implication not only that the new economy is all about dot.coms and the internet and all the very exciting stuff for which I have a certain responsibility as Minister for Small Business and E-Commerce, but that that is all the new economy consists of, and that the old economy—which is always associated with traditional manufacturing sectors—is somehow destined to decline and die. That is, of course, absolute rubbish.
  The new technologies—including, but not only, the information and communications technology underlying the internet—are transforming every sector of the economy. They are also transforming every part of the production process and almost all the goods and services that we buy. Therefore, a high-tech, science-based and modern manufacturing sector is just as much a part of the global, 21st century, knowledge-driven economy as the service sector, the dot.com companies and the rest of the so-called new economy.
  It is very important that we get that message across to City analysts, to the financial institutions that make investment decisions and to the public. I think that the hon. Gentleman and I might well agree on that point. However, I can assure him that there is no confusion at all within the Government about the importance of manufacturing industry. Moreover, as this is an Adjournment debate, I shall not dwell on the lamentable record of the previous Government, who killed off large parts of United Kingdom manufacturing industry in two disastrous recessions, in the early 1980s and in the early 1990s.
  The other thing that is happening under the impact particularly of information and communications technology is that the distinction between the manufacturing and the service sectors is becoming increasingly blurred. It is important that we understand that, too. In a modern luxury car, for example—as the

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  hon. Gentleman said, cars have been somewhat in the news recently—70 per cent. of the value comes from the design, styling and, above all, intelligence—the computing power and the communications power—that are embedded within it. Therefore, it is manufacturing, but it is also services.
  Let us consider the example of the internet, e-commerce and dot.com companies that have been so much the fashion recently. As the Minister responsible for e-commerce, I am constantly struck by the sheer volume of manufacturing industry that is required by the internet, the telecommunications and, increasingly, the converging sectors.
  Earlier today, I had the pleasure of going to Colt's new internet hosting centre. Colt is not only a rapidly growing British-based telecommunications company, but the first telecommunications company to be licensed after the telecommunications duopoly collapsed some years ago. What I saw there was bank upon bank and row upon row of intensely intelligent, expensive and highly engineered manufactured equipment which are the servers enabling the very secure hosting of websites and other services for Colt's hundreds—and, in future, undoubtedly many more—business clients. That type of facility is developing in many parts of London, which is one of the centres for electronic commerce, particularly in the European Union.
  All of that depends on high-tech manufacturing, and ever more of that high-tech manufacturing is being done in the United Kingdom. We are European and world leaders in many parts of the electronics and components industry, which is enormously important to our economic future, to employment and to the standard of living that we can offer our people. Therefore, there is certainly no misunderstanding or mistake on the Government's part about the importance of manufacturing and the need to ensure that the environment is right to get the investment in the high-tech, high-value-added and highly competitive manufacturing base of the future.
  The hon. Gentleman and I agree that it is not the proper role of a modern Government to run industry. However, it is the Government's responsibility to create an environment in which modern manufacturing and every other part of the economy can flourish. Our first and most important task as a Government was to create a stable economy—a stable macro-economic environment and an end to the cycle of boom and bust that has bedevilled the British economy not just for the past 20 years, but for the past 30 or 40 years.
  The economic cycle has been far more intense in the United Kingdom than in our competitor countries. We have had far higher upswings of unsustainable, inflationary, above-trend growth and far more severe and damaging recessions that plunged home owners into negative equity and businesses into bankruptcy. That was a disaster for manufacturing, for business generally and for long-term investment, because more than any other factor the cycle of boom and bust accounts for the fact that long-term investment in productive capacity in our country has been so much lower than it has been in Germany or the USA, with the result that we face a severe productivity gap. One can argue about the numbers and the different ways of measurement, but one cannot argue about the reality of the productivity gap between us and France, Japan and the USA. That holds us back.
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  Our first task was to secure economic stability and our first decision was to take the politics out of interest rates by giving the Bank of England independence to set them. As a result, we have not only got inflation down and kept it down, but we have the lowest long-term—and, indeed, short-term—interest rates that we have had for a long time, with no prospect in this or, I think, the next economic cycle of returning to the appalling situation that we had under the previous Government, when interest rates were above 10 per cent. for four years on end, peaking at 15 per cent. I remember only too well the pain and devastation that that caused to home owners and businesses alike.
  We are making decisions for the long term and building for long-term economic stability. We are not going to put that long-term stability at risk by trying to provide short-term fixes. As my right hon. Friend the Chancellor said last week, we well understand that the exchange rate between sterling and the euro does not reflect any sensible view of long-term economic fundamentals. We readily acknowledge that that rate creates real difficulties for any company seeking to export into the eurozone. That particularly affects manufacturing.
  However, that does not mean that we should seek an artificial devaluation of the currency. It is worth remembering that against the dollar, the pound has been remarkably stable for the past four years. The suggestion that sterling is fundamentally overvalued does not hold water. The problem clearly has much more to do with the weakness of the euro. The hon. Gentleman expressed his view and that of a large part of the Conservative party about the euro, but one reason for our commitment in principle to joining a successful single currency if the economic conditions are met is that it would eliminate the exchange rate instability that has been so damaging and that has created such difficult conditions for manufacturing industry and other exporters.
  Mr. Robertson: Does the Minister recognise that the two recessions that she referred to—those in 1988 and 1991—were caused by the Conservative Government trying to skew the economy to keep the pound at artificial levels? The problem is not the fluctuation of the exchange rate, but that sterling is at too high a level. Locking sterling into the single currency would mean that that situation existed for ever, rather than just for a brief time, as was the case under the exchange rate mechanism.
  Ms Hewitt: I said that we wanted to join a successful single currency if and when the five economic conditions were met. I have no doubt that the hon. Gentleman will be familiar with the economic conditions that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor has laid down, but I readily remind him that we would have to be satisfied that convergence between our economy and that of the eurozone countries had been achieved on a lasting basis, not on a temporary basis, and that membership of a successful single currency would be good for jobs, business and the City. Clearly, that would not have been the case had we joined last year, or indeed if we were to join this year, and that is why we are not joining.

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  I stress that we are not about to engineer an artificial devaluation of the currency against the euro. We are not about to try some short-term fix that might or might not produce short-term gain but would undoubtedly put at risk long-term economic stability and would throw away the prize that we have secured of departing from the long-term post-war record of boom and bust that is at the heart of the economic problems from which we have suffered.
  The hon. Gentleman referred to the recessions under the Conservative Government, and I am glad that he was willing to acknowledge their mistakes. There is no doubt at all that the policy of the former Chancellor, Nigel Lawson, in trying to pursue an inflation target and an exchange rate target through the shadowing of the deutschmark, was absolutely fatal. Some right hon. and hon. Members—notably those on the Liberal Benches—would have us repeat that mistake and that would not be at all sensible.
  The hon. Gentleman referred to two local issues. I was extremely sorry to hear of the loss of 250 jobs that would result from the closure of Ultra Hydraulics. I understand that the hon. Gentleman wrote to my hon. Friend the Minister for Competitiveness in April. When I checked up on that, I found that my hon. Friend and his office have absolutely no record of having received that letter, but of course the hon. Gentleman will now receive a reply. After an initial glance, we do not have enough information about the suggestion that the German Government may be offering state aid in breach of the European state aid rules to try to entice Chemnitz to relocate Ultra
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  Hydraulics to Germany. However, we shall readily explore the matter with the hon. Gentleman and if we can get chapter and verse we shall pursue the issue.
  Following the announcement of those redundancies, the Employment Service has granted large-scale redundancy status which means that rapid response funding has been approved so that workers made redundant from Ultra Hydraulics will be given additional fast-track help in job searches and, if it proves necessary, in retraining to secure new employment. I hope that that will be of real assistance to his constituents who are at risk of losing their jobs. Gloucestershire development agency has been in contact with the company to discuss the help that is available locally and through the regional development agency.
  Finally, I am pleased that the hon. Gentleman repeated his welcome for the announcement that we made on the award of the A400M airbus project. I know that it is a matter of great concern to him. Indeed, I know that he saw my noble Friend Baroness Symons back in March to discuss the project and was accompanied at that meeting by the managing director of Dowty Propellers and the marketing director of Ultra Electronics—both, I think, companies in his consituncy engaged in the development of that aircraft. Like him, I welcome the announcement by my right hon. Friend the Defence Secretary that the Ministry of Defence will procure missiles—
  The motion having been made at 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 half-past Ten o'clock.

Preamble
[MR. MICHAEL LORD in the Chair]

Health and Safety Executive
[Relevant documents: Fourth Report from the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee HC 31.]
Motion made, and Question proposed, That the sitting be now adjourned.—[Mr. Pope.]
9.30 am
Mr. Andrew F. Bennett: I am grateful for the opportunity to debate the work of the Health and Safety Executive, the report of the Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs and the Government's response to it. I wish to place on record my thanks to the specialist assistant who helped us a great deal when we prepared the report and to our advisers, Professor Malcolm Harrington and Graham Reid. I cannot deal with the whole report in a short debate, so I shall pick out one or two issues that need to be emphasised.
I refer first to the tripartite nature of the Health and Safety Commission. When it was set up in the 1970s, such a format made sense. Much of the evidence that the Select Committee received suggested that many changes had been made to industry and to work in general, and that perhaps a different format should be adopted. Having looked into the matter carefully, I believe that it would be a big mistake to change the format of the Health and Safety Commission. Many people do not belong to trade unions. How are they represented? There is an increasing number of small businesses in this country. How are they represented? The problem is that owners of small businesses spend so much time running them that they do not have time to make contacts with other small businesses and to be representative.
The same applies to people who are not in a trade union. They do not have a framework in which to participate. We want the tripartite system to work. We should encourage people to join trade unions and ensure that employers participate in employers' organisations. The arguments that were put to us reflect the changes in industry and employment in this country, but they do not necessitate a change to the Health and Safety Commission. Through working parties and others, the commission ensures that the whole spectrum of the working population is covered.
I make a small plea to individuals. I see many people at my advice bureau who have major problems. They need someone to represent them, so even if a person is not in a place of employment where there is a trade union, it is worth while joining a union merely for insurance purposes and to have a representative if things go wrong. The tripartite system should be encouraged and be made to work.
On the whole, the record in Britain of reducing accidents at work is good, although I am not absolutely certain that that is because of the huge success of the
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Health and Safety Executive, safety representatives and employers. The changing nature of work in this country lies behind much of the improvement. Once we get away from mining and quarrying and some of the other heavy industries in which accident rates are high, the number of accidents should reduce dramatically. Good employers, particularly those who have good health and safety representatives, have achieved a remarkable reduction in the number of accidents at work. The HSE must concentrate on a relatively small number of employers and workplaces where health and safety matters are not taken seriously. A great deal more pressure needs to be placed on such places of work.
Health and safety inspectors must follow up accidents much more vigorously than they have been doing, and they must visit places about which they receive complaints about safety issues at work. Statistics are available to show the contact that has been made. However, I suspect that on far too many occasions contact with a company merely constitutes someone ringing up and asking what happened, and if that person is half-satisfied as a result of that telephone call, he records it as a contact. That is not the same as visiting to investigate the circumstances. It is important that the inspectorate undertakes vigorous inspection and that senior inspectors carry the work load of inspections. They are not especially good at management, and it is important that they continue to be inspectors, rather than become managers.
One of the key issues is the level of prosecutions and fines. In cases involving some appalling incidents, the courts have been extremely lenient in imposing fines. It is important that the level of fines is increased, and that the courts impose them vigorously.
If the person involved in an accident at work cannot return to his job, it is important that health and safety inspectors visit and prepare a full report, because civil proceedings will almost certainly follow. It is important that the inspectorate and the person instituting civil proceedings co-operate, to ensure that some compensation is available for people who have suffered because of a poor safety regime at work.
The Government must tell us more about the measures that they intend to take to tackle corporate killing and to deal quickly with the small number of large companies that do not have a safety culture throughout their businesses. Companies' insurance premiums for safety at work should reflect the company's record much more than at present. At the moment, companies with good safety records may be subsidising through the insurance mechanism companies with much poorer records.
The message that I want to send as a result of this debate relates to a different issue. In the past, companies have been slow to respond to new problems. We are all good at solving yesterday's problem, but we must solve new problems. For a time, no one knew anything about problems such as the injuries sustained by people who worked with asbestos. It was therefore possible to say, "Very tragic, but we were not aware of the problem." Gradually, people became aware of the problem, and perhaps we were slow to act.
The major anxiety about health at work now relates to the problems that people suffer as a result of office work. The Health and Safety Executive must pay much

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more attention to problems such as repetitive wrist strain, which people may develop as a result of using a keyboard, sick building syndrome and, problems caused by laser printers and stress.
Much more effort must be put into those aspects, as well as keeping up with traditional areas of activity. In particular, we have a responsibility to consider how to get people back to work. I represent Stockport and Tameside, and when I was first elected in the 1970s, big companies had a firm culture. They did not want accidents at work to happen, but if one did, they felt that they had a responsibility to find a job for the person who had been injured when he was fit to return to work. Even if the person could not return to his previous job, work was found for him.
That was a fine culture. If a company felt that it had any responsibility for an employee's state of health, or if an accident had occurred and the employee had to take time off, it would find that employee a job to go back to. The problem for a lot of people who do office-based work is that, when they have been absent with stress or other job-related illnesses, it is extremely difficult for them to get back. I make a firm plea that, in considering their task, the Health and Safety Executive and the Health and Safety Commission should examine the new problems facing people in work, rather than concentrate solely on the old ones. They should work hard to reduce the problems of stress of work, and they should investigate sick building syndrome and the problems associated with laser printers and other such equipment.
I commend the report to the House and I commend the Government's response. However, although we are doing well in comparison with the rest of Europe at reducing accidents at work, people still suffer a great deal of misery from injuries and poor health at work. We need to do more to tackle that.
9.41 am
Mr. Hilary Benn: There is much to reflect on in the report. However, it is striking that the structure of the Health and Safety Commission has, broadly speaking, stood the test of time in the 26 years since it was established under the Health and Safety at Work, etc. Act 1974. That shows the benefits of regulation—if I may be controversial so early in the morning. For all the complaints that we hear about business being crushed by bureaucracy, it is worth remembering that the HSE exists to protect workers from being crushed by machinery—and so it has.
In the 26 years since the establishment of the commission, the number of people killed at work has decreased from about 2,000 a year to about 400, which is 400 too many deaths, but the reduction is welcome. Half that reduction may be attributed to the change in industrial structure, and the other half to the impact of better health and safety awareness. Not all regulation is bad, but bad employers make regulation necessary and, in some cases, we could do with more of it. Over the years, the public response to events such as Flixborough, Piper Alpha or the Southall railway disaster has told us that there are always lessons to learn and to be applied.
My next point follows on from the comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish (Mr. Bennett), and it relates to the changing nature of
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risk in the workplace, our perception of it and how best to address the health and safety question. He referred to the problem of asbestos, and there is currently a debate about the safety of mobile phones. Nobody knows what the long-term implications of those issues will be, but we need to be on guard and to monitor carefully the impact that new products have when they come on to the market.
My hon. Friend also referred to workplace stress. There is nothing new about that type of stress. Robert Owen went around factories in the 19th century and reported on the 14-hour days worked by children aged 10, and played a large part in bringing the first of the Factory Acts into being. We have recently developed a greater understanding and awareness of the problem of stress, partly because of the use of the law. That is another change to the way in which we treat health and safety issues. Court cases that have been brought on behalf of people suffering from stress in the workplace have made employers more aware of the duty of care that they owe to their employees, which is a change for the better. However, although the law provides a remedy in the form of a civil penalty inflicted on employers, it does not necessarily act as an incentive to them to change their practice. They may have an insurance policy that pays for the penalty, and their only cost will be in bad publicity.
Bad publicity can be a powerful weapon, however, because no one likes to be clamped in the stocks of public opinion. Increasingly, companies cannot afford to have a bad reputation. Therefore, I strongly welcome what the report says about publishing more information about firms that have breached health and safety legislation. I am in favour of naming and shaming as well as the tougher penalties that the Chairman of the Select Committee spoke of a moment ago. Publicity is part of the modern armoury for dealing with health and safety risk in the workplace, as is better information about those risks and how they need to be addressed.
In a sense, safety is a state of mind. We need to renew the crusade for that state of mind in the workplace a quarter of a century after the establishment of the Health and Safety at Work, etc Act 1974. Preventive visits play an important part in creating and maintaining that state of mind. I support what the report has to say about the issue. Everyone agrees that we want more investigation of accidents, but I hope that it will not be at the expense of preventive work.
My final point concerns the role that partnership has to play in ensuring health and safety in the workplace, in particular the role of trade unions. I should at this point declare the support that I receive from the Manufacturing, Science and Finance Union. The tripartite structure is another aspect of the 1974 Act that has stood the test of time. Last night Sir Clive Thompson was bemoaning the impact of regulation, but even the Confederation of British Industry describes the tripartite structure of the Health and Safety Commission as a success story.
That is no happenstance. Workplaces with union representatives and union safety committees have half the rate of accidents compared with workplaces where there is no consultation with workers. It is even more interesting that that benefit accrues not just in big companies, but in smaller companies where there is a trade union presence. That connection was spotted way

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back in 1937 by Sir Henry Walker, who was the chief inspector of mines. When he reported on the Gresford colliery disaster in which 265 men lost their lives, he said:
I hope that I am not exceeding my functions in saying now what I have held for many years, that miners should be members of some effective trades union. That opinion is based on the grounds of safety, with which I am alone concerned, for I believe that a well organised trades union, wisely directed, can be as potent an influence for promoting greater safety in mines as it is already in matters, for example, of wages and conditions of employment.
He was absolutely right.
Trade unions naturally have an interest in protecting their members, and they do an effective job under the civil remedy in gaining £300 million a year in compensation for those who have been injured at work. However, all hon. Members would acknowledge that it is one thing to have a right enshrined in law and another to be able to access it. The most important role that trade unions play as part of civil society is to help thousands of people each year to access their rights to health and safety.
Mr. Tim Loughton: The hon. Gentleman is making an interesting point about the role of the trade unions. They play a valuable role in many respects, but how would he explain the apparent anomaly in that the number of accidents is at a record low, albeit at a plateau, but trade union membership is also at a record low? Surely on his logic, as union membership has gone down, the propensity for accidents at work should have gone up.
Mr. Benn: No, that is not the case. Unionised workplaces are still much safer than non-unionised workplaces. I put that down to the greater health and safety awareness in our society since the Health and Safety at Work, etc Act 1974 and the establishment of the Health and Safety Commission. The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Mr. Loughton) anticipates the point that I was about to make.
Given the problems that we know exist in getting access to smaller workplaces to deal with health and safety, and given the cry we still hear from employers in those workplaces about what they perceive as the burden of regulation, we can do two things. The first was identified in the report: roving safety representatives should be able to visit workplaces where that union has members, even if they are not recognised, to report on health and safety conditions.
Secondly, I should like to see trade unions, which after all have a lot of expertise in the field of health and safety through their work in training health and safety representatives, offering their knowledge and their expertise as consultants to workplaces in which there may be no trade union members. If unions wanted to think innovatively about their role, they could offer employers help to ensure that they comply with legislation, advise on the systems needed and provide assistance in accessing information to ensure safer working conditions. Paragraph 85 of the report is about the possibility of giving small employers help with consultancy fees. Perhaps trade unions could offer to charge a moderate fee in return for such a service.
We have come a long way since the 1974 Act and the all-party consensus that led to it. Thanks to the work of the Health and Safety Commission, many more people are today free to work in safer workplaces. The price of that freedom is eternal vigilance.
9.50 am
Mr. Crispin Blunt: It is a pleasure to take part in my first debate on a report of the Select Committee on Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs, as I am now one of its members. I was not a member when it agreed the report, which was probably just as well, as I would have had some difficulty putting my name to it.
I want to put the unfashionable and difficult other side of the case about the Health and Safety Executive. When people properly point to deaths and serious injuries in the workplace, it is difficult to say that a balance must be struck between the regulation of industry, the function of the Health and Safety Executive and our duty as a nation to ensure that our industries are as safe as possible. Compared with other countries, the United Kingdom has an excellent health and safety record. The hon. Members for Denton and Reddish (Mr. Bennett) and for Leeds, Central (Mr. Benn) have drawn attention to the fact that the number of deaths at work has fallen from 2,000 to 400 since the Health and Safety Executive has been active.
The Pareto principle is that for 20 per cent. of the effort one can achieve 80 per cent. of the target, and that it becomes ever more onerous to bear down on the final part of the target. That applies to industry. Given that the level of industrial activity and production has increased considerably since 1974—I accept that the nature of industries has changed and that some of the more dangerous industries do not employ the same number of people as they did—it will still require an enormous effort to reduce the figure from 400. Bearing down on the final part of the target through regulation or another mechanism will have damaging effects, as regulation is a burden on employers and leads to wider burdens on industry and wealth creation potential as a whole.
Those considerations must be borne in mind. People will say that it is reckless to attack anything to do with safety, but if we want to make things wholly safe, we should stop production. That is the only way to guarantee achieving the 100 per cent. target.
My experience is of the armed forces, in which safety and training is important. However, if training were risk free, the British Army, the Royal Air Force and Royal Navy would not enjoy such high professional standards. It is because they train rigorously that we can put troops on the ground in Sierra Leone who are second to none in the world, and are now performing an immensely valuable role on behalf of not only the British citizens there, but the people of Sierra Leone. That is a result of a demanding training regime.
That experience relates to the armed forces, but there is a parallel with the industries of wealth creation on the question of where one draws the line between trying to prevent accidents at any price and trying to prevent them by sensibly regulating the workplace. I am not saying that there should be no safety regime; that would be madness. Everyone would want Army ranges, for example, to be thoroughly well-regulated and, safety officers properly briefed and the rest of it. Safety during simple range exercises is easy to control, but fire-and-manoeuvre exercises in places such as Salisbury plain or by the British Army training unit Suffield in Canada are a different matter. The more difficult and demanding the

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training, the more likely it is that people will be hurt or killed—as the low-level flight training of Royal Air Force fast-jet pilots has sadly shown.
I can draw only on my experience of the services. Some people will say that there is no parallel to industry, but I believe that there is. We must make a judgment about the sensible balance to strike.
Mr. Bennett: If the situation across the whole of industry were the same, I could accept the hon. Gentleman's case, but there are huge variations even between companies involved in the same activity. Some companies have done much better than others in reducing their accident rate to the 20 per cent. to which he referred. We surely need to bear down on companies whose record is poor. They are getting a competitive advantage because they are putting people's health and lives at risk.
Mr. Blunt: I agree with the hon. Gentleman. I shall outline my difficulties with the report. The hon. Member for Leeds, Central said that the Health and Safety Executive could take responsibility for half the reductions in deaths but the other half could be attributed to the change in the nature of the industry. I am not sure how one can allocate such neat percentages. The Chairman of the Select Committee concluded that the improvement was due simply to the change in the nature of industrial work. The Health and Safety Executive can surely take some credit, but the good record is also a reflection of both employers and employees being committed to good practice from the start and of the use of common sense. It is obviously in the interests of employers and employees for accidents in the workplace not to happen. As the Chairman of the Committee said, there will always be unscrupulous employers and irresponsible employees, and the Health and Safety Executive will have to step in. However, the report's call to put unlimited faith in prosecutions, fines and litigation may strike the wrong balance.
I agree with naming and shaming the worst offenders and bringing prosecutions where there has clearly been negligence and irresponsibility. No one would argue against that. However, if companies believed that the Health and Safety Executive, rather than a source of advice and preventive measures, represented only legal action against any and every mistake in the workplace, the spirit of co-operation and good practice that has helped produce the good record could be threatened and damaged.
The hon. Member for Denton and Reddish drew attention to the practice of large companies in the early 1970s: if an employee had been hurt in the workplace, they would try to find him alternative work, in the best paternalistic tradition of good employers. If we create a spirit of antagonism over safety, we will undermine the tradition of employers caring for their employees—which I believe still operates among the best employers. Indeed, it is increasingly seen to be in employers' interests properly to look after their own people. We are moving to a climate in which, particularly in the UK, people rather than capital are the employer's most important resource. If we accepted the Committee's recommendation, that self-evident common sense could be undermined.
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My greatest problem with the report is the Committee's wish to give additional powers to workplace safety representatives, including permission for those representatives to initiate prosecutions. I agree with the Confederation of British Industry, which is interested in facilitating the reporting by representatives or others of unsafe practices, but is worried that increasing formal powers
might promote antagonism between various parts of the company.
The Committee seems to have brushed such criticisms aside, not least those of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, which argues that such a move could allow employers to shirk their responsibilities, diluting the primary responsibility of line management. That is the danger.
In the Select Committee yesterday, we took evidence on biodiversity and the first witnesses wanted a biodiversity tsar—someone who is seen to be responsible and will take the lead. We all want someone to be seen to be in a leadership position to take responsibility, whereas in fact safety must be the responsibility of us all, particularly in the workplace. It must be the responsibility of both line management and employees. If safety is delegated or shoved off to a representative in the workplace, the ownership of the issue will to some extent be taken away from the rest of line management and other employees. I agree with RoSPA and the CBI that that would be a pity.
Health and safety has steadily improved in the United Kingdom, because the vast majority of employers and employees show a common-sense interest in voluntarily minimising risk and working safely in what the CBI pertinently describes as a "blame free culture". As always when people want to improve health and safety, no one can question the good intentions behind the Committee's report. However, there is a danger that co-operation could be replaced by antagonism and blame, which would not be in anyone's interest.
10.2 am
Mrs. Christine Butler: I cannot say that I agree with much of what the hon. Member for Reigate (Mr. Blunt) has just said. The precursor to much of what I have to say is the comment "mind the gap", because there are serious gaps in joint or co-operative working between local authorities, the Health and Safety Executive and the Environment Agency.
The Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee report has been worth while, and I much enjoyed my involvement in the Committee's work. In particular, I was greatly enlightened when I shadowed a health and safety inspector on his routine rounds in my constituency. I found that different standards apply to different sorts of works. For instance, we visited a waste transfer station, where the attitude towards health and safety was different from the far more stringent approach at a local school of 1,000 vulnerable young people. We went into much greater detail at the school. At the waste transfer station, working practices were constrained by other factors.
I return to my original point about the gaps. I have before me part of the memorandum submitted by the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, which says:

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HSE has close links with the Environment Agency in England and Wales and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA), not only because of the potential environmental implications of health and safety failures in work places that handle particularly hazardous or dangerous substances (eg chemicals), but more recently through the Control of Major Accident Hazards (COMAH) Regulations 1999. Under these Regulations, the HSE, Environment Agency and SEPA are jointly designated as the Competent Authority for authorising and inspecting safety arrangements at establishments covered by the COMAH Regulations.
Similarly, HSE has close links with local authorities as the latter have responsibility for the enforcement of health and safety legislation in shops, offices, distribution outlets, hotels, restaurants, residential care homes and leisure centres. The formal mechanism for this is the HSE/Local Authority Enforcement Liaison Committee (HELA), though much informal contact is at inspector level on a day-to-day basis. HSE provides guidance to local authorities on their enforcement function.
Part of the memorandum concerns land-use planning. The Committee did not dwell on that, but since the report's publication, huge concerns about it have arisen in my constituency. I know that the Minister cannot discuss specific examples, so I will refrain from using names, but I shall bring one or two matters to his attention. On land-use planning, the agency and the HSE
separately advise Local Planning Authorities (LPAs) on the possible impact of industrial developments on people and the environment. The Agency and the HSE recognise the need for liaison to resolve differences of view before comments are provided to LPAs.
Unfortunately, I have a problem with the HSE's powers. It has not yet been determined whether a planning application from my constituency will go to the Secretary of State. A company that deals in accident-damaged cars has applied to store those cars on a 25-acre site until the insurance has been settled, when they will be auctioned. When the local planning authority formally consulted the HSE, all aspects of the application had become retrospective, except for the auctioning. The HSE objected to the application, because the land for the proposed use was close to hazardous installations. The HSE had used its processes for risk assessment and deduced that the risk to the public from attending auctions would be too high. It advised against that and said that it would support the local authority if the application went to appeal. The HSE also said that if it were not satisfied that the local planning authority could enforce stricter conditions, it would allow 21 days for deliberation with the authority. If the HSE remained unhappy after that, it would recommend that the Secretary of State called in the application.
That is how the system is supposed to work. However, the local authority and the developer—the applicant—managed to produce conditions to satisfy the HSE in part and tried to remove the objections. The HSE tells me that the objections still stand, but that is a legal matter, because no permission will be granted until GO-East recommends that the Secretary of State call in the application, and he decides to do so, or there is a public inquiry, the outcome of which we would await. The application could also return to the local authority, which, by the way, is minded to give permission.
Such land use does not fall within the HSE's inspection remit. It is a matter for the local authority, because auctions are retail activities. It would have been
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the HSE's direct responsibility to inspect the site if it had been a breaker's yard. Hundreds of my constituents are worried, and through their elected representatives, who include members of an action group and people such as myself, have asked, "What is the matter with the Health and Safety Executive? Why can it not intervene?" The firm has not complied with conditions before, so why should it do so now? There is a great fear that the conditions will not be met or enforced. It is not for me to say whether that will be so, but the fear exists. The HSE will have no powers of intervention if the conditions are not met or enforcement is inadequate and the local planning authority cannot police matters. That is a grave concern. I seek the Minister's guidance on those points.
I turn to the inconsistencies that sometimes arise between the actions of the Environment Agency and the HSE. I can refer to a small, but good example, which highlights the issue. When we visited a waste transfer station with the health and safety inspector, we saw empty liquefied petroleum gas bottles of the sort used in caravans and homes, and in skips in the yard—all sorts of things go into skips. The people in charge said, "We had a visit from the Environment Agency, and they said that we had to store the bottles inside. But when the HSE came round, they said, 'No, don't leave them inside where workmen might have a quick tea break; they should be outside.'" I was asked for my opinion, and had to bow to greater experience and knowledge. I could not answer the questions of people at the yard, except to suggest that they return the bottles to the gas company. There are, therefore, difficulties with the lines taken by the Environment Agency and the HSE, which was mentioned in some of the Committee's evidence sessions. I should be grateful if the Minister replied to those points or at least investigated some of them.
10.12 am
Mr. Brian H. Donohoe: First, I pay tribute to the Clerks of the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee for constructing such a good report. The Minister and the Government have welcomed it, as their response demonstrates. I shall touch briefly on the issue of corporate manslaughter and the fact that health and safety is not treated with the seriousness that it might be.
As a long-term campaigner on health and safety, and having been a safety representative in the shipyards 25 years ago, I know that the question of safety has moved along apace and that there have been improvements in the more responsible yards and factories. However, a hard core of major problem industries must still be tackled. The present regulations do not cover the problems suggested by the statistics.
In 1996–98, there were more than 47,000 major injuries in United Kingdom factories. The number of deaths has dropped to 400 a year, as my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, Central (Mr. Benn) mentioned, but given the statistics that we received in the evidence-taking session, I still do not believe that employers are even close to treating the problem as seriously as they might.
As the hon. Member for Reigate (Mr. Blunt) said, claiming that there have been reductions in the number of accidents is virtually warping the statistics, because

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the number of workers in manufacturing during the lifespan of the Health and Safety Executive has dropped drastically. When the number of injuries is compared with the number employed in a particular industry, little improvement in real terms is apparent.
Not one director or manager who has been prosecuted in the past six years has received a fine of more than £1,000; that, in itself, shows another part of the problem of corporate manslaughter. A £1,000 fine was imposed in a case involving someone who was killed in the construction industry; I will not mention the company, but it has a very bad record. That shows that the issue has not been treated seriously enough—and the Government should tackle it sooner rather than later.
I note in the Government's response that the Home Office will soon introduce new measures on corporate manslaughter, first as a form of consultation. What is the Minister's definition of "soon"? It must be very much sooner than action promised by Ministers in respect of other, equally important, matters. It may not be in the Minister's brief, but as someone in the lead Department, he will be aware of the issue.
I note, too, that the Scottish Executive will have a separate responsibility to look into the matter. I shall write to the appropriate Ministers in the Scottish Executive on this issue, which has been dear to my heart for so long, suggesting that they trail-blaze, allowing the courts in Scotland to reach the same conclusion as the Trades Union Congress and to treat more seriously the matter of fining individuals responsible for deaths.
When giving evidence, my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Environment gave the clear impression that he was sympathetic to my argument; many members of the public have written to me, showing that those in the wider world are very concerned about the matter, which requires a positive response from the Government. I look forward to his reply.
10.18 am
Mrs. Louise Ellman: I, too, commend the report because of the renewed attention it brings to the issue of health and safety. I commend it also because of the stress it lays on the importance of prevention and responsibility. I support the recommendation that there should be a crime of corporate killing, and the sooner such a measure is introduced, the better.
The report draws attention to the key and successful role played by the tripartite structure of employers, employees and others including local authorities and the public. This morning, I shall draw attention to a failing in that other section, which relates to the responsibility to consider the health and safety of those not directly employed in the workplace and to the role of a local authority as an agent of the Health and Safety Executive.
I wish to draw attention to tragic circumstances in which the system failed. On 20 May 1999, two of my constituents—Vanessa Gregson aged 19 and a strong swimmer, and Tshan Kamara aged seven—were found drowned at the deep end of an unsupervised swimming pool at Honicombe Manor holiday park in Cornwall.
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Indeed, the hon. Member for South-East Cornwall (Mr. Breed) held an Adjournment debate on the subject in January this year.
At the inquest, the coroner stated that, if a lifeguard had been present, at least one life could have been saved. The coroner criticised the sudden and hidden change in gradient in the swimming pool towards the deep end. He said:
I find it almost incredible that such a hazard can be allowed in a pool to which holiday clients have access.
The coroner also pointed out that there had been two inspections of the pool by Caradon council, acting as agents for the HSE. He noted that its recommendations had not been carried out and also that there had been no follow-up. He queried the adequacy of the inspections and the expertise of those who were sent to carry them out. He doubted whether they had sufficient expertise to assess swimming pools effectively. It was subsequently found that the owner of the pool did not possess the publication "Safety in Swimming Pools"; that no emergency system was in place; and that there was no written safety policy. Today sees the start of the prosecution of the pool owner by Caradon council.
Such a tragic circumstance raises several key issues relating to health and safety. I have raised the incident with the director general of the HSE. In a letter that I received from her on 16 March, I was told:
If swimming pool operators follow the guidance given, they will be well placed to prevent unnecessary injuries and fatalities to pool users… As part of a routine programme, we regularly review all guidance to ensure the best possible advice is available…We shall be reviewing the guidance for swimming pool operators again in the near future.
I hope that the HSE will indeed review its guidance to ensure that it is effective. I also hope that, in doing so, it examines the implementation of the guidance more closely and assesses the expertise of those whose remit is to implement it. I hope, too, that it will look beyond its current guidelines. It and the Government must examine the issue of statutory licensing of pools that are used by the public. It is not good enough to be told, as I was by the director general of the HSE, that because it is more dangerous to swim in the sea than it is in a private swimming pool, we do not need to secure closer regulation of such pools.
My constituents died in tragic circumstances; two young lives were lost needlessly. The prosecution, which starts today, will reach its conclusion on that specific instance. However, I want the HSE to examine the general guidelines more closely to ascertain whether they are adequate and whether there should be greater follow-up and greater strength in the law to enforce them.
10.24 am
Dr. Vincent Cable: I have not had the privilege of serving on the Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs, but I should like to contribute to the strands of argument on this matter. Clearly, there is a high level of consensus that the Health and Safety Executive has played an important and positive role in a generally favourable long-term trend of reducing accidents and a growing safety culture. I shall focus on the two more controversial strands of the argument, which appear to

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point in opposite directions. One is that the Health and Safety Executive is not sufficiently aggressive in enforcement, and the second is that, as many small businesses claim, the HSE contributes to red tape and the gold-plating of regulation.
Local small companies tell anecdotes about the inspectors who visit them; a typical example is that of a small company with an English-speaking labour force that is required to put all its signs in multiple languages. There must be hundreds of examples of such red tape, but I shall concentrate on the inadequacy of enforcement. The matter has been raised in passing, but I shall make the point more systematically.
The Select Committee and the Centre for Innovation in Corporate Responsibility have conducted some good research from which there are several criticisms—the first is the simple lack of investigation. Between 1996 and 1998, only one in every 10 serious accidents, which include amputations, was investigated; of those, only one in 10 led to prosecution—one in five in cases involving fatalities. That prompts the question: what is the HSE doing when it considers serious accidents? The argument, which was touched on by the hon. Member for Cunninghame, South (Mr. Donohoe) and others, is that because of how the HSE functions, 80 per cent. of the cases that it prosecutes are heard in magistrates courts, thus the fines imposed are derisory—£20,000 is the maximum.
Why are other powers not utilised? The Minister may say that it is because it is necessary to legislate for new powers of corporate manslaughter, but the HSE already has the power to refer matters to the police, although only 1 per cent. of its actions have ever been so referred. I stand to be corrected, but I believe that only two cases in the past 10 years have been pursued to a charge of manslaughter. The power to pursue such a case already exists; further legislation is not needed.
My final criticism is the high level of inconsistency in enforcement. There is a factor of six in the likelihood of investigation when farming and mining are compared, and a factor of about five or six in the average fine imposed in magistrates courts in Wales compared with those imposed in the west midlands. There is no obvious reason for those enormous variations.
The lack of prosecution and investigation and the disparity in fines has damaging implications; there is little deterrence in the system and it brings the concept of punishment for serious negligence into disrepute. The hon. Member for Reigate (Mr. Blunt) argued that the emphasis should be on preventive work rather than on enforcement. If the evidence that I have cited is right, it should be the opposite; too much attention is probably paid to the pernickety details of preventive work and routine inspection, and not enough to enforcement. It would be helpful if the Minister described roughly the balance of the HSE's work load and whether he is satisfied with it.
A shift in the direction of enforcement would not result in confrontation or an anti-business sense. I came to Parliament from a large multinational company in the oil industry, in which there was an intense safety culture, not for idealistic reasons, but for fear of loss of reputation as a result of a bad accident. The company would have difficulty recruiting top professionals if it was not seen as at the frontier of health and safety. There
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are sound reasons why good companies have a safety culture; many of those companies would like the cowboys in the industry to be prosecuted more aggressively for lapses. A shift in the direction of tough enforcement would not in any sense undermine the HSE's mission to raise standards throughout industry.
10.30 am
Mr. Tim Loughton: I congratulate the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Mr. Bennett) on securing this debate, and on the report of his Committee. Though short, it is an interesting, useful and detailed report. Many members of the Committee have spoken in this debate, citing striking personal examples of the need for the Health and Safety Executive—in particular, the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs. Ellman), who referred to a tragic swimming pool incident involving her constituents.
The Health and Safety Executive has, since its establishment in 1974, done a good job. The figures speak for themselves. Whatever the reason for the better figures, there has been a remarkable reduction in the number of accidents at work. I am not sure how the hon. Member for Leeds, Central (Mr. Benn) concluded that half that reduction is owing to changing work patterns and half to safety measures, but a combination of factors has been involved.
In the United Kingdom, 1.7 fatal injuries occur per 100,000 workers, whereas in the United States the figure is 3.2, and in Europe it is 3.9. Those are interesting figures. The figure for the United States is substantially higher than that for the UK, despite the "sue first" culture in which companies tend to face lawsuits if a slight injury—or worse—is suffered in the workplace. More ironically, in Europe, business is subject to much more excessive and costly social regulation and bureaucracy. We have benefited from not being part of that. Despite those factors, the safety record in north America and Europe is much worse than in the UK.
As well as paying tribute to the work of the Health and Safety Executive, we should pay tribute to the efforts and resources that companies put into health and safety, to which various hon. Members have alluded. Health and safety is now treated seriously across the board, in most, although not all, places of work. The hon. Member for Leeds, Central described that as a crusade for a state of mind in the workplace. That crusade has been largely successful.
I agree with the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish that it would be a mistake to change the format of the HSE. Most hon. Members have commented that the tripartite approach has worked well, and should continue to do so. I agree with the hon. Gentleman that we should concentrate on the relatively small number of employers who still do not take health and safety seriously, which is unforgivable. I also agree with his point about large divergences between similar companies in the same kind of business. That is not acceptable.
We are not only considering companies. As my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate (Mr. Blunt) pointed out, many health and safety applications are received in relation to defence, in which he is an expert. The hon. Member for Riverside spoke about leisure facilities, which also present many dangers.

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It is right that the report has been produced 26 years after the formation of the HSE. Working practices have changed significantly since 1974, when the majority of people worked in large manufacturing companies. Currently, 99 per cent. of enterprises have fewer than 50 employees, 80 per cent. of enterprises are run by the self-employed, and the service sector accounts for more than 75 per cent. of employment. Clearly, as the number of manufacturing jobs is still falling significantly, that trend will continue.
Changes in trade union membership patterns have been mentioned, although the hon. Member for Leeds, Central and I came to different conclusions about what that should mean for health and safety. Industries are also changing. Less heavy machinery is used, and fewer people are employed in the mining industry, which was traditionally a big source of dangerous jobs. There has also been a big increase in outsourcing, subcontracting and working from home. The last of those presents a particular challenge, although I do not suggest that, on the basis that some statistics suggest that most accidents happen at home, we should increase the HSE's work by providing for personal inspectors for everyone who works there.
The hon. Member for Castle Point (Mrs. Butler) said that different types of regulatory approach should be flexible, and I thoroughly endorse that. The health and safety regulation that applies to a school will differ from that which applies to the waste transfer station that she mentioned, where well-trained professionals rather than vulnerable youngsters will be present. It is right that we should adapt and find new ways of doing things. However, I am concerned that the HSE's work should not become overly prescriptive and that it should not expand its role simply because workplace patterns are more fragmented. I hesitate to use the term "modernise", which crops up in the report, but there must be good reason to modernise; one should not do so simply for modernity's sake, although the term is a buzz word with the Government.
I hope, therefore, that the report will not be seen as a solution in search of a problem, when there is not actually a problem. The figures might have reached a plateau, but they have probably reached a reasonable level. I fully accept that, as hon. Members have said, 400 deaths are 400 deaths too many, but we compare favourably with countries across the world. We need to avoid a blame culture, in which there is no such thing as a genuine accident.
I certainly want to avoid excessive regulation on small and emerging businesses, which are the key to the Chancellor's enterprise economy, about which we hear so much. People who work from home should not have to comply with the expensive regulations that apply to manufacturing industry, for example. The requirements on smaller businesses and on the self-employed should be minimalist, and costs should not be disproportionately high.
I want to query a few issues with the Minister. I agree with the report's conclusion that the preventative role of the Health and Safety Executive should remain its priority, because that is its most valuable role. Proactive inspections form about half the executive's
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regulatory contact with employers each year. What is the Government's attitude to workplace injury reporting and to criticism that more injuries are not reported? I am certainly in favour of naming and shaming the worst offenders, as long as that is done fairly and on an even playing field so that firms are not victimised. We need to set out the criteria clearly so that we know when firms have strayed from an acceptable benchmark. I am most concerned about firms that repeatedly commit the same offences against health and safety standards. The hon. Member for Denton and Reddish said that we needed to concentrate on the worst offenders and on those who repeat offences. What is the experience of workplace injury reporting in the United States and Europe? Are there more criteria? Are more injuries reported?
I also back the idea, to a limited extent, of encouraging insurance firms to reflect best safety practices in their premiums and conditions. That is a case in which the marketplace can work effectively. The problem with that approach is that it might not necessarily have the same impact on larger and smaller firms, because premiums are a fairly small percentage of turnover for large firms. I caution against the possibility of encouraging larger firms not to report their injuries where that would have an impact on their no-claims bonus or the level of their premiums. Have the Government had initial talks with the insurance industry about that? When may we expect the Government's consultation proposals on corporate manslaughter, to which the hon. Members for Cunninghame, South (Mr. Donohoe) and for Riverside referred?
The report criticised the poor record in pursuing prosecutions in cases of serious injuries. Is the number and success of such prosecutions the best measure of the HSE's success? The United Kingdom has a relatively small number of workplace accidents and the demand for prosecutions may result in the victimisation of employers who have just been unlucky with unavoidable accidents. I certainly agree, however, that we must not hold back from throwing the book at the worst offenders.
The report and various hon. Members have called for greater penalties. That is worth looking into for larger companies, for which the maximum fine of £20,000 is a mere drop in the ocean. Such a fine is already a big deterrent for smaller companies. The hon. Member for Cunninghame, South raised an interesting point when he said that the highest penalty that has been imposed in the past six years on directors and mangers of businesses has been only £1,000. His criticisms and those of the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish were mainly of the courts because they were not meting out larger penalties. We should not focus only on the inadequacies of the HSE's powers.
I shall deal briefly with the hypothecation of fines to the Treasury. There is an interesting parallel to be drawn with the Financial Services Authority. I was a member of both the Joint Committee and the Standing Committee which considered the Financial Services and Markets Bill. The current proposal is that fines levied on financial firms for misdemeanours go to the Financial Services Authority—the regulator, which is akin loosely to the Health and Safety Executive. It will be an obvious temptation for the FSA to step up prosecution regimes

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to expand its own empire, in order to increase the number of regulators whom it employs, the number of regulations that it delivers and the fine income from its members when firms fall foul of those regulations. It will be a vicious circle.
There is a scheme in the FSA to rebate to members the fine income against their fees. I can draw an interesting analogy. Refunds to people who are regulated by the HSE would ensure that the cost of complying with regulations is reduced and, thus, make it easier and give them greater incentive to comply with the extra regulations. It will make compliance more affordable. Does the Minister know how much money in fines has gone to the Government?
The Health and Safety Executive has already placed a large financial burden on business. Over the next three years, an extra £63 million will be spent on that—£43 million as a result of the introduction of charging in the gas, transportation and railway industries, which is a little publicised additional stealth tax. If the Government are not willing to hypothecate revenue from fines for health and safety-related matters, will they offer tax breaks for small firms, in particular, for the cost of consultancy advice on health and safety matters? As the hon. Member for Leeds, Central said, trade unions could charge for consultancy advice to members of the Confederation of British Industry.
Finally, I wish to query rail safety and its future. Ostensibly, the Health and Safety Executive performs the role of signing off the safety of rail signals, for example. When an accident is caused as a result of a faulty signal, it investigates why the accident happened and what remedial action should take place. Will the Government clarify that role?
The report is useful. The debate has been well constructed. I agree with the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish that we should concentrate on solving tomorrow's problems, not yesterday's, and work in partnership with tomorrow's businesses rather than using yesterday's excessive restrictions and regulations to solve yesterday's problems.
10.44 am
The Minister for the Environment(Mr. Michael Meacher): This has been an excellent debate, which has raised important points on which I shall reflect. I warmly congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish (Mr. Bennett), the Chairman of the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee, on the Committee's fourth report, which, like so many of the Committee's reports, is well prepared. The Government always take the Committee's reports seriously, and the fourth report is no exception. I shall try in the time available to respond to as many as possible of the main points that have been made, but if I am unable to do so I shall write to hon. Members.
My hon. Friend said that he thought that the tripartite system had worked, and I agree, but there remains a problem with getting through to small and medium-sized enterprises. It was said that the whole occupational structure of industry has changed and that there is a long tail of small companies. I do not know whether a change in the Health and Safety Commission will be necessary, or whether, as the Committee says,
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people should be encouraged to join their employer organisations or a relevant trade union. I am not sure that they are mutually exclusive. I strongly agree that that would be the way to make contacts with a much wider field.
The country's record on reducing accidents at work is good. It is better than that of the United States or the rest of Europe. That is unquestionably due in significant measure to the Health and Safety Commission and the Health and Safety Executive, but we cannot be complacent. I agreed with the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Mr. Loughton) until he used the ill-advised phrase "a reasonable plateau". We cannot accept that. It has been repeatedly said that some 400 people still die each year in workplace accidents. Another statistic that I find just as alarming is that 25,000 people are injured or made ill by their work and leave the work force each year, never to return. Those are shameful statistics in the modern world of work.
My hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish said that more investigations and prosecutions were needed—a point also picked up by the hon. Member for Twickenham (Dr. Cable). I agree. I am not satisfied with the number of investigations or prosecutions. It is, of course, a question of resources. When the Government came to power we immediately put extra resources into health and safety. As a result, in the past three years there has been an increase in regulatory activity. More specifically, that has meant inspector contacts with industry up to a record 188,000; enforcement notices up to a record 11,000, and prosecutions up to 1,800. I accept that that is from a low base and that it is not adequate, but we agree on the objective.
On the crucial question of penalties, the amounts are derisory. It is insulting that, when a member of a family has been killed at work, the penalties in some instances are as low as £2,000. I am pleased to say that the Court of Appeal has pointed the way and that the Howe judgment of 1988 encouraged the courts to adopt a tougher stance on sentencing. For example, Balfour Beatty learned the hard way when it was fined more than £1 million for the Heathrow tunnel collapse, when it was a miracle that no one was killed. That case showed the way in which the courts regard such accidents, and I strongly support that.
The Government will legislate—when parliamentary time allows, but not in the dim and distant future—for courts to have stronger sentencing powers for health and safety offences. That will include the prospect of jail for the majority of offences. In addition, the Home Secretary will consult soon on changing the law to make it easier for corporate bodies to be prosecuted for involuntary manslaughter. That matter was raised by several hon. Members and it would be a vital reform of the criminal justice system. Those serious measures will bring home the importance of better health and safety management where it matters most—in the boardroom.
We intend to do more to toughen penalties for breaches of the law by those with a casual, reckless and criminal approach to safety. The real aim is not simply to punish people, but to induce a positive management culture. A small minority always thinks that attention, time and resources need not be given to proper safety management, and the Committee agrees unanimously that it is those companies that must be targeted hard. We are considering making more innovative penalties

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available to the courts to hit hard and punish individuals responsible for health and safety failures as well as the companies. The suspension of managers without pay, the prohibition of director bonuses for fixed periods and the possibility of custodial penalties in the most serious cases involving recklessness and gross negligence are matters under consideration.
The last point that my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish made concerned occupational health and stress—the latter being perhaps the most widespread of several environmental health issues. I have long thought that Britain has never really had an occupational health system. It is clear that, in addition to reducing accidents, we must improve the nation's health at work. Some 2 million people suffer from ill-health caused by their work, and a staggering 500,000 say that their health is affected by the stress of their job. Too many people are made ill at work. That is why the revitalising health and safety agenda, which we shall publish shortly—I do mean shortly—will set out some pretty demanding targets for reducing the number of days lost through illness and injury at work.
My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, Central (Mr. Benn) spoke about the need for sensible regulation. No one wants over-prescriptive legislation, but sensible and necessary regulation is important and has undoubtedly contributed to the gradual steady reduction in the number of deaths. I agree with my hon. Friend about the importance of naming and shaming, and I warmly welcome the HSE's initiative to publish a special annual report to name and shame companies and individuals convicted in the previous 12 months.
My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, Central and others asked about insurance practice. Many who responded to our consultation document "Revitalising Health and Safety" thought that the insurance industry should do more to exert pressure on employers' health and safety performance, and I agree. I shall soon discuss with the industry further steps that it might take. Insurers already graduate employers' liability premiums according to the degree of risk, in the same way as is done for car users, whose record is taken into account, and that is helpful.
With regard to prevention, my hon. Friend was right to say—the figures are clear about this—that the number of accidents in firms that have health and safety representatives is about half that of similar companies which do not. I am glad that the HSE is publishing a discussion document on worker involvement, including a consideration of increased powers, which might entail issuing improvement or prohibition notices.
The speech of the hon. Member for Reigate (Mr. Blunt) was, on the most charitable interpretation, seriously misconceived, and, less charitably, nothing less than disgraceful in some of its implications. He said that it was too burdensome to address the problem of the remaining 400 people who are killed every year and to be concerned about the remaining 20 per cent. He drew a comparison with army training, in which one expects some casualties, but there is no comparison whatever between army training and the circumstances in factories where procedures are set down and equipment has to be provided in order to minimise risk.
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I asked the HSE to supply the figures for previous cases in order to ascertain how many accidents were the responsibility of the employee—some, unfortunately, behave foolishly and pay for it with their lives or receive serious injury—and how many were the consequence of inadequate management. The figures showed that seven out of every eight were the fault of poor management.
The hon. Member for Reigate asked where the line should be drawn and wanted to secure a sensible balance. I totally disagree with him. However many lives short of 400 are lost—whether the hon. Gentleman draws the line at 100, 200 or 300—I am not prepared to accept them. I passionately believe that a great deal more can be done to reduce the unacceptable carnage at places of work.
We seek not to increase antagonism, but to accentuate a safety-conscious management culture, which is quite different. We want management on side—we do not aim to be punitive—and the vast majority of management is on side, but a significant minority is not. There is no question of delegating from line managers to health and safety representatives. Of course line managers retain the prime responsibility—from the boardroom downwards—but the representatives have an important role.
My hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Mrs. Butler) mentioned several examples, such as the local auction and the storage of liquid petroleum gas bottles, in which there was a difference of viewpoint between the HSE, the Environment Agency and the local planning authority. I shall certainly take a close interest in that matter and request an explanation. I promise my hon. Friend that I will investigate further.
My hon. Friend the Member for Cunninghame, South (Mr. Donohoe) asked when the Home Office would publish its consultation document on proposals for reforming the law on involuntary manslaughter, and I promise my hon. Friend that it will be published within the next month.
My hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs. Ellman) mentioned the tragic deaths of two young people in a swimming pool at a holiday site. The matter is now the subject of a prosecution and we shall watch carefully to see how the case unfolds. She asked about statutory licensing, and, again, I undertake to examine the issue further and, if necessary, to reply to her in writing.
The hon. Member for Twickenham referred to there being too few investigator prosecutions. I have already said that the HSE's resources are inadequate and we have bid for a significant increase in the spending review. I insist on no reduction on front-line preventive work; additional resources must come on top of that. I am sure that all hon. Members would agree that prevention is better than prosecution after the event.
The hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham asked about reporting. There will always be questions surrounding non-reporting, but I am not satisfied with failures. New arrangements for reporting by telephone and through the internet should improve under-reporting. I understand that the HSE will set up a reporting centre for incidents by April 2001, which is expected to increase response rates. The HSE will also review the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 1995 next year,

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and consider how employees and their representatives can be actively involved in reporting accidents and ill health.
The question of ill health and fines was raised, for which the courts have responsibility. I am concerned that cases in magistrates courts are not sufficiently referred to Crown courts, where the penalties are higher.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Frank Cook): Order. We come to our next subject for consideration.

Generic Drugs
[Relevant documents: First report from the Health Committee, HC 105 and Government response, CM 4673.]
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Mr. David Hinchliffe: I am grateful for the opportunity for a brief debate on concerns regarding the cost and availability of generic drugs to the national health service, and on several of the points raised in the report of the Select Committee on Health that was published on 9 December. I express my appreciation to Professor Joe Collier, the Committee's specialist adviser on the inquiry, and to its Clerk, Dr. John Benger, and his excellent staff for their work on the report and their consistent work throughout the Parliament.
In recent years, the Health Committee has resolved to consider briefly some topical issues. Its attention was drawn to concerns on this subject by several hon. Members, especially my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin (Mr. Bradley), who might hope to catch your eye this morning, Mr. Deputy Speaker. He was active in expressing worries about what had been brought to his attention in his constituency. I should also mention the South Huddersfield primary care group, which covers two wards in my constituency. Its chairman, Dr. Bill Parker, and its chief executive, Mr. John Roebuck, drew my attention to the implications of the problems facing the group arising from generic drugs. Following representations, the Committee determined to take evidence on 4 November from a range of interested parties, including Government representatives.
Generic drugs are crucial to the national health service's drive to keep prescribing costs down. The performance assessment framework document from the national health service executive, "Quality and Performance in the NHS: High Level Performance Indicators and Clinical Indicators", describes generic prescribing as one of the
high level indicators of performance.
Generic prescribing grew from 11.5 per cent. of the NHS drugs budget to around 21.7 per cent. in 1997. The average generic prescribing rate for all practices was 63 per cent. by the end of 1998, and the Government have set a target of a 72 per cent. rate by the end of March 2002.
Our inquiry was prompted by a range of reports about huge rises in the costs of generic drugs. I shall give one or two examples, which are set out in more detail in the report. Amoxycillin cost 47p for 28 days' supply in September 1998, but a year later it cost £1.69, an increase of 260 per cent. Thryoxine cost 21p for 28 days' supply in September 1998, but cost £1.62 a year later, an increase of 670 per cent. The worst example which we found was Frusemide, which increased from 26p to £2.14 over the period, an increase of 723 per cent.
The scale of the problem was brought home by an excellent report on BBC 2's "Newsnight" on 19 October. With the co-operation of the BBC, we were fortunate to be provided with the raw data that informed the report, which showed that, of 464 commonly prescribed generic drugs, 132 had increased in price by more than 50 per cent. in the previous

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12 months. The impact of that was devastating for health authorities and primary care groups, which were in their first financial year under the new structure. Croydon health authority has told us that
any overspend on PCG prescribing budgets will impact on other areas of health services expenditure, because now this budget is cash-limited as part of the PCG unified Hospital and Community Health Service.
Many hon. Members have spoken about the local implications of the increases. I met people from the South Huddersfield PCG last Friday; they told me that the projected full-year additional costs to their group were £248,000. To be fair, the Government have so far contributed £153,000 additional allocation to that group, but that high figure shows the extent of the problem. We have received evidence from other primary care groups. Birmingham PCGs anticipate an overspend of £800,000 on their prescribing budget, Manchester PCGs report an overspend of £604,000, even allowing for use of their contingency fund, and West Sussex health authority anticipates a deficit of £750,000.
The health service faced serious problems at a local level in the first year of the new operational PCGs. There was also an impact on individual patients, who had to come to terms with different packages, colours of tablets, dosage instructions and so on. That confused many of them, especially the elderly patients, and, inevitably, a great deal of NHS staff time has been used in explaining the changes to people who might not otherwise have understood them.
There has been no shortage of reasons advanced by different parties for the huge price rises. The generic manufacturers and industry representatives placed most emphasis on two factors. First, Regent GM, one of the largest manufacturers of generic drugs, closed suddenly after the Medicines Control Agency's findings that some of its drugs could have been contaminated by penicillin. At the time, that company had a market share of about 10 per cent. Secondly, there was a move away from bulk dispensing towards patient packs to comply with an EC directive.
Mr. Philip Hammond: Did the hon. Gentleman's Committee come to any conclusions about the action taken by the Government immediately following the closure of Regent GM? It was easy to anticipate that that closure would have a significant impact on the market for generic drugs.
Mr. Hinchliffe: If the hon. Gentleman will bear with me, I will cover that point. As he knows, we took evidence on that matter, and the report referred to our thoughts on it.
It would appear that, as late as 20 October 1999, the Government accepted the two key reasons for the price rises that had been identified by the industry. That was made clear in a parliamentary answer that day from the Minister of State, Department of Health, my hon. Friend the Member for Barrow and Furness (Mr. Hutton), which gave the impression that those two reasons were central to the Government's understanding of the cause of the problem. The Committee concluded that the supply shock caused by
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the Regent closure might have been a catalyst for that problem, but could not be called the cause. We noted that it was significant that production levels had returned to normal but that prices had not. Our view, therefore, is that the industry overstated the impact of the Regent closure and that the Government may have been a little naive in accepting it as the major factor for as long as they did.
The patient packs question may be more complex. Government and industry agree that the move caused shortages of some products. In our report, however, we state that some products that were never in shortage underwent huge price hikes. The industry argues that it understood that the Department of Health had agreed a phased and orderly transition to patient packs, and that it had hoped for financial support for that from the Government. The Department of Health strongly rejects that suggestion. Ministers told us that it was "simply not the case" that plans had been agreed for an orderly transition. We felt that we could not take a view on whether the Government should have offered financial support for the transition but that the breakdown of talks had ultimately proved extremely expensive. The PSNC estimated that the cost of transitional support would have been around £20 million. Clearly, the cost to the NHS of the whole affair has been many times that amount.
We also criticised the Government for not giving a higher priority to ensuring that the transitional arrangements were properly co-ordinated. Even if the Department of Health is correct in saying that no formal agreement had been reached, the evidence we saw suggested that the industry could hardly be blamed for assuming that such an agreement was in the bag. Nevertheless, unlike the Department of Health last October, we were not convinced that any of these factors was in itself sufficient to explain the price rises that we had witnessed. The BBC "Newsnight" survey pointed out that of the 132 products surveyed that, had undergone price rises of more than 50 per cent., only 18 had been repackaged. We therefore looked elsewhere. The more the Committee studied this, the more we concluded that the operation of the drug tariff itself lay at the heart of the problem. This is a complex area, but I shall refer briefly to what we looked at and the basis for our concerns.
The Prescription Pricing Authority monitors the supply of a drug by two major wholesalers and three major manufacturers to ascertain the basket price. When two wholesalers or one wholesaler and two manufacturers declare that they have less than four weeks' supply of a drug it is placed in category D and the supplier is paid the price of the drug, which can be the brand name price, rather than the generic price. The flaws in that mechanism became all too apparent in the evidence to us. First, the four-week measure was outdated because most wholesalers now hold stock for 12 to 15 days. Secondly, it is up to the manufacturers and wholesalers who are monitored for the drug tariff to determine what levels of stock they maintain. We thought it unsatisfactory that the system relied on a few wholesalers and manufacturers who were free to determine levels of stock and thus could trigger category D status, which, in turn, had commercial implications for their industry.

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In the year or so before we took evidence, the number of category D listed drugs rose from 30 to 192. An enormous burden was put on the Prescription Pricing Authority. In our view, it acted with commendable promptness and was among the first to realise the urgency of the situation. But that was at some cost: 140,000 overtime hours were worked between April and November 1999 and 230 more staff were recruited, at an annual cost of £3.2 million.
The final and most powerful factor in the equation was the nature of the generic markets. This was a commodity market, which the Minister admitted was not "working effectively at present". We felt that the flaws in the category D system, the fact that the drug tariff was slow to respond to trends between bulk and patient packs and the limited number of players in the generic market made the market ripe for manipulation. Who was manipulating it remains an open question. One group that was clearly fingered in the evidence to us was the short-line wholesalers. They moved in and out of the market with speed and were quick to spot trends. They were well placed both to corner stocks and to profiteer from shortages. Although we believe that they were well placed to exploit the market, we felt that they became the potential scapegoat for everyone else because they were the only major force not represented in oral or written evidence, as they did not have a collective trade body.
Mr. Hammond: Does the hon. Gentleman agree that short-line wholesalers also have the potential to lubricate the market and to act as a force for bringing in supplies from elsewhere whenever there is a shortage? In any market, players who duck in and out can enhance its working, as well as gum it up in other ways.
Mr. Hinchliffe: The nature of any market is exactly as the hon. Gentleman described. Our worry is that the current mechanisms created a shortage and allowed key players to cash in on that shortage. They were thus at an advantage and able to enhance their own interests at the expense of the national health service. We could not draw conclusions about the individual guilty party; the finger could be pointed at a range of people who had taken advantage of a difficult situation. We hope that we will learn lessons from what happened and, to be fair, the Government have attempted to draw conclusions from the difficulties that occurred.
Market manipulation, hoarding and collusion were not limited solely to the short-line wholesalers who were pointed out by several witnesses at the evidence session. The Government's recent consultation paper seems to agree with our conclusion that none of the original reasons cited fully explains the continued high prices in generics. The paper stated that the Government had not been made aware of any factors that would justify prices remaining at their current high levels for so long.
Our final conclusion drew attention to the absurdity of the current situation; we were assured that manufacturers took steps to block excessive orders, but that the wilier short-line wholesalers might buy up large quantities on a Saturday morning. The report stated:
It seems to us entirely undesirable that the proper functioning of the market in generics should have to rely on companies having to refuse to sell their products and on management being present on a Saturday morning to prevent sales from taking place.
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We felt that the price rise of the past 18 months must have enriched many individuals at the expense of the national health service.
I come now to what has been done and what needs to be done; the first thing to remember is that most of the players in the industry told us that they were unhappy with such a disorderly market and would welcome more regulation and control. Thus the Government are in a strong position to act to avoid a recurrence. As I said, the Government did not grasp the urgency of the situation as early as they should have done; perhaps it is not surprising that they dissented from that analysis. In their reply to our report, the Government argued that at no time did they give a firm commitment to fund the transition to patient packs. They also maintained—contrary, in my view, to the evidence—that what the Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority noted in March 1999 was not what we termed a looming crisis but a
rising trend in medicines in Category D.
That explanation is less than adequate. However, the Government acted promptly to reform category D; eight days after we took evidence the Department met the PSNC and agreed modifications to the entrance and exit procedures and to reduce the stockholding period to two weeks. More important still, the Department has pledged to undertake a fundamental review of the operation of the generics market and the drugs tariff, which we greatly welcome. The proposals set out in the consultation document show that the Government have tackled the problem directly and taken wholly appropriate measures. Just as our report criticised the Government, I hope constructively and not without reason, it is right to pay credit to the thoroughness of their new approach, which I welcome.
I also welcome the proposal to fix the prices of generic medicines that fall within the scope of the scheme at a ceiling that corresponds to prices between November 1998 and January 1999. That is an appropriate response to those profiteering at the national health service's expense and is the only measure that will bring the market into line reasonably quickly. The improvements in data gathering will be invaluable in the longer term in giving the NHS a better feel for what is going on in the market.
The generics market has, in general terms, served the NHS well. The Committee was anxious that the real benefits of generic drugs were being dissipated by a sudden and apparently inexplicable crisis in the market. I hope that the Health Committee's contribution to the debate helped prompt the thorough measures now proposed. We feel that a properly regulated generics market that is free from the turbulence of recent months would benefit the generic manufacturing industry as well as PCGs, health authorities, patients and taxpayers.
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Mr. Peter Bradley: May I take this opportunity to commend the Health Committee for arranging this debate and for the investigation that it undertook last year into this important issue? I welcome the opportunity, too, to play my part in exposing what I consider to be cynical and organised profiteering by some sections of the pharmaceutical industry—a form of profiteering that has driven many health authorities,

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including my own in Shropshire, and many health trusts and PCGs, to the point of bankruptcy, ironically at a time when investment in the NHS is at an all-time high.
Mr. Hammond: I am sorry to interrupt, but the hon. Gentleman makes a serious allegation. He used the phrase "organised profiteering". Is he suggesting collusion between companies?
Mr. Bradley: I am grateful for the hon. Gentleman's interest. I am scarcely under way; indeed, I do not believe that I have reached the first semicolon. As my contribution unfolds, he may have a clearer idea of my views.
The Government were elected on a pledge to restore the national health service, and we are now witnessing unprecedented levels of funding, including, this year alone, an additional £2 billion as part of a £21 billion package. That extra investment is intended principally to benefit patients and, indeed, people who work in the NHS. It is not intended to enrich already pretty affluent and successful directors and shareholders of drug companies. Too high a proportion of that new investment is entering through the front door of the NHS, only to disappear out the back as quickly as it arrives.
I am not arguing against the profit motive. Last week, in this very Chamber, when debating the conduct of privatised utilities in my constituency, I made the point that private sector companies are perfectly entitled to take a profit and to make their margins. However, in this sector, as in others, private profit should work in the public interest. I do not believe that that has been the case over the past couple of years in the NHS drugs market.
I acknowledge the pharmaceutical industry's contribution to our economy. It directly employs some 60,000 people, and it is argued that a quarter of a million people indirectly owe their employment to the pharmaceutical sector. Investment in research and development is £7 million a day, and that high investment must be redeemed through the market. We can take pride in the fact that six of the 25 best-selling drugs are made in this country. The pharmaceutical sector in this country earns £2 billion-worth of exports annually.
None the less, I am not happy about the power that pharmaceutical companies wield throughout the NHS or the stranglehold that they have seemed to have had in the past in negotiating with the Department of Health. Their powerful employment base and their research and development activities in this country give them undue leverage in such negotiations. Nor am I happy about the ways in which they can distort the medical research sector through their enormous financial clout. We have talked a lot about the market, and I am sure that we shall hear more about it this morning. It stands to reason that pharmaceutical companies have a vested interest in investing in research connected to treating conditions rather than preventing them. We can hardly blame the sector for taking an interest in that from which it will profit most, but it nevertheless has an undue influence on the general character of research in this country,
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which is much to be regretted. Moreover, there is a growing disquiet about the ability of the pharmaceutical sector in this country and elsewhere to patent the very means of life and death in the research being undertaken on genes. Lastly, but most serious in the context of this debate, it is my view that the drugs industry has systematically ripped off the national health service.
In an Adjournment debate last year, before the category D issue became evident, I drew attention to the cost of hospital-led prescribing. For many years, the drug industry has made disproportionate profit from the NHS by that means. The equation is simple. Drug companies provide branded drugs as loss leaders to hospitals, because they know that only 20 per cent. of NHS drugs are dispensed in hospitals and that 80 per cent. of drugs are prescribed or dispensed in the community. That is the catch. They hook the patient in hospital, and when discharged, the patient will tell a doctor that he or she now wants the drug that was prescribed in hospital, and that the consultant believed was the best for his or her condition. In many cases, general practitioners will prescribe the branded drugs. They may be unaware that the cost of those drugs in the community is astronomically higher than it is in hospitals, where, for example, Imdur costs 2.5 per cent. of its value in the community, and the popular drug Frumil costs 6 per cent. of that value. That is a cynical and calculated scam and it is all too effective.
The problem is serious. In 1997–98, the NHS overspent its drug budget by £69 million, which is the equivalent of about 4,000 grade D nurses. If generic rather than branded drugs had been prescribed, £66 million of that £69 million could have been saved, and patients would have suffered no discernible deleterious effects. Of 100 English health authorities, 78 overspent their drugs budgets—five by £2 million or more, and 34, including my local health authority, Shropshire, by more than £1 million. That is an intolerable drain on the NHS's budget.
I will briefly refer to a second problem. Dispensing doctors often load additional costs on the NHS, because their remuneration system contains an in-built incentive to prescribe branded drugs, which are more expensive than generic drugs. In 1998–99, even before category D became an issue, those two problems already cost Shropshire health authority £1.2 million. In 1999–2000, that cost was more than £1.5 million.
Last year, primary care groups were introduced in Shropshire and elsewhere. Primary and secondary health care sectors were working more closely together, and innovative software was introduced to help GPs to identify the best-value drugs that they should prescribe or dispense. There was at last an opportunity to reduce the NHS drug costs. The Government negotiated a 4.5 per cent. reduction in the cost of branded drugs through the pharmaceutical price regulation scheme, but ironically, just when it seemed that there would be good news for the NHS and its patients, the category D list issue loomed.
At the same time as the cost of branded drugs was to reduce, the cost of generic drugs escalated. My hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield (Mr. Hinchliffe) described the consequences of that. In autumn 1998, only 30 drugs were on the category D list of the generic drugs that were difficult to obtain. By summer 1999, 170 were on the list, and the number rose further to about

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190. The cost of some generics increased by more than 700 per cent., and the drug barons claim that the closure of Regent GM was a major factor. That may have had an effect, but it is difficult to accept that the closure of one manufacturer in such a buoyant and profitable sector could have had such a disproportionate effect on the market.
Mr. Hammond: I thought that drug barons came from Colombia. The hon. Gentleman talked about a shocking 700 per cent. increase. Does he know what percentage of the NHS drugs budget covered the increase in the cost of generic drugs during that year? He will find that to be a less dramatic figure than that which he quotes.
Mr. Bradley: If the hon. Gentleman is going to mount a defence of the pharmaceutical sector later in the debate, I will be fascinated to hear it; he will be one of the very few outside the industry to have attempted that. The overall cost to the NHS of both generic and branded drugs has risen considerably in recent years. That has occurred for many reasons, some of which are quite acceptable, such as breakthroughs in drug technology and the availability of drugs, which we welcome. My argument, and that of the Select Committee, is that there was not a reasonable explanation for the increase in the cost of generics last year.
The argument about the switch from bulk supplies to patient packs is not credible either. It is difficult to accept that an industry as sophisticated, profitable and succesful as the drugs industry could not have anticipated better and planned more effectively for that transition, even if it were not without problems.
There is overwhelming circumstantial evidence that the market was rigged and that there was stockpiling and hoarding among wholesalers and pharmacies, if not by manufacturers. The cost to the NHS is at least £0.25 billion, and probably higher; perhaps the Minister will be able to provide more precise figures. That was a major blow to the primary care groups in their first year, at a time when they were seeking to establish confidence and extend and improve primary health care. It was a major blow also to their patients—the people who really matter in all this.
In Shropshire, the category D issue—the increase in the price of generic drugs—meant that the difference in the cost of drugs to the health authority between November 1998 and November 1999 was about 16 per cent. Between £2 million and £3 million is the price tag that Shropshire health authority has had to meet for the increased prices of generic drugs. That is without considering the additional and undue costs of hospital-led prescribing and dispensing GPs. I would estimate that, last year, Shropshire health authority lost from its budget £4 million to £5 million-worth of resources that should have been spent on front-line health care.
The Government have acted—I believe, belatedly, although I welcome their action. They provided £90 million last winter to compensate—at least in part—for the additional burden on primary care groups and health authorities. The Government are moving to cap drug prices, and we await with great anticipation the results of the OXERA review of the generics market.
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Finally, there is a reference to the Office of Fair Trading last August and I, for one, am looking forward with anticipation to its findings. However, I will not be foolish enough to hold my breath, since I referred to the OFT an issue relating to this sector as long ago as 27 April last year, and I am still awaiting its response. I do not consider it to be in the public interest that, when serious issues such as these are raised with the OFT, it should take quite so long to come to a conclusion.
Whatever the OFT's findings are, it is essential that the Government ensure that this form of price fixing in the NHS can never happen again. The pharmaceutical companies are entitled to their profit, but they are not entitled to rip off the NHS. Whatever the OFT establishes, someone along the supply line got very rich very quick, and did so at the expense of my constituents. Every penny of the billions of pounds that the Government are now investing in the NHS on behalf of the taxpayer is precious. I look forward to hearing how the Minister will ensure that every one of those precious pennies is spent on health care for my constituents, for the Minister's and for everyone else's.
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Sandra Gidley: As a new Member, I am afraid that I have not had time to read the report. Until recently, I might have had to declare an interest. However, I have now given up pharmacy. It may be of interest for Members to hear about my practical experience.
The big factor for me is the impact on the patient. There is no doubt that the change to patient packs—and possibly the closure of Regent—has had a real impact on patients. We have struggled to obtain supplies of drugs. A number of people had to go without their medicine for a few days because, in Southampton—where I worked—we could not get supplies. That is a worry on a level that is other than financial.
Nobody has yet mentioned an additional impact on the NHS. Previously, a lot of patients were issued private prescriptions by their GP because it was cheaper for them to get a private prescription for a generic drug than it was to pay £6—or £5.90, as it was last year—for an NHS prescription. Because of the big price increases, patients now find it cheaper to spend £6 on an NHS prescription. Obviously, that is another load on the NHS. I do not know how big an impact that will have—nobody has done any work on it—but it is another factor in the equation.
I doubt whether the drug tariff is bedtime reading for many hon. Members. However, I would be interested to see how it is to be updated with reference to the 14-day lead time. Currently, it is updated monthly. In the past, there has been a time lag between pharmacies' having to pay increased costs for the drugs and that fact being recognised and their remuneration coming through. In the past, the tariff system has worked against the financial interests of pharmacists. A system that responded more quickly would be in the interests of all concerned.
The introduction of patient packs was a complete fiasco from a professional point of view. There has been no standardisation on the size of pack and no move to encourage GPs to prescribe according to the size of pack. The resulting mess leads to confusion for the

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patient and has an impact on the pharmacist, who has to cope with the extra volume of stock. It may be too late now, but we must learn the lessons from that and plan for the future.
The hon. Member for The Wrekin (Mr. Bradley) was concerned about hospitals prescribing branded drugs, and said that that was being forced on to the community. That is not a problem. GPs these days are painfully aware of the cost of drugs. They understand that generic drugs will save them money and most are keen to get the best benefit from their budgets for their patients. That was a red herring; it does not happen in practice, and certainly not in my area.
Mr. Peter Bradley: I welcome the contribution of the hon. Lady, the newest Member of the House, and I congratulate her on her diligence in speaking again today, having made her maiden speech only last night. I provided figures in my speech that suggested that, before the category D issues arose, the cost to my health authority of the hospital-led prescribing scam—as I described it last year—was more than £1 million, and that that cost was replicated throughout the health sector. Seventy-eight of 100 health authorities had a similar experience. Surely her anecdotal evidence does not measure up to that statistical evidence.
Sandra Gidley: I admit that I can only speak for the area in which I worked. Yes, manufacturers provide drugs in their packs and the patients like to think that they are getting the same again. However, where there is a history of generic prescribing in an area, patients quickly realise that they often receive packs with different presentations. In the area that I represent, GPs are cost-conscious, and generic prescribing is the name of the game. Most of them have a little button on their computers which, when pressed, automatically generates prescriptions in a generic form. That causes some confusion with items such as baths oils, but, on the whole, it works in the best interests of the patient.
I agree with what has been said about dispensing doctors—I would, wouldn't I? The evidence shows that where doctor dispensing is the norm, the drug costs are higher. That should be looked at.
When prices are agreed for the drug tariff, surely the onus is on the Government. Twenty years ago, when I first qualified, the Government slashed the prices that they would pay for drugs such as valium and vitamins and targeted particularly a company called Roche. If they could do that then, and if they could encourage the 4 per cent. cut in drug prices a few years ago, I see no reason why, with the will, they could not do that today.
The onus should be on the manufacturers to justify the price rises. I do not believe that Regent was a major factor because the closure of a factory does not mean increased costs. It does not suddenly cost more to produce a drug just because somebody is not doing it. That is a difficult argument to follow.
There is no doubt that, in many cases, the packaging costs more than the drugs being supplied. That is a worry, but patient safety is a factor. We now have to enclose leaflets to explain to the public the properties of the drug and its side effects, which is welcome, but that cost has not been mentioned.
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As an observation, I would say that the vast majority of pharmacists are honest. However, I know of cases where weaknesses in the drug tariff have been exploited. If the drug tariff were one's bedtime reading, one could make a lot of money. For some drugs it is necessary to endorse the pack size dispensed, which may be 28 tablets in a little box or a little bottle from a pack of 1,000. Pharmacists are supposed to say what has been given out. The costs are different and the vast majority of pharmacists will note accurately what is given out. However, some do not and there is no way of checking what has been supplied by the pharmacist. That should be tightened up so that those claiming the higher-priced packs can be checked. That would be beneficial for the profession and the public purse.
I welcome this debate. There is a problem, but we must be careful that we do not penalise pharmacists who have to suffer a time delay. Sometimes one has to pay more for drugs without getting the money back. That must be addressed. We must also address the need to keep prices down so that GPs, or whoever is paying for the drugs, can spend the money on other patient services.
11.43 am
Dr. Howard Stoate: I still hold some sessions as a general practitioner and, therefore, declare an indirect interest in the debate. I want to put that on the record.
There was once a time when the cost of drugs was of concern to only the Government. General practitioners had no interest in it because the budget was open-ended and there was no cash limit on the cost of drugs available to GPs. They could prescribe exactly what they chose in the interests of patients and it made no difference to them. That was undesirable in many ways. It did not foster cost-effectiveness or prompt GPs to look at their prescription habits. It did not prompt them to check wastage or compliance with patients or to look at the overall structure of what they were doing. They wrote the prescriptions and somebody else paid the bill.
That was a huge opportunity cost on the NHS. If there was inappropriate prescribing and wastage, and if GPs inadvertently used the most expensive version of a drug by branding it, money was used that could have been spent in other parts of the NHS to benefit patients in other ways. That was undesirable and, over the years, Governments have sought to address that problem by introducing various schemes to make GPs more cost-effective.
First, we had PACT—prescribing analysis and cost—under which, every month, GPs are sent a statement of the cost of their prescribing in relation to their colleagues and the national picture. That enabled them to see where they stood. They also receive an analysis of the percentage of generics used so that they can compare themselves locally and nationally. Also, the monthly PACT statement shows the target budget for the year so that GPs can assess whether they are overspending or underspending.
Some health authorities have introduced prescribing incentive schemes where practices that achieve a locally set target can recoup some money. For example, if a GP saves 2 per cent. on a drug bill this year, some money will go to the practice to spend on equipment or other

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patient services. That is welcome because it provides an enormous incentive for GPs to look at the cost of prescribing.
Mr. Philip Hammond: I was interested to hear the hon. Gentleman's historical analysis of the increase in generic drug prescribing. Would he care to pay tribute to my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke) for his key role in setting off the trend dramatically to increase generic prescribing in the NHS?
Dr. Stoate: I will do that because, to be fair to the previous Government, they did address the problem. In fact, my next sentence was going to be in favour of fundholding. Fundholding introduced cost discipline on GPs and, to some extent, it was worth while. The problem is that fundholding was unfair and produced a two-tier service. It took resources away from some practices and gave them to others. There were clear losers as well as winners, but the principle was right in that it introduced a discipline for GPs. They looked carefully at what they were doing, analysed the effects and made sure that money was spent in the best possible way. I welcome that, from whatever Government it came.
We now have primary care groups, which represent the Rolls-Royce of reorganisation for GPs. Primary care groups embrace all GPs, not just those who are entrepreneurial enough to make a go of fundholding at the expense of their colleagues. The good news about that is that every GP now has a clear incentive to be cost-effective. The downside is that, just as GPs were getting used to the new unified budgets and to the idea that what they spent on prescribing could not be spent on referrals and so on, they were suddenly hit by the whammy of a huge increase in the cost of generics which, as has been mentioned, has spiralled out of control.
Some of the examples are striking. I shall give the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr. Hammond) an example. It was estimated last year that about £200 million was spent on the generic problem. That equates to about 3 per cent. of the NHS drug budget—a significant sum. Three per cent. is a significant cost, particularly at times of low inflation, of which the Government can rightly be proud. We are talking about large sums of money and a significant impact on NHS costs.
That has caused a huge overspend and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield (Mr. Hinchliffe) said, it has caused massive pressure on the Prescription Pricing Authority, from which it has not yet recovered. For example, this week I received my PACT statement for December—over four months late. It is impossible for a GP practice or primary care group to budget properly for their drug costs if they are only now receiving statements relating to last December.
Mr. Hammond: I am glad that the hon. Gentleman has raised that—it was raised in the Select Committee report and it confused me then. Is the hon. Gentleman suggesting that GPs who are prescribing generically—in the cheapest and most cost-effective way—should change their prescribing practice, which could only
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mean issuing fewer prescriptions, in response to information that their budget is becoming overspent? Is that what the hon. Gentleman recommends?
Dr. Stoate: Quite the opposite. Most GPs are very cost-effective prescribers, and there are now many reasons for them to be so—primary care groups also have incentives to be cost-effective—but if they cannot judge what they are spending on an item because the response from the Prescription Pricing Authority is four or five months late, it makes it extremely difficult to set budgets. It makes it almost impossible to get involved in a meaningful prescribing incentive scheme, simply because the data are meaningless. One cannot equate what one is doing now with figures that may arrive many months late.
Of course all GPs have an interest in the increasing use of generics. As the hon. Member for Romsey (Sandra Gidley) rightly said, many GPs now have a simple conversion system on their desk, which is a welcome development.
I want to make a clear distinction between the manufacturers of branded and of generic medicines. It is not fair to blame the branded manufacturers. The vast majority of companies that manufacture branded drugs do not also manufacture generic drugs. We must not confuse the two. The generics manufacturers must shoulder their part of the blame.
Mr. Peter Bradley: I acknowledge the distinction that my hon. Friend is making, but does he not accept that in many cases there are links between the companies and that many of the ultimate owners own both branded and generic companies?
Dr. Stoate: I was of that opinion before the Select Committee conducted its inquiry, but the vast majority of the evidence that we received was that they are entirely different companies, owned by different people, although I accept that there must be some overlap. I want to ensure that we place the blame where it belongs.
Enormous difficulties have been caused for general practices, primary care groups and trusts. I welcome the fact that the Government made available £90 million last year to cover some of the overspend, but there are two problems: many primary care groups are complaining that they remain overspent through no fault of their own; and the money should have been spent on nurses, hospitals and equipment. The NHS could ill afford to lose that £90 million, so it is a great shame that the Government had to use it in that way.
Schedule D is well and truly overdue for reform. For all the reasons that hon. Members have mentioned, it is too open to manipulation. I do not want to point the finger directly, but any market that is effectively controlled by a basket of five suppliers and manufacturers, with a series of short-line wholesalers hanging out on the wings, is almost certain to be ripe for manipulation by one person or another. I would like to believe that the majority of people in the system are honest, but I cannot believe that they all are. There is far too much evidence that manipulation has occurred, with all sorts of distortions of the market, stockpiling and the deliberate running down of stock to force drugs onto schedule D. That is extremely worrying.

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The Government have already suggested that they want to replace schedule D with a maximum prices scheme. That will go a long way towards solving the problem, but I urge caution. If we introduce maximum pricing—I have heard rumours that this is happening already—what is to stop manufacturers simply removing themselves from the generics market altogether and saying that, for the price that the Government are prepared to pay, they are not prepared to manufacture? That would have severe repercussions.
I currently chair the all-party group on pharmacy and I have discussed some of my worries with representatives of pharmaceutical groups and community pharmacists. The worry is that if manufacturers stop producing generics, the pharmacists will be in a very difficult position. They will have only three possible responses.
First, pharmacists could refer the patient back to the GP and say, "I'm sorry, we can't get the drug because the manufacturers have stopped making it in sufficient quantities at the price that the Government are prepared to pay. Go and get an alternative prescription." Secondly, they could say "I can't get the drug, but it's worth shopping around in case another pharmacist can." That would be very unsatisfactory for the patient. Thirdly, the pharmacist could dispense a more expensive version and bear the cost himself or herself. That would also be very undesirable and an unreasonable burden on community pharmacy.
The Select Committee is considering how to enhance the role of community pharmacists, who are clearly concerned about the problem. If generics became in short supply because the price went down too far, that would be a cynical manipulation of the market and would be extremely regrettable. What does my hon. Friend the Minister think we can do to prevent that, if we do indeed abandon schedule D and replace it with a maximum prices scheme?
I welcome this debate, which is on an important subject, and would appreciate a response to the points that I have raised.
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Dr. Peter Brand: Like my colleague the hon. Member for Dartford (Dr. Stoate), I declare an interest as a member of a primary care group. I am not as sure as he is whether such groups are the Rolls-Royce of primary care or whether we are developing a Rover—time will tell.
I congratulate the Chairman of the Select Committee, the hon. Member for Wakefield (Mr. Hinchliffe), under whom it is a pleasure to serve. The Select Committee system seems to be very effective, especially in relation to the health service, because quite often we have only to announce that we are to launch an investigation, and we get Government action even before we report. The Minister is clearly proud of that fact. It saddens me, however, that it took the Select Committee only one day's worth of evidence, plus a perusal of the written submissions, to come up with real problems and suggest real solutions, prompting Government action that was too late and too slow.
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Our investigation focused not only on generic prescribing but on the bigger issue of the place of market forces in the supply of drugs to the national health service. At present, there is no such thing as market forces in NHS drugs procurement. We have an extraordinary system in which, if there is a cartel fixing prices, the Government appear to be part of that price-fixing ring, either as a willing victim or a dupe—I am not sure which. The evidence on which decisions are made is seldom published, and the way in which the tariffs are set and the pharmaceutical price regulation scheme produces its magic figure is highly secretive.
We have a nonsensical system in which the Department of Health is the licenser of the drug, promotes research and development and takes seriously its responsibility for supporting an industry that is important to this country, both economically and from a jobs perspective, but is at the same time the major purchaser of that industry's products. That system is long overdue for an overhaul. I know that the industry is not keen on introducing a further hurdle, but we must understand that there has been a massive escalation of drug costs in the past 10 years, not only in real terms—in cash terms, the cost has gone up from just over £2 billion to £5 billion—but as a proportion of NHS expenditure.
The point was well made by the hon. Member for The Wrekin (Mr. Bradley) that that is much to be commended in some instances, where there are now pharmaceutical ways of treating people rather than carving them up or relying on very restrictive life styles. As a clinician, I am extremely grateful to the pharmaceutical industry, without which we doctors would be much less effective—in fact, we would be totally useless.
The Government should consider experiences elsewhere. In New Zealand, the drugs budget was rising by about 10 per cent. a year, as tends to be the case here. A new contracting system was introduced that stopped prices surging ahead and slowed down the rise to 3 per cent. a year, which is probably a better reflection of the increased use of drugs.
We have a system in which a drug is licensed for use, but that licence does not automatically allow it to be prescribed in the NHS. There should be a separate round of contracting to determine which drug and which manufacturer supplies the NHS. That would overcome the problem to which the hon. Member for Dartford referred. If a manufacturer bids to supply a generic drug to the NHS, it will not move in and out of that market willy-nilly; it will be geared up for a big contract. A contracting round—presumably carried out annually, or on a rolling annual basis—would achieve value for money for the NHS. It is not clear that value for money and fair remuneration are achieved at present.
Mr. Hammond: I am fascinated by the hon. Gentleman's comments, but it flies in the face of all accepted principles of economics to suggest that having a single supplier and allowing other potential competitors to fall away would benefit the buyer. In the long run, that would be extremely detrimental to the buyer.
Dr. Brand: No, there is not a single supplier. There are multiple competitors and the reference price would be

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set in the contracting round. If other manufacturers wanted to compete by charging less than a particular price, we could ensure a supply of products—including branded products—at an affordable price. Research shows that the NHS drug budget could save more than £1 billion, which would pay for new drug development and ensure that new drugs were available without postcode prescribing. That could end the enormous anomaly of prescription charges.
We must either overhaul the prescription-charging system, which is based on clinical categories established in about 1950, or scrap it altogether. I think that we should scrap it because that would make life much simpler. The £300 million that it costs could be easily recouped by better contracting by the NHS. That would also move us away from the perverse incentive to which my hon. Friend the Member for Romsey (Sandra Gidley) referred; it is splendid that a knowledgeable professional has taken part in the debate. Doctors, such as the hon. Member for Dartford and myself, tend to speak on all NHS matters, but we must remember that others have a great deal of professional expertise.
We have a perverse system in which the rewards for pharmacists and dispensing GPs depend on the cost of the drug that they hand out. That cannot be a sensible way to run an economy. We must find better ways of rewarding our community pharmacists for their professional work. We rely far too much on their expertise as business men and shopkeepers who sell all sorts of other goods, which underpins their professional work. We must find a system in which they are rewarded for doing the right thing rather than for using drugs with high tariffs and high on-costs that give them a higher share of profit.
The drug industry has done tremendous things for clinical practice in this country and it is important to have an open scheme for ensuring that it has enough money for research and development. That could be done through the Medical Research Council, for example, and the Department of Trade and Industry should provide any necessary help with investment. The current system, in which the Department of Health is the main consumer and the supporter of the industry, has led to obfuscation and secrecy, which, in the 21st century, is no longer suitable.
12.5 pm
Mr. Philip Hammond: This has been a useful and well-informed debate. We must view the problem in context. The hon. Member for The Wrekin (Mr. Bradley) used some inflammatory language and spoke about price increases of several hundred per cent. There have been large percentage increases in the price of individual drugs, but the hon. Member for Dartford (Dr. Stoate) put that in context. We are talking about a problem that has added between 3 and 4 per cent. to the prescription budget and perhaps 0.5 per cent. to health authority allocations overall. I would not deny that that is a significant problem, but using inflammatory figures such as 700 per cent. does not help to achieve a solution.
Mr. Bradley: Is it not a fact that the cost of Frusemide increased by 720 per cent. in a short time? That is not inflammatory; it is inflationary.
Mr. Hammond: The hon. Gentleman's fact is indisputable, but it is important to understand that we
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are talking about a 3 or 4 per cent. increase in the overall prescribing budget. That is a significant figure, which we must address, but not a catastrophe of the proportions that bandying around figures of several hundred per cent. might suggest.
I congratulate the Select Committee on its extremely well written and coherent report, which provided a helpful analysis. I found it extremely useful, especially in pointing up the weakness of the operation of category D of the drug tariff in terms of the method of entry and exit and the lack of incentive for a pharmacist to prescribe the cheapest possible available category D product that meets the doctor's prescription.
The hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Dr. Brand) hit the nail on the head when he said that the United Kingdom drugs market is managed. When we hear phrases such as "market manipulation", we must remember that we are talking not about a free and open market but about a market that is managed by virtue of there being only one overwhelming buyer. The solution that the hon. Gentleman proposed would make the problem that he identified worse, not better.
To bring the tone of the debate back down from some of the extremes that have perhaps been reached, we should acknowledge that we are debating structural defects in a managed market. That is a matter not of honest or dishonesty—words that have been used this morning—but of market players responding to signals from the market. Those signals may be false and may lead the market in the wrong direction.
Mr. Bradley: I certainly did not say that anything dishonest or illegal has happened in the market—nor did I hear other hon. Members say that; but does the hon. Gentleman nevertheless accept that there has been manipulation and that that has cost the NHS and patients who depend on it a considerable sum, which should have gone into front-line health care? That is a serious matter, and it is not diminished by the fact that the companies or individuals who have rigged the market have behaved within the law.
Mr. Hammond: On reading the report of the debate, the hon. Gentleman will find that the words "honesty" and "dishonesty" have been used, but I readily acknowledge that the Select Committee report has identified a defect in the way in which the market operates. We can all agree that the market has not operated and does not operate properly, but, to achieve the targets on which we all agree, it is important not only that the market in generic drugs operates properly but that the Government's target of significantly increasing the percentage of generic drugs in the mix is met.
Paragraph 14 of the Select Committee report talks about delays in feedback. I had an exchange about that with the hon. Member for Dartford. It would be bizarre to suggest that GPs should change their prescribing practice as a result of the feedback that they got from the Prescription Pricing Authority. I accept that, from a budgeting point of view, they need that information, but, from a prescribing point of view, I hope that they do not need it if they are already prescribing generics.
There is no doubt that, under the present system, the overspend has impacted on GPs and on their budgets. I wonder whether the Minister has given any thought to

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whether, given the nature of the managed market in prescription drugs, it might be better for the system of GP budgeting to be based on the drug tariff in place at the outset of the budget period—together with a considered measure of what inflation is likely to be in that period—so that it is the Government who take the risk of dramatic fluctuations in prices from the posted drug tariff at the outset, rather than that risk being borne by GP practices and primary care groups, which have no way of inputting to the management of the economy in drugs and are thus vulnerable to a risk that they cannot control.
I have read the Select Committee report and it is evident that the Government did not know what was going on in relation to the generic drug marketplace in 1999. When they did find out, they failed to act effectively. Ministerial answers, with the benefit of hindsight, clearly provide an inadequate explanation of what was going on.
I think that we have agreed that, whatever the arguments about the continuation of higher prices in the market, there is no dispute about the events that triggered those changes in the marketplace: the closure of Regent and the patient packs fiasco. The first was a problem that the Government did not precipitate, but which had clearly predictable outcomes. I would be interested to hear from the Minister what the Government did in the immediate period after the closure of Regent—and, indeed, in anticipation of the Medicines Control Agency's closure of Regent—to deal with what were entirely predictable consequences.
In the case of patient packs, when I was first appointed to the Opposition Front-Bench health team, one of the first functions that I attended was the British Generic Manufacturers Association dinner in the summer of 1998, at which Baroness Jay was the speaker. I was surprised by the genuine sense of anger among the people to whom I spoke about what they saw as a complete volte face by the Government. They had given them a clear and long-term indication, both at political level during the time of the previous Administration and at official level, that they supported and condoned the move towards developing patient packs in accordance with the European Union directive, and changed direction 180 degrees when they came into office.
It is a problem for which the Government bear full responsibility. It is an example of staggering Government incompetence and an abdication of Government responsibility for moving the industry into compliance with the EU directive in a timely way. The industry was forced to implement the directive independently. Ironically, the switch of supply to patient packs is likely to leave short-term shortages of bulk supplies. Because there is a marketplace of sorts out there, short-term shortages of supply will lead to an increase in prices and opportunities for brokers. I use the term "brokers" rather than "short-line wholesalers" because, in many senses, they share the same characteristics as brokers: they are players who come into the market to seek to arbitrage defects in the workings of the market.
The inevitable conclusion from reading the Select Committee report is that, in seeking to save £20 million, the Government have precipitated a chain of events that
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has cost the NHS many times that figure. I say with respect to the Chairman of the Select Committee, the hon. Member for Wakefield (Mr. Hinchliffe), that I thought that paragraph 31 of the report, which is a gentle criticism of the Government's actions—or inactions—was a model of understatement. I could almost sense the clenched teeth as I read it. I know that Ministers would agree that the hon. Gentleman is not always as gentle in his comments on Government policy.
Again, it was ironic that the Government, who have made so much of the bureaucracy around the extra-contractual referrals regime that was implemented by the previous Government—which generated some few thousands of pieces of paper per health authority—should be responsible for a bureaucratic explosion in the activity of the pharmaceutical pricing agency. We understand from the Select Committee report that 230 additional pen-pushers were taken on to process the extra paperwork that the fiasco has generated. A total of 140,000 hours of overtime were incurred, which sits rather ill with the Government's commitment at the last general election to cut bureaucracy in the NHS and redirect resources to patient care.
I hope that the Minister will tell us about the Government's ideas for reform of the drug tariff system. I hope that she can tell us what the current status is of the fundamental review that was set up by her noble Friend Lord Hunt. The review is due to report in the summer, but the document published by the NHS Executive on 20 April, which indicated a set of proposed maximum prices, appears to many people to pre-empt the outcome of that review. I would be grateful if the hon. Lady could clarify how we should interpret the publication of that document.
It seems that the maximum price approach is precisely the wrong one for the Minister to pursue. Examples from around the world and across history show that imposing maximum prices on a market where there are shortages will simply starve the market of product. Although the decision on how to proceed must be one for Ministers, they can be sure that we will hold them to account if the result of their reforms of the drug tariff system is to make supplies of certain drugs unavailable in the UK, or—perhaps more realistically—to push the UK into being the swing marketplace for producers, which they sell into only when demand is low elsewhere, or when they happen to have surplus production capacity, so that patients in this country cannot be sure of the continuing availability of drugs.
This is a sorry story of Government incompetence, which has been hidden behind an elaborate conspiracy theory. The Select Committee's report was a good job of work, if understated in its criticism of the Government. The danger in reacting too late to the situation that the Select Committee has identified is that the Government will do what they have done already in the patient packs situation, and, in trying to save some money for the NHS, will introduce a regime which, in the long run, costs the NHS more and damages the interests of patients and GPs.
12.18 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Ms Gisela Stuart): I am grateful to the Chairman of the Select Committee on Health, my hon.

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Friend the Member for Wakefield (Mr. Hinchliffe), for initiating what is a timely debate. I pay tribute to the use of Westminster Hall. It gives us an opportunity to discuss Select Committee reports and to recognise their significance.
The Select Committee was quick to recognise the significance of last year's events in the generics market. The report on its inquiry made an important contribution to that debate. We certainly had its recommendations in mind when we developed our recent proposals for setting maximum prices for generics. I welcome the opportunity to provide some more details.
I am surprised at the comments by the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Dr. Brand), who said that it took the Government too long—they were too late—in the same breath as welcoming the Government's swift action. I hope that, in the course of the explanation that—
Dr. Brand: Will the Minister give way?
Ms Stuart: There is very little time and I should like to outline the position, but the hon. Gentleman cannot have it both ways. It seems that we responded quickly, but also too late.
As the Select Committee's report says, the reasons for what happened during previous years are by no means clear. A measured and appropriate response had to be given at the time. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, which we all sometimes wish we had, but the Committee assessed the circumstances fairly. I wish the comments of the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr. Hammond) had been as measured and considered as the Committee's response.
We regard the increase in generic prescribing rates over a number of years as a success story for the national health service. It is widely accepted that non-proprietary or generic drugs are as effective as, and in general cheaper than, their proprietary or branded counterparts. That is why we are taking action to secure higher rates of generic prescribing. The proportion of generic prescriptions in England increased from 43 per cent. in 1992 to 63 per cent. in 1998. I am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford (Dr. Stoate) will be pleased to learn that we too are committed to ensuring that every penny spent in the NHS is focused on patients.
The increase to which I referred has allowed us to channel money, and we are determined to build on that success. Indeed, we have set ourselves the fairly ambitious target of increasing the average generic prescribing rate to at least 72 per cent. by the end of March 2002, and we are well on the way to meeting that target.
Our policy of encouraging generic prescribing depends on a reliable supply of old and new generics, which must offer value for money. We believe that that can best be secured through a soundly managed and fully competitive generics market. I must take issue with the economic analysis presented by the hon. Member for Isle of Wight about how we can square the circle in this regard: how can a sole purchaser exist alongside competitive forces?
By and large, the system has worked well, but last year it clearly failed. In response to that failure, in December we commissioned a fundamental review of the generics
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supply chain from Oxford Economics Research Associates. The hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge asked what action we were taking. When the first soundings were coming in, we were assured by the market that the situation was temporary rather than long-term, but we began discussions. It was then suggested that the market was not competitive. We referred the matter to the Office of Fair Trading, and are still awaiting its report.
When it became clear that the situation was not temporary, we took two steps. One was the long-term review, whose objective was to decide whether the existing arrangements best served the NHS, and to consider possible alternatives. OXERA's work on the fundamental review is well under way.
Our priority is to safeguard the position of the NHS, and services for patients. Last year's price increases in the generics market put substantial and, we believe, unwarranted cost pressures on the NHS. The cost to the NHS in England is expected to be some £200 million in 1999–2000. My hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin (Mr. Bradley) described the pressures placed on primary care groups and health authorities. The Government intervened, and provided an extra £90 million to deal with the pressure immediately. Some of that will have to be absorbed by contingency funding.
I do not subscribe to the view of the hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge that we should change the budget for primary care groups and primary care trusts, taking the drugs budget out. I think that we are talking about the allocation of, as it were, a whole envelope. When things happen unexpectedly, as they did last year, the Government provide extra funds.
We had to intervene, because it would have been irresponsible not to do so, but it must be recognised, given the nature of the market, that we do not intervene lightly. Logic suggests that in commodity markets prices can go up as well as down. A number of factors were involved, many of which have been mentioned today. I will not go into details, but we are responsible for ensuring a secure supply chain. That means that the number of permanent players in the market must be fairly fixed: movements in and out of the market would not be conducive to permanent supply. That is why we are talking to the industry, and why we are removing category D, which has clearly contributed to the instability.
The fundamental review will allow us to make strategic decisions about the future shape of the market. We are talking to all the interested parties: this is a genuine consultation. At the same time, it appears that there is continued pressure on the NHS, and I think it important to describe our short-term response. That involves negotiating with industry—consultation will end on 24 May—on the imposition of a maximum price range for generic drugs. We propose to use powers provided by the Health Act 1999—subject to parliamentary approval—to introduce maximum prices that will be applicable across the United Kingdom, which will be reviewed in 15 months' time.
Mr. Hammond: Will the Minister give way?
Ms Stuart: Ever so briefly.
Mr. Hammond: Having given the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Dr. Brand) a lesson in economics, will the

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Minister tell the rest of us what normally happens to supply in a marketplace when a product is priced at a certain level, and someone imposes an artificially much lower price?
Ms Stuart: As the hon. Gentleman said earlier, this is a managed market. In a managed market, mechanisms must be introduced to allow the industry to operate, and also to allow the NHS to secure safe supply. I therefore do not think the question entirely relevant.
As I have said, there is a short-term review and a long-term review, and they are working in tandem. Members have asked how the two interact.
I welcome the hon. Member for Romsey (Sandra Gidley). It is delightful to work with a new Member, especially when it is another woman: we do not have enough of those. The hon. Lady raised two significant points on the basis of her experience as a pharmacist. She mentioned patient behaviour, and control of prescribing by pharmacists. We will take her points on board, and feed them into the long-term review that is being conducted by OXERA.
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield for his succinct and precise summary of the Committee's findings. My hon. Friend the Member for Dartford described the PCT arrangements as a "Rolls-Royce": I consider that equal to Rover—as a Member whose constituency is next to Longbridge, but not in any other context. He described the difficulties, but also the benefits, of the system, and explained how we should manage it in the interests of all players. He expressed concern about what would happen if manufacturers simply said that they would not go on producing. That is exactly why the long-term review and the consultation with the market are genuine. This is a two-way relationship. If we exclude the last year—which was really quite unusual—it is possible for the long-term arrangements to be successful, and we will build on that.
It was suggested that the introduction of patient packs was a major contributory factor. There is no evidence for that. Let me put on record, however, that we have not left it to the industry to comply with a European Union directive that was introduced in 1992. The directive requires the provision of a patient leaflet, and also the provision of certain information on the label. That cannot be equated with a patient pack. We are complying with the directive. The previous Government thought patient packs were the way forward, but the present Government gave no indication to the industry that we would pursue that. However, I would by no means describe our disagreement with the policies of the last Government as a U-turn.
We need to recognise the tremendous importance of pharmacists, but also the Government's responsibility to ensure that the market is successful, and that NHS patients are supplied with drugs as and when they are needed—but at a price and within a structure that give us, as taxpayers and as a Government, value for money. I believe that the two reviews—the short-term review on maximum price, and the long-term review—will deliver that.

Disability Living Allowance
12.30 pm
Mr. Brian H. Donohoe: It usually gives me the greatest pleasure to initiate debates on issues that are within the Government's competence, but, sadly, that is not so in this case. This debate is based on my concerns about various shocking cases of which I am sure that the Minister is already aware. I would perhaps not be so concerned if the issue arose in only an isolated case, but, on the basis of my information, it seems to be arising across the country. I feel—as I am sure that other hon. Members do—that my constituents have a right to consistently high service standards, but, in disability living allowance, they are not receiving them.
I should like to raise three issues, the first of which is the problem of inordinate delay in DLA administration. The second is the difficulty in obtaining, quickly, accurate information. The third is the difficulty in finding anyone within the Department of Social Security with any knowledge of anything within its remit on the details of a particular case.
Delay is perhaps the most important issue. I am told that, when a person applies for DLA, it takes 11 weeks for a decision to be made. That situation is most unsatisfactory, and I should be interested to hear from the Minister just how he intends to improve it. About 87 per cent. of cases are dealt with within 53 working days. Although those cases satisfy the Department's own targets, I think that it is a very poor performance, and that the targets are not sufficiently strong. I suggest that the Minister has to resolve that obvious disparity. Furthermore, the situation is not improving, but—although the Department's own business plans make no mention of it—deteriorating.
Some cases that I have had are taking years to resolve. I shall give just three examples. In August 1998, Mrs. Fulton, a constituent of mine, tried to renew her DLA. In March 1999, she got in touch with my office, as the DLA unit was showing persistent incompetence. Such was the incompetence that the unit offered £200 as an ex gratia payment. The unit lost files. It was inaccurate, even sending out an inaccurate reply from its chief executive. Although the case began in August 1998, it went to appeal only last month. However, because of further incompetence, Mrs. Fulton will have to go to the commissioner to resolve the situation. Absolutely no solution to the case is yet in sight.
The Minister will also know about the second case, concerning another of my constituents—who does not want his name to be mentioned in this debate. His DLA was stopped in February 1998. The tribunal was in October 1998. However, because of the Benefits Agency's incompetence, the appeal could not be heard. I understand that, as the Benefits Agency had not reviewed its original decision, an appeal is now not legally possible.
The individual contacted me in August 1999. He said that there was to be a second appeal tribunal—which, eventually, occurred in February 2000, after further massive incompetence within the Department. However, a review of the case is still not possible. In a recent letter from the chief executive, the information on

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the case was three weeks out of date. Now that we have brought attention to the case, we have finally been promised that there will be a review.
The third case is that of another of my constituents, Mr. Stewart, who first contacted my office in May 1999. He had two claims, the first of which—dating back to 1995, when the original claim was made—was with the ombudsman. The second claim was for renewal of benefit. The latter claim has, so far, taken 19 months, but it has still not been decided by a commissioner. There is absolutely no indication when a decision on it will be made.
Mr. Stewart's initial claim to the assessors was made in March 1997. I am sure that the Minister has a copy of the assessors' damning report on the handling of the case, and that he will mention it in his reply. However, even in that case, no date for a tribunal has been set.
How have such delays been created, and how can they be stopped? Time limits on resolving cases must be established, and there must be some way of enforcing them. Perhaps automatic compensation should be made to constituents with cases such as those that I have mentioned.
Accurate information is another problem, as it is almost impossible to obtain such information from the Department. Locally, I have no problems with the Benefits Agency. I have the manager's telephone number, I lift a telephone and contact him or one of his officers, and I receive a response almost automatically—in most cases within a day; certainly within a fortnight. The local situation with the Benefits Agency differs extremely from the national one, particularly on DLA. Replies take at least a month. Frequently—as I have outlined in the above cases—they are inaccurate.
I realise that the national organisation is larger, but I reject completely that it should be so inaccurate in its replies. I should also expect, as a member of Parliament, to receive much quicker responses. The worst element of the situation is that at no stage does any checking seem to be done within the chief executive's office itself. Letters seem to be written by someone outside the agency, without being checked for accuracy by the chief executive himself or by anyone in his office.
No one within the chief executive's office or the agency itself seems to know what is going on. Frequently, when a constituent's case has to be dealt with by action beyond a usual decision, review or appeal, my office has to contact someone within the agency who—I should like to think—has some understanding of that case. My experience is that, in such cases, one is passed from pillar to post. One telephones the Benefits Agency, but is then knocked about from one person to the next. One tries to resolve the problem, and one thinks that one has done so. Then, nothing happens. One again contacts the agency, but then has to deal with another person. It can go on for month after month without a resolution.
I ask the Minister to consider for a moment the possibility of establishing at the agency a "Member of Parliament's hotline", such as that operating at the Child Support Agency. It would at least ensure that we know that the individual whom we talk to will go and do something on the case. A similar set-up at the DLA unit is long overdue.
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Currently, it is impossible in any circumstances quickly to resolve even obvious problems. It is certainly impossible to resolve problems with a telephone call. When one tries to do so, one encounters complete bureaucracy. Finally, one has to write to the chief executive, who—right across the board—knows nothing about the case and shows no understanding or competence in his replies. I believe, based on both the evidence that I have gathered and anecdotal evidence, that my constituents are not receiving the service to which they are entitled.
I encourage welfare groups in my area. My constituency is not one of the leafy suburbs, but an area of high unemployment and high dependency on entitlements from the state. Those people tell the same story of delays and inaccurate information. It is bad enough that the Benefits Agency fails to reply to letters, but I am told that Ministers never reply either. That is worrying.
I am concerned that the Benefits Agency seems to think that everything is fine. Its annual reports do not mention the problems. I trust that, on the basis of what I have said and what he must know from other hon. Members, my hon. Friend the Minister will try to do something to change the situation.
Some parts of the Benefits Agency give people a reasonable service. I do not have a problem locally. However, I hope that my hon. Friend can ensure that the obvious problem in the disability living allowance unit will be resolved. I hope that he can assure me and, more importantly, my constituents, that changes will be made.
12.40 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Social Security(Mr. Hugh Bayley): I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Cunninghame, South (Mr. Donohoe) on securing this debate. He has raised some important deficiencies in the administration of that important benefit, which the Government take seriously.
Disability living allowance and its sister benefit, attendance allowance, which is payable to people who make claims after the age of 65, make a very important contribution to the welfare of the 3.3 million people who currently receive them. The Government have a responsibility to administer the benefits fairly and efficiently. I agree with my hon. Friend that members of the public have a right to a consistently high standard of service from the Benefits Agency and the DLA unit. In most cases, they get it, but in some cases they do not. My hon. Friend has highlighted three particularly worrying cases. We must address the problems that have led to those cases not being properly managed.
I shall respond to my hon. Friend's three cases in as much detail as I can. I am grateful to him for giving me advance notice of them so that I can look into the background. Despite the problems, it would be a mistake to believe that they are typical of the service that the Benefits Agency provides. We receive and process 70,000 new claims for DLA and attendance allowance every month, as well as 12,000 renewals and 5,000 appeals. Usually, we avoid making serious errors. However, the fact that we normally get it right is no excuse for getting it wrong on occasions. I hope to have a little time to talk about the Department's policies to improve the quality of administration of DLA.

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I agree with my hon. Friend on the important role of welfare groups in providing advice and assistance to people claiming those benefits. I have recently been convening meetings with the National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux throughout the countries of the United Kingdom, including a recent meeting in Edinburgh for welfare rights advisers in Scotland to discuss medical services reports, which are a vital component of the benefit. My officials and I have had a lot of good feedback and some good ideas from those meetings. As a result of ideas put forward at the meetings, we have recently started to ensure that SEMA, the contractor of medical services, regularly meets the head of the independent tribunal service, Judge Harris, to get feedback on the outcome of appeals. The Department's chief medical adviser was already doing that, but the contractor was not. The two now meet the tribunal service regularly to get feedback. It is important for us to listen to those who are working in the field with people claiming the benefits.
My hon. Friend raised several issues relating to the general delay in processing the benefits. He was concerned that 11 weeks was a long time to process a new claim to benefit. Because of the nature of the benefit, we have set a 53-day target. Whereas entitlement to most benefits depends on facts—such as whether a person has savings, whether they work or whether their husband has recently died—entitlement to disability living allowance depends on opinions about issues such as whether a person needs care throughout the day and the night. Decision-makers often need to seek medical evidence from GPs or other medical professionals to build up a complete picture of the care and mobility needs arising from the person's disability. Writing reports for the Benefits Agency is not a high priority for most doctors. I know from individual cases that hon. Members have written to me about that it can often take two or three reminder letters and several weeks to get the necessary medical report for making a correct determination of entitlement to benefit. Would that it were easier and quicker, but it is because of the nature of the benefit that the target time is so long.
We have special rules that ensure that claims from people with progressive diseases and those who are terminally ill are dealt with quickly. The Benefits Agency is currently clearing 86 per cent. of such cases within 10 days.
I accept that the Benefits Agency's performance against the target of processing 85 per cent. of new claims within 53 days has been worsening. Last year, we did not meet the target for mainstream DLA claims, excluding the special rules cases, although we did meet it for attendance allowance. I shall deal later with how we intend to improve the administration of the benefit.
I shall refer to the constituent, whose name my hon. Friend did not give, as Mr. X. His entitlement to benefit was suspended when he was imprisoned in December 1995. On his release in December 1997, he asked the Benefits Agency to reinstate his disability living allowance, which it did from the day of his release, on 10 December 1997. In February 1998, the Benefits Agency sought additional evidence from Mr. X's GP to confirm that his medical condition and the mobility and care needs arising from it had not changed. As a result of
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the GP's evidence, the adjudication officer decided that Mr. X no longer qualified for the care component of disability living allowance, with effect from 4 February 1998.
Since July 1996, BA staff have been required to seek additional evidence in all cases involving claims for the highest rates of both components of DLA, which included the case that my hon. Friend raised. In retrospect, I agree that it would have been sensible for the additional evidence to be sought before the benefit was reinstated in December 1997, although there was no legal requirement for that.
Mr. X appealed against the decision to change his benefit entitlement, but, as my hon. Friend has said, the appeals service referred the case back to the Benefits Agency, because it did not consider that the decision-maker had conducted a mandatory review of the decision to change an award of benefit.
Under the old rules for DLA appeals, there had to be a review process before an appeal could be heard. The Benefits Agency, on the other hand, felt that it had followed the law correctly in both its review decisions to reinstate the benefit on Mr. X's release from prison and to reduce his benefit following the receipt of new medical evidence.
I strongly regret that the difference of opinion between the Benefits Agency and the tribunal service led to an impasse that lasted two years. The BA believed that it would be unlawful to review Mr. X's benefit for a third time and the tribunal service judged that it would be unlawful for it to hear an appeal which, it felt, had not been previously subjected to a second-tier review.
Under the old legislation, the impasse was insoluble, however, the Government have introduced new decision making and appeals legislation which gives us the opportunity to do something that could not have been done in the past—to implement a further review. The DMA legislation in relation to disability living allowance was introduced in October 1999 and amended the legislative framework by introducing a far simpler and more flexible system. As a result, the case is now being reconsidered by a Benefits Agency decision maker and Mr. X was sent a decision yesterday. Normal appeal rights will, of course, apply to that decision. So the works are ungummed, but I regret that the system led to an impasse that lasted two years.
Although it acted within the law, the way in which the case was handled by the Benefits Agency has caused considerable delay for Mr. X, and, through his Member of Parliament, I offer my sincere apologies.
I now turn to the case of Mrs. Fulton. I am informed that, on 16 June 1999, Mrs. Fulton appealed against the decision not to extend the care component of her DLA beyond 30 January 1999. On 16 August 1999, the disability benefits unit sent all relevant documents to the appeals service. The appeal was arranged for 20 December 1999, but the hearing was adjourned as the tribunal did not have all the necessary documents. I have been unable to establish whether all of these documents were sent by the Benefits Agency, whether they were received by the appeals service or whether they were lost in transit. However, I accept that the lack of certain documents should have been spotted by the appeals service before the hearing. I am pleased to inform my hon. Friend that the appeals service has now introduced

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procedures and training for all clerks to appeals tribunals to ensure that cases are checked for completeness before a date is set for a hearing. Once again, I accept that there was a problem and we have taken action to seek to ensure that it should never happen again.
On 22 February 2000, the tribunal reconvened, but again adjourned. At the hearing, it requested a doctor's report to provide additional information about Mrs. Fulton's mobility and care needs. The tribunal has the authority to consider Mrs. Fulton's entitlement to both components of DLA if it considers that there are good reasons for doing so. Obviously, if it identifies certain questions that it needs to determine properly to deal with the case, it needs to obtain the necessary evidence. That is a matter for the tribunal service, which is entirely independent of the DSS and not accountable to Ministers.
I am sorry for the inconvenience that any mishandling has caused Mrs. Fulton. As my hon. Friend mentioned in his speech, two ex gratia payments of £100 each were made to Mrs. Fulton for this inconvenience, the first in August 1999 and another in April 2000.
The case of Mr. Stewart, the third constituent to whom my hon. Friend referred, is a long and complex one and I am afraid that I can say less in response to the points that he raised. As the case is currently the subject of an investigation by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration, it would not be appropriate to comment on the service that Mr. Stewart has received from the various welfare agencies.
I understand that Mr. Stewart's appeal against the decision of the appeals tribunal to award him the lower-rate care component for a fixed period is currently being considered by a social security commissioner and questions concerning the handling of the case should be directed to the Lord Chancellor. Like tribunals, social security commissioners are not accountable to the DSS. However, my hon. Friend asked what might be done to allow people who take their case beyond the appeal stage to the social security commissioners and to check on its progress. I can confirm that people in that situation would need to contact the appeals service and ask for a form called OSSC1, on which to register their appeal to the commissioners. On that form are the contact details for the office of the social security commissioners.
My hon. Friend made an interesting proposal that Members of Parliament should have a helpline or a complaints line in relation to DLA and attendance allowance similar to that for the Child Support Agency. If I recall rightly, under the previous Government when there were difficulties following the introduction of DLA, there was such a helpline. I shall certainly look at what happened then and consider whether it would be appropriate to reintroduce it.
My hon. Friend also mentioned the independent assessors report. Although he gave me advance warning, I have not yet seen the report, so I shall respond in writing to the issues that he raised.
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The level of service provided by the Benefits Agency and the appeals service is undoubtedly unacceptable in these cases. I apologise directly and unreservedly to my hon. Friend's constituents. I cannot undo the problems that they have encountered, but I can tell my hon. Friend what we are doing to prevent similar problems from occurring in the future.
The length of time that it takes for DLA and attendance allowance claims to be processed has increased and the Benefits Agency is taking steps to address the issue urgently. I am taking a close interest in that work. We are moving part of the work load from areas where the backlog is greatest to areas with less backlog and streamlining the processes to remove bottlenecks. We are simplifying some of the forms and letters to customers, recruiting and training additional staff and making maximum use of overtime within the strictures of the working time directive. That will have an effect, but it takes about six months to train a decision maker on DLA and attendance allowance as they are the most complicated benefits. So I am afraid that it will be some months before we reduce the times to acceptable levels.
We have introduced a programme of work within the Benefits Agency specifically designed to improve the way in which DLA is administered. This programme—the disability benefits modernisation programme—has introduced a new system for reviewing awards—called periodic inquiry—to ensure that customers receive their full entitlement to benefit. In the majority of awards that change it means an increase in benefit, although it can lead to a reduction in benefit in some cases. In addition, we are testing more personalised ways of dealing with new claims to benefit. Elderly people in particular find the application form daunting. It is a 40-page form which asks a lot of searching questions which are necessary in relation to securing entitlement to benefit. Indeed, it was designed as a self-assessment benefit in which claimants, who know best the effect of their disability or illness on their daily lives, to make an assessment of their needs. Therefore, claimants have to provide a great deal of information. We are testing the effectiveness of taking claims verbally, with somebody going out to meet claimants.
Hon. Members may also be aware that we are currently committed to introducing a fairer system of determining entitlement to disability benefits—called activities for managing life. It involves a set of proposed new tests that have been developed by and with voluntary bodies representing disabled people. If such a system came into use, it would be a significant change which the House would not expect us to introduce without careful consideration, consultation and testing, although I hope that we will be able to test the ideas produced by the working group some time next year.
The launch of the appeals service has reduced the number of outstanding appeals—
Mr. Deputy Speaker(Mr. Nicholas Winterton): Order. We must now move on to the next debate

Rural White Paper
1 pm
Mr. David Prior: The rural white Paper has been a long time coming. Its delay is one of many reasons why people living in the country believe that the Government do not understand rural issues and are not concerned about their needs. I ask the Minister to ensure that, when we finally see the White Paper later this summer, there is not too much talk about vision, and instead some tangible, practical ideas to make rural life better.
The last thing that we want is a White Paper full of spin and good intentions, covered with words such as "sustainable", "inclusion", "integrated", "empowerment" and "workable modernisation", which sound wonderful, but often to not add up to more than a row of beans.
The countryside is not afraid of change. After all, the agricultural revolution came before the industrial revolution. The replacement of the horse with the tractor between the two wars had far-reaching implications for rural life, and agriculture, on which the rural economy is still largely based, has undergone great swings in the agricultural cycle over the years.
The changes taking place are profound. If one had told a farmer even 20 years ago that the production of wheat was less important than the number of skylarks, he would have thought that one was mad. He may still think that, but wildlife and the environment are now considered more important than maximising crop yields. How the pendulum has swung over the past 20 years.
There is another major factor at work. The population in the countryside is growing, but the services that people expect are lagging far behind those available in the towns. Public transport is non-existent in many areas; police services are grossly overstretched; social services are poorly funded; and there is a lack of affordable housing for local people. There is a growing feeling that the Government have been content to spend more in urban areas at the expense of those living in the country.
Finally, the rural community, which used to comprise thousands of more or less self-contained villages, with shops, pubs, schools, police, houses, churches and chapels, is dangerously fragile. That has happened over many years. The car, the supermarket, and intensive large-scale farming practices have all had their impact. Especially for the old and the young, living in the country is often lonely and expensive, and it is difficult to make a living there.
The rural White Paper will need to address these and other issues. Inevitably, it will have to contend with multiple and conflicting objectives. There will be a temptation to descend into platitudes, and Sir Humphrey will have to be kept in close check.
I shall set out a few of my own ideas, drawn from my experience of having lived in the country for most of my life and of representing North Norfolk, a very rural constituency, for the past three years.
First, I shall speak about farming. Every aspect of farming—livestock, vegetables or arable—is going through the wringer. Rightly, subsidies for production
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are being phased out, and prices are coming down to world market levels. The post-war period in which food production and yield improvement were king, is over.
A new regime which provides subsidies for landscape management, less intensive farming systems, wildlife habitat and environmental benefit, is with us. I hope that that will increasingly be extended to include rural development. Area payments, graduated and linked to the environment or the intensiveness of agricultural practice are, in my view, the way forward.
Against that background, farmers must be able to rely on the Government to provide them with a level playing field so that they do not have to compete against other countries with less rigorous hygiene, animal welfare and environmental standards. It cannot be right, for example, to import from Asia chickens that have been fed on substances banned in this country, or to import from Europe pork from pigs that have been raised in welfare conditions that are rightly illegal in Britain.
Imports that do not comply with our own minimum legal standards should be banned, and to the extent to which farmers are saddled with extra costs not recognised in the market, they should be compensated. Furthermore, food labelling should accurately state the country of origin, not just where it was processed or packaged, and it should contain more accurate information about the production methods used.
Finally, the Government must cut regulation. The Minister of State, Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, the right hon. Member for Gateshead, East and Washington, West (Ms Quin), has just written to me stating that
we must regulate only where it is really necessary…The Government's policy on implementing EU obligations in relation to farming will be to avoid all "gold plating" of the legislation, its implementation and enforcement; to regulate in the least bureaucratic and burdensome way and to avoid implementing legislation ahead of specified EU deadlines. We will also negotiate in Brussels to secures measures which minimise regulatory burdens.
Tell that to the marines. Sadly, that does not apply in practice.
I shall deal now with the services that people need in the countryside. The Government must recognise that it often costs much more to provide local public services in rural areas, where the population is sparsely spread, than in towns. That applies to policing, school transport, social care and smaller schools.
Mr. John Hayes: My hon. Friend is right about the sparsity factor in the allocation of Government resources. Will he also note that there are some rural communities in which the population is scattered, as well as sparse? That certainly applies to the Lincolnshire fens, which I represent. A scattered population must also be taken into account in the allocation of public services.
Mr. Prior: My hon. Friend makes a good point, which is as valid in North Norfolk as it is in The Deepings. Lack of public transport denies access to goods and services that many people in towns take for granted. Central Government support for rural areas must reflect that.
There is a consensus that we must have more front-line policemen. The number of policemen has gone down by 50 in Norfolk since 1997, and by some 2,000

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across the country. That trend is in the wrong direction. Much crime in the countryside is not reported, particularly on farms. Response times are far too slow. Many groups of travellers seem to be almost untouchable and beyond the law.
There is little visible police presence in many of our market towns. The morale of the police is not high, swamped as they are by paperwork and bureaucracy. Too little of their time is spent out and about in the community. Moreover, even when convictions are obtained, the courts seem reluctant to hand out longer custodial sentences, most notably for persistent offenders.
The cost of policing geographically widespread areas such as Norfolk is not reflected in the current funding formula that determines the central government grant. That must be addressed as a matter of urgency in the White Paper.
I am sorry to have to say it, but the confidence in the police to maintain law and order effectively has been severely dented over the past few years. As Fred Broughton, the chairman of the Police Federation, said earlier this week:
The Police Service has now lost confidence in the system and the public has lost confidence in the Police Service. The public are not getting the service that they are entitled to.
On transport, the Government's high fuel tax policy may make sense in big towns where there is alternative public transport, but it penalises the rural motorist. The Government should consider differential petrol and car tax for people living in the country, and should devolve resources and decision making to district, town and parish councils, so that flexible and voluntary community transport schemes can be supported.
The Minister should note that 75 per cent. of English rural parishes have no daily bus service, 94 per cent. have no train service, and 79 per cent. have no community transport service. For most people living in the country, the car is a necessity, not a luxury. Young people looking for jobs, and pensioners, suffer the most. How does one travel to work or to get training without a car? How does one get to the doctor or pick up one's pension or visit the hospital without a car?
Sadly, the Government's rural bus partnership fund has been a major disappointment. I hope that the White Paper will reassess that grandiose but unsuccessful scheme, so that the resources can be channelled into routes and vehicles appropriate to local requirements.
I debated the subject of housing with the Minister only a month ago. Many local people can no longer afford to live where they were born. As Bob Prince of the Broadlands housing association put it:
Affordable housing is a big issue, particularly in hot spots like Cromer and Sheringham, where young families are being squeezed out of the market by second homes and high house prices.
I have two proposals for the White Paper. First, I believe that owners of second homes should pay the full council tax, not 50 per cent. as at present. That should be at the discretion of the local council, and the additional tax raised should be ring fenced and made available for low-cost, affordable housing. That would be fair and would remove any resentment. It would be levied only in districts where there is a concentration of second homes, and the proceeds would help local people on low incomes or with special needs who wish to live locally.
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Secondly, district councils should be able to negotiate between 25 and 30 per cent. of social rented housing in new housing developments. Those houses should be made available to local people. However, I do not believe that weakening the existing planning regulations is the right way forward, and I hope that there will be no such relaxation in the White Paper.
I turn last to the health of the rural community. I am indebted to a fascinating booklet by my constituent Alice Dennes, which is called "A Look at Neatishead". It describes the history of that village in north Norfolk over the past 200 or so years. She reminded me that villages used to be self-supporting, and that people had a range of trades. There were saddlers, butchers, bakers, tailors and people in many other trades that sadly have died out over the years, while forges, schools, brick kilns, chapels and churches were common throughout the countryside.
In the Countryside Agency's annual report this year, the chairman stated:
There is an unsettling fear that villages and market towns are losing their sense of community… Many rural services are closing, posing particular problems for the less well off trying to get basic services if the post office, the doctor's surgery or village shop had disappeared.
I hope that the Government will bring forward concrete proposals to help local services such as post offices, rural pubs, rural garages or village shops. Specifically, I want there to be greater relief from business rates for rural businesses and activities. I want the Government to reverse their policy of paying directly into bank accounts benefits and pensions that hitherto have been going through post offices.
I hope that the Government will do that in part by giving more resources to parish and town councils. The last thing that the White Paper should do is put any more power into the hands of regional government. This country needs less central control, and less of bureaucratic central government. What it wants is more solid, decent, feet-on-the-ground common sense from local people. Parish councils and town councils have a vital part to play in local government.
What I shall call the metropolitan view sees the countryside through rose-tinted spectacles. It regards the countryside as a place to visit at the weekend and as a theme park where the sun always shines. The reality often is not like that. For many people, the countryside can be a lonely place. Travelling around the countryside can be difficult, as can finding a job. Old people who live in the countryside can find it difficult to look after themselves. Moreover, farming—such a crucial part of rural life—is going through a period of profound and radical structural change.
I hope that the White Paper will recognise those problems and that it will make concrete proposals that will help the great transition through which agriculture is going; that it will provide greater financial support for local services by recognising the greater cost of delivery; and that it will accept that rural deprivation exists and that it must be addressed. I hope that it will begin the regeneration of our village communities and market towns.
1.14 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions (Mr. Chris Mullin): The hon. Member for North Norfolk (Mr. Prior) made an interesting speech. It contained some tangible proposals on many matters that will be given consideration in the rural White Paper. The hon. Gentleman has picked a good day for this debate, as I believe that the report on the rural White Paper from the Select Committee on the Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs is published today.
Before I deal in detail with some of the issues that have been raised, I shall make one or two comments about what the hon. Member said and about the general tone of his speech. People listening to him might be forgiven for thinking that all the problems of the countryside—which I acknowledge exist—began on 1 May 1997. They might not know, if they confined themselves to what he said, that many of the policies pursued by the previous Conservative Government exacerbated the problems rather than helped solve them. The previous Government's social policies widened the gulf between the fortunate and the less fortunate, and problems of the sort that the hon. Gentleman outlined are the inevitable result.
I note that much of the hon. Gentleman's speech consisted of calls for more subsidies. That comes ill from a member of a party that is for ever going on about the need to reduce public spending. When the Conservatives were in office, cutting public spending was exactly what they did—year by year, and on many of the matters for which the hon. Gentleman now calls for greater subsidies.
The Conservative party is willing to organise mass hysteria at the drop of a hat when there is any suggestion of a tax increase, but money for greater public spending on public services has to be raised from somewhere. I think that it is about time that the hon. Gentleman and his party paid more attention to that point, as we could then have a realistic debate.
However, one of the lessons that the Government have learned over recent years is that problems cannot be solved merely by chucking money at them. I think that the hon. Gentleman, in a sober moment, would agree with that. He mentioned agriculture subsidies, but if problems really could be solved by chucking money at them, the farming industry would have been sorted out years ago. Enormous sums of public money have been poured into agriculture. Often, the result has been increased production of products for which there is no market. It does not make sense to go on doing that, and the Government are facing up to the problem—indeed, the previous Government, in their latter days, were beginning to do the same.
The hon. Gentleman mentioned the Government's high fuel tax policy. I thought that that was particularly cheeky. I see that the hon. Gentleman is grinning, so it is clear that he acknowledges the point that I am about to make. He knows as well as I do that the fuel tax escalator was introduced by the previous Conservative Government, and that its operations were suspended by this Government.
With regard to affordable housing, I repeat the point that I made earlier: a lot of affordable housing disappeared during the 18 years in which the
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Conservatives were in office. I accept that the hon. Gentleman makes a serious point about a serious problem, and I shall come to some of the details in a moment. However, it ill behoves a Conservative Member to complain about the lack of affordable housing, given that the previous Conservative Government presided over a huge redistribution of wealth in favour of the fortunate and away from the less fortunate.
I turn now to the substance of the debate. First, I want to state that thriving rural communities are an integral part of the Government's vision of a fair and decent society. I know that the hon. Member does not like the word "vision", and I, too, have my suspicions about it. The Government's manifesto included specific pledges on the countryside—to recognise the special needs of rural areas, not to allow rural transport and other public services to deteriorate, and to give greater protection to wildlife, even at the expense of a bit of production. In addition, we are taking a series of measures to help farming through its current crisis, the seriousness of which I readily acknowledge.
Secondly, although there are problems specific to the countryside, it would be wrong to look at rural areas in isolation. People who live in the country will benefit as much as those who live in the cities from the huge amount of extra money that we are putting into health and education. The new deal programme has lead to a huge fall in long-term youth unemployment, and young unemployed people in both rural areas and the cities have benefited.
However, the Government recognise that country areas have distinctive problems that require distinct solutions. That is why we are in the process of producing a rural White Paper. It is being prepared in tandem with the urban White Paper, and both White Papers share a common set of themes.
The first aim is to achieve sustainable—I know that the hon. Gentleman does not like that word, but the Government are in favour of sustainable economic growth—with a better balance between regions, in regions and in individual cities and rural areas. Secondly, we must tackle social exclusion and ensure that everybody has the opportunity to fulfil their potential. Thirdly, we want to ensure that we meet the need for more homes in the most sustainable—that word again—way. Fourthly, we must ensure that everybody has access to the services that they need. Finally, we must strive both to ensure that everyone has a reasonable quality of life wherever they live, and to protect and enhance the environment.
We expect the rural White Paper to focus on sustainable growth and regeneration in rural areas, new directions for agriculture, access to services in rural areas, social exclusion, conservation and recreation, and ensuring that the whole of government is aware of the rural dimension.
I shall now address one or two specific issues that the hon. Member raised. First, let us consider crime in rural areas. At the outset, I want to emphasise that it is important to keep a sense of proportion. We should not pretend, on the basis of one or two well-publicised incidents, that people in the countryside are somehow "under siege". I saw those very words in a recent Sunday newspaper headline. It is simply not true. There is

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significantly less crime in rural areas than in cities, especially inner cities. Crime in Norfolk in most of the main categories—robbery, burglary, sexual offences, car theft—is well below the average for England and Wales. There is less crime in the part of Norfolk where the hon. Member lives than there is elsewhere in Norfolk. I say that to put his remarks in context, not because there is cause for complacency.
There is no cause for complacency. The Government are anxious to encourage rural bids for some of the money that we are making available to fund 5,000 extra police officers. We also want more closed circuit television cameras in rural areas. Policing in rural areas will be one of the issues that the White Paper tackles.
The White Paper will also consider how to ensure that rural communities have access to the services and quality of life that they can reasonably expect. That will cover local facilities such as shops and post offices, health, education, transport and affordable housing. The Government have already taken action in a variety of ways to support rural communities and services.
One scheme, already in operation, is the mandatory rate relief for village shops and post offices. That means that the sole shop or post office, with a rateable value of less than £6,000 in a settlement of fewer than 3,000 people, is eligible for 50 per cent. rate relief. That can be increased to 100 per cent. for any rural business with a rateable value of less than £12,000, if the local authority believes that that would benefit the community.
The Government also recognise the importance of access to financial services in rural areas. As the hon. Member pointed out, we debated that recently. We are committed to maintaining a nationwide network of post offices, which increasingly give bank customers convenient access to their accounts. That is an area of potential expansion for the Post Office.
The hon. Gentleman suggested that it was Government policy to do away with rural post offices. Nothing could be further from the truth, but we have to face the reality that more and more people choose to have their benefits and pensions paid directly into a bank account. There will therefore be a decline in that aspect of post office business. It happened under the previous Government, and it will happen under ours. Post offices must build up alternative services. They can expand into banking services, especially when banks are progressively withdrawing from rural areas.
The Government have invested almost £500 million in supporting the Horizon programme to automate every post office in the country by next year. That will enable the Post Office to offer improved services under agency agreements with banks and building societies. Some post offices already do that.
Let us consider transport. The hon. Member expressed disappointment, but Norfolk has not fared badly from the extra subsidies that we provided for rural bus services. Overall, we have provided an additional
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£170 million in the three years since 1998, including new support for rural bus services and encouragement for community transport initiatives. We have also extended the rural bus subsidy grant for three more years until at least 2004, and provided an extra £5 million for the rural bus challenge. That makes a total of £20 million this year. Norfolk has received £1.5 million each year through the rural bus subsidy. That has already supported 66 new and improved services in Norfolk.
The Government recognise the need for a good supply of affordable, good-quality housing in rural areas, especially to enable people to live near their work, and young people to live where they were born and bred.
We have taken steps to improve the quality and increase the supply of affordable rented housing. We have also introduced measures to help people who want to buy their own homes, through the low-cost home ownership scheme in rural communities.
The Housing Corporation continues to have a significant role in providing new housing. We set a rural housing target each year to ensure that sufficient priority is given to the needs of small communities. The current target is for 3.4 per cent. of new homes to be in villages with populations of fewer than 3,000. Since 1989, when the programme began, it has provided an additional 16,000 homes in rural areas.
The planning system also has a part to play. Where there is evidence of need for affordable housing—low cost and subsidised—local planning authorities can require the inclusion of an element of such housing as part of a wider residential development of suitable sites.
The rural development regulation, which is worth £1.6 billion over seven years, signifies a substantial boost to agriculture. That is part of an ambitious plan for a major switch in farm spending from simply increasing production to advancing environmentally beneficial farming practices, modernising and restructuring.
To bridge the gap until the rural development regulation comes into effect, the Prime Minister announced in March £200 million extra funding, including some £26 million for the restructuring of the pig industry, in which the hon. Member for North Norfolk has an interest. Our programme covers all parts of the agri-food chain, from the farm to the supermarket shelf, and is aimed squarely at helping to chart a way out of the current crisis, helping farmers to find new and better ways to make their businesses more resilient, efficient and responsive to demand.
I hope I have said enough to demonstrate that, like the hon. Gentleman, we take rural issues seriously. That will be apparent when he reads the rural White Paper. I hope that he will address some of the issues a little more generously when we next debate them.
Mr. Deputy Speaker(Mr. Nicholas Winterton): We can move to the next debate a little early as the hon. Member for Ilford, South (Mr. Gapes), who has initiated it, and the Minister are in their places.

National Missile Defence
1.28 pm
Mr. Mike Gapes: The proliferation of ballistic missiles is a matter of growing concern, especially because they are capable of delivering weapons of mass destruction—nuclear, biological and chemical. The United States has identified North Korea, Iraq and Iran as states which, within a few years, could deploy ballistic missiles capable of reaching US territory. We can argue about how quickly that will happen, but we can assume that, before too long, several states will be able to reach US territory with weapons of mass destruction. There will also be a similar concern in Europe.
How do we respond? It is worth remembering that, for 50 years, Europe and the United States have been within range of Russian or Soviet ballistic missiles. We have relied on a policy of deterrence to counter that threat, without the need for national missile defences. Why does the prospect of much smaller quantities of ballistic missiles in less militarily significant states cause such alarm in the United States, and why does it appear to be placing in question the basis of the deterrence policy that has been in existence for many years?
In July last year, President Clinton signed into law the Missile Defence Act, which declared a policy to deploy a national missile defence
as soon as technologically possible.
Perhaps the Minister will inform us whether the Government believe, as the United States appears to believe, that the traditional policy of deterrence is no longer adequate to deter states such as Iraq.
If a rogue state wished to kill large numbers of Americans, it would be far more likely to choose methods of delivery other than ballistic missiles. A light aircraft spraying anthrax over New York, a suitcase bomb or some other means of delivery would be easier, cheaper and probably more effective.
National missile defence is aimed at tackling one means by which a state might deliver a weapon of mass destruction. However, that means is probably one of the least likely. Such a defence could not work against a spray tank or a nuclear bomb on the back of a truck or in a suitcase.
Furthermore, one must question whether it is technically feasible to hit a bullet with a bullet, which is what we are discussing. It is easy to deploy countermeasures to a national missile defence, such as dummy warheads and chaff. Therefore, we not only have to hit a bullet with a bullet: we have to hit the right bullet with a bullet. Nor is it sufficient to deploy a national missile defence on the basis of a handful of tests. The defence must be the weapon that works perfectly at the time of the enemy's choosing and the first time that it is used for real. Otherwise, it will have failed. How many weapon systems have achieved that standard of success?
There is widespread concern throughout the world as well as in parts of the United States that the American Congress and Administration are rushing ahead with this technology before it is properly tested and that there is a political and commercial momentum behind the project, which is becoming so strong that all the
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unfavourable technical shortcomings and practical arguments are being ignored or glossed over. Let us remember that if a single nuclear warhead landed on any American city, it would represent a massive failure of security policy.
Of course, such a defence will be massively expensive. The Pentagon estimates that to deploy and maintain a single site with 20 launchers in Alaska would cost $26.6 billion. I wonder whether that money could be better spent on conflict prevention, non-proliferation strategies and conventional capabilities that are already proven, rather than on this fanciful technological fix.
We can question whether the system is necessary to deal with rogue states, whether it will work as required and whether it is appropriate. It is certainly not a solution to the threat of the delivery of weapons of mass destruction. My main concern, however, is about the implications of the programme for the future of arms control.
Under the first stage of national missile defence, the United States wants to deploy 100 interceptors in Alaska and to upgrade its early warning radars, including that at Fylingdales in Yorkshire. Even that limited deployment would require an amendment to the 1972 anti-ballistic missile treaty. It would require the elimination of the article I ban on nationwide defences and the revision of article III, which places limits on the allowed deployment areas. Article IX of the treaty prevents the deployment of ABM systems or components outside of national territory, which suggests that an upgrade of Fylingdales would require that article to be amended. Perhaps the Government could clarify or confirm whether that is the case.
Even the first stage of a national missile defence requires some serious amendments to the treaty. Amending article I, which forbids the deployment of missile defences to defend the territory of a country, would break the very principle on which the treaty is based. If we then moved to the second stage of national missile defence deployment, which would involve 250 missiles at each of two sites, along with further radars, further amendments to the ABM treaty would be required.
Let us be clear. The ABM treaty is intended to prohibit national missile defence. It permits only 100 launchers to defend a single site. Therefore, what the United States proposes is fundamentally at odds with the entire purpose of the treaty. If we amend the treaty to permit, rather than prohibit, national missile defence and then seek a further expansion of those defences, at some point it will cease to be an arms control treaty; it will become an arms expansion treaty.
Last month, in a welcome development, the Russian Duma voted by 288 votes to 131 to ratify the START 2—strategic arms reduction talks—treaty, seven years after it was signed and four years after its ratification by the US Senate. That was a welcome achievement by the newly elected President Putin—it was something that his predecessor President Yeltsin, had been unable to obtain.
At the non-proliferation treaty review conference earlier this month, the five nuclear weapons states, including the United Kingdom, said that they were
looking forward to the conclusion of START III as soon as possible while preserving and strengthening the ABM Treaty as a cornerstone of strategic stability and as a basis for further reductions of strategic offensive weapons.

107WH
Can the Minister confirm whether that means that the Government support the ABM treaty as it is constituted, or do they support an amendment to the treaty? How do the Government envisage strengthening the ABM treaty? Strengthening a treaty that forbids national missile defence should not mean amending it to allow such defence. Do the Government share that view or is their interpretation different?
The Americans are trying to persuade the Russians to accept the amendment of the ABM treaty in return for more favourable terms under a possible future START 3 agreement, although so far Russia is refusing. Indeed, when Russia recently decided to ratify START 2, article 2 of the Duma resolution stated that the Russian Federation would feel bound by the treaty only if the ABM treaty remained intact. In an address to the Duma, President Putin said:
If the United States withdraws from the ABM treaty following ratification of START-2 and 1997 agreements, Russia will pull out of the entire system of agreements on strategic nuclear forces as well as START-2 and will carry out its own nuclear deterrence policy.
That is a strong statement and there is no reason to believe that President Putin was playing to the gallery when he made it. Indeed, I believe that it reflects Russia's national position.
At the end of last month, George W. Bush, the Republican candidate for the United States presidency, said that, if he became President, he would reserve the right to proceed to a much more extensive missile defence programme than any currently under discussion in Washington. From a Russian perspective, that surely adds further to anxiety about national missile defence. Why should Russia do a deal which may well be torn up next year by an incoming American President?
The Russians object to national missile defence for the same reason that the United Kingdom wants missile defences to be restricted, and believe that national missile defence preserves the credibility of their deterrent forces. If the Russians start to think that national missile defence can shoot down their warheads, they will want more of those warheads to overwhelm those defences. That is what the previous Conservative Government argued when they deployed more warheads on Trident than were deployed on Polaris, saying that that was necessary to overwhelm Soviet missile defences around Moscow.
Will the Foreign Office ask the Ministry of Defence how it will respond if Russia starts to deploy its own national missile defence? Will the MOD be forced to consider reversing the Government's welcome cuts in warhead numbers announced as part of the strategic defence review?
Another response to national missile defence could be to rely increasingly on launch on warning, or, in other words, launching a retaliatory strike on detecting an attack, rather than waiting for incoming missiles to land. That is the hair-trigger posture, which, as anyone who knows anything about strategic nuclear matters is aware, is inherently dangerous because it heightens the risk of accidental nuclear war. Indeed, for many years, people have been trying to find ways of moving away from those hair-trigger dangers.
Incredibly, documents published in the most recent edition of the useful American publication The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists suggest that the United States is
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encouraging Russia to maintain a hair-trigger alert to allay Russian fears about national missile defence. The Americans say that they plan only a limited national missile defence which cannot challenge the credibility of Russian nuclear forces. However, Russia believes that that limited national missile defence is only the thin end of the wedge and that, at some later date, it will be expanded to provide a capability that will be effective against its nuclear forces as well as those of so-called rogue states.
Let us imagine that the United States deploys its national missile defence. What happens when, at a later date, scientists say that they are able to do more, and ask for missiles, radars and satellites so that they can work to achieve invulnerability against Russia as well as Korea. Is it credible that an American President in those circumstances would refuse to do that? He would be denounced and people would cry, "Why do we insist on invulnerability against North Korea, but accept vulnerability to Russia?" The argument about the thin end of the wedge is therefore persuasive.
If Russia does not compromise and the US proceeds with unilateral deployment of national missile defence, thereby abrogating the ABM treaty, what happens then? Russia has made clear that the START process would stop. It might not be able to afford to re-arm, but it would not feel bound by the START treaties. Verifiable reductions in Russian nuclear weapons would be a thing of the past and Russia's launch-on-warning posture would be strengthened, as it would fear that it would lose weapons if it did not use them. China will expand its nuclear forces, taking further cuts in global nuclear weapons off the agenda.
The comprehensive test ban treaty would be threatened because Russia and China in particular might insist on developing and testing new warheads that are more capable of penetrating the new missile defences. Agreeing the fissile material cut-off treaty would be more difficult, as China has already said that national missile defence will oblige it to continue producing fissile material for more weapons. Therefore, there would be no ABM treaty, the START process would reverse, the comprehensive test ban would unwind and there would be no progress on the fissile material cut-off treaty. The future of the nonproliferation treaty itself would appear uncertain. The nuclear weapon states committed themselves in article VI to act in good faith in disarmament measures. However, they would be seen to have reneged on that and, as a result, more states might consider nuclear weapons of their own and the whole non-proliferation regime would be under threat. Indeed, India and Pakistan might be even less likely to join the non-proliferation treaty.
There is still time for the United States and Russia to do a deal, but, given the forthcoming US elections, the prospects are not good. We must therefore start to consider what will happen if there is no deal and the US withdraws from the ABM treaty. Under those circumstances, would the Government co-operate with whatever the Americans ask for on radar upgrades and so on? Are we prepared passively to accept the new reality because it appears inevitable, even though we may not like it? Do we just sit and watch all the arms control treaties unravel, our own security situation worsen slowly and our relations with Russia deteriorate, damaging European security?

109WH
The issue has the potential to become the most divisive in NATO for 20 years. I do not want to go back to the situation in the 1980s, as those of us involved in the debate at that time know how damaging it was to the cohesion of the NATO alliance. The United States says that it will consult its allies before deciding to proceed. It is time for all NATO allies forcefully to make our views known. Do we share the views of Javier Solana, the EU High Representative, who states that national missile defence could be decoupling? Do we believe that it is worth jeopardising the future of the NATO alliance, European security, strategic arms control and security on the planet in the hope of, or aspiration to, some misguided technological fix? Clearly, we must say no to that and convince the United States that it must not go ahead with abrogating the ABM treaty.
1.49 pm
The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office(Mr. Keith Vaz): I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford, South (Mr. Gapes) for giving us the opportunity to debate this important issue. I pay tribute to his long-standing involvement in international affairs, to his close interest in nuclear issues and to the passionate and eloquent way in which he presented his case.
I know that the United States interest in the possible deployment of a national missile defence system has engaged the close interest of many hon. Members over the past few weeks and months. The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, my hon. Friend the Member for Neath (Mr. Hain) responded in some detail to concerns raised on the issue during a debate in Westminster Hall on 3 May on the non-proliferation treaty review conference. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence also set out the Government's views on the matter in some detail in the House during the defence debate on 4 May. I know that the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs is also examining the issue in some detail, as part of its on-going inquiry into weapons of mass destruction.
I think that it is fair to say, therefore, that there has been no shortage of recent debate and discussion on the issue. For that reason, I apologise in advance if anything that I have to say is familiar to hon. Members who have followed the issue closely. I have no dramatic statements to make in response to my hon. Friend's initiative. He will not be surprised to hear that the Government's approach to the issue has not changed during the past fortnight. As my fellow Minister of State said on 3 May, and in his speech in New York to the NPT review conference, we recognise that United States interest in national missile defence raises some complex issues. As has been evident from the debate, these of course go wider than the potential impact on the anti-ballistic missile treaty.
First, I shall focus on that question, which has been the starting point for this afternoon's debate. In expressing views on the ABM treaty, we have been careful to emphasise that it is primarily a matter for the parties to that treaty. As my hon. Friend knows, we are not such a party; that is an important distinction in international law, and one that we need to keep firmly in
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mind when debating this issue. It explains why we have not been, and will not be, directly involved in negotiations on the future of the treaty. It explains also why we have not offered proposals of our own on whether or how the treaty might be amended to accommodate the limited national missile defence system that the United States Administration has discussed with Russia.
Some hon. Members have asked, not only today but on previous occasions, whether, in the Government's view, the sort of NMD system that the US is considering would be compatible with the present terms of the ABM treaty. The US is not arguing that the system would be compatible; indeed, it has acknowledged that if it were to decide to proceed with the deployment of the sort of system that it currently envisages, amendments to the present terms of the treaty would be required. That is why the US has sought negotiations with Russia to that end.
Presidents Clinton and Yeltsin agreed at Cologne in June 1999 that the US and Russia should hold discussions on the ABM treaty and on further reductions in their respective nuclear arsenals. We welcomed that move. A number of rounds of such discussions have since taken place. It is no secret that these discussions have not been easy. However, it is not for us to attempt to intrude on them in an effort to be helpful. We have no intention of further complicating what are already highly complex and sensitive discussions. Neither the US nor Russia, nor anyone else, would thank us for that.
We have stressed consistently at the highest level that if the US decides to proceed with the deployment of a national missile defence system, we strongly hope that it will be in the context of agreement with Russia. We have made clear to both sides the importance that we continue to attach to the ABM treaty, and our wish to see it preserved. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister spelt that out clearly in his meeting last month in London with President Putin. He also made it clear that we hope that Russia will engage in earnest in negotiations with the US on this issue.
Russia cannot have failed to appreciate the strength of concerns in the US about the acquisition of long-range ballistic missiles by countries of concern. As both my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence and my hon. Friend the Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office have said, we understand these concerns. We do not believe that any responsible Government, including the Russian Government, can afford to ignore that threat. At the same time, we continue to value the strategic stability which the ABMT provides.
We believe that it is in Russia's interest, too, to see that stability is preserved. The Russians have made it clear that they wish to see significant cuts in US and Russian nuclear arsenals. So we believe that it is strongly in Russia's own interests to engage seriously with the US over its concerns about the long-range missile threat, and at the same time over the START 3 treaty.
The US Administration have said publicly that the President would have to decide whether to withdraw from the ABM treaty if the US decided to proceed with the deployment of a limited NMD system but had been unable to persuade Russia to agree modifications to the treaty to permit it.

111WH
A second question raised by hon. Members over the past few weeks has concerned potential UK involvement in any US NMD system. Let me be clear about the present position. The US has not taken a decision to deploy such a system. It will not do so until later in the year, at the earliest. Only if and when that decision has been taken might the US Administration put any request to us in relation to the possible use of facilities in this country for NMD purposes.
Reports that we have already agreed to host elements of the system are simply untrue. We cannot reasonably be expected to say now how we might respond to such a request, if and when it comes, as we cannot know now in what circumstances such a request might be put to us. All that we can sensibly say is that we would naturally give any such request careful consideration, in the light of the circumstances at that time.
My hon. Friend talked about deterrence. Neither we nor the United States are about to give up our long-standing policy of deterrence, notwithstanding my hon. Friend's eloquence and passion. However, the question of so-called rogue states is more complex. Many are concerned in the United States that they themselves may
112WH
in future be deterred from intervening in support of their allies by rogue states possessing long-range missiles and weapons of mass destruction. That concern requires consideration going far beyond long-standing thinking about traditional defence and deterrence. However, it does not mean giving up that fundamental tenet of our policy.
It has been suggested during debates over the recent past that there have been significant differences in the views expressed by Ministers and Departments. I am happy to have the opportunity to put the record straight. No such differences exist. I hope that what I have said will have made that position absolutely clear.
I reaffirm that progress on arms control remains one of the Government's highest priorities. As we have been discussing the issue, our officials have been working hard in New York for a successful outcome to the five-yearly non-proliferation treaty review conference. I am sure that the House will join me in expressing the hope that their efforts will meet with success.
Question put and agreed to.
Adjourned accordingly at one minute to Two o'clock.

INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT

  Sexual and Reproductive Health Policy
  Ms McCafferty
  To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what plans she has to discuss sexual and reproductive health policy with her European counterparts at the forthcoming European Council meeting. [122489]

  Clare Short
  I will be discussing a range of development issues with my European colleagues at the forthcoming Development Council meeting, including EC policy on HIV/AIDS.

  Debt Decision Day
  Mr. Bob Russell
  To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what plans she has to mark Debt Decision Day on 23 July; and if she will make a statement. [122099]

  Clare Short
  The Prime Minister and the Chancellor have informed the Japanese Presidency of the G7/8 that we would like to use the opportunity of the Okinawa Summit (21–23 July), and the meeting of the G7 Finance Ministers running up to the Summit, to review and encourage progress on the debt relief initiative.

  The Government are committed to keeping up the momentum in the run up to, and beyond, Okinawa, and will make every effort to see that resources are released for the eradication of poverty in HIPC countries.

  Penalty Clauses
  Mr. Gordon Prentice
  To ask the Secretary of State for International Development if she will list the contracts entered into with private sector companies for the provision of goods or services since May 1997 where penalty clauses were triggered for non-performance; and if she will make a statement. [122012]

  Clare Short
  My Department's standard contracts do not contain penalty clauses. In cases of poor performance we can withhold payment. We do not keep a central record of where poor performance has resulted in payment being withheld and this information could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.

  Defence Systems Ltd.
  Ann Clwyd
  To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what checks her Department carried out on the suitability of Defence Systems Ltd. prior to awarding the company a contract to clear mines and unexploded munitions in Kosovo. [122129]

  Clare Short
  When NATO troops entered Kosovo in June 1999, we invited a number of mine/unexploded ordnance (UXO) clearance organisations to submit 124W
  capability statements so that self-contained rapid response teams could be immediately provided to deal with the mine threat in Kosovo. Five organisations, including DSL, were selected for an initial period of two months, on the basis of experience in stated capabilities, quality of key personnel, experience in humanitarian mine action, ability to deploy quickly the requisite skills, equipment and back-up, value for money and knowledge of the region.

  The United Nations Mine Action Co-ordination Centre (UNMACC) in Pristina later requested the services of these organisations, including DSL, for two further phases: another three months of emergency work; a phase for the year 2000 to address the mine/UXO threat in a more structured way. For the present phase, DSL and the other organisations were invited to submit detailed proposals which were assessed as above, in the light of their earlier performance in Kosovo and their ability to meet UNMACC's future needs. Before entering into a long-term contract with DSL, we consulted a range of Government departments, as is our normal practice in such cases.

  DSL has been accredited by UNMACC for work in Kosovo and has been commended both as a field operator and as a co-ordinator of mine action activities in southern Kosovo.

  Sierra Leone
  Mr. Nigel Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what assessment she has made of the supply of(a) food and (b) medical supplies to the Kambia region of Sierra Leone. [122026]

  Clare Short
  Kambia District, situated in the Northern Province, remained volatile after the signing of the peace agreement last July. Although access was, and is difficult, food security assessments were carried out in January and February 2000 by Caritas Makeni and Community Action through Progress (CAP) who are local implementing partners of Children's Aid Direct (CAD). CAD are supported by the Department for International Development.

  The CAD programme began in Kambia in March. So far it has been limited to assessments and targeting and registration of beneficiaries. The distribution of inputs will commence as soon as the security situation allows.

  Halabja
  Ann Clwyd
  To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what assistance her Department is giving to people of Halabja in the current year. [122130]

  Clare Short
  We are supporting the work of Professor Christine Gosden of Liverpool University to develop a prioritised programme, in conjunction with the universities in northern Iraq and the recently established post-graduate school at Halabja. This will benefit the victims of chemical and biological weapon attacks on the Kurds, principally at Halabja in northern Iraq. The programme will include developing proposals for palliative care, curative treatment,
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  and neutralising environmental contamination. We shall consider providing more substantive assistance on the basis of these proposals. Other donors such as Switzerland, Sweden, Finland, Norway, Italy and the Vatican have shown an interest in providing humanitarian and other support.

CULTURE, MEDIA AND SPORT

  Analogue TV Switch-off
  Mr. Baker
  To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what assessment has been made of the viability of his Department's timetable for the switching off of analogue television transmitters. [121486]

  Janet Anderson
  We will be making regular assessments of the estimated timescale for the switch-over from analogue to digital transmission in the formal two-yearly reviews which I announced last autumn. The first of these reviews will be in autumn 2001. They will measure progress against the key tests of availability of digital services; affordability; and take-up of digital equipment. The Viewers' Panel, which we are setting up, will provide advice at each review on the extent of progress towards digital television from the viewers' point of view.

  BBC News 24
  Mr. Baker
  To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what criteria will be used to assess the performance of BBC News 24 in the Government's review; and if he will make a statement. [121487]

  Janet Anderson
  We aim to announce our proposals for the reviews of the BBC's digital services in due course.

  Seaside Resort Regeneration
  Shona McIsaac
  To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what measures he will take to encourage take up of Lottery funds to regenerate seaside resorts. [122364]

  Kate Hoey
  As a result of the National Lottery Act 1998 and Policy Directions issued by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, distributors are already doing much to ensure Lottery money is distributed more equitably. Research into the impact of the National Lottery on the coalfields and other areas, soon to be published, should help to identify what more can be done to ensure that those in every area, including seaside resorts, have access to grants from the National Lottery.

  Television Licence
  Mr. MacShane
  To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what the total cost was of administering the television licence system(a) in cash terms and (b) as a percentage of BBC licence fee revenue in each of the last 10 years. [122451]
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  Janet Anderson
  The cost administering the television licensing system in the 10 years to 1998–99, the latest year for which figures are available, was as follows:

  Cost of administering the television licensing system

  Year

  £ million

  As a percentage of licence fee revenue

  1989–90

  81.0

  6.6

  1990–91

  84.3

  6.2

  1991–92

  91.5

  6.2

  1992–93

  92.5

  5.8

  1993–94

  89.2

  5.3

  1994–95

  91.0

  5.2

  1995–96

  95.0

  5.2

  1996–97

  96.9

  5.1

  1997–98

  109.5

  5.5

  1998–99

  133.1

  6.1

  Concessionary Television Licences (Rotherham)
  Mr. MacShane
  To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport how many concessionary television licences have been withdrawn in Rotherham in(a) 1997, (b) 1998 and (c) 1999 in (i) council-run old peoples' homes and (ii) privately-run old peoples' homes. [122450]

  Janet Anderson
  Since 1991, the BBC has had statutory responsibility for the administration of the television licensing system, including the Accommodation for Residential Care concessionary licence scheme. The day-to-day management of the scheme is carried out by TV Licensing as agent for the BBC. I understand from the BBC that information on the concessionary scheme is not held in the form requested.

  Communications White Paper
  Ms Keeble
  To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport if he will make a statement on consultation on the Communications White Paper. [123002]

  Mr. Chris Smith
  My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry and I have already announced an invitation for any comments on the Communications White Paper to be submitted to us by 23 June. As a further contribution to the debate and discussion on the issues at the heart of the White Paper, we have also asked a number of external experts individually to prepare policy papers on a variety of related subjects, which will form the basis for discussion at a seminar in July and which will be published on the internet.

  The experts are:

  Quentin Thomas (Chair)

  David Cleevely

  Elizabeth Forgan

  Andrew Graham

  Janice Hughes

  Mark Oliver

  Damian Tambini

  George Yarrow.

HEALTH

  Motor Neurone Disease
  Mr. Edward Davey
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what support the Government provide to research into motor neurone disease; what involvement the Motor Neurone Disease Association has had in the channelling of Government resources into this research; what support the Government provide to the Motor Neurone Disease Association; what the level of Government funding will be for research into motor neurone disease in the next three years; and if he will make a statement. [120735]

  Mr. Denham
  The Government support research into motor neurone disease through the Medical Research Council (MRC) and the Department of Health.

  The MRC is the main Government agency through which we support research on the causes and treatment of disease and receives most of its income via grant-in-aid from the office of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry. In 1999–2000, the MRC spent approximately £1.6 million on motor neurone disease and on basic work on the function of motor neurones. They are also funding relevant underpinning research, for example on nerve function and damage. The MRC involve the Motor Neurone Disease Association (MNDA) whenever they consider an application for clinical trials in motor neurone disease.

  The Department funds research to support policy development in health and social care, and to support effective practice in the National Health Service. The Department also provides NHS support funding for research sponsored by charities, such as MNDA, and by the MRC that takes place in the NHS. The current commitment of centrally commissioned research projects relating to motor neurone disease is approximately £241,000. Information about expenditure on NHS service support and devolved Departmental research in the NHS are not held centrally. The total level of Department of Health support for motor neurone disease may therefore be higher than the expenditure for centrally commissioned research.

  Project details of Department funded research can be found on the National Research Register (NRR). This is available in the Library and most medical libraries on CD Rom, and on the Internet: http://www.doh.gov.uk/nrr.htm.

  It is not possible to predict what the future level of Government expenditure will be on specific areas of research as new research proposals are regularly being considered and commissioned.

  The Government do not provide financial support directly to the MNDA.

  Beef (Cattle over 30 Months)
  Mr. Yeo
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) if there is a ban on the import of meat and meat products from cattle of over 30 months into this country; [121434]

  (2) if the ban on the sale of meat products from cattle over 30 months old includes gelatine and other edible by-products; [121433]
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  (3) what checks are carried out on imports of meat and meat products to the United Kingdom to ensure that they are not from cattle over 30 months old. [121435]

  Ms Stuart
  [holding answer 9 May 2000]: I am advised by the Food Standards Agency that there is no restriction on the import of meat and meat products from cattle over 30 months, but the ban on sale of beef for human consumption from cattle aged over 30 months at slaughter applies to both home produced and imported supplies. The only exceptions to this ban are for meat from specialist grass-reared United Kingdom herds under the Beef Assurance Scheme (BAS) and meat from 14 non-EU countries that traditionally supplied the UK and have no history of BSE. As far as home supplies and meat imported into licensed premises are concerned, the ban is enforced by the Meat Hygiene Service. The carcase or part of a carcase of any bovine animal that is found to be more than 30 months old at slaughter (or over 42 months for BAS animals) is sterilised or stained immediately as an animal by-product. Local authorities are responsible for enforcement at other points in the supply chain.

  Imported gelatine and other edible by-products are not subject to the over 30 months rule. However, they are subject to controls on the use of specified risk materials in their production. The UK introduced these national SRM controls from 1 January 1998, pending the implementation of Community measures. Imports of gelatine and other edible by-products must be accompanied by a certificate confirming that they are SRM-free or that they are from animals born, reared and slaughtered in Australia or New Zealand.

  Specified Risk Material
  Mr. Yeo
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will make a statement on the recommendations of the Scientific Steering Committee about extending the Specified Risk Material regulations in force in Britain to all EU member states. [121439]

  Ms Stuart
  [holding answer 9 May 2000]: The Scientific Steering Committee advises the European Commission on matters relating to the risks from BSE. It is for the Commission to decide, in the light of that advice, whether any proposals for measures to manage those risks at European Union level need to be made.

  Harefield Hospital
  Mr. Green
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what his plans are for the future of Harefield Hospital; and if he will make a statement. [121708]

  Mr. Denham
  Kensington and Chelsea and Westminster Health Authority has undertaken formal public consultation over proposals to move inpatient paediatric services from Harefield Hospital to the Royal Brompton Hospital. A decision to pursue these proposals has been contested by Hillingdon Community Health Council and it will, therefore, be referred to Ministers for a final decision. Any decision on the future location of Harefield Hospital's paediatric transplantation services would require the consideration of the National Specialist Commissioning Advisory Group.

  These proposals must be set in the context of longer term plans. Following detailed planning and assessment by National Health Service organisations in West London

  129W
  and the Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine, a preferred option has been identified for the future of specialist inpatient services in West London, including cardiothoracic services. This would see services that are currently provided at Harefield Hospital located in a new building on the Paddington Basin site, alongside other West London specialist cardiothoracic services currently provided at the Royal Brompton and St Mary's Hospitals.

  An Outline Business Case is due to be submitted to the London Regional Office of the NHS Executive assessing a number of options, including that for the Paddington Basin. Full public consultation will be held in the summer of 2000 before any decisions are made.

  NHS Dentistry (Cheltenham)
  Mr. Nigel Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what percentage of the adult population in Cheltenham are registered with an NHS dentist. [122006]

  Mr. Hutton
  Information on dental registrations in individual constituencies is not collected by the Department. In the Gloucestershire Health Authority area 31 per cent. of the adult population was registered with a National Health Service dentist at 31 March 2000.

  In Cheltenham patients who are not registered with a NHS dentist can receive treatment under the personal dental service scheme. On Monday to Friday emergency patients can access treatment via the health authority's dental helpline. Gloucestershire Health Authority has submitted proposals for a dental access centre in Cheltenham. A decision about this scheme will be made shortly.

  Violence against NHS Staff (Shropshire)
  Mr. Paul Marsden
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what steps each health trust in Shropshire is taking to reduce the incidence of violence against NHS staff; and if he will make a statement. [121761]

  Mr. Denham
  We are determined to ensure that National Health Service staff are never faced with intimidation and violence, which is unacceptable and will not be tolerated. In addition to the national 'NHS Zero Tolerance Zone' campaign, each of the three local trusts in Shropshire are taking independent action to protect staff from violent and aggressive behaviour.

  The Royal Shrewsbury Hospitals NHS Trust have introduced the People Management Standards Document, which states that all staff in high risk areas will receive prevention of violence training by an approved organisation.

  The Princess Royal Hospital NHS Trust have recently updated their Dealing with Violence and Aggression Policy. Measures include logging abusive incidents, and the use of a 'Safe Haven' room for patients showing extreme aggression.

  Shropshire Community and Mental Health Services NHS Trust have carried out risk assessments in all work areas, to identify potential areas of weakness. Areas of activity resulting from this include additional staff training, and issuing mobile phones, pagers and personal alarms where appropriate.

  Hospital Care Beds
  Mr. Cox
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many acute hospital care beds there are in NHS hospitals in the Greater London area. [122077]

  Mr. Denham
  The average daily number of available acute hospital care beds in the London region in the financial year 1998–99 was 17,022.

  Bed data are not collected by general geographical area. The area covered by London Regional Office has been used as the closest approximation of Greater London.

  General Social Care Council
  Mrs. Ellman
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health when he intends to establish the General Social Care Council; and if he will make a statement. [122766]

  Mr. Hutton
  We propose to establish the General Social Care Council on 1 October 2001.

  Originally we had intended to establish the new Council on 1 April 2001. However, the GSCC Advisory Group, set up to consider the requirements for a well functioning Council, has recommended October 2001 as a more appropriate start date. This will allow sufficient time to complete the many tasks that have to be undertaken for the Council to begin its important work. The Care Standards Bill, which is currently before this House, proposes vital functions for the GSCC that will increase the level of safety offered to the public. We see it as being in the best interests of the public and the GSCC itself that sufficient time is allowed in order to deliver a Council that is ready and able to take forward these vital functions.

  The GSCC Advisory Group will be continuing its role until the Council is established in shadow form.

  Female Circumcision
  Ms McCafferty
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health what guidance his Department issues to chairs of local authority social services committees concerning the operation of the Prohibition of Female Circumcision Act 1985. [122492]

  Mr. Hutton
  As well as being illegal, female circumcision is an extremely unpleasant practice with lasting mental and physical effects on those girls on whom it is carried out. We have issued no specific guidance on this matter to chairs of social services committees but our wider advice, set out in "Working Together to Safeguard Children" on child protection procedures is clear. The Prohibition of Female Circumcision Act 1985 makes female circumcision, excision or infibulation (female genital mutilation (FGM)) an offence, except on specific physical and mental health grounds. A local authority may exercise its powers under section 47 of the Children's Act 1989 if it has reason to believe that a child is likely to be or has been the subject of FGM.

  Departmental Vehicles
  Mr. Pearson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many(a) cars and (b) commercial vehicles operated by his Department were manufactured (i) in the UK, (ii) in the EU and (iii) elsewhere. [122258]
  131W
  Ms Stuart
  This information is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.

  Dystonia
  Mr. Hancock
  To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many people have been diagnosed as having dystonia in each of the last five years; and if he will make a statement. [119914]

  Mr. Denham
  The table shows a count of finished consultant episodes (FCEs) in National Health Service hospitals in England where the primary (main) diagnosis was dystonia, for the years 1994–95 to 1998–99.

  FCEs where the primary dianosis was dystonia—;NHS hospitals England 1994–95 to 1998–99

  Data year

  FCEs

  1994–95

  1,414

  1995–96

  1,953

  1996–

  1,967

  1997–98

  2,477

  1998–99

  2,709

TRADE AND INDUSTRY

  Minimum Wage
  Mr. Alexander
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many employers, broken down by size of firm, have been fined for paying less than the minimum wage. [122534]

  Mr. Alan Johnson
  The National Minimum Wage (NMW) Act provides for officers to issue a financial penalty against an employer who does not comply with an enforcement notice. So far, 141 enforcement notices have been issued. Only one of these has required follow up action with a penalty notice fining the employer for each day of non-compliance with the enforcement notice. The company concerned employs between 0–10 people.

  It is also a criminal offence to refuse or wilfully neglect to pay the NMW. So far it has not been necessary to use these criminal powers, though we will do so in appropriate circumstances.

  Cosmetic Surgery
  Mr. Baker
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what assessment he has made of the operation of regulations pertaining to advertising of cosmetic surgery. [122307]

  Dr. Howells
  [holding answer 16 May 2000]: I am satisfied that the powers given to the Director General of Fair Trading by the Control of Misleading Advertisements Regulations 1988, together with the self-regulatory system operated by the Advertising Standards authority, are effective in controlling advertising in the United Kingdom. However, the Government recognise that advertising controls alone may not be sufficient in the field of cosmetic surgery to ensure that the information patients receive is of an acceptable standard and my colleagues in the Department of Health are therefore considering how best to take this matter forward.

  Chief Scientific Adviser
  Mr. Fabricant
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, pursuant to his answer of 11 May 2000,Official Report, column 445W, what engineering skills and qualifications will be required of the Government Chief Scientific Adviser. [122496]

  Ms Hewitt
  The Government's Chief Scientific Adviser will need to have a first class international reputation in science or engineering. Candidates for the post are likely to be Fellows of the Royal Academy of Engineering or of the Royal Society. In addition to being excellent in their own disciplines candidates will need to have an understanding of a wide range of science and engineering issues.

  Post Office
  Mr. Miller
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if he has set the financial target for the Post Office for 2000–01; and if he will make a statement. [122924]

  Mr. Alan Johnson
  The Government are setting the Post Office a return on capital employed target of 13 per cent. in 2000–01 and this translates into an operational pre-tax profit target of £392 million in 2000–01. This target excludes the network of post offices, where the PIU report is awaited, and the non-operational interest arising from past surpluses held on the Post Office's balance sheet. This target will be subsumed within the overall post-tax profit target for the Post Office as a whole, as described in the White Paper.

  As already announced, the 'dividend' that the Government effectively take out of the Post Office is set at 40 per cent. of the post-tax profits of the business as a whole. This is subject to a dividend floor payment which this year will be raised from 80 per cent. to 90 per cent. of the dividend that would be paid if the Post Office meets its overall profit target.

  In order to help the Post Office to plan for the medium term, the Government are also setting an indicative financial target for 2002–03 of 13 per cent. return on capital employed (ROCE) in the Post Office's operational business, excluding the network of post offices and any non-operational interest arising from past surpluses. Return on capital employed is defined as profit before interest payable and tax, but after operating interest receivable, divided by operating capital employed.

  I have set the Post Office's financial target and dividend floor for 2000–01, and the indicative financial target for 2002–03 in the light of external benchmarking, the likely regulatory environment, market expectations, the Post Office's approved Strategic Plan for 1999–2004, and other projections from the Post Office.

  Communications White Paper
  Mr. Todd
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if he will make a statement on consultation on the Communications White Paper. [123003]

  Mr. Byers
  My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport and I have already announced an invitation for any comments on the Communications White Paper to be submitted to us by 23 June. As a further contribution to the debate and
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  discussion on the issues at the heart of the White Paper, we have also asked a number of external experts individually to prepare policy papers on a variety of related subjects, which will form the basis for discussion at a seminar in July and which will be published on the internet.

  The experts are:

  Quentin Thomas (Chair)

  David Cleevely

  Elizabeth Forgan

  Andrew Graham

  Janice Hughes

  Mark Oliver

  Damian Tambini

  George Yarrow.

  Export Credit (Military Goods)
  Dr. Tonge
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many times countries which have been granted export credit for military goods have defaulted on their repayments in each of the last 10 years. [122246]

  Mr. Caborn
  [holding answer 16 May 2000]: The following list details the countries on which ECGD has paid claims in each of the last 10 years as a result of payment defaults in relation to export credits for defence equipment.
  1990–91

  Algeria

  Argentina

  Brazil

  Egypt

  Jordan

  Kenya

  Nigeria

  1991–92

  Argentina

  Brazil

  Egypt

  Jordan

  Kenya

  1992–93

  Brazil

  Egypt

  Jordan

  Kenya

  Venezuela

  1993–94

  Brazil

  Egypt

  Jordan

  Kenya

  Venezuela

  1994–95

  Algeria

  Egypt

  Jordan

  Kenya

  Venezuela

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  Algeria

  Egypt

  Jordan

  Kenya

  Venezuela

  1996–97

  Algeria

  Egypt

  Jordan

  Kenya

  1997–98

  Algeria

  Egypt

  Jordan

  Kenya

  1998–99

  Indonesia

  Jordan

  Kenya

  1999–2000

  Indonesia

  Zimbabwe.

  Gas Transporters
  Mr. Gibb
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if he will list the companies, organisations and public bodies he has consulted over the removal of geographic exclusivity of licensed areas for gas transporters. [122324]

  Mrs. Liddell
  In October 1998. my Department published a consultation paper on the future of gas and electricity regulation. Among other things, this paper invited views on the abolition of geographic exclusivity. In October 1999, the Government's proposals for legislation in this area were published. That document set out the Government's decision to abolish geographic exclusivity. It also contained a list of those who had responded to the consultation paper, leaving aside only those who had requested confidentiality. Copies of that document were placed in the Libraries of both Houses.

  British Energy and AES
  Mr. Gibb
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if he will make a statement on the reference to the Competition Commission of British Energy and AES. [122330]

  Dr. Howells
  This reference has been made by the Director General for Electricity Supply under the terms of the Electricity Act 1989 and the Competition Commission will report to him at the end of their inquiries.

  Parental Leave
  Ms Harman
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what are the terms of reference of the Parental Leave Monitoring Group and the review of maternity pay and leave and parental leave. [122360]
  135W
  Mr. Alan Johnson
  The Parental Leave Monitoring Group will assess the impact of parental leave and look at the take-up of the new right by men and women. We are currently considering the terms of reference of the group in the light of the review on maternity pay and parental leave. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State made an announcement on 9 May setting out the scope of the review on maternity pay and parental leave.

  Ms Harman
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry when the Parental Leave Monitoring Group will meet. [122359]

  Mr. Alan Johnson
  We are currently considering the terms of reference of the group in the light of the review on parental leave and maternity pay and a meeting will be convened in due course.

  Domestic Fuels
  Shona McIsaac
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if he will investigate the sales methods used by suppliers of domestic gas and electricity for new residents who are taking over previous contracts. [122353]

  Mrs. Liddell
  The Office of Gas and Electricity Markets (Ofgem) is responsible for regulating the activities of gas and electricity suppliers. It imposes a licence condition in respect of sales and marketing practices, which has recently been extended to 31 March 2002. Ofgem closely monitors the sales and marketing activities of suppliers, and is working with the industry to ensure that abuses are avoided. Where necessary it will take formal action against individual suppliers under the licence condition.

  Genes (Patents)
  Joan Ruddock
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry how many UK patents have been granted for(a) human genes, (b) animal genes and (c) plant genes. [121305]

  Dr. Howells
  Patents are only available for inventions for new technical solutions. Under the Patents Act 1977 and a recent EC Directive on the legal protection of biotechnological inventions, genes as they exist in nature cannot be the subject of patent rights. However, material—including genes—isolated from its natural environment by means of an inventive technical process may be subject to patent rights. To be patentable, such inventions would have to satisfy the general criteria for patentability that the invention is new and would not be obvious to someone in the technical field.

  To date, approximately 50 patents relating principally to human genes or variants thereof; approximately 10 patents relating to animal genes or variants thereof; and, approximately nine patents relating to plant genes or variants thereof have been granted by the United Kingdom Patent Office.

  Animal Welfare
  Mr. Coaker
  To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what steps he is taking to promote the development of internationally-agreed animal welfare standards in the context of the WTO negotiations building on existing work in the Council of Europe. [120123]
  136W
  Mr. Morley
  [holding answer 20 April 2000]: I have been asked to reply.

  We strongly supported the requirement in Article 8 of Directive 98/58/EC for the European Commission to report on the scope for developing wider international acceptance of EU farm welfare standards. Their report—which is overdue—will be a key element in defining how to approach this issue. For our own part, we have argued for the Office International des Epizooties to extend its activities to animal welfare: and we will take all opportunities offered by international gatherings such as the Animals 2000 World Congress of the World Society for the Protection of Animals to make contracts and advance this question.

ENVIRONMENT, TRANSPORT AND THE REGIONS

  DVLA
  Mr. Sarwar
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will make a statement on the differences between DVLA's procedures for processing applications for vehicles purchased from(a) car importers and (b) traditional dealers. [121316]

  Mr. Hill
  When presented with an application for the registration of a new vehicle the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) needs to be satisfied that(a) the vehicle is new (b) it meets type approval requirements and (c) VAT has been/or will be paid. Longstanding arrangements allow franchise dealers to register new vehicles without producing documentary evidence. This facility is not currently available to independent commercial importers.

  The Agency is developing similar arrangements for importers. It is intended that a revised manual system of registration which will not require documentary evidence will be available to them by the end of the summer. An electronic system should become operational in 2001.

  Sub-post Offices
  Dr. Lynne Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will list the documents and publications produced by his Department and Agencies that are available at sub-post offices. [121627]

  Ms Beverley Hughes
  I refer my hon. Friend to the answer given by the Under-Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, my hon. Friend the Member for Hull, West and Hessle (Mr. Johnson), on 15 May 2000,Official Report, column 23W.

  Tunnels (Fire Resistance)
  Mr. Llwyd
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what initiatives are being pursued to introduce fire-resistant materials in new tunnels. [121722]

  Mr. Hill
  For roads, there are a number of initiatives directly or indirectly concerned with fire and safety issues in tunnels. They are being undertaken by European and other international expert bodies. If these initiatives
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  indicate it is appropriate that more fire resistant materials should be introduced into tunnels, they will be included into the UK's current tunnel design standards.

  Following the fire in the Channel Tunnel, research has been done into increasing the resistance of concrete tunnel linings under conditions of extreme and prolonged heat. This research has been adopted by the designers of the Channel Tunnel Rail Link (CTRL) and fire protected concrete will be used in the new rail tunnels under London and the Thames.

  Penalty Clauses
  Mr. Gordon Prentice
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will list the contracts entered into with private sector companies for the provision of goods or services since May 1997 where penalty clauses were triggered for non-performance; and if he will make a statement. [122011]

  Ms Beverley Hughes
  It is not the policy of the Department of the Environment Transport and the Regions to use penalty clauses in its contracts as they are not legally enforceable. Legally valid clauses which require the contractor to make payments when in default have been invoked in 17 contracts since May 1997.

  Jet-skis and Water Bikes
  Mr. Wigley
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what the Government's policy is on bringing in new legislation to give local authorities control over jet skis and wet bikes; and if he will make a statement. [121926]

  Mr. Meacher
  Local authorities have the power to regulate personal watercraft, such as jet-skis and water bikes, through local byelaws. For instance, strict speed limits may be imposed to exclude watercraft from specific areas. My Department's Review of Byelaw Powers for the Coast recommended, among other things, that local authorities should be given a new power to create bathing-only zones and more general powers to regulate activities on the coast which affect the wider environment, such as the use of personal watercraft. We shall introduce legislation where it is needed to implement the Review's recommendations. In the meantime, we have published a voluntary code of best and safe practice for leisure craft users, and we are exploring options for a voluntary boat registration and identification scheme, which would include jet-skis.

  Mersey Basin Campaign
  Mr. Ben Chapman
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what assessment he has made of the role of the Mersey Basin campaign in relation to youth and community involvement in the North West Region. [122071]

  Ms Beverley Hughes
  The Secretary of State is aware of the achievements of the campaign in involving local communities in the care and maintenance of watercourses through the Mersey Basin Trust initiatives such as Stream Care, Waterside Revival and Green Action Grants. In addition through its Water Detectives resource packs for schools, the Campaign involves young people in the caring for their local rivers and streams.

  A612
  Mr. Coaker
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what discussions his Department has had with Nottinghamshire County Council about the impact of a Gedling relief road on the A612 Nottingham to Burton Joyce at the junction of Shearing Hill and Burton Road.[122151]

  Mr. Hill
  There have been no discussions on this subject so far. The junction lies within the area of the Greater Nottingham Local Transport Plan which is being prepared jointly by Nottinghamshire County and Nottingham City Councils and will be submitted to Government by the end of July. It will form the basis for Government funding allocations for local transport initiatives and major local road schemes for the five year period 2001–06.

  Climate Change Levy
  Mrs. Fiona Jones
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what representations he has received in relation to the proposed Climate Change Levy being applied to combined heat and power where electricity sales made to licensed suppliers are subsequently sold on to business consumers; and what representations he has received on the effect on future investment in combined heat and power by commercial investors. [122150]

  Mr. Meacher
  Thirty-five responses to the Government's proposals in the consultation document, "A Quality Assurance Programme for Combined Heat and Power", commented on the proposed arrangements for sale of electricity from combined heat and power installations to other users, in relation to the Climate Change Levy. One company has informed the Government that it has decided to defer its decision to proceed with two CHP proposals, citing a number of factors including the proposed provisions for the operation of the Climate Change Levy.

  Mr. Nicholas Winterton
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what proposals he has to extend the number of industrial sectors able to enter into negotiated agreements with Government in respect of the Climate Change Levy; and what particular plans he has to extend negotiated agreements to those manufacturing sectors currently excluded. [122123]

  Mr. Meacher
  In his Budget statement on 21 March 2000, my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer confirmed that negotiated agreements will be open to those installations operating processes covered by Parts Al and A2 of the forthcoming Pollution Prevention and Control Regulations.

  A final consultation paper on these Regulations was recently published, by the Department of Environment, Transport and the Regions, with the objective of laying the Regulations in Parliament before the summer recess. As part of these wider consultations on the Regulations, and as is set out in the consultation paper, the Government are considering which processes currently covered by Part B of the PPC Regulations should, given their environmental effects, be more appropriately regulated under Part A2. Any processes that do move to regulation under Part A2 will become eligible for entry into the agreements.
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  Mr. Nicholas Winterton
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what assessment he has made of the compatibility of the principle of rebates contained in the Climate Change Levy negotiated agreements with the European Commission's draft guidelines on state aid for environmental protection; and if he will make a statement. [122124]

  Mr. Meacher
  The Climate Change Levy agreements seek to deliver significant improvements in energy efficiency in exchange for a reduction in the standard rate of levy. This reduction counts as operating aid and is the subject of a current State Aids notification. The Government have linked the availability of the aid to helping to achieve an important environmental policy objective that the Commission shares: ie, the need to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases. The Government believe they have prepared a robust, balanced case which will deliver significant environmental benefits while also helping to safeguard international competitiveness.

  In parallel, the European Commission's draft revised guidelines on State Aids for environment protection are being discussed with member states. The UK is playing a full part in these discussions and I understand the current draft is being revised further in the light of member states' comments.

  Mr. Burgon
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what decisions he has come to following the Government's consultation on the proposed CHP Quality Assurance programme, in relation to the exemption of Good Quality CHP from the Climate Change Levy; and if he will make a statement. [123005]

  Mr. Meacher
  The Chancellor announced in the pre-Budget Report in November 1999 that Good Quality CHP was to be exempted from the Climate Change Levy. The Government's proposals for determining 'Good Quality' were set out in the consultation paper "CHPQA—A Quality Assurance Programme for Combined Heat and Power", issued in January.

  Over 130 detailed responses to the proposals were received. There was general agreement that the proposed Quality Index (QI) approach provided a sound basis for measuring the thermal efficiency and environmental quality of the range of CHP installations of different sizes, type and fuel use, and for determining eligibility for exemption from the Climate Change Levy, and for other purposes. The consultation also identified a number of detailed improvements to the proposals.

  There was also general agreement that a QI score of 100 was the appropriate level at and above which installations should be eligible for full exemption from Climate Change Levy—that is to say, exemption of all heat and of all generated electricity used on site or sold directly to other users. There will be an interim commissioning period of 12 months for industrial installations, and 24 months for community heating installations, during which the threshold will be a QI of 95.

  There was also agreement that the proposed CHP Equivalent Generation Limit (CHP EGL) methodology provided a robust basis for determining the entitlement to partial Levy exemption for installations with a QI of less than 100. But respondents argued that the datum used in
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  the calculation of CHP EGL for a scheme should be 100, rather than the figure of 110 in the consultation proposals, and the Government accept the case for this.

  Special provisions for simplified metering and monitoring arrangements for small-scale CHP schemes will apply to installations of 2 MWe or less, representing almost 90 per cent. of installations, rather than 1 MWe as previously proposed.

  The operation of CHPQA will be reviewed in the light of experience. Any changes made will apply to subsequent CHP developments, and will not be applied retrospectively to existing CHP schemes.

  The provisions for exemptions from the electricity supply licensing requirements are relevant to the operation of direct sale of electricity from Good Quality CHP. The Department of Trade and Industry's document, "Electricity (Class Exemption from the Requirements for a Licence) Order 1997 Proposed Amendments" sought views on possible changes, to facilitate CHP and other embedded generation. DTI are now considering responses, and will announce their conclusions shortly.

  I am grateful for the valuable contribution from CHP users and suppliers and other interested parties in developing these arrangements for the detailed operation of CHP's exemption from the Climate Change Levy—a measure which gives crucial recognition to the environmental, climate change and other benefits of CHP, alongside the exemption of Good Quality CHP from business rates and Government's other supporting initiatives.

  My Department will shortly publish a detailed consultation response, setting out the decisions in full. Meantime, I have placed a note with further details of the key elements in the Library.

  Aviation
  Miss McIntosh
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will he seek access to(a) cabotage rights and (b) ownership of US carriers by UK carriers in the forthcoming UK-US bilateral aviation negotiations. [122080]

  Mr. Mullin
  This Government will continue to press for the removal of all barriers to fair competition in the UK-US aviation market, including the refusal of cabotage rights and the restrictions on foreign ownership of US carriers. However, as cabotage and foreign ownership and control are banned by US law, it would require a change in US law to remove these barriers. The timetable for their removal must therefore extend beyond the horizon of the current round of negotiations.

  Mr. Jenkin
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what representations he has received regarding the problems experienced with the theoretical knowledge examinations for the JAA Air Transport Pilot Licence; and what action he intends to take as a result of these representations. [122483]

  Mr. Mullin
  [holding answer 16 May 2000]: The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) is responsible for the day-to-day aviation safety regulation, including the licensing of pilots. The CAA shares the concern of those in the aviation industry and other interested parties over the recent disappointing results of those candidates who

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  participated in the Joint Aviation Requirements Flight Crew Licensing (JAR-FCL) examinations. It is also aware of the importance of achieving a smooth transition to the new JAR-FCL examinations, but this change has been less smooth than originally was hoped. The CAA is keen to maintain a high level of standards within the UK, but none the less is looking closely into the failure rate of these examinations. I shall write to the hon. Member shortly with details of the CAA's findings and actions.

  Vulnerable People (Support)
  Angela Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will make a statement about Government plans for providing support for vulnerable people; and how he intends to take forward, "Supporting People". [122566]

  Mr. Raynsford
  Britain is fortunate in having an effective and valuable stock of supported and sheltered housing, providing much-needed help to people such as older people, the mentally ill, the disabled and those with drink and drug problems.

  As with most services, things can always be improved. The Government value the supported housing sector and through "Supporting People" we want to improve how supported housing is funded to make sure the highest quality of services are given, in the areas it can be most effective.

  The "Supporting People" programme offers vulnerable people the opportunity to improve their quality of life through greater independence. It promotes housing-related services which are cost-effective and reliable, and which complement existing care services. It is a working partnership of local government, service users and support agencies.

  Users will benefit from the increased range and focus of support services that will be provided through the partnership of councils and support agencies under "Supporting People". The programme will raise the priority of support services and encourage councils to take a more strategic approach to provision, integrating it fully with social and health services, housing, neighbourhood renewal and community safety.

  While stakeholders broadly welcomed "Supporting People" in initial consultation, there are many challenges to be faced, and many complex issues to be worked through.

  Today I have published a short document, "Together towards 2003", with an Action Plan of clear goals that must be achieved in order to prepare for the full roll out of "Supporting People" in April 2003. These are:
  May 2000
  Consultation paper on Phased implementation
  Consultation paper on Managing the changeover
  July 2000
  Consultation paper on Administrative arrangements and decision-making processes
  Consultation paper on Charging for services
  October 2000
  Consultation paper on Quality and monitoring
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  November 2000
  Announcement on Phasing
  Initial guidance to local authorities on administration arrangements
  April 2001
  Consultation on the principles of the Distribution Formula
  October 2001
  The Complete Package of guidance on implementing "Supporting People". This will include guidance on administrative structures, financial arrangements, continuation arrangements, needs assessment methodology and supply assessment. It will ensure diversity and equality of service delivery and enable authorities to plan their resource allocation
  April 2002
  First allocations to authorities based on the Distribution Formula, including transfer arrangements from current spending to new formula
  December 2002
  Readiness review—this will provide data on the main problem areas which will inform the provision of additional guidance.

  The process of implementation has started today with the publication of two short consultation papers on phased implementation and managing change. Implementing the programme is a demanding task, which can be effectively achieved only by drawing on the knowledge and experience of local authorities, registered social landlords and other providers of support services.

  I want to reassure providers and users that there will be no sudden changes to the support services as a result of the shift to "Supporting People".

  We will be providing advice and support to councils, agencies and users throughout the transition period through the publication of guidance, a series of conferences and a quarterly newsletter. We will be disseminating results from research, pilot projects and advisory groups. People will also be able to refer to a dedicated website and helpline for more advice.

  I am placing the consultation papers and a summary booklet about "Supporting People" in the House Library. They are also available on the DETR website at www.supporting-people.detr.gov.uk.

  GM Trial Sites
  Mr. Keetch
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what consultations he had with(a) organic growers and (b) the Soil Association in Herefordshire about the siting of the GM trials at Kempley, Gloucestershire and Preston Wynne, Herefordshire; and if he will make a statement. [122038]

  Mr. Meacher
  [holding answer 15 May 2000]: There has not been any specific consultation with organic growers or the Soil Association about the siting of farm scale evaluations of GM crops at Kempley or Preston Wynne.

  However, my Department and the Ministry for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food have been in dialogue with UKROFS (United Kingdom Register of Organic Food Standards) and the Soil Association about the Farm Scale Evaluations. MAFF has also been encouraging discussions between organic farmers and the GM industry

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  body, SCIMAC, and have established a forum aimed at finding ways that the two systems can operate successfully alongside one another.

  National Air Traffic Services
  Mr. Temple-Morris
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions when he plans to publish further information on the design of the NATS public-private partnership. [122974]

  Mr. Mullin
  The Government have today published an information brochure on the NATS PPP. A copy has been placed in the Library of the House and will shortly be available on the DETR website.

CABINET OFFICE

  Departmental Vehicles
  Mr. Pearson
  To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office how many(a) cars and (b) commercial vehicles operated by her Department were manufactured (i) in the UK, (ii) in the EU and (iii) elsewhere. [122267]

  Mr. Ian McCartney
  The Government Car and Despatch Agency operates a fleet of vehicles, in the following table, for the Government as a whole. Seven of these vehicles are own by GCDA but operated by the Cabinet Office (Infrastructure Division).

  (a) Cars

  (b) Commercial vehicles

  Total

  (i) UK

  60

  16

  76

  (ii) EU

  130

  41

  171

  (iii) Elsewhere

  0

  0

  0

  Total

  190

  57

  247

  In addition, one vehicle is leased by the Cabinet Office (Infrastructure Division) from Lex, which is made in the UK.

  Statutory Instruments (Wales)
  Mr. Llew Smith
  To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office how many statutory instruments have been referred by Government departments to the National Assembly for Wales; and if he will list the dates on which a response was received from the Assembly in each case. [122456]

  Mr. Stringer
  There is no general provision for statutory instruments to be referred by Government Departments to the National Assembly for Wales. The Government of Wales Act 1998 and the National Assembly for Wales (Transfer of Functions) Order 1999 both contain provisions which require that certain instruments are either subject to consultation with the National Assembly for Wales, or are subject to their consent being obtained.

  Other contacts takes place on an information basis, as covered in the bilateral concordats between Government Departments and the National Assembly for Wales. No central record is kept of such informal contact in relation to statutory instruments; and the information could only be collected at disproportionate cost.

  Regeneration Initiatives
  Mr. Don Foster
  To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office if she will list the number and value of(a) bids and (b) grants made in each of the last three financial years for which figures are available, for each (i) area-based and (ii) other regeneration-related initiative for which her Department is responsible. [119802]

  Mr. Stringer
  The Cabinet Office is responsible for the Better Government for Older People programme and the Drug Action Teams listed by DETR as under (ii) other regeneration-related initiatives.

  For the Better Government for Older People (BGOP) programme it is not possible to distinguish between direct/indirect government grants, redirected existing LGA provision, local partner funding and other contributions without incurring disproportionate costs. The Cabinet Office provides a small grant each year to help support the central co-ordination of the BGOP pilots and this figure is included in the expenditure totals.

  Better Government for Older People (BGOP)

  1998–99

  1999–2000

  Total

  Bids for pilot project

  64

  —

  64

  Accepted

  28

  —

  28

  All expenditure (£)

  322,154

  597,285

  919,439

  Notes:

  1. The BGOP was launched in 1998–99 and ends in 2000–01. All pilots were approved in 1998–99.

  2. The Local Government Authorities concerned, together with their local partner organisations, meet all the costs of their pilot projects.

  The Home Office's Drugs Advisory Service award grants to the Drugs Action Teams (DATs) for development. These grants are awarded on the basis of population, not bids.

  Drug Action Teams

  1998–99

  1999–2000

  Total

  Number of Durg Action Teams

  98

  106

  Development Funding 'Grants' form Central Government

  2,989,700

  5,035,000

  8,024,700

  Notes:

  1. Development Funding began in 1996–97. The expenditure is provided through the Drugs Advisory Service part of the Home Office. However details of expenditure for 1997–98 are not readily available.

  2. In addition to grants the Drugs Action Teams (DATs) receive funding and resources from a variety of sources including local agencies.

  3. There are 111 DATs to be funded in 2000–01.

  Mr. Don Foster
  To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office if she will list for each(a) area-based and (b) other regeneration-related initiative for which her Department is responsible (i) the amount budgeted and (ii) the total expended in each financial year for the planned lifetime of each initiative. [119794]

  Mr. Stringer
  The Cabinet Office is responsible for two of the programmes listed by DETR under 'other regeneration-related initiatives'—The Better Government for Older People and The Drug Action Teams. It is not possible to provide information as specifically requested. The Cabinet Office does not have accounting responsibility for the majority of expenditure made on these two initiatives.
  145W
  The Better Government for Older People programme was launched in 1998 and runs until end of 2000. The pilot projects are fully paid for by Local Government Authorities and their partners. The Cabinet Office contributes a small grant toward the central co-ordination of the pilots. Total cost of the programme for each financial year is as follows: 1998–99 (£322,154), 1999–2000 (£597,285), and expected expenditure in 2000–01 (£500,000).

  The Drugs Action Teams (DATs) receive funding and resources from a variety of sources, including local agencies and it is not possible to provide total expenditure figures that would be on a consistent basis. DATs receive 'development funding' from central Government, based on population data and paid through the Drugs Prevention Advisory Service at the Home Office. Information available for expenditure on development is for 1998–99 (£2,989,700) and 1999–2000 (£5,035,000). Expenditure forecasts for 2000–01 will be no lower than in 1999–2000. Resources for 2000–01 and beyond are subject to the Cross Cutting Review on Drugs as part of the 2000 Spending Review.

SOCIAL SECURITY

  War Pensions
  Mr. Cox
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many(a) men and (b) women are in receipt of a war pension. [121477]

  Mr. Bayley
  The administration of the war pensions is a matter for the Chief Executive of the War Pensions Agency, Mr. Gordon Hextall. I have asked him to write to my hon. Friend.

  Letter from Gordon Hextall to Mr. Tom Cox, dated 17 May 2000:
  The Secretary of State for Social Security has asked me to reply to your recent Parliamentary Question asking how many (a) men and (b) women are in receipt of a war pension.
  The latest data available is from 30th November 1999. The total number of war pensions in payment at that date was 299,124. This is comprised as follows:

  Number

  War Disablement Pensions

  Women

  9,201

  Men

  234,390

  Widows/Widowers pensions

  Widows

  54,714

  Widowers

  7

  Others

  812

  Total

  299,124

  The number of "others" include: 52 war orphans' pensions; 163 war parents' pensions, 23 adult dependants' pension; 1 unmarried dependant's pension; and 573 child allowances paid alone.If I can be of any further assistance, please do not hesitate to contact me.

  Housing Benefit (Scotland)
  Mr. Gorrie
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what the total estimated expenditure was 146W
  on Housing Benefit in Scotland in (a) 1998–99 and (b) 1999–2000, for (i) public sector tenants, (ii) housing association tenants and (iii) other private sector tenants. [122089]

  Angela Eagle
  The information is in the table.

  Total Housing Benefit expenditure in Scotland for public sector tenants, housing association tenants and other private sector tenants

  £ million

  1998–99

  1999–2000

  Local authority tenants

  700

  709

  Registered social landlord tenants

  167

  188

  Private rented sector tenants

  167

  163

  Total Housing Benefit

  1,033

  1,060

  Note:

  The figures for 1998–99 are an estimate and those for 1999–2000 are based on the latest forecast.

  Mr. Gorrie
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security if he will list, for(a) 1996–97, (b) 1997–98 and (c) 1998–99, the gross expenditure on (i) rent allowances and (ii) rent rebates for each local authority in Scotland. [122088]

  Angela Eagle
  The information is in the table.

  Gross expenditure on rent allowances and rent rebates for each local authority in Scotland

  £000

  Local authority

  Rent allowance expenditure

  Rent rebate expenditure

  1996–97

  Aberdeen

  8,085

  16,176

  Aberdeenshire

  6,213

  10,432

  Angus

  4,795

  5,677

  Argyll-Bute

  6,439

  6,728

  Clackmannanshire

  1,699

  5,269

  Comhairle Nan Eilean Siar

  817

  2,391

  Dumfries and Galloway

  8,250

  13,371

  Dundee

  14,621

  27,654

  East Ayrshire

  4,380

  13,929

  East Dunbartonshire

  2,635

  5,117

  East Lothian

  5,310

  7,024

  East Renfrewshire

  2,653

  3,675

  Edinburgh

  48,826

  50,486

  Falkirk

  4,409

  15,078

  Fife

  16,406

  35,550

  Glasgow

  75,549

  164,076

  Highland

  10,440

  19,617

  Inverclyde

  4,798

  12,865

  Midlothian

  5,341

  3,679

  Moray

  3,836

  5,019

  North Ayrshire

  6,994

  15,896

  North Lanarkshire

  10,096

  47,042

  Orkney

  1,074

  881

  Perth and Kinross

  6,999

  6,834

  Renfrewshire

  8,130

  22,295

  Scottish Borders

  6,384

  5,413

  Shetland

  306

  1,504

  South Ayrshire

  6,033

  12,346

  South Lanarkshire

  9,389

  39,587

  Stirling

  2,801

  9,404

  West Dunbartonshire

  3,875

  16,205

  West Lothian

  8,222

  11,790

  Cumbernauld1

  0

  1,819

  Irvine1

  0

  1,653

  Livingston1

  26

  3,009

  Scottish Homes

  358

  41,134

  147W

  Gross expenditure on rent allowances and rent rebates for each local authority in Scotland

  £000

  Local authority

  Rent allowance expenditure

  Rent rebate expenditure

  1997–98

  Aberdeen

  7,404

  17,421

  Aberdeenshire

  6,045

  10,684

  Angus

  6,257

  6,171

  Argyll-Bute

  5,650

  6,894

  Clackmannanshire

  1,921

  5,408

  Comhairle Nan Eilean Siar

  808

  2,492

  Dumfries and Galloway

  8,806

  13,075

  Dundee

  17,181

  30,072

  East Ayrshire

  5,573

  14,786

  East Dunbartonshire

  2,247

  5,557

  East Lothian

  4,991

  7,395

  East Renfrewshire

  2,807

  3,830

  Edinburgh

  47,593

  55,280

  Falkirk

  4,675

  17,643

  Fife

  17,933

  38,334

  Glasgow

  78,171

  174,654

  Highland

  10,242

  21,009

  Inverclyde

  6,450

  14,211

  Midlothian

  5,783

  4,156

  Moray

  3,898

  5,142

  North Ayrshire

  8,054

  17,359

  North Lanarkshire

  10,801

  50,268

  Orkney

  975

  871

  Perth and Kinross

  7,190

  7,257

  Renfrewshire

  8,931

  24,913

  Scottish Borders

  6,377

  5,692

  Shetland

  282

  1,572

  South Ayrshire

  6,023

  13,550

  South Lanarkshire

  10,018

  44,003

  Stirling

  2,716

  8,986

  West Dunbartonshire

  4,339

  16,457

  West Lothian

  9,785

  15,593

  Cumbernauld1

  —

  —

  Irvine1

  —

  —

  Livingston1

  —

  —

  Scottish Homes

  0

  33,145

  1998–99

  Aberdeen

  7,250

  20,372

  Aberdeenshire

  6,028

  10,670

  Angus

  6,318

  6,562

  Argyll-Bute

  6,638

  7,241

  Clackmannanshire

  3,144

  5,546

  Comhairle Nan Eilean Siar

  686

  2,390

  Dumfries and Galloway

  8,945

  12,823

  Dundee

  19,334

  29,911

  East Ayrshire

  6,265

  16,055

  East Dunbartonshire

  2,411

  5,807

  East Lothian

  5,195

  7,862

  East Renfrewshire

  2,770

  3,936

  Edinburgh

  45,229

  55,264

  Falkirk

  2—

  2—

  Fife

  18,716

  39,517

  Glasgow

  79,115

  177,905

  Highland

  9,832

  21,083

  Inverclyde

  6,472

  14,983

  Midlothian

  5,894

  4,434

  Moray

  4,136

  5,229

  North Ayrshire

  8,652

  18,189

  North Lanarkshire

  11,556

  51,860

  Orkney

  994

  832

  Perth and Kinross

  7,278

  7,199

  Renfrewshire

  13,144

  25,637

  Scottish Borders

  6,827

  5,872

  Shetland

  281

  1,734

  South Ayrshire

  6,389

  12,762

  South Lanarkshire

  10,663

  46,490

  Stirling

  2,565

  8,964

  West Dunbartonshire

  4,425

  16,314

  West Lothian

  10,742

  17,394

  Cumbernauld1

  —

  —

  148W

  Gross expenditure on rent allowances and rent rebates for each local authority in Scotland

  £000

  Local authority

  Rent allowance expenditure

  Rent rebate expenditure

  Irvine1

  —

  —

  Livingston1

  —

  —

  Scottish Homes

  0

  23,225

  1No data available for Falkirk for 1998–99

  2These authorities ceased to exist from 1997–98. Cumbernauld was absorbed into North Lanarkshire, Irvine into North Ayrshire and Livingston into West Lothian

  Mr. Gorrie
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security what account he will take in his reform of Housing Benefits of the differences between the English and Scottish housing systems; what plans he has to ensure that(a) tenants on the lowest incomes and (b) vulnerable households do not suffer financial loss from any changes to the Housing Benefit system; and what measures he plans to ensure that changes to Housing Benefit take account of other benefit and social policy reforms. [122086]

  Angela Eagle
  In our recent Housing Green Paper "Quality and Choice: A Decent Home For All" we acknowledge the importance of making sure that Housing Benefit and housing policies work together, and that the Government are sensitive to the housing policy aims and objectives of the devolved administrations.

  Housing Benefit provides valuable support so that those with low incomes can meet their rent. A basic principle of any reform is that those who are most in need should continue to be able to afford reasonable rents.

  We are determined to modernise Housing Benefit to improve customer service, tackle fraud and error and improve incentives to work. The Housing Green Paper contains proposals and ideas to reform Housing Benefit, and seeks the views of interested parties by 31 July 2000. We will take these views into account as we continue to work to improve Housing Benefit.

  State Pension
  Dr. George Turner
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security, pursuant to his answer of 8 May 2000,Official Report, column 275W, on the state pension, if he will identify separately the costs of (a) a £5 increase at 75–79 years and (b) a £10 increase at 80 years, if each increase were to be implemented without the other. [122251]

  Mr. Rooker
  The information is in the table.

  £ million

  £5 increase at 75

  £10 increase at 80

  Gross cost

  1,100

  1,200

  Net cost after income-related benefits offset

  750

  800

  Net cost after income-related benefits offset and taxation

  700

  700

  Notes:

  1. Part (a) of this question has been interpreted as a £5 increase for all those aged 75 and above rather than 75–79, otherwise people would receive a £5 increase at 75 then lose it again at age 80.

  2. All costs are in £ million, rounded to the nearest £50 million, and are for 2000–01. Figures may not sum due to rounding.
  149W
  3. Other benefits, whose rates are linked to the basic State pension, are not included.

  4. Gross costs estimated by the Government Actuary's Department.

  5. Income-related benefits offsets estimated by Analytical Services Division, Department of Social Security.

  6. Income tax receipts estimated by the Inland Revenue.

  Departmental Vehicles
  Mr. Pearson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Social Security how many(a) cars and (b) commercial vehicles operated by his Department were manufactured (i) in the UK, (ii) in the EU and (iii) elsewhere. [122254]

  Mr. Bayley
  The Department has a total of 2,753 cars and commercial vehicles currently on its fleet.

  Breakdown of the place of origin

  Cars

  Commercial vehicles

  Total

  UK

  1,1717

  61

  1,778

  EU

  883

  26

  909

  Elsewhere

  60

  6

  66

  Total

  2,660

  93

  2,753

  Note:

  Some caution should be exercised with the figures in the table. The largest single make of car owned by the Department is Vauxhall and the totals for the UK above include 397 Astras and 60 Cavaliers. There is no guarantee that every one of these cars was built in UK—some may have been built elsewhere in the EU. This is true of a further 114 cars of other makes on the fleet also shown above as built in UK. Disproportionate cost would be involved in trying to establish individually where all these units were manufactured.

  For information on cars provided by the Government Car and Despatch Agency I refer my hon. Friend to the Written Answer which will be provided by my right hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary, Cabinet Office.

NORTHERN IRELAND

  Decommissioning
  Miss McIntosh
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what assessment he has made of when the decommissioning section of the Belfast agreement will be implemented. [121150]

  Mr. Mandelson
  The Government regard the recent IRA statement as a very significant development, including for the first time a definite commitment to put weapons completely and verifiably beyond use.

  We believe we can now build on this announcement so that the Good Friday Agreement can be implemented in all its aspects.

  Mr. Brady
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what assessment he has made of when he expects the decommissioning provisions of the Belfast agreement will be implemented. [121155]

  Mr. Mates
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what progress has been made on the decommissioning of illegally held arms and explosives. [121157]
  150W
  Mr. Nicholas Winterton
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what progress has been made in the process of decommissioning illegally-held weapons and explosives. [121163]

  Mr. Fabricant
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the state of the peace process with regard to decommissioning. [121166]

  Mr. Ian Bruce
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what progress has been made on the decommissioning of illegally held arms and explosives. [121168]

  Mr. Forth
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what progress has been made on the decommissioning of illegally held arms and explosives. [121170]

  Mr. Ingram
  I refer the right hon. Member and the hon. Members to the answer given earlier by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State.

  Mr. Maginnis
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what the current status is of the de Chastelain commission; and if its role will be extended beyond 22 May. [121161]

  Mr. Ingram
  The role of the IICD will continue to be as stated in the joint declaration by the two Governments on 5 May:The IICD will continue its task under the Agreement. The Governments will now ask the IICD to consider urgently, in consultation with representatives of the paramilitary organisations, whether there are any further proposals for decommissioning schemes which offer the Commission greater scope to proceed in a more effective and satisfactory way with the discharge of this basic mandate, and to report. The Governments will make further reports as necessary. Those reports will be published promptly by the two Governments.

  Mr. Blunt
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what his policy is towards the inclusion of political representatives of paramilitary groups in the Northern Ireland Executive without the decommissioning of illegally held arms and explosives. [121165]

  Mr. Mandelson
  Our policy is to achieve both devolution and decommissioning on terms consistent with the Good Friday Agreement. With the British and Irish Governments' Joint Statement on 5 May and the IRA statement of 6 May, I believe there is now a basis for making progress in achieving both objectives.

  EU Structural Funds
  Ms Buck
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland when he last met European Commissioners to discuss EU structural funds allocated to Northern Ireland. [121152]

  Mr. Ingram
  On 25 November 1999 I met with Commissioner Neil Kinnock (Vice President Administrative Reform) over dinner at Hillsborough Castle but was unable to meet Commissioner Barnier (DG Regio) during his visit on 4 February 2000 due to political developments in relation to the suspension of devolution.

  I hope to have the opportunity to meet Commissioner Barnier on 18 May in London.

  Devolution
  Sir Raymond Whitney
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what steps have been taken to re-establish the Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly. [121153]

  Mr. Ottaway
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what steps have been taken to re-establish the Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly. [121159]

  Mr. Bill O'Brien
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what assessment he has made of the prospects for re-establishing the Executive in Northern Ireland; and if he will make a statement. [121171]

  Mr. Mandelson
  I refer the hon. Members and my hon. Friend to the answer I gave earlier today to my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip-Northwood (Mr. Wilkinson).

  Peace Process
  Mr. Corbyn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the current state of the peace process. [121154]

  Mr. Mandelson
  I refer the hon. Gentleman to my statement to the House on 8 May.

  Mr. John Smith
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland when he last met the Irish Prime Minister to discuss progress towards peace. [121158]

  Mr. Ivan Lewis
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland when he last met the Irish Prime Minister to discuss progress on the peace process. [121160]

  Mr. Mandelson
  I last met the Irish Prime Minister during an intense period of negotiations at Hillsborough on 4 and 5 May.

  Exiles
  Mr. Barnes
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will take further steps to gather statistics on the numbers of those exiled from their homes in Northern Ireland by paramilitary organisations. [121156]

  Mr. Ingram
  Currently the RUC record figures relating to reported intimidation but paramilitary expulsions cannot be separately identified. Figures on exclusions are particularly hard to calculate, since those affected are often reluctant to notify the police. Exclusions can also vary from temporary decisions to leave a town or area within it and total "exclusion" from Northern Ireland. We would be prepared to explore ways with the police in which the quality of these statistics could be improved, but it is not easy to gather accurate statistics in this area.

  Security
  Mrs. Laing
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement about the security situation in Northern Ireland. [121162]

  Mr. Ingram
  The main paramilitary groups are maintaining their ceasefires and the recent IRA statement reflects a real reduction in the threat from that quarter. There remains a threat from dissident paramilitaries who 152W
  are opposed to the Good Friday Agreement, and the security forces will continue to thwart attempts by these groups to undermine the peace process.

  Victim Support
  Mr. Hilary Benn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what assessment he has made of the impact of the Government's programmes for victim support. [121164]

  Mr. Ingram
  Victim Support, which is funded by £737,000 from Government, dealt with 33,000 referrals of victims of crime during 1999–2000. The Government have also committed more than £6.25 million over three years to support victims of the Troubles. An evaluation of the Small Grants Scheme operated by the Community Relations Council is currently under way, and we have agreed to review the Core Funding Programme for victims groups, which is being administered by the Northern Ireland Voluntary Trust, during the 2001–02 financial year.

  Goidelic Languages
  Mr. Flynn
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what proposals he has to promote tuition in Goidelic languages. [121167]

  Mr. George Howarth
  The Education (Northern Ireland) Order 1998 gave the Department of Education the power to fund a body which has as its objective the encouragement or promotion of Irish-medium education. Work is currently in hand to establish a new body, Comhairle Na Gaelscolaiochta, for this purpose. An Irish-medium curriculum materials unit has been established in St. Mary's University College, a College of the Queen's University of Belfast, under the auspices of the Education and Library Boards' Curriculum Advisory and Support Services, to provide a central source of Irish-medium expertise to support schools throughout Northern Ireland. The Northern Ireland Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment provides GCSE and GCE A level examinations through the medium of Irish in subjects as required.

  Giant's Causeway
  Mr. Mackinlay
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the destruction by fire of the facilities at the Giant's Causeway. [121169]

  Mr. Ingram
  The fire at the Giant's Causeway Visitor Centre destroyed 80 per cent. of the building. Senior Government officials met Moyle District Council on 4 May to discuss the development of a permanent replacement and the provision of temporary buildings in the interim so that services to visitors can be maintained. The Council has been asked to liaise with Government on a way forward.

  British-Irish Council
  Mr. Gordon Prentice
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how often he has attended meetings of the British-Irish Council. [121151]

  Mr. Mandelson
  I attended the first and only meeting to date of the British-Irish Council on 17 December 1999.
  153W
  Further meetings will follow the restoration of the Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive.

  Belfast Port
  Mr. Borrow
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement on the future of Belfast Port. [121143]

  Mr. Ingram
  A proposal by Belfast Harbour Commissioners involving the transport of the Port of Belfast to the private sector, with a view to establishing a public/private partnership, with Government retaining a 'golden' share interest, is under consideration. A further option, involving the restructuring of the Port while retaining its trust port status, is also being examined at present.

  Given the vital role of the Port in relation to the Northern Ireland economy, its future is a matter of considerable importance not only to the port authority and port users, but also to those in industry and commerce in Northern Ireland. I am hopeful that the Executive will be restored before the end of this month and I am sure that the future of the Port of Belfast will be high on its agenda.

  Sheltered Accommodation (Burglaries)
  Mr. Maginnis
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement about the number of burglaries at sheltered accommodation complexes in Northern Ireland from January 1997 to date; how many within the control of each housing association have been burgled; what has been the total number of occasions on which burglaries have occurred; how many residents have lost property; and what has been the estimated total value of property stolen. [121231]

  Mr. Ingram
  The information requested is not readily available and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.

  Mr. Maginnis
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will make a statement about window and double-glazing installations in sheltered accommodation complexes which make them vulnerable to burglars; and if he will require housing associations to take immediate measures to improve security at their properties. [121232]

  Mr. George Howarth
  It is deplorable that burglars are targeting the elderly in this way. The problem with certain window and double-glazing installations is not, however, confined to sheltered accommodation complexes. It applies to other housing, residential and non-domestic premises where such glazing was used. Those double-glazed windows most at risk were probably installed in the late 1980s/early 1990s, and it would appear that some window types may be more vulnerable than others. Where problems are identified, additional measures can be incorporated in the existing frame to enhance security. Housing associations have already undertaken a number of modifications. In 1991, the Department introduced a new requirement for housing association developments that "the design of doors and windows minimise the risk of forced entry". The Department will write to all associations drawing attention to the current situation. It will consult with the Northern 154W
  Ireland Federation of Housing Associations on whether any additional guidance is needed, and if the programme of identification and modification can be accelerated.

  Mr. Maginnis
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will ensure that elderly residents within sheltered accommodation do not suffer financial loss as a result of burglaries arising from structural or glazing installation inadequacies at these complexes. [121233]

  Mr. George Howarth
  No. Housing Associations are required to insure property against structural damage and it is the responsibility of individuals to insure the contents of their properties against theft or damage.

  Mr. Maginnis
  To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what discussions the RUC has had about appointing a co-ordinated task force to deal with burglary from sheltered accommodation; how many individuals have been charged with burglary from sheltered accommodation since January 1997; what convictions have been achieved; and what penalties have been imposed in each case. [121234]

  Mr. Ingram
  The Royal Ulster Constabulary is not aware of a problem specific to burglaries from sheltered dwellings. If the hon. Member would care to provide me with more details I would be happy to look into the matter.

  The information requested on detection and convictions is not readily available and could be provided only at a disproportionate cost.

PRIME MINISTER

  Interception of Communications Act
  Mr. MacShane
  To ask the Prime Minister what arrangements have been made to appoint a Commissioner under section 8 of the Interception of Communications Act following the expiration of Lord Nolan of Brasted's appointment on 10 April; and if he will make a statement. [122801]

  The Prime Minister
  Lord Justice Swinton Thomas has accepted an appointment as the Interception of Communications Commissioner for a period of three years from 10 April 2000. I thank his predecessor, Lord Nolan of Brasted for the great contribution he made during the six years he spent as Interception Communications Commissioner.

  Sanctions
  Mr. Dalyell
  To ask the Prime Minister if he will discuss with Kofi Annan the allowing of sanctions against(a) Serbia and (b) Iraq to be lifted on goods relating to bona fide scientific and technological work, essential to food testing and civil manufacturing industry. [121302]

  The Prime Minister
  I refer my hon. Friend to the answer given to him by the Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the hon. Member for Neath (Mr. Hain) on 8 May 2000,Official Report, column 258W.

  Engagements
  Sir Peter Tapsell
  To ask the Prime Minister if he will list his official engagements for Wednesday 17 May. [122108]

  The Prime Minister
  This morning I had meetings with Ministerial colleagues and others. In addition to my duties in the House I will have further such meetings later today.

FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS

  eEurope
  Mr. Woodward
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs which targets announced following the European Council meeting in Lisbon on eEurope in March and agreed to by the United Kingdom have been fully implemented; and what is the timetable for implementing the remaining targets. [122444]

  Mrs. Liddell
  I have been asked to reply

  The Special European Council in Lisbon in March reached a number of conclusions under the heading of "An information society for all". The chief conclusions with targets were:
  The adoption as rapidly as possible during 2000 of pending legislation on the legal framework for e-commerce, on copyright and related rights, e-money, distance selling of financial services, jurisdiction and the enforcement of judgments, and the dual-use export control regime; and also the promotion of consumer confidence in e-commerce, in particular through alternative dispute resolution systems;
  The conclusion as early as possible in 2001 of work on legislative proposals following the Commission's 1999 review of the EU's telecoms regulatory framework; meeting the frequency requirements for future mobile communications systems in a timely and efficient manner; and completing fully integrated and liberalised telecommunications markets by the end of 2001;
  Work towards introducing greater competition in local access networks before the end of 2000 and unbundling the local loop;
  Ensuring that all schools in the EU have access to the Internet and multimedia resources by the end of 2001, and that all teachers needed are skilled in the use of the Internet and multimedia resources by the end of 2002;
  Ensuring generalised electronic access to main basic public services by 2003;
  With the support of the EIB, making available in all European countries low cost, high-speed interconnected networks for Internet access and fostering the development of state-of-the-art information technology and other telecom networks as well as the content for those networks, with specific targets in the eEurope action plan.

  The Special European Council asked the Commission to produce a comprehensive action plan with targets as part of its eEurope initiative, which identifies ways to reinforce a digital culture among European businesses, schools, individuals and public administrations. The Commission is expected to publish shortly a draft action plan with targets, for agreement by Heads of State and Government at the Feira European Council in June. We expect the action plan to include these and other areas related to developing the information society.
  156W
  As the earliest of the targets identified above is the end of this year, most of the related activity is still in progress. However, the Council and the European Parliament have given an important lead by fast tracking the adoption of the E-Commerce Directive, which sets the legal framework for e-commerce in Europe by removing barriers to cross-border electronic business and providing legal certainty on issues such as the liability of intermediary service providers, e-contracts and information to be provided to consumers. Adoption is expected in the next few weeks, with implementation in all member states to follow within 18 months.

  Treaty of Nice
  Mr. Redwood
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will list the dates in 2000 for(a) negotiating sessions and (b) other meetings on the draft Treaty of Nice. [120808]

  Mr. Vaz
  [holding answer 5 May 2000]: A timetable for the intergovernmental conference negotiations until the end of the current Portuguese Presidency is available in the Library of the House of Commons. The French Government have yet to publish a timetable for their Presidency, which runs from 1 July until the end of the year.

  British Embassy Vehicles
  Mr. Baker
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, pursuant to his answer of 2 May 2000,Official Report, column 68W, on British Embassy vehicles, what the (a) cost, (b) make and (c) model was of the motor vehicles leased for use by British diplomatic representatives in Germany since 1 May 1997. [121508]

  Mr. Vaz
  [holding answer 11 May 2000]: Posts in Germany currently spend a total annual cost of DM 438,005.52 (£136,876.73 @ 3.20) on leased vehicles. The annual costs since 1 May 1997 would not be too different. The make and model of the vehicles currently being used are:

  Berlin/Bonn/BTO Leipzig

  Rolls Royce—Silver Seraph

  Jaguar—XJ8

  Rover—75 2.0 Ltr

  Rover—75 2.0 Ltr

  Rover—75 2.0 Ltr

  Rover—75 2.0 Ltr

  Rover—600 2.0 Ltr

  Rover—600 1.8 Ltr

  Rover—600 1.8 Ltr

  Rover—600 1.8 Ltr

  Rover—216 1.4 Ltr

  Mercedes Lorry—7.5 Ton

  Ford—Courier

  Ford—Courier

  VW—Minibus

  Land Rover—Discovery

  Frankfurt

  Roverx2014;825 SI LUX

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  Munich

  Rover—825 SI LUX

  Rover—600 2.0 Ltr

  Dusseldorf

  Jaguar—XJ6

  Rover—825 SI LUX

  Rover—600 2.0 Ltr

  Rover—400 1.6 Ltr

  Stuttgart

  Rover—75 2.0 Ltr.

  Since 1 May 1997 the overall composition of the fleet has remained more or less the same.

  Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe
  Mr. Maude
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what factors underlay the decision taken at the Lisbon Summit to involve commissioners Solana and Patten in implementation of the Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe. [121976]

  Mr. Vaz
  The Lisbon European Council invited High Representative Solana and Commissioner Patten "to enhance co-ordination with the Stability Pact and other efforts of the international community". This is intended to maximise the international community's overall contribution to the Balkans by making co-ordination among the different players as effective as possible.

  The Danube
  Mr. Maude
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (1) what proposal was made by the Regional Funding Conference on 30 March to reopen the Danube for international and local traffic; [121830]

  (2) what grant the European Commission has given to finance removal of obstacles in the Danube. [121831]

  Mr. Vaz
  On 25 January the Danube Commission submitted a proposal for clearance of the Danube to the European Commission. The European Union has provisionally agreed to finance 85 per cent. of the total 24.1 million euro cost of the clearance work, conditional on the Danube Commission providing clarification on outstanding technical questions.

  The Danube Commission proposal was also cleared by the European Investment Bank and included in a list setting out EIB projects at the Stability Pact Regional Funding Conference on 30 March. The EIB has not, however, agreed additional funding for the proposal.

  British Council
  Mr. Wyatt
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what the reduction has been in the number of London-appointed British Council staff serving overseas since 1997; and if he will make a statement on the impact of these reductions on the work of the British Council. [121823]

  Mr. Hain
  The number of London-appointed British Council staff serving overseas has been reduced by 6 per cent. since 1997–98. This reduction has been partly offset by the appointment of skilled local managers in the Council's local offices.
  158W
  Mr. Wyatt
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make it his policy to increase the programme funds available to British Council offices in developing countries. [121822]

  Mr. Hain
  The British Council performs a valuable role and should be properly funded. It is already able to bid against a range of FCO programme funds; for example, it manages some 50 per cent. of Human Rights Projects Fund activities. Its freedom to bid for access to these funds will continue.

  Mr. Wyatt
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what his policy is on changing in the funding of the British Council when it is required to operate in additional countries. [121828]

  Mr. Hain
  The British Council is funded through grant-in-aid, voted by Parliament, for its activities world-wide rather than through specific grants for individual countries. We expect the Council to reshape its representation around the world as required, including opening new offices, within the resources it has from the FCO and other Government Departments, the private sector and paid for services. Technology now allows the Council also to reach target audiences in a different way.

  Mr. Wyatt
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what has been the(a) percentage reduction in the value of the British Council's DFID-funded contract work since 1996–97 and (b) impact of this reduction on the British Council's work in developing countries. [121821]

  Mr. Hain
  The value of the British Council's DFID-funded contract work has been reduced by 55 per cent. since 1996–97. The resulting drop in income has led to extensive restructuring in overseas directorates in developing countries and a reduction of staff in the UK and abroad. Council operations in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa have been most affected.

  Mr. Wyatt
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will restore the British Council's grant in aid to its real terms level before 1995–96. [121827]

  Mr. Hain
  The FCO and the British Council experienced cuts in funding in the period from 1995–96 until this Government had the opportunity, in the last comprehensive spending round, to arrest the decline. It is unrealistic to expect that the FCO and the British Council will receive increases that will recoup these cuts quickly. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary is pressing for a much-needed increase in FCO resources across the board. I expect the Council to achieve an increase in its grant in aid broadly in line with the settlement for the FCO as a whole as it performs a valuable role and I always try to visit its offices abroad while on ministerial visits to demonstrate my support.

  Mr. Wyatt
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what has been the percentage reduction in the number of UK-based staff at the British Council since 1996–97; and if he will make a statement on the impact of the reduction on the Council's work. [121820]

  Mr. Hain
  The number of UK-based staff at the British Council has been reduced by 23 per cent. since 1996–97. These cuts have resulted in a reduction in the range of services offered to international students in the UK and in
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  the size of the Council's network of regional offices in the UK. Reductions in the number of subject advisers and geographical managers in the Council's London and Manchester offices, and in personnel and finance officers, have affected the support provided to overseas operations.

  Mr. Wyatt
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what has been the percentage reduction in corporate overheads at the British Council since 1995–96. [121826]

  Mr. Hain
  Corporate overheads at the British Council have been reduced by 23 per cent. since 1995–96.

  Mr. Wyatt
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will list the British Council country directorates which have no full-time London-appointed staff. [121824]

  Mr. Hain
  The following 16 British Council country directorates have no full-time London-appointed staff: Albania, Algeria, Belarus, Bolivia, Brunei, Caribbean, Denmark, Eritrea, Estonia, Finland, Lithuania, Macedonia, Malta, Norway, Swaziland and Switzerland.

  Georgia Presidential Visit
  Mr. Bruce George
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs when the President of Georgia will visit the UK. [121802]

  Mr. Vaz
  [holding answer 15 May 2000]: We are looking forward to an early visit by President Shevardnadze. When the Secretary of State visited Georgia in February he invited President Shevardnadze to visit the UK. We have now offered dates to the Georgian Government and are awaiting their response.

  Departmental Vehicles
  Mr. Pearson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many(a) cars and (b) commercial vehicles operated by his Department were manufactured (i) in the UK, (ii) in the EU and (iii) elsewhere. [122259]

  Mr. Battle
  The Foreign and Commonwealth Office's policy is to purchase vehicles on the basis of value for money. We are also required to comply with the UK's international obligations under the EC Public Procurement Directives. The statistics cover vehicles in the UK and at posts overseas. The majority of our fleet is manufactured in the UK.

  Place of manufacture

  UK

  EC

  Elsewhere

  Home Fleet

  Cars

  13

  5

  0

  Commercial vehicles

  13

  15

  1

  Overseas Fleet

  Cars

  594

  159

  285

  Commercial vehicles

  54

  0

  3

  Totals for Home and Overseas Fleets

  Cars

  607

  164

  285

  Commercial vehicles

  67

  15

  4

DEFENCE

  Joint Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Regiment
  Mr. Anthony D. Wright
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will make a statement on the long term location of the Joint Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Regiment currently based at RAF Honington. [123004]

  Mr. Spellar
  The Joint Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Regiment, which was established as a joint initiative in April 1999, following recommendations arising from the Strategic Defence Review, will be permanently based at RAF Honington.

  The Regiment was established at RAF Honington as a successful joint initiative in April last year, following the recommendations of the Strategic Defence Review, and was fully operational by December. The Regiment's operational capability will comprise nuclear, biological and chemical detection, reconnaissance and survey and will combine these aspects with expertise in decontamination techniques. This is a critical enabling capability—and the Regiment will be invaluable in reducing the risk to our armed forces who deploy in dangerous areas like the Gulf.

  Sierra Leone
  Mr. Wilkinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many flights by Antonov 124/100 aircraft have been chartered by his Department to West African destinations associated with the crisis in Sierra Leone; on what dates; what loads were carried in each case; and how many refuelling stops were required en route. [122533]

  Mr. Hoon
  As of 1200 hours 16 May, five Antonov 124/100 sorties have been chartered by the MOD to West African destinations associated with the crisis in Sierra Leone: three flights on 8 May 2000; one flight on 9 May 2000; and one flight on 13 May 2000. Each flight carried between 61 tonnes and 82.5 tonnes of store and equipment. Refuelling stops were not required.

  Naval Funding
  Mr. Quentin Davies
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what is the Royal Navy's budgeted fund allocation for 2000–01; and what was the corresponding budget for the previous five years. [122113]

  Mr. Spellar
  The operating costs of the Ministry of Defence are managed by 11 Top Level Budget (TLB) holders. Major equipment and research programmes are managed separately. Prior to 2000–01 there were three discrete TLBs covering the main activities of the Royal Navy, however, from 2000–01 a new tri-service TLB has been created to manage the Departments logistics activities—the Chief of Defence Logistics (CDL) TLB. This budget includes the costs of the Navy as well as the Army and RAF and it is not possible separately to identify the single service elements; the budget is managed as a whole. Equipment procurement costs are also managed centrally the Defence Procurement Agency (DPA) and are therefore also excluded.

  For 2000–01 the budgets set for the two remaining Navy TLBs is £1,693 million. The total budget for the CDL TLB is £4,854 million.
  161W
  The Navy Budget for the previous five years was as follows:

  Year

  £ million (actuals)

  1995–96

  3,879

  1996–97

  3,761

  1997–98

  3,714

  1998–99

  3,765

  1999–2000

  3,698

  Lord Levy
  Mr. Maude
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, pursuant to his answer of 27 March 2000,Official Report, column 25W, if Lord Levy has requested any further defence briefings since 25 March 1999. [118284]

  Mr. Hoon
  [holding answer 11 April 2000]: No.

  Mr. Maude
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, pursuant to his answer of 27 March 2000,Official Report, column 25W, for what reason Lord Levy was given a briefing on Syria by the Chief of Defence Intelligence; and if Lord Levy received security clearance prior to receiving that briefing. [118283]

  Mr. Hoon
  [holding answer 11 April 2000]: On 25 March 1999, the Chief of Defence Staff asked the Chief of Defence Intelligence (CDI) to see Lord Levy, as he judged that this would be of benefit to him prior to his visit to the Middle East carrying messages for the Prime Minister. Lord Levy did not receive security clearance for this specific meeting as he already holds the appropriate clearance.

  Mr. Maude
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence from which officials Lord Levy has received briefings on the Middle East. [119671]

  Mr. Hoon
  I refer to my answer of 27 March 2000,Official Report, column 25W. Lord Levy has not been briefed on the Middle East by any other Ministry of Defence officials.

  Mr. Maude
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, pursuant to his answer of 27 March 2000,Official Report, column 25W, (1) what assistance was offered by Lord Levy to the Chief of Defence Staff during his visit to Israel last September; [118280]

  (2) which meetings Lord Levy attended during the Chief of Defence Staff's visit to Israel; and what was the subject of those meetings; [118279]

  (3) to which Israeli officials Lord Levy made representations regarding the Chief of Defence Staff's visit to Israel; [118305]

  (4) what preparatory work was done in Israel by Lord Levy for the Chief of Defence Staff's visit last September; [118304]

  (5) if the Chief of Defence Staff discussed arms sales during his visit to Israel. [118285]

  Mr. Hoon
  [holding answer 11 April 2000]: The British embassy in Tel Aviv prepared and arranged the Chief of Defence Staff's visit to Israel. Lord Levy and HM
  162W
  Ambassador accompanied the Chief of Defence Staff to a call on Prime Minister Barak. A range of matters of mutual interest were discussed. Arms sales were not discussed.

  Bahrain
  Mr. Maude
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence when the Chief of Defence Staff visited Bahrain; whom he met; what topics were discussed; and who was in his accompanying delegation. [118286]

  Mr. Spellar
  [holding answer 11 April 2000]: General Sir Charles Guthrie last visited Bahrain between 25 and 27 February 2000. He met the Amir of Bahrain, the Crown Prince, the Prime Minister, the Defence Minister, the Chief of Staff of the Bahrain Defence Force, Vice Admiral Moore of the US Navy and UK personnel deployed in Bahrain. They discussed aspects of the UK's bilateral relationship with Bahrain and a variety of regional issues. General Guthrie was accompanied on the visit by his Deputy Principal Staff Officer and Aide De-Camp. Our Ambassador to Bahrain was present during the calls on Bahraini officials and the Defence Attaché escorted throughout.

  Nuclear-powered Submarines
  Mrs. Gilroy
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence (1) if he will list the maximum design accidents assessed by the Nuclear Powered Warships Committee following a near instantaneous loss of primary circuit coolant which are in place for the Swiftsure and Trafalgar nuclear powered submarines in operation near and in the Devonport Royal Dockyard; what is the anticipated frequency of MDA per reactor year; what is the core inventory in terms of the fission products Kr, Xe, I, Te, Cs, Sr, and Ru for the nominated MDA for a reactor that(a) is at Plant State A and (b) has recently been derated to Plant State B on the basis of the Standard Core History for the average reactor in-core life for the currently operational Core Z fuel charge; if he will place in the Library copies of his Department's BR1, BR 3018, BR 3019, BR3020, BR 3025 and BR 3030 documents and where appropriate the documents that have superseded them; and if he will make a statement; [121412]

  (2) if, in relation to the refitting and refuelling of Royal Navy nuclear-powered submarines at Devonport Royal Dockyard, he will provide the Reference, MDA or Design Basics Accidents (a) applicable to periods (i) when the boat is under repair in the dry dock facility, other than when refuelling, (ii) when the boat is being defuelled in preparation for refuelling for the nuclear reactor, including the transition of the irradiated fuel to the dockyard storage locality and (iii) when the boat is out of commission and awaiting decommissioning without and with irradiated fuel in the reactor core and (b) relating to the treatment, packaging and storage of past and present arisings of radioactive waste undertaken and held at the Dockyard; and if he will make a statement. [121348]

  Mr. Spellar
  Response plans for a nuclear accident during submarine operations, including refitting, refuelling, fuel and waste handling, within HM Naval Base and the Royal Dockyard, Devonport are firmly based on detailed analysis and comply with appropriate legislation (in particular the Ionising Radiations Regulations). Probabilistic techniques are employed where appropriate in this analysis.
  163W
  The radioactive inventories and source terms used in this analysis are classified, because they are related to sensitive information about the design of naval propulsion reactors. I am, therefore, withholding this information under Exemption 1 of the Code of Practice on Access to Government Information. However, work is underway within my Department to respond to the forthcoming Radiation (Emergency Preparedness and Public Information) Regulation (REPPIR) which are expected to require that some aspects of the hazard assessments are made available to the public. Some information of this nature is already available in the document DEVPUBSAFE.

  I am placing a copy of Joint Service Publication JSP392 (Instructions for Radiological Protection, which replaced Book of Reference BR3020) together with BR3030 Vol. 1, in the Library of the House. The other documents listed are classified and I am, therefore, withholding them under Exemption 1 of the Code of Practice on Access to Government Information.

  Project Allenby Scoping Study
  Mr. Key
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will place in the Library a copy of the Project Allenby Scoping Study Executive Summary. [121942]

  Mr. Spellar
  Yes. I have arranged for a copy of the Project ALLENBY Scoping Study Executive Summary to be placed in the Library of the House.

  Anti-personnel Mines
  Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many joint operations which took place outside the UK in the last three years involved the use of anti-personnel mines. [122092]

  Mr. Spellar
  UK armed forces were involved in 15 joint operations involving the use of anti-personnel landmines over the last three years, primarily involving operations in the Balkans. However, in no instances were UK armed forces responsible for their use.

  Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many Ranger anti-personnel mines are being used for training purposes. [122091]

  Mr. Spellar
  The UK has retained 2,088 Ranger Anti-Personnel Mines for training purposes in accordance with Article 3 of the Ottawa Convention. The retention of these mines is included in the UK's annual return to the UN Secretary General, in the UK Article 7 report for the period 1 August 1999 to April 2000.

  Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence which countries retain stocks of Ranger anti-personnel mines. [122090]

  Mr. Spellar
  It is not for the Government to provide information on other countries' mine holdings. Details of APL stocks held by parties to the Ottawa convention can be found, however, on the UN website www.un.org.

  Regional Brigades
  Mr. Key
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what were the terms of reference for the Scott review of regional brigades; when it will be complete; and if he will place a copy in the Library. [121941]
  164W
  Mr. Spellar
  The Regional Brigade Study is due to report in June 2000 following which proposals will be put in the CinC LAND and Ministers. I have arranged for a copy of the Terms of Reference to be placed in the Library of the House.

  Type 22 Frigate
  Dr. Julian Lewis
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what is the annual running cost of a Type 22 frigate. [121705]

  Mr. Spellar
  I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Mr. Duncan Smith) on 12 May 2000,Official Report, columns 511–12W.

  Naval Vessels
  Dr. Julian Lewis
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence when he expects the two new LPD class ships to enter service with the Royal Navy. [121703]

  Dr. Moonie
  HMS Albion and HMS Bulwark, the two Landing Platform Dock (Replacements), are planned to enter service with the Royal Navy in 2003.

  Dr. Julian Lewis
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence when HMS Fearless and HMS Intrepid were commissioned. [121701]

  Mr. Spellar
  HMS Fearless was commissioned on 25 November 1965. HMS Intrepid was commissioned on 11 March 1967.

  Eurofighter
  Mr. Wilkinson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what is the cost of one(a) Mauser 27mm shell, (b) Advanced Short Range Air to Air Missile and (c) Advanced Medium Range Air to Air Missile. [121681]

  Dr. Moonie
  [holding answer 11 May 2000]: The unit cost of a 27mm Mauser High Explosive round is estimated to be in the region of £63. Based on prices in the most recent MOD contracts, the unit price of an Advanced Medium Range Air to Air Missile (AMRAAM) is in the order of £380,000 and that of an Advanced Short Range Air to Air Missile (ASRAAM) in the order of £200,000. All figures include VAT and are at September 1999 prices. Unit prices will vary depending on batch sizes, including orders from other customers.

  Departmental Building Costs
  Mr. Pollard
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence what are the projected costs of reconstructing his Department's building in Whitehall; and if he will make a statement. [122310]

  Dr. Moonie
  A contract to carry out the long overdue modernisation of the MOD's London headquarters was signed with Modus Services plc earlier this month. Main Building falls well short of modern standards. The redevelopment will result in the modern flexible working environment needed to provide effective direction and support to the armed forces. The costs to the Ministry of Defence will be some £55 million per annum at March 2000 prices over the 30 years of the Public Private Partnership contract. This encompasses the short-term decant arrangements as well as the long-term provision of
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  a wide variety of services to both the redeveloped Main Building and the Old War Office Building. These two buildings will then be the only buildings containing headquarters staff in the central London area, allowing five other buildings to be disposed of.

  Fishery Protection and Patrol Vessels
  Mr. Key
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence if he will list the(a) Castle class and (b) Island class fishery protection and patrol vessels by (i) completion date and (ii) lay off date; and what plans he has for their replacement. [122464]

  Mr. Spellar
  (i) The Castle and Island Class patrol vessels were commissioned as follows:

  Commissioned

  Castle Class

  Leeds Castle

  1981

  Dumbarton Castle

  1982

  Island Class

  Shetland

  1977

  Guernsey

  1977

  Lindisfarnce

  1978

  Anglesey

  1979

  Alderney

  1979

  (ii) On current plans these vessels are intended to have ship life of about 30 years and, as part of the normal planning process, the ordering of replacements will be considered as they reach the end of their lives.

  Sea Patrol
  Mr. Key
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence on how many days from 1 January 1999 to date the patrol ship Atlantic (North) has been on patrol at sea. [122463]

  Mr. Spellar
  A ship is allocated to the Atlantic Patrol Task (North) for 365 days of the year. From 1 January 1999 to 30 April 2000, a ship was actually on patrol in the area on this task for 224 days. This does not include days in transit by ships to or from the area.

  HMS Endurance
  Mr. Key
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence when HMS 'Endurance'(a) left the United Kingdom and (b) will return to the United Kingdom; and if he will make a statement about the length of this deployment. [122466]

  Mr. Spellar
  HMS Endurance left the United Kingdom on 5 January 2000 and returned on 2 May. The length of this deployment was shorter than normal due to an extended refit period.

  Ballistic Missile Defence Research
  Mr. Baker
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how much the UK Government has spent per year since 1991 on ballistic missile defence research; and how much of each year's expenditure was on pre-feasibility programmes. [121793]

  Mr. Hoon
  [holding answer 15 May 2000]: The cost of the Pre-feasibility Programme, undertaken in 1994–96, was approximately £4.5 million. The Technology Readiness and Risk Assessment Programme (TRRAP), which
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  emerged from the Strategic Defence Review (SDR) and which is scheduled to run for three years from July 1998, has approved funding of £12 million within MOD's Corporate Research Programme. In addition approximately £500K per annum has been expended since 1991 on technical studies and experiments in collaboration with the US.

  Fleet Air Arms
  Mr. Quentin Davies
  To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many flying hours were flown by the Fleet Air Arms in(a) 1995–96, (b) 1996–97, (c) 1997–98, (d) 1998–99 and (e) 1999–2000; and what is the (i) budget and (ii) planning assumption for 2000–01. [122114]

  Mr. Spellar
  The answer is as follows:

  Fleet Air Arm flying hours

  Total hours flown

  1995–96

  57,593

  1996–97

  54,065

  1997–98

  56,679

  1998–99

  53,532

  1999–2000

  55,346

  On current planning, in Financial Year 2000–01, some 63,000 flying hours are expected to be flown by Fleet Air Arm aircraft which now come under Commodore Naval Aviation, Joint Helicopter Command and Joint Harrier Force. The total estimated fuel budget for these aircraft for this year is in the order of £8.8 million. This will of course be subject to adjustment in the light of operational and other considerations.

HOUSE OF COMMONS

  Select Committees
  Mr. Pearson
  To ask the President of the Council when the Government plan to publish their response to the Liaison Committee's First report, Shifting the Balance: Select Committees and the Executive, HC 300. [122923]

  Mrs. Beckett
  I intend to publish the Government's response tomorrow.

HOME DEPARTMENT

  Policing (Somerset)
  Mr. Ashdown
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what plans he has to allocate additional cash for policing in Somerset; and if he will make a statement. [121214]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  [holding answer 9 May 2000]: Somerset and Avon Police Authority set a budget this year of £181.2 million, an increase of 4.5 per cent compared with last year. In addition, the force will benefit from a number of initiatives to help tackle crime. Distribution of resources between the counties of Avon and Somerset will reflect the Chief Constable's judgment of priorities at different times and is not subject to Government determination.
  167W
  Under the Crime Reduction Programme, over £2 million has been allocated so far to Avon and Somerset for the Reducing Burglary, Targeted Policing and Closed Circuit Television (CCTV) initiatives.

  Five Reducing Burglary bids have been approved with programme funding amounting to £0.3 million. Under the latest round of the Targeted Policing Initiative, two proposals with a combined value of just over £1 million have been approved for further development: one combating robbery in central Bristol, the other increasing the use of court confiscation orders against property criminals and drug dealers in Avon and Somerset. Another £1 million has been allocated to fund nine projects in Avon and Somerset under the CCTV initiative.

  Additionally, through the Crime Fighting Fund, Avon and Somerset will receive resources for additional recruits above and beyond the number that would otherwise have been recruited.

  Police Vehicles
  Mr. Pearson
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what guidance he gives police forces and authorities on the purchase and leasing of vehicles which are manufactured in the United Kingdom. [122153]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  None. It is the responsibility of chief officers in England and Wales, together with their police authority, to determine which vehicles they purchase or lease. Decisions will be based on the operational needs of the force but must comply with European Union procurement law.

  Framework Arrangements, centrally negotiated by Police Information Technology Organisation, enable forces to benefit from agreed discounts. These Arrangements cover a variety of vehicles, including motorcycles, and also vehicle spare parts.

  Child Abuse
  Ms Southworth
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) how many criminal convictions have been secured against adults charged in relation to child abuse more than three years after the alleged offences took place in each year since 1990; [122292]

  (2) how many adults employed in a position of trust have been charged in relation to child abuse more than three years after the alleged offences took place in each year since 1990. [122293]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  The requested information cannot be determined from the data collected centrally.

  Operation Care
  Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to his answer of 24 November 1999,Official Report, column 119W, on Operation Care, as a result of the police investigations into child abuse, how many people who were convicted pleaded not guilty; how many (a) suspects and (b) offenders there were; how many separate complaints of child abuse were received; how many people were acquitted after trial; how many people were arrested but had no further action taken against them; how many persons have been charged and are awaiting trial and how
  168W
  long they have been waiting; how many persons are on police bail; with respect to each investigation how many victims have applied for compensation; how much each individual has received; and how many victims have not applied for compensation. [121698]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  I understand that Operation Care is a continuing investigation, and the information which follows is accurate as of 11 May.

  Four people convicted on charges arising from Operation Care had pleaded not guilty. 407 persons were classified as offenders or suspects. The number of separate complaints relevant to this operation is not readily available, but is at least 759. Four people were acquitted after trial; 12 people were arrested but had no further action taken against them; 17 people have been charged and are awaiting trial. Of these latter, four have been awaiting trial for up to one year, a further seven for up to 18 months, a further three for up to two years, and a further three for up to 31 months. (Delays in trial are sometimes due to defence requests.) Twelve people are on police bail. 108 people have applied for compensation to the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority and 32 people have received awards as shown in the table. The precise number of complainants who have not applied for compensation is not known.

  Amounts paid in compensation

  Number of people

  £500

  2

  £1,000

  5

  £2,000

  7

  £2,500

  1

  £3,000

  7

  £5,000

  1

  £6,000

  2

  £6,300

  1

  £7,500

  3

  £10,000

  1

  £10,750

  1

  £20,000

  1

  Mrs. Curtis-Thomas
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to his answer of 24 November 1999,Official Report, column 119W, on Operation Care, if he will list the forces that (a) have carried out and (b) are carrying out investigations into institutional child abuse; what is the name of each investigation and its terms of reference; when each investigation (i) commenced and (ii) ended; which are continuing; what period of time is covered by each investigation; how many people have been (A) charged, (B) arrested and (C) convicted and sentenced; and how many people who have been convicted and sentenced have appealed. [121697]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  Information is not collected on the number of investigations into institutional child abuse or on the numbers of people arrested, charged or convicted as a result. But a survey was carried out last year on behalf of the Association of Chief Police Officers Crime Committee to establish how many forces in England and Wales had been or were currently investigating claims of institutional child abuse. During the period covered by the questionnaire (1 January 1998 to 30 June 1999), 32 forces said they had been, or were, currently investigating such allegations. Many of the remaining forces stated that they had been engaged in such inquiries at other times.

  Police Forces (Funding)
  Mr. Hilary Benn
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many police officers in each force area are currently being employed using funding through the(a) single regeneration budget and (b) discretionary local authority funds. [121712]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  Information on the number of police officers employed using Single Regeneration Budget funding is not available centrally.

  It is also not possible to determine how many officers are recruited using discretionary local authority funds. Force budgets are treated as a whole and distinctions are not made between those officers financed by local authority and central grant funds.

  Crime Clear-up Rate (London)
  Mr. Cox
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what has been the clear-up rate for criminal offences in the Metropolitan police area in the last 12 months. [121975]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  The most recent available data from the Metropolitan police relate to the year ending 31 March 2000. This indicates that their clear-up rate for recorded crimes in that year was 16 per cent.

  Wrongfully Convicted Prisoners
  Mrs. Ellman
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many prisoners have been released by the Court of Appeal on grounds of wrongful conviction since the Criminal Cases Review Commission was set up; and how many cases are awaiting consideration. [121938]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  To date, 27 of the cases heard by appellate courts following a referral by the Criminal Cases Review Commission have resulted in the conviction being quashed or the sentence being reduced. Twelve appellants were in custody at the time and were released due to the Court's decision. At present, 45 cases referred by the Commission are awaiting an appeal hearing. At the end of April, the Commission had 462 applications under review, and 921 awaiting review.

  Mr. Johnny Kamara
  Mrs. Ellman
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement on the case of Mr. Johnny Kamara and the formal quashing of his conviction by the Court of Appeal on 9 May following consideration by the Criminal Cases Review Commission. [121943]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  It is a matter for the greatest regret when anyone suffers punishment as a result of a miscarriage of justice. I welcome the decision of the Court of Appeal to quash Mr. Kamara's conviction, and that of the Criminal Cases Review Commission to refer the case to the Court.

  Racial Abuse
  Mr. Llwyd
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many cases of racial abuse were recorded in(a) each police authority and (b) each constituency in the past five years. [121720]
  170W
  Mr. Charles Clarke
  Information on the number of racist incidents recorded by the police is published annually by the Home Office in "Statistics on Race and the Criminal Justice System" for each police force area. Information is not collected centrally by constituency.

  It is not possible to identify which of these incidents could be described as racial abuse.

  Racially Motivated Crime
  Mr. Llwyd
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many people were(a) charged and (b) convicted of racially motivated crimes in each of the past five years (i) in England and (ii) in Wales. [121726]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  No information is collected centrally on the number of persons charged or on the number convicted of a racially motivated offence.

  Information is available on those cautioned or convicted of any offence identified as racially aggravated by the Crime and Disorder Act 1998. The statistics currently available cover the period October 1998 to September 1999 (December 1999 for the Crown court) in England and Wales. These show that 326 persons were cautioned by the police, 486 persons convicted at magistrates courts and 84 at the Crown court.

  Humberside Police
  Shona McIsaac
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many anti-social behaviour orders have been issued in the Humberside police area. [121935]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  As I stated in my reply to the hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Mr. Hawkins) on 21 February 2000,Official Report, column 824W, records of the numbers of anti-social behaviour orders applied for are not currently held centrally. We are not aware of any issued in the Humberside police area since the relevant provisions of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 came into force in April last year.

  Shona McIsaac
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement on the disbanding of Humberside police's Drug Squad. [121934]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  This is an operational matter for the Chief Constable of the Humberside police. Inquiries have established, however, that there are no plans to disband the force's Drugs Squad.

  Penalty Clauses
  Mr. Gordon Prentice
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list the contracts entered into with private sector companies for the provision of goods or services since May 1997 where penalty clauses were triggered for non-performance; and if he will make a statement. [122025]

  Mr. Straw
  It is not my Department's policy to include penalty clauses in contracts. However, available details about contracts my Department has entered into with private sector companies for the provision of goods or services since May 1997 where financial compensation or damages were triggered for non-performance are given in the table.
  171W

  Company

  Contract

  Rebound ECD

  Provision of Secure Training Centre

  Medomsley Training Services Ltd.

  Provision of Secure Training Centre

  Premier Monitoring Services Ltd.

  Provision Of Electronic Monitoring Services

  Premier Monitoring Services Ltd.

  Provision of Electronic Monitoring Services

  GSSC of Europe Ltd.

  Provision of Electronic Monitoring Services

  Securicor Custodial Services Ltd.

  Provision of Electronic Monitoring Services

  NPT Frame work Agreement

  Siemens

  Crime Fighting Fund
  Mr. Hope
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he intends to accelerate police recruitment under the Crime Fighting Fund; and if he will make a statement. [122564]

  Mr. Straw
  I announced in the reply I gave my hon. Friend the Member for Elmet (Mr. Burgon) on 9 February 2000,Official Report, column 172W, that all 43 forces in England and Wales had successfully bid for a share of the Crime Fighting Fund (CFF) to recruit 5,000 police officers over and above the number they had otherwise planned to recruit over the next three years commencing April 2000. These were to be phased on the basis of 1,000 recruits this year (2000–01), 2,000 in 2001–02 and 2,000 in 2002–03. I also gave details of the number of police officers each force had been allocated.

  Since then, and as a result of the funding decisions outlined by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the Budget, I was able to announce in my reply I gave my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry, South (Mr. Cunningham) on 27 March 2000, Official Report, columns 1–3W, that part of the £91 million provided in the Budget for modernising the police service in England and Wales would be used to accelerate the CFF with a view to delivering the 5,000 recruits within the first two years of the scheme.

  I have consulted the police service and police authority representatives and I am now pleased to announce that forces will be able to recruit up to a maximum of 3,000 new recruits in year one of the scheme (2000–01), rather than 1,000 as announced in February, and the remaining 2,000 in year two (2001–02). Tripling the number which can be recruited during the current financial year will cost about £24 million above and beyond the £35 million which has already been provided for the current allocation. Further decisions on funding for the police service for 2001–04 will be announced as part of the Spending Review 2000 in the summer.

  The table shows the revised distribution of officers allocated to each force under the accelerated scheme.

  My officials have today written to each chief constable and each police authority to explain the funding arrangements under the scheme. I have placed a copy of the letter in the Library.

  The funding for each force will be determined once each force has provided a profile of their planned recruitment during the first year. This will help ensure that funding can be maintained for forces to recruit up to the maximum in year one. Forces are also being given the opportunity, by prior agreement, to revise their
  172W
  CFF allocations if they are experiencing difficulty in recruitment by deferring part of their allocation to year two and those who are able to, to accelerate some of their year two allocation into year one. No force will be able to exceed its overall total CFF allocation and any increase may be limited by the total CFF budget for year one.

  Revised share of 5,000 recruits

  Forces

  2000–01 Year 1

  2001–02 Year 2

  Total

  Avon and Somerset

  67

  34

  101

  Bedfordshire

  28

  27

  55

  Cambridgeshire

  37

  5

  42

  Cheshire

  47

  39

  86

  City of London

  8

  0

  8

  Cleveland

  20

  8

  28

  Cumbria

  25

  15

  40

  Derbyshire

  49

  52

  101

  Devon and Cornwall

  77

  61

  138

  Dorset

  29

  17

  46

  Durham

  36

  15

  51

  Dyfed-Powys

  25

  25

  50

  Essex

  70

  33

  103

  Gloucestershire

  29

  23

  52

  Greater Manchester

  186

  192

  378

  Gwent

  31

  12

  43

  Hampshire

  82

  51

  133

  Hertfordshire

  40

  5

  45

  Humberside

  47

  27

  74

  Kent

  82

  64

  146

  Lancashire

  75

  51

  126

  Leicestershire

  46

  37

  83

  Lincolnshire

  29

  12

  41

  Merseyside

  105

  96

  201

  Metropolitan

  663

  450

  1,113

  Norfolk

  35

  31

  66

  North Wales

  34

  28

  62

  North Yorkshire

  20

  5

  25

  Northamptonshire

  32

  21

  53

  Northumbria

  85

  51

  136

  Nottinghamshire

  52

  35

  87

  South Wales

  59

  9

  68

  South Yorkshire

  67

  34

  101

  Staffordshire

  49

  34

  83

  Suffolk

  31

  14

  45

  Surrey

  46

  32

  78

  Sussex

  69

  43

  112

  Thames Valley

  111

  89

  200

  Warwickshire

  21

  9

  30

  West Mercia

  50

  39

  89

  West Midlands

  173

  137

  310

  West Yorkshire

  107

  24

  131

  Wiltshire

  26

  14

  40

  Total

  3,000

  2,000

  5,000

  Metropolitan Police Vehicles
  Mr. Heald
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what has been the average daily number of Metropolitan police vehicles off the road for repairs in each month of this year; and if he will make a statement. [122362]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  The Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis informs me that the average daily number of vehicles off the road for repairs in each month of this year was as follows: January—532; February—427; March—405; and April—864.
  173W
  Mr. Heald
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many vehicles the Metropolitan police had in(a) March 1997 and (b) March 2000. [122363]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  The Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis informs me that in March 1997 there were 4,160 vehicles; in March 2000 there were 3,991.

  Hunting with Dogs
  Mr. Baker
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) by whom it was decided to widen the initial remit of his Department's inquiry into hunting with dogs; and what factors led to this decision; [122527]

  (2) if he will list the persons involved (a) within and (b) outside his Department in drawing up the remit of the Burns inquiry; [122525]

  (3) what was the role of Baroness Jay in determining the remit of his Department's inquiry into hunting with dogs; what role she has played in the inquiry; and if he will make a statement. [122526]

  Mr. Mike O'Brien
  The terms of reference of the Committee of Inquiry into Hunting with Dogs were drawn up by Home Office Officials, in consultation with Lord Burns, and approved by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary.

  Baroness Jay has had no role whatsoever either in drawing up the terms of reference or in the Inquiry itself.

  The remit has always been about hunting with dogs—not shooting or retrieval of quarry with dogs. The question of "widening" the Terms of Reference is a misunderstanding.

  Female Circumcision
  Ms McCafferty
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what guidance his Department issues to chief constables concerning training for the policing of the Prohibition of Female Circumcision Act 1985. [122491]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  New Government guidance "Working Together to Safeguard Children" which is available in the Library and which has been circulated to chief officers of police, recommends that in local areas where there are communities who traditionally practice female genital mutilation, the policy of Area Child Protection Committees (on which the police are represented) should focus on a preventive strategy involving community education.

  Ms McCafferty
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) how many(a) arrests and (b) convictions have been made under the Prohibition of Female Circumcision Act 1985; [122490]

  (2) how many (a) arrests and (b) convictions have been made under (i) the Children Act 1989 and (ii) the Criminal Justice (Terrorism and Conspiracy) Act 1998, in relation to the practice of female genital mutilation in the UK and abroad. [122494]

  Mr. Charles Clarke
  Arrest data are not collected centrally by individual offence.

  The Home Office Court Proceedings Database show no defendants proceeded against under the Prohibition of Female Circumcision Act 1985. Information collected
  174W
  under the Children Act 1989 and the Criminal Justice (Terrorism and Conspiracy) Act 1998 does not distinguish such offences from others within these Acts.

  Departmental Vehicles
  Mr. Pearson
  To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many(a) cars and (b) commercial vehicles operated by his Department were manufactured (i) in the UK, (ii) in the EU and (iii) elsewhere. [122257]

  Mr. Straw
  The information requested is given in the table. It has not been possible to identify the exact origin of all the vehicles as this would require individual chassis numbers which are not readily to hand.

  Home Office fleet vehicles: place of manufacture

  Cars

  Commercial vehicles

  Total1

  Total percentage of fleet

  United Kingdom

  95

  330

  425

  42

  European Union

  295

  81

  376

  37

  United Kingdom/European Union2

  45

  95

  140

  14

  Other

  0

  18

  18

  2

  Not known2

  20

  5

  45

  5

  1Figures exclude any vehicles over 10 years old

  2Some manufacturers (eg Vauxhall) require details regarding individual chassis numbers and model specifications to be able to give this information

AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD

  Seed Purity
  Judy Mallaber
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what action the Government are taking to address the issue of seed purity. [122925]

  Ms Quin
  We are taking several new steps to ensure seed purity, in addition to the current consultation on the importation and labelling of seeds. These include pressing internationally for agreed standards, testing of seed imports to the UK and working with the industry on a Code of Practice. The need for action in this area is highlighted by the recent information we have received from Advanta Seeds UK that some of its conventional rapeseed sold and sown in 1999 and 2000 in several EU member states, including the UK, contained about 1 per cent. of genetically modified rapeseed. The genetic modification in question has already been assessed and cleared for food use and for field trials in the UK. We have consulted both ACRE (The Advisory Committee on Releases to the Environment) and the Food Standards Agency who have confirmed the view that there is no risk to public health or the environment.

  Forest Enterprise
  Mr. Drew
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what arrangements are being made for the quinquennial review of the Forest Enterprise Executive Agency. [122800]

  Mr. Morley
  As an executive agency, Forest Enterprise is subject to review every five years—part of the process of continuous improvement of Government services
  175W
  promised in the "Modernising Government" White Paper of March 1999. Forest Enterprise was established as an executive agency on 1 April 1996 and its review has now started. Stage 1 is concerned with getting the organisation right, and its conclusions will be reported to Forestry Ministers in July. Stage 2, which is concerned with improving the agency's performance, will be completed in December.

  The review will include wide ranging consultation with Forest Enterprise's customers, visitors and other interested parties, who are invited to contact the Secretary to the Forestry Commissioners, at 231 Corstorphine Road, Edinburgh EH12 7AT or to visit the Forestry Commission's website at www.forestry.gov.uk/fereview.

  Over-30-months Scheme
  Judy Mallaber
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food when the weight limit on payments for cattle entering the over-30-months scheme will be removed; and if he will make a statement. [122926]

  Ms Quin
  On 12 May the Beef Management Committee agreed a Commission proposal to remove the weight limit on payments for all cattle entering the over-30-months scheme. This will take effect for all cattle entering the scheme on or after 5 June. This delivers on a key element of the Government's Action Plan for Farming. It is worth £20 million a year in payments to UK farmers and will also increase asset values. It will be of particular benefit to those running suckler heards.

  Pig Industry
  Miss McIntosh
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what estimate his Department has made of the number of UK pig slaughterings per week over the last two years; and what are his projections for next year. [121763]

  Ms Quin
  The table gives UK weekly clean pig slaughterings for the past two years. Estimates of slaughterings for future years are not prepared on a weekly basis, but a Eurostat estimate of UK slaughterings for the year 2000 as a whole amount to 13.5 million heads.

  UK weekly clean pig slaughterings

  Unit: thousand head

  1998

  1999

  2000

  2000 weeks

  254.9

  307.1

  246.3

  8 January 2000

  321.1

  313.0

  276.1

  15 January 2000

  320.9

  313.5

  271.3

  22 January 2000

  315.1

  315.7

  268.6

  29 January 2000

  310.0

  297.3

  265.8

  5 February 2000

  304.6

  304.1

  260.9

  12 February 2000

  305.8

  295.9

  256.7

  19 February 2000

  304.4

  285.0

  250.1

  26 February 2000

  305.7

  286.2

  259.0

  4 March 2000

  305.9

  285.4

  250.7

  11 March 2000

  302.2

  277.3

  242.7

  18 March 2000

  295.1

  282.7

  250.9

  25 March 2000

  295.0

  251.0

  250.4

  1 April 2000

  300.1

  252.0

  238.6

  8 April 2000

  265.2

  279.7

  244.8

  15 April 2000

  248.5

  267.5

  218.7

  22 April 2000

  301.7

  270.0

  —

  29 April 2000

  300.7

  245.9

  —

  6 May 2000

  176W

  UK weekly clean pig slaughterings

  Unit: thousand head

  1998

  1999

  2000

  2000 weeks

  259.2

  279.0

  —

  13 May 2000

  299.6

  269.4

  —

  20 May 2000

  301.8

  269.3

  —

  27 May 2000

  262.7

  243.8

  —

  3 June 2000

  302.1

  269.3

  —

  10 June 2000

  301.6

  265.6

  —

  17 June 2000

  299.7

  272.8

  —

  24 June 2000

  288.2

  272.5

  —

  1 July 2000

  296.6

  274.6

  —

  8 July 2000

  292.2

  266.5

  —

  15 July 2000

  279.8

  273.3

  —

  22 July 2000

  293.3

  268.0

  —

  29 July 2000

  297.2

  264.5

  —

  5 August 2000

  297.1

  273.7

  —

  12 August 2000

  299.8

  270.2

  —

  19 August 2000

  308.0

  269.6

  —

  26 August 2000

  308.5

  246.5

  —

  2 September 2000

  267.8

  278.3

  —

  9 September 2000

  318.9

  275.5

  —

  16 September 2000

  315.6

  275.6

  —

  23 September 2000

  317.3

  278.5

  —

  30 September 2000

  324.1

  274.1

  —

  7 October 2000

  316.3

  280.9

  —

  14 October 2000

  321.3

  276.1

  —

  21 October 2000

  317.1

  280.3

  —

  28 October 2000

  322.0

  285.1

  —

  4 November 2000

  320.8

  286.9

  —

  11 November 2000

  324.4

  290.6

  —

  18 November 2000

  322.3

  295.6

  —

  25 November 2000

  325.0

  298.9

  —

  2 December 2000

  331.3

  310.3

  —

  9 December 2000

  335.7

  322.0

  —

  16 December 2000

  360.3

  242.8

  —

  23 December 2000

  194.2

  120.2

  —

  30 December 2000

  192.9

  —

  —

  —

  Miss McIntosh
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what steps he will take, with regard to the recently announced aid package for United Kingdom pig farmers, to ensure that the complexity of meeting the scheme's requirements does not deter the industry from accessing the funds available. [121767]

  Ms Quin
  The Pig Industry Restructuring Scheme is being developed in close consultation with the National Pig Association and the Meat and Livestock Commission to ensure as far as is possible that the scheme is relevant to the needs of pig producers. Clearly the scheme must also remain within UK and EU law and meet any financial propriety concerns.

  Agriculture Council
  Mr. Browne
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will make a statement about the outcome of his negotiations at the March Council Meeting of EU Agriculture Ministers in respect of export refunds for the UK spirit industry. [121971]

  Ms Quin
  The EU Agriculture Council on 20 March agreed on conclusions to guide the Commission in its strategy for accommodating budgetary and WTO pressures in the fixing of export refunds for processed products. My right hon. Friend the Minister emphasised to the Council the importance of export refunds to the cereals-based spirit drinks industry, notably Scotch
  177W
  whisky. He urged the Commission to recognise this concern in its implementation of export refund reductions. A statement to this effect was recorded in the minutes of the Council.

  Discussions with the Commission on the implementation of the strategy are continuing at official level. Our aim is to achieve the best outcome possible for all sectors affected, including the spirits sector.

  Move

  Firm

  1. Move of officials between our Whitehall offices, Nobel House on Millbank, and St. Christopher House in Southwark.

  Planned in house with removals by Rockshields Ltd.

  2. Move of officials from Tolworth and St. Christopher House to 1A Page Street, London SW1

  Planned in house with removals by Bishops Move Ltd.

  3. Move from offices at Alphington Road, Exeter to new offices at Clyst St. Mary

  Planned by Vickery Holman with removals by Pickfords Business Services Ltd.

  4. Move from offices at Wistaton, Crewe to Electra Way, Crewe

  Planned by Edmund Kirby with removals by Bishops Move Ltd.

  5. Move of Central Science Laboratory at Slough to Sand Hutton, near York

  Planned by Robert Shanks and Associates with removals by Burton and Smith Moving Ltd.

  Imported Carcases
  Miss McIntosh
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what estimate he has made of the number of imported carcases over the last two years; and what are his projections for next year. [121764]

  Ms Quin
  Although import statistics are not collected in this form, it is unlikely that much pigmeat imported into the UK over the last two years was in the form of pig carcases. In 1998 the UK imported 188,000 tonnes of pork and 231,000 tonnes of bacon and ham. The equivalent figures for 1999 were 212,000 tonnes and 227,000 tonnes.

  Estimates of future imports are not available.

  Animal Slaughtering
  Mr. Baker
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will make a statement on the incidence of animals being illegally slaughtered without pre-stunning in abattoirs. [121957]

  Mr. Morley
  [holding answer 15 May 2000]: Slaughter in an abattoir without prior stunning is not illegal if it is carried out by a religious method and in accordance with the requirements set for religious slaughter. The Government would prefer all animals to be stunned before slaughter, but are committed to maintaining this exemption from the requirement to stun, in recognition of the wish of certain communities to slaughter animals in accordance with their religious beliefs. That does not mean that we do not seek to apply improved welfare standards and we do meet representatives of religious organisations to discuss their issues.

  Departmental Vehicles
  Mr. Pearson
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how many(a) cars and (b) commercial vehicles operated by his Department were manufactured (i) in the UK, (ii) in the EU and (iii) elsewhere. [122265]

  Civil Servants (Relocation)
  Mr. Hunter
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food which relocation companies his Department has used when relocating civil servants since May 1997. [122296]

  Mr. Morley
  My Department has used the following companies:

  Mr. Morley
  Country of manufacture is not routinely provided by suppliers and so the information is not readily available. Although it is possible to obtain the information from main dealers it would mean having to extract the chassis number of each vehicle in the Departmental fleet to enable the dealership to trace its country of origin. With some 550 official vehicles in use throughout the Department and Agencies, this could be done only by incurring disproportionate cost.

  Zimbabwe (Import Licences)
  Mr. Bercow
  To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what recent representations were made to the European Commission concerning permitted maximums in import licences for agricultural products from Zimbabwe; and if he will make a statement. [120852]

  Ms Quin
  No representations have been made by the Government. Any other representations are a matter for the European Commission.

LORD CHANCELLOR'S DEPARTMENT

  Criminal Defence Service
  Angela Smith
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department when he will introduce the Criminal Defence Service. [122927]

  Mr. Lock
  The Lord Chancellor has agreed to a request from the Legal Services Commission to postpone the introduction of the Criminal Defence Service from 2 October 2000 to 2 April 2001. This will allow additional time for preparation by the professions and for the implementation of the new arrangements by criminal defence lawyers. The Legal Services Commission is notifying the professions by letter accordingly. This delay will have no substantial effects on the reform programme, including the development of the salaried defender service.
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  Consultation papers on the establishment of the salaried defender service and on the choice of representative will be published shortly.

  Departmental Vehicles
  Mr. Pearson
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department how many(a) cars and (b) commercial vehicles operated by the Lord Chancellor's Department were manufactured (i) in the UK, (ii) in the EU and (iii) elsewhere. [122248]

  Mr. Lock
  The Lord Chancellor's Department operates a total of 636 cars of which (i) 251 were manufactured in the UK, (ii) 373 in the EU, and (iii) elsewhere.

  Eleven commercial vehicles are operated by the Department. Of these 10 were manufactured within the UK. The place of manufacture of the other commercial vehicle, in use by the Northern Ireland Court Service, is unknown and does not therefore appear in the table.

  The breakdown of vehicles operated by the Lord Chancellor's Department is shown in the table.

  Department

  UK

  EU

  Elsewhere

  Cars

  Lords Chancellors Department

  14

  0

  0

  Court Service

  232

  341

  11

  Public Trustee Office

  0

  0

  0

  Northern Ireland Court Service

  0

  0

  0

  Commercial

  Lords Chancellors Department

  0

  0

  0

  Court Service

  1

  0

  0

  Public Trustee Office

  0

  0

  0

  Land Registry

  9

  0

  0

  Public Records Office

  0

  0

  0

  Trials (Health Problems)
  Mr. Sheerman
  To ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department how many people who have been(a) brought to trial and (b) involved in a trial as an accused person have in the past 20 years been excused from trial due to (i) physical and (ii) mental ill-health. [122079]

  Jane Kennedy
  The information requested is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost. However, figures are available, from 1986 onwards, for defendants who have been found unfit to plead at the Crown court. They do not, however, take into account the nature of the defendant's illness.

  Year

  Found unfit to plead

  1986

  30

  1987

  30

  1988

  36

  1989

  93

  1990

  49

  1991

  36

  1992

  51

  1993

  1—

  1994

  1—

  1995

  32

  1996

  19

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  Year

  Found Unfit to plead

  1997

  38

  1998

  35

  1999

  34

  1Reliable information unavailable due to the introduction of the Crown court IT System.

WALES

  Comprehensive Spending Review
  Mr. Llwyd
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what meetings he has had with the Chancellor of the Exchequer in relation to this year's Comprehensive Spending Review. [121740]

  Mr. Paul Murphy
  I meet the Chancellor regularly and discuss a range of issues, including the Government's Spending Review which is currently under way.

  Mr. Llwyd
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales what representations he has made on behalf of the National Assembly for Wales in relation to this year's Comprehensive Spending Review. [121739]

  Mr. Paul Murphy
  I represent the interests of Wales in the Government's Spending Review that is currently under way. This is a very significant part of my job, and I can assure you that I attach a great deal of importance to it. I can guarantee that the Assembly's views will be fully taken into account when the final decisions are made.

  Departmental Vehicles
  Mr. Pearson
  To ask the Secretary of State for Wales how many(a) cars and (b) commercial vehicles operated by his Department were manufactured (i) in the UK, (ii) in the EU and (iii) elsewhere. [122252]

  Mr. Paul Murphy
  I refer the hon. Member to the answer being given to him by my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Cabinet Office.

  My Department operates no vehicles other than those provided by the Government Car and Despatch Agency.

EDUCATION AND EMPLOYMENT

  Eco-schools Scheme
  Mr. Kidney
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what assessment he has made of the contribution that the eco-schools scheme makes to the teaching of curriculum subjects. [121933]

  Jacqui Smith
  The Eco-schools Programme is managed in the UK by Going for Green, a charitable trust. My Department is aware of the programme and the contribution it can make to environmental awareness in schools, and I recently visited a school to present an eco-schools certificate. We also discuss it as part of our regular liaison with the Department of Environment, Transport and the Regions.

  Penalty Clauses
  Mr. Gordon Prentice
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will list the contracts entered into with private sector companies for the provision of goods or services since May 1997 where penalty clauses were triggered for non-performance; and if he will make a statement. [122021]

  Mr. Wicks
  There are none to list as the Department for Education and Employment does not include penalty clauses in its contracts.

  Objective 3 Funding
  Mr. Öpik
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment which areas of England and Wales are covered by the European Social Fund Objective 3 Funding; when the funding scheme will come into operation; and if he will make a statement. [122101]

  Ms Jowell
  In England, Objective 3 will cover all the English regions, except for the Objective 1 areas of Merseyside, Cornwall and South Yorkshire. I expect the European Commission to approve our plan in June, and for bidding rounds to be held in all regions before the end of July. In Wales Objective 3 will cover the seven unitary authorities outside the Objective 1 area of West Wales and the Valleys. The Welsh plan has been prepared by the National Assembly for Wales, and I understand that approval from the Commission is expected in time for the programme to come into operation either in the summer or in the early part of the autumn.

  Female Circumcision
  Ms McCafferty
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what guidance his Department issues to local education authorities concerning the operation of the Prohibition of Female Circumcision Act 1985. [122495]

  Jacqui Smith
  Our advice in "Working Together to Safeguard Children", which we published jointly with the Department of Health and the Home Office earlier this year, highlights the importance of focusing on preventative strategies in relation to female genital mutilation. Copies of "Working Together" were sent to all local education authorities. Furthermore, our advice to schools and local education authorities on child protection procedures in Circular 10/95, "Protecting Children from Abuse: The Role of the Education Service" makes clear that, if school staff have reason to believe that a child is at risk from any form of abuse, they should report their suspicions immediately to the school's designated teacher for child protection. The designated teacher will refer any concerns to the appropriate professional agencies to investigate further.

  Institute for Learning and Teaching
  Mr. Boswell
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will make a statement on(a) membership and (b) industrial relations at the Institute for Learning and Teaching in higher education. [122169]

  Mr. Wicks
  The Institute for Learning and Teaching (ILT) is an independent body. 1,100 applications for membership have been received in the six months of recruitment which has taken place so far. The ILT is 182W
  taking steps to increase awareness of the benefits of membership among those eligible to join. I understand that both the AUT and NATFHE have representation on the Transitional Council of the ILT and that their contribution is greatly valued by the Institute.

  Hearing-impaired Children
  Mr. Boswell
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what guidance his Department has given to local education authorities about making educational provision for children with a hearing loss(a) over and (b) under the age of two years in order to support their language and educational development. [122249]

  Jacqui Smith
  The Code of Practice on the Identification and Assessment of Special Educational Needs includes guidance on the steps to be taken to identify and meet the needs of children with sensory impairments, including hearing difficulties. The Code of Practice also contains a chapter offering guidance on assessments of special educational needs for children under the age of five, which includes specific guidance on the assessment of children under the age of two. Local education authorities are under a statutory duty to have regard to the Code of Practice.

  Mr. Boswell
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what steps he is taking to ensure that take-up of training by teachers wishing to undertake the mandatory training for teachers of the deaf is sufficient to meet national demand. [122250]

  Jacqui Smith
  Prime responsibility for the in-service training of teachers rests with local education authorities and schools, who are in the best position to determine their needs and respond to demand in the light of local circumstances. In recognition of the importance of training, the Department is supporting expenditure of £26 million in the 2000–01 financial year through the Standards Fund to help LEAs with the costs of training teachers of children with special educational needs, including training in the mandatory qualifications. The Teacher Training Agency has also been conducting a review of the courses leading to mandatory qualifications.

  Correspondence
  Sir Brian Mawhinney
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment when the right hon. Member for North-West Cambridgeshire will receive a substantive reply to his letter of 29 March on behalf of his constituent Dr. Irwin. [122331]

  Mr. Wills
  [holding answer 16 May 2000]: A reply to the right hon. Member's letter was issued on 15 May.

  Connexions
  Mr. Clappison
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what assessment he has made of the optimum mix of delivery of the Connexions Service through private, voluntary and public partners as referred to in paragraph 7.12 of Connexions: the best start in life for every young person. [122454]

  Mr. Wicks
  The Connexions Service: prospectus and specification, which was published on 4 May, invites prospective partner organisations to come together to agree how the Connexions Service can operate most
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  effectively in their area and to produce outline Partnership Proposals. Partnerships will need to ensure that the mix of public, private and voluntary sector provision is appropriate to the needs of the particular area and that these decisions are based on the quality of existing provision. Partnerships will need to demonstrate in their Business Plans to be produced in the autumn that public, private and voluntary sector providers have been given a fair opportunity in each area to offer relevant services, on the basis of the quality of existing provision. The Connexions Service National Unit, through its assessment and approval of partnership Business Plans and subsequent monitoring of service delivery, will ensure that an appropriate mix of public, private and voluntary sector providers are involved.

  Class Sizes
  Shona McIsaac
  To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will list the average class size in each infant school in Cleethorpes constituency since 1995. [122347]

  Ms Estelle Morris
  Information on individual schools is not normally published. Where individual school information is published, as in the School Performance tables, the information is first checked with the schools concerned. The latest available information on infant class sizes in the parliamentary constituency of Cleethorpes is shown in the table.

  Provisional national estimates of infant class sizes in England for January 2000 was recently published in a Statistical First Release "Class sizes in Maintained schools in England: January 2000" on 12 April 2000. Prior to this, information on infant class sizes for September 1999 was published in Statistical First Release "Infant class sizes in England: September 1999" on 21 January 2000. Copies of both publications are available from the Library.

  Average Size of infant classes1 taught by one teacher in maintained primary schools in the parliamentary constituency of Cleethorpes: 1995–20002

  Position as at January

  Average Class size

  20022

  24.7

  1999

  26.5

  1998

  28.3

  1997

  27.5

  1996

  3—

  1995

  3—

  1Key Stage 1 Classes

  2Provisional

  3Not available

TREASURY

  Prudential Assurance Company
  Mrs. Spelman
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer when he expects the talks initiated in March 1996 between his Department and the Prudential Assurance Company regarding a modification of 10 per cent. distributable surplus to reach an outcome. [122487]

  Miss Melanie Johnson
  [holding answer 16 May 2000]: When discussions of this kind take place and a conclusion is reached, the company concerned makes an
  184W
  announcement. Information about proposals of this kind may be confidential or price sensitive, and therefore subject to statutory restrictions on disclosure.

  Departmental Vehicles
  Mr. Pearson
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many(a) cars and (b) commercial vehicles operated by his Department were manufactured (i) in the UK, (ii) in the EU and (iii) elsewhere. [122264]

  Mr. Timms
  All vehicles operated by the Treasury are provided by the Government Car and Dispatch Agency (GCDA). GCDA are an agency of the Cabinet Office and I refer my hon. Friend to the answer given today by my right hon. Friend the Minister of State, Cabinet Office.

  NIRS2
  Mr. Flynn
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what assessment he has made of the total cost of the difficulties encountered with the NIRS2 computer system; and what percentage of that cost will be recouped from Andersen Consulting. [122104]

  Dawn Primarolo
  [holding answer 15 May 2000]: Andersen Consulting has worked with the Inland Revenue to resolve the problems experienced with the NIRS2 system. All the costs in undertaking this work have been met by Andersen Consulting. The cost to Andersen Consulting is approximately £20 million.

  Tax Rates (Businesses)
  Mr. Pollard
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what plans he has to extend to unincorporated small businesses the new lower 10 per cent. starting tax rate levied on the initial £10,000 business profits. [122357]

  Dawn Primarolo
  Unincorporated businesses are subject to income tax whereas small companies are subject to corporation tax. Income tax rates are applied to total income from all sources; therefore profits from unincorporated business activities are aggregated with an individual's other income, and the appropriate rates charged after deduction of personal allowances. A 10p income tax band was introduced in Budget 1999 and increased in Budget 2000. As with the whole tax system, this band is kept under constant review. Any future changes will be announced in the normal way.

  Press Officers
  Mr. Portillo
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many press officers were employed by the Treasury in(a) May 1997 and (b) May 2000. [122381]

  Miss Melanie Johnson
  In May 1997, HM Treasury employed 5 press officers (besides the Head of Communications) and at May 2000 the number is 5.5.

  Working Families Tax Credit
  Mr. Alexander
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many households in(a) Scotland and (b) Paisley, South which are eligible for the Working Families Tax Credit are (i) single parent families where the woman is the sole earner, (ii) single parent families

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  where the man is the sole earner, (iii) couples, where the male is the sole earner, (iv) couples, where the female is the sole earner and (v) dual income families. [122371]

  Dawn Primarolo
  It is estimated that 98,800 families in Scotland have been awarded the Working Families Tax Credit to the end of March 2000, of which 1,400 were in Paisley, South.

  The breakdown requested for Scotland is as follows:

  Family type

  Number with Working Families Tax Credit awards at March 2000

  Single Parent—female earner

  61,100

  Single Parent—male earner

  2,100

  Couple—male sole earner

  21,800

  Couple—female sole earner

  8,500

  Couple—both earning

  5,400

  Total

  98,800

  There are too few cases in the 5 per cent. sample used for these analyses to provide a complete breakdown for Paisley, South. It is estimated that 1,100 families with WFTC awards in Paisley, South were single parents where the woman is the sole earner.

  VAT (Renovations and Conversions)
  Mr. Bob Russell
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what representations he has received in the past six months requesting that value added tax be(a) reduced and (b) removed on building renovations and conversions; and if he will make a statement. [122127]

  Dawn Primarolo
  Treasury Ministers have received about 5,550 letters since last November asking for changes to the rate of VAT on building, renovation and maintenance work. The vast majority of these letters have asked for a reduced rate rather than removal of VAT. The removal of VAT from repairs and renovations is illegal under agreements with our European partners.

  Mr. Bob Russell
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what plans he has to reduce the level of value added tax levied on building renovations and conversions; and if he will make a statement. [122121]

  Dawn Primarolo
  The Government have no present plans to introduce a reduced rate for building renovations and conversions.

  Mortgage Tax Relief (Scotland)
  Mr. Gorrie
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what the total cost of mortgage tax relief was in Scotland in(a) 1996–97, (b) 1997–98, and (c) 1998–99; and what was the estimated cost in 1999–2000. [122087]

  Miss Melanie Johnson
  The estimated costs of mortgage interest relief in Scotland for 1996–97, 1997–98 and 1998–99 are published in Table 5.3 of "Inland Revenue Statistics 1999", a copy of which is in the House of Commons Library. The provisional figure for 1999–2000 is £130 million.

  Economic and Monetary Union
  Mr. Gill
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will list the estimates covering expenditure on the national changeover plan; and the dates on which they were approved by the House. [121811]

  Miss Melanie Johnson
  Details of expenditure on national changeover planning were included in the second Outline National Changeover plan which was published on 9 March. A copy of the Plan is in the Library of the House.

  Mr. Gill
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer on what date and in which forum the decision was taken to proceed with a national changeover plan. [121809]

  Miss Melanie Johnson
  In his statement to the House in October 1997, my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer said that the Government would begin now to prepare ourselves so that, should we meet the economic tests, we can make a decision to join a successful single currency early in the next Parliament.—[Official Report, 27 October 1997; Vol. 299, c. 587.]

  The first Outline National Changeover Plan was presented to the House by the Prime Minister on 23 February 1999.

  Indirect Taxation
  Mr. Matthew Taylor
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will place a copy of the document entitled, "The simulation of indirect tax reforms: the IFS simulation model for indirect taxation", in the Library. [121741]

  Dawn Primarolo
  A copy of "The simulation of indirect tax reforms: the IFS simulation model for indirect taxation", published by the Institute for Fiscal Studies in 1990, has been available in the House of Commons Library since 1995.

  Funding (Wales)
  Mr. Llwyd
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what meetings his Department has had with the(a) National Assembly for Wales and (b) Office of the Secretary of State for Wales in relation to the Comprehensive Spending Review. [121738]

  Mr. Andrew Smith
  Officials from my Department meet officials from the National Assembly for Wales and the Office of the Secretary of State for Wales regularly to discuss a range of issues.

  Contributions Agency
  Mr. Sarwar
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what changes have been made in the past year by the Contributions Agency in its policy on employment of civil servants between the ages of 60 and 65 years. [121321]

  Dawn Primarolo
  The Contributions Agency (CA), a former agency of the Department of Social Security (DSS), ceased to exist with effect from 1 April 1999 when, as part of the transfer arrangements with the Inland Revenue, all CA functions and associated staff moved across to the Revenue.
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  Prior to the transfer with the Revenue the CA, in line with other Government Departments and agencies, had delegated responsibility to formulate their own retirement age policy. Their policy, operated under the central DSS policy framework, provided for a normal retirement age of 60 for all staff. As part of the transitional arrangements on moving to this policy, some staff had been granted extensions of service up to a maximum retention date of 31 July 1999.

  As part of the negotiations prior to the transfer, the Revenue undertook to honour any commitments given to staff in respect of extension of service in place at 31 March 1999. This undertaking was embodied in the terms and conditions package negotiated with the relevant trade unions, and accepted by CA staff by way of a ballot. Thus after the transfer any former member of the CA who had been granted an extension of service was able to remain with the Revenue until the expiry of that extension, up to the maximum retention date of 31 July 1999. Where an extension was not agreed at 31 March 1999, then staff would subsequently retire in line with Revenue retirement age policy, which at the time of the transfer was similar to CA policy, in providing for a normal retirement age of 60.

  The Revenue has recently introduced a concession to the normal retirement age of 60, whereby staff with less than 25 years pensionable service at age 60 may be retained until this level of pensionable service is attained, or reach age 65, whichever is the earlier. This concession was part of a package of terms and conditions changes attached to a Modernisation Agreement with the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) accepted as part of the revised 1999 pay offer. The concession took effect on 21 January 2000.

  On a wider front, the Revenue is carrying out a review of its current retirement age policy and, following consultation with the relevant trade unions, any resultant policy changes will be announced in due course.

  Tax
  Mr. Gill
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what estimate he has made of the aggregate burden of additional taxes on trade, industry and commerce since May 1997. [121351]

  Dawn Primarolo
  Details of the Budget measures can be found in the relevant tables of the July 1997, March 1998, 1999 and 2000 Red Book. Many of these measures are of particular benefit to trade, industry and commerce.

  Barnett Formula
  Mr. Matthew Taylor
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what Barnett formula comparability factors are being used for(a) Scotland, (b) Wales and (c) Northern Ireland for each Department in the 2000 Spending Review; and if he will make a statement. [121085]

  Mr. Andrew Smith
  The Barnett comparability factors which were used in the 1998 Comprehensive Spending Review were included in the Statement of Funding Policy published by the Treasury last year. The 2000 spending review is currently underway and will report in due course.

  Mobile Phone Licences
  Mr. Mitchell
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what sum he expects to receive from allocation of licences for the new generation of mobile telephones; and what assessment he has made of the effects of(a) his proposed use of it to redeem national debt and (b) such planned redemption on the maximum annual debt in sterling he can incur under the Maastricht protocol or stability pact. [121076]

  Mr. Andrew Smith
  The total sum of the completed bids from the auction of licences for spectrum to support third generation mobile services in the UK was £22.5 billion. Within any given level for total public spending, less on debt interest will mean more is available for other public services. Total spending will be unchanged from the spending envelope set in the Budget in line with the Government's neutral view of the economy's trend growth and in line with the fiscal rules. The Budget forecast that the stability and growth pact reference levels of 3 per cent. of GDP for the deficit and 60 per cent. for debt are achieved comfortably throughout the next five years.

  Manufacturing Jobs
  Mr. Kidney
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what proportion of the jobs created in the United Kingdom since May 1997 have been in the manufacturing sector. [120840]

  Miss Melanie Johnson
  The information requested, the proportion of jobs created in the UK since May 1997 that have been in the manufacturing sector, is not available.

  Household Incomes
  Mr. Cox
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the average income per week per household in the London Borough of Wandsworth. [122384]

  Miss Melanie Johnson
  The information requested falls within the responsibility of the Director of the Office for National Statistics. I have asked him to reply.

  Letter from John Pullinger to Mr. Tom Cox, dated 17 May 2000:
  The Director of the Office for National Statistics (ONS) has been asked to reply to your recent question asking about the average household income of Wandsworth. I am replying in the Director's absence.
  No household income estimates are available from ONS at London borough level.
  The latest figures published by ONS for household income by region, up to 1997 were published in Regional Accounts 1997: part 2, Economic Trends no. 551, October 1999. This publication is available in the House of Commons Library.
  In this publication income of the household sector is defined on a national accounts basis. In addition to private households, this includes charities, voluntary and other non-profit organisations and quasi-corporations.
  The published figures are normally presented in terms of total annual household income per head of population. Converted to weekly averages published regional estimates for London (the smallest area published that includes Wandsworth) are as follows:

  1994: £268

  1995: £282

  1996: £303

  1997: £312.

  Employment Statistics (Greater London)
  Mr. Cox
  To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many(a) people were unemployed and (b) job vacancies there were in the Greater London area on 1 April. [122078]

  Miss Melanie Johnson
  The information requested falls within the responsibility of the Director of the Office for National Statistics. I have asked him to reply.

  Letter from John Pullinger to Mr. Tom Cox, dated 17 May 2000:
  The Director of the Office for National Statistics (ONS) has been asked to reply to your recent question on unemployment and job vacancies in the Greater London area. I am replying in the Director's absence.
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  Estimates of economic status are available from the Labour Force Survey (LFS). The measure of unemployment derived from the LFS is defined on a consistent and internationally recognised basis set out by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and counts as unemployed people who are a) without a paid job, b) available to start work within the next two weeks and c) have either looked for work in the last four weeks or are waiting to start a job already obtained.
  The latest seasonally adjusted estimates from the Labour Force Survey covering winter (December–February) 1999/2000 show there were 268,000 ILO unemployed in the Greater London area.
  In the closest aggregation of Jobcentres to the Greater London area there were 36,100 unfilled vacancies in March 2000 the latest date for which data are available. Jobcentre vacancies do not represent the total number of vacancies available in the economy. Latest estimates suggest that about a third of all vacancies nationally are notified to Jobcentres. This proportion may vary between regions.

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

Lord Evans of Temple Guiting
Matthew Evans, Esquire, CBE, having been created Baron Evans of Temple Guiting, of Temple Guiting in the County of Gloucestershire, for life—Was, in his robes, introduced between the Lord Rogers of Riverside and the Lord Bragg.
Lord Roper
John Francis Hodgess Roper, Esquire, having been created Baron Roper, of Thorney Island in the City of Westminster, for life—Was, in his robes, introduced between the Lord Thomson of Monifieth and the Lord Newby.

Schools: Physical Education
2.48 p.m.
Lord Dormand of Easingtonasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether the standard of physical education in all types of school is satisfactory.
The Minister of State, Department for Education and Employment (Baroness Blackstone): My Lords, physical education teaching is satisfactory or better in most schools according to Ofsted. To bring in further improvements we have recently launched our strategy, A Sporting Future fir All, which proposes increasing specialist sports colleges to 110; the creation of school sports co-ordinators to expand the range of sports activities in 600 secondary schools and up to 3,000 linked primary schools; setting up a national advisory panel on school playing fields to back up our already tough measures on sales; and steps to improve teacher training. We want to encourage all schools to provide at least two hours of PE and sport each week.
Lord Dormand of Easington: My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that reply. However, is she aware that the two separate reports which have been issued by Sport England and by Speednet show that more than half a million hours of physical education are being lost in primary schools? Is she further aware that the annual report of Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Schools, which she just mentioned, states that in primary schools one-third of progress is good? Presumably, two-thirds is not so good.
As regards secondary schools, is my noble friend aware of the fear that is expressed of the effect of paying PGCE physical education students for their
280
final year, compared with the four-year commitment for undergraduates in physical education who receive no such payment?
Baroness Blackstone: My Lords, I am aware of the figures that my noble friend has just produced. There is a slight reduction in the number of hours that are devoted to physical education in primary schools. That is a matter that the Government want schools to address. I am also aware of the points that my noble friend made about Ofsted. However, I do not think he should assume that the other two-thirds that he mentioned are not satisfactory. Ofsted has shown that across all ages the provision of physical education in our schools is on the whole satisfactory. Of course that does not mean to say that we should be complacent. More should be done. That is why I listed some of the measures that the Government are taking. The applications for teaching physical education in our schools are buoyant.
Lord Monro of Langholm: My Lords, what are the Government doing to encourage team games in schools and inter-school fixtures, all of which do so much to encourage discipline and leadership? They have a tremendous effect on school morale if one is on the winning side. Nowadays PE teachers devote far too much time to individual sports and not enough to team sports, which offer so many more advantages.
Baroness Blackstone: My Lords, the Government feel that a range of PE activities should be provided in our schools, of which team sports are an important part. However, I do not entirely accept the implication of the noble Lord's remarks; namely, that individual sports are not highly appropriate for many young people. I mention the example of dance. Dance is taught to groups of young people and it is an appropriate activity for many teenage girls who may not wish to participate in team sports. Of course, competitions of the kind that the noble Lord has mentioned are also—
Noble Lords: Oh!
Baroness Blackstone: My Lords, I am not sure what is so surprising about suggesting that adolescent girls derive much physical education and exercise from dance, which is demanding and stretches the body. It is part—and only one part—of what schools provide in the form of PE. As regards competitive sport and competitions between schools, the Government encourage that but, in the end, it is a matter for school governing bodies and head teachers.
Baroness Trumpington: My Lords, do the Government really consider that dance is a sport; it certainly was not in my day?
Baroness Blackstone: My Lords, I wonder whether the noble Baroness has carefully read my noble

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friend's Question, which is not about sport but about physical education. I state categorically that dance provides opportunities for physical education.
Lord Addington: My Lords, perhaps I may confine my remarks to the issue of sport as opposed to PE generally. Does the Minister agree that, in the short and medium term, amateur sports clubs will be the only answer to this historical problem in our school system? As they are subsidising this very important part of our national education system, what is the attitude of the Minister and her department towards ensuring that amateur sports clubs do not pay out quite so much in tax?
Baroness Blackstone: My Lords, the taxation of amateur sports clubs is not an issue with which I am familiar. I therefore cannot answer the noble Lord's question in that regard. However, a great deal of extra curricular sporting activity, including team sports, is now taking place in our schools and, indeed, it is growing. Of the wide variety of extra curricular activities which now take place, team sports are the most popular. There should be some encouragement of amateur sporting clubs to work with schools in this regard.
Lord Peston: My Lords, I hate to introduce a disagreeable note before my noble friend, but could I ask her to reflect back to her own schooldays, as I do to mine? Physical education—or, as we called it, PT—was the most ghastly event of the day. It left us hot and sticky and, although we did not have the benefits of the national curriculum, it certainly put us off studying anything that our teachers wanted us to learn for the rest of the day. Why is such great emphasis placed on this activity? It actually puts people off that kind of physical exertion for the rest of their lives.
Baroness Blackstone: My Lords, I am sure that my noble friend was very good at many sports. He is certainly a football fanatic; I cannot believe that he did not play it while at school. We should all remember the wonderful scene in the film Kes, which showed how team sports should not be taught in our schools. It is all a matter of how it is done. Sport should be taught in such a way as to encourage all young people, including those who are not particularly talented and who will never make the school team, but who may be—to come back to what I said earlier—rather good at some kind of individual sport.
Lord Glentoran: My Lords, does the Minister agree that in three out of four of the age ranges the Government have failed to achieve their target of two hours PE per week? What are the Government doing to reverse the decline of 19 per cent in the recruitment of PE teachers?
Baroness Blackstone: My Lords, as regards PE teachers in our secondary schools, the recruitment figures demonstrate that there are no shortages. As I
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said earlier, there is a high demand from young people wishing to work in this particular area. As to the noble Lord's point about not meeting targets, we have not set targets; we have issued guidelines. The previous Government did not introduce guidelines, but we have, and we shall be monitoring the effects of that guidance over the coming months and next year.

Employers: Family Friendly Policies
2.56 p.m.
Lord Northbourneasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they will consider requiring all public limited companies to make, in their annual report, a statement about their policy in relation to employees who have caring responsibilities for children.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, the Government have no plans at present to introduce such a requirement.
Lord Northbourne: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, up to a point, for that reply. Does he agree that in this context it is important that employers should be brought to think about this problem in the same way as they are asked in their annual report to think about the environmental and equal opportunities responsibilities of their companies? Does he agree that in the past three or four decades British business and industry have benefited enormously from a major influx of working mothers? Is it too much to ask that boards of directors should be asked to spend perhaps two or three minutes once a year pondering whether they are exercising their responsibilities appropriately in regard to their employees who have children—not only because of their social responsibility in the matter but because those children are the workforce of tomorrow?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, my Answer was of course accurate, but I apologise for it appearing to be negative. The noble Lord is right: we want people to have caring responsibilities as well as being employees. My noble friend Lady Jay rightly said last week that women do not want to have to choose between being successful mothers or successful employees. It is not that we are against boards of directors considering these matters, but it is not for the Government now to intervene when we have a company law review which is proposing that firms, in their operating and financial review, should give an account of the company's key relationships with employees. This should include employment policies and practices, including disability policies, non-discrimination policies, employee involvement policies, compliance with international labour

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conventions and anti-discrimination law. There is much there worth considering, but it should be done in the context of the company law review.
Lord Trefgarne: My Lords, is there no end to the list of absurd propositions for directors of major companies? Would it not be better to reduce the list of things to which they have to adhere?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, if the noble Lord cares to look at the consultative document published by the Company Law Review last month, which I hasten to say is an independent document and not one published by the Government, he will find that most of it concerns improved financial reporting. I hope he will agree that that is entirely appropriate. In addition, it makes suggestions which, although they may be a slight burden on directors, certainly should be of great assistance to investors, shareholders and employees in understanding what trust they can put in the activities of the company.
Baroness Sharp of Guildford: My Lords, is the Minister aware that there is now considerable empirical evidence to suggest that shorter working hours and higher productivity go together? Is he further aware that a number of leading British companies, including Glaxo Wellcome and BT, are now encouraging their managers not to stay at work for long hours, to take their full leave entitlement and to spend more time with their families? Is he therefore certain that the Government are right to be quite so reluctant to implement the full spirit of the working time directive?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, I do not think that the Government are reluctant. I was answering a Question about what should be said by plcs. I should add that plcs employ only just over one-third of the workforce in this country. However, the noble Baroness is entirely right. That is why the speech of my noble friend Lady Jay was made at the launch of a government review considering issues surrounding maternity pay and parental leave. Indeed, that is why in the past week we have had the Work/Life Balance initiative and the Work/Life Balance Week, which I hope the noble Baroness supports.
Lord Alton of Liverpool: My Lords, does the Minister agree that the introduction of Sunday trading, with over 1.5 million more people now being required to work on Sundays, bringing the total number to 9 million people working on Sundays each week, has had a disastrous effect on family life because it has prevented families from having time together? Does he particularly agree with some of the arguments currently being advanced by Ms Cherie Booth QC in regard to the time parents should be able to have off from work?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, the case in which Ms Cherie Booth appeared yesterday is still sub judice so I am not in a position to comment on that.
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The noble Lord raised the issue of Sunday trading. He will recall that at the time of the passage of Sunday trading legislation very considerable protection was included for those employees who did not wish to work on Sundays. Against that one has to balance the fact that shopping and other family activities on Sundays are important additions to the cementing of family relationships.
Baroness Miller of Hendon: My Lords, will the Minister accept from me that we feel that he has perhaps been working just too hard, which has caused a strain on his voice? I am very sorry that he has to deal with all of these matters. We offer our great sympathy.
Does the noble Lord agree that if the Government were to accept the suggestion set out in the Question the floodgates would be opened and a precedent would be set? It might be legally necessary to put all kinds of other statements in the annual report—I have in mind sexual orientation, race, gender and so on—whereas the prime reason for the annual report is to discuss the financial health of the company and the behaviour of the directors.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, the reason for my strained voice is a good deal less dramatic than that. I think that I have just caught a cold from my baby granddaughter. As to the wider issue, the Company Law Review from which I quoted will come to a conclusion some time next year. It will be open for consultation and the Government will consider their response. The Government are constantly aware of the necessity to avoid unnecessary burdens on business. At the same time, I stick to my answer to the noble Lord, Lord Trefgarne. There is great value in having company reports which reflect to employees, shareholders and potential investors the true state of health of the company in its widest sense.

Climate Change Levy
3.4 p.m.
Lord Campbell of Croyask Her Majesty's Government:
Whether they are still considering changes in the proposals for a climate change levy.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, the Government have developed the climate change levy in an open and consultative way. The views expressed by business have helped to refine the design of the levy. Legislation underpinning the levy is included in the Finance Bill 2000, which is currently passing through Parliament. Indeed, it was before the Standing Committee yesterday. The levy will come into effect from April 2001. As with all measures in the Finance Bill, the Government will naturally listen to any views expressed by interested parties.
Lord Campbell of Croy: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for his reply. While some changes have been

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made, does the noble Lord accept that the present proposals would still damage certain manufacturing industries? As the Prime Minister confirmed last night that the Government are not prepared to try to alter the exchange rate for the euro and have left interest rates to the Bank of England, would not further changes in this levy be a timely way of assisting manufacturing in the face of an over-strong pound?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, the climate change levy is being introduced in response to a legal obligation which is imposed on us under the Kyoto agreements. We have said that we will reduce emissions of six greenhouse gases by 12.5 per cent between 1990 and 2008–12. Since business is responsible for 40 per cent of the emission of those gases, clearly something has to be done about business. It cannot be left to other energy users. The climate change levy is economically neutral in the sense that it is balanced by a reduction in business national insurance contributions. We will listen to arguments in detail at any time, but I believe that the climate change levy is a necessary consequence of our legal international obligations.
Lord Ezra: My Lords, is the noble Lord aware of the serious concern about the decision so far of the Government not fully to exempt from the impact of the levy electricity generated from combined heat and power plants? Such electricity as goes into the grid has to pay the full levy. The effect of that is already that a number of major plants contemplated by such firms as British Sugar have been postponed and that NHS hospital trusts, which are increasingly reliant on combined heat and power, are now becoming reluctant to build more plant because of the cost of exporting a proportion of the electricity, which they cannot avoid.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, there is a derogation in favour of high quality combined heat and power plants. It has to be said that, although combined heat and power is generally advantageous, it is not necessarily advantageous in all circumstances. That is why we have restricted the derogation to high quality plants.
Lord Geddes: My Lords, whatever changes may or may not take place in the climate change levy, can the Minister assure the House that no burden—particularly no financial burden—will be imposed on sources of renewable energy, including hydro-electricity, relative to the climate change levy?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, it would be too simple to say that all forms of renewable energy are necessarily good and all forms of non-renewable energy are necessarily bad. There is a spectrum in these matters. We have sought, within the terms of our international obligations, to provide as much protection for industry as we can, consistent with keeping the energy savings. That is why we have an 80
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per cent discount for those companies with energy efficiency discount agreements and that is why we have a 50 per cent discount for horticulture.
Lord Mackay of Ardbrecknish: My Lords, perhaps I may press the Minister on the point made by my noble friend Lord Geddes about hydro-power, which of course is pollution free and is the major source of renewable energy available now and is likely to be in the future. Is the noble Lord absolutely satisfied that nothing in the climate change levy inhibits the generators from either going into new hydro- schemes or carrying out modernisation and upgrading work on existing hydro-schemes in order to increase the amount of energy we get from this excellent and, I should have thought, climate-friendly source?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, I do not believe that any terms in the climate change levy will have the effect that the noble Lord suggests. However, because I am not certain, I believe that I should write to him. Of course, hydro-electric power is not available everywhere. I noticed that one noble Lord introduced to the House today comes from Thorney Island in the City of Westminster. I do not think that there are many waterfalls around Thorney Island.
Lord Haskel: My Lords, is there any proof that directors and workers in manufacturing companies are not as concerned about climate change as those who work in other businesses? After all, does my noble friend agree that people involved in manufacturing breathe the same air as the rest of us and that they, too, have families? I believe that they are as concerned about climate change as everyone else.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, my noble friend is entirely right. However, I fear that each of us knows of the conflict between the person and the heart.
The Earl of Northesk: My Lords, will the Minister stand by his statement made two days ago in response to a Question that the climate change levy will be neutral in its effect on industry? Does that sanguine view extend to the prospect of energy-intensive industries relocating elsewhere in Europe to escape the strictures of the tax, thereby possibly creating the effect of exporting jobs and importing pollution?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: My Lords, of course I stand by the view I expressed two days ago. In aggregate, the climate change levy is neutral in its effect on industry as a whole. However, it would have no effect at all if it did not cause some industries, notably energy-intensive industries and those which cannot or will not sign energy efficiency agreements, to suffer. The benefits will then be returned to other, more energy-efficient industries. If that means that occasionally decisions are taken to relocate, that would be regrettable. However, I should remind the

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noble Earl that the climate change levy and the Kyoto agreements are international agreements. They affect other European countries as well.

The Queen Mother: 100th Birthday Celebrations
3.11 p.m.
Baroness Sharplesasked Her Majesty's Government:
What plans they have to support events to honour the 100th birthday of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother.
The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence (Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean): My Lords, the Government have been pleased to authorise Headquarters London District of the Ministry of Defence to support the pageant planned for 19th July. This event, involving the many charities and interests which Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother has supported throughout her life, will be the focus of the people's tribute to her as she celebrates her 100th birthday. Her Majesty's Government believe that it will be a very happy occasion.
Baroness Sharples: My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for her reply. When finalising the arrangements for the celebrations surrounding Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother's 100th birthday, and bearing in mind the high esteem and deep affection in which she is held in this country, will the general public be given the widest possible opportunity to witness these events? There has been considerable criticism in many parts of the media.
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, the Government believe it is important that as many as possible of the people of the United Kingdom who wish to witness the pageant are able to do so. As the noble Baroness has pointed out, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother is held in great esteem and, perhaps I may say, enormous affection by most people in this country.
At the pageant some 12,400 free seats will be provided, over 10,000 of which will be available to the general public. Eight thousand will be made available to people affiliated to charities or military units; 2,000 are being distributed through two national newspapers; 1,200 seats are reserved for the family and friends of Her Majesty and will be dealt with by the Palace; 500 have been allocated to the Government and 700 for performers and people supporting the event. Furthermore, there will be 600 additional seats in hospitality boxes.
I believe that the noble Baroness is also concerned about the arrangements for broadcasting this event. It is of course a matter for all television companies to decide what they wish to cover and what they do not. It is also a matter for the BBC, which has been the subject of some controversy in this respect. The BBC
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does, of course, have complete editorial independence. However, I think it is right to say that the Government would prefer to see a wider audience for this event. I am happy to tell the House that today there have been some positive indications from an independent television broadcasting company. It has indicated that it may wish to carry live coverage of the event. I believe that that would be splendid.
Baroness Trumpington: My Lords, do Her Majesty's Government intend to declare the 100th birthday of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother a public holiday? If not, why not?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, no such plans have been made for Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother's birthday. However, I am sure that on the day itself—4th August—Her Majesty will be greeted with the affection which is customary on her birthday. Given that, I am sure that on this special birthday many people will wish to take time off from work in order to offer their congratulations personally.
Lord Acton: My Lords, can the Minister confirm that the two newspapers selected to distribute the 2,000 tickets are the Sun and the Sunday Telegraph? As someone who does not read either of those newspapers, I ask the Minister whether she can tell the House how they were selected.
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, I can confirm that my noble friend is entirely right. The Sun and the Sunday Telegraph will distribute the tickets. I do not know the precise reasons why those two newspapers were selected. Perhaps the choice reflects a certain degree of irritation with some of the disobliging comments made by other newspapers about this event. Obviously, the choice reflects what might be termed one popular newspaper with a very broad circulation and one high quality broadsheet.
Lord Carlisle of Bucklow: My Lords, should the BBC stand by its present intention not to cover this event, will the Minister undertake to remind the BBC that many of us who have, throughout our time in politics, supported the principle that the BBC should be funded by a licence fee on the basis that the BBC is a national body may now have reason to consider changing our support?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, perhaps I may say gently to the noble Lord that whatever one's feelings might be as an individual, it is not my job as a Minister to make that point to the BBC. However, I have not been unhappy to see a number of people making the point.
Lord Elton: My Lords, does the noble Baroness agree that it would be appropriate for this House to send a message of congratulation to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother? Furthermore,

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can she tell the House whether the business load is such that it is likely to be possible for the House to do that on the day itself?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, I am sure that this matter can be arranged through the usual channels. Noble Lords will have seen that my boss, the Government Chief Whip, has indicated his views. Perhaps I may remind noble Lords that the date in question is 4th August. Noble Lords may well have their own views about what this House will be doing on that day. However, I am sure that, as individuals, many of us will wish to send our heartiest congratulations to a very special and very lovely lady.
Lord Renton: My Lords, will the Government bear in mind that those of us who have long memories, such as mine, recall that the Queen Mother showed immense courage when her husband came to the throne and again during the war years when King George VI and the Queen Mother remained in London throughout the bombing? Her Majesty demonstrated enormous courage and was a fine example to the people. Furthermore, she has also shown courage and devotion over a period of 75 years throughout the Commonwealth. Does the Minister agree that these are factors which the Government should not overlook?
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean: My Lords, I agree entirely with what has been said by the noble Lord. I hope that he will be reassured to learn that the administration and organisation of the pageant have been conducted entirely by Headquarters London District. As many noble Lords will know for themselves, that group has an enormous amount of experience of this kind of event. It has of course been working in direct consultation with the Palace and other participants. It is important that on such a special day the events will be of a character that reflects the wishes and interests of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother. I am sure that it will be a great success and a very happy occasion.

Law and Order
3.19 p.m.
Lord Tebbitrose to call attention to the problems of maintaining law and order; and to move for Papers.
The noble Lord said: My Lords, I am grateful for this opportunity to draw attention to the problems of maintaining law and order. The maintenance of law and order, the upholding of the Queen's peace, is, in the order of priorities of government, second only to that of the defence of the realm. But there can be no doubt that the state of law and order has deteriorated—not just over the past 36 months, but over at least the past 36 years.
There probably never was a golden age of law and order. Golden ages live retrospectively in our imaginations and prospectively in our election
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manifestos. But in London during the war mothers did not worry about young children travelling alone through the pitch darkness of a blacked-out city. Churches had no need, 30-odd years ago, to lock their doors against vandals and thieves. The idea of an assault on a teacher by a pupil or parent, although sometimes tempting to pupils, was unthinkable. As for murder, it was a crime which then still truly shocked. For most of us, and my experience is common, the only peddlers and pushers around the gates of our schools were the Wall's ice-cream men, not drug dealers.
Where do we now find ourselves? The case of Mr Martin, the Norfolk farmer recently convicted of the murder of a hardened young criminal who was burgling his home, highlighted the growing problem of rural crime and the ineffectiveness of current policies aimed at deterring crime. The three burglars were professional criminals. They had been arrested, charged and convicted over and over again. But the penalties exacted for their crimes were laughable—and laugh at them those criminals did. Indeed, the penalties constituted an incitement to crime—an incitement which worked. Incidentally, I should be grateful if, in replying to the debate, the Minister would tell the House whether the two burglars who survived have yet been charged with burglary.
Last Thursday, the Daily Telegraph published a real and simple table of crime statistics for 1954 and 1997. Let me rehearse the comparative figures. Homicide: 1954, 311; 1997, 739. Sexual offences: 16,096; 33,165. Violent crime: 24,414; 347,064. Burglary: 75,443; 1,015,075. Theft and handling stolen goods: 291,667, rising to 2,164,952. Criminal damage: 5,251; 877,042. The grand totals are roughly 434,000 for 1954 and 4,600,000 for 1997.
In the face of a ten-fold increase in crime, the forces against crime have not yet surrendered—but they have conceded ground to criminality and disorder. And they have developed, as we saw in the May Day disturbances, an unstated policy of tolerance of a given level of crime.
An effective policy for the preservation of the Queen's peace rests upon three pillars. The first is a moral authority, stating in absolute terms the distinction between right and wrong. It does not debate, it does not argue—it commands, most notably in western civilisation, through the Ten Commandments.
The second is the civic pressure of society. Man is a social animal. He needs the approval of his peers, and that creates a pressure for social conformity: the pressure to conform not only to the law, but beyond that to accept the standards and norms of society or to be disapproved of and to some extent frozen out of that society. In the lawless housing estates and town centres in our country today, that norm is the norm of criminality.
The third pillar is the combined force of the judicial system. Few would deny that the first pillar, that of moral authority, has been greatly weakened in recent times. Rightly or wrongly—I regret this—the Church, particularly the Church of England, is perceived

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widely to be in decline, anachronistic, lacking in faith in itself, and preoccupied in introverted controversy over issues such as women priests and gay marriage rather than upholding the supremacy of the commandments.
As for the second pillar, the very fabric of our society is being assaulted. The family, the basic building block of society, is being weakened—especially, I regret to say, by the present Administration. Ministers say that they have a policy for the family. But however often I ask—and I have done so frequently—they deny that they have a definition of the word "family". It is difficult to have an effective policy towards that which one cannot define. I think that for them the family is not exclusively about intended long-life partnership between men and women or of ties of blood; for them, family includes any association of two or more humans coming together for however brief a period.
Nor does the Administration have much respect for the institutions and values of the society in which we grew up. Apparently, those institutions represent the forces of conservatism, demonised by the Prime Minister and seen as racist, class-dominated and homophobic, outdated and unworthy of respect.
With 250,000 immigrants a year flooding, or should I say "trickling"—in case I am thought to be panicking into this country, not to mention the 5 million or more members of ethnic minorities already here, there is an overwhelming need to uphold and support, not to denigrate, the society into which they are coming. Their integration into this society should be a priority. But if they are told that the society is worthless, why should they integrate? So that pillar of policy is being weakened.
The load has therefore increased on the thin blue line of the police, and the far thicker and fatter line of the judicial and legal establishment who are, together, responsible for the detection, conviction and punishment of criminals. If we are left to rely more upon that pillar, then we should have been strengthening it, not weakening it. Yet who can deny that the balance between criminals and police has been shifted against the police in every respect? Indeed, the numbers of police have been falling, and will be lower at the end of this Parliament than they were at the beginning.
The establishment view has been that punishment does not significantly deter crime—unless, of course, the crime is sexism, racism, homophobia or speeding on motorways. Oddly, those crimes constitute a separate class of behaviour; they are said not only to be capable of being deterred by heavier punishment but to demand heavier and heavier punishment.
The Metropolitan Police have been subjected to what I regret I must call the crass stupidity of the Macpherson report. Senior officers now engage in public self-flagellation to purge themselves of imagined racism—an essential, of course, for future promotion—while officers on the beat hunger for retirement and decline to notice suspicious behaviour by people from racial minorities, fearful of accusations
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of racism leading to the loss of their reputation, their jobs and their pensions. The result is an increase in crime, particularly against members of the racial minorities.
Mr Wilkinson, the director of Bramshill strategic command course, states in today's Telegraph that although overall "crime management"—a curious phrase—is a key role for police chiefs, they should study "social exclusion, racism" and "that sort of thing". He talks about directing the Met as a big company job and "not messing about chasing criminals". He says that that is "a concept of the police 10 years ago"; nowadays senior policemen are business executives "trying to improve the social outcomes".
I suspect that I edge towards the controversial, so I may as well go further. Over the past four decades the whole direction of policy to maintain law and order has been perverse, totally mistaken and has had the reverse effect of what was intended. That view will be dismissed by those responsible for the conventional wisdom of the past 40 years, but it is their theories and policies which have not worked. Crime has got worse, not better.
It is not the first time in recent years that the conventional wisdom of the day has been found wanting. For example, 30 or 40 years ago the conventional view was that inflation was caused by greedy unions and workers pushing up wages and greedy capitalists pushing up prices, thus creating a wage-price spiral. Everyone knew that the cure was a prices and incomes policy, although no one could find one. The dissident voices of Milton Friedman, Hayek and Enoch Powell were dismissed as those of wild, bulging-eyed extremists, but they were right. We all know now that inflation is, and can only be, caused by governments. The "cures" for inflation that we used were at best ineffective—more likely, counter-productive—and certainly caused us to neglect the policies now in place which control inflation.
What I say today will no doubt be rubbished by the legal judicial establishment, the criminologists and, above all, the soft, wet, Left establishment. But I ask them at least to ask themselves why the reduction of sanctions against criminality has coincided with an increase in criminality. The two could be unconnected. But is it very likely? The principal difficulty in maintaining law and order lies not in our criminals, vandals and thugs but ourselves. It was Home Secretary Jenkins who famously said that,
"the permissive society is the civilised society".
We have tasted it. Many parts of our society have descended into barbarism. Our society has become less civilised in every respect.
The same was true of society in New York, but there the policy of zero tolerance, not merely of crime but of crude, loutish and uncivilised behaviour, has been shown to work. Here, a policy of permissiveness has also worked but in precisely the opposite direction. I give two brief examples of behaviour that we see every day. Cyclists are allowed to ride unchecked on the footpath and ignore traffic lights, one-way streets and keep left signs, and they ride at night without lights.

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They abuse and threaten anyone who objects. Motorcyclists now follow their example. Shoplifting has not been prosecuted effectively for years. Gangs now walk into shops and wheel out racks of clothes. Shop staff are told by employers not to risk their lives resisting shoplifters. It is a sad comment on our society that on average about four people a year are killed by convicted killers who have been released from prison to kill again.
Crime will not be beaten nor the streets made safe for the citizen by acting solely against the most serious crime. Not many criminals start their careers with serious crime; they learn to scoff at the law as juveniles, commit petty crime and work their way up. It is at the early stages that effective action can stop the escalation into a life of serious crime. Zero tolerance is not a soft option. For a similar population, London has 25,600 police officers whereas New York has over 40,000. That pays huge dividends. In New York since 1993 both violent and property crimes have fallen by more than half; murders have fallen by two-thirds; and hooliganism has been defeated. New York has been liberated from crime and returned to its citizens. The liberal permissive establishment derided Mayor Guiliani, just as Friedman and Hayek were derided, but was proved wrong.
Sadly, the Home Secretary has been taken hostage by that same wet, soft Left, pink, permissive establishment, and that is a great disappointment to me. Despite his difficult adolescence in student politics, I thought that the Home Secretary had grown up. I had great hopes that he might run his department; alas, it is running him, as it did almost all his predecessors, except Mr Michael Howard. I hope that he will break free and campaign for the law-abiding majority, not the criminal minority.
Think what a crowning achievement for this Government it would be if they could make the streets of Islington, Holland Park, Battersea and Fulham safe for the new London permissives to stroll between expensive restaurants and soft porn cinemas flaunting their pearls and gold Rolex watches. My Lords, I beg to move for Papers.
3.36 p.m.
Lord Brennan: My Lords, I declare an interest as a practising barrister. I make that declaration with pride, and I must add to it a disappointment for the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit: as chairman of the Bar last year, I was described by The Times as the "antithesis of establishment man". Although the contrast between what I am about to say (following the traditions of this House) and what has just been said may be stark, I hope that your Lordships will nevertheless find my comments helpful.
One of the best measures of a civilised society is the effectiveness and fairness with which it seeks to maintain law and order. The legislature is a crucial component of that objective, whether in legislating for policing, sentencing, the care of victims or the criminal justice system generally. Such legislation is, surely,
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directed at the long-term welfare of society. There is, therefore, an obligation on us to conduct any debate on law and order with moderation and on the basis of reliable data; otherwise, in seeking to respond to people's concerns (if I have the phrase correctly) we can quickly descend into at best rhetoric and at worst populist clamour.
The need for debate both in your Lordships' House and among the public to be well informed is well illustrated by information provided only last week by a research study by the Home Office into attitudes to crime based on the British Crime Survey 1998. From that contemporary knowledge, it emerges that 80 per cent of those interviewed thought that 30 per cent of recorded crime was violent crime. Serious violent crime accounts for only 8 per cent. That reveals a dramatic misunderstanding of the position. As to sentencing, 80 per cent of those interviewed felt that judges were out of touch, not because of their social habits, but essentially because of what was perceived to be their approach to sentencing. Yet, when asked what to do with a convicted burglar with previous convictions, the majority of members of the public who were consulted came out with a more lenient sentence than current Court of Appeal guidelines.
Finally, the public want tough sentences, but they do not want more prisons. That tension between expectation and reality means that debates like this must be informed and constructive. Knowing that some of your Lordships will speak on them, I therefore decline to talk about the reform of the Crown Prosecution Service to deal with the speed with which it is now hoped to bring the arrested to disposal and about the importance of looking after the victim. I am sure that they will be covered in the debate.
Rather than doing that, I invite your Lordships' attention to three discrete areas of change, each of which is designed not only to maintain but also to improve law and order. The first—I ask no forgiveness for making it number one—is to ensure that in our civilised society racial crime is properly dealt with. Whatever was said earlier, the fact is that we have a diverse ethnic society. Anecdotal evidence indicates, from an article in the Economist the other day, that racial crime is on the increase. I need not trouble your Lordships with the famous examples. With that increase, perceived even if not real, the fact is that the police, my profession, and the courts should be aware that this crime is a cancer in our modern society. What more effective way to deal with it is there than to ensure that, in their constitution, the police should be required to represent the demography of our present society? London and the West Midlands are the most ethnically diverse of our communities; the percentage of ethnic minority representation in the London Metropolitan force is only 3.9 per cent; in the Midlands it is 4.4 per cent. In neither case is that figure truly representative.
The police are making great efforts to improve on that, and I commend them on it. I invite your Lordships' constant attention to the need to ensure that racial crime is properly investigated as such, and, if a conviction occurs, properly sentenced as such.

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Secondly and very differently, the Sex Offenders Act 1997 established for the first time a UK register of sex offenders. When I was travelling abroad last year in my professional capacity, it became clear that the international aspect of such registers must be considered. The Association of Chief Police Officers is at present discussing with the Home Office how to improve the register. There are two ways. Difficult though they are in technicality, they are important in principle. The first is to ensure that sex offenders travelling abroad declare such a journey beforehand so that the country they intend to visit can be informed. Vice versa, those who go abroad to commit such sexual crimes against children and who become convicted for it, on their return to this country should be required to declare the same and have it registered.
Thirdly and finally, perhaps I may make a suggestion which I hope is not too "modernising"; it has extremely venerable origins. I refer to the codification of the criminal law. The Martin case, what is the true extent of self-defence, double jeopardy, and the injustice that can be created by the mandatory life sentence, are all discrete aspects of the criminal law, all of which have been considered in recent months in isolation from the rest of that law, often quickly, superficially and not helpfully.
In 1879, Lord Blackburn presented to this House a Roya1 Commission report on the codification of the criminal law. In 1989, the Law Commission produced a draft modern criminal code in clear, rational language. I invite the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor and the Home Secretary to seek to implement that code in any future parliamentary session. Why? First, it will give coherence, clarity and certainty to our community about what the criminal law is. Secondly, it will save the cost of the legal judicial establishment having to investigate, as we now do, the terminology of an Act of Parliament of the last century dictating crimes of violence. Thirdly, it will show the public that the law and this House are in tune with what they think should happen to maintain law and order.
I thank noble Lords and the staff of the House for the courtesy shown to me since my introduction. My daily diet is what might gently be called a "robust dialogue" between Bench and Bar. To have enjoyed, as I have just done, an uninterrupted monologue has been a real pleasure.
3.45 p.m.
Baroness Young: My Lords, it is my very great pleasure to be the first to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Brennan, on his maiden speech. We all know of his distinguished record. He was the chairman of the Bar Council last year. He is now a recorder of the Crown Court and has been so since 1982. He brings to your Lordships' House tremendous experience and expertise and we have all listened with immense interest to what he said on this important subject this afternoon. The noble Lord made a number of points that I, for one, and I believe others, will want to read in Hansard. I am sure I speak for everyone in saying
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that we look forward to hearing him on many occasions. I believe, as we all do, that he has much to contribute to our debates.
I start by thanking my noble friend Lord Tebbit for introducing this important debate this afternoon. It is almost impossible to meet anyone who is not concerned about law and order. Like your Lordships, I believe that the two basic functions of the state are the defence of the realm, and law and order at home. I do not believe that there are any quick solutions or easy answers to the question. In my opinion, to reduce the level of crime today will be a long haul.
I was interested in my noble friend's analysis. He pointed out that the three props which maintained law and order in the past—the moral authority of the Church, the moral authority of society at large and the judicial system—have all changed, particularly the first two. In the course of my remarks I shall concentrate on what I see as the collapse of society and its effect on law and order.
One of the great changes I have seen in my lifetime is the increase in crime. When I was a child in the 1930s, we could go out without locking the front door. Now everything must be locked, even when we are in the house—windows and doors. Of course, we all have the inevitable burglar alarm. Cars must always he locked. Like many women, when out driving I like to have a mobile telephone to hand as an assurance. Despite all that, which is common knowledge, it is hard to think of anyone we know who has not been burgled even when what is taken is not valuable.
Nor is a breakdown of law and order confined to the richer members of society. There are enough vandalised council estates up and down the country to show that all sections of society are suffering. As my noble friend rightly pointed out, a number of crimes are no longer even considered crimes. (For instance, at my home in Oxford cyclists regularly ride on the pavement, through red lights and without lights at night, to the great danger of both motorists and pedestrians.) The same may be said of shoplifting.
All that comes at a time when the country has never been richer. Like my noble friend, I do not suggest that there was some mythical golden age. But the fact is that crime was lower before and immediately after the war and increased only very slowly during the 1950s. Statistics show that crime has increased rapidly since the 1960s and has continued increasing every year. As my noble friend's figures illustrate only too well, there has been an incredible increase from 1954 to 1997.
I am not a lawyer; nor have I had a great deal of experience of the systems of justice. However, I have heard enough debates in your Lordships' House to know that many remedies have been tried. I well recall that in 1979 we talked about the short, sharp shock. We have talked at length about community sentencing and longer prison sentences. Now I read that there are proposals promoting prison by day with perhaps evenings and weekends off. I have no doubt that for some offenders some treatments have been effective and should be continued and lessons learned. I believe strongly that those in prison should be educated and

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trained to be able to have some constructive employment when they come out. I certainly believe that there should be more policemen on the beat. There is no greater reassurance to the public than seeing someone in uniform. It is quite extraordinary that one hardly ever sees a uniformed policeman, even in the centre of towns, unless there is some kind of violent demonstration.
I should like to speak about what I believe to be some of the fundamental causes of the increase in crime. In preparation for the debate, I reread that interesting book by Norman Dennis and George Erdos, Families without Fatherhood, which I much recommend. In the introduction, Professor Halsey states:
"No one can deny that divorce, separation, birth outside marriage and one-parent families as well as cohabitation and extra-marital sexual intercourse have increased rapidly. Many applaud these freedoms. But what should be universally acknowledged is that the children of parents who do not follow the traditional norm (i.e., taking on personal, active and long-term responsibility for the social upbringing of the children they generate) are thereby disadvantaged in many major aspects of their chances of living a successful life. On the evidence available, such children tend to die earlier, to have more illness, to do less well at school, to exist at a lower level of nutrition, comfort and conviviality, to suffer more unemployment, to be more prone to deviance and crime, and finally to repeat the cycle of unstable parenting from which they themselves have suffered".
I am not for one moment suggesting that no children from traditional families ever take to crime. But the price of marriage breakdown and the growth of single parent families has been a heavy one. The focus and the justification for easier divorce, and the explanations given of the so-called benefits of this, are that it has benefited women, many of whom in the past considered themselves to be oppressed by marriage. But the consequences for the young male in particular—and I regret to say that on the whole it is young males who take to crime—growing up without a father, without a role model showing him what responsibility is all about, have been disastrous. Many boys growing up now never see a man in a position of responsibility until they reach their second, third or fourth year in a secondary school when they see a schoolmaster. There are few men in primary schools. If they come from a single-parent family, brought up by their mother, there is no man taking responsibility whom they meet regularly until they reach the age of 13 or 14. We find that the dramatic decline of young men who are married and living with children has been paralleled by soaring crime rates as well as drug and alcohol abuse. One result is that those young men make very unattractive prospects as husbands and so the marriage rate continues to fall as girls do not want to be married to someone they regard as an irresponsible drop-out.
We are in a descending cycle from which at present it is difficult to see how we shall escape. The figures of all the surveys confirm this trend. The National Survey of Health and Development, following a group of people born in 1946, found that boys who had experienced the breakdown of their parents' marriages were more likely to be in custody; and those who had been young at the
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time of the breakdown were twice as likely to be delinquent by the age of 21 and to have been convicted of serious offences. Data from the National Child Development Study found from follow-up of 16 year-olds that 8 per cent of boys with both natural parents had been to court at some point whereas 16 per cent of boys with lone mothers, and 19 per cent of boys with stepfathers, had been before the courts.
The Cambridge study of delinquent development found that experience of separation from a parent before the age of 10 was associated with future delinquency. Where separation was caused by parental conflict rather than death, 32 per cent of boys separated because of parental conflict were convicted as juveniles compared with 16 per cent of unseparated boys.
Interestingly, American criminologist Robert Sampson was able to show that a city's divorce rate is actually a better predictor of the robbery rate than statistics of arrests and sentencing.
Looking to the future, the British criminologist Professor Sparke predicts that by the year 2010,
"crimes of violence, rape and sex crimes will be greatly increased. So too will the effects of alcohol and drugs".
Those are serious figures. It is a serious issue for all of us to consider. Your Lordships will know that I have long taken an interest in family policy. One of the issues which worries me about our society today is that I see it in free-fall: that the figures of the breakdown of marriages, children being brought up by single mothers and teenage pregnancies become worse each year. Unquestionably, that is having an effect on law and order in this country. Many people feel that we now have growing up a kind of warrior class of young men who have no role models, with no fathers and grandfathers to show them how a responsible man lives and contributes to society, and who are left simply to rob, molest and maraud from one end of the United Kingdom to the other. It is not an issue which will be solved today or overnight. I support very much what my noble friend said about zero tolerance. If we could achieve that, it would be very important. But I do hope that we shall find more ways of sustaining marriage, because until we do society will continue in its free-fall and crime will increase.
3.59 p.m.
Lord Greaves: My Lords, this is my first speech in your Lordships' House. When I inquired about the conventions relating to maiden speeches, I was told that I must not be controversial. I have to tell the House that I have never made a non-controversial speech in my life, but there is always a first time for everything. I obtained copies of the maiden speeches which some of my noble friends have made in recent months. I discovered that one word stands out from the pages of Hansard: "trepidation". I looked up the word "trepidation" in the OED and found that it meant:
"Tremulous agitation: confused hurry or alarm",
and—this is how I feel now—
"involuntary trembling of the limbs, as in paralytic affections".

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One thing I have discovered in the past week in your Lordships' House is that, if I am overcome by tremulous agitation to the extent that I collapse in a heap on the Floor of the House, many extremely kind and friendly people will pick me up and sort me out. The wonderful friendliness I have encountered from noble Lords on all sides of the House has been a revelation; and the friendliness, efficiency and superb professionalism of the Officers of the House and of all the staff have been a great help in joining a somewhat intimidating new institution.
As regards getting lost, which everyone does, as a mountaineer I have discovered a tip for all other neophyte Peers. I advise them to carry a pocket compass. Once I discovered that the alignment of your Lordships' House and of the whole building is from north to south, life became a great deal easier.
I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, for the opportunity to take part in this debate on the problems of maintaining law and order. I speak as someone who grew up in a police family. One of my great regrets today is that my father unfortunately died quite recently and cannot be here to listen to this speech. He served his life in the West Riding Constabulary, and my second exhibit this afternoon—I am not sure whether exhibits are permitted, but never mind—is a police whistle which he bequeathed to me. I have been strongly advised by noble friends that blowing it here would not be a good idea.
However, policing has changed very rapidly since the days of the police whistle. Whether it is the legitimate demand for more visible policing on the streets and in villages, in towns and on council estates, or whether it is the equally legitimate requirements of the police force for a new generation of highly skilled and specialist officers to deal with crime in modern technological ways, I hope that your Lordships' House will respond with its support.
I come here as a lifelong Liberal. As a Member of the Liberal Democrat Benches, I suppose that the question of police numbers is one for easy political knock-about at the moment. Police numbers fell during previous Conservative governments and they have fallen by 2,000 since 1997. However, that is not my intention today. Although, like everyone else, I could read out my party briefings, I am told not to be controversial on this occasion and, anyhow, we all know the figures.
I want to pose two perhaps much more fundamental questions. The first is that we should ask ourselves why crime is wrong. It may be obvious; it may be a silly question. However, is it wrong because it breaks the rules? Is it wrong because it is a counter to authority? Or is it wrong because it is simply unpleasant? The real reason why crime is wrong is because it has victims and attacks people's basic, fundamental human rights. As a Liberal, it is people's basic, fundamental human rights that I am in politics to support and defend.
The second question I ask is: can the police eradicate crime? The answer, I suggest, self-evidently is no, although that is not because the police are no good or because they do not have enough resources. The police
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can never eradicate crime any more than can the courts, the state or any other authority on their own; nor can schools eradicate truancy on their own or landlords eradicate housing arrears.
Like everyone else, the police operate within society as it is. It is not simply to the organisation, the resources and the support for the police that we should address our questions, although that is very important; we should also ask what is wrong with our society that there should be such an increase in crime. The police and other authorities can limit crime; they can contain it. If we are prepared for very authoritarian, draconian measures, they can suppress it, at least for a time.
However, fundamentally, it is to society as a whole that we should address our questions; that is, society at all its levels. If we are too draconian and too authoritarian in the measures we put forward, they will not work. What is more, they will begin to restrict to an unacceptable degree the very liberties of all the people who are not engaged in crime. It is a balance that we have to find.
I thank noble Lords for their patience and courtesy in listening to me today. I am relieved to inform the House that I have not been completely ovenwhelmed by tremulous agitations, at least not just yet! I look forward to playing a full part in the work of your Lordships' House and I promise that in future I shall not be quite so non-controversial.
4.7 p.m.
Baroness Stern: My Lords, it is my great pleasure to be the first to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, on an excellent maiden speech. His remarks showed the radicalism, clarity, forthrightness and also the humour for which he is well known. That may be because he comes from Lancashire. It may be that, because he used to be a geography teacher, he has had more success than some of us in finding his way quickly round this House. He brings to the House 30 valuable years of experience of local government, activism and community politics. On the strength of what he has said today, we look forward very much to his participation in future debates.
I also congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, on his foresight in initiating this debate, and I congratulate him on the title he has chosen for it. By drawing attention to the problems of maintaining law and order and to the complexity of the subject, I believe that he does us a great service. He makes it clear how difficult it is to maintain law and order in a democratic and pluralistic society where there is such a range of views, as no doubt we shall hear today, about what is proper behaviour and what is not, about what should be tolerated and what should be stamped on, and about what is the exuberance of youth and what is thuggish, yobbish behaviour.
I wish to draw attention to what we know of the success of various strategies for maintaining law and order and to ask the Minister how he sees the way forward.
I begin by reminding the House of something said by a distinguished colleague of the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, in government in the 1980s. It was said by the

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noble Lord, Lord Hurd—who is not in his place—when Home Secretary. Addressing the debate about law and order at the 1988 Conservative Party conference, he said:
"If we doubled the police, doubled the penalties, doubled the prisons until all three reached American levels we still might find ourselves with American levels of crime and violence much greater than our own".
He was making the point rather wisely and, perhaps in the environment he chose, rather courageously that the maintenance of law and order in any society does not come primarily from what does or does not happen to criminals. It comes from many other aspects of social life and social policy and from what is going on in society more generally: the strength of families; the level of child poverty; and the social and moral climate. All those areas were helpfully elucidated by the noble Baroness, Lady Young.
Not surprisingly, the noble Lord, Lord Hurd, was also making an interesting prophecy. Since 1988 we have put into practice some of the policies upon which he counselled caution. We have not doubled the number of people we lock up in prison but we have increased it from just under 49,000 in 1988 to more than 64,000 today. We have not doubled the police; the number was more or less the same in 1999 as it was in 1988. We have not doubled the penalties but we have certainly increased them.
The proportionate use of prison has increased substantially. In 1988, 20 per cent of men over 21 sentenced for indictable offences went to prison. Ten years later, 27 per cent were sent to prison. Of every 100 men over 21 being sentenced, seven more are now being locked up. We have nearly doubled the number of prisoners serving sentences of more than four years, from 10,000 in 1988 to over 18,000 in 1998.
What about the rate of recorded crime? In 1988 there were 3.6 million recorded crimes. In 1998–99 there were 5.1 million. These are crude measures needing more analysis, but they show that there can be no simple trade-off between a harsher penal system and a more peaceful society. Maintaining law and order is about much more than catching and punishing criminals, as the police know well. I look forward to hearing the noble Lord, Lord Mackenzie of Framwellgate, with his great experience of policing.
I have had the opportunity to travel and see at first hand the criminal justice system in many countries. I can say with confidence that we should be overwhelmingly grateful for the police we have in this country. They are unarmed, with an understanding that they are a service, not a force, and with an enormous commitment to maintaining peaceful communities through community policing. They work with social agencies and try whenever possible to prevent a crime before it happens rather than waiting until it has happened and picking up the pieces. It is no wonder that so many British police officers are working all over the world running training programmes in British-style policing. Policing and how communities are policed is one of the keys to a peaceful society.
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In 1990, the noble Lord, Lord Hurd, was no longer Home Secretary. A White Paper on crime policy was published in that year when the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, was Home Secretary. One phrase from that 1990 White Paper, Crime, Justice and Protecting the Public, became famous throughout the world. It is claimed that it stated:
"Prison is an expensive way of making bad people worse".
Just as Lord Acton did not say that power corrupts, as with many famous quotations, that is not quite what the White Paper said. The actual words are more guarded. Perhaps I may remind the House of those words:
"nobody now regards imprisonment in itself as an effective means of reform for most prisoners … Prison is a society which requires absolutely no sense of responsibility from prisoners. Normal social or working habits do not fit. The opportunity to learn from other criminals is pervasive. For most offenders, imprisonment has to be justified in terms of public protection, denunciation and retribution. Otherwise it can be an expensive way of making had people worse."
That wise passage from the White Paper of the noble Lord, Lord Waddington, has also been forgotten in what the Mail on Sunday last Sunday called,
"the competition between the Conservative and Labour parties over who can take the toughest line on law and order".
The Home Office is now predicting a much higher prison population, saying that by the year 2007 it will be between 70,400 and 80,300. What effect will that upsurge in locking up people have on crime? We do not have enough clear evidence to answer that question definitively. Some research put out by the Home Office in 1993 suggested that an increase in the prison population by 25 per cent might lead to a crime reduction of 1 per cent.
We also have the results of a study carried out in the United States by the Rand Corporation, a respected research body. The study shows how many crimes are prevented each year by certain kinds of policy. One million dollars spent on helping children to finish their school education prevents 258 crimes being committed. One million dollars spent on families experiencing difficulty bringing up their children prevents 160 crimes. One million dollars spent on prison prevents 60 crimes.
The same organisation conducted research on the relative advantages of dealing with illegal drugs. Its report is helpfully entitled, Mandatory Minimum Drug Sentences, throwing away the key or the taxpayers' money? The report concluded that spending 1 million dollars to expand the use of mandatory sentencing for drug offenders would reduce national drug consumption by 13 kilograms. Spending the same sum on treatment would reduce consumption by 100 kilograms.
Those surveys are perhaps not the whole story, but they make a point about what policies are worth pursuing to deal with problems of law and order. Can the Minister tell the House whether he has looked at the results of such research studies and whether he is sure that the great expansion of prison places planned by the Government will provide value for money, safety on the streets and satisfaction for victims?
4.18 p.m.
Lord Eden of Winton: My Lords, in his powerful speech opening this debate, my noble friend made reference to the rioting which took place in London on 1st May. I, too, want to start my speech with reference to those events.
I cannot claim to bring any particular knowledge or expertise to the debate. For that, I apologise to noble Lords. I do not make a habit of taking part in debates on this subject. However, I feel I am speaking as an ordinary member of the public; one who remains deeply troubled by the events that we witnessed on 1st May. I still have many questions to ask about that. How was it ever allowed to happen, particularly as it is well known that a large number of those who committed acts of violence on that day were already known to the police authorities? They were clearly bent on violence and hijacked other causes seeking to demonstrate in their own interest.
It appeared to me that the police made the judgment that if they acted with care and sensitivity, there would be the minimum of disturbance and trouble and that, on the whole, things would go comparatively quietly. As events showed, that was a misjudgment. But I do not blame the police for not knowing quite what to do. They must be deeply disillusioned. They have been held accountable on those occasions when there has been sustained violence, as happened in earlier rioting in the streets of London. It was the police who were then accused more than those who actually perpetrated the acts of violence. They are again in the dock of public opinion for not acting strongly or quickly enough to stop the violence on 1st May. So they are in a no-win situation.
I am not surprised that morale in the police force is low and that they are uncertain of the action they should take in the face of threats of violence of the kind witnessed. Let us be totally frank: what we saw was nothing new. It has happened many times before. It happens on the football terraces as much as in the streets. They are the same type of people who commit acts of wanton thuggery and violence.
The question in all our minds must be how we are to tackle this problem. First, we must support the police and the authorities in tackling all major disturbances and all minor breaches of the peace. We must support them in the action that they feel it necessary to take in dealing with any offences committed against people or property. It has been reported that crime in London is increasing, as the figures quoted indicate. Street crime rose by 36 per cent last year; that is, muggings, robbery, shop lifting, snatch and grab, damage to property, smashing of windows, and the growing use of knives and imitation guns.
Many of those acts of violence and robbery are opportunist; they are committed on impulse, probably for kicks, by young people below the age of 20 years, sometimes as young as 10. It is difficult for the police to deal with them and it is quite wrong for us to expect the police alone to deal with them.
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One of the first things we can do is to ensure that the urban environment is improved and enhanced, not just in the housing estates, but in shopping centres, Underground tunnels and bus shelter areas; in fact, any area to which the general public have access. There is far too much litter and graffiti around. I believe that by dealing with the problem of litter and graffiti we will improve the quality of the environment for people, and that in doing that we shall raise the threshold of expectancy of conduct and behaviour. We must start with something simple and small. That means we must have people on the ground to deal with it.
I do not know whether any other noble Lord has had the opportunity to visit the London Eye, but if they walk along where County Hall used to be, alongside the River Thames, they will find it to be a sordid area. It is an absolute disgrace. It ought not to be allowed to exist as it is. It is knee-deep in litter. Every five yards someone is selling sausages and the whole place smells of fried onions. It is an absolute abuse. I do not know which local authority is responsible for that area, but it should be thoroughly ashamed of itself. That situation should be tackled straightaway. We all know that if we leave a pile of litter in one place, before long other litter comes to join it. If we clean it regularly, it is kept clean permanently. So the quality of the environment is most important.
I am glad that my few faltering remarks will be followed by the much more informed comments of the noble Lord, Lord Warner. He has experience of youth offending teams, which are an admirable introduction into ways of dealing with the problems. I should like to know how they are progressing. What analysis has been made so far of the pilot schemes that have been in existence? I believe the reason they work so well is that they bring together the police, the probation services, social workers, and people involved in education and in health. They bring their collective experience and knowledge to bear when dealing with young offenders in order to ensure that they do not reoffend.
Anything that can be done to end the demarcation between the authorities will be good. Just as the environment needs to be improved in quality, so does the provision of education, again in the quality of the buildings, the toilet facilities and so forth. Parent support groups are developing under the youth offending teams, which must give enormous encouragement to the prospect that parents will acquire new skills and experience for dealing with their own children.
As always, it all comes down to resources. Resources are very necessary yet, as we heard from my noble friend Lord Tebbit, police numbers are falling. They are finding it hard to recruit new people to train for the police force. Good people are leaving the force because they are attracted by better pay and conditions in other employment. For example, recently in London the mortgage allowance for police was withdrawn and we now have the anomaly of two policemen working together, one being in receipt of

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the housing allowance and the other not. There is a difference of £5,000 a year to an individual, which means a great deal in terms of quality of life.
There are fewer police officers on the streets. That means that there are not enough of them even to answer emergency calls. They have to cope with skeleton staff. In the post-Macpherson atmosphere it is hardly surprising that morale is low. Therefore, there is an urgent need to reverse that trend; to change the pattern as rapidly as possible; to dedicate more resources to the police; to support them in their work and to encourage the constructive efforts that so many of them are prepared to make.
4.30 p.m.
Lord Warner: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for his kind remarks about youth offending teams. However, I confess that I rather like the smell of fried onions so that may mitigate what I am going to say. We have heard two very distinguished maiden speeches this afternoon. I particularly draw attention to the voice of reason, rational analysis and balance put forward by my noble friend Lord Brennan in a most impressive maiden speech which whetted my appetite for more.
We should be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, for giving us an opportunity to discuss this issue today. Apart from anything else, it provides an occasion to remind people of the generally undistinguished record of his party on law and order when it was in government for about half of the 36 years to which the noble Lord drew attention. I hope to say a few words about that. Before turning to that, I should declare an interest as chairman of the Youth Justice Board for England and Wales, probably to be dismissed by the noble Lord as part of the wet establishment which has done so much damage.
I had the interesting experience of entering the Home Office, that bastion of pink liberalism, on the day after the 1997 election, as the Home Secretary's senior policy adviser. It was rather like being a member of the Seventh Cavalry arriving in a John Wayne film. That is hardly surprising when one considers what the poor civil servants there had had to put up with. Crime doubled in the 1980s and early 1990s. The number of criminals brought to book fell by one-third. During those years one's chances of being burgled increased from one in 32 to one in 13. Violent criminals became three times more likely to get away with their crimes. Successful prosecutions for rape plummeted. I remind noble Lords that it was the Conservatives in office who voted against a total ban on handguns.
It is perhaps worth drawing the attention of noble Lords to the fact that during that period there was a strikingly large increase in unemployment. The number of children living in poverty during that period rose dramatically. I suggest that there is some cause and effect between some of these events. When I arrived at the Home Office in 1997 my sympathies were immediately with the civil servants because nobody likes to be associated with failure.
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The problem that they faced was a lack of consistency of action based on any coherent policy analysis during much of that time. Home Secretaries came and went, dabbled here and there, and left. I suggest that the only serious piece of analytical work was done by the noble Lord, Lord Hurd of Westwell, no doubt another member of this wet establishment. He understood that the criminal justice system had to be effective and, to borrow a phrase, you needed to be tough on the causes of crime as well as on crime itself.
In recent weeks we have seen the Conservative Party leadership revert to its default setting of knee-jerk populism aimed at raising public fear of crime. The noble Lord, Lord Brennan, drew attention to the factual position and public perceptions of crime. It is very worrying when people in leading positions drive up public anxiety about crime when in many cases there are no grounds for doing so. Indeed, it is quite interesting that the Conservative leader has effectively taken over the home affairs portfolio because his shadow Home Secretary, no mean populist herself, cannot plumb the depths he wishes to achieve. For example, I remind your Lordships that she was unwise to suggest in the aftermath of the Tony Martin case that the present law gave adequate protection to those who used reasonable force in defending themselves against burglars—probably an extremely career-limiting stance to take.
However, enough of dwelling on the past. I want to leave time to talk about the present and future. It is worth bearing in mind that recorded crime in England and Wales has fallen by about 7 per cent since 1977, although I recognise that in recent months there has been some upward movement in some crimes in some places. It is also worth bearing in mind that the domestic burglary rate of recorded crime is down by about 20 per cent in that period.
The Crime and Disorder Act 1998 has laid a strong foundation for a comprehensive and credible attack on crime. It set up local crime and disorder partnerships so that police, local councils and the community throughout the country can fight crime together. That moves the agenda away from assuming that fighting crime is just a matter for the police and, that emotive term, the thin blue line.
My conversations with many police officers at all levels suggest that they welcome this fundamental change of approach. The Act has provided new orders that target specific problems such as anti-social behaviour orders, drug testing and treatment orders and sex offender orders. In their different ways they provide protection for the public by enabling the courts to achieve a sharper focus in their responses to particular offences.
I wish briefly to remind noble Lords of that Act's provision for a radical overhaul of what was a failing youth justice system. In 1996, when the Audit Commission made its fully justified criticisms of that failing system, which was costing about £1 billion a year to the taxpayer, the current shadow Home Secretary, who was then in office, brushed aside its recommendations as a change which involved nothing new.

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This Government went much further than the Audit Commission recommendations. I am pleased to be able o tell the noble Lord, Lord Eden, that there are now 154 youth offending teams across England and Wales, working on a genuine multi-agency basis, with funding from all the participating agencies and, for the first time, with health and education interests fully involved in tackling youth crime. The failed system of repeat cautions is being replaced by a new final warning scheme that will enable everybody to tackle offending behaviour much earlier when young people begin to offend.
Good progress has been made in speeding up youth justice with persistent young offenders being dealt with within 100 days on average at the end of 1999 compared with 142 days in May 1997. The board chair is now using contracts to drive up standards and the use of constructive regimes in all the secure facilities for offenders under the age of 18.
The noble Baroness, Lady Young, rightly mentioned the problem of role models for many young male offenders. She is right, and that is why the board has been funding a large increase in the number of mentoring schemes so that there can be role models working with young offenders in order to move them back 10 a less anti-social approach to life. I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Elton, who is now president, I believe, of DIVERT, one of the many organisations that we have funded and which runs extremely good mentoring schemes.
These changes are based on analysis and support of the various agencies. They are going with the grain. They are buttressed also by changes that tackle the causes of crime; namely, in the New Deal, Sure Start programme, and a new approach to family policy. If the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, is having difficulty in understanding what is the Government's family policy, I commend to him a document called Supporting Families, a consultation paper that was published a year or two ago. That sets out very clearly the Government's approach.
Lord Tebbit: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord. I did not say that I was having difficulty in understanding the Government's policy on the family; I said that the Government will not define what is a family. That is a different matter. I do not see how you can have a policy for something that you cannot define.
Lord Warner: My Lords, if the noble Lord re-reads the document to which I referred, he will see—unless he is having great difficulty in understanding the Queen's English—that it does actually define what the family is and what the policies are in that respect. I commend the document to the noble Lord.
I believe that the Government have also made a good start on something to which I referred earlier; namely, the reduction of child poverty. This, and other measures, have helped some of the most deprived communities. We sometimes speak as though the problems of crime are unconnected with poverty and social deprivation, but research has shown that there
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are very strong links. We must do more to help people in those communities to fight crime. They are often the greatest victims of crime. It is also worth mentioning that the police are being properly supported with more money, new and more modern equipment, better training and greater diversity in their recruitment. The Home Secretary has already announced improvements in funding and an increase in numbers over the next two years.
As I near the end of my remarks, there are just a couple of issues that I believe are worth mentioning. They are sometimes dismissed as being slightly bureaucratic, but I think that they are very important in relation to the way that we tackle crime. In the past, there has been a huge mis-match in the organisational boundaries of the criminal justice agencies. These are being changed to help those agencies co-operate more effectively. The Probation Service will be undergoing major reforms that will improve public protection. Since 1997, I suggest that the emphasis has been on considered practical reform that enhances public protection through greater effectiveness and partnership, rather than relying on empty rhetoric.
Again, we have seen the Government responding to problems during the past few days in a thoughtful and focused way. The sentencing review launched by the Home Secretary and his willingness to use different approaches in responding to different types of offences suggests to me the kind of measured way forward that we need to take.
The central point that I should like to make in conclusion is that we are living through a period in which the approaches and procedures of the criminal justice system are being modernised and adapted so its to become more effective at catching and convicting criminals, improving crime prevention, tackling youth crime and re-balancing the system to take better account of the needs of victims and the harassment of people from ethnic minorities. I feel privileged to have been part of that process. I am far less pessimistic about the future than the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit.
4.42 p.m.
Lord Mackie of Benshie: My Lords, I should like to begin my remarks by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, for introducing this important debate, in which I shall mention several small matters. I greatly enjoyed the two maiden speeches. I dare say that both speakers will be able to learn how to make an impartial and non-controversial speech from the contribution just made by the noble Lord, Lord Warner. Of course, I particularly enjoyed the speech of my noble friend Lord Greaves. I have known him, and of him, for 30-odd years. I can tell noble Lords that I thought him the biggest blasted nuisance in the Liberal Party when he was a young Liberal. But it just shows what 30 years of responsible, public life in local government can do. Indeed, he has come into this House and, within a week, has turned into a totally civilised Member of whom we are all proud. That just shows the importance of environment for our young people.

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I should like to concentrate my remarks on the police. I come from a rural area in Angus, which is fairly peaceful. However, crime is on the increase, with vandalism, and so on, getting out of control. It is not what it used to be. If I think back more than 30 years ago, I can recall a certain Sergeant Kippen. He was the sergeant in charge of the police in Kirriemuir and had two constables under his command. He was a remarkable example of policing. He knew all the trouble-making families; indeed, he knew them and sympathised with their troubles in quite an amazing way. They, in turn, trusted and liked him.
The sergeant knew the people who were apt to take too much drink and make trouble; and he could handle them. At that time, I was the chairman of the annual dinner of the Kirriemuir and District Agricultural Society. This was a noble event at which a certain amount of good will was shown and during which a certain amount of alcohol was taken. At about 12.30 a.m. the sergeant would come into the hall of the Airlie Arms Hotel and stand at the door; he might even have a small dram. But as people went out he would say, "Goodnight Willie", or, "Charlie, if I were you I would take a taxi", and so on. That is policing as it ought to be.
Although the sergeant was an extremely clever man and a very good poet, among other things, he was, sadly, passed over for promotion because he was not conventional enough. Had he been promoted, he would have taken his knowledge of people and applied it in a different way. However, he left the force and went to work as a security officer for a bank in Glasgow. That was a great loss. This kind of thing is happening all over the country.
At present, we do not have any local bobbies in Angus. The police accommodation has been sold, and policing is run from the centre. We have many good policemen, but perhaps I may give noble Lords an example of the situation. The man who came to check my gun licence was a nice and able chap. However, he was checking all gun licences in the whole of the county and, therefore, did not know the whereabouts of most of the people. Indeed, he had to ask me where various people lived. That is the sort of thing that makes for extremely bad policing.
Moreover, in the town of Forfar, which is a small part of Angus, the policing is centrally run. The police move around in cars because, I suppose, there are not enough of them to enable them to go about on their feet. Nevertheless, if the same sort of trouble arises as seems to happen everywhere and you ring up the police, you are just as likely to get through to one of those appalling recorded messages, which I hate, which instruct you to press various buttons, according to the service you require. Certain kinds of blasphemy come to mind when the response after pressing button after button is, "We are busy just now, but hang on and we'll deal with you shortly"; they never do. That is at the root of a great deal of our troubles in the country. I cannot speak of the city, but we are having troubles in the countryside.
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We need more policemen. Of course they have to operate from a centre. However, if they were better organised and had more special constables living in the area—there are not enough of them at present—the police would gain a knowledge of the countryside and of the people in it. Such information must be the source of success as regards catching criminals. That is a most important point. As I say, we need more policemen because the number has gone down. People would be willing to pay; and I think that they should pay. I believe that the police force has suffered because of the amalgamation of the various police services. The police are apt to look on themselves as part of the police force as a whole, not as part of the local scene. They seem to think that the force is a sort of fifth estate, instead of something that serves the community. Although we have wonderful chief constables with excellent qualifications all over the country, they are part of the force; they have no local connection. In the old days chief constables were appointed who had local connections. That made a difference to the attitude of the police. I admire the police. I like our local chaps and I think that they do a good job. However, I do not think that the organisation is right. We need more of them and we need them to be allocated to districts where they know the people.
4.49 p.m.
The Lord Bishop of Bristol: My Lords, like other speakers, I too thank the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, for introducing the debate this afternoon. I am perhaps a little less grateful for his description of the Church of England. Is it anachronistic? Perhaps the robes that we are made to wear in the Chamber convey that impression. I was grateful for the use of the word "perceived", as the media report the Church of England according to perceptions.
I defend the right of women to be part of the whole life of the Church of God. I rejoice in the fact that for the past six years women have been ordained in the Church of England. The issue of homosexuals and their rights and place in our society is one with which most of the western world struggles at the present time. As a Church we are in the middle of a process of education and discernment. We cannot at the moment give a simple answer to this particular problem. If we are not given good media coverage, perhaps we have to be tolerant and wait to see what will happen in the future.
It is clear from the speeches we have already heard this afternoon that there are no simple answers to the problems that the noble Lord mentioned. Time and time again the important question has been posed: why are these crimes committed? It has been the accepted wisdom, not least on these Benches, that there is a connection between the committing of crime and deprivation. It has been the accepted wisdom that poverty and unemployment, and lives which contained little to hope for, gave people the motivation to steal and burgle as they wanted what others already had, and that as people became better off they were less likely to steal. As a former parish priest on a council estate in the West Midlands, I, along with many other

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members of the clergy, would say that, judging from our own observations and experience, that account of why some crimes occur is probably true.
However, recent sociological research published in the Home Office paper, Trends in crime Revisited 1999, suggests that we got it wrong and that property crime in particular is affected by opportunities to steal goods. Looser social controls on young men from the ages of 15 to 20 have resulted in an increase in property crime. The correlation between prosperity and theft makes interesting reading. Between 1995 and 1999, every 1 per cent increase in consumer expenditure led to a 2 per cent increase in theft and burglary. Likewise, a 1 per cent increase in the population of young men between 15 and 20 leads to a 1 per cent increase in theft and burglary. There was a decrease in property crime in the late 80s and early 90s which was, in part, due to the decline in the number of young men between 15 and 20. I am told that that is no longer the case and that there is now an increase in that kind of crime.
The challenge for law and order is to socialise our young people and, in particular, young men, given that much crime begins when they no longer feel bound by the norms of our society. The noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, was absolutely right to pinpoint issues relating to morals, to norms of society, and to the way in which legislation and the courts deal with these matters. Why has there been such a dramatic increase in crime between the mid-1950s and the present? Perhaps noble Lords need to go back to the 1960s and the Wolfenden report. That report engendered an interesting debate about law, order, morality and religion. Lord Devlin in his Maccabean lectures, The Enforcement of Morals, responded to by Professor Hare and subsequently by Basil Mitchell, argued the case as to what happens when you separate religion, morality and legislation. Let there be no mistake: in the middle to late 1960s the connection between legislation and religious understanding was certainly broken.
We are reaping the whirlwind of what at that time seemed right and proper; namely, that people should have rights and should exercise them as individuals. However, I regret to say that we forgot to talk about obligations and how we learn to live together in society. Therefore, there is no simple answer. The issues we are discussing today concern what is right and how, together, we perceive that, and how, together, we ensure that it comes into being. That is the responsibility of us all.
But perhaps we do not have to be quite so pessimistic. As a previous speaker said, initiatives are being undertaken which are aimed in part at socialising our young people. I refer to the work of the Social Exclusion Unit and to the New Deal. The noble Lord, Lord Warner, has already mentioned youth offending teams. Each of these measures in their own way helps to tackle the reasons that crimes are committed. I say optimistically that I believe they will achieve some success. We as a society need to know that those initiatives are being undertaken. That requires information to be made available. It also requires co-operation between the various agencies in our society.
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I was about to talk of defending the Churches, but that is being defensive. Rather I share with noble Lords some of the initiatives that are being undertaken at the present time. I apologise to the noble Lord, Lord Bassam of Brighton, that at Question Time on Monday I was not quite as clear as I should have been with regard to community chaplains and the Prison Service. Prison chaplains in Canada, and especially those working in the community, have been successful in cutting reoffending rates significantly. If we are to tackle law and order, that is something that we need to address.
In Gloucester, Cardiff and Bristol, plans are already in place—and are beginning to be implemented—to develop the concept of community chaplains. The aim is to bring together the combined efforts of prison chaplains and world faith visiting ministers together with Christian churches and other faith worship groups outside prison, voluntary organisations, the police and probation services. The aims are simple, although they will be difficult to achieve. They comprise, first, the provision of an effective ministry to ex-offenders. Prison chaplains know prisoners well. They have privileges in terms of getting to know well people the rest of us hardly dream of. The intention is that that expertise, combined with community experience, will enable us to provide an effective ministry to ex-offenders.
The second aim is to deal with the reintegration of offenders into society. We must be honest and acknowledge that, as a society, we are unforgiving. Someone makes a mistake, pays the price and carries that for the rest of his or her life. In the Solomon Islands in the middle of the Pacific, the law is quite clear; namely, someone who commits an offence goes to prison or pays a fine. But when a person has finished his or her prison sentence, they are welcomed back into the community with a feast. The feast does not celebrate the fact that the offence has been committed, but that the person concerned has paid his or her debt and is now part of the community once more. Reoffending rates there are minimal.
We, as a society, need to deal with the issues of reintegration of offenders into our society. Community chaplains aim to do that. It is about the creation of partnerships. We have heard already that this is vital where resources are limited—and that certainly will be the case. Lastly, it is an opportunity for the creative face of the prison to offer the local community an expectation that can build safer homes and streets. Both information about what is happening and co-operation in the activities that are here described are needed; that is, wide ecumenical co-operation.
On a smaller and more mundane level, we all know that there is a correlation between drugs and crime. The Bristol Churches' Council for Industry and Social Responsibility, an ecumenical body, has now created a drugs officer post. It is launching an initiative on substance misuse. It is quite well known that communities, left to themselves, will hardly ever change—they may not even be able to change —the situation in which they find themselves. The Council

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for Industry and Social Responsibility intends to provide guidance for parishes to enable their local communities to cope more easily, in a constructive way, with drug and alcohol problems. Here again, it is about partnership, trained volunteers, the sharing of information, and encouraging communities to believe that what they do can change situations.
The issue of law and order is about what we believe as individuals; how we are willing to work together to ensure that moral authority, the norms of society and legislation go together—and are consistently together; that we are willing to try to diminish the number of crimes committed, to help people back into society and to help them not to commit crimes in the first place. That requires information and wide co-operation among many people in our society.
I thank the noble Lord for raising this important issue. It is clear today that we know that it is not an easy issue, but it is one in which we are willing to be engaged.
5.2 p.m.
Baroness Carnegy of Lour: My Lords, in his quiet, knowledgeable way, the right reverend Prelate made a very thoughtful speech, which contrasts clearly with at least one of the other speeches we have heard. I was greatly helped by the maiden speech of the noble Lord, Lord Brennan. He summed up from his end of the microscope how he sees what noble Lords must do in this area. It was very helpful to hear him.
Most of the debate has centred around policies which are the responsibility of the Home Office. I want to say a word about what is happening in this country at the moment as a result of one area of our education and employment policies, and what the department should be looking at in particular if the growth in youth crime is, at any rate in part, to be stemmed.
We have to bear in mind all the time that, according to the Home Office statistics for 1998, 41 per cent of all offenders cautioned or sentenced for indictable offences were under 21 years old. Most significantly, those males most likely to commit crime were in the 18 to 20 year-old group, followed by those aged 15 to 17 and, thirdly, those between 12 and 14. Somewhat strangely, the females most likely to offend were those between 15 and 17, followed by those aged 18 to 20 and, thirdly, those between 12 and 14. We see young first offenders turning into second offenders, and then into repeat offenders—all this while still at school or within a short period of leaving school, and most while still living at home.
We recognise—it has been discussed in the debate—that the root causes are extremely complex and that the solutions not easy to find. Punishments that are a strong disincentive are undoubtedly important. When the noble Lord, Lord Warner, was able to get off his political soapbox and tell us about his professional involvement and the job he is doing for the Government at this time, we can see that there is much promise in what is being planned. I am very interested in the youth offender panels that are now coming into operation. I believe there is hope there.
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But what about education? It has long been known that a child's character and ability to cope with what comes in life is largely formed by the time he or she is five years old. How babies and toddlers and under-fives are handled by and relate to their parents makes a huge difference subsequently to how they get on at school and outside school. Every teacher knows this; every social worker knows this; and most parents know it. I believe that in their hearts most parents want very much to be able to find a solution, but the pressures and changes in modern ways of living seem to make it more and more difficult to see how one can succeed as a parent.
For increasingly puzzled parents, current government policies are in some ways very helpful. Getting mothers and, indeed, fathers, off benefit and into work is not only good for the economy—and the economy matters to everyone—but it means a more satisfying life for parents and probably a better income. The children benefit from all those things. Widespread nursery schooling for three year-olds as well as for four year-olds makes possible the advantages of part-time work for parents. If the nursery school is a good one, that can be helpful for the children.
But there is a downside, which is very much related to the debate. Children are being cared for less and less by their parents and more and more by others. At the same time, the opportunities to learn how to handle children for those parents who most need to—and who, in their hearts of hearts, probably most desire to—are being diminished.
It is still a great help to most parents to discuss issues with other parents and to watch and to learn from trained people how they can deal better with misbehaviour and encourage self-control in their children; to learn how they can encourage in their children consideration, generosity, the habit of doing things properly and the basics that bring life's chances to a child. The opportunity to develop such skills is being crowded out and must somehow be brought back.
I hope my noble friend Lord Tebbit will not think what I say next is a "pink" remark—I believe that he —may—but I should like to give a true example, based on experience. Some years ago I was chairman of the Scottish Community Education Council, and I declare an interest as an honorary fellow of that body. I gained experience then of the pre-school playgroup movement. The success of voluntary playgroups, not just in working with small children but in working with adults, with parents of small children, was notable. Those parents were trained to work with other mothers and sometimes fathers. Nursery schools involve parents, but not at all in the same way.
The last government introduced an excellent scheme to include playgroups in the list of pre-school choices that parents could exercise using the voucher scheme. The pre-school play groups flourished in that way. This Government saw fit to abandon the vouchers, and funded places for three and four-year olds in nursery schools so copiously that the playgroups lost out.

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The figures given by the Pre-School Alliance for England and Wales show that the numbers of parents involved in those groups have been decimated. In 1997, 700 pre-schools closed in England and Wales; in 1998, 800; and in 1999, 400. That figure would have been more but for a special grant from the Department for Education and Employment that saved 1,200 nurseries. This year, no less than 3,500 of the remaining 17,000 pre-schools have stated that they are under threat.
I understand, although I have no figures, that further education colleges are experiencing a fall in demand by parents for courses in how to bring up small children. They, too, have been crowded out.
Parents find it difficult to get to schools because of their involvement in work, and primary and secondary schools, particularly in areas with a higher percentage of lone parents, have increasing difficulty in persuading the parents to find time to come to the school to discuss their children's progress. It may be that the time of day that parents are invited to attend is awkward, and I do not know whether discussions are related purely to academic progress or whether they include general handling of children and their behaviour. However, I suspect that something could be done about that.
Surely, a critical part of the Government's strategy on youth crime should be encouraging parents to involve themselves more, not less, in the upbringing of their children and in developing their skills as parents. Surely, the playgroups should be brought back to life. Perhaps nursery school teachers should be given an added remit to help parents. Primary and secondary schools and further education establishments should work out new ways of accommodating parents' needs within their premises. Directions from the centre will not work.
It is good that more and more parents can enjoy life, but working parents are still parents, and it is parents above all who can enable their children to do well in life and keep out of trouble. I hope that the Department for Education and Employment, as well as the Home Office, are thinking about what they should be doing in this area.
5.13 p.m.
Baroness Byford: My Lords, statistics are often confusing, and I believe that they are sometimes gathered according to rules that the average person neither approves nor endorses.
For example, road accidents are counted only if someone has been killed or injured sufficiently badly to require hospital treatment. I know of several communities that cluster around rural crossroads, where "shunts" are a regular occurrence, and where residents will not walk for fear of vehicles mounting the pavement to avoid the traffic queuing to turn right. The locals complain to the parish council, which in turn complains to the police, and the police in turn commission a traffic census. The pundits at County Hall look at the result and conclude that because
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nobody has been killed there is no problem. The locals mutter and complain to the parish council, and the whole business starts all over again.
The Home Office publication of 18th January 2000 contains crime statistics relating to incidents recorded by the police.
A local householder returns from a shopping trip to find two youths in his garage, which contains some old cans of paint, two rusty bikes and three ancient electrical appliances. The youths run off with a metal toolbox containing a couple of damaged screwdrivers, a blunt chisel and an assortment of nails and hooks. The householder telephones the police, who turn up seeking descriptions of the offenders, and they record the incident. They have probably told the beat officers to look out for a couple of youngsters behaving suspiciously, and they may catch up with them a couple of miles away.
Another householder returns from market to find a couple of men in the barn across the farmyard from his house. He sets the dogs loose and the intruders run away across the field. An attempt has been made to remove the locking device from the new baler. It is perhaps four-thirty in the afternoon, and the farm is eight miles from the nearest police station, which only functions from nine to five. Even if the farmer were to ring the police, they would be most unlikely to have the time to travel out immediately, so he does not bother. The damaged lock costs £95 to replace, and he has an excess on his insurance of £ 100. The attempted theft is not recorded, but I hope that noble Lords will agree that of the two, it is probably the worst.
It is not only distance and isolation that affect crime statistics; there is a difference in criminal activity between crowded urban areas and scattered rural communities, as mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Mackie. How many of our roads in towns and cities are blocked overnight by a lorry load of fly-tipped concrete spoil or fifty or sixty foot Leylandii tops?
When this happens in a village, someone tells the clerk, who rings up the borough, which eventually sends a lorry. In the meantime, the villagers find another way of getting to work. It is an offence punishable by a fairly steep fine, but I doubt if many of the heaps of rubbish that we see every day abandoned across our gateways, in our lay-bys and on our verges, are recorded in crime statistics. Yet there is a strong feeling that one does not want to meet the kind of people who commit such obscenities, especially in a gateway at the dead of night. There is no doubt in my mind that the locals are intimidated by this simple kind of intrusion.
The Countryside Agency's report, The State of the Countryside 2000, makes a similar point. It states that some types of crime have increased at a greater rate in rural areas than elsewhere. For example, a higher proportion of burglaries result in entry to property and theft than in towns and cities. From 1991 to 1995, vehicle-related theft increased by 24 per cent in rural areas, compared with only 4 per cent in urban areas and 10 per cent in inner cities.

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These figures bother me because they are averages. There are parts of the countryside where vehicle theft has possibly increased less than in inner cities, but, equally, in some areas the increase is much greater than 24 per cent. In Leicestershire, police figures reveal that while rural areas cover some 84 per cent of the county recorded crime is only 14 per cent.
Noble Lords might ask why I am making a fuss about that. The problem is that, animal welfare legislation apart, crime tends to be defined as actions that damage or harm or outrage people, and it seems to have escaped everyone's notice that towns and cities contain more people than the countryside. The population density of Leicester is 4,087 people per hectare, while the density of the rest of the county is only 288 people per hectare. If the rural area covers 84 per cent of the county, at a density of one-fourteenth of the city, I would expect rural crime to be running at 27 per cent of the total. If, however, some rural crimes are not reported and some others are not recorded, I would expect the figure to be lower than 20 per cent.
As the county is Leicestershire, I would expect rural crime to be roughly as it is because the police have adopted a very positive attitude to their jobs in small towns and villages. They have 173 beats with one specialist officer per beat. The specialist gets to how his or her assignment and is backed up by strong management, regular high quality information and modern technology. Other parts of the countryside are not so well covered.
Other parts of the country are also more isolated than Leicestershire and the time it takes for police to respond to an urgent call for help takes correspondingly longer. I was in Lancashire last weekend and picked up the local newspaper to find a headline from a police inspector calling for,
"the people themselves to join rural crime fight".
She was referring to the work of Neighbourhood Watch and Rural Watch but on the same page was an article on a local farmer who has to cope every month with burnt-out cars, fly-tipping and the debris from drug abuse. He admits that he would not now tackle people he finds on his property for fear of abuse and personal violence. Although the noble Lord, Lord Warner, is not in his place, perhaps I may say that I do not agree with what he said earlier. Individual people have a real fear. That fear has not been talked up, as my example shows.
Last Saturday's Daily Telegraph carried a report on how farmers in Teesdale, County Durham, are turning to high-tech gadgets and security firms to beat the criminals. The NFU Mutual Insurance Company estimates that in 1998 theft cost the rural community £93 million, of which £73 million was for vehicle theft—more than 30,000 four-wheel drives and tractors. There was £14 million of farm machinery and equipment, and more than 100,000 livestock were taken.
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The Daily Telegraph report pointed out that over the past 50 years two out of three farms have disappeared and the agricultural workforce has fallen to one-tenth of its pre-war level. There is simply no longer a countryside populated by people who know one another and live and work in a small area. As other noble Lords have said, people do not know each other as they used to. They go out to work all day. They shop, play and socialise in the market towns and cities and may not know their neighbours as people used to in the past. To make matters worse, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, told us on Monday, three-quarters of married women work nowadays so they are not at home during the day either. My noble friend Lady Young spoke clearly and accurately about the importance of the role of the family. I should like to associate myself with her comments. The family is the fundamental building stone on which we start.
Last year the Wear and Tees Farmwatch was voted Britain's best scheme. Every member is equipped with a radio bought by a grant from the NFU Mutual, which paid up after the scheme proved it was saving on claims. The members patrol in two-crew teams for four or five hours at a time after dark, and some nights will have as many as 40 vehicles out. They work closely with the police who give them some of the registration numbers of suspect vehicles and sometimes share patrols. Grown men do not behave like that for no reason. It is fear and anger which cause them to take such action.
This debate is about the problem of maintaining law and order. Rural dwellers can be asked by the police to get involved in crime prevention and can be assisted in carrying out patrols on a regular basis. In the cities that would be regarded as a vigilante movement, but in the rural areas it has become the norm.
Another of the major problems of our society is that lawlessness, intimidation, aggression and selfishness are treated not as the way in which the minority of adults choose to behave but as the outcome of social factors. Some families are dysfunctional. Children are set a bad example. But our education system should surely restore the balance. Lessons in personal and social education, concentration on spiritual development and the broadening of the curriculum to include not only Christianity but the basic beliefs of all the world's major religions mean that children should not leave school unaware of the choices available to them.
I sincerely thank my noble friend Lord Tebbit for giving us the opportunity to discuss this important subject. There can be no doubt about the strength of feeling in the Chamber. I suspect that all noble Lords would agree that the answer starts in the home.
5.25 p.m.
Baroness Howells of St Davids: My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lords, Lord Brennan and Lord Greaves, on their speeches on law and order. I feel sure that the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, who initiated the debate, will allow me to present to your Lordships' House what I know about the connection between race and law and order.

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I shall try to speak about a troubling aspect of our system of justice that is too often ignored. I refer to the disproportionate numbers of black people in prison. It has taken less than a decade to turn the descendants of a hard working group of migrants in the 1950s and 1960s into fodder for the police, the courts and the prisons. The rush to imprison and criminalise innocent black people while allowing the real criminals to get away is a policy which hinders rather than advances the state of law and order in this country.
I am old enough—perhaps even wise enough—to understand that there are people who break the law from every racial grouping and that they should be stopped. But the number of black people in our prisons is out of all proportion to their numbers in the general population. In 1998, black people made up 11.8 per cent of the prison population compared with under 2 per cent of the general population. In other words, for every 100,000 persons in the general population there were 185 white persons in prison, 160 south Asians and 1,245 black people. Black women are particularly over-represented in prison—18 per cent of female prisoners are black.
If we agree that the most important aim is to increase the rule of law and order and decrease offending, we must examine what is causing the disproportionate representation of minorities in prison. We know that ethnic minorities are hugely over-represented among those with low incomes. Our poorest neighbourhoods continue to be run-down and shut off from the labour market. Three out of 10 households with a black or Indian head were in the poorest fifth of the income distribution in 1997. We know that minority children make up one-fifth of looked after children but only one-tenth of the under-18 population as a whole. There is a disturbing trend for local authorities to discharge young people from care early. The proportion leaving care at the age of 16 increased from 33 per cent in 1993 to 46 per cent in 1998. Nearly half of the young homeless people in London are black African, black Caribbean or come from other ethnic minority groups.
Around half of all young offenders have been in care or have had contact with the social services. In the 1950s and 1960s, black parents were accused of being too Victorian in the way they tried to bring up their children. It is not surprising that children who find themselves in care, then released alone into the world at the age of 16 with no permanent safe housing and no parental guidance, are the same children who go to prison. Although no more likely to be persistent truants, Afro-Caribbean pupils are five times more likely to be excluded from school than white pupils.
When we speak of law and order, perhaps I may remind the House that minorities are more likely to be the victims of crime in British society. Crime tends to be concentrated in poor areas. A recent Home Office report on social exclusion suggested that in England 40 per cent of all crime occurs in only 10 per cent of all areas. In 1995, blacks were more likely to be the victims of burglary, assault, vehicle theft and robbery than whites.
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Racial discrepancies in the criminal justice system contribute to the high percentage of minorities in prison. According to the Home Office's Section 95 report, black people received longer sentences than whites or Asians. For young prisoners, 89 per cent of black offenders were sentenced to over 12 months, whereas the figure for white offenders was only 75 per cent. The pattern of longer sentencing continues for adult offenders. Sixty-three per cent of black prisoners were sentenced to four years or over as compared with only 47 per cent of white prisoners.
Black people are four or five times more likely to be stopped and searched by the police. In nearly all police forces there was a lower use of cautioning for suspected black offenders than for both white and Asian offenders. The social mechanisms which cause minorities to be over-represented in prison are varied and complex. It would be foolish to believe that a response that puts too much emphasis on filling up our prisons will improve the state of law and order.
Many black people know at first hand the problems of maintaining law and order. It is a firm belief within the black community, and supported by statistics, that if you are black you are more likely to be a victim of crime. However, the police continue to stop and search on the basis of racist stereotypes and outdated assumptions, while the real criminals are going scot-free.
The Home Secretary has set in motion a series of initiatives to restore trust in police forces. One move is to make the forces more accountable for their actions. That is why the Race Relations (Amendment) Bill has been introduced. It will extend the Race Relations Act to operational policing. Furthermore, it will afford rights to ordinary citizens who experience racism and discrimination not only by the community but also by the police. This will mean that all of us—including the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit—will have a right not to be discriminated against by the police. Chief Constables, or in London, the Metropolitan Commissioner, will also be held liable for discriminatory acts committed by individual officers in their forces.
Despite the rhetoric of the previous Metropolitan Commissioner, the reality of policing for ethnic minorities has not changed since the death of Stephen Lawrence or the Macpherson report. Lessons have not yet been learned by ordinary police officers on the street. Perhaps I may take a little time to give noble Lords one example. A number of so-called "rotten apples" in the police force, aided and abetted by an unwitting, institutionally racist system, joined forces to violate the rights of a member of the black community. Before I set out the details, I should like to stress that these events occurred after the publication of the Macpherson report.
Mr Tomlinson was an estate agent. In May 1999 he was awarded six-figure damages against the Metropolitan Police after being hauled from his car and beaten up. Since then he has suffered another two incidents at the hands of Metropolitan Police officers. In the original incident, Mr Tomlinson was sitting in his sports car in a quiet residential street in Brixton,

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waiting to show a client around a house. Three plainclothes policemen suddenly threw open the door, pulled him to the ground and began to kick and punch him. He was handcuffed, taken to Streatham police station and accused of stealing his own car. When it was discovered that the car belonged to him, he was then charged with assaulting an officer. That case was dismissed in 1995.
His injuries resulted in two operations and, because of his impaired sight, he was unable to return to work. He developed a fear of police officers, whom he believed picked on him because he was black.
On 16th June 1999, Mr Tomlinson was stopped in Chiswick High Street and handcuffed. He was detained in Chiswick police station for several hours and then released without charge, without an apology and without even an explanation such as, "We made a mistake". On 29th June, Mr Tomlinson sustained a fracture of the right arm and an injury to his already damaged left eye. It began when he parked his Rover Montego car in a multi-storey car park in Brixton. He was with his mother, a reverend at the local Pentecostal church. He was ordered from the car, brought to the ground and handcuffed. His glasses were smashed. After being taken to Brixton police station, he was again released with no charge. He went to hospital for treatment to his face and arms. His facial injuries, received at the hands of police officers, required surgery.
Can we expect people like Mr Tomlinson, his friends, family and his peers, to seek protection from the police, let alone to consider building a career in the police force, if officers in the Met continue to do things like that? I think not.
Perhaps I may say a few words in response to recent statistics from the Met which suggest that street crime has increased because police officers are scared of using stop and search methods. They fear being labelled as racists. No one, whether black or white, has asked the police to stop doing their job. Speaking as a member of the black community, I do not wish to be blamed for a rise in crime. What every black person wants, as much as any white person, is what every taxpaying member of our community wants—a police force that is fair and equitable.
As he leaves this House tonight, I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, will bear in mind that if he were a black male, he would be five times more likely to be stopped and searched on his way home. My words may seem to be a terrible indictment of the police, but it must be borne in mind that what I have said is supported by empirical data. We have only to ask the police how many more times they have taken black people into custody than they have been able to bring charges against them.
Whether this racism is unwitting or otherwise, I ask that this House, in its wisdom, joins with me in the belief that what we need is a police service that is fully transparent and accountable. Furthermore, we need it now. There needs to be root and branch reform of the whole policing system. We need to pull or even drag a
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police force that is inequitable in composition into the 21st century so that it begins to use our culturally diverse and able citizens to assist in bringing back law and order.
The Government are doing well with leadership from the top. We need a commissioner of police who is passionate about law and order and who polices with his team and makes policing a crusade and not merely a means to early retirement on a comfortable pension. We must stop accepting policing on racist assumptions and give this society fair and equitable policing. I apologise to the House for speaking for slightly longer than my allotted time.
5.40 p.m.
Baroness Linklater of Butterstone: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, for calling attention to a subject which arouses great passions and conflicts of view, despite an undoubted shared desire on the part of all of us to see law and order in this country maintained and improved.
As the crime rate goes up and up, so the response by politicians and sentencers is on a parallel escalator of toughness and harshness with more, and longer, prison sentences to ever fuller prisons. If such a response actually worked as a means of improving law and order, the level of crime should come down. But all the available evidence indicates that it does not. Indeed, all the evidence suggests that imprisonment, as measured by reconviction rates, not only fails to deter but can itself contribute to further law-breaking and disorder.
Of course, crime is totally unacceptable in any form—it is frightening, destabilising and dangerous—and the maintenance of law and order is the cornerstone of a free, civil society. The use of imprisonment serves the dual function of keeping offenders off the streets for the duration and meets the requirements of the law and society of retribution. We know that imprisonment can also be constructive, and excellent practice and projects occur throughout the Prison Service—as I well know, having set up the Butler Trust 15 years ago which administers the Prison Service annual award scheme.
All that matters is that policies for improving law and order are effective. Their aim must be to reduce crime, help social inclusion, contribute to the greater long-term protection and safety of our citizens, and promote a law-abiding and ordered society where we all feel safe. That being so, I believe that we have to reverse some of our current policies—at the very least, in relation to young people, and above all children, because that is the area of greatest failure so far as custody is concerned. How we deal with them now will have a direct bearing on our society of tomorrow.
The simple facts are that we have over 11,000 young people in prison in England and Wales—a figure which has increased by two-thirds in the past five years. Most worryingly, the sharpest increases have been among the youngest offenders: the population of 15 to 17 year-old boys in custody, for example, has more than

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doubled since 1993 and the number of 15 to 17 year-old girls in custody increased five times between 1988 and 1998. Of the 29 member states of the Council of Europe, only Romania, Estonia and Lithuania have higher rates of imprisonment for under-21 year-olds. That is some record. While levels of both crime and its detection have gone up in this age group in recent years, I cannot believe that our young people generally are so significantly more criminal than those in the whole of the rest of Europe.
The reconviction rate within two years of young male offenders discharged in 1995 was 77 per cent—and the younger the age group, the higher the reconviction rate: for 14 to 16 year-olds, it is 88 per cent. Imprisonment for this age group is no deterrent by this crudest of measurements and is another example of the escalator at work and its failure to promote law and order. It also gives no indication of the further social dislocation created in already dislocated lives.
We know that the toughest, nastiest hoodlums are likely to have a significant degree of mental and physical problems; to have learning difficulties of some kind and/or to have experienced social exclusion; to have experienced abuse themselves; to have poor parent al relationships—if at all; and to be significantly involved in drugs or alcohol. None of those factors excuses any kind of law-breaking, but should help to explain some of it. Most importantly, addressing them and ensuring reparation for their victims would be a far more appropriate response to their offending.
I want in particular to draw your Lordships' attention to a developing aspect of imprisonment which I believe is shocking in the extreme. I refer to the detaining of 12 to 14 year-olds who are persistent offenders in what were called "secure training centres" when the first one, Medway, opened in 1998 and have now been renamed "detention training centres". Since we debated this issue in this House in March last year, not only has Medway continued in business, but two more centres have opened, each holding 40 children, and I am told that there are plans for more. I understand that Medway has modified its practices following the highly critical report of the Social Services Inspectorate, but these DTCs are run on prison lines—unlike the secure units run by local authorities, which have a therapeutic dimension and where the children's problems are addressed while they are contained.
As a member of the Children's Panel in Scotland, I know just how valuable and necessary secure accommodation is. Indeed, the report of the inspectorate found that Medway was actually strengthening the children's criminal behaviour, where poorly trained staff used excessive force against them. Since Rainsbrook STC opened in July 1999 and Hassockfield in September 1999, there have been 33 and 29 staff resignations respectively, five staff terminations from each, and what are called "performance penalty points" awarded against both, carrying financial penalties amounting to tens of thousands of pounds.
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This is an extremely difficult group of young offenders who have been convicted of an offence punishable by imprisonment for people over 21, and they clearly need custody. It does not take much imagination to realise that these are children with monumental problems when they are so much out of the control of themselves, their families and the law. But I find it extraordinary that in a so-called "civilised" country such as ours, our response should be so inappropriate. In Scotland, thank God, no such provision exists; nor should it England either.
It is as though the Government have chosen to forget that these are children they are dealing with; that they have chosen the tough, punitive route and elected to bypass the existing provision of local authority secure accommodation with its much more therapeutic approach, which I believe should, instead, have been greatly expanded. Furthermore, they have chosen an approach which costs upwards of £2,000 per week for each child. Although it is too early to assess reconviction rates, a Home Office paper published as early as 1992, Juveniles Sentenced for Serious Crimes, in which children in local secure units were compared with children in prison, concluded that the experience was better in every way, including significantly lower reconviction rates. In Northern Ireland, the Lisnevin Training Centre, which is a type of STC institution, had a reconviction rate of 100 per cent in 1995. Using the escalator model, that may not be too far off the DTC results in England today. That is a national disgrace and an unacceptable way to deal with the problem. My plea is that, in the name of justice, decency and humanity, the Government go home and think again about how they deal with the youngest offenders. Although they are offenders, they are still children whose detention in STCs should make us all feel thoroughly ashamed.
5.50 p.m.
Baroness Seccombe: My Lords, I listened with great interest to earlier speeches. I thank my noble friend Lord Tebbit for introducing this debate with his usual vigour and common sense. I wish to raise an issue that concerns me very much: the long-term future of the magistracy. I have just completed over 30 years as a magistrate, and it has been a huge privilege. Looking back and assessing the changes that have occurred over that period, I recall that when appointed I joined a Bench of 26, a size that was quite usual in those days. What was unusual, however, was our most enlightened and brilliant clerk who was respected throughout the profession and the community. At my first training session he told me that he wanted his magistrates to have wide experience of life and an understanding of people and to possess integrity, compassion, common sense and the ability to make decisions. I thought then, and I still think, that they were qualities that I should like to have and live up to. He also told me that I was not there to know and interpret the law; it was his job to advise the Bench on legal issues.
At that time two courts sat. twice a week and rarely failed to finish by lunchtime. I wore a hat in court, which I found rather difficult. I had worn a hat only at

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weddings. I believed that a hat was quite inappropriate. One day I plucked up courage and asked the chairman whether it would be possible to sit without a hat, to which he replied he had never understood why we wore hats anyway. As a consequence, none of us ever wore hats again.
Today, we have a Bench of 150 with six courts sitting all day five days a week and wide representation from across the community. The make-up of the Bench includes more women and members of ethnic minorities. The basic training that I received has developed tremendously, with everyone working to try to ensure that we achieve national standards of competence.
Another area in which startling progress has been made is consistency of sentencing. It is so important to avoid odd, one-off decisions. Here I pay tribute to the Magistrates' Association. The critical work that it has done in producing national sentencing guidelines has been of great assistance to Benches. Those guidelines are widely used. I was most grateful to have a starting point for discussion with colleagues in the retiring room. However, as a note of caution, I hope we do not reach a point where there is more and more paperwork, with everyone being appraised to such an extent that extra magistrates have to be appointed to fulfil the requirements and to man the courts. I am all in favour of training so that magistrates have the confidence to play a full part with the clerk in the running of the court.
There has been enormous change in a service which is a most important part of the judiciary. I was, therefore, more than happy to agree with the noble and learned Lord the Lord Chancellor when he said to me that he thought being a magistrate must be a very rewarding form of public service. One of the nicest things that happened to me while on the Bench was when, as a known political animal, I was elected chairman. On my Bench, politics were always left at home, quite rightly. I hope it is obvious that I am a devoted fan of the magistracy, and as a consequence I am concerned that it should continue to play a major role in future.
I understand the irritation of the Lord Chancellor when he read a newspaper article condemning him for his intention to "sweep away magistrates' courts". I am confident that no such idea is in his mind. He has said so and I believe him. But I have a nasty suspicion that some civil servants may be beavering away in the background so that, with a change of administration, or even (dare I say) Lord Chancellor, they will be ready to put forward a plan to an incoming holder of that high office. That is a personal view, but the cynic in me says that there may be those who want to see an end to the lay magistracy and the introduction of a wholly professional judiciary which would be under the control of the Civil Service. One could point to instances leading to that belief. My purpose today is to raise that as a possibility and to declare my wholehearted opposition to it.
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I conclude on an optimistic note. I am much heartened by the warm support of the Lord Chancellor and the Lord Chief Justice. The Lord Chancellor said:
"The Magistrates' Courts Service is based on a system which is close to the communities it serves, and which can respond to the special needs of the communities. I very much want the changes that my colleagues and I are taking forward to strengthen the magistracy—to help you to continue to deliver strong, effective local justice".
The noble and learned Lord, Lord Bingham, said:
"The existence of 30,000 citizens distributed around the country, all with a sound, practical understanding of what the law is and how it works is, I think, a democratic jewel beyond price".
I am proud to have had the privilege to contribute to something that I believe is very special. I hope that your Lordships support my view that the lay magistracy is very special.
5.56 p.m.
Lord Mackenzie of Framwellgate: My Lords, I am delighted to bring some balance to the debate by following a bevy of noble Baronesses. If that is a sexist remark, I plead guilty. Several speakers have already said, rightly, that the second most important task of any government is to maintain law and order. Law and order is the basis of any civilised society, and without it presumably one has anarchy. Throughout the history of this country there have been examples of anarchy when law and order has broken down.
I should like to touch on three components of law and order. Obviously, the front line is represented by the police. The Crown Prosecution Service is, quite rightly, independent of the police. We also have the court system and the sentences that they impose. In the United Kingdom we are proud to police by consent. A number of noble Lords have already referred to the value of the police service. As a former police officer, I thank those noble Lords who have paid tribute to the service. Policing is a difficult job. After 35 years in the police service I am aware of the difficulties faced by police officers. I have experienced both ups and downs.
I regret that the noble Baroness, Lady Howells of St Davids, is not in her place. I was disappointed by her description of one terrible case. She dealt with the matter with great passion, and I have no reason to disbelieve the facts. However, I took exception to her generalisation. She blamed the whole of the police service on the strength of one particular set of circumstances. I do not believe that that adds to the debate, in the sense that we seek remedies. If one of the remedies is to recruit more officers from ethnic minorities, it behoves all of us to encourage and not discourage that process, which the noble Baroness tended to do.
Morale in the police service is important. I had meant originally to thank the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, for this timely debate. It takes place in the House at the same time as the Police Federation conference in Brighton, where issues such as these are being discussed. It is an important subject which has excited newspaper articles and discussions generally, usually revolving around rural policing and the case of Tony Martin.

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Morale is important. I have been a police officer long enough to have been through crises before. I joined on the back of a Royal Commission in 1960 when there was a crisis in policing. The police service was given a boost in salary and we had quite a number of new recruits. Many of them are now coming up to the time when they retire, which is why there is a difficulty.
I remember that in 1978 the noble Lord, Lord Merlyn-Rees, was Home Secretary and there was a similar crisis. People could not afford to come into the police service. They were on assistance and had difficulty in making ends meet. What the noble Lord, Lord Merlyn-Rees, did was positive. He set up the Edmund-Davies Inquiry in 1979. Its report was implemented by the then new government of Mrs Thatcher, and the Edmund-Davies report was very enlightened. It set the salaries of police officers at the correct level, as it was then perceived. It also index-linked them to the average index of earnings. That seemed to me to be sensible because it took the police out of the industrial scene at the time of trouble and strife. As noble Lords know, police officers are not allowed by statute to strike. That is quite right because it is an important service. That crisis was put right by the injection of cash into the service.
We then went through halcyon days in policing, in my experience, where recruiting was good, quality was good and the police service has good quality people. We have heard criticism by the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, of senior managers and I share some of his concerns, particularly about the "management speak" that we hear. I used to be a DI, a detective inspector. Now we call them crime managers, for what reason I know riot. We read about the local crime manager and I despair. What is wrong with being a DI? I was proud to be a DI and spent most of my service in the CID, so I have done my share of talking to and dealing with the victims of criminals, sympathising with them and their families. Policemen have hearts. They care about the causes of crime, but they also care about the victims of crime. Because the police are generally first on the scene, they have to pick up the pieces. The police deal with the social consequences of crime in the communities. So policemen and policewomen see the results of crime. I suspect that no one would wish more to find a solution to crime than police officers throughout the land.
Morale is important and we need to consider why it is low. One reason is economics. It is difficult in a place like London to join the police service on £16,000 a year and expect to be able to house your family. I was talking to a soldier in one of the many bars in this House. He was thinking of leaving the armed services. He wanted to join the Metropolitan Police, but he had examined the prospect and could not afford to house his family. It is as simple as that. An exceptional recruit was lost to the police service because the allowances and salary are not sufficient.
What has gone wrong since Edmund-Davies? I shall tell your Lordships. We had a new Home Secretary, the right honourable Kenneth Clarke, who became Home Secretary in the mid-1990s. He set up the
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Sheehy inquiry which examined the responsibilities and remuneration of the police service. It was felt that the police were perhaps being too well rewarded. He had done a similar exercise in the education and health services. I am not speaking out of turn, I went to see Lord Whitelaw—God bless him!—about police problems. Sitting on the settee in his house in Cumbria, he told me that Kenneth Clarke had achieved the same objective in the health and education services. Whether he was being disloyal, I do not know, but he used to speak the truth, and I welcome anyone speaking the truth. It is good to hear it.
Sir Kenneth Clarke set up the Sheehy inquiry, which was opposed strongly by all the staff associations. Much of it was not implemented; it was flawed. He tried to look at the police force as a business, but it is not a business. You cannot measure performance in the way you can the production of widgets, motor cars or anything else. It is a great problem. We tend to measure activities that are easy to measure and judge performance by them instead of measuring activities that are more difficult. For example, we measure the speed or response time of a police officer at the scene of a crime if someone makes a 999 call. That is easy to measure. But we do not seem to measure the quality of the service once the police officer gets there. If a police officer arrives at the scene of a crime and spends quality time with the elderly widow who has been robbed or burgled, that is what good policing is about. It is spending time with victims. There is a great danger that we are making police officers respond to performance indicators. We must be careful before we push out more and more indicators if that does not produce the results we want. In sense, it is a 24-hour social service and we must bear that in mind. We need quality at the point of delivery as well as efficiency in terms of speed and so on.
Kenneth Clarke's Sheehy inquiry suggested that changes were needed. The last government, took away the housing allowance and that was disastrous. In 1994 they took it away for new recruits and at a stroke they created a two-tier police service. There were officers with relatively similar service going out to do a job—and this still happens—but being paid with a difference in salary or income of £5,000 or £6,000 in a place like London. That is difficult to justify: it causes divisions within the service and lowers morale. We need to address that as a matter of urgency. It cannot be right that people do the same job but receive such a different salary.
I am conscious of the time. I have only said a quarter of what I intended. I finish by pointing out that we are at risk of destroying the instincts of the good policeman. A good policeman senses when someone needs to be stopped. I cannot explain it, but I have seen good examples of it. When I was a young PC there was a police officer, PC Brown, at Hebburn on Tyneside. We had many police officers. I remember him standing in the office at two o'clock in the morning. He would close the occurrence book, jump on his bike—yes, he had a bike—cycle down the road and catch a burglar coming out of a shop almost instinctively. It was

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remarkable. He did not do it just once but regularly. I cannot explain it, but I have seen it happen on many occasions.
The difficulty is that if we introduce technology we tend to forget about our instincts. The policeman in a patrol car might be driving down the road and in the past he would sense that there was something wrong with a car. It might have a lower boot level than other cars and therefore had something in it that it should not. The policeman would stop it. Now, the police officer checks the car on the PNC, the police national computer, which comes back and tells him that it belongs to Joe Bloggs and is not stolen. I hope that the good PC does not accept what the PNC says and will still stop the car to check it; it might have been stolen but not yet reported as stolen. It might not be on the computer for whatever reason. We should not rely too much on technology but on the good judgment of good policemen.
Throughout the country, many good policemen are doing a very difficult job. The message from this House should be one of support for, and not denigration of, the police. Denigration will not help. Clearly it is right to denigrate police officers who fall below standard. We shall root out the racist police officers. But let us not tar them all with the same brush.
6.10 p.m.
Lord Bradshaw: My Lords, first, I declare an interest as vice-chairman of the Thames Valley Police Authority. What I say tonight will be drawn very much from that police authority.
Our aim is to have an adequately staffed force which is properly equipped and has high morale. Crime prevention needs to be given a higher profile. As several speakers have said, we need to have a more effective regime for dealing with first-time offenders, in particular young people.
I do not wish to enter any competition to build up recruitment targets. The simple fact is that we are not recruiting and retaining sufficient new policemen and women. Seven years ago in Thames Valley we had 3,763 officers. We now have 3,746. We have stayed almost still in seven years. The new recruits are four years younger than the average age seven years ago. The average age of 26 has gone down to 22. We are getting less experienced, less mature people. The soldier who was referred to is not coming forward to join the police force. Fifty-three per cent of the people come from outside our force area, so we are having to draw people in. For the most part, they are not local people. It is inevitable that once those people have been trained they will transfer away, so we have this "churning" going on.
We also need now to process twice as many applicants to secure one acceptable recruit. Over the next two years, in order to meet the targets set by the Home Office we need to gain 28 new officers every month. We are currently recruiting 18 officers a month and we are losing 15 through wastage. We have to face facts. With current trends we shall have fewer officers,
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not more. The possibility is that those will be of a lower standard, with all the implications that that brings. We know from the past that lowering standards brings big trouble as regards the kind of force we shall have in 10 or 15 years' time.
So what have we to do? First, one of the great problems is the perception of the police. The service is currently denigrated both as an institution and as a career. I was quite horrified by what the noble Baroness, Lady Howells, said. I am sure it will disturb many of us. I hope that Ministers will have taken careful note of that criticism and that something will be done about it. Having said that, I do not believe that it is general in the police force. No doubt there are dishonest, racist and lazy people in the police force as there are in all occupations, including some of those people who set themselves up in judgment over us—journalists perhaps and lawyers.
Ministers and other politicians must stress continually the value of having a first-class police force. Neither the police, nor for that matter nurses, school teachers or those caring for the elderly or the mentally ill, should be made scapegoats upon which shortcomings should be heaped by a society which often is too mean adequately to resource the services which it demands. A decent society requires subscriptions from the members of that society.
Remuneration is a serious problem throughout the south of England, the south-west, East Anglia and the London area, although not in other places. My noble friend Lady Harris of Richmond—she regrets that she is unable to be present today—tells me that North Yorkshire has a list of people wishing to join the police force. However, there is a serious problem wherever housing costs are high. It is no good simply addressing this problem in the metropolitan area. The proposed lead of £6,000 which has been offered to metropolitan officers would simply transfer the crisis to neighbouring police forces because people who work for Thames Valley in Slough or Windsor would transfer a few miles over the boundary to receive £6,000 more. That will not help.
There is a real problem of public sector workers and housing costs. In many areas I do not know how people who are coming to teach children or to work in hospitals will be able to marry, buy a house and bring up a family. They simply cannot afford housing.
The rank structure in the police force also disturbs me. It is extraordinarily flat. A large number of policemen retire as constables. That is not a bad thing. One wants that experience. But there comes a point where one's earnings do not increase. The prospects of promotion in much of the police force are not good. It takes until one is perhaps in the late 30s or early 40s to reach superintendent level. That is not characteristic of many professions. The police force is rather short of promotion possibilities.
Police authorities face serious financial problems. The rise in the total standard spending for policing in England last year was 2.9 per cent. That compares with 8.6 per cent for education and 5.6 per cent for social services. Police salaries are geared to average earnings

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not inflation rates, so police salaries are going up faster. Pension costs absorb 14 per cent of the police budget. That will rise soon to 20 per cent. That burden has to be lifted off police authorities. More and more money is going to pay the pensions of people who have retired; it is not delivering a police service.
We shall have a new public service radio communications project. We have to have a new system because the Government have sold off the existing police radio wavelengths—at some profit to government—but the police authorities have very little money for a new system on new wavelengths. We shall apparently receive the money for the system but it requires many peripherals. It is an intelligent system. A policeman can take a hand-held piece of equipment with which he can interrogate databases. He can take pictures of the scene of crime and transmit them back. But there is no money to buy any of those peripherals. It is no good sending out policemen who are ill-equipped.
We need to have decent call centres that people can ring up and receive satisfaction. That requires the Home Office and government to address the issue of having two call numbers: 999 if the burglar is at the door; and 555 if one wants advice. First, divide; and then do not measure how quickly one gets the person off the line to attend to the next call, although that is important if there is crime in action. But how satisfied are the callers with the response? Contrary to what was said, Thames Valley Police do measure the satisfaction of people by visits of policemen after burglaries, road accidents and 999 calls. We know well how satisfied—should I say dissatisfied?—the public are. But we do know it is wrong to say that we do not have any follow-up.
I believe that the police need more help from the Home Office than they receive in the use of technology to deal with many road traffic offences. Chief constables have robbed the traffic department of staff because they are under such pressure elsewhere. Technology exists to deal with many offences; for example, with regard to policing bus lanes. However, at the moment the Home Office says, "We'll have an experiment in London until the year 2003 and then we'll consider extending it somewhere else". One cannot work on those timescales. If it works, it can be extended. We do not need to wait for years and to test something almost to destruction.
I commend the work that we are carrying out on restorative justice. That involves a plan whereby, instead of receiving a police caution, first offenders are brought in and challenged very firmly about their behaviour. Usually, they are made not simply to apologise but to do something practical. I give as an example the case of someone who burnt down a hayrick and was then made to work on the farm for a long time. It did not pay for the hay, but it put into his head the notion that that kind of behaviour is absolutely unacceptable. Under this scheme, a person is not put in prison or a youth offender sector. Last year we received 5,000 referrals. The scheme has been tested to see what the rate of recidivism is, and early indications are that we shall see a very significant drop.
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I do not believe that we need a Royal Commission. We need to pay the police properly. We know what the matter is and we need more money to put it right. However, in conclusion—I raised this matter approximately three weeks ago in a debate on an Ustarred Question—I believe that we must consider putting in place an auxiliary police force of some kind in order to get more people on the beat as quickly as possible. We need retained men—specials on a different contract of service—who attend regular training every Wednesday night or whatever. They must be made more professional and be available to deal with the hot spots in towns at weekends. That is the way in which to achieve an active, uniformed policeman in almost every village. In Oxfordshire we have 300 retained firemen; 300 retained policemen would make a huge difference to the police presence and to the satisfaction of the public. There is much to do, and I look forward to the Minister's response.
6.22 p.m.
The Earl of Listowel: My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, for allowing us the opportunity to debate these grave matters this afternoon. I apologise to him and to the noble Lord, Lord Brennan, for having been unavoidably detained and having arrived after their speeches. I have visited the office of Hansard and have since read their speeches in print.
I put down my name to speak today because of my experience of working with young people on the edge of, or outside, society. I do not believe that noble Lords have mentioned attrition this afternoon. I am not very au fait with penal matters, but I understand that it is an important concept and an important factor. I believe that the drive of the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, was that people should be held accountable for their actions; that, when they harm others, criminals need to know that they have done so, and take the consequences. The public need to know that, when they are harmed, the perpetrator receives his just deserts.
The noble Baroness, Lady Young, gave a very clear and helpful analysis of the present state of our society. I very much share her concerns about what is going on. I hope that I do not sound pessimistic; I believe that I am realistic. I shall return to this at a later point.
I am sure that she has read it, but I shall again draw the noble Baroness's attention to the Government's document, Supporting Families. The original document was quite good at suggesting ways of reinforcing marriage; for example, by introducing a delay of months between the time that people say that they wish to be married and the fact of their being married. The Home Secretary was most positive. He said that we live in a modern society and have various ways of relating to one another, but that marriage is the bulwark of society. In the next report, following greater consultation with the public, that sentiment. was watered down—sadly, I believe.
Perhaps I stray from the main point, but I believe that, if we expect criminals to take responsibility for their actions, a fundamental issue is how we treat our

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children. I am not calling us criminals but I believe that we must take responsibility for the way in which we treat our children in terms of their behaviour towards us when they come of age.
I am aware that many people feel alarmed about proselytising about marriage, and understandably so. In some schools 50 per cent of the children come from single-parent families. It would not do at all to say to those children, "There is something wrong with you and your parentage". That would be absolutely unacceptable. Recently, I spoke to a headmistress of, I believe, an Anglican primary school near here. She pointed out that one can talk to children—even children from single-parent families—about the importance of marriage without making them feel bad about themselves. Teachers are trained to teach, and sensitive ways can be found to introduce that kind of idea.
I shall speak about my first experience of working approximately 12 years ago in an intermediate treatment centre—an institution which is half-way between a school and a prison. There was a young boy of about 10 or 11 years of age. He had blond hair and was very cute. He was the son of a traveller family. He used to hit us. They were not powerful blows but were stronger than taps. We tried to make sense of why he should hit us. We came to the conclusion that that was his way of expressing affection because he had difficulty in showing his feelings. He obviously came from a troubled background. A memory of him that stands out is a joke that he made against his mother: "What is the difference between my mother and a cream egg?" I shall not give the reply, but it was another indicator of the kind of troubled background from which he came. Since then, I have worked with many other young people who have come from troubled families.
I believe that the analysis of the state of society given by the noble Baroness, Lady Young, is very sound. Therefore, I believe that I am not pessimistic, but realistic, about the future. I am concerned that the number of young people, and people in general, who go to prison will increase. The Government seem to have made an allowance for that: they have allowed for 82,000 people in custody in two years' time. I believe that we must be realistic by admitting that we have made a mess of things and that more people will offend. We must tell the public that no matter how much we increase the police force and no matter how draconian we are, mixed-up young people will still commit crimes. That does not excuse the young people who commit crimes and it does not mean that we do not have to be tough on them. However, I believe that we shall move towards American levels of crime. Much can be done to mitigate that. The noble Lord, Lord Warner, very eloquently put forward several suggestions.
This Government have taken many positive steps in terms of the New Deal for getting young people into work. I refer also to Sure Start, the family tax credit, and the arrangements for the Youth Justice Board. They are to be applauded for that. I have spoken to the
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noble Lord, Lord Warner, about this before. The Government may not recognise the gravity of the problem they face and they may end up disappointing people and leading us to take the American view which is, even in fairly liberal households, that some people fail in life and that is just too bad. We do not yet have that view in Britain but there is a danger of that.
I ask the noble Lord, Lord Warner, perhaps to be a bit more modest before the great challenges which he faces. I hope he will forgive me for saying that. I see that he is not in his place at the moment.
I am concerned also that the noble Lord, Lord Warner, has not had experience of working with young people. I hope that he will forgive me if I am harsh on him this afternoon. I believe that he has a great responsibility to young people on the edges of society. I know that he is a very intelligent and talented man; that he has been a head of social services; and that he is a fast-track civil servant. But I have discussed this matter with him and he has had no actual hands-on experience of working with troubled children from troubled families. I believe that he should consider remedying that lack.
This morning I was speaking to a researcher of the care leaving project of the Prince of Wales Trust. He gave a very eloquent presentation with all the facts and figures. I spoke to him afterwards and I asked him about the importance of hands-on experience. He said, "One must have all the facts. One must also have the hands-on experience". That goes with what the noble Lord, Lord Mackenzie of Framwellgate said. A policeman operates from his instincts as well as from his information. The Prince of Wales is raising that same subject this evening. He is asking us to balance scientific research with instinctive wisdom. Instinctive wisdom can come only from experience and in this case, that means working with troubled young people.
The noble Baroness, Lady Pitkeathley, is responsible for organising volunteering to a very large degree. Perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Warner, would consider talking to her about some sort of easy and relevant experience for himself. I hope that he will not feel that I am being presumptuous by making such a suggestion.
I listened with great interest to the words of the noble Baroness, Lady Howells of St Davids. It is awful that there seems to be that personal vendetta against that particular man by the police. I have worked with young black people. I remember an incident when taking some young black people from the White City estate to Hyde Park with a senior black youth worker. When we had the rendezvous at the minibus, two plain clothes policemen came up and accused the young black boys of "feeling up the cars", of trying car doors. The result was that the young boys resisted giving their names. The black youth worker encouraged them in that. I could see that from the policemen's point of view, they were doing their job and trying to protect the public. From the point of view of the young black youths and the black youth worker, the policemen were a sort of army of occupation. There was such

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resentment there. That is a terribly difficult issue to resolve. I am glad that that is not too much part of my responsibility.
I conclude by saying that if we are to be wise in our treatment of children who are likely to be attracted to crime, we need to know at least one such child personally in order to gain experience of such a situation. We need to spend some time regularly with that child over several months. I give an example of a possible opportunity to do that. There is a primary school near here. It is on an estate with a large number of single parents and a large ethnic population. I am sure that it could do with someone to help the children's reading for 10 minutes per week. Surely that would not be an impractical way of gaining experience in that area.
6.35 p.m.
Lord Elton: My Lords, I am most grateful to my noble friend Lord Tebbit for introducing a really difficult and fascinating debate in which I shall try to marshal the enormous number of thoughts which have already been provoked in my mind.
I am grateful also to the noble Lord, Lord Warner, for his kind mention of the DIVERT Trust, of which I am the founding president. I hope he does not think that that exonerates him from any further mention. He made a highly political speech and I have no intention of making one myself.
I should just say this, to restore the balance, that we have all contributed to the present situation. I can best illustrate that by saying that within four days of being appointed Minister for Prisons, I had to answer a full-dress Wednesday debate in your Lordships' House on the future of the Prison Service. In that research, in that very sharp learning curve, I discovered that during the years which separated that debate, which was in 1982, from the end of the previous century, not one single brick had been put upon any other brick in any male secure adult accommodation since before the end of Queen Victoria's reign. If I remember correctly, the prison population had either trebled or quadrupled in the period. All parties had been in office during that time and none of us can wash our hands of it.
I ant sorry that the noble Lord, Lord Warner, did not come in earlier because he might have interrupted me but now he will have to content himself with clicking his tongue when he reads Hansard.
My noble friend Lord Tebbit was very keen that we should have an effective criminal justice system from start to finish; that is, from the police, through the courts, the Prison Service, the Probation Service and the Parole Board. I entirely support him in every respect. I was very impressed by his analysis of the causes which are now contributing to the increase in crime.
In particular, I endorse his belief that we need an effective police force, and we have had two eminent policemen contributing very practical advice in that respect. But it must also be fair. I dare say that the idea of zero tolerance, about which my noble friend so warmly enthused, will seem more attractive to him,
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and even slightly more attractive to me, than it does to the unfortunate Mr Tomlinson, of whom the noble Baroness, Lady Howells, spoke so movingly and in such detail.
She made very serious charges. I join the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, in hoping that the Minister will do something about that matter. I believe that it calls for an inquiry and, since the reputation of the police is at stake and since we should not generalise from the particular but should be confident that the conclusion is just, I think it should be a judicial inquiry. If there is to be zero tolerance towards bad behaviour, it must concentrate not only on the public but also on the police and, indeed, as my noble friend kindly prompts me, zero tolerance of bad police behaviour. That is precisely what I am saying.
The noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, spoke on one issue which, although she is not here, I cannot forbear to mention; that is, the institution of training centres, against which my noble friend Lord Carr of Hadley and I divided the House, successfully in the first instance. Those institutions were subsequently set up. I very much hope to hear from the Minister that those institutions have changed in their nature and the regimes within them have changed from what was originally established. The idea of concentrating ne'er-do-well children—and children they are—l00 miles or more away from home and any possible continuity of support seems bad under any regime.
I fear that the balance of this debate is perhaps wrong. We are concentrating on deterrence. I am not sure that deterrence is effective, as many of my noble friends and others believe it to be. After all, when a gamekeeper pins up a magpie on the barn door, he finds that dead magpies do not stop live magpies stealing eggs. I am afraid that the same is true of criminals if they think they are not going to be the next magpie. What are the chances of being the next magpie?
In 1986, the Audit Commission published a seminal report called Misspent Youth from which I quoted at length in another debate and from which I must make a selective quotation now. The report calculates, convincingly, that 28 million offences are committed every year at a cost to taxpayers and victims of £16,000 million. One quarter of the offenders were under 18 and accounted for around 7 million offences in that year. Under one-fifth of those offences were even recorded by the police and a bare 5 per cent cleared up. So, the magpie has a 95 per cent chance of getting away with it. Then, the magpie that is caught very often gets away with it too. Only a microscopic 3.1 per cent of crimes committed resulted in any attempt at corrective action. That attempt often failed. While 1.8 per cent led to a caution, only 1.3 per cent ended up in court. Not all those resulted in convictions and not all convictions were pursued.
It is clear that the majority of the tiny proportion who go into custody as a result of trial re-offend at an astonishingly high rate; much higher than 50 per cent, nearer 88 per cent. This necessary exercise in deterring crime and trying to protect the public is enormously

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expensive and ineffective. Merely identifying a single young offender costs the police around £1,200. A successful prosecution costs a further £2,000 after that. Your Lordships have heard from other lips than mine the enormous cost of keeping those people in prison.
It seems to me that prevention has to be better than cure. Prevention is not achieved by nailing the magpie to the barn door. It has to be achieved by addressing the problem. We have a government whose one endearing feature, I thought, when they came into power was being tough not only on crime but on the causes of crime. I should like to see a bit more of that.
I was very glad to read in Hansard on 15th May that the On Track crime reduction programme is due to start in 24 areas almost immediately. The objective is to set pilot schemes dealing with children. I cannot find a reference to the ages but I think that it is between five and 11. That makes sense to me. Our experience at DIVERT is that the threshold of criminal behaviour is becoming younger. I have always thought that the predetermining conditions were almost at birth, depending on the condition of the family and the extent of love within that family. That bears on what has already been said about the availability of good role models.
One can try to supply what is missing, as the DIVERT Trust does. One can try to provide a good male role model, where it is missing, in the form of a mentor, but one needs a society which supports one. The right reverend Prelate, in a speech of which I only heard two-thirds as I had to leave the Chamber to attend a meeting, identified the decade of the sixties as the point at which there was a divergence between public convention and morality on the one hand and tolerance and public behaviour on the other.
The time has come to stand up and be counted. We make these intellectual points in our debates. We quote statistics in the security of this Chamber and we have intellectual arguments over the dinner table. They rely on the sort of statistics I have been quoting. But the fruits we are reaping now are the fruits of a society which has lost its direction.
My noble friend rightly said—he gazes anxiously at the clock but I have two minutes left—that one of the pillars of maintaining an orderly society is social convention. The other is an established morality. How often do you hear people rooting for social convention and standing firm on public morality? Occasionally there is a great public event, such as that in which my noble friend Lady Young tends to become involved, and it is a debate in this House. But it seems to me that more and more we need ordinary people like the rest of us to make clear in conversation that decent behaviour is what is expected of people; that outrageous behaviour is outrageous and that cruelty is something we will not tolerate, even at personal risk.
We need to teach society again the lesson it has forgotten and without which it will not survive, which is taught by Our Lord. I make no apology for the fact that I am a Christian. If more people said that they might then be forced to go on and say why. The
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essential duty of every member of society is not to look after himself but to look after everybody else. If we did that, these problems would diminish with great rapidity. That would make the difficult job of the Government a little easier.
Having sat in that place opposite that Dispatch Box facing this sort of question, I have great sympathy with the Minister. It is not easy. I do not expect to be greatly satisfied by what he does. If I am not, I shall return to the attack, as I am sure will my noble friend.
6.47 p.m.
Lord Dholakia: My Lords, from this side of the House I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Brennan, on the clarity of his contribution. Perhaps I may also say how delighted I was to see my noble friend Lord Greaves making his maiden speech today. He and I grew up together as young Liberals and never in the past 40 years changed our opinion of that political party.
I start by saying to the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, that I hope he will accept that I have hands-on experience of the subject on which I speak. The reason for that is simple. I have served as a magistrate, on a board of visitors of a prison, and on a police authority. At times I have contributed to a parole system review and at present, as chair of NACRO, we look after those discharged from prison. I have, therefore, considerably wide experience.
Events of the past few weeks have clearly demonstrated why law and order is so high on the public agenda. The violent demonstrations that desecrated the Cenotaph and the statue of Winston Churchill are a clear reminder that there are still elements in society who are increasingly lawless. But we also know that the nature and extent of crime varies from place to place and generation to generation. It is therefore appropriate that I start with a quotation from Sir Winston Churchill. As Home Secretary, during a speech to the House of Commons on the prison vote on 28th July 1910, he said:
"The mood and temper of the public in regard to the treatment of crime and criminals is one of the most unfailing tests of the civilisation of any country".
That is my starting point. Crime is something with which all society must come to terms in its own way. Over the years there has been much debate about the underlying causes of crime and a good deal of research into the efficacy of various responses. Today's debate is no exception. It is however important to bear in mind that most research has tended to refute rather than confirm hypotheses about the causes of crime and the effectiveness of punishment and treatments. It is as true now as it has always been that the public and political mood continues to be conditioned more by gut feeling and media hype than by considered analytical research.
Unlike the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, I welcome the changes that have taken place in policing our diverse society. Let me put on record my thanks to Judge Macpherson for his report on the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence. The Home Secretary of the day,

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Michael Howard, turned down a request from the Commission for Racial Equality to set up an independent investigation. It took the courage of Jack Straw to put that matter right. Without that thorough investigation, we would never have discovered the incompetent way in which the murder inquiry was carried out. More importantly, it identified the extent of racism in our society. The noble Baroness, Lady Howells, clearly demonstrated how that affects our communities. The noble Lord, Lord Mackenzie, said that that was only one example. Perhaps he and I could sit down together and, if he has the time, I can give him other examples.
We, as a society, failed to arrest racism, of which Stephen Lawrence was a victim. Let me say also to the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, that more than half of those in minority groups are born in this country. They are as British as anybody else and we do not need a cricket test to prove that. Of course, I shall have to read his speech carefully in relation to our diverse society; but let me say this. I have been a product of the British Empire, having been born in Africa and lived in India, and during that time I have never come across an integrated Englishman.
But let me go further. Like the glorious 12th, which is the start of the shooting season, we now start with the Police Federation conference. It seems to be a focal point of political and public response to law and order. But we must bear in mind that it is a trade union for the police and they will clamour for more resources and more power. Nobody disputes that. As Mandy Rice-Davies said, "They would, wouldn't they?".
Popular tabloids have had a field day. The political pronouncement of this week is a case in point. Even before the ink is dry on the Government's response to the Macpherson report, we have the Conservative Party clamouring for the reform of the double jeopardy rule. Of course we know that the Law Commission is examining that issue and it will be wise to await its deliberations. Why is it that we are so impatient on such fundamental issues of law? Political point-scoring is not helpful at all.
Are we being increasingly lawless? All crime indicators point in that direction. There is too much reliance on prison as a way of dealing with offenders. The Government and the Opposition are now competing to identify with the slogan that "prisons work", and I need not take noble Lords through the argument put to the Minister on Monday. But the noble Lord, Lord Allen of Abbeydale, was absolutely right when he said that there will always be prisoners who, on leaving prison, will return to society embittered against authority or perhaps having learned from fellow prisoners new ways of committing crime, or who may have become drug addicts during their time inside, all of whom are likely to re-offend. Is not that how prison works in a rather unattractive way?
It is profoundly depressing that so much of the public and political debate about law and order is currently based on the wholly unfounded assumption that the most effective way of reducing crime would be
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to increase the degree of harshness towards offenders. That punitive approach all too often simply produces more hardened and embittered offenders who are rather more than likely to re-offend. The overwhelming weight of worldwide research evidence shows that the most hopeful answers lie in a three-pronged approach to crime. First, effective measures to prevent crime; secondly, effective sentencing practice which learns the lessons of research into what works; and, thirdly, determined effort to rehabilitate and resettle offenders who go to prison.
If we look first at preventing crime, physical methods of crime prevention involving better locks, bolts and security devices have an important role to play and have undoubtedly helped to reduce the number of recorded burglaries and car crimes. But even more important in the long run are social measures to prevent crime. For example, support for families under stress can help to reduce the chances of the children of those families becoming delinquent. Research in the United States—the noble Baroness, Lady Stern, quoted some figures—demonstrates that programmes which help parents to develop confidence and parenting skills can improve parenting, reduce child abuse and neglect, improve school achievement and reduce delinquency. It has been estimated that for every one dollar invested in such programmes, six dollars are saved as a result of reduced demands on the benefits system and the criminal justice process.
The research shows that high quality pre-school education for disadvantaged children, which involves their parents in their education, can cut crime when those children grow older. A long-term evaluation of the Perry pre-school programme in a disadvantaged area of Michigan found that children who had taken part were more likely to complete their schooling, more likely to find a job, more likely to own their own home, less likely, in the case of girls, to become pregnant as a teenager, less likely to get involved with drugs and less likely to be arrested. By the age of 20, 7 per cent of the programme participants had been arrested five or more times, compared with 35 per cent of similar children who did not participate. And I can give many more similar figures.
There is powerful evidence that well-structured activity programmes for at risk young people in disadvantaged high crime areas can make an important contribution to reduce youth crime. I am grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, for giving us his experience in such matters. Earlier this year, NACRO, which I chair, produced a report called Making a Difference, summarising research on a wide range of such projects which helped to reduce youth crime in their areas by amounts ranging from 30 to 75 per cent. For example, one NACRO youth activity project in Bolton led in one year of operation to a drop in youth-related crime of 30 per cent. A similar NACRO project in Southwark produced a 39 per cent decrease in criminal damage and a 62 per cent decrease in motor vehicle crime in the heat area where most of the young people lived.
Once again, there is striking evidence of cost effectiveness. An evaluation carried out by Coopers and Lybrand for the Prince's Trust in 1994 looked at

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five youth work schemes for young offenders and young people at risk of offending. The average annual cost of working with a young person in those programmes ranged between £165 and £440—less than the cost of keeping a young person in custody for one week. The total saving from preventing a crime committed by a young person was conservatively estimated at £2,400. Because the young people on those projects were at risk of becoming prolific offenders, it was estimated that on average the projects would be cost effective if they prevented just one in 50 of the participants from offending.
We need effective sentencing based on the lessons of research into what works. A growing body of evidence shows that some types of work with offenders can reduce offending by between 10 and 50 per cent more than other types. They include a range of highly focused programmes which confront offending behaviour; teach offenders to restrain aggressive and impulsive behaviour; make offenders aware of the impact of their crimes on victims; tackle the alcohol and drug problems; and provide skills training and employment. The research indicates that those programmes produce better results when carried out in the community than in custody.
Much of that evidence is available in a number of reports produced at NACRO. I want to look more fundamentally at how we resettle and rehabilitate prisoners. Here again, the evidence from the research is clear. It shows that unemployed ex-prisoners are twice as likely to re-offend as those who obtain and keep a job; that homeless ex-prisoners are two-and-a-half times more likely to reoffend than similar ex-prisoners in stable accommodation; and so forth.
Arrangements to resettle short-term prisoners are particularly deficient, and the Minister perhaps should look at this. Prisoners sentenced to under 12 months constitute over 50,000 of the 80,000 people sentenced to imprisonment each year. But they receive much less help than longer-term prisoners who are compulsorily supervised by the Probation Service on release. What can we do effectively to put that right? Far more needs to be done to support composite counselling in assisting the victims of crime.
I am coming to the end of my contribution. Perhaps I may give noble Lords some late news. Just before I began to speak a note was thrust into my hands which says that I may like to know that not police have fired teargas in Copenhagen to disperse fighting Arsenal and Galatasaray fans. That happened today. Therefore, there is also a need for us to bang the drum for involving young persons in their own society, difficult as that is when communities are under such strain. Unless and until every young citizen feels that he or she is part of society and takes their own stake in it, we will only be sticking plaster on the body politic. It is no good talking about low morale. I have worked in every organisation, be it policing or whatever, but I have never come across an organisation where morale has been high except in the case of the committee room at the Romsey by-election. That teaches us never to have a knee-jerk reaction to policies of this nature.
7 p.m.
Lord Cope of Berkeley: My Lords, this has been a reflective debate on the very long-standing problems of law and order. It was a debate improved by two excellent maiden speeches. I congratulate both the new Members of your Lordships' House on their speeches. The noble Lord, Lord Brennan, made an impressive speech drawing on both his experience and expertise as an advocate over many years, to our great advantage. The noble Lord, Lord Greaves, also brought his own experience to the debate, and in a small way that of his father, as well as a touch of humour.
I do not believe that my noble friend Lord Tebbit has ever before been thanked by so many people from such a diverse spectrum of politics for introducing the debate this afternoon. He began with a typically powerful and thoughtful speech, with plenty of his usual colourful language to emphasise his points. He emphasised particularly the length of time over which the problems of law and order, or crime and disorder, as I believe we should really call it, have been building up, to the frustration not only of our citizens but of all governments over the period. He also introduced the theme, taken up by others, that the foundations of law and order rest not only on the police, the courts, the prisons and so forth but also on the other pillars, as he described them, of morality and social pressures on society. Other speakers emphasised that as the debate continued. My noble friend Lady Young spoke of family life and the noble Baroness, Lady Stern, gave us some figures from research. My noble friend Lord Elton, among others, emphasised our duty to others.
Successive governments have attempted to deal with these problems and all kinds of things have been tried. But as regards the Home Office side of matters, it was my right honourable friend Michael Howard, as Home Secretary, and my right honourable friend John Major, as Prime Minister, who achieved the first improvements in the total crime figures for many decades.
I do not pretend for a moment that the problem was solved but there was some improvement. I make that point in particular because the noble Lord, Lord Warner, began his speech with examples of the political use of statistics, against which the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, had warned us. The fact is that when the noble Lord, Lord Warner, entered the Home Office in 1997, as he described, we were towards the end of six consecutive annual falls in the rates of crime. The noble Lord, Lord Warner, told us that that created consternation among Home Office civil servants and caused him to have sympathy for them. Perhaps that tells us something about the attitudes that my noble friend Lord Tebbit described.
Once the noble Lord, Lord Warner, got off his political soapbox, as my noble friend Lady Carnegy expressed it, he spoke about the youth justice board and other initiatives. I am certain that we all wish him and his colleagues well in what they are trying to do. There is nothing more important in this field than youth justice and tackling the problems of youth crime. I hope that the noble Lord will take note of

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some of the remarks of the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, because I believe he missed his speech. The noble Earl made some important points.
The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Bristol gave us an extremely interesting speech. He defended the Church of England against earlier remarks. Although he said it in a very different style and with a different approach, a lot of what he said seemed similar to some of the things said by my noble friend Lord Tebbit. He also told us of important initiatives in the Church and in his diocese in particular. That was also an extremely important contribution.
There is no doubt that throughout this debate the issue of morals and the norms of society were revealed as being extremely important and must, as the right reverend Prelate said, go together with legislation.
That brings us to the question of race, which was touched on throughout the debate. No one who listened to the speech of the noble Baroness, Lady Howells of St Davids, could imagine that there is no racial element to these problems. Her examples and statistics as regards offenders, those in the criminal justice system and also the victims of crime among the black community were extremely important. Reference to the Macpherson report reminded me of a fact also referred to in some other speeches—that it not only seemed to emphasise racism but inefficiency. The problems arising from lack of supervision, follow-up, ineptitude and general incompetence revealed in that report were extremely worrying apart from the racial aspects. Sir William Macpherson thought that these inefficiencies and the ineptitude could only be explained by racial attitudes. It worried me that there was more to it than that.
Another theme of the debate has been strong support for the police. That was no more strongly expressed than by the noble Lord, Lord Mackenzie of Framwellgate, drawing on his experience. He referred briefly to what seemed to me to be a hint of a golden age with PC Brown, I believe it was—I nearly said PC Dixon. There was an important message in what he said. He encapsulated one of the problems to which my noble friend Lord Tebbit drew attention. He told us that the job he did as a detective inspector was now being done by crime managers, which is an extraordinary choice of phrase to describe such a function.
We were brought close to the day-to-day problems of the police by the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, speaking from his experience as vice-chairman of the Thames Valley police authority. Among other things, he spoke about police pensions and the problem of financing them. I fully recognise that that is a difficult problem, but I hope that the Minister will refer to it in his response. The noble Lord also raised the question of the special constabulary, which was discussed a few days ago, and the possibility of retained policemen.
However, it is clearer than ever from this debate that noble Lords do not believe that the police, or the courts and the prisons, should bear all the burdens of dealing with crime. But they should have all possible support in what they do. At present, it is extremely
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difficult to follow what the Home Secretary thinks will happen to police numbers as a result of the Crime Fighting Fund, because the story seems to have changed from time to time. If it is successful, it seems likely that all it will do is stem the fall in the number of policemen, rather than lead to a significant increase.
But we are not only concerned about numbers; we are also concerned about morale. Anyone who doubts this has only to read the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Mackenzie, and that made this morning by the Chairman of the Police Federation at the conference, which I was able to attend briefly before coming to your Lordships' House for this debate.
I turn now to prisons. What worries me is that the prison population continues to rise much faster than expenditure on prisons. One of the results of that has been a series of adverse reports by the inspector. I hope that the Government's only action in that respect will not be to change the way that Her Majesty's Inspector of Prisons works. That seems to be at least a possibility judging by recent press reports.
The Government are also releasing some prisoners early from prison, with the aid of electronic tagging. However, many of the prisoners released in that way have re-offended and some serious crimes have been committed. I do not know whether new thought will be given to this policy during the course of the sentencing review which we are told will take place. The latest proposal is that prisoners should be imprisoned only from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. That does not seem to be a good idea because, generally speaking, the working hours of criminals are not nine to five; indeed, they tend to be during the evenings. So this proposed scheme will deprive those concerned of the ability to earn a living, support their families and go straight, as it were, while not depriving them of the ability to continue with a life of crime.
Several references were rightly made to the importance of trying to make prison and detention constructive, as well as keeping criminals out of society for the duration of their sentences. That is also important. As I said, we have had a wide-ranging and thought-provoking debate. I hope that our comments will be widely considered and referred to so that we can follow up some of the points expressed. I should add that our debate was improved by the two excellent maiden speeches that we heard.
7.13 p.m.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Home Office (Lord Bassam of Brighton): My Lords, I, too, greatly enjoyed this afternoon's debate and discussions. I have waited a long time to have a disagreement with the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, and this debate has given me an opportunity, at least in part, to pursue that disagreement with him. Like many other speakers, I also enjoyed the contributions made in the two maiden speeches of my noble friend Lord Brennan and the noble Lord, Lord Greaves.
My noble friend Lord Brennan was absolutely right to try to focus our attention on ensuring that we had a debate that was, as he put it, well informed, with good

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information, and with reliable data and facts—not, I suppose, fiction. His other point was echoed several times during the debate; namely, the important issue of racism. He said that racism was a cancer in our society. I have been heartened by many of the comments made in your Lordships' House and most impressed, as ever, by the comments of my noble friend Lady Howells in her very strong and powerful contribution.
I should also like to pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, for his maiden speech. I observed and listened with interest to what he said. However, after listening to some of his colleagues, I am not sure whether he is a reformed radical or a radical reformer. Whichever it is, I thought that the noble Lord spoke with the good sense of a local grass-roots activist—something that I can certainly identify with most strongly. Indeed, I believe that that has very much been the noble Lord's trademark in Liberalism—or now, perhaps, Liberal democracy. I thought that the contributions of both maiden speakers bode well for the future. I look forward to hearing much more from both my noble friend and the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, in our debates.
As I indicated at the beginning of my remarks, I have enjoyed waiting for the opportunity to disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit. The greatest source of my disagreement with him is his analysis of where he feels that we, as a government, are going wrong; and perhaps his general attack on the liberal establishment. In summary, the noble Lord's attack seemed to me to suggest that the police are suffering from over-zealous political correctness; that we are living in a society that seems to tolerate crime, whatever happens; that the judiciary are in some way weak; that the establishment is full of soft "pinko" liberals; and, worse, that the Home Secretary is now the victim of the virus of extreme liberalism. I do not believe that my right honourable friend Jack Straw, the Home Secretary—and my boss—would see any of that in his persona, but no doubt the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, takes an entirely different view.
The noble Lord also seemed to conclude that in the lifetime of modern politics—after all, he stretched back to what he said may not have been a golden age—the only real Home Secretary we have had was Michael Howard. I must say that that seemed to me to be a rather chilling view. Michael Howard was the last of a long line of distinguished Conservative Home Secretaries. The noble Lord spoke about the distinguished record of the previous government. However, we should not forget the simple fact that that term of office stretched to 18 years. My noble friend Lord Warner reminded us of some of the statistics of that government which were, perhaps, less than distinguished.
Indeed, crime doubled in the 1980s and early 1990s and, during that time, the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, was a leading government Minister and a member of the Cabinet. The number of criminals brought to book fell by one-third and the crime rate increased faster than in any other major western country. The chance of being a victim of burglary under that government
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increased from one in 32 to one in 13. The representatives of that government voted against a total ban on handguns, and violent criminals became three times more likely to get away with their crimes. The number of recorded rapes ending in conviction or caution fell from 37 per cent in 1980 to 11 per cent in 1996. The number of robberies ending in conviction or caution fell from one in four in 1980 to one in 10 in 1996. More than 500 serious criminals were released from prison in August 1996 and the chance of being a victim of violent crime trebled.
During those 18 years, the total cost of crime rose to £16 billion. The cost of house and car insurance rose by almost 90 per cent between 1984 and 1994. The average delay for getting persistent young offenders from arrest to sentence rose to four and a half months, and the number of young offenders cautioned or found guilty fell by more than one-third between 1984 and 1994. Of course, famously in 1992, the Conservative government broke their manifesto promise to provide an extra thousand police officers within a year. That is a fairly serious indictment.
This afternoon's debate has been about the problems of maintaining law and order. All governments are infected with this particular problem; indeed, we all have to deal with it. Noble Lords who made the point that maintaining law and order must be a second priority after maintaining the defence of the realm were absolutely correct to make that point.
The debate ranged far and wide and noble Lords made telling contributions. Although I disagreed with some of the remarks of the noble Baroness, Lady Young, she was right to focus on the importance of family life, however one defines it. Clearly, family life provides a bedrock for all of us in our early and formative years. It informs the way we think and it certainly shapes how we are. Both parents, or a single parent, as the case may be, have an important influence on the way their children view the world. That was certainly the case as regards my childhood and my generation. The noble Baroness dwelt perhaps over long on the notion of the collapse of society. That is an interesting point. Not everyone agrees with that notion. For example, the noble Baroness, Lady Thatcher, did not appear to think that society existed at all. Therefore, I am not quite sure that she would recognise the collapse of society in the context in which it was mentioned. Nevertheless, family values are important in our society. The Government strongly believe that they must be supported. Our policies and programmes seek to achieve that.
The Government were elected on a coherent law and order programme which touches on a whole range of services. When we came to office, the services which relate to the criminal justice system—the courts, the prisons, the Probation Service and the police—were not connected. We decided to establish a coherent programme to bring all those services together to enable us to bring pressure to bear to reduce crime in our society. To that end, we enacted the Crime and Disorder Act 1998. I believe that it has laid firm foundations for our attack on crime and disorder.

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The Act set in place a framework to deliver local solutions to local problems. It set up successful crime and disorder partnerships through which police, local authorities and other agencies can identify and tackle problems together in the coherent manner that I mentioned earlier. It encouraged inter-agency working, a partnership approach and the involvement of the community through those partnerships. The Government have strongly supported those partnerships. Through the partnerships, three-year crime reduction strategies have been developed which reflect local needs and priorities; for example, by focusing on crimes which are a particular local problem, or by emphasising the special needs of rural areas—something which many noble Lords have mentioned this evening. The noble Baroness, Lady Byford, gave a clear and analytical exposition of some of the problems in Leicestershire where she lives. We need to focus on the problems of rural crime. The Government certainly do not underestimate those problems.
In addition, the Government's crime reduction strategy—this has a bearing on both rural and urban areas—has set ambitious targets; for example, to cut vehicle crime by over 30 per cent over five years. The Government are keen to see crime reduced, not merely contained. We refuse to be cynical, as it were, about crime. We want to tackle it. That is part of our programme and the way in which vie see ourselves working.
The Crime and Disorder Act also introduced antisocial behaviour orders. I know that there has been some cynicism about the effect of those orders. However, there are now some 45 in place. I believe that they have led to a rethink on the part of crime partnerships at local government level and within the police service as regards the way in which they approach anti-social behaviour in their localities. The orders have enabled us to focus more on those kinds of problems.
The Government are spending over £150 million on CCTV schemes in England and Wales. That is the biggest ever CCTV investment programme. We are investing £60 million on projects to prevent burglary as part of our crime reduction initiatives. We shall concentrate that resource in about 2 million homes in high-crime areas. We seek especially to strengthen the homes of low-income pensioners.
At the same time, there is an urgent need to restore public faith in the criminal justice system. Therefore, the Government have embarked on an important phase of reform: speeding up the court process; improving the prosecution system; and ensuring that offenders are properly punished. We have also undertaken the most radical overhaul of our youth justice system in decades. I cannot speak on that subject with the authority of the noble Lord, Lord Warner, who, based on his long experience in local and central government, understands precisely the issues and problems that are involved.
Youth offending teams have been set up to bring together all the local agencies dealing with young offenders in order to nip offending behaviour in the
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bud. I believe that the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, believed that that element was missing. It is an important element of what we are trying to achieve. A system of final warnings and new options to help the courts to reduce crime, such as parenting orders, has been introduced. I claim some small responsibility for that. We believe that parenting orders will have a profound impact on the relationship between parents and offenders, making parents take some responsibility for the offending behaviour of their children.
All of these measures appear to be working extremely well. The latest published figures show that recorded crime in England and Wales has fallen by about 7 per cent since the general election. Having listened to the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, earlier, one would think that crime was increasing inexorably and that somehow the Government had given up on it. That has never been the case. Even more impressive have been the reductions in domestic burglary, down by 20 per cent, and car theft, down by 17 per cent. No one can afford to give up on these issues. We certainly cannot afford to be complacent. But even at a time of a small increase in the general level of recorded crime, the Government are committed to ensuring that we attack those problems.
I do not think that there can be any doubt about the Government's commitment to supporting the police. Much criticism has been levelled at the police, not just in your Lordships' House. I echo the support voiced for the police by many noble Lords this evening. The Government have tried to ensure that we have a recruitment strategy that works. We turn our face against the numbers game. We do not believe that it is appropriate to become involved in that. Nevertheless we are committed to expanding the number of police officers over the next two years. The noble Lord, Lord Cope, referred to numbers. We think that we have now adopted the correct position in this respect. I refer to the recruitment of 5,000 officers that we pledged in September of last year. We are now rolling forward that programme of recruitment. We shall offer the police service the opportunity to recruit 3,000 of those 5,000 additional police officers within the current financial year. However, we believe that it is right that chief officers remain responsible for their overall budgets. They are, after all, best placed to assess local priorities and to allocate and manage their resources.
Other measures will also help the police to work more efficiently and waste less time on bureaucracy. Here I pick up a point that I believe the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, raised. We are putting more resources into the Public Safety Radio Communications Project to provide more reliable, better quality and secure communications. We are also expanding the DNA database. All of these measures are part of our commitment to modernise and improve the way in which the police service works.
We want to end the phenomenon of "revolving door" justice which sees offenders returning to the courts again and again. The Criminal Justice and Court Services Bill, which is currently before another

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place, significantly tightens up the enforcement of community sentences and ensures that the Probation Service acts as a law enforcement agency. We believe that to be entirely correct.
A number of noble Lords asked questions about the Prison Service. I do not believe that I can this evening respond to all of the points that were made in that respect. The noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, made some important points, which we support in the main. We need to ensure that we have purposeful regimes within our prisons, and we need to ensure that those regimes produce people who are not worse for being through the prison system. For that reason, we are focusing on the world of work; on improving the quality and range of education opportunities (on Monday I informed the noble Lord, Lord Elton, that we were increasing teaching hours by some 200,000 across the entire prison estate); on offering more and better training in our industrial and agricultural prisons; and on ensuring that people have access to the kinds of courses that will enable them, when they come out of prison, to lead a better, straighter life and to find work, rather than to return to a world of crime.
So far as concerns the Prison Service, another important part of our programme is to ensure that the evil of drugs within the prison system is tackled. I remind your Lordships that I said on Monday that the mandatory drug testing programme, which just two years ago revealed that 24 per cent of prisoners tested had drugs, has now found that we have reduced that to 14 per cent. That is a very impressive statistic. It shows how much the determined CARATS programme and the programmes of rehabilitation and support are now beginning to achieve within the prison estate.
Many noble Lords raised issues relating to public order. Much has been made of the problems of public disorder which the police have had to face. The noble Lord, Lord Eden, was very critical on this point, and the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, also took issue on the subject. Public disorder is not new to this Government's time in office; it has been with us for many decades. I do not need to remind your Lordships' House of the kinds of problems faced by the previous Conservative government. There were riots in many of our major cities—in Toxteth, in Birmingham, in Brixton, in Handsworth and in parts of Haringey—and there were the poll tax riots. Throughout and during those occasions, it was absolutely right that when we were in opposition we provided the kind of support that the police quite properly deserved.
The Government congratulate the police on meeting the challenges of the kinds of organised chaos which protestors tried to impose on 18th June and 30th November last year and again on May Day this year. We deprecate the actions of the organised hooligans and the way in which they abuse our public statues and disfigure public life. It is clear that the police deserve our full support for learning from past incidents—they clearly have—in the way in which they contained the problems on 1st May and in dealing effectively with the serious damage and
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violence which spread through our streets on that occasion. The police worked well; they deserve our support. They will carry on deserving our support and we must give it most fully.
It is surprising to hear in your Lordships' House criticisms of the police for being, on the one hand, too heavy-handed and, on the other, for being too slow to take action in respect of minor misdemeanours. Noble Lords will know that the police have always had an element of discretion in regard to the way in which they enforce the law. It is right and proper that they should, and that they can rely on that operational independence. They must rightly be given the opportunity to make the difficult judgments that have to be made by both commanders and individual officers as to how best to deal with situations of public disorder. We should fully recognise that and support the police efforts to get it right. I know that they are committed to ensuring that they do get it absolutely right.
Lord Elton: My Lords, would this be an appropriate time to ask the Minister whether he has taken on board the concern of many noble Lords that something further should be done about the case of Mr Tomlinson.
Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for reminding me of the case of Mr Tomlinson. I shall certainly study Hansard very carefully. I was impressed that the noble Lord raised that issue in reflection of what the noble Baroness, Lady Howells, had said earlier. Yes, I shall ensure that we look at that case urgently; it deserves to be looked at more closely.
I said earlier that I had a profound disagreement with the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit. It relates to the Stephen Lawrence inquiry report. That report will be seen in future years as very much a watershed. Critics on the right of our political culture see it as being something which has undermined, or acted to undermine, the police in the very difficult job they do. I take an entirely different view, as does the Home Secretary. We see it as a watershed in the sense that it will have a profound impact on improving police and community relations, and, in particular, police relations with black and ethnic minority communities.
The noble Lord, Lord Cope, said that, in part, the Macpherson report commented on the sheer inefficiency of the police in dealing with that particular tragedy, that horrible murder. Far from having had an adverse effect on police morale in the context of dealing with street crime, it has enabled us to take time and take stock of police and community relations, and the whole relationship with ethnic minority communities.
As a government, we have been right to put in place training and measures which ensure that we have a police force which properly reflects the composition of what is now a multi-ethnic and diverse community. Over the months in which I have been a Home Office Minister, I have been impressed by the way in which the police service has begun to respond very fully to the

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implications of the Macpherson report. I pay tribute to it for that. I do not believe that over time the report will undermine its work; I think that it will help it. It will encourage policing by consensus, something on which many Members of your Lordships' House have laid particular emphasis and stress.
The Home Secretary has taken a very keen interest. He has made this very much a test of the way in which we modernise our police service. He has established a ministerial priority for all police forces to increase trust and confidence among minority ethnic communities, and he has set targets to ensure that the police service properly reflects the composition of our communities.
Many noble Lords focused on crime and crime reduction. We are making a significant investment in that sector and we believe that, over time, it will pay off. Crime statistics published in January show that, while crime rose nationally, it is not all gloom and doom. Those forces which are putting in place policing plans and tackling the important issues—such as burglary and non-domestic burglary—in a focused way are continuing to show falls in recorded crime. We think that that is the right way to proceed. Making sure that the criminal justice system works in a focused, purposeful and cohesive way will bring longterm benefits.
Yes, there are problems. The noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, ably described some of the difficulties which police forces—particularly in the Home Counties—are facing in terms of recruitment. The announcement that the Home Secretary made today, again reinforcing the need to bring in more police officers and better training, and increasing the ability of chief constables to recruit, will make a long-term difference.
The noble Lord is right to remind us of the issue of police pensions. It is a matter that we are urgently reviewing.
I have spent many minutes on my feet. It is right that I should conclude by thanking all Members of your Lordships' House who have made important contributions to this long—and perhaps long-awaited—debate on crime, crime reduction and the problems of law enforcement. The noble Baroness, Lady Young, made the point that there are no quick fixes to the problems of crime and disorder. Crime increased significantly under the previous government; we have set our sights on reducing crime. We have put
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in place a number of important changes to the legal framework and reforms of the criminal justice system in order to tackle crime more effectively and to restore public confidence. We have fully supported the police in their efforts to fight crime and disorder on our streets, and we will continue to do so.
I thank the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, for introducing this debate, and I thank again your Lordships for making it so interesting. It has ensured that we focus on this most important of all public issues.
7.40 p.m.
Lord Tebbit: My Lords, the debate was remarkably short of political partisanship; that is, until the Minister read his departmental political rant. However, I am grateful to him for his presence throughout the debate, although I am disappointed that he has not answered my question as to whether the burglars in the Martin case in Norfolk have yet been charged.
Lord Bassam of Brighton: My Lords, I apologise for not having given a response. I am quite happy to provide the noble Lord with that reply.
The two burglars were charged with conspiracy to burgle. One burglar was sentenced to three years' imprisonment and the other, who did not enter the building, was sentenced to two and a half years' imprisonment.
Other noble Lords have also asked questions to which I have not responded, but I undertake to reply in writing.
Lord Tebbit: My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister. We have listened to two maiden speeches, both of which I shall certainly remember. I shall also long remember the Liberal homily on racism, which ended with the statement "I have never met an integrated Englishman."
I was most encouraged by the general concern expressed by noble Lords on all sides about the weakness in the moral and social pillars of our defences against crime and disorder. We should build on that consensus. I beg leave to withdraw the Motion for Papers.
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.
House adjourned at nineteen minutes before eight o'clock.

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